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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/34630-0.txt b/34630-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d29ece8 --- /dev/null +++ b/34630-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8230 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of Some Experiences of an Irish R.M., by E. Œ. Somerville and Martin Ross + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: Some Experiences of an Irish R.M. + +Author: E. Œ. Somerville and Martin Ross + +Release Date: January 15, 2011 [eBook #34630] +[Most recently updated: December 12, 2021] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Al Haines + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. *** + + + + +SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. + + +by + +E. Œ. SOMERVILLE + +and + +MARTIN ROSS + + +THOMAS NELSON & SONS LTD +LONDON EDINBURGH PARIS MELBOURNE +TORONTO AND NEW YORK + + + Reprinted by permission of + Messrs. Longmans Green & Co., Ltd. + + + + +CONTENTS + + I. GREAT-UNCLE MCCARTHY + II. IN THE CURRANHILTY COUNTRY + III. TRINKET'S COLT + IV. THE WATERS OF STRIFE + V. LISHEEN RACES, SECOND-HAND + VI. PHILIPPA'S FOX-HUNT + VII. A MISDEAL + VIII. THE HOLY ISLAND + IX. THE POLICY OF THE CLOSED DOOR + X. THE HOUSE OF FAHY + XI. OCCASIONAL LICENSES + XII. "OH LOVE! OH FIRE!" + + + + +SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. + + + + +I +GREAT-UNCLE McCARTHY + + +A Resident Magistracy in Ireland is not an easy thing to come by +nowadays; neither is it a very attractive job; yet on the evening when +I first propounded the idea to the young lady who had recently +consented to become Mrs. Sinclair Yeates, it seemed glittering with +possibilities. There was, on that occasion, a sunset, and a string +band playing "The Gondoliers," and there was also an ingenuous belief +in the omnipotence of a godfather of Philippa's--(Philippa was the +young lady)--who had once been a member of the Government. + +I was then climbing the steep ascent of the Captains towards my +Majority. I have no fault to find with Philippa's godfather; he did +all and more than even Philippa had expected; nevertheless, I had +attained to the dignity of mud major, and had spent a good deal on +postage stamps, and on railway fares to interview people of influence, +before I found myself in the hotel at Skebawn, opening long envelopes +addressed to "Major Yeates, R.M." + +My most immediate concern, as any one who has spent nine weeks at Mrs. +Raverty's hotel will readily believe, was to leave it at the earliest +opportunity; but in those nine weeks I had learned, amongst other +painful things, a little, a very little, of the methods of the artisan +in the West of Ireland. Finding a house had been easy enough. I had +had my choice of several, each with some hundreds of acres of shooting, +thoroughly poached, and a considerable portion of the roof intact. I +had selected one; the one that had the largest extent of roof in +proportion to the shooting, and had been assured by my landlord that in +a fortnight or so it would be fit for occupation. + +"There's a few little odd things to be done," he said easily; "a lick +of paint here and there, and a slap of plaster----" + +I am short-sighted; I am also of Irish extraction; both facts that make +for toleration--but even I thought he was understating the case. So +did the contractor. + +At the end of three weeks the latter reported progress, which mainly +consisted of the facts that the plumber had accused the carpenter of +stealing sixteen feet of his inch-pipe to run a bell wire through, and +that the carpenter had replied that he wished the divil might run the +plumber through a wran's quill. The plumber having reflected upon the +carpenter's parentage, the work of renovation had merged in battle, and +at the next Petty Sessions I was reluctantly compelled to allot to each +combatant seven days, without the option of a fine. + +These and kindred difficulties extended in an unbroken chain through +the summer months, until a certain wet and windy day in October, when, +with my baggage, I drove over to establish myself at Shreelane. It was +a tall, ugly house of three storeys high, its walls faced with +weather-beaten slates, its windows staring, narrow, and vacant. Round +the house ran an area, in which grew some laurustinus and holly bushes +among ash heaps, and nettles, and broken bottles. I stood on the +steps, waiting for the door to be opened, while the rain sluiced upon +me from a broken eaveshoot that had, amongst many other things, escaped +the notice of my landlord. I thought of Philippa, and of her plan, +broached in to-day's letter, of having the hall done up as a +sitting-room. + +The door opened, and revealed the hall. It struck me that I had +perhaps overestimated its possibilities. Among them I had certainly +not included a flagged floor, sweating with damp, and a reek of cabbage +from the adjacent kitchen stairs. A large elderly woman, with a red +face, and a cap worn helmet-wise on her forehead, swept me a +magnificent curtsey as I crossed the threshold. + +"Your honour's welcome----" she began, and then every door in the house +slammed in obedience to the gust that drove through it. With something +that sounded like "Mend ye for a back door!" Mrs. Cadogan abandoned her +opening speech and made for the kitchen stairs. (Improbable as it may +appear, my housekeeper was called Cadogan, a name made locally possible +by being pronounced Caydogawn.) + +Only those who have been through a similar experience can know what +manner of afternoon I spent. I am a martyr to colds in the head, and I +felt one coming on. I made a laager in front of the dining-room fire, +with a tattered leather screen and the dinner table, and gradually, +with cigarettes and strong tea, baffled the smell of must and cats, and +fervently trusted that the rain might avert a threatened visit from my +landlord. I was then but superficially acquainted with Mr. Florence +McCarthy Knox and his habits. + +At about 4.30, when the room had warmed up, and my cold was yielding to +treatment, Mrs. Cadogan entered and informed me that "Mr. Flurry" was +in the yard, and would be thankful if I'd go out to him, for he +couldn't come in. Many are the privileges of the female sex; had I +been a woman I should unhesitatingly have said that I had a cold in my +head. Being a man, I huddled on a mackintosh, and went out into the +yard. + +My landlord was there on horseback, and with him there was a man +standing at the head of a stout grey animal. I recognised with despair +that I was about to be compelled to buy a horse. + +"Good afternoon, Major," said Mr. Knox in his slow, sing-song brogue; +"it's rather soon to be paying you a visit, but I thought you might be +in a hurry to see the horse I was telling you of." + +I could have laughed. As if I were ever in a hurry to see a horse! I +thanked him, and suggested that it was rather wet for horse-dealing. + +"Oh, it's nothing when you're used to it," replied Mr. Knox. His +gloveless hands were red and wet, the rain ran down his nose, and his +covert coat was soaked to a sodden brown. I thought that I did not +want to become used to it. My relations with horses have been of a +purely military character, I have endured the Sandhurst riding-school, +I have galloped for an impetuous general, I have been steward at +regimental races, but none of these feats have altered my opinion that +the horse, as a means of locomotion, is obsolete. Nevertheless, the +man who accepts a resident magistracy in the south-west of Ireland +voluntarily retires into the prehistoric age; to institute a stable +became inevitable. + +"You ought to throw a leg over him," said Mr. Knox, "and you're welcome +to take him over a fence or two if you like. He's a nice flippant +jumper." + +Even to my unexacting eye the grey horse did not seem to promise +flippancy, nor did I at all desire to find that quality in him. I +explained that I wanted something to drive, and not to ride. + +"Well, that's a fine raking horse in harness," said Mr. Knox, looking +at me with his serious grey eyes, "and you'd drive him with a sop of +hay in his mouth. Bring him up here, Michael." + +Michael abandoned his efforts to kick the grey horse's forelegs into a +becoming position, and led him up to me. + +I regarded him from under my umbrella with a quite unreasonable +disfavour. He had the dreadful beauty of a horse in a toy-shop, as +chubby, as wooden, and as conscientiously dappled, but it was +unreasonable to urge this as an objection, and I was incapable of +finding any more technical drawback. Yielding to circumstance, I +"threw my leg" over the brute, and after pacing gravely round the +quadrangle that formed the yard, and jolting to my entrance gate and +back, I decided that as he had neither fallen down nor kicked me off, +it was worth paying twenty-five pounds for him, if only to get in out +of the rain. + +Mr. Knox accompanied me into the house and had a drink. He was a fair, +spare young man, who looked like a stable boy among gentlemen, and a +gentleman among stable boys. He belonged to a clan that cropped up in +every grade of society in the county, from Sir Valentine Knox of Castle +Knox down to the auctioneer Knox, who bore the attractive title of +Larry the Liar. So far as I could judge, Florence McCarthy of that ilk +occupied a shifting position about midway in the tribe. I had met him +at dinner at Sir Valentine's, I had heard of him at an illicit auction, +held by Larry the Liar, of brandy stolen from a wreck. They were +"Black Protestants," all of them, in virtue of their descent from a +godly soldier of Cromwell, and all were prepared at any moment of the +day or night to sell a horse. + +"You'll be apt to find this place a bit lonesome after the hotel," +remarked Mr. Flurry, sympathetically, as he placed his foot in its +steaming boot on the hob, "but it's a fine sound house anyway, and lots +of rooms in it, though indeed, to tell you the truth, I never was +through the whole of them since the time my great-uncle, Denis +McCarthy, died here. The dear knows I had enough of it that time." He +paused, and lit a cigarette--one of my best, and quite thrown away upon +him. "Those top floors, now," he resumed, "I wouldn't make too free +with them. There's some of them would jump under you like a spring +bed. Many's the night I was in and out of those attics, following my +poor uncle when he had a bad turn on him--the horrors, y' know--there +were nights he never stopped walking through the house. Good Lord! +will I ever forget the morning he said he saw the devil coming up the +avenue! 'Look at the two horns on him,' says he, and he out with his +gun and shot him, and, begad, it was his own donkey!" + +Mr. Knox gave a couple of short laughs. He seldom laughed, having in +unusual perfection, the gravity of manner that is bred by +horse-dealing, probably from the habitual repression of all emotion +save disparagement. + +The autumn evening, grey with rain, was darkening in the tall windows, +and the wind was beginning to make bullying rushes among the shrubs in +the area; a shower of soot rattled down the chimney and fell on the +hearthrug. + +"More rain coming," said Mr. Knox, rising composedly; "you'll have to +put a goose down these chimneys some day soon, it's the only way in the +world to clean them. Well, I'm for the road. You'll come out on the +grey next week, I hope; the hounds'll be meeting here. Give a roar at +him coming in at his jumps." He threw his cigarette into the fire and +extended a hand to me. "Good-bye, Major, you'll see plenty of me and +my hounds before you're done. There's a power of foxes in the +plantations here." + +This was scarcely reassuring for a man who hoped to shoot woodcock, and +I hinted as much. + +"Oh, is it the cock?" said Mr. Flurry; "b'leeve me, there never was a +woodcock yet that minded hounds, now, no more than they'd mind rabbits! +The best shoots ever I had here, the hounds were in it the day before." + +When Mr. Knox had gone, I began to picture myself going across country +roaring, like a man on a fire-engine, while Philippa put the goose down +the chimney; but when I sat down to write to her I did not feel equal +to being humorous about it. I dilated ponderously on my cold, my hard +work, and my loneliness, and eventually went to bed at ten o'clock full +of cold shivers and hot whisky-and-water. + +After a couple of hours of feverish dozing, I began to understand what +had driven Great-Uncle McCarthy to perambulate the house by night. +Mrs. Cadogan had assured me that the Pope of Rome hadn't a betther bed +undher him than myself; wasn't I down on the new flog mattherass the +old masther bought in Father Scanlan's auction? By the smell I +recognised that "flog" meant flock, otherwise I should have said my +couch was stuffed with old boots. I have seldom spent a more wretched +night. The rain drummed with soft fingers on my window panes; the +house was full of noises. I seemed to see Great-Uncle McCarthy ranging +the passages with Flurry at his heels; several times I thought I heard +him. Whisperings seemed borne on the wind through my keyhole, boards +creaked in the room overhead, and once I could have sworn that a hand +passed, groping, over the panels of my door. I am, I may admit, a +believer in ghosts; I even take in a paper that deals with their +culture, but I cannot pretend that on that night I looked forward to a +manifestation of Great-Uncle McCarthy with any enthusiasm. + +The morning broke stormily, and I woke to find Mrs. Cadogan's +understudy, a grimy nephew of about eighteen, standing by my bedside, +with a black bottle in his hand. + +"There's no bath in the house, sir," was his reply to my command; "but +me A'nt said, would ye like a taggeen?" + +This alternative proved to be a glass of raw whisky. I declined it. + +I look back to that first week of housekeeping at Shreelane as to a +comedy excessively badly staged, and striped with lurid melodrama. +Towards its close I was positively home-sick for Mrs. Raverty's, and I +had not a single clean pair of boots. I am not one of those who hold +the convention that in Ireland the rain never ceases, day or night, but +I must say that my first November at Shreelane was composed of weather +of which my friend Flurry Knox remarked that you wouldn't meet a +Christian out of doors, unless it was a snipe or a dispensary doctor. +To this lamentable category might be added a resident magistrate. +Daily, shrouded in mackintosh, I set forth for the Petty Sessions +Courts of my wide district; daily, in the inevitable atmosphere of wet +frieze and perjury, I listened to indictments of old women who plucked +geese alive, of publicans whose hospitality to their friends broke +forth uncontrollably on Sunday afternoons, of "parties" who, in the +language of the police sergeant, were subtly defined as "not to say +dhrunk, but in good fighting thrim." + +I got used to it all in time--I suppose one can get used to anything--I +even became callous to the surprises of Mrs. Cadogan's cooking. As the +weather hardened and the woodcock came in, and one by one I discovered +and nailed up the rat holes, I began to find life endurable, and even +to feel some remote sensation of home-coming when the grey horse turned +in at the gate of Shreelane. + +The one feature of my establishment to which I could not become inured +was the pervading sub-presence of some thing or things which, for my +own convenience, I summarised as Great-Uncle McCarthy. There were +nights on which I was certain that I heard the inebriate shuffle of his +foot overhead, the touch of his fumbling hand against the walls. There +were dark times before the dawn when sounds went to and fro, the moving +of weights, the creaking of doors, a far-away rapping in which was a +workmanlike suggestion of the undertaker, a rumble of wheels on the +avenue. Once I was impelled to the perhaps imprudent measure of +cross-examining Mrs. Cadogan. Mrs. Cadogan, taking the preliminary +precaution of crossing herself, asked me fatefully what day of the week +it was. + +"Friday!" she repeated after me. "Friday! The Lord save us! 'Twas a +Friday the old masther was buried!" + +At this point a saucepan opportunely boiled over, and Mrs. Cadogan fled +with it to the scullery, and was seen no more. + +In the process of time I brought Great-Uncle McCarthy down to a fine +point. On Friday nights he made coffins and drove hearses; during the +rest of the week he rarely did more than patter and shuffle in the +attics over my head. + +One night, about the middle of December, I awoke, suddenly aware that +some noise had fallen like a heavy stone into my dreams. As I felt for +the matches it came again, the long, grudging groan and the +uncompromising bang of the cross door at the head of the kitchen +stairs. I told myself that it was a draught that had done it, but it +was a perfectly still night. Even as I listened, a sound of wheels on +the avenue shook the stillness. The thing was getting past a joke. In +a few minutes I was stealthily groping my way down my own staircase, +with a box of matches in my hand, enforced by scientific curiosity, but +none the less armed with a stick. I stood in the dark at the top of +the back stairs and listened; the snores of Mrs. Cadogan and her nephew +Peter rose tranquilly from their respective lairs. I descended to the +kitchen and lit a candle; there was nothing unusual there, except a +great portion of the Cadogan wearing apparel, which was arranged at the +fire, and was being serenaded by two crickets. Whatever had opened the +door, my household was blameless. The kitchen was not attractive, yet +I felt indisposed to leave it. None the less, it appeared to be my +duty to inspect the yard. I put the candle on the table and went forth +into the outer darkness. Not a sound was to be heard. The night was +very cold, and so dark, that I could scarcely distinguish the roofs of +the stables against the sky; the house loomed tall and oppressive above +me; I was conscious of how lonely it stood in the dumb and barren +country. Spirits were certainly futile creatures, childish in their +manifestations, stupidly content with the old machinery of raps and +rumbles. I thought how fine a scene might be played on a stage like +this; if I were a ghost, how bluely I would glimmer at the windows, how +whimperingly chatter in the wind. Something whirled out of the +darkness above me, and fell with a flop on the ground, just at my feet. +I jumped backwards, in point of fact I made for the kitchen door, and, +with my hand on the latch, stood still and waited. Nothing further +happened; the thing that lay there did not stir. I struck a match. +The moment of tension turned to bathos as the light flickered on +nothing more fateful than a dead crow. + +Dead it certainly was. I could have told that without looking at it; +but why should it, at some considerable period after its death, fall +from the clouds at my feet. But did it fall from the clouds? I struck +another match, and stared up at the impenetrable face of the house. +There was no hint of solution in the dark windows, but I determined to +go up and search the rooms that gave upon the yard. + +How cold it