Chapter 3

They reached the top of the lane and crossed a narrow public road, and then were in a broad avenue, almost arched by trees, at the end of which was the Manor. It was a squarely-built sixteenth century house, made of stone, taken from the Roman quarry a mile or two away on the road to Franscombe. The first Graham to own it received it and the lands adjacent to it from Henry the Second, and ever since that time a Graham had been lord of the manor of Boveyhayne. Ninian was the last of his line. If he were to die, there would be no more Grahams at Boveyhayne. That was the fear that haunted Mrs. Graham....

Mary ran swiftly across the grass in the centre of the avenue and pushed open the gate that led through a fine stone arch. She held the gate open for Henry, and then they both passed up the flagged path into the house.

"Mother, mother!" Mary shouted, quickly entering the drawing-room, "here's Quinny, and please can we have tea at once because the trawlers are just coming home and we want to see them being beached and ... oh, I say, my hands are messy, aren't they. Still, it doesn't matter! I can wash them afterwards."

"My dear!" said Mrs. Graham reproachfully, and then she turned to greet Henry who had become awkward again. "How do you do, Mr. Quinn," she said, holding her hand out to him.

Henry flushed deeply. It was the first time any one had ever called him Mister, and he was very glad that Ninian was not present to hear. He was quite well, he said. No, he was not a bit tired. Yes, he would rather like to go to his room.... A maid had followed him into the room, and Mrs. Graham asked her to show Mr. Quinn to his room, and, flushing deeper still, he turned to go with her. As he left the room, he heard Mary saying to Mrs. Graham, "Oh, mother, you mustn't call him _Mr._ Quinn. He blushed frightfully when you said that. His name is 'Quinny,' or you can call him 'Henry' if you like!"

"I think I'll call him 'Henry,' my dear!" said Mrs. Graham.

5

It seemed to Henry that Mrs. Graham was the most beautiful woman in the world, and he had a great longing that she would draw him to her, as she drew Ninian, and put her arms about him and kiss him. Sometimes he had faint memories of the way in which poor Bridget Fallon had hugged him, and how she had cried over him once when she told him that his soul would be damned forever because he was a "black Protestant." ... He remembered that episode more vividly than any other because he had howled with fear when she narrated the pains and torments of hell to him. There had been a Mission at the chapel the previous week, and a preaching friar had frightened the wits out of her with his description of "the bad place." He had told the congregation of scared servants and frightened labourers that they would be laid on red-hot bars in hell and that the devil would send demons to nip their flesh with burning pincers.... Henry could not be comforted until she had promised to rescue him from the Evil One, and when she bade him wear the scapular, he hurriedly hung it round his neck as if he were afraid that before he could get it on, the Devil would have him.... Well, Bridget had loved him very tenderly, and of all the women he had ever known, she seemed to him to be the most beautiful. But Mrs. Graham was more beautiful than Bridget, more beautiful than Bridget could ever be. There was something so exquisite in her movements, her smile (Mary had her smile) and her soft sweet voice with its slight Devonshire burr, that Henry felt he wished to sit beside her and walk with her and always be by her. His sudden, growing love for her made him feel bold, and he lost the shy, nervous sensation he had had when he first came into her presence and heard her call him "Mr. Quinn," and so, when Ninian and Mary talked about the trawlers, he turned to Mrs. Graham quite naturally, and said, "Won't you come to the beach, too, Mrs. Graham?" Instantly Ninian and Mary were clamorous that she should go with them, and so she consented....

"We'll have to hurry," said Mary, "because the boats come in awf'lly quick."

"My dear, I can't run," Mrs. Graham said.

It was Ninian who suggested that Widger should harness the pony and that they should drive down to the beach in the buggy....

"Yes, yes," said Mary.

And Ninian went off to tell Widger to hurry harder than he had ever hurried before in his life.

"I'll do that for 'ee, Mas'er Ninyan, sure 'nough!" said Widger.

But Ninian and Mary were too impatient to wait for the buggy, and so they set off together, leaving Henry to follow with Mrs. Graham.

"Quinny'll drive you down, mater," Ninian said.

Mrs. Graham turned to Henry. "You won't let Peggy run away with me, will you?" she said, pretending to be alarmed, and Mary and Ninian burst into laughter at the thought of Peggy ... which was short for Pegasus ... running away with any one.

"He's fat and lazy," said Ninian.

