Shane

“ From the peace and fantasy of that beginning in the Ulster hills, from an unsympathetic mother and his two quaint, lovable uncles, Shane, at his own ardent desire, goes to knock about the world as a seafarer, and, always with the simplicity and idealism of his boyhood to lead and mislead him, is by-and-by tricked into marrying the cold southern Irish girl who dies after a year or so, and, his love for her having died before, he can feel no grief but only a strange dumb wonder. ”

“ We could have taken such a planet only by conquest. Would your worlds have liked that, Shane? Would they have been willing to see us come in and seize their homelands? You fought out of pride, for the belt the Chonya chieftains gave you. Would the worlds of your system do less if we tried to invade them?"
Shane stood mute.
Kyrsis' arm slipped about him. The rich purple lips came close to his. "Come with us, Shane! Join us!" she whispered. "For a million aching years I have sought a man like you. ”

“ It dissipates and scatters, transmuted into useless forms by a process that not even our science can reverse." Her voice fell. "Then, Shane, your planet dies."
Shane stared at her. "So you bought slaves—"
"Of course we bought slaves!" A note of hysteria crept into the silver woman's laugh. "Power, you talked about. Why would anyone buy slaves in a universe where power is free? What we sought was life—life in a form we could drink up, before our bodies finally died!" She came close to Shane, her pale face smooth and glowing, the violet eyes afire. "Look at me, Earthman! ”

“ Shane flicked the switch. "Blast, then, Reggar! Blast—but you'll blast the Lady Kyrsis with me!"
Beside him, Kyrsis screamed, "No Reggar! Not that—not that! The meteors—"
Shane snapped the switch. "The meteors—?"
The silver woman's poise was gone. She shook her fist, and the glittering metallic hair came tumbling down about her shoulders. "You'll see, Earthman! You'll see! We have weapons such as you've never dreamed of—"
Shane's eyes flicked back to the long-range visiscreen—to the silver fleet that raced towards Gadar. ”

“ The thought brought fear, and in the same instant you became the great Gar Shane, who would strike down Gadar and save your solar system." She laughed, and the sound was chill as outer space. "You are as much a child as that dead lump there beside you. Do you think to pit yourself against my people—scientists who could plot your every thought ten million years before your birth? You are but a fool, and you will die as all the others have died, and Quos Reggar will wear your belt and serve us!"
"There comes a time for every man to die," Shane said. ”

“ No one discussed John Shane with his wife or children because they had kept alive for more than thirty years a lie, a pretense. John Shane had been accepted silently and unquestioningly as all that a husband should be. Now the manner of Mrs. Tolliver brightened visibly at the approach of an opening for which she had waited more years than she was able to count.{164}
“But he was a man and she was a woman,” persisted Lily. “I know that most American women own their husbands, but the strange thing is that I could never have married a man whom I could own. ”

“ The tremor in Kyrsis' voice was stronger, now—a sort of undercurrent of strange excitement.
"Your 'other buying'—?"
"A few young slaves to ... to train for household use." The silver woman's fingers trembled, cold as ice, upon Shane's arm. "Come! Let us go now—quickly—"
She led Shane out, through other rooms, where other vendors hawked their wares, and other slaves stood shamed or sobbing, bared to the eager, weirdly-lusting eyes of the silver people. ”

“ Kyrsis whispered. Her pale hand touched the Earthman's arm. "I tell you, Shane: there is none. How many years have our scientists sought it? How many eons of spatial time? But always, the answer is no. We must have life itself—humanoid life, like that of this girl here. No other can be transmuted to our bodies."
"If life is an element, as you say, a thing that wells up with creation, out of the birth of a planet, then you could have moved to another planet," Shane said in a dull, flat voice. "If life is gone from Gadar, then you could have migrated, picked a new home." ”

“ Then Terence had shown too much of the florid farmer, too much of the bovine contented animal breadth which men exhibit who live much in the open air and look on cattle. Then nothing could be more refined and elegant than Shane--with his miniature figure, his faultless limbs and tiny hands, his clean-cut features whereon sat the expression of command which marks a man for one to whom authority is an undisputed birthright. ”