was! I can feel now the frozen musty air of those attics, +with their rat-eaten floors and wall-papers furred with damp. I went +softly from one to another, feeling like a burglar in my own house, and +found nothing in elucidation of the mystery. The windows were +hermetically shut, and sealed with cobwebs. There was no furniture, +except in the end room, where a wardrobe without doors stood in a +corner, empty save for the solemn presence of a monstrous tall hat. I +went back to bed, cursing those powers of darkness that had got me out +of it, and heard no more. + +My landlord had not failed of his promise to visit my coverts with his +hounds; in fact, he fulfilled it rather more conscientiously than +seemed to me quite wholesome for the cock-shooting. I maintained a +silence which I felt to be magnanimous on the part of a man who cared +nothing for hunting and a great deal for shooting, and wished the +hounds more success in the slaughter of my foxes than seemed to be +granted to them. I met them all, one red frosty evening, as I drove +down the long hill to my demesne gates, Flurry at their head, in his +shabby pink coat and dingy breeches, the hounds trailing dejectedly +behind him and his half-dozen companions. + +"What luck?" I called out, drawing rein as I met them. + +"None," said Mr. Flurry briefly. He did not stop, neither did he +remove his pipe from the down-twisted corner of his mouth; his eye at +me was cold and sour. The other members of the hunt passed me with +equal hauteur; I thought they took their ill luck very badly. + +On foot, among the last of the straggling hounds, cracking a carman's +whip, and swearing comprehensively at them all, slouched my friend +Slipper. Our friendship had begun in Court, the relative positions of +the dock and the judgment-seat forming no obstacle to its progress, and +had been cemented during several days' tramping after snipe. He was, +as usual, a little drunk, and he hailed me as though I were a ship. + +"Ahoy, Major Yeates!" he shouted, bringing himself up with a lurch +against my cart; "it's hunting you should be, in place of sending poor +divils to gaol!" + +"But I hear you had no hunting," I said. + +"Ye heard that, did ye?" Slipper rolled upon me an eye like that of a +profligate pug. "Well, begor, ye heard no more than the thruth." + +"But where are all the foxes?" said I. + +"Begor, I don't know no more than your honour. And Shreelane--that +there used to be as many foxes in it as there's crosses in a yard of +check! Well, well, I'll say nothin' for it, only that it's quare! +Here, Vaynus! Naygress!" Slipper uttered a yell, hoarse with whisky, +in adjuration of two elderly ladies of the pack who had profited by our +conversation to stray away into an adjacent cottage. "Well, +good-night, Major. Mr. Flurry's as cross as briars, and he'll have me +ate!" + +He set off at a surprisingly steady run, cracking his whip, and +whooping like a madman. I hope that when I also am fifty I shall be +able to run like Slipper. + +That frosty evening was followed by three others like unto it, and a +flight of woodcock came in. I calculated that I could do with five +guns, and I despatched invitations to shoot and dine on the following +day to four of the local sportsmen, among whom was, of course, my +landlord. I remember that in my letter to the latter I expressed a +facetious hope that my bag of cock would be more successful than his of +foxes had been. + +The answers to my invitations were not what I expected. All, without +so much as a conventional regret, declined my invitation; Mr. Knox +added that he hoped the bag of cock would be to my liking, and that I +need not be "affraid" that the hounds would trouble my coverts any +more. Here was war! I gazed in stupefaction at the crooked scrawl in +which my landlord had declared it. It was wholly and entirely +inexplicable, and instead of going to sleep comfortably over the fire +and my newspaper as a gentleman should, I spent the evening in +irritated ponderings over this bewildering and exasperating change of +front on the part of my friendly squireens. + +My shoot the next day was scarcely a success. I shot the woods in +company with my gamekeeper, Tim Connor, a gentleman whose duties mainly +consisted in limiting the poaching privileges to his personal friends, +and whatever my offence might have been, Mr. Knox could have wished me +no bitterer punishment than hearing the unavailing shouts of "Mark +cock!" and seeing my birds winging their way from the coverts, far out +of shot. Tim Connor and I got ten couple between us; it might have +been thirty if my neighbours had not boycotted me, for what I could +only suppose was the slackness of their hounds. + +I was dog-tired that night, having walked enough for three men, and I +slept the deep, insatiable sleep that I had earned. It was somewhere +about 3 A.M. that I was gradually awakened by a continuous knocking, +interspersed with muffled calls. Great-Uncle McCarthy had never before +given tongue, and I freed one ear from blankets to listen. Then I +remembered that Peter had told me the sweep had promised to arrive that +morning, and to arrive early. Blind with sleep and fury I went to the +passage window, and thence desired the sweep to go to the devil. It +availed me little. For the remainder of the night I could hear him +pacing round the house, trying the windows, banging at the doors, and +calling upon Peter Cadogan as the priests of Baal called upon their +god. At six o'clock I had fallen into a troubled doze, when Mrs. +Cadogan knocked at my door and imparted the information that the sweep +had arrived. My answer need not be recorded, but in spite of it the +door opened, and my housekeeper, in a weird _déshabille_, effectively +lighted by the orange beams of her candle, entered my room. + +"God forgive me, I never seen one I'd hate as much as that sweep!" she +began; "he's these three hours--arrah, what, three hours!--no, but all +night, raising tallywack and tandem round the house to get at the +chimbleys." + +"Well, for Heaven's sake let him get at the chimneys and let me go to +sleep," I answered, goaded to desperation, "and you may tell him from +me that if I hear his voice again I'll shoot him!" + +Mrs. Cadogan silently left my bedside, and as she closed the door she +said to herself, "The Lord save us!" + +Subsequent events may be briefly summarised. At 7.30 I was awakened +anew by a thunderous sound in the chimney, and a brick crashed into the +fireplace, followed at a short interval by two dead jackdaws and their +nests. At eight, I was informed by Peter that there was no hot water, +and that he wished the divil would roast the same sweep. At 9.30, when +I came down to breakfast, there was no fire anywhere, and my coffee, +made in the coachhouse, tasted of soot. I put on an overcoat and +opened my letters. About fourth or fifth in the uninteresting heap +came one in an egregiously disguised hand. + +"Sir," it began, "this is to inform you your unsportsmanlike conduct +has been discovered. You have been suspected this good while of +shooting the Shreelane foxes, it is known now you do worse. Parties +have seen your gamekeeper going regular to meet the Saturday early +train at Salters Hill Station, with your grey horse under a cart, and +your labels on the boxes, and we know as well as _your agent in Cork_ +what it is you have in those boxes. Be warned in time.--Your +Wellwisher." + +I read this through twice before its drift became apparent, and I +realised that I was accused of improving my shooting and my finances by +the simple expedient of selling my foxes. That is to say, I was in a +worse position than if I had stolen a horse, or murdered Mrs. Cadogan, +or got drunk three times a week in Skebawn. + +For a few moments I fell into wild laughter, and then, aware that it +was rather a bad business to let a lie of this kind get a start, I sat +down to demolish the preposterous charge in a letter to Flurry Knox. +Somehow, as I selected my sentences, it was borne in upon me that, if +the letter spoke the truth, circumstantial evidence was rather against +me. Mere lofty repudiation would be unavailing, and by my infernal +facetiousness about the woodcock I had effectively filled in the case +against myself. At all events, the first thing to do was to establish +a basis, and have it out with Tim Connor. I rang the bell. + +"Peter, is Tim Connor about the place?" + +"He is not, sir. I heard him say he was going west the hill to mend +the bounds fence." Peter's face was covered with soot, his eyes were +red, and he coughed ostentatiously. "The sweep's after breaking one of +his brushes within in yer bedroom chimney, sir," he went on, with all +the satisfaction of his class in announcing domestic calamity; "he's +above on the roof now, and he'd be thankful to you to go up to him." + +I followed him upstairs in that state of simmering patience that any +employer of Irish labour must know and sympathise with. I climbed the +rickety ladder and squeezed through the dirty trapdoor involved in the +ascent to the roof, and was confronted by the hideous face of the +sweep, black against the frosty blue sky. He had encamped with all his +paraphernalia on the flat top of the roof, and was good enough to rise +and put his pipe in his pocket on my arrival. + +"Good morning, Major. That's a grand view you have up here," said the +sweep. He was evidently far too well bred to talk shop. "I thravelled +every roof in this counthry, and there isn't one where you'd get as +handsome a prospect!" + +Theoretically he was right, but I had not come up to the roof to +discuss scenery, and demanded brutally why he had sent for me. The +explanation involved a recital of the special genius required to sweep +the Shreelane chimneys; of the fact that the sweep had in infancy been +sent up and down every one of them by Great-Uncle McCarthy; of the +three ass-loads of soot that by his peculiar skill he had this morning +taken from the kitchen chimney; of its present purity, the draught +being such that it would "dhraw up a young cat with it." +Finally--realising that I could endure no more--he explained that my +bedroom chimney had got what he called "a wynd" in it, and he proposed +to climb down a little way in the stack to try "would he get to come at +the brush." The sweep was very small, the chimney very large. I +stipulated that he should have a rope round his waist, and despite the +illegality, I let him go. He went down like a monkey, digging his toes +and fingers into the niches made for the purpose in the old chimney; +Peter held the rope. I lit a cigarette and waited. + +Certainly the view from the roof was worth coming up to look at. It +was rough, heathery country on one side, with a string of little blue +lakes running like a turquoise necklet round the base of a firry hill, +and patches of pale green pasture were set amidst the rocks and +heather. A silvery flash behind the undulations of the hills told +where the Atlantic lay in immense plains of sunlight. I turned to +survey with an owner's eye my own grey woods and straggling plantations +of larch, and espied a man coming out of the western wood. He had +something on his back, and he was walking very fast; a rabbit poacher +no doubt. As he passed out of sight into the back avenue he was +beginning to run. At the same instant I saw on the hill beyond my +western boundaries half-a-dozen horsemen scrambling by zigzag ways down +towards the wood. There was one red coat among them; it came first at +the gap in the fence that Tim Connor had gone out to mend, and with the +others was lost to sight in the covert, from which, in another instant, +came clearly through the frosty air a shout of "Gone to ground!" +Tremendous horn blowings followed, then, all in the same moment, I saw +the hounds break in full cry from the wood, and come stringing over the +grass and up the back avenue towards the yard gate. Were they running +a fresh fox into the stables? + +I do not profess to be a hunting-man, but I am an Irishman, and so, it +is perhaps superfluous to state, is Peter. We forgot the sweep as if +he had never existed, and precipitated ourselves down the ladder, down +the stairs, and out into the yard. One side of the yard is formed by +the coach-house and a long stable, with a range of lofts above them, +planned on the heroic scale in such matters that obtained in Ireland +formerly. These join the house at the corner by the back door. A long +flight of stone steps leads to the lofts, and up these, as Peter and I +emerged from the back door, the hounds were struggling helter-skelter. +Almost simultaneously there was a confused clatter of hoofs in the back +avenue, and Flurry Knox came stooping at a gallop under the archway +followed by three or four other riders. They flung themselves from +their horses and made for the steps of the loft; more hounds pressed, +yelling, on their heels, the din was indescribable, and justified Mrs. +Cadogan's subsequent remark that "when she heard the noise she thought +'twas the end of the world and the divil collecting his own!" + +I jostled in the wake of the party, and found myself in the loft, +wading in hay, and nearly deafened by the clamour that was bandied +about the high roof and walls. At the farther end of the loft the +hounds were raging in the hay, encouraged thereto by the whoops and +screeches of Flurry and his friends. High up in the gable of the loft, +where it joined the main wall of the house, there was a small door, and +I noted with a transient surprise that there was a long ladder leading +up to it. Even as it caught my eye a hound fought his way out of a +drift of hay and began to jump at the ladder, throwing his tongue +vociferously, and even clambering up a few rungs in his excitement. + +"There's the way he's gone!" roared Flurry, striving through hounds and +hay towards the ladder, "Trumpeter has him! What's up there, back of +the door, Major? I don't remember it at all." + +My crimes had evidently been forgotten in the supremacy of the moment. +While I was futilely asserting that had the fox gone up the ladder he +could not possibly have opened the door and shut it after him, even if +the door led anywhere, which, to the best of my belief, it did not, the +door in question opened, and to my amazement the sweep appeared at it. +He gesticulated violently, and over the tumult was heard to asseverate +that there was nothing above there, only a way into the flue, and any +one would be destroyed with the soot---- + +"Ah, go to blazes with your soot!" interrupted Flurry, already half-way +up the ladder. + +I followed him, the other men pressing up behind me. That Trumpeter +had made no mistake was instantly brought home to our noses by the reek +of fox that met us at the door. Instead of a chimney, we found +ourselves in a dilapidated bedroom full of people. Tim Connor was +there, the sweep was there, and a squalid elderly man and woman on whom +I had never set eyes before. There was a large open fireplace, black +with the soot the sweep had brought down with him, and on the table +stood a bottle of my own special Scotch whisky. In one corner of the +room was a pile of broken packing-cases, and beside these on the floor +lay a bag in which something kicked. + +Flurry, looking more uncomfortable and nonplussed than I could have +believed possible, listened in silence to the ceaseless harangue of the +elderly woman. The hounds were yelling like lost spirits in the loft +below, but her voice pierced the uproar like a bagpipe. It was an +unspeakably vulgar voice, yet it was not the voice of a countrywoman, +and there were frowzy remnants of respectability about her general +aspect. + +"And is it you, Flurry Knox, that's calling me a disgrace! Disgrace, +indeed, am I? Me that was your poor mother's own uncle's daughter, and +as good a McCarthy as ever stood in Shreelane!" + +What followed I could not comprehend, owing to the fact that the sweep +kept up a perpetual undercurrent of explanation to me as to how he had +got down the wrong chimney. I noticed that his breath stank of +whisky--Scotch, not the native variety. + + * * * * * + +Never, as long as Flurry Knox lives to blow a horn, will he hear the +last of the day that he ran his mother's first cousin to ground in the +attic. Never, while Mrs. Cadogan can hold a basting spoon, will she +cease to recount how, on the same occasion, she plucked and roasted ten +couple of woodcock in one torrid hour to provide luncheon for the hunt. +In the glory of this achievement her confederacy with the stowaways in +the attic is wholly slurred over, in much the same manner as the +startling outburst of summons for trespass, brought by Tim Connor +during the remainder of the shooting season, obscured the unfortunate +episode of the bagged fox. It was, of course, zeal for my shooting +that induced him to assist Mr. Knox's disreputable relations in the +deportation of my foxes; and I have allowed it to remain at that. + +In fact, the only things not allowed to remain were Mr. and Mrs. +McCarthy Gannon. They, as my landlord informed me, in the midst of +vast apologies, had been permitted to squat at Shreelane until my +tenancy began, and having then ostentatiously and abusively left the +house, they had, with the connivance of the Cadogans, secretly returned +to roost in the corner attic, to sell foxes under the ægis of my name, +and to make inroads on my belongings. They retained connection with +the outer world by means of the ladder and the loft, and with the house +in general, and my whisky in particular, by a door into the other +attics--a door concealed by the wardrobe in which reposed Great-Uncle +McCarthy's tall hat. + +It is with the greatest regret that I relinquish the prospect of +writing a monograph on Great-Uncle McCarthy for a Spiritualistic +Journal, but with the departure of his relations he ceased to manifest +himself, and neither the nailing up of packing-cases, nor the rumble of +the cart that took them to the station, disturbed my sleep for the +future. + +I understand that the task of clearing out the McCarthy Gannon's +effects was of a nature that necessitated two glasses of whisky per +man; and if the remnants of rabbit and jackdaw disinterred in the +process were anything like the crow that was thrown out of the window +at my feet, I do not grudge the restorative. + +As Mrs. Cadogan remarked to the sweep, "A Turk couldn't stand it." + + + + +II +IN THE CURRANHILTY COUNTRY + + +It is hardly credible that I should have been induced to depart from my +usual walk of life by a creature so uninspiring as the grey horse that +I bought from Flurry Knox for £25. + +Perhaps it was the monotony of being questioned by every other person +with whom I had five minutes' conversation, as to when I was coming out +with the hounds, and being further informed that in the days when +Captain Browne, the late Coastguard officer, had owned the grey, there +was not a fence between this and Mallow big enough to please them. At +all events, there came an epoch-making day when I mounted the Quaker +and presented myself at a meet of Mr. Knox's hounds. It is my belief +that six out of every dozen people who go out hunting are disagreeably +conscious of a nervous system, and two out of