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You want sleep: your eyes show that. Martha! Is everything ready in the Deemster's room? All but the lamp? Take it up, Martha. Philip, you'll drink a little brandy and water first? I'll carry it to your room then; you might need it in the night. Go before me, dear. Yes, yes, you must. Do you think I want you to see how old I am when I'm going upstairs? Ah!
On St. Bridget's Day Philip held Deemster's Court in Ramsey. The snow had gone and the earth had the smell of violets. It was almost as if the violets themselves lay close beneath the soil, and their odour had been too long kept under. The sun, which had not been seen for weeks, had burst out that day; the air was warm, and the sky was blue.
The procession of the Deemster's funeral passed the house, and she closed her eyes and seemed to see it the coffin on the open cart, the men on horseback riding beside it, and then the horses tied up to posts and gates about the churchyard, and the crowd of men of all conditions at the grave-side. In her mind's eye, Kate was searching through that crowd for somebody. Was he there?
"I do not know if you are aware, your Excellency, that this is Deemster's Court-day?" The Governor smiled, and a titter went round the court. "We will dispense with that," he said. "We have better business this morning." 34 "Excuse me, your Excellency," said Philip; "I am still Deemster. With your leave we will do everything according to rule."
Jem was behind him, answering at his back. Their voices were low; they scarcely moved. "All well upstairs?" said Philip. "Pretty well, your Honour." "More cheerful and content?" "Much more, except when your Honour is from home. 'The Deemster's back, she'll say, and her poor face will be like sunshine on a rainy day." Philip remained silent for a moment, and then said in a scarcely audible voice
I tried to place a speech into a monk's mouth a speech that ought to swell with pride and intolerance, but it was of no use; so I skipped over the monk and tried to work out an oration the Deemster's oration to the violator of the Temple, and I wrote half-a-page of this oration, upon which I stopped.
The Deemster's countenance became pale, his eyes glistened, his look wandered, his lips trembled he was biting them, they were bleeding. "Remove her in custody," he muttered; "let her be well cared for." There was a tumult in a moment. Everybody had recognised the prisoner as she was being taken out, though shame and privation had so altered her. "Peter Quilliam's wife!"
He was holding the dazzling lamp up to the Deemster's face. "A little faint that's all. Go to bed." Then Philip was alone in his room. "Conscience!" he thought. "Pete may go, but this will be with me to the end. Which, O God? which?" He poured out half a tumbler from the bottle on the table, and gulped it down at a draught. At the same moment he heard a light foot overhead.
By this time she was at the door to the prisoners' yard, and it was standing open. The door of the corridor leading by the Deemster's chamber to the Court-house was also ajar, as if it had been opened to relieve the heat of the crowded room within. "Be just and fear not," said the voice. The poor bedraggled wayfarer stood in the darkness and trembled.
At first "society" in the island objected to his disregard of the conventions. Now he is as popular at Government House, or at the Deemster's, as he is in Black Tom's cottage. But his warmest friends are amongst the peasants and fishermen, from one end of the island to the other. "They are such good fellows," he says, "and such excellent subjects for study for my books.
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