“ From the beginning I had marked Rory Mac Shane himself, and kept as close a watch upon him as in the press and hurry I could. Being, as I have said, a man of monstrous bulk, he was not so nimble in his motions as the leaner fry, nor did not essay to mount upon a ladder among the first. But as I turned from dealing with one hardy climber, I espied Mac Shane, a good way off, swing himself from the top of his ladder and throw one leg across the wall, plying a doughty sword against an ancient servitor that sought to stay him with his pike. ”

“ My hand for ye, Shane will see his own funeral yet, for the devil another crathur, barring a fox, could creep down the cliff till the moon rises, any how. But I know what saved yer bacon; he that’s born to be hanged—you can repate the rest o’ the thrue ould saying yerself, ye poor atomy!”
“Chorpan Doul,” said Shane Glas, rather chafed by the severe raillery of the other, “is it because to shoulder an ould gun that an honest man can’t tell you what a Judy ye make o’ yerself, swaggering like a raw Peeler, and frightening every shag on the cliff with yer foolish bull-scuttering! ”

“ You will never believe them until you see them. We have conquered time and space and matter—"
"And the child is dead," Shane said.
"The child—" Kyrsis broke off, and a shadow crossed her face. "Yes, the child is dead."
Unspeaking, the Earthman waited. His temple veins no longer throbbed, but his jaw was hewn of granite.
Kyrsis said: "There are so many things your childish science knows that are not true—and one of them is the nature of life."
Shane studied her, narrow-eyed. "So? In what way?"
"You think that life comes into being when certain conditions are correct. But we know otherwise." ”

“ The smile left the silver woman's face. Turning, she walked thoughtfully across the room, not speaking.
After a moment, Shane followed.
Again Kyrsis turned, looked up at him. Her expression was unfathomable. "You are a bold and clever man, Shane," she said. "It is a pity you can never hope to be quite clever enough."
"You mean—?"
"She means you've failed again, you chitza!" cut in a harsh familiar voice from the mirrored door behind Shane.
The Earthman spun about.
His great carcass draped in a fala cloak, Quos Reggar stood in the doorway, light-gun in hand. ”

“ Reports will come in—confirmed reports that say the Earthman, Shane, great gar of the asteroids, has gone the Chonya way. That he, himself, is leading raiders, sweeping the lesser moons for slaves."
Bleakly, Shane stared at the creature. His fists clenched spasmodically, and knots of muscle stood out at the hinges of his jaws.
Then that, too, passed.
"A lie is a lie, Reggar," he said tonelessly. "Someplace, sometime, it always breaks down." ”

“ Shane Thurlough, "as dacent a boy," and Shane's wife, as "clane-skinned a girl," as any in the world. There is Shane, an active, handsome-looking fellow, leaning over the half-door of his cottage, kicking a hole in the wall with his brogue, and picking up all the large gravel within his reach to pelt the ducks with—those useful Irish scavengers. Let us speak to him. "Good morrow, Shane!" "Och! the bright bames of heaven on ye every day! and kindly welcome, my lady—and won't ye step in and rest—it's powerful hot, and a beautiful summer, sure—the Lord be praised!" "Thank you, Shane. ”

“ An indistinct dread of open rupture between the brothers had forced her to give Shane a reason for more considerate behaviour towards Terence. But the shot, she found, had entirely missed its mark. Shane was not a good man; he was gross, brutal, and endowed with none of the attributes of the serpent. He was not like Cassidy, for instance. If he hated a person, all the world might know it. By virtue of his bringing-up as Chief of Blasters and King of Cherokees, he was terribly handy with rapier and pistol ”

“ Why do your people need slaves—?"
She shook her head sadly. "I am sorry, Shane, truly sorry. But those secrets are not mine to tell ... unless—"
"Unless what—?"
"Unless you are willing to travel with me ... to take the road Quos Reggar took." Again her hand was on his arm, her silvery body close to his. A note of tension crept into her voice. "Because we need slaves, Shane! You cannot know how desperately we need them! Nor is it hard. They do not suffer...."
For a moment the Earthman stood there with her, and her hand left his arm and came up to caress his cheek. ”