the six are in what is +brutally called "a blue funk." I was not in a blue funk, but I was +conscious not only of a nervous system, but of the anatomical fact that +I possessed large, round legs, handsome in their way, even admirable in +their proper sphere, but singularly ill adapted for adhering to the +slippery surfaces of a saddle. By a fatal intervention of Providence, +the sport, on this my first day in the hunting-field, was such as I +could have enjoyed from a bath-chair. The hunting-field was, on this +occasion, a relative term, implying long stretches of unfenced moorland +and bog, anything, in fact, save a field, the hunt itself might also +have been termed a relative one, being mainly composed of Mr. Knox's +relations in all degrees of cousinhood. It was a day when frost and +sunshine combined went to one's head like iced champagne; the distant +sea looked like the Mediterranean, and for four sunny hours the Knox +relatives and I followed nine couple of hounds at a tranquil footpace +along the hills, our progress mildly enlivened by one or two scrambles +in the shape of jumps. At three o'clock I jogged home, and felt within +me the newborn desire to brag to Peter Cadogan of the Quaker's doings, +as I dismounted rather stiffly in my own yard. + +I little thought that the result would be that three weeks later I +should find myself in a railway carriage at an early hour of a December +morning, in company with Flurry Knox and four or five of his clan, +journeying towards an unknown town, named Drumcurran, with an +appropriate number of horses in boxes behind us and a van full of +hounds in front. Mr. Knox's hounds were on their way, by invitation, +to have a day in the country of their neighbours, the Curranhilty +Harriers, and with amazing fatuity I had allowed myself to be cajoled +into joining the party. A northerly shower was striking in long spikes +on the glass of the window, the atmosphere of the carriage was blue +with tobacco smoke, and my feet, in a pair of new blucher boots, had +sunk into a species of Arctic sleep. + +"Well, you got my letter about the dance at the hotel to-night?" said +Flurry Knox, breaking off a whispered conversation with his amateur +whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, and sitting down beside me. "And we're to go +out with the Harriers to-day, and they've a sure fox for our hounds +to-morrow. I tell you you'll have the best fun ever you had. It's a +great country to ride. Fine honest banks, that you can come racing at +anywhere you like." + +Dr. Hickey, a saturnine young man, with a long nose and a black torpedo +beard, returned to his pocket the lancet with which he had been +trimming his nails. + +"They're like the Tipperary banks," he said; "you climb down nine feet +and you fall the rest." + +It occurred to me that the Quaker and I would most probably fall all +the way, but I said nothing. + +"I hear Tomsy Flood has a good horse this season," resumed Flurry. + +"Then it's not the one you sold him," said the Doctor. + +"I'll take my oath it's not," said Flurry with a grin. "I believe he +has it in for me still over that one." + +Dr. Jerome's moustache went up under his nose and showed his white +teeth. + +"Small blame to him! when you sold him a mare that was wrong of both +her hind-legs. Do you know what he did, Major Yeates? The mare was +lame going into the fair, and he took the two hind-shoes off her and +told poor Flood she kicked them off in the box, and that was why she +was going tender, and he was so drunk he believed him." + +The conversation here deepened into trackless obscurities of +horse-dealing. I took out my stylograph pen, and finished a letter to +Philippa, with a feeling that it would probably be my last. + +The next step in the day's enjoyment consisted in trotting in cavalcade +through the streets of Drumcurran, with another northerly shower +descending upon us, the mud splashing in my face, and my feet coming +torturingly to life. Every man and boy in the town ran with us; the +Harriers were somewhere in the tumult ahead, and the Quaker began to +pull and hump his back ominously. I arrived at the meet considerably +heated, and found myself one of some thirty or forty riders, who, with +traps and bicycles and footpeople, were jammed in a narrow, muddy road. +We were late, and a move was immediately made across a series of grass +fields, all considerately furnished with gates. There was a glacial +gleam of sunshine and people began to turn down the collars of their +coats. As they spread over the field I observed that Mr. Knox was no +longer riding with old Captain Handcock, the Master of the Harriers, +but had attached himself to a square-shouldered young lady with +effective coils of dark hair and a grey habit. She was riding a +fidgety black mare with great decision and a not disagreeable swagger. + +It was at about this moment that the hounds began to run, fast and +silently, and every one began to canter. + +"This is nothing at all," said Dr. Hickey, thundering alongside of me +on a huge young chestnut; "there might have been a hare here last week, +or a red herring this morning. I wouldn't care if we only got what'd +warm us. For the matter of that, I'd as soon hunt a cat as a hare." + +I was already getting quite enough to warm me. The Quaker's +respectable grey head had twice disappeared between his forelegs in a +brace of most unsettling bucks, and all my experiences at the +riding-school at Sandhurst did not prepare me for the sensation of +jumping a briary wall with a heavy drop into a lane so narrow that each +horse had to turn at right angles as he landed. I did not so turn, but +saved myself from entire disgrace by a timely clutch at the mane. We +scrambled out of the lane over a pile of stones and furze bushes, and +at the end of the next field were confronted by a tall, stone-faced +bank. Everyone, always excepting myself, was riding with that furious +valour which is so conspicuous when neighbouring hunts meet, and the +leading half-dozen charged the obstacle at steeplechase speed. I +caught a glimpse of the young lady in the grey habit, sitting square +and strong as her mare topped the bank, with Flurry and the redoubtable +Mr. Tomsy Flood riding on either hand; I followed in their wake, with a +blind confidence in the Quaker, and none at all in myself. He refused +it. I suppose it was in token of affection and gratitude that I fell +upon his neck; at all events, I had reason to respect his judgment, as, +before I had recovered myself, the hounds were straggling back into the +field by a gap lower down. + +It finally appeared that the hounds could do no more with the line they +had been hunting, and we proceeded to jog interminably, I knew not +whither. During this unpleasant process Flurry Knox bestowed on me +many items of information, chiefly as to the pangs of jealousy he was +inflicting on Mr. Flood by his attentions to the lady in the grey +habit, Miss "Bobbie" Bennett. + +"She'll have all old Handcock's money one of these days--she's his +niece, y' know--and she's a good girl to ride, but she's not as young +as she was ten years ago. You'd be looking at a chicken a long time +before you thought of her! She might take Tomsy some day if she can't +do any better." He stopped and looked at me with a gleam in his eye. +"Come on, and I'll introduce you to her!" + +Before, however, this privilege could be mine, the whole cavalcade was +stopped by a series of distant yells, which apparently conveyed +information to the hunt, though to me they only suggested a Red Indian +scalping his enemy. The yells travelled rapidly nearer, and a young +man with a scarlet face and a long stick sprang upon the fence, and +explained that he and Patsy Lorry were after chasing a hare two miles +down out of the hill above, and ne'er a dog nor a one with them but +themselves, and she was lying, beat out, under a bush, and Patsy Lorry +was minding her until the hounds would come. I had a vision of the +humane Patsy Lorry fanning the hare with his hat, but apparently nobody +else found the fact unusual. The hounds were hurried into the fields, +the hare was again spurred into action, and I was again confronted with +the responsibilities of the chase. After the first five minutes I had +discovered several facts about the Quaker. If the bank was above a +certain height he refused it irrevocably, if it accorded with his ideas +he got his forelegs over and ploughed through the rest of it on his +stifle-joints, or, if a gripe made this inexpedient, he remained poised +on top till the fabric crumbled under his weight. In the case of walls +he butted them down with his knees, or squandered them with his +hind-legs. These operations took time, and the leaders of the hunt +streamed farther and farther away over the crest of a hill, while the +Quaker pursued at the equable gallop of a horse in the Bayeux Tapestry. + +I began to perceive that I had been adopted as a pioneer by a small +band of followers, who, as one of their number candidly explained +"liked to have some one ahead of them to soften the banks," and +accordingly waited respectfully till the Quaker had made the rough +places smooth, and taken the raw edge off the walls. They, in their +turn, showed me alternative routes when the obstacle proved above the +Quaker's limit; thus, in ignoble confederacy, I and the offscourings of +the Curranhilty hunt pursued our way across some four miles of country. +When at length we parted it was with extreme regret on both sides. A +river crossed our course, with boggy banks pitted deep with the +hoof-marks of our forerunners; I suggested it to the Quaker, and +discovered that Nature had not in vain endued him with the hindquarters +of the hippopotamus. I presume the others had jumped it; the Quaker, +with abysmal flounderings, walked through and heaved himself to safety +on the farther bank. It was the dividing of the ways. My friendly +company turned aside as one man, and I was left with the world before +me, and no guide save the hoof-marks in the grass. These presently led +me to a road, on the other side of which was a bank, that was at once +added to the Quaker's black list. The rain had again begun to fall +heavily, and was soaking in about my elbows; I suddenly asked myself +why, in Heaven's name, I should go any farther. No adequate reason +occurred to me, and I turned in what I believed to be the direction of +Drumcurran. + +I rode on for possibly two or three miles without seeing a human being, +until, from the top of a hill I descried a solitary lady rider. I +started in pursuit. The rain kept blurring my eye-glass, but it seemed +to me that the rider was a schoolgirl with hair hanging down her back, +and that her horse was a trifle lame. I pressed on to ask my way, and +discovered that I had been privileged to overtake no less a person than +Miss Bobbie Bennett. + +My question as to the route led to information of a varied character. +Miss Bennett was going that way herself; her mare had given her what +she called "a toss and a half," whereby she had strained her arm and +the mare her shoulder, her habit had been torn, and she had lost all +her hairpins. + +"I'm an awful object," she concluded; "my hair's the plague of my life +out hunting! I declare I wish to goodness I was bald!" + +I struggled to the level of the occasion with an appropriate protest. +She had really very brilliant grey eyes, and her complexion was +undeniable. Philippa has since explained to me that it is a mere male +fallacy that any woman can look well with her hair down her back, but I +have always maintained that Miss Bobbie Bennett, with the rain +glistening on her dark tresses, looked uncommonly well. + +"I shall never get it dry for the dance to-night," she complained. + +"I wish I could help you," said I. + +"Perhaps you've got a hairpin or two about you!" said she, with a +glance that had certainly done great execution before now. + +I disclaimed the possession of any such tokens, but volunteered to go +and look for some at a neighbouring cottage. + +The cottage door was shut, and my knockings were answered by a +stupefied-looking elderly man. Conscious of my own absurdity, I asked +him if he had any hairpins. + +"I didn't see a hare this week!" he responded in a slow bellow. + +"Hairpins!" I roared; "has your wife any hairpins?" + +"She has not." Then, as an after-thought, "She's dead these ten years." + +At this point a young woman emerged from the cottage, and, with many +coy grins, plucked from her own head some half-dozen hairpins, crooked, +and grey with age, but still hairpins, and as such well worth my +shilling. I returned with my spoil to Miss Bennett, only to be +confronted with a fresh difficulty. The arm that she had strained was +too stiff to raise to her head. + +Miss Bobbie turned her handsome eyes upon me. "It's no use," she said +plaintively, "I can't do it!" + +I looked up and down the road; there was no one in sight. I offered to +do it for her. + +Miss Bennett's hair was long, thick, and soft; it was also slippery +with rain. I twisted it conscientiously, as if it were a hay rope, +until Miss Bennett, with an irrepressible shriek, told me it would +break off. I coiled the rope with some success, and proceeded to nail +it to her head with the hairpins. At all the most critical points one, +if not both, of the horses moved; hairpins were driven home into Miss +Bennett's skull, and were with difficulty plucked forth again; in fact, +a more harrowing performance can hardly be imagined, but Miss Bennett +bore it with the heroism of a pin-cushion. + +I was putting the finishing touches to the coiffure when some sound +made me look round, and I beheld at a distance of some fifty yards the +entire hunt approaching us at a foot-pace. I lost my head, and, +instead of continuing my task, I dropped the last hairpin as if it were +red-hot, and kicked the Quaker away to the far side of the road, thus, +if it were possible, giving the position away a shade more generously. + +There were fifteen riders in the group that overtook us, and fourteen +of them, including the Whip, were grinning from ear to ear; the +fifteenth was Mr. Tomsy Flood, and he showed no sign of appreciation. +He shoved his horse past me and up to Miss Bennett, his red moustache +bristling, truculence in every outline of his heavy shoulders. His +green coat was muddy, and his hat had a cave in it. Things had +apparently gone ill with him. + +Flurry's witticisms held out for about two miles and a half; I do not +give them, because they were not amusing, but they all dealt ultimately +with the animosity that I, in common with himself, should henceforth +have to fear from Mr. Flood. + +"Oh, he's a holy terror!" he said conclusively; "he was riding the +tails off the hounds to-day to best me. He was near killing me twice. +We had some words about it, I can tell you. I very near took my whip +to him. Such a bull-rider of a fellow I never saw! He wouldn't so +much as stop to catch Bobbie Bennett's horse when I picked her up, he +was riding so jealous. His own girl, mind you! And such a crumpler as +she got too! I declare she knocked a groan out of the road when she +struck it!" + +"She doesn't seem so much hurt?" I said. + +"Hurt!" said Flurry, flicking casually at a hound. "You couldn't hurt +that one unless you took a hatchet to her!" + +The rain had reached a pitch that put further hunting out of the +question, and we bumped home at that intolerable pace known as a +"hound's jog." I spent the remainder of the afternoon over a fire in +my bedroom in the Royal Hotel, Drumcurran, official letters to write +having mercifully provided me with an excuse for seclusion, while the +bar and the billiard-room hummed below, and the Quaker's three-cornered +gallop wreaked its inevitable revenge upon my person. As this process +continued, and I became proportionately embittered, I asked myself, not +for the first time, what Philippa would say when introduced to my +present circle of acquaintances. + +I have already mentioned that a dance was to take place at the hotel, +given, as far as I could gather, by the leading lights of the +Curranhilty Hunt. A less jocund guest than the wreck who at the +pastoral hour of nine crept stiffly down to "chase the glowing hours +with flying feet" could hardly have been encountered. The dance was +held in the coffee-room, and a conspicuous object outside the door was +a saucer bath full of something that looked like flour. + +"Rub your feet in that," said Flurry; "that's French chalk! They +hadn't time to do the floor, so they hit on this dodge." + +I complied with this encouraging direction, and followed him into the +room. Dancing had already begun, and the first sight that met my eyes +was Miss Bennett, in a yellow dress, waltzing with Mr. Tomsy Flood. +She looked very handsome, and, in spite of her accident, she was +getting round the sticky floor and her still more sticky partner with +the swing of a racing cutter. Her eye caught mine immediately, and +with confidence. Clearly our acquaintance that, in the space of twenty +minutes, had blossomed tropically into hair-dressing, was not to be +allowed to wither. Nor was I myself allowed to wither. Men, known and +unknown, plied me with partners, till my shirt cuff was black with +names, and the number of dances stretched away into the blue distance +of to-morrow morning. The music was supplied by the organist of the +church, who played with religious unction and at the pace of a +processional hymn. I put forth into the mêlée with a junior Bennett, +inferior in calibre to Miss Bobbie, but a strong goer, and, I fear, +made but a sorry début in the eyes of Drumcurran. At every other +moment I bumped into the unforeseen orbits of those who reversed, and +of those who walked their partners backwards down the room with faces +of ineffable supremacy. Being unskilled in these intricacies of an +elder civilisation, the younger Miss Bennett fared but ingloriously at +my hands; the music pounded interminably on, until the heel of Mr. +Flood put a period to our sufferings. + +"The nasty dirty filthy brute!" shrieked the younger Miss Bennett in a +single breath; "he's torn the gown off my back!" + +She whirled me to the cloak-room; we parted, mutually unregretted, at +its door, and by, I fear, common consent, evaded our second dance +together. + +Many, many times during the evening I asked myself why I did not go to +bed. Perhaps it was the remembrance that my bed was situated some ten +feet above the piano in a direct line; but, whatever was the reason, +the night wore on and found me still working my way down my shirt cuff. +I sat out as much as possible, and found my partners to be, as a body, +pretty, talkative, and ill dressed, and during the evening I had many +and varied opportunities of observing the rapid progress of Mr. Knox's +flirtation with Miss Bobbie Bennett. From No. 4 to No. 8 they were +invisible; that they were behind a screen in the commercial-room might +be inferred from Mr. Flood's thundercloud presence in the passage +outside. + +At No. 9 the young lady emerged for one of her dances with me; it was a +barn dance, and particularly trying to my momently stiffening muscles; +but Miss Bobbie, whether in dancing or sitting out, went