"He goes to sleep in the shafts," Mary added, running out of the drawing-room on Ninian's heels.

6

Boveyhayne Bay is a little bay within the very large bay that is guarded at one end by Portland Bill and at the other end by Start Point. It lies in the shelter of two white cliffs which keep its water quiet even when the sea outside is rough, and so it is a fine home for fishermen though there is no harbour and the trawlers have to be hauled up the shingly beach every night. Nowhere else on that coast are chalk cliffs to be found, and the sudden whiteness of Boveyhayne Head and the White Cliff shining out of the red clay of the adjoining cliffs is a sign to sailors, passing down the Channel on their homeward beat, that they are off the coast of Devonshire. Mrs. Graham talked to Henry about the fishermen as they drove down Bovey Lane towards the village.

"I love Boveyhayne," she said, "because the people are so fine. They rely on themselves far more than any other people I know. That's because they're fishermen, I suppose, and have no employers. They work for themselves ... and it's frightfully hard work too. People come to Boveyhayne in the summer, but they can't spoil it because the villagers don't depend on visitors for a living: they depend on themselves ... and the sea. There isn't a man in Boveyhayne who is pretending to be a fisherman and is really a cadger on summer visitors. Some of them won't be bothered to take people out in rowing-boats--they feel that that is work for the old. I used to wonder," she went on, "why it was that I didn't really like the villagers in other places, but I never found out why until I came to Boveyhayne, and it was simply because I felt instinctively that they were spongers ... those other people ... that they hadn't any real work to do, and that they were living on us like ... like ticks on a sheep. The Boveyhayne men are splendid men. It wouldn't make any difference ... much difference, anyhow ... to them if another visitor never came to the place. And that is how it ought to be in every village in England!"

Henry was not quite certain that he understood all that she was saying, but he liked to listen to her, and so he did not interrupt her, except to say "Yes" and "I suppose so" when it seemed that she was waiting for him to say something.

"Do you like being in England?" she asked him suddenly.

"Oh, yes," he answered.

"Would you rather be in England than in Ireland?"

He did not know. He liked being at home with his father, but he also liked being at Rumpell's with Gilbert and Roger and Ninian, and now he felt that he would like to be at Boveyhayne with Mrs. Graham and Mary.

"Perhaps you like people better than you like places," Mrs. Graham said.

"I don't know," he replied. "I hadn't thought about that."

"You must come again to Boveyhayne. Perhaps, in the summer, Gilbert and Roger will come, too!"

Henry thought that that would be awf'lly jolly....

They turned down the village street and left Peggy at the foot of it while they went down the slope leading on to the beach where the trawlers were now being hauled up by the aid of hand winches. Henry could see Mary and Ninian in the group of fishermen who were working the nearest winch. They had hold of one of the wooden bars and were helping to push it round.

"We'll go down to the boats," said Mrs. Graham, "and see the fish!"

She put her hand on his shoulder, and he helped to steady her as they walked across the shingle to where the boats were slowly climbing out of the sea over wooden runners on to the high stones.

One of the boats had already been hauled up, and the fishermen, having thrown out their gear, were now getting ready to sell their fish. They threw out a heap of skate and dun-cows,[1] and auctioned them to the dealers standing by.

"They're still alive," Henry whispered to Mrs. Graham as he watched the dun-cows curling their bodies and the skate gasping in the air. He looked over the side of the trawler and saw baskets of dabs and plaice and some soles and turbot and a couple of crabs. A plaice flapped helplessly and fell off the heap in the basket on to the bottom of the boat, and one of the fishermen trod on it.... "They're _all_ alive," Henry said, turning again to Mrs. Graham.

"Yes," she answered.

"But ... isn't it cruel? Oughtn't they to kill them?"

"It would take a long time to kill all those fish," she said. "Most of them are dead already, and the others will be dead soon...."

But he could not rid himself of the feeling that the fish were suffering agonies, and he began to feel sick with pity.

"I think I'll go and see Mary and Ninian," he said to Mrs. Graham, edging away from the boat.

"All right," she replied.

But Ninian and Mary were on their way down to the boats, and so he did not get far.

"Come and see them cutting up the skate and dun-cows!" said Ninian, catching hold of Henry's arm and pulling him back.

"Yes, let's," Mary added.

