Priscilla's Spies. George A. Birmingham
the age of fifteen she rebels more effectively, whenever the coming of holidays affords opportunity.
Being a young woman of energy, determination and skill in rebellion, she made an assault upon her Aunt Juliet’s authority on the very first morning of her summer holidays. She began at breakfast time.
“Father,” she said, “I may go to meet Cousin Frank at the train, mayn’t I?”
“Certainly,” said Sir Lucius.
It was right that some one should meet Frank Mannix on his arrival. Sir Lucius did not want to do so himself. A youth of seventeen is a troublesome guest, difficult to deal with. He is neither man enough to associate on quite equal terms with grown men nor boy enough to be turned loose to play according to his own devices. Sir Lucius did not look forward to the task of entertaining his nephew. He was pleased that Priscilla should take some part, even a small part, of the business off his hands.
Priscilla glanced triumphantly at her aunt.
“There is no possible objection,” said Miss Lentaigne, “to your meeting your cousin at the train, but if you are to do so you cannot spend the morning in your boat.”
Priscilla thought she could.
“I’m only going as far as Delginish to bathe,” she said. “I’ll be back in lots of time.”
“Be sure you are,” said Sir Lucius.
“After being out in the boat,” said Miss Lentaigne, “you will be both dirty and untidy, certainly not fit to meet your cousin at the train.”
Priscilla, who had a good deal of experience of boats, knew that her aunt’s fears were well founded. But she had not yet reached the age at which a girl thinks it desirable to be clean, tidy and well dressed when she goes to meet a strange cousin. She treated Miss Lentaigne’s opposition as beneath contempt.
“I must bathe,” she said, “It’s the first day of the hols.”
“Holidays,” said Miss Lentaigne.
“Sylvia Courtney,” said Priscilla, “who won the prize for English literature at school calls them ‘hols.’ ”
“That,” said Sir Lucius, “settles it. The authority of any one who wins a first prize in English literature——”
“And besides,” said Priscilla, “she said it, hols that is, to Miss Pettigrew when she was asking when they began. She didn’t object.”
Miss Lentaigne poured out her second cup of tea in silence. Against Miss Pettigrew’s tacit approval of the word there was no arguing. Miss Pettigrew, the head of a great educational establishment, does more than win, she awards prizes in English literature.
Priscilla, released from the tedium of the breakfast table, sped down the long avenue on her bicycle. Across the handle bars was tied a bundle, her towel and scarlet bathing dress. From the back of the saddle, wobbling perilously, hung a much larger bundle, a new lug sail, the fruit of hours and hours of toilsome needlework on the wet days of the Christmas “hols.”
From the gate at the end of the avenue the road runs straight and steep into the village. At the lower end of the village is the harbour, with its long, dilapidated quay. This is the centre of the village life. Here are, occasionally, small coasting steamers laden with coal or flour, and heavy brigantines or topsail schooners which have felt their way from distant English ports round a wildly inhospitable stretch of coast. Here, almost always, are the bluff-bowed hookers from the outer islands, seeking cargoes of flour and yellow Indian meal, bringing in exchange fish, dried or fresh, and sometimes turf for winter fuel. Here are smaller boats from nearer islands which have come in on the morning tide carrying men and women bent on marketing, which will spread brown sails in the evening and bear their passengers home again. Here at her red buoy lies Sir Lucius’ smartly varnished pleasure boat, the Tortoise, reckoned “giddy” in spite of her name by staid, cautious island folk; but able, with her centre board and high peaked gunter lug to sail round and round any other boat in the bay. Here, brilliantly green, lies Priscilla’s boat, the Blue Wanderer, a name appropriate two years ago when she was blue, less appropriate last year, when Peter Walsh made a mistake in buying paint, and grieved Priscilla greatly by turning out the Blue Wanderer a sober grey. This year, though the name still sticks to her, it is less suitable still, for Priscilla, buying the paint herself at Easter time, ordained that the Blue Wanderer should be green.
Above the quay, at the far side of the fair green, stands Brannigan’s shop, a convenient and catholic establishment. To the left of the door as you enter, is the shop of a publican, equipped with a bar and a sheltering partition for modest drinkers. To the right, if you turn that way, is a counter at which you can buy anything, from galvanised iron rowlocks to biscuits and jam. On the low window sills of both windows sit rows of men who for the most part earn an honest living by watching the tide go in and out and by making comments on the boats which approach or leave the quay. It is difficult to find out who pays them for doing these things, but it is plain that some one does, for they are not men of funded property, and yet they live, live comfortably, drink, smoke, eat occasionally and are sufficiently clothed. Of only one among them can it be said with certainty that he is in receipt of regular pay from anybody. Peter Walsh earns five shillings a week by watching over the Tortoise and the Blue Wanderer.
Priscilla leaped off her bicycle at the door of Bran-nigan’s shop. The men on the window sills took no notice of her. They were absorbed in watching the operation of warping round the head of a small steamer which lay far down the quay. The captain had run out a hawser and made the end of it fast to a buoy at the far side of the fair-way. A donkey-engine on the steamer’s deck was clanking vigorously, hauling in the hawser, swinging the head of the steamer round, a slow but deeply interesting manoeuvre. “Peter Walsh,” said Priscilla, “is that you?” “It is, Miss,” said Peter, “and it’s proud and pleased I am to see you home again.” “Is the Blue Wanderer ready for me?” “She is, Miss. The minute you like to step into her she’s there for you. There’s a new pair of rowlocks and I’ve a nice bit of rope for a halyard for the little lug. Is it it you have tied on the bicycle?”
“It is,” said Priscilla, “and it’s a good sail, half as big again as the old one.”
“I’d be glad now,” said Peter, “if you’d make that same halyard fast to the cleat on the windward side any time you might be using the sail.”
“Do you think I’m a fool, Peter?”
“I do not, Miss; but sure you know as well as I do that the mast that’s in her isn’t over and above strong, and I wouldn’t like anything would happen.”
“There’s no wind any way.”
“There is not; but I wouldn’t say but there might be at the turn of the tide.”
“Haul her up to the slip,” said Priscilla. “I’ll be back again long before the tide turns.”
The steamer swung slowly round. The rattle of her donkey-engine was plainly audible. The warp made fast to the buoy dipped into the water, strained taut dripping, and then dipped again. Suddenly the captain on the bridge shouted. The engine stopped abruptly. The warp sagged deep into the water. A small boat with one man in her appeared close under the steamer’s bows, went foul of the warp and lay heavily listed while one of her oars fell into the water and drifted away.
“That’s a nice sort of fool to be out in a boat by himself,” said Priscilla.
“He was damn near having to swim for it,” said Peter, as the boat righted herself and slipped over the warp.
“Who is he?”
“I don’t rightly know who he is,” said Peter, “but he paid four pounds for the use of Flanagan’s old boat for a fortnight, so I’m thinking he has very little sense.”
“He has none,” said Priscilla. “Look at him now.”
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