in for "the +rigour of the game." She was in as hard condition as one of her +uncle's hounds, and for a full fifteen minutes I capered and swooped +beside her, larding the lean earth as I went, and replying but +spasmodically to her even flow of conversation. + +"That'll take the stiffness out of you!" she exclaimed, as the organist +slowed down reverentially to a conclusion. "I had a bet with Flurry +Knox over that dance. He said you weren't up to my weight at the pace!" + +I led her forth to the refreshment table, and was watching with awe her +fearless consumption of claret cup that I would not have touched for a +sovereign, when Flurry, with a partner on his arm, strolled past us. + +"Well, you won the gloves, Miss Bobbie!" he said. "Don't you wish you +may get them!" + +"Gloves without the _g_, Mr. Knox!" replied Miss Bennett, in a voice +loud enough to reach the end of the passage, where Mr. Thomas Flood was +burying his nose in a very brown whisky-and-soda. + +"Your hair's coming down!" retorted Flurry. "Ask Major Yeates if he +can spare you a few hairpins!" + +Swifter than lightning Miss Bennett hurled a macaroon at her retreating +foe, missed him, and subsided laughing on to a sofa. I mopped my brow +and took my seat beside her, wondering how much longer I could live up +to the social exigencies of Drumcurran. + +Miss Bennett, however, proved excellent company. She told me artfully, +and inch by inch, all that Mr. Flood had said to her on the subject of +my hair-dressing; she admitted that she had, as a punishment, cut him +out of three dances and given them to Flurry Knox. When I remarked +that in fairness they should have been given to me, she darted a very +attractive glance at me, and pertinently observed that I had not asked +for them. + + As steals the dawn into a fevered room, + And says "Be of good cheer, the day is born!" + +so did the rumour of supper pass among the chaperons, male and female. +It was obviously due to a sense of the fitness of things that Mrs. +Bennett was apportioned to me, and I found myself in the gratifying +position of heading with her the procession to supper. My impressions +of Mrs. Bennett are few but salient. She wore an apple-green satin +dress and filled it tightly; wisely mistrusting the hotel supper, she +had imported sandwiches and cake in a pocket-handkerchief, and, warmed +by two glasses of sherry, she made me the recipient of the remarkable +confidence that she had but two back teeth in her head, but, thank God, +they met. When, with the other starving men, I fell upon the remains +of the feast, I regretted that I had declined her offer of a sandwich. + +Of the remainder of the evening I am unable to give a detailed account. +Let it not for one instant be imagined that I had looked upon the wine +of the Royal Hotel when it was red, or, indeed, any other colour; as a +matter of fact, I had espied an inconspicuous corner in the entrance +hall, and there I first smoked a cigarette, and subsequently sank into +uneasy sleep. Through my dreams I was aware of the measured pounding +of the piano, of the clatter of glasses at the bar, of wheels in the +street, and then, more clearly, of Flurry's voice assuring Miss Bennett +that if she'd only wait for another dance he'd get the R.M. out of bed +to do her hair for her--then again oblivion. + +At some later period I was dropping down a chasm on the Quaker's back, +and landing with a shock; I was twisting his mane into a chignon, when +he turned round his head and caught my arm in his teeth. I awoke with +the dew of terror on my forehead, to find Miss Bennett leaning over me +in a scarlet cloak with a hood over her head, and shaking me by my coat +sleeve. + +"Major Yeates," she began at once in a hurried whisper, "I want you to +find Flurry Knox, and tell him there's a plan to feed his hounds at six +o'clock this morning so as to spoil their hunting!" + +"How do you know?" I asked, jumping up. + +"My little brother told me. He came in with us to-night to see the +dance, and he was hanging round in the stables, and he heard one of the +men telling another there was a dead mule in an outhouse in Bride's +Alley, all cut up ready to give to Mr. Knox's hounds." + +"But why shouldn't they get it?" I asked in sleepy stupidity. + +"Is it fill them up with an old mule just before they're going out +hunting?" flashed Miss Bennett. "Hurry and tell Mr. Knox; don't let +Tomsy Flood see you telling him--or any one else." + +"Oh, then it's Mr. Flood's game?" I said, grasping the situation at +length. + +"It is," said Miss Bennett, suddenly turning scarlet; "he's a disgrace! +I'm ashamed of him! I'm done with him!" + +I resisted a strong disposition to shake Miss Bennett by the hand. + +"I can't wait," she continued. "I made my mother drive back a +mile--she doesn't know a thing about it--I said I'd left my purse in +the cloak-room. Good-night! Don't tell a soul but Flurry!" + +She was off, and upon my incapable shoulders rested the responsibility +of the enterprise. + +It was past four o'clock, and the last bars of the last waltz were +being played. At the bar a knot of men, with Flurry in their midst, +were tossing "Odd man out" for a bottle of champagne. Flurry was not +in the least drunk, a circumstance worthy of remark in his present +company, and I got him out into the hall and unfolded my tidings. The +light of battle lit in his eye as he listened. + +"I knew by Tomsy he was shaping for mischief," he said coolly; "he's +taken as much liquor as'd stiffen a tinker, and he's only half-drunk +this minute. Hold on till I get Jerome Hickey and Charlie +Knox--they're sober; I'll be back in a minute." + +I was not present at the council of war thus hurriedly convened; I was +merely informed when they returned that we were all to "hurry on." My +best evening pumps have never recovered the subsequent proceedings. +They, with my swelled and aching feet inside them, were raced down one +filthy lane after another, until, somewhere on the outskirts of +Drumcurran, Flurry pushed open the gate of a yard and went in. It was +nearly five o'clock on that raw December morning; low down in the sky a +hazy moon shed a diffused light; all the surrounding houses were still +and dark. At our footsteps an angry bark or two came from inside the +stable. + +"Whisht!" said Flurry, "I'll say a word to them before I open the door." + +At his voice a chorus of hysterical welcome arose; without more delay +he flung open the stable door, and instantly we were all knee-deep in a +rush of hounds. There was not a moment lost. Flurry started at a +quick run out of the yard with the whole pack pattering at his heels. +Charley Knox vanished; Dr. Hickey and I followed the hounds, splashing +into puddles and hobbling over patches of broken stones, till we left +the town behind and hedges arose on either hand. + +"Here's the house!" said Flurry, stopping short at a low entrance gate; +"many's the time I've been here when his father had it; it'll be a +queer thing if I can't find a window I can manage, and the old cook he +has is as deaf as the dead." + +He and Doctor Hickey went in at the gate with the hounds; I hesitated +ignobly in the mud. + +"This isn't an R.M.'s job," said Flurry in a whisper, closing the gate +in my face; "you'd best keep clear of house-breaking." + +I accepted his advice, but I may admit that before I turned for home a +sash was gently raised, a light had sprung up in one of the lower +windows, and I heard Flurry's voice saying, "Over, over, over!" to his +hounds. + +There seemed to me to be no interval at all between these events and +the moment when I woke in bright sunlight to find Dr. Hickey standing +by my bedside in a red coat with a tall glass in his hand. + +"It's nine o'clock," he said. "I'm just after waking Flurry Knox. +There wasn't one stirring in the hotel till I went down and pulled the +'boots' from under the kitchen table! It's well for us the meet's in +the town; and, by-the-bye, your grey horse has four legs on him the +size of bolsters this morning; he won't be fit to go out, I'm afraid. +Drink this anyway, you're in the want of it." + +Dr. Hickey's eyelids were rather pink, but his hand was as steady as a +rock. The whisky-and-soda was singularly untempting. + +"What happened last night?" I asked eagerly as I gulped it. + +"Oh, it all went off very nicely, thank you," said Hickey, twisting his +black beard to a point. "We benched as many of the hounds in Flood's +bed as'd fit, and we shut the lot into the room. We had them just +comfortable when we heard his latchkey below at the door." He broke +off and began to snigger. + +"Well?" I said, sitting bolt upright. + +"Well, he got in at last, and he lit a candle then. That took him five +minutes. He was pretty tight. We were looking at him over the +banisters until he started to come up, and according as he came up, we +went on up the top flight. He stood admiring his candle for a while on +the landing, and we wondered he didn't hear the hounds snuffing under +the door. He opened it then, and, on the minute, three of them bolted +out between his legs." Dr. Hickey again paused to indulge in +Mephistophelian laughter. "Well, you know," he went on, "when a man in +poor Tomsy's condition sees six dogs jumping out of his bed he's apt to +make a wrong diagnosis. He gave a roar, and pitched the candlestick at +them, and ran for his life downstairs, and all the hounds after him. +'Gone away!' screeches that devil Flurry, pelting downstairs on top of +them in the dark. I believe I screeched too." + +"Good heavens!" I gasped, "I was well out of that!" + +"Well, you were," admitted the Doctor. "However, Tomsy bested them in +the dark, and he got to ground in the pantry. I heard the cups and +saucers go as he slammed the door on the hounds' noses, and the minute +he was in Flurry turned the key on him. 'They're real dogs, Tomsy, my +buck!' says Flurry, just to quiet him; and there we left him." + +"Was he hurt?" I asked, conscious of the triviality of the question. + +"Well, he lost his brush," replied Dr. Hickey. "Old Merrylegs tore the +coat-tails off him; we got them on the floor when we struck a light; +Flurry has them to nail on his kennel door. Charley Knox had a +pleasant time too," he went on, "with the man that brought the +barrow-load of meat to the stable. We picked out the tastiest bits and +arranged them round Flood's breakfast table for him. They smelt very +nice. Well, I'm delaying you with my talking----" + +Flurry's hounds had the run of the season that day. I saw it admirably +throughout--from Miss Bennett's pony cart. She drove extremely well, +in spite of her strained arm. + + + + +III +TRINKET'S COLT + + +It was Petty Sessions day in Skebawn, a cold, grey day of February. A +case of trespass had dragged its burden of cross summonses and cross +swearing far into the afternoon, and when I left the bench my head was +singing from the bellowings of the attorneys, and the smell of their +clients was heavy upon my palate. + +The streets still testified to the fact that it was market day, and I +evaded with difficulty the sinuous course of carts full of soddenly +screwed people, and steered an equally devious one for myself among the +groups anchored round the doors of the public-houses. Skebawn +possesses, among its legion of public-houses, one establishment which +timorously, and almost imperceptibly, proffers tea to the thirsty. I +turned in there, as was my custom on court days, and found the little +dingy den, known as the Ladies' Coffee-Room, in the occupancy of my +friend Mr. Florence McCarthy Knox, who was drinking strong tea and +eating buns with serious simplicity. It was a first and quite +unexpected glimpse of that domesticity that has now become a marked +feature in his character. + +"You're the very man I wanted to see," I said as I sat down beside him +at the oilcloth-covered table; "a man I know in England who is not much +of a judge of character has asked me to buy him a four-year-old down +here, and as I should rather be stuck by a friend than a dealer, I wish +you'd take over the job." + +Flurry poured himself out another cup of tea, and dropped three lumps +of sugar into it in silence. + +Finally he said, "There isn't a four-year-old in this country that I'd +be seen dead with at a pig fair." + +This was discouraging, from the premier authority on horse-flesh in the +district. + +"But it isn't six weeks since you told me you had the finest filly in +your stables that was ever foaled in the County Cork," I protested: +"what's wrong with her?" + +"Oh, is it that filly?" said Mr. Knox with a lenient smile; "she's gone +these three weeks from me. I swapped her and £6 for a three-year-old +Ironmonger colt, and after that I swapped the colt and £19 for that +Bandon horse I rode last week at your place, and after that again I +sold the Bandon horse for £75 to old Welply, and I had to give him back +a couple of sovereigns luck-money. You see I did pretty well with the +filly after all." + +"Yes, yes--oh rather," I assented, as one dizzily accepts the +propositions of a bimetallist; "and you don't know of anything +else----?" + +The room in which we were seated was closely screened from the shop by +a door with a muslin-curtained window in it; several of the panes were +broken, and at this juncture two voices that had for some time carried +on a discussion forced themselves upon our attention. + +"Begging your pardon for contradicting you, ma'am," said the voice of +Mrs. McDonald, proprietress of the tea-shop, and a leading light in +Skebawn Dissenting circles, shrilly tremulous with indignation, "if the +servants I recommend you won't stop with you, it's no fault of mine. +If respectable young girls are set picking grass out of your gravel, in +place of their proper work, certainly they will give warning!" + +The voice that replied struck me as being a notable one, well-bred and +imperious. + +"When I take a barefooted slut out of a cabin, I don't expect her to +dictate to me what her duties are!" + +Flurry jerked up his chin in a noiseless laugh. "It's my grandmother!" +he whispered. "I bet you Mrs. McDonald don't get much change out of +her!" + +"If I set her to clean the pig-sty I expect her to obey me," continued +the voice in accents that would have made me clean forty pig-sties had +she desired me to do so. + +"Very well, ma'am," retorted Mrs. McDonald, "if that's the way you +treat your servants, you needn't come here again looking for them. I +consider your conduct is neither that of a lady nor a Christian!" + +"Don't you, indeed?" replied Flurry's grandmother. "Well, your opinion +doesn't greatly distress me, for, to tell you the truth, I don't think +you're much of a judge." + +"Didn't I tell you she'd score?" murmured Flurry, who was by this time +applying his eye to a hole in the muslin curtain. "She's off," he went +on, returning to his tea. "She's a great character! She's +eighty-three if she's a day, and she's as sound on her legs as a +three-year-old! Did you see that old shandrydan of hers in the street +a while ago, and a fellow on the box with a red beard on him like +Robinson Crusoe? That old mare that was on the near side--Trinket her +name is--is mighty near clean bred. I can tell you her foals are worth +a bit of money." + +I had heard of old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas; indeed, I had seldom dined +out in the neighbourhood without hearing some new story of her and her +remarkable ménage, but it had not yet been my privilege to meet her. + +"Well, now," went on Flurry in his slow voice, "I'll tell you a thing +that's just come into my head. My grandmother promised me a foal of +Trinket's the day I was one-and-twenty, and that's five years ago, and +deuce a one I've got from her yet. You never were at Aussolas? No, +you were not. Well, I tell you the place there is like a circus with +horses. She has a couple of score of them running wild in the woods, +like deer." + +"Oh, come," I said, "I'm a bit of a liar myself--" + +"Well, she has a dozen of them anyhow, rattling good colts too, some of +them, but they might as well be donkeys for all the good they are to me +or any one. It's not once in three years she sells one, and there she +has them walking after her for bits of sugar, like a lot of dirty +lapdogs," ended Flurry with disgust. + +"Well, what's your plan? Do you want me to make her a bid for one of +the lapdogs?" + +"I was thinking," replied Flurry, with great deliberation, "that my +birthday's this week, and maybe I could work a four-year-old colt of +Trinket's she has out of her in honour of the occasion." + +"And sell your grandmother's birthday present to me?" + +"Just that, I suppose," answered Flurry with a slow wink. + +A few days afterwards a letter from Mr. Knox informed me that he had +"squared the old lady, and it would be all right about the colt." He +further told me that Mrs. Knox had been good enough to offer me, with +him, a day's snipe shooting on the celebrated Aussolas bogs, and he +proposed to drive me there the following Monday, if convenient. Most +people found it convenient to shoot the Aussolas snipe bog when they +got the chance. Eight o'clock on the following Monday morning saw +Flurry, myself, and a groom packed into a dogcart, with portmanteaus, +gun-cases, and two rampant red setters. + +It was a long drive, twelve miles at least, and a very cold one. We +passed through long tracts of pasture country, fraught, for Flurry, +with memories of runs, which were recorded for me, fence by fence, in +every one of which the biggest dog-fox in the country had gone to +ground, with not two feet--measured accurately on the handle of the +whip--between him and the leading hound; through bogs that +imperceptibly melted into lakes, and finally down and down into a +valley, where the fir-trees of Aussolas clustered darkly round a +glittering lake, and all but hid the grey roofs and pointed gables of +Aussolas Castle. + +"There's a nice stretch of a demesne for you," remarked Flurry, +pointing downwards with the whip, "and one little old woman holding it +all in the heel of her fist. Well able to hold it she is, too, and +always was, and she'll live twenty years yet, if it's only to spite the +whole lot of us, and when all's said and done goodness knows how she'll +leave it!" + +"It strikes me you were lucky to keep her up to her promise about the +colt," I said. + +Flurry administered a composing kick to the ceaseless strivings of the +red setters under the seat. + +"I used to be rather a pet with her," he said, after a pause; "but mind +you, I haven't got him yet, and if she gets any notion I want to sell +him I'll never get him, so say nothing about the business to her." + +The tall gates of Aussolas shrieked on their hinges as they admitted +us, and shut with a clang behind us, in the faces of an old mare and a +couple of young horses, who, foiled in their break for the excitements +of the outer world, turned and galloped defiantly on either side of us. +Flurry's admirable cob hammered on, regardless of all things save his +duty. + +"He's the only one I have that I'd trust myself here with," said his +master, flicking him approvingly with the whip; "there are plenty of +people afraid to come here at all, and when my grandmother