Isla smiled, and pressed his hand kindly; her lips never moved, but now she began to shake as if with an ague; pale flushes came and went through her clear skin, and her breathing was hurried and broken. The trustee touched Joe on the shoulder. “I fear you are distressing her!” he said kindly, seeing the man labouring in anguish of perplexity. “You forget Isla hears nothing, and she has not yet learned to read from the lips.”
Joseph Brazybone started to his feet, and threw up his hands with a strange gesture.
“What’s that you’re sayin’?” he asked. “What’s that you said, gentleman, about Isly Heron?”
“I do not need, surely, to tell you that she is deaf and dumb,” said the trustee. “You cannot speak to her by signs, as Jacob did when he came!”
“Deef!” cried Joe, and his voice rang through the room like a trumpet. “Isly Heron deef? It’s a lie, whoever says so. Isly, why don’t you speak to me? why don’t you speak to these folks, and tell ’em not to call you out o’ your name?
“Isly Heron deef and dumb, her that sings like a bird, and talks like angels in the sky? Why, gentleman, and you, lady stranger, you—you don’t understand what you’re sayin’. I tell ye, if God only allowed one voice on this airth, that voice ’ud be Isly Heron’s. And old Joe comes to see his young lady, and she won’t speak to him. Oh, Isly, Isly, for yer father’s sake, speak to old Joe just once, if ye never do again!”
He was down on the floor again, crouching at her feet. Isla looked round the room, with wild eyes of a trapped creature that sees death before it; she saw the grave wonder, the doubt and distress, in the faces of the two spectators; she saw the agony of pleading in the rugged, misshapen features of the fisherman. She looked,—ah! where else should she turn now for comfort? In the face of her little Jacob; Jacob, for whose dear sake she had borne and suffered all; to whom now, perhaps, she was bringing shame, punishment for her sin; for she never doubted its being a sin. Jacob was smiling, pleased and happy at seeing a face that he remembered well in the old days at home. Those days were growing dim now for Jacob, and the new life filled his little cup with joy and comfort. He looked happily up at his sister, but met her eyes all fierce and burning, saw her face drawn and distorted with pain. Jacob did not understand pain, and Isla looked dreadful. He shrank from her, and caught the hand that was next to him, the hand of the principal of the school, and nestled in her gown.
When Isla Heron saw that, she threw out her arms, and cried aloud.
“God!” she cried in her extremity. “God! God! where are you?” Then, with her bird-like motion, she swung out from among them, pushing aside the hands that would have held her, avoiding the kind arms that sought to stay her; out of the room, and down the stair, flying so light and swift that no one missed the wings; out of the room and down the stair; and, before any one could stir to follow her, they heard the front door open quickly, close lightly,—Isla was gone!