Joseph Antony Kinsella wanted no more visitors on Inishbawn. Least of all did he want one whom he knew to be a “high-up gentleman” and suspected of being a government official of the most dangerous and venomous kind, but Joseph Antony Kinsella was not the man to see a fellow creature drift across Inishbawn Roads without making an effort to help him ashore. With the aid of Jimmy he launched the stout, broad-beamed boat from which Miss Rutherford had fished for sponges. Priscilla raced down from the tents and sprang on board just as Jimmy, knee deep in foaming water, was pushing off. She shipped the rudder. Joseph Antony and Jimmy pulled hard. They forced their way to windward through clouds of spray and before Lord Torrington was half way across the bay Joseph Antony hauled him dripping into the boat.
Peter Walsh, standing in the water beside the stranded Tortoise, saw with blank amazement that Kinsella turned the boat’s head and rowed back again to Inishbawn.
“Bedamn,” he said, “but if I’d known that was to be the way it was to be I might as well have put him ashore there myself and not have wetted him.”
On the beach at Inishbawn when the boat grounded, were Lady Isabel, Mrs. Kinsella with her baby, the three small Kinsella boys, Frank Mannix, who, to the further injury of his ankle, had hobbled down the hill, and in the far background, the Reverend Barnabas Pennefather.
Lady Isabel rushed upon her father, flung her arms round his neck and kissed him passionately with tears in her eyes. Lord Torrington did not seem particularly pleased to see her.
“Hang it all, Isabel,” he said, “I’m surely wet enough. Don’t make me worse by slobbering over me. There’s nothing to cry about and no necessity for kissing.”
“Mrs. Kinsella,” said Priscilla, “go you straight up to the house and get out your husband’s Sunday clothes. If he hasn’t any Sunday clothes, get blankets and throw a couple of sods of turf on the fire.”
“Glory be to God!” said Mrs. Kinsella.
Priscilla took Joseph Antony by the arm and led him a little apart from the group on the beach.
“Get some whisky,” she said, “as quick as you can.”