goes out +driving she has a boy on the box with a basket full of stones to peg at +them. Talk of the dickens, here she is herself!" + +A short, upright old woman was approaching, preceded by a white woolly +dog with sore eyes and a bark like a tin trumpet; we both got out of +the trap and advanced to meet the lady of the manor. + +I may summarise her attire by saying that she looked as if she had +robbed a scarecrow; her face was small and incongruously refined, the +skinny hand that she extended to me had the grubby tan that bespoke the +professional gardener, and was decorated with a magnificent diamond +ring. On her head was a massive purple velvet bonnet. + +"I am very glad to meet you, Major Yeates," she said with an +old-fashioned precision of utterance; "your grandfather was a dancing +partner of mine in old days at the Castle, when he was a handsome young +aide-de-camp there, and I was----you may judge for yourself what I was." + +She ended with a startling little hoot of laughter, and I was aware +that she quite realised the world's opinion of her, and was indifferent +to it. + +Our way to the bogs took us across Mrs. Knox's home farm, and through a +large field in which several young horses were grazing. + +"There now, that's my fellow," said Flurry, pointing to a fine-looking +colt, "the chestnut with the white diamond on his forehead. He'll run +into three figures before he's done, but we'll not tell that to the old +lady!" + +The famous Aussolas bogs were as full of snipe as usual, and a good +deal fuller of water than any bogs I had ever shot before. I was on my +day, and Flurry was not, and as he is ordinarily an infinitely better +snipe shot than I, I felt at peace with the world and all men as we +walked back, wet through, at five o'clock. + +The sunset had waned, and a big white moon was making the eastern tower +of Aussolas look like a thing in a fairy tale or a play when we arrived +at the hall door. An individual, whom I recognised as the Robinson +Crusoe coachman, admitted us to a hall, the like of which one does not +often see. The walls were panelled with dark oak up to the gallery +that ran round three sides of it, the balusters of the wide staircase +were heavily carved, and blackened portraits of Flurry's ancestors on +the spindle side stared sourly down on their descendant as he tramped +upstairs with the bog mould on his hobnailed boots. + +We had just changed into dry clothes when Robinson Crusoe shoved his +red beard round the corner of the door, with the information that the +mistress said we were to stay for dinner. My heart sank. It was then +barely half-past five. I said something about having no evening +clothes and having to get home early. + +"Sure the dinner'll be in another half-hour," said Robinson Crusoe, +joining hospitably in the conversation; "and as for evening +clothes----God bless ye!" + +The door closed behind him. + +"Never mind," said Flurry, "I dare say you'll be glad enough to eat +another dinner by the time you get home." He laughed. "Poor Slipper!" +he added inconsequently, and only laughed again when I asked for an +explanation. + +Old Mrs. Knox received us in the library, where she was seated by a +roaring turf fire, which lit the room a good deal more effectively than +the pair of candles that stood beside her in tall silver candlesticks. +Ceaseless and implacable growls from under her chair indicated the +presence of the woolly dog. She talked with confounding culture of the +books that rose all round her to the ceiling; her evening dress was +accomplished by means of an additional white shawl, rather dirtier than +its congeners; as I took her in to dinner she quoted Virgil to me, and +in the same breath screeched an objurgation at a being whose matted +head rose suddenly into view from behind an ancient Chinese screen, as +I have seen the head of a Zulu woman peer over a bush. + +Dinner was as incongruous as everything else. Detestable soup in a +splendid old silver tureen that was nearly as dark in hue as Robinson +Crusoe's thumb; a perfect salmon, perfectly cooked, on a chipped +kitchen dish; such cut glass as is not easy to find nowadays; sherry +that, as Flurry subsequently remarked, would burn the shell off an egg; +and a bottle of port, draped in immemorial cobwebs, wan with age, and +probably priceless. Throughout the vicissitudes of the meal Mrs. +Knox's conversation flowed on undismayed, directed sometimes at me--she +had installed me in the position of friend of her youth, and talked to +me as if I were my own grandfather--sometimes at Crusoe, with whom she +had several heated arguments, and sometimes she would make a statement +of remarkable frankness on the subject of her horse-farming affairs to +Flurry, who, very much on his best behaviour, agreed with all she said, +and risked no original remark. As I listened to them both, I +remembered with infinite amusement how he had told me once that "a pet +name she had for him was 'Tony Lumpkin,' and no one but herself knew +what she meant by it." It seemed strange that she made no allusion to +Trinket's colt or to Flurry's birthday, but, mindful of my +instructions, I held my peace. + +As, at about half-past eight, we drove away in the moonlight, Flurry +congratulated me solemnly on my success with his grandmother. He was +good enough to tell me that she would marry me to-morrow if I asked +her, and he wished I would, even if it was only to see what a nice +grandson he'd be for me. A sympathetic giggle behind me told me that +Michael, on the back seat, had heard and relished the jest. + +We had left the gates of Aussolas about half a mile behind when, at the +corner of a by-road, Flurry pulled up. A short squat figure arose from +the black shadow of a furze bush and came out into the moonlight, +swinging its arms like a cabman and cursing audibly. + +"Oh murdher, oh murdher, Misther Flurry! What kept ye at all? 'Twould +perish the crows to be waiting here the way I am these two hours----" + +"Ah, shut your mouth, Slipper!" said Flurry, who, to my surprise, had +turned back the rug and was taking off his driving coat, "I couldn't +help it. Come on, Yeates, we've got to get out here." + +"What for?" I asked, in not unnatural bewilderment. + +"It's all right. I'll tell you as we go along," replied my companion, +who was already turning to follow Slipper up the by-road. "Take the +trap on, Michael, and wait at the River's Cross." He waited for me to +come up with him, and then put his hand on my arm. "You see, Major, +this is the way it is. My grandmother's given me that colt right +enough, but if I waited for her to send him over to me I'd never see a +hair of his tail. So I just thought that as we were over here we might +as well take him back with us, and maybe you'll give us a help with +him; he'll not be altogether too handy for a first go off." + +I was staggered. An infant in arms could scarcely have failed to +discern the fishiness of the transaction, and I begged Mr. Knox not to +put himself to this trouble on my account, as I had no doubt I could +find a horse for my friend elsewhere. Mr. Knox assured me that it was +no trouble at all, quite the contrary, and that, since his grandmother +had given him the colt, he saw no reason why he should not take him +when he wanted him; also, that if I didn't want him he'd be glad enough +to keep him himself; and finally, that I wasn't the chap to go back on +a friend, but I was welcome to drive back to Shreelane with Michael +this minute if I liked. + +Of course I yielded in the end. I told Flurry I should lose my job +over the business, and he said I could then marry his grandmother, and +the discussion was abruptly closed by the necessity of following +Slipper over a locked five-barred gate. + +Our pioneer took us over about half a mile of country, knocking down +stone gaps where practicable and scrambling over tall banks in the +deceptive moonlight. We found ourselves at length in a field with a +shed in one corner of it; in a dim group of farm buildings a little way +off a light was shining. + +"Wait here," said Flurry to me in a whisper; "the less noise the +better. It's an open shed, and we'll just slip in and coax him out." + +Slipper unwound from his waist a halter, and my colleagues glided like +spectres into the shadow of the shed, leaving me to meditate on my +duties as Resident Magistrate, and on the questions that would be asked +in the House by our local member when Slipper had given away the +adventure in his cups. + +In less than a minute three shadows emerged from the shed, where two +had gone in. They had got the colt. + +"He came out as quiet as a calf when he winded the sugar," said Flurry; +"it was well for me I filled my pockets from grandmamma's sugar basin." + +He and Slipper had a rope from each side of the colt's head; they took +him quickly across a field towards a gate. The colt stepped daintily +between them over the moonlit grass; he snorted occasionally, but +appeared on the whole amenable. + +The trouble began later, and was due, as trouble often is, to the +beguilements of a short cut. Against the maturer judgment of Slipper, +Flurry insisted on following a route that he assured us he knew as well +as his own pocket, and the consequence was that in about five minutes I +found myself standing on top of a bank hanging on to a rope, on the +other end of which the colt dangled and danced, while Flurry, with the +other rope, lay prone in the ditch, and Slipper administered to the +bewildered colt's hindquarters such chastisement as could be ventured +on. + +I have no space to narrate in detail the atrocious difficulties and +disasters of the short cut. How the colt set to work to buck, and went +away across a field, dragging the faithful Slipper, literally +_ventre-à-terre_, after him, while I picked myself in ignominy out of a +briar patch, and Flurry cursed himself black in the face. How we were +attacked by ferocious cur dogs, and I lost my eyeglass; and how, as we +neared the River's Cross, Flurry espied the police patrol on the road, +and we all hid behind a rick of turf, while I realised in fulness what +an exceptional ass I was, to have been beguiled into an enterprise that +involved hiding with Slipper from the Royal Irish Constabulary. + +Let it suffice to say that Trinket's infernal offspring was finally +handed over on the high-road to Michael and Slipper, and Flurry drove +me home in a state of mental and physical overthrow. + +I saw nothing of my friend Mr. Knox for the next couple of days, by the +end of which time I had worked up a high polish on my misgivings, and +had determined to tell him that under no circumstances would I have +anything to say to his grandmother's birthday present. It was like my +usual luck that, instead of writing a note to this effect, I thought it +would be good for my liver to walk across the hills to Tory Cottage and +tell Flurry so in person. + +It was a bright, blustery morning, after a muggy day. The feeling of +spring was in the air, the daffodils were already in bud, and crocuses +showed purple in the grass on either side of the avenue. It was only a +couple of miles to Tory Cottage by the way across the hills; I walked +fast, and it was barely twelve o'clock when I saw its pink walls and +clumps of evergreens below me. As I looked down at it the chiming of +Flurry's hounds in the kennels came to me on the wind; I stood still to +listen, and could almost have sworn that I was hearing again the clash +of Magdalen bells, hard at work on May morning. + +The path that I was following led downwards through a larch plantation +to Flurry's back gate. Hot wafts from some hideous caldron at the +other side of a wall apprised me of the vicinity of the kennels and +their cuisine, and the fir-trees round were hung with gruesome and +unknown joints. I thanked Heaven that I was not a master of hounds, +and passed on as quickly as might be to the hall door. + +I rang two or three times without response; then the door opened a +couple of inches and was instantly slammed in my face. I heard the +hurried paddling of bare feet on oilcloth, and a voice, "Hurry, +Bridgie, hurry! There's quality at the door!" + +Bridgie, holding a dirty cap on with one hand, presently arrived and +informed me that she believed Mr. Knox was out about the place. She +seemed perturbed, and she cast scared glances down the drive while +speaking to me. + +I knew enough of Flurry's habits to shape a tolerably direct course for +his whereabouts. He was, as I had expected, in the training paddock, a +field behind the stable-yard, in which he had put up practice jumps for +his horses. It was a good-sized field with clumps of furze in it, and +Flurry was standing near one of these with his hands in his pockets, +singularly unoccupied. I supposed that he was prospecting for a place +to put up another jump. He did not see me coming, and turned with a +start as I spoke to him. There was a queer expression of mingled guilt +and what I can only describe as divilment in his grey eyes as he +greeted me. In my dealings with Flurry Knox, I have since formed the +habit of sitting tight, in a general way, when I see that expression. + +"Well, who's coming next, I wonder!" he said, as he shook hands with +me; "it's not ten minutes since I had two of your d--d peelers here +searching the whole place for my grandmother's colt!" + +"What!" I exclaimed, feeling cold all down my back; "do you mean the +police have got hold of it?" + +"They haven't got hold of the colt anyway," said Flurry, looking +sideways at me from under the peak of his cap, with the glint of the +sun in his eye. "I got word in time before they came." + +"What do you mean?" I demanded; "where is he? For Heaven's sake don't +tell me you've sent the brute over to my place!" + +"It's a good job for you I didn't," replied Flurry, "as the police are +on their way to Shreelane this minute to consult you about it. _You_!" +He gave utterance to one of his short diabolical fits of laughter. +"He's where they'll not find him, anyhow. Ho! ho! It's the funniest +hand I ever played!" + +"Oh yes, it's devilish funny, I've no doubt," I retorted, beginning to +lose my temper, as is the manner of many people when they are +frightened; "but I give you fair warning that if Mrs. Knox asks me any +questions about it, I shall tell her the whole story." + +"All right," responded Flurry; "and when you do, don't forget to tell +her how you flogged the colt out on to the road over her own bounds +ditch." + +"Very well," I said hotly, "I may as well go home and send in my +papers. They'll break me over this----" + +"Ah, hold on, Major," said Flurry soothingly, "it'll be all right. No +one knows anything. It's only on spec the old lady sent the bobbies +here. If you'll keep quiet it'll all blow over." + +"I don't care," I said, struggling hopelessly in the toils; "if I meet +your grandmother, and she asks me about it, I shall tell her all I +know." + +"Please God you'll not meet her! After all, it's not once in a blue +moon that she--" began Flurry. Even as he said the words his face +changed. "Holy fly!" he ejaculated, "isn't that her dog coming into +the field? Look at her bonnet over the wall! Hide, hide for your +life!" He caught me by the shoulder and shoved me down among the furze +bushes before I realised what had happened. + +"Get in there! I'll talk to her." + +I may as well confess that at the mere sight of Mrs. Knox's purple +bonnet my heart had turned to water. In that moment I knew what it +would be like to tell her how I, having eaten her salmon, and capped +her quotations, and drunk her best port, had gone forth and helped to +steal her horse. I abandoned my dignity, my sense of honour; I took +the furze prickles to my breast and wallowed in them. + +Mrs. Knox had advanced with vengeful speed; already she was in high +altercation with Flurry at no great distance from where I lay; varying +sounds of battle reached me, and I gathered that Flurry was not--to put +it mildly--shrinking from that economy of truth that the situation +required. + +"Is it that curby, long-backed brute? You promised him to me long ago, +but I wouldn't be bothered with him!" + +The old lady uttered a laugh of shrill derision. "Is it likely I'd +promise you my best colt? And still more, is it likely that you'd +refuse him if I did?" + +"Very well, ma'am." Flurry's voice was admirably indignant. "Then I +suppose I'm a liar and a thief." + +"I'd be more obliged to you for the information if I hadn't known it +before," responded his grandmother with lightning speed; "if you swore +to me on a stack of Bibles you knew nothing about my colt I wouldn't +believe you! I shall go straight to Major Yeates and ask his advice. +I believe _him_ to be a gentleman, in spite of the company he keeps!" + +I writhed deeper into the furze bushes, and thereby discovered a sandy +rabbit run, along which I crawled, with my cap well over my eyes, and +the furze needles stabbing me through my stockings. The ground shelved +a little, promising profounder concealment, but the bushes were very +thick, and I laid hold of the bare stem of one to help my progress. It +lifted out of the ground in my hand, revealing a freshly-cut stump. +Something snorted, not a yard away; I glared through the opening, and +was confronted by the long, horrified face of Mrs. Knox's colt, +mysteriously on a level with my own. + +Even without the white diamond on his forehead I should have divined +the truth; but how in the name of wonder had Flurry persuaded him to +couch like a woodcock in the heart of a furze brake? For a full minute +I lay as still as death for fear of frightening him, while the voices +of Flurry and his grandmother raged on alarmingly close to me. The +colt snorted, and blew long breaths through his wide nostrils, but he +did not move. I crawled an inch or two nearer, and after a few seconds +of cautious peering I grasped the position. They had buried him. + +A small sandpit among the furze had been utilised as a grave; they had +filled him in up to his withers with sand, and a few furze bushes, +artistically disposed round the pit, had done the rest. As the depth +of Flurry's guile was revealed, laughter came upon me like a flood; I +gurgled and shook apoplectically, and the colt gazed at me with serious +surprise, until a sudden outburst of barking close to my elbow +administered a fresh shock to my tottering nerves. + +Mrs. Knox's woolly dog had tracked me into the furze, and was now +baying the colt and me with mingled terror and indignation. I +addressed him in a whisper, with perfidious endearments, advancing a +crafty hand towards him the while, made a snatch for the back of his +neck, missed it badly, and got him by the ragged fleece of his +hind-quarters as he tried to flee. If I had flayed him alive he could +hardly have uttered a more deafening series of yells, but, like a fool, +instead of letting him go, I dragged him towards me, and tried to +stifle the noise by holding his muzzle. The tussle lasted engrossingly +for a few seconds, and then the climax of the nightmare arrived. + +Mrs. Knox's voice, close behind me, said, "Let go my dog this instant, +sir! Who are you----" + +Her voice faded away, and I knew that she also had seen the colt's head. + +I