The sick feeling was growing stronger in Henry. He hated the sight of blood. Once he had been ill in the street because William Henry Matier had shown a dead rabbit to him, the blood dribbling from its mouth ... and the sight of a butcher's shop always filled him with nausea. He did not wish to see the skate cut up, but he felt that Mary would despise him if he did not go with Ninian and her, so he followed after them.

The fishermen were sharpening their knives on the stones when they came up to them, and then one of them seized a dun-cow and struck its head on the shingle and cut it open, while another fisherman inserted his knife into the quivering body of a skate and cut out the entrails and the head in circular pieces.

"But they're alive," said Henry.

"Of course, they're alive," said Ninian, seizing a dun-cow and smacking its head against the beach. "Here you are, Jim," he added, passing the dun-cow to a fisherman. "Here's another one!"

Henry could not stay any longer. He turned away quickly and almost ran up the beach. "Hilloa," Ninian shouted after him, "where are you going?"

He stopped for a moment and looked back, wondering what excuse he should make for his running away. "I ... I'm just going to see if ... if Peggy's all right!"

_"She's_ all right," Ninian replied.

"I think I'll just go all the same," said Henry.

"But you'll miss it all," Mary called to him.

"I'll ... I'll come back presently," he answered.

7

He had finished a game of cards with Mary and then Mary had gone off to bed. She had kissed her mother and Ninian, and then she held out her hand to him and said "Good-night, Quinny!" and he said "Good-night, Mary!" and held the door open for her so that she might pass out.

"Let's go out in a boat to-morrow," she said. "We'll go to the Smugglers' Cave...."

"Yes, let's," he answered.

When she had gone, Mrs. Graham called him to her. "Come and sit here," she said, pointing to a footstool at her feet. Ninian was trying to solve a chess problem and was deaf to the whole world....

"I suppose you didn't like to see the fish being gutted, Henry?" Mrs. Graham said.

He glanced up at her quickly. He had not spoken of his feeling to any of them because he was ashamed of it. "It's namby-pamby of me," he had said to himself. He flushed as he looked up, fearing that she must despise him for his weakness, and he almost denied that he had had any feeling at all about it; but he did not deny it. "I couldn't bear it, Mrs. Graham," he said quickly in a low voice. "I felt I should be ill if I stayed there any longer!"

"I used to feel like that," she said, patting his shoulder, "but you soon get used to it. The fishermen aren't really cruel. They are the kindest men I know!"

Ninian, having failed to solve his chess problem, got up from the table and stretched himself and yawned.

"I'm going to bed, Quinny," he said. "Are you coming?"

Henry rose and shook hands with Mrs. Graham. "Good-night," he said.

"Good-night, Henry!" she replied. "I hope you'll sleep well." And then she turned to kiss Ninian, who pushed a sleepy face against hers.

8

In the morning, there were fried plaice for breakfast, and Henry ate two of them.

"These are some of the fish you saw on the beach last night," said Mrs. Graham.

"Oh, yes," said Henry, reaching for the toast, and swallowing a mouthful of the fish. "And jolly nice, too!"

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: Dog-fish.]

THE THIRD CHAPTER

1

He stayed at Boveyhayne until the time came to return to Rumpell's, and the holiday passed so quickly that he could not believe that it was really over. They had picnicked in the Smugglers' Cave and on Boveyhayne Common where the gorse was in bloom, and Henry had plucked whinblossoms to dye Easter eggs when he found that the Grahams did not know that whinblossoms could be used in this way. "You boil the blossoms and the eggs together, and the eggs come out a lovely browny-yellow colour. We always dye our eggs like that in the north of Ireland!" And on the day they picnicked on Boveyhayne Common, Mrs. Graham took them down the side of the hill to the big farm at Franscombe and treated them to a Devonshire tea: bread and butter and raspberry jam and cream, cream piled thick on the jam, and cake. (But they ate so much of the bread and butter and jam and cream that they could not eat the cake.) And they swam every day.... Mary was like a sea-bird: she seemed to swim on the crest of every wave as lightly as a feather, and was only submerged when she chose to thrust her head into the body of some wave swelling higher and higher until its curled top could stay no longer and it pitched forward and fell in a white, spumy pile on the shore. She would climb over the stern of a rowing-boat and then plunge from it into the sea again, and come up laughing with the water streaming from her face and hair, or dive beneath Ninian and pull his feet until he kicked out....

