“It does, by the rights of it. Every step and foot of land belongs to the Herons, and she’s the only Heron left alive, save and except the boy, as he don’t count, bein’ deef-dummy. But Isly Heron she’s the born queen, and you may believe what Joseph says about that, preacher. I knowed Herons all my life. Herons was master folks over on the main, before ever they come here. When they come over, they brought Brazybones with ’em, to clean their fish and wash out their boats. Long ago thet was, way back among the gret-grets, and ’t hes been so ever since, till it come down to Giles and Joe. Joe done it, too, as long as Giles would let him. Old Joe would ha’ done it to the last, but Giles sent him away. He was sick and sufferin’, Giles was, and he didn’t want old Joe to know it, but Joe did know. Joe would have died when Giles did, preacher, if it hadn’t ha’ been for Isly and the boy.”
The strange creature was brushing his ragged gray sleeve across his eyes, and his voice quavered curiously.
“You never saw Giles?” he said, looking up presently.
“Giles was Isly’s father, but he’s dead now. You might never have seen him formerly, when he was over on the main some time?”
The preacher shook her head.
“He was another!” Joe went on, half to himself. “Like a king, Giles was, for all his smilin’, pleasant ways. Most folks didn’t know it, but Joe knowed it. Many’s the time I’ve hid down against the rock, after Giles wouldn’t see me no more, and waited so I could touch him when he went by. It done me good to touch his coat; I felt good come out to me, every time I done it.”
He stared at the preacher, and she stared back at him, thinking him out of his wits. Probably he was, or, more likely still, he had never had his full share of intelligence. Yet, if the preacher had been a seer—if she had had powers of vision that could pierce the veil of past as of future years—she might have called up scenes and figures that from century to century should seem to justify some of Joe Brazybone’s ideas, fantastic as they were. She might see, in generation after generation, two figures side by side, one masterful, dominant, the other crouching, serving, loving, coming to heel when called, like a dog, springing like a man to action at the master’s word. One might almost, even now, fancy a dim scene, half hidden by rolling clouds of dust and smoke. A battle-field. Gilles Tête d’Airain, the fair-haired Norman, stands wiping his bloody sword, and calls back his men from the pursuit, for the enemy is scattered beyond redemption. The half-savage soldiers come trooping back with wild gestures, with great shouts of triumph. Among them the chief singles out one, an ugly fellow of enormous strength, who twice, since the bloody morning, has stood between his master and death. He kneels, a serf, bound for life and for death; he is bidden to rise a free man, with henceforth a name and a station of his own.
“Brave et bon tu t’es montré; Brave-et-Bon sera ton nom, d’ici à jamais!”
The clouds roll forward, the vision is gone. But was this true? and has Tête d’Airain sunk to mere Heron, and has Brave-et-Bon, good and brave, drawled itself away into Brazybone? If this were so, it might account for poor Joe’s attitude, at which all the villagers laugh.
“You’d like to see Isly, preacher? You was meanin’ to speak to her?”