positively felt sorry for her. At her age there was no knowing what +effect the shock might have on her. I scrambled to my feet and +confronted her. + +"Major Yeates!" she said. There was a deathly pause. "Will you kindly +tell me," said Mrs. Knox slowly, "am I in Bedlam, or are you? And +_what is that_?" + +She pointed to the colt, and that unfortunate animal, recognising the +voice of his mistress, uttered a hoarse and lamentable whinny. Mrs. +Knox felt around her for support, found only furze prickles, gazed +speechlessly at me, and then, to her eternal honour, fell into wild +cackles of laughter. + +So, I may say, did Flurry and I. I embarked on my explanation and +broke down; Flurry followed suit and broke down too. Overwhelming +laughter held us all three, disintegrating our very souls. Mrs. Knox +pulled herself together first. + +"I acquit you, Major Yeates, I acquit you, though appearances are +against you. It's clear enough to me you've fallen among thieves." +She stopped and glowered at Flurry. Her purple bonnet was over one +eye. "I'll thank you, sir," she said, "to dig out that horse before I +leave this place. And when you've dug him out you may keep him. I'll +be no receiver of stolen goods!" + +She broke off and shook her fist at him. "Upon my conscience, Tony, +I'd give a guinea to have thought of it myself!" + + + + +IV +THE WATERS OF STRIFE + + +I knew Bat Callaghan's face long before I was able to put a name to it. +There was seldom a court day in Skebawn that I was not aware of his +level brows and superfluously intense expression somewhere among the +knot of corner-boys who patronised the weekly sittings of the bench of +magistrates. His social position appeared to fluctuate: I have seen +him driving a car; he sometimes held my horse for me--that is to say, +he sat on the counter of a public-house while the Quaker slumbered in +the gutter; and, on one occasion, he retired, at my bidding, to Cork +gaol, there to meditate upon the inadvisability of defending a friend +from the attentions of the police with the tailboard of a cart. + +He next obtained prominence in my regard at a regatta held under the +auspices of "The Sons of Liberty," a local football club that justified +its title by the patriot green of its jerseys and its free +interpretation of the rules of the game. The announcement of my name +on the posters as a patron--a privilege acquired at the cost of a +reluctant half-sovereign--made it incumbent on me to put in an +appearance, even though the festival coincided with my Petty Sessions +day at Skebawn; and at some five of the clock on a brilliant September +afternoon I found myself driving down the stony road that dropped in +zigzags to the borders of the lake on which the races were to come off. + +I believe that the selection of Lough Lonen as the scene of the regatta +was not unconnected with the fact that the secretary of the club owned +a public-house at the cross roads at one end of it; none the less, the +president of the Royal Academy could scarcely have chosen more +picturesque surroundings. A mountain towered steeply up from the +lake's edge, dark with the sad green of beech-trees in September; fir +woods followed the curve of the shore, and leaned far over the +answering darkness of the water; and above the trees rose the toppling +steepnesses of the hill, painted with a purple glow of heather. The +lake was about a mile long, and, tumbling from its farther end, a +fierce and narrow river fled away west to the sea, some four or five +miles off. + +I had not seen a boat race since I was at Oxford, and the words still +called up before my eyes a vision of smart parasols, of gorgeous +barges, of snowy-clad youths, and of low slim outriggers, winged with +the level flight of oars, slitting the water to the sway of the line of +flat backs. Certainly undreamed-of possibilities in aquatics were +revealed to me as I reined in the Quaker on the outskirts of the crowd, +and saw below me the festival of the Sons of Liberty in full swing. +Boats of all shapes and sizes, outrageously overladen, moved about the +lake, with oars flourishing to the strains of concertinas. Black +swarms of people seethed along the water's edge, congesting here and +there round the dingy tents and stalls of green apples; and the club's +celebrated brass band, enthroned in a wagonette, and stimulated by the +presence of a barrel of porter on the box-seat, was belching forth "The +Boys of Wexford," under the guidance of a disreputable ex-militia +drummer, in a series of crashing discords. + +Almost as I arrived a pistol-shot set the echoes clattering round the +lake, and three boats burst out abreast from the throng into the open +water. Two of the crews were in shirt-sleeves, the third wore the +green jerseys of the football club; the boats were of the heavy +sea-going build, and pulled six oars apiece, oars of which the looms +were scarcely narrower than the blades, and were, of the two, but a +shade heavier. None the less the rowers started dauntlessly at +thirty-five strokes a minute, quickening up, incredible as it may seem, +as they rounded the mark boat in the first lap of the two-mile course. +The rowing was, in general style, more akin to the action of beating up +eggs with a fork than to any other form of athletic exercise; but in +its unorthodox way it kicked the heavy boats along at a surprising +pace. The oars squeaked and grunted against the thole-pins, the +coxswains kept up an unceasing flow of oratory, and superfluous little +boys in punts contrived to intervene at all the more critical +turning-points of the race, only evading the flail of the oncoming oars +by performing prodigies of "waggling" with a single oar at the stern. +I took out my watch and counted the strokes when they were passing the +mark boat for the second time; they were pulling a fraction over forty; +one of the shirt-sleeved crews was obviously in trouble, the other, +with humped backs and jerking oars, was holding its own against the +green jerseys amid the blended yells of friends and foes. When for the +last time they rounded the green flag there were but two boats in the +race, and the foul that had been imminent throughout was at length +achieved with a rattle of oars and a storm of curses. They were clear +again in a moment, the shirt-sleeved crew getting away with a distinct +lead, and it was at about this juncture that I became aware that the +coxswains had abandoned their long-handled tillers, and were standing +over their respective "strokes," shoving frantically at their oars, and +maintaining the while a ceaseless bawl of encouragement and defiance. +It looked like a foregone conclusion for the leaders, and the war of +cheers rose to frenzy. The word "cheering," indeed, is but an +euphuism, and in no way expresses the serrated yell, composed of +epithets, advice, and imprecations, that was flung like a live thing at +the oncoming boats. The green jerseys answered to this stimulant with +a wild spurt that drove the bow of their boat within a measurable +distance of their opponents' stroke oar. In another second a +thoroughly successful foul would have been effected, but the cox of the +leading boat proved himself equal to the emergency by unshipping his +tiller, and with it dealing "bow" of the green jerseys such a blow over +the head as effectually dismissed him from the sphere of practical +politics. + +A great roar of laughter greeted this feat of arms, and a voice at my +dogcart's wheel pierced the clamour-- + +"More power to ye, Larry, me owld darlin'!" + +I looked down and saw Bat Callaghan, with shining eyes, and a face +white with excitement, poising himself on one foot on the box of my +wheel in order to get a better view of the race. Almost before I had +time to recognise him, a man in a green jersey caught him round the +legs and jerked him down. Callaghan fell into the throng, recovered +himself in an instant, and rushed, white and dangerous, at his +assailant. The Son of Liberty was no less ready for the fray, and what +is known in Ireland as "the father and mother of a row" was imminent. +Already, however, one of those unequalled judges of the moral +temperature of a crowd, a sergeant of the R.I.C., had quietly +interposed his bulky person between the combatants, and the coming +trouble was averted. + +Elsewhere battle was raging. The race was over, and the committee boat +was hemmed in by the rival crews, supplemented by craft of all kinds. +The "objection" was being lodged, and in its turn objected to, and I +can only liken the process to the screaming warfare of seagulls round a +piece of carrion. The tumult was still at its height when out of its +very heart two four-oared boats broke forth, and a pistol shot +proclaimed that another race had begun, the public interest in which +was specially keen, owing to the fact that the rowers were stalwart +country girls, who made up in energy what they lacked in skill. It was +a short race, once round the mark boat only, and, like a successful +farce, it "went with a roar" from start to finish. Foul after foul, +each followed by a healing interval of calm, during which the crews, +who had all caught crabs, were recovering themselves and their oars, +marked its progress; and when the two boats, locked in an inextricable +embrace, at length passed the winning flag, and the crews, oblivious of +judges and public, fell to untrammelled personal abuse and to doing up +their hair, I decided that I had seen the best of the fun, and prepared +to go home. + +It was, as it happened, the last race of the day, and nothing remained +in the way of excitement save the greased pole with the pig slung in a +bag at the end of it. My final impression of the Lough Lonen Regatta +was of Callaghan's lithe figure, sleek and dripping, against the yellow +sky, as he poised on the swaying pole with the broken gold of the water +beneath him. + +Limited as was my experience of the Southwest of Ireland, I was in no +way surprised to hear on the following afternoon from Peter Cadogan +that there had been "sthrokes" the night before, when the boys were +going home from the regatta, and that the police were searching for one +Jimmy Foley. + +"What do they want him for?" I asked. + +"Sure it's according as a man that was bringing a car of bogwood was +tellin' me, sir," answered Peter, pursuing his occupation of washing +the dogcart with unabated industry; "they say Jimmy's wife went roaring +to the police, saying she could get no account of her husband." + +"I suppose he's beaten some fellow and is hiding," I suggested. + +"Well, that might be, sir," asserted Peter respectfully. He plied his +mop vigorously in intricate places about the springs, which would, I +knew, have never been explored save for my presence. + +"It's what John Hennessy was saying, that he was hard set to get his +horse past Cluin Cross, the way the blood was sthrewn about the road," +resumed Peter; "sure they were fighting like wasps in it half the +night." + +"Who were fighting?" + +"I couldn't say, indeed, sir. Some o' thim low rakish lads from the +town, I suppose," replied Peter with virtuous respectability. + +When Peter Cadogan was quietly and intelligently candid, to pursue an +inquiry was seldom of much avail. + +Next day in Skebawn I met little Murray, the district inspector, very +alert and smart in his rifle-green uniform, going forth to collect +evidence about the fight. He told me that the police were pretty +certain that one of the Sons of Liberty, named Foley, had been +murdered, but, as usual, the difficulty was to get any one to give +information; all that was known was that he was gone, and that his wife +had identified his cap, which had been found, drenched with blood, by +the roadside. Murray gave it as his opinion that the whole business +had arisen out of the row over the disputed race, and that there must +have been a dozen people looking on when the murder was done; but so +far no evidence was forthcoming, and after a day and a night of search +the police had not been able to find the body. + +"No," said Flurry Knox, who had joined us, "and if it was any of those +mountainy men did away with him you might scrape Ireland with a +small-tooth comb and you'll not get him!" + +That evening I smoked an after-dinner cigarette out of doors in the +mild starlight, strolling about the rudimentary paths of what would, I +hoped, some day be Philippa's garden. The bats came stooping at the +red end of my cigarette, and from the covert behind the house I heard +once or twice the delicate bark of a fox. Civilisation seemed a +thousand miles off, as far away as the falling star that had just drawn +a line of pale fire half-way down the northern sky. I had been nearly +a year at Shreelane House by myself now, and the time seemed very long +to me. It was slow work putting by money, even under the austerities +of Mrs. Cadogan's _régime_, and though I had warned Philippa I meant to +marry her after Christmas, there were moments, and this was one of +them, when it seemed an idle threat. + +"Pether!" the strident voice of Mrs. Cadogan intruded upon my +meditations. "Go tell the Major his coffee is waitin' on him!" + +I went gloomily into the house, and, with a resignation born of +adversity, swallowed the mixture of chicory and liquorice which my +housekeeper possessed the secret of distilling from the best and most +expensive coffee. My theory about it was that it added to the illusion +that I had dined, and moreover, that it kept me awake, and I generally +had a good deal of writing to do after dinner. + +Having swallowed it I went downstairs and out past the kitchen regions +to my office, a hideous whitewashed room, in which I interviewed +policemen, and took affidavits, and did most of my official writing. +It had a door that opened into the yard, and a window that looked out +in the other direction, among lanky laurels and scrubby hollies, where +lay the cats' main thoroughfare from the scullery window to the rabbit +holes in the wood. I had a good deal of work to do, and the time +passed quickly. It was Friday night, and from the kitchen at the end +of the passage came the gabbling murmur, in two alternate keys, that I +had learned to recognise as the recital of a litany by my housekeeper +and her nephew Peter. This performance was followed by some of those +dreary and heart-rending yawns that are, I think, peculiar to Irish +kitchens, then such of the cats as had returned from the chase were +loudly shepherded into the back scullery, the kitchen door shut with a +slam, and my retainers retired to repose. + +It was nearly half-an-hour afterwards when I finished the notes I had +been making on an adjourned case of "stroke-hauling" salmon in the +Lonen River. I leaned back in my chair and lighted a cigarette +preparatory to turning in; my thoughts had again wandered on a +sentimental journey across the Irish Channel, when I heard a slight +stir of some kind outside the open window. In the wilds of Ireland no +one troubles themselves about burglars; "more cats," I thought, "I must +shut the window before I go to bed." + +Almost immediately there followed a faint tap on the window, and then a +voice said in a hoarse and hurried whisper, "Them that wants Jim Foley, +let them look in the river!" + +If I had kept my head I should have sat still and encouraged a further +confidence, but unfortunately I acted on the impulse of the natural +man, and was at the window in a jump, knocking down my chair, and +making noise enough to scare a far less shy bird than an Irish +informer. Of course there was no one there. I listened, with every +nerve as taut as a violin string. It was quite dark; there was just +breeze enough to make a rustling in the evergreens, so that a man might +brush through them without being heard; and while I debated on a plan +of action there came from beyond the shrubbery the jar and twang of a +loose strand of wire in the paling by the wood. My informant, whoever +he might be, had vanished into the darkness from which he had come as +irrecoverably as had the falling star that had written its brief +message across the sky, and gone out again into infinity. + +I got up very early next morning and drove to Skebawn to see Murray, +and offer him my mysterious information for what it was worth. +Personally I did not think it worth much, and was disposed to regard it +as a red herring drawn across the trail. Murray, however, was not in a +mood to despise anything that had a suggestion to make, having been out +till nine o'clock the night before without being able to find any clue +to the hiding-place of James Foley. + +"The river's a good mile from the place where the fight was," he said, +straddling his compasses over the Ordnance Survey map, "and there's no +sort of a road they could have taken him along, but a tip like this is +always worth trying. I remember in the Land League time how a man came +one Saturday night to my window and told me there were holes drilled in +the chapel door to shoot a boycotted man through while he was at mass. +The holes were there right enough, and you may be quite sure that chap +found excellent reasons for having family prayers at home next day!" + +I had sessions to attend on the extreme outskirts of my district, and +could not wait, as Murray suggested, to see the thing out. I did not +get home till the following day, and when I arrived I found a letter +from Murray awaiting me. + +"Your pal was right. We found Foley's body in the river, knocking +about against the posts of the weir. The head was wrapped in his own +green jersey, and had been smashed in by a stone. We suspect a fellow +named Bat Callaghan, who has bolted, but there were a lot of them in +it. Possibly it was Callaghan himself who gave you the tip; you never +can tell how superstition is going to take them next. The inquest will +be held to-morrow." + +The coroner's jury took a cautious view of the cause of the +catastrophe, and brought in a verdict of "death by misadventure," and I +presently found it to be my duty to call a magisterial inquiry to +further investigate the matter. A few days before this was to take +place, I was engaged in the delicate task of displaying to my landlord, +Mr. Flurry Knox, the defects of the pantry sink, when Mrs. Cadogan +advanced upon us with the information that the Widow Callaghan from +Cluin would be thankful to speak to me, and had brought me a present of +"a fine young goose." + +"Is she come over here looking for Bat?" said Flurry, withdrawing his +arm and the longest kitchen-ladle from the pipe that he had been +probing; "she knows you're handy at hiding your friends, Mary; maybe +it's he that's stopping the drain!" + +Mrs. Cadogan turned her large red face upon her late employer. + +"God knows I wish yerself was stuck in it, Master Flurry, the way ye'd +hear Pether cursin' the full o' the house when he's striving to wash +the things in that unnatural little trough." + +"Are you sure it's Peter does all the cursing?" retorted Flurry. "I +hear Father Scanlan has it in for you this long time for not going to +confession." + +"And how can I walk two miles to the chapel with God's burden on me +feet?" demanded Mrs. Cadogan in purple indignation; "the Blessed Virgin +and Docthor Hickey knows