And then the last evening of his visit came. The vicar of Boveyhayne and his wife were to dine at the Manor that night, and so they were bidden to put on their company manners and their evening clothes. Ninian grumbled lustily when he heard the news, for he had made arrangements with a fisherman to "clean" a skate that evening when the trawlers came home. "I bet him thruppence I could do it as good as he could, and now I'll have to pay up. Beastly swizz, that's what it is!" he said to Henry in the stable where he was busy rubbing down Peggy, although Peggy did not need or wish to be rubbed down. "I think Mother ought to give me the thruppence anyhow!..."

After dinner, Ninian and Henry and Mary had contrived to miss the drawing-room, whither Mrs. Graham led the Vicar and his wife, and they went to the room which had been the nursery and was now a work-room, and lit the fire and sat round it, talking and telling tales and reading until the time came for Mary to go to bed.

"We're going soon, too!" said Ninian. "We've got to get up jolly early to-morrow, blow it! I hate getting up early!"

Henry yawned and stretched out his hands to the fire. "I wish I weren't going to-morrow," he said, half reflectively.

"So do I," Mary exclaimed.

She was sitting on the floor beside him and he turned to look at her, a little startled by the suddenness of her speech.

"I wish you weren't going," she said, sitting up and leaning against him as she was accustomed to lean against Ninian. "It's been great fun this Easter!"

Ninian caught hold of her hair and pulled it. "He isn't a bad chap, old Quinny," he said. "Soft-hearted, a bit!"

"Shut up, Ninian!" Henry shouted, punching him in the ribs.

But Ninian would not shut up. "Blubs like anything if you kill a rabbit or anything. He eats them all the same!"

Mary put her hands over Ninian's mouth. "Leave Quinny alone, Ninian," she said. "He's much nicer than you, and I do think it's horrid of you to go gutting fish just for fun. The fishermen have to do it, else we wouldn't get any breakfast, and of course plaice are very nice for breakfast...."

"Yahhh!" yelled Ninian.

"Well, anyhow," she continued, "Quinny's much nicer than you are. Aren't you, Quinny?"

"No, he isn't," Ninian asserted stoutly. "I'm ten times nicer than he is!"

"No, you're not...."

Henry, embarrassed at first by Mary's admiration, plucked up his spirits and joined in.

"Of course, I'm nicer than you are, Ninian," he said. "Anybody could see that with half an eye in his head!"

"All right, then, I'll fight you for it," Ninian replied, squaring up at him in mock rage.

"I'll box your ears for you, Ninian Graham!" said Mary, "and I won't let Quinny fight you, and Quinny, if you dare to fight him, I shan't like you any more...."

"Then I won't fight him, Mary. She's saved your life, Ninian," he said, turning to his friend.

"Yahhh!" Ninian shouted.

"I'll get up very early to-morrow morning," said Mary, as she prepared to leave them, "and perhaps mother'll let me drive to Whitcombe with you to see you off!"

"No," Ninian objected, "we don't want you blubbing all over the platform!..."

"I shan't blub, Ninian. I never blub!..."

"Yes, you do. You always blub. You blubbed the last time and made me feel an awful ass!" he persisted.

"Well, I shan't blub this time, or if I do, it won't be about you.... Anyhow, I shall get up early and see Quinny off. I _like_ Quinny!..."

Ninian pointed at Henry, and burst out laughing. "Oh! Oh, he's blushing! Look at him! Oh! Oh!!"

"Shut up, Ninian, you ass!" said Henry, turning away.

Mary went over to him and took hold of his arm. "Never mind, Quinny," she said, "I _do_ like you. Good-night!"

Then she went out and left him alone with Ninian.

"I suppose," said Ninian when she had gone, "we ought to go down and say something to the Vicar!"

2

That night, Henry went to bed in the knowledge that he loved Mary Graham. "I'll marry her," he said, as he stripped his clothes off. "That's what I'll do. I'll jolly well marry her!"

In the excitement of his love, he forgot to wash his hands and face and clean his teeth, and he climbed into bed and lay there thinking about Mary. "I suppose," he said, "I ought to tell her about it. That ass, Ninian'll be sure to laugh if I tell him!" He sat up suddenly in bed. "Lord," he exclaimed, "I forgot to wash!" He got out of bed and washed himself. "Beastly fag, cleaning your teeth," he murmured, and then went back to bed.