“ He pushed the Venusian down the steps. "Get on with you, woman...."
An attendant pushed Shane forward, heavy with irons. "An Earthman, vendor—"
The vendor struck the gong. "An Earthman, my friends; a fighting man—powerful, surging with life in spite of his wounds. Who'll start it—?"
Coldly, Shane swept the auction room with his glance.
Here, in front, on one side, were the slaves—a motley assortment, dragged to this final degradation from a dozen far-flung planets. One by one, they were thrust upon the block, exposed to the ghoulish appraisal of the crowd that filled the room. ”

“ Shane's eyes were bleak. He stood unyielding, jaw outthrust, and his words slashed. "When the chonya chiefs came in and struck their banners and picked me, an Earthman, as gar of the asteroids to lead them, I swore on the star-stone of Hiaroloch that I'd stop scum like you—"
"Only now I'm back," Reggar cut in harshly. "I'm bigger this time, Shane; big enough to make up for all the years I've had to stay away. My fleets are stronger than yours, and my brain is better. Today, when you broke free and fled, I said to myself: 'Where would the Earthman go? ”

“ Crowell’s account, Shane turned to Eunice and said bluntly, “You and your husband good friends?”
Eunice gasped. Then, after one scathing glance, she deliberately turned back to the window, and neglected to answer.
“That won’t do, ma’am,” said Shane, in his heavy voice, which was coarse and uncultured but not intentionally rude. “I’m here to ask questions and you people have got to answer ‘em. Mebbe I can put it different. Was you and Mr. Embury on good terms?” ”

“ Shane's teeth were clenched, his lips parted, his eyes glued tight to the viewer of the visiscreen. The muscles stood out along his neck. The tension about him was a living thing.
"Ten seconds."
A sort of paralysis seemed to grip the Earthman. He stood frozen, still staring like one in a trance.
The ribs in the satellite's casing stood out, now—the ports, the vents.
The meteors seemed to have grown to blazing suns.
"Five seconds."
Shane's paralysis broke. He snatched the phones, and of a sudden his eyes were blazing like the nightmare scene beyond their hull. "Veer!" he shouted. "Don't land! ”

“ This was at the end of a rather complete account of Helmeth's business relations with Mr. Shane.
"Oh, well," I could see Christian charity struggling with Mrs. Shane's profound conviction of the rectitude of her own way of life. "She was a good woman, but no—imagination." She was so pleased to have hit upon a word which carried no intrinsic condemnation that she repeated it. "No imagination whatever. One feels," she modified the edge of her judgment still further, "that so much might have been made out of Mr. Garrett. These self-made men are so difficult." ”

“ To Shane’s violence he could oppose nothing but intrigues. The most brilliant expedient which occurred to him was to go to Armagh during the moonlight nights, and there parley with [Pg 57] the enemy, so that he might not use them to plunder his neighbours. A State policy which depends upon the phases of every moon is really beneath criticism. ”

“ He desires an English wife.
Badly as he had been treated, Shane declared himself ready to make restitution wherever anything could be proved against [Pg 18] him. His savagery, which he confessed again and again, he thought could best be eradicated by an English wife, ‘some gentlewoman of some noble blood meet for my vocation, whereby I might have a friendship towards your Majesty.’ This impossible she would indeed be much more than an intermediary between him and the Queen to declare his grief and those of his country. ”

“ Misther Cronin, but you and the boys is up to fun. The devil a naither glass o’ brandy: no wonder ye should laugh and sing over it. How goes the Colleen Ayrigh, and her Bochal Fadda, that knows how to bark so purty at thim plundering thieves, the wather-guards?”
“Ah! welcome, Shane,” replied the person addressed; “the customer you’ve brought may be depinded on, I hope. Sit down, boys.”
“’Tis ourselves that will, and welkim,” rejoined Shane. “Depinded on! why, ’scure to the dacenther father’s son from this to himself than Paddy Corbett, ’tisn’t that he’s to the fore.” ”

“ By the help of the English admiral, Shane fully intended to make capital out of this sea-fight, and win for himself an English peerage, and possibly some convenient sinecures. As it was, he was already rich and great. But the richer we are, the poorer we often believe ourselves to be. Shane fancied himself quite a pauper--a worthy subject for eleemosynary grants. Now, supposing that Tone had left Glas-aitch-é with the other prisoners unrecognised, there were ten chances to one against his so escaping in Dublin. ”