well the hardship I gets from them. If it +wasn't for a pair of the Major's boots he gave me, I'd be hard set to +thravel the house itself!" + +The contest might have been continued indefinitely, had I not struck up +the swords with a request that Mrs. Callaghan might be sent round to +the hall door. There we found a tall, grey-haired countrywoman waiting +for us at the foot of the steps, in the hooded blue cloak that is +peculiar to the south of Ireland; from the fact that she clutched a +pocket-handkerchief in her right hand I augured a stormy interview, but +nothing could have been more self-restrained and even imposing than the +reverence with which she greeted Flurry and me. + +"Good-morning to your honours," she began, with a dignified and +extremely imminent snuffle. "I ask your pardon for troubling you, +Major Yeates, but I haven't a one in the counthry to give me an adwice, +and I have no confidence only in your honour's experiments." + +"Experience, she means," prompted Flurry. "Didn't you get advice +enough out of Mr. Murray yesterday?" he went on aloud. "I heard he was +at Cluin to see you." + +"And if he was itself, it's little adwantage any one'd get out of that +little whipper-shnapper of a shnap-dhragon!" responded Mrs. Callaghan +tartly; "he was with me for a half-hour giving me every big rock of +English till I had a reel in me head. I declare to ye, Mr. Flurry, +after he had gone out o' the house, ye wouldn't throw three farthings +for me!" + +The pocket-handkerchief was here utilised, after which, with a heavy +groan, Mrs. Callaghan again took up her parable. + +"I towld him first and last I'd lose me life if I had to go into the +coort, and if I did itself sure th' attorneys could rip no more out o' +me than what he did himself." + +"Did you tell him where was Bat?" inquired Flurry casually. + +At this Mrs. Callaghan immediately dissolved into tears. + +"Is it Bat?" she howled. "If the twelve Apostles came down from heaven +asking me where was Bat, I could give them no satisfaction. The divil +a know I know what's happened him. He came home with me sober and +good-natured from the rogatta, and the next morning he axed a fresh egg +for his breakfast, and God forgive me, I wouldn't break the score I was +taking to the hotel, and with that he slapped the cup o' tay into the +fire and went out the door, and I never got a word of him since, good +nor bad. God knows 'tis I got throuble with that poor boy, and he the +only one I have to look to in the world!" + +I cut the matter short by asking her what she wanted me to do for her, +and sifted out from amongst much extraneous detail the fact that she +relied upon my renowned wisdom and clemency to preserve her from being +called as a witness at the coming inquiry. The gift of the goose +served its intended purpose of embarrassing my position, but in spite +of it I broke to the Widow Callaghan my inability to help her. She did +not, of course, believe me, but she was too well-bred to say so. In +Ireland one becomes accustomed to this attitude. + +As it turned out, however, Bat Callaghan's mother had nothing to fear +from the inquiry. She was by turns deaf, imbecile, garrulously candid, +and furiously abusive of Murray's principal witness, a frightened lad +of seventeen, who had sworn to having seen Bat Callaghan and Jimmy +Foley "shaping at one another to fight," at an hour when, according to +Mrs. Callaghan, Bat was "lying sthretched on the beddeen with a sick +shtomach" in consequence of the malignant character of the porter +supplied by the last witness's father. It all ended, as such cases so +often do in Ireland, in complete moral certainty in the minds of all +concerned as to the guilt of the accused, and entire impotence on the +part of the law to prove it. A warrant was issued for the arrest of +Bartholomew Callaghan; and the clans of Callaghan and Foley fought +rather more bloodily than usual, as occasion served; and at intervals +during the next few months Murray used to ask me if my friend the +murderer had dropped in lately, to which I was wont to reply with +condolences on the failure of the R.I.C. to find the Widow Callaghan's +only son for her; and that was about all that came of it. + +Events with which the present story has no concern took me to England +towards the end of the following March. It so happened that my old +regiment, the ----th Fusiliers, was quartered at Whincastle, within a +couple of hours by rail of Philippa's home, where I was staying, and, +since my wedding was now within measurable distance, my former +brothers-in-arms invited me over to dine and sleep, and to receive a +valedictory silver claret jug that they were magnanimous enough to +bestow upon a backslider. I enjoyed the dinner as much as any man can +enjoy his dinner when he knows he has to make a speech at the end of +it; through much and varied conversation I strove, like a nervous +mother who cannot trust her offspring out of her sight, to keep before +my mind's eye the opening sentences that I had composed in the train; I +felt that if I could only "get away" satisfactorily I might trust the +Ayala ('89) to do the rest, and of that fount of inspiration there was +no lack. As it turned out, I got away all right, though the sight of +the double line of expectant faces and red mess jackets nearly +scattered those precious opening sentences, and I am afraid that so far +as the various subsequent points went that I had intended to make, I +stayed away; however, neither Demosthenes, nor a Nationalist member at +a Cork election, could have been listened to with more gratifying +attention, and I sat down, hot and happy, to be confronted with my own +flushed visage, hideously reflected in the glittering paunch of the +claret jug. + +Once safely over the presentation, the evening mellowed into frivolity, +and it was pretty late before I found myself settled down to whist, at +sixpenny points, in the ancient familiar way, while most of the others +fell to playing pool in the billiard-room next door. I have played +whist from my youth up; with the preternatural seriousness of a +subaltern, with the self-assurance of a senior captain, with the +privileged irascibility of a major; and my eighteen months of +abstinence at Shreelane had only whetted my appetite for what I +consider the best of games. After the long lonely evenings there, with +rats for company, and, for relaxation, a "deck" of that specially +demoniacal American variety of patience known as "Fooly Ann," it was +wondrous agreeable to sit again among my fellows, and "lay the longs" +on a severely scientific rubber of whist, as though Mrs. Cadogan and +the Skebawn Bench of Magistrates had never existed. + +We were in the first game of the second rubber, and I was holding a +very nice playing hand; I had early in the game moved forth my trumps +to battle, and I was now in the ineffable position of scoring with the +small cards of my long suit. The cards fell and fell in silence, and +Ballantyne, my partner, raked in the tricks like a machine. The +concentrated quiet of the game was suddenly arrested by a sharp, +unmistakable sound from the barrack yard outside, the snap of a +Lee-Metford rifle. + +"What was that?" exclaimed Moffat, the senior major. + +Before he had finished speaking there was a second shot. + +"By Jove, those were rifle-shots! Perhaps I'd better go and see what's +up," said Ballantyne, who was captain of the week, throwing down his +cards and making a bolt for the door. + +He had hardly got out of the room when the first long high note of the +"assembly" sang out, sudden and clear. We all sprang to our feet, and +as the bugle-call went shrilly on, the other men came pouring in from +the billiard-room, and stampeded to their quarters to get their swords. +At the same moment the mess sergeant appeared at the outer door with a +face as white as his shirt-front. + +"The sentry on the magazine guard has been shot, sir!" he said +excitedly to Moffat. "They say he's dead!" + +We were all out in the barrack square in an instant; it was clear +moonlight, and the square was already alive with hurrying figures +cramming on clothes and caps as they ran to fall in. I was a free +agent these times, and I followed the mess sergeant across the square +towards the distant corner where the magazine stands. As we doubled +round the end of the men's quarters, we nearly ran into a small party +of men who were advancing slowly and heavily in our direction. + +"'Ere he is, sir!" said the mess sergeant, stopping himself abruptly. + +They were carrying the sentry to the hospital. His busby had fallen +off; the moon shone mildly on his pale, convulsed face, and foam and +strange inhuman sounds came from his lips. His head was rolling from +side to side on the arm of one of the men who was carrying him; as it +turned towards me I was struck by something disturbingly familiar in +the face, and I wondered if he had been in my old company. + +"What's his name, sergeant?" I said to the mess sergeant. + +"Private Harris, sir," replied the sergeant; "he's only lately come up +from the depôt, and this was his first time on sentry by himself." + +I went back to the mess, and in process of time the others straggled +in, thirsting for whiskies-and-sodas, and full of such information as +there was to give. Private Harris was not wounded; both the shots had +been fired by him, as was testified by the state of his rifle and the +fact that two of the cartridges were missing from the packet in his +pouch. + +"I hear he was a queer, sulky sort of chap always," said Tomkinson, the +subaltern of the day, "but if he was having a try at suicide he made a +bally bad fist of it." + +"He made as good a fist of it as you did of putting on your sword, +Tommy," remarked Ballantyne, indicating a dangling white strap of +webbing, that hung down like a tail below Mr. Tomkinson's mess jacket. +"Nerves, obviously, in both cases!" + +The exquisite satisfaction afforded by this discovery to Mr. +Tomkinson's brother officers found its natural outlet in a bear fight +that threatened to become more or less general, and in the course of +which I slid away unostentatiously to bed in Ballantyne's quarters, and +took the precaution of barricading my door. + +Next morning, when I got down to breakfast, I found Ballantyne and two +or three others in the mess room, and my first inquiry was for Private +Harris. + +"Oh, the poor chap's dead," said Ballantyne; "it's a very queer +business altogether. I think he must have been wrong in the top +storey. The doctor was with him when he came to out of the fit, or +whatever it was, and O'Reilly--that's the doctor y' know, Irish of +course, and, by the way, poor Harris was an Irishman too--says that he +could only jibber at first, but then he got better, and he got out of +him that when he had been on sentry-go for about half-an-hour, he +happened to look up at the angle of the barrack wall near where it +joins the magazine tower, and saw a face looking at him over it. He +challenged and got no answer, but the face just stuck there staring at +him; he challenged again, and then, as O'Reilly said, he 'just oop with +his royfle and blazed at it.'" Ballantyne was not above the common +English delusion that he could imitate an Irish brogue. + +"Well, what happened then?" + +"Well, according to the poor devil's own story, the face just kept on +looking at him and he had another shot at it, and 'My God Almighty,' he +said to O'Reilly, 'it was there always!' While he was saying that to +O'Reilly he began to chuck another fit, and apparently went on chucking +them till he died a couple of hours ago." + +"One result of it is," said another man, "that they couldn't get a man +to go on sentry there alone last night. I expect we shall have to +double the sentries there every night as long as we're here." + +"Silly asses!" remarked Tomkinson, but he said it without conviction. + +After breakfast we went out to look at the wall by the magazine. It +was about eleven feet high, with a coped top, and they told me there +was a deep and wide dry ditch on the outside. A ladder was brought, +and we examined the angle of the wall at which Harris said the face had +appeared. He had made a beautiful shot, one of his bullets having +flicked a piece off the ridge of the coping exactly at the corner. + +"It's not the kind of shot a man would make if he had been drinking," +said Moffat, regretfully abandoning his first simple hypothesis; "he +must have been mad." + +"I wish I could find out who his people are," said Brownlow, the +adjutant, who had joined us; "they found in his box a letter to him +from his mother, but we can't make out the name of the place. By Jove, +Yeates, you're an Irishman, perhaps you can help us." + +He handed me a letter in a dirty envelope. There was no address given, +the contents were very short, and I may be forgiven if I transcribe +them:-- + + +"My dear Son, I hope you are well as this leaves me at present, thanks +be to God for it. I am very much unaisy about the cow. She swelled up +this morning, she ran in and was frauding and I did not do but to run +up for torn sweeney in the minute. We are thinking it is too much +lairels or an eirub she took. I do not know what I will do with her. +God help one that's alone with himself I had not a days luck since ye +went away. I am thinkin' them that wants ye is tired lookin' for ye. +And so I remain, + +"YOUR FOND MOTHER." + + +"Well, you don't get much of a lead from the cow, do you? And what the +deuce is an eirub?" said Brownlow. + +"It's another way of spelling herb," I said, turning over the envelope +abstractedly. The postmark was almost obliterated, but it struck me it +might be construed into the word Skebawn. + +"Look here," I said suddenly, "let me see Harris. It's just possible I +may know something about him." + +The sentry's body had been laid in the dead-house near the hospital, +and Brownlow fetched the key. It was a grim little whitewashed +building, without windows, save a small one of lancet shape, high up in +one gable, through which a streak of April sunlight fell sharp and +slender on the whitewashed wall. The long figure of the sentry lay +sheeted on a stone slab, and Brownlow, with his cap in his hand, gently +uncovered the face. + +I leaned over and looked at it--at the heavy brows, the short nose, the +small moustache lying black above the pale mouth, the deep-set eyes +sealed in appalling peacefulness. There rose before me the wild dark +face of the young man who had hung on my wheel and yelled encouragement +to the winning coxswain at the Lough Lonen Regatta. + +"I know him," I said, "his name is Callaghan." + + + + +V +LISHEEN RACES, SECOND-HAND + + +It may or may not be agreeable to have attained the age of +thirty-eight, but, judging from old photographs, the privilege of being +nineteen has also its drawbacks. I turned over page after page of an +ancient book in which were enshrined portraits of the friends of my +youth, singly, in David and Jonathan couples, and in groups in which I, +as it seemed to my mature and possibly jaundiced perception, always +contrived to look the most immeasurable young bounder of the lot. Our +faces were fat, and yet I cannot remember ever having been considered +fat in my life; we indulged in low-necked shirts, in "Jemima" ties with +diagonal stripes; we wore coats that seemed three sizes too small, and +trousers that were three sizes too big; we also wore small whiskers. + +I stopped at last at one of the David and Jonathan memorial portraits. +Yes, here was the object of my researches; this stout and earnestly +romantic youth was Leigh Kelway, and that fatuous and chubby young +person seated on the arm of his chair was myself. Leigh Kelway was a +young man ardently believed in by a large circle of admirers, headed by +himself and seconded by me, and for some time after I had left Magdalen +for Sandhurst, I maintained a correspondence with him on large and +abstract subjects. This phase of our friendship did not survive; I +went soldiering to India, and Leigh Kelway took honours and moved +suitably on into politics, as is the duty of an earnest young Radical +with useful family connections and an independent income. Since then I +had at intervals seen in the papers the name of the Honourable Basil +Leigh Kelway mentioned as a speaker at elections, as a writer of +thoughtful articles in the reviews, but we had never met, and nothing +could have been less expected by me than the letter, written from Mrs. +Raverty's Hotel, Skebawn, in which he told me he was making a tour in +Ireland with Lord Waterbury, to whom he was private secretary. Lord +Waterbury was at present having a few days' fishing near Killarney, and +he himself, not being a fisherman, was collecting statistics for his +chief on various points connected with the Liquor Question in Ireland. +He had heard that I was in the neighbourhood, and was kind enough to +add that it would give him much pleasure to meet me again. + +With a stir of the old enthusiasm I wrote begging him to be my guest +for as long as it suited him, and the following afternoon he arrived at +Shreelane. The stout young friend of my youth had changed +considerably. His important nose and slightly prominent teeth +remained, but his wavy hair had withdrawn intellectually from his +temples; his eyes had acquired a statesmanlike absence of expression, +and his neck had grown long and bird-like. It was his first visit to +Ireland, as he lost no time in telling me, and he and his chief had +already collected much valuable information on the subject to which +they had dedicated the Easter recess. He further informed me that he +thought of popularising the subject in a novel, and therefore intended +to, as he put it, "master the brogue" before his return. + +During the next few days I did my best for Leigh Kelway. I turned him +loose on Father Scanlan; I showed him Mohona, our champion village, +that boasts fifteen public-houses out of twenty buildings of sorts and +a railway station; I took him to hear the prosecution of a publican for +selling drink on a Sunday, which gave him an opportunity of studying +perjury as a fine art, and of hearing a lady, on whom police suspicion +justly rested, profoundly summed up by the sergeant as "a woman who had +th' appairance of having knocked at a back door." + +The net result of these experiences has not yet been given to the world +by Leigh Kelway. For my own part, I had at the end of three days +arrived at the conclusion that his society, when combined with a +note-book and a thirst for statistics, was not what I used to find it +at Oxford. I therefore welcomed a suggestion from Mr. Flurry Knox that +we should accompany him to some typical country races, got up by the +farmers at a place called Lisheen, some twelve miles away. It was the +worst road in the district, the races of the most grossly unorthodox +character; in fact, it was the very place for Leigh Kelway to collect +impressions of Irish life, and in any case it was a blessed opportunity +of disposing of him for the day. + +In my guest's attire next morning I discerned an unbending from the +role of cabinet minister towards that of sportsman; the outlines of the +note-book might be traced in his breast pocket, but