"I know," he said, as he blew out the candle and hauled the clothes well about his neck. "I'll make Ninian look after the luggage and stuff, and then I'll tell her. On the platform! I hope she won't be cross about it!" And then he fell asleep.

3

In the morning, they went off, Mary with them, and they stood up in the carriage and waved their hands to Mrs. Graham until the dip in the road hid her from their view. Ninian, who had been so disdainful of "blubbers" the night before, sat down in a corner of the carriage and looked miserable, but neither Mary nor Henry said anything to him. They drove slowly down the Lane because it was difficult to do otherwise, but when they had come into the road that leads to Franscombe, Widger whipped up the horse, and the carriage moved quickly through the village, past the schools, until they came to the long hill out of the village ... and there Jim Rattenbury was waiting for them.

"I brought 'ee a li'l bit o' fish, Mas'er Ninyan," he said, putting a basket into the carriage.

"I say, Jim!" Ninian exclaimed, forgetting his misery for a while. They thanked him for the gift and enquired about the baby Rattenbury and wished him good-luck in the mackerel fishing, and were about to go on when Ninian recollected his failure to keep his appointment with Tom Yeo on the previous evening. "Oh, Jim," he said, "I bet Tom Yeo thruppence I'd 'clean' a skate as good as he can, but I couldn't come ... so here's the thruppence. You might give it to Tom for me, will you!"

Jim Rattenbury waved the money away. "Ah, that be all right, Mas'er Ninyan," he exclaimed. "You can try your 'and at it nex' time you comes 'ome. I'll tell Tom. 'Er'll be glad to 'ave longer to get ready for it, 'er will!" He laughed at his own joke, and they laughed, too. "Good luck to 'ee, Mas'er Ninyan," Jim went on, "an' to 'ee too, sir!" he added, turning to Henry.

"And me, Jim, _and_ me!" Mary said impetuously.

"Why, of course, Miss Mary, an' to 'ee, too!"

They drove on up the hill, from which they could look down on the village, tucked snugly in the hollow of the rising lands, and along the top of the ridge, gaining glimpses of the blue Channel, dotted far out with the sails of trawlers, and down the hair-pin road where the pine trees stand like black sentinels, through Whitcombe to the station....

"I wish we weren't going!..." one or other of them said as they drove on.

"I'd love to have another swim," said Ninian.

"Or go out in a boat," said Henry.

The carriage entered the station-yard and they got out and walked towards the platform. There were very few people travelling by that early train, and Henry was glad because, if he could dispose of Ninian for a few moments, he thought he could settle his affairs with Mary.

"Ninian," he said, trying to speak very casually, "you and Widger can look after the luggage and tickets, can't you!"

Ninian, who had already induced one of the porters to describe a thrilling fox-hunt in which the fox took to the river and was killed, after a hard struggle, in the water, nodded his head and said "Righto!"

"Let's walk up and down," Henry said to Mary, and they walked towards the end of the platform. "It's been awf'lly nice here!" he added.

"Yes, hasn't it?" she replied. "You'll come again, won't you?"

_"Ra_-ther!" he exclaimed.

"How long will it be before you can come again?"

"I don't know. You see, my father'll expect me to go home in the summer...."

"Oh!"

"But I might come for part of the hols. I'd like to!"

"Yes," she said, sliding one of her feet in front of her and regarding the tip of her shoe intently.

They did not speak for a few moments until he remembered that time was fleeting. "It's an awf'lly nice day," he said, and licked his lips.

"Yes, isn't it?..."

"Awf'lly nice," he continued and broke off lamely.

They could see the train coming into Coly station, and a sense of despair seized Henry when he thought that it would soon come into Whitcombe station and then go back again to the junction, carrying Ninian and him with it. He could feel his nervousness mounting up his legs until it began to gallop through his body.... He felt frightfully dry, and when he tried to speak, he could not do anything but cough. The train had started now from Coly station. He could see the white smoke rising from the engine's funnel almost in a straight line, so little wind was there in the valley.... "Oh, Lord!" he said to himself....

"What age are you?" he suddenly demanded of her.

"Fourteen," she replied.

"I'm sixteen ... nearly!" he continued.

"Ninian's over sixteen," Mary said, and added, "I wish I were sixteen!"

"Why!"

"Oh, I don't know. I just wish I were. When I'm sixteen, you'll be eighteen ... nearly!"