traversing it was +the strap of a pair of field-glasses, and his light grey suit was smart +enough for Goodwood. + +Flurry was to drive us to the races at one o'clock, and we walked to +Tory Cottage by the short cut over the hill, in the sunny beauty of an +April morning. Up to the present the weather had kept me in a more or +less apologetic condition; any one who has entertained a guest in the +country knows the unjust weight of responsibility that rests on the +shoulders of the host in the matter of climate, and Leigh Kelway, after +two drenchings, had become sarcastically resigned to what I felt he +regarded as my mismanagement. + +Flurry took us into the house for a drink and a biscuit, to keep us +going, as he said, till "we lifted some luncheon out of the Castle Knox +people at the races," and it was while we were thus engaged that the +first disaster of the day occurred. The dining-room door was open, so +also was the window of the little staircase just outside it, and +through the window travelled sounds that told of the close proximity of +the stable-yard; the clattering of hoofs on cobble stones, and voices +uplifted in loud conversation. Suddenly from this region there arose a +screech of the laughter peculiar to kitchen flirtation, followed by the +clank of a bucket, the plunging of a horse, and then an uproar of +wheels and galloping hoofs. An instant afterwards Flurry's chestnut +cob, in a dogcart, dashed at full gallop into view, with the reins +streaming behind him, and two men in hot pursuit. Almost before I had +time to realise what had happened, Flurry jumped through the +half-opened window of the dining-room like a clown at a pantomime, and +joined in the chase; but the cob was resolved to make the most of his +chance, and went away down the drive and out of sight at a pace that +distanced every one save the kennel terrier, who sped in shrieking +ecstasy beside him. + +"Oh merciful hour!" exclaimed a female voice behind me. Leigh Kelway +and I were by this time watching the progress of events from the +gravel, in company with the remainder of Flurry's household. "The +horse is desthroyed! Wasn't that the quare start he took! And all in +the world I done was to slap a bucket of wather at Michael out the +windy, and 'twas himself got it in place of Michael!" + +"Ye'll never ate another bit, Bridgie Dunnigan," replied the cook, with +the exulting pessimism of her kind. "The Master'll have your life!" + +Both speakers shouted at the top of their voices, probably because in +spirit they still followed afar the flight of the cob. + +Leigh Kelway looked serious as we walked on down the drive. I almost +dared to hope that a note on the degrading oppression of Irish +retainers was shaping itself. Before we reached the bend of the drive +the rescue party was returning with the fugitive, all, with the +exception of the kennel terrier, looking extremely gloomy. The cob had +been confronted by a wooden gate, which he had unhesitatingly taken in +his stride, landing on his head on the farther side with the gate and +the cart on top of him, and had arisen with a lame foreleg, a cut on +his nose, and several other minor wounds. + +"You'd think the brute had been fighting the cats, with all the +scratches and scrapes he has on him!" said Flurry, casting a vengeful +eye at Michael, "and one shaft's broken and so is the dashboard. I +haven't another horse in the place; they're all out at grass, and so +there's an end of the races!" + +We all three stood blankly on the hall-door steps and watched the wreck +of the trap being trundled up the avenue. + +"I'm very sorry you're done out of your sport," said Flurry to Leigh +Kelway, in tones of deplorable sincerity; "perhaps, as there's nothing +else to do, you'd like to see the hounds----?" + +I felt for Flurry, but of the two I felt more for Leigh Kelway as he +accepted this alleviation. He disliked dogs, and held the newest views +on sanitation, and I knew what Flurry's kennels could smell like. I +was lighting a precautionary cigarette, when we caught sight of an old +man riding up the drive. Flurry stopped short. + +"Hold on a minute," he said; "here's an old chap that often brings me +horses for the kennels; I must see what he wants." + +The man dismounted and approached Mr. Knox, hat in hand, towing after +him a gaunt and ancient black mare with a big knee. + +"Well, Barrett," began Flurry, surveying the mare with his hands in his +pockets, "I'm not giving the hounds meat this month, or only very +little." + +"Ah, Master Flurry," answered Barrett, "it's you that's pleasant! Is +it give the like o' this one for the dogs to ate! She's a vallyble +strong young mare, no more than shixteen years of age, and ye'd sooner +be lookin' at her goin' under a side-car than eatin' your dinner." + +"There isn't as much meat on her as 'd fatten a jackdaw," said Flurry, +clinking the silver in his pockets as he searched for a matchbox. +"What are you asking for her?" + +The old man drew cautiously up to him. + +"Master Flurry," he said solemnly, "I'll sell her to your honour for +five pounds, and she'll be worth ten after you give her a month's +grass." + +Flurry lit his cigarette; then he said imperturbably, "I'll give you +seven shillings for her." + +Old Barrett put on his hat in silence, and in silence buttoned his coat +and took hold of the stirrup leather. Flurry remained immovable. +"Master Flurry," said old Barrett suddenly, with tears in his voice, +"you must make it eight, sir!" + +"Michael!" called out Flurry with apparent irrelevance, "run up to your +father's and ask him would he lend me a loan of his side-car." + +Half-an-hour later we were, improbable as it may seem, on our way to +Lisheen races. We were seated upon an outside-car of immemorial age, +whose joints seemed to open and close again as it swung in and out of +the ruts, whose tattered cushions stank of rats and mildew, whose +wheels staggered and rocked like the legs of a drunken man. Between +the shafts jogged the latest addition to the kennel larder, the +eight-shilling mare. Flurry sat on one side, and kept her going at a +rate of not less than four miles an hour; Leigh Kelway and I held on to +the other. + +"She'll get us as far as Lynch's anyway," said Flurry, abandoning his +first contention that she could do the whole distance, as he pulled her +on to her legs after her fifteenth stumble, "and he'll lend us some +sort of a horse, if it was only a mule." + +"Do you notice that these cushions are very damp?" said Leigh Kelway to +me, in a hollow undertone. + +"Small blame to them if they are!" replied Flurry. "I've no doubt but +they were out under the rain all day yesterday at Mrs. Hurly's funeral." + +Leigh Kelway made no reply, but he took his note-book out of his pocket +and sat on it. + +We arrived at Lynch's at a little past three, and were there confronted +by the next disappointment of this disastrous day. The door of Lynch's +farmhouse was locked, and nothing replied to our knocking except a +puppy, who barked hysterically from within. + +"All gone to the races," said Flurry philosophically, picking his way +round the manure heap. "No matter, here's the filly in the shed here. +I know he's had her under a car." + +An agitating ten minutes ensued, during which Leigh Kelway and I got +the eight-shilling mare out of the shafts and the harness, and Flurry, +with our inefficient help, crammed the young mare into them. As Flurry +had stated that she had been driven before, I was bound to believe him, +but the difficulty of getting the bit into her mouth was remarkable, +and so also was the crab-like manner in which she sidled out of the +yard, with Flurry and myself at her head, and Leigh Kelway hanging on +to the back of the car to keep it from jamming in the gateway. + +"Sit up on the car now," said Flurry when we got out on to the road; +"I'll lead her on a bit. She's been ploughed anyway; one side of her +mouth's as tough as a gad!" + +Leigh Kelway threw away the wisp of grass with which he had been +cleaning his hands, and mopped his intellectual forehead; he was very +silent. We both mounted the car, and Flurry, with the reins in his +hand, walked beside the filly, who, with her tail clasped in, moved +onward in a succession of short jerks. + +"Oh, she's all right!" said Flurry, beginning to run, and dragging the +filly into a trot; "once she gets started--" Here the filly spied a +pig in a neighbouring field, and despite the fact that she had probably +eaten out of the same trough with it, she gave a violent side spring, +and broke into a gallop. + +"Now we're off!" shouted Flurry, making a jump at the car and +clambering on; "if the traces hold we'll do!" + +The English language is powerless to suggest the view-halloo with which +Mr. Knox ended his speech, or to do more than indicate the rigid +anxiety of Leigh Kelway's face as he regained his balance after the +preliminary jerk, and clutched the back rail. It must be said for +Lynch's filly that she did not kick; she merely fled, like a dog with a +kettle tied to its tail, from the pursuing rattle and jingle behind +her, with the shafts buffeting her dusty sides as the car swung to and +fro. Whenever she showed any signs of slackening, Flurry loosed +another yell at her that renewed her panic, and thus we precariously +covered another two or three miles of our journey. + +Had it not been for a large stone lying on the road, and had the filly +not chosen to swerve so as to bring the wheel on top of it, I dare say +we might have got to the races; but by an unfortunate coincidence both +these things occurred, and when we recovered from the consequent shock, +the tire of one of the wheels had come off, and was trundling with +cumbrous gaiety into the ditch. Flurry stopped the filly and began to +laugh; Leigh Kelway said something startlingly unparliamentary under +his breath. + +"Well, it might be worse," Flurry said consolingly as he lifted the +tire on to the car; "we're not half a mile from a forge." + +We walked that half-mile in funereal procession behind the car; the +glory had departed from the weather, and an ugly wall of cloud was +rising up out of the west to meet the sun; the hills had darkened and +lost colour, and the white bog cotton shivered in a cold wind that +smelt of rain. + +By a miracle the smith was not at the races, owing, as he explained, to +his having "the toothaches," the two facts combined producing in him a +morosity only equalled by that of Leigh Kelway. The smith's sole +comment on the situation was to unharness the filly, and drag her into +the forge, where he tied her up. He then proceeded to whistle +viciously on his fingers in the direction of a cottage, and to command, +in tones of thunder, some unseen creature to bring over a couple of +baskets of turf. The turf arrived in process of time, on a woman's +back, and was arranged in a circle in a yard at the back of the forge. +The tire was bedded in it, and the turf was with difficulty kindled at +different points. + +"Ye'll not get to the races this day," said the smith, yielding to a +sardonic satisfaction; "the turf's wet, and I haven't one to do a +hand's turn for me." He laid the wheel on the ground and lit his pipe. + +Leigh Kelway looked pallidly about him over the spacious empty +landscape of brown mountain slopes patched with golden furze and seamed +with grey walls; I wondered if he were as hungry as I. We sat on +stones opposite the smouldering ring of turf and smoked, and Flurry +beguiled the smith into grim and calumnious confidences about every +horse in the country. After about an hour, during which the turf went +out three times, and the weather became more and more threatening, a +girl with a red petticoat over her head appeared at the gate of the +yard, and said to the smith: + +"The horse is gone away from ye." + +"Where?" exclaimed Flurry, springing to his feet. + +"I met him walking wesht the road there below, and when I thought to +turn him he commenced to gallop." + +"Pulled her head out of the headstall," said Flurry, after a rapid +survey of the forge. "She's near home by now." + +It was at this moment that the rain began; the situation could scarcely +have been better stage-managed. After reviewing the position, Flurry +and I decided that the only thing to do was to walk to a public-house a +couple of miles farther on, feed there if possible, hire a car, and go +home. + +It was an uphill walk, with mild generous raindrops striking thicker +and thicker on our faces; no one talked, and the grey clouds crowded up +from behind the hills like billows of steam. Leigh Kelway bore it all +with egregious resignation. I cannot pretend that I was at heart +sympathetic, but by virtue of being his host I felt responsible for the +breakdown, for his light suit, for everything, and divined his +sentiment of horror at the first sight of the public-house. + +It was a long, low cottage, with a line of dripping elm-trees +overshadowing it; empty cars and carts round its door, and a babel from +within made it evident that the race-goers were pursuing a gradual +homeward route. The shop was crammed with steaming countrymen, whose +loud brawling voices, all talking together, roused my English friend to +his first remark since we had left the forge. + +"Surely, Yeates, we are not going into that place?" he said severely; +"those men are all drunk." + +"Ah, nothing to signify!" said Flurry, plunging in and driving his way +through the throng like a plough. "Here, Mary Kate!" he called to the +girl behind the counter, "tell your mother we want some tea and bread +and butter in the room inside." + +The smell of bad tobacco and spilt porter was choking; we worked our +way through it after him towards the end of the shop, intersecting at +every hand discussions about the races. + +"Tom was very nice. He spared his horse all along, and then he put +into him--" "Well, at Goggin's corner the third horse was before the +second, but he was goin' wake in himself." "I tell ye the mare had the +hind leg fasht in the fore." "Clancy was dipping in the saddle." +"'Twas a dam nice race whatever----" + +We gained the inner room at last, a cheerless apartment, adorned with +sacred pictures, a sewing-machine, and an array of supplementary +tumblers and wineglasses; but, at all events, we had it so far to +ourselves. At intervals during the next half-hour Mary Kate burst in +with cups and plates, cast them on the table and disappeared, but of +food there was no sign. After a further period of starvation and of +listening to the noise in the shop, Flurry made a sortie, and, after +lengthy and unknown adventures, reappeared carrying a huge brown +teapot, and driving before him Mary Kate with the remainder of the +repast. The bread tasted of mice, the butter of turf-smoke, the tea of +brown paper, but we had got past the critical stage. I had entered +upon my third round of bread and butter when the door was flung open, +and my valued acquaintance, Slipper, slightly advanced in liquor, +presented himself to our gaze. His bandy legs sprawled +consequentially, his nose was redder than a coal of fire, his prominent +eyes rolled crookedly upon us, and his left hand swept behind him the +attempt of Mary Kate to frustrate his entrance. + +"Good-evening to my vinerable friend, Mr. Flurry Knox!" he began, in +the voice of a town crier, "and to the Honourable Major Yeates, and the +English gintleman!" + +This impressive opening immediately attracted an audience from the +shop, and the doorway filled with grinning faces as Slipper advanced +farther into the room. + +"Why weren't ye at the races, Mr. Flurry?" he went on, his roving eye +taking a grip of us all at the same time; "sure the Miss Bennetts and +all the ladies was asking where were ye." + +"It'd take some time to tell them that," said Flurry, with his mouth +full; "but what about the races, Slipper? Had you good sport?" + +"Sport is it? Divil so pleasant an afternoon ever you seen," replied +Slipper. He leaned against a side table, and all the glasses on it +jingled. "Does your honour know O'Driscoll?" he went on irrelevantly. +"Sure you do. He was in your honour's stable. It's what we were all +sayin'; it was a great pity your honour was not there, for the likin' +you had to Driscoll." + +"That's thrue," said a voice at the door. + +"There wasn't one in the Barony but was gethered in it, through and +fro," continued Slipper, with a quelling glance at the interrupter; +"and there was tints for sellin' porther, and whisky as pliable as new +milk, and boys gain' round the tints outside, feeling for heads with +the big ends of their blackthorns, and all kinds of recreations, and +the Sons of Liberty's piffler and dhrum band from Skebawn; though +faith! there was more of thim runnin' to look at the races than what +was playin' in it; not to mintion different occasions that the +bandmasther was atin' his lunch within in the whisky tint." + +"But what about Driscoll?" said Flurry. + +"Sure it's about him I'm tellin' ye," replied Slipper, with the +practised orator's watchful eye on his growing audience. "'Twas within +in the same whisky tint meself was, with the bandmasther and a few of +the lads, an' we buyin' a ha'porth o' crackers, when I seen me brave +Driscoll landin' into the tint, and a pair o' thim long boots on him; +him that hadn't a shoe nor a stocking to his foot when your honour had +him picking grass out o' the stones behind in your yard. 'Well,' says +I to meself, 'we'll knock some spoort out of Driscoll!' + +"'Come here to me, acushla!' says I to him; 'I suppose it's some way +wake in the legs y'are,' says I, 'an' the docthor put them on ye the +way the people wouldn't thrample ye!' + +"'May the divil choke ye!' says he, pleasant enough, but I knew by the +blush he had he was vexed. + +"'Then I suppose 'tis a left-tenant colonel y'are,' says I; 'yer mother +must be proud out o' ye!' says I, 'an' maybe ye'll lend her a loan o' +thim waders when she's rinsin' yer bauneen in the river!' says I. + +"'There'll be work out o' this!' says he, lookin' at me both sour and +bitther. + +"'Well indeed, I was thinkin' you were blue moulded for want of a +batin',' says I. He was for fightin' us then, but afther we had him +pacificated with about a quarther of a naggin o' sperrits, he told us +he was goin' ridin' in a race. + +"'An' what'll ye ride?' says I. + +"'Owld Bocock's mare,' says he. + +"'Knipes!' says I, sayin' a great curse; 'is it that little staggeen +from the mountains; sure she's somethin' about the one age with +meself,' says I. 'Many's the time Jamesy Geoghegan and meself used to +be dhrivin' her to Macroom with pigs an' all soorts,' says I; 'an' is +it leppin' stone walls ye want her to go now?' + +"'Faith, there's walls and every vari'ty of obstackle in it,' says he. + +"'It'll be the best o' your play, so,' says I, 'to leg it away home out +o' this.' + +"'An' who'll ride her, so?' says he. + +"'Let the divil ride her,' says I." + +Leigh Kelway, who had been leaning back seemingly half asleep, obeyed +the hypnotism of Slipper's gaze, and opened his eyes. + +"That was now all the conversation that passed between himself and +meself," resumed Slipper, "and there was no great delay afther that +till they said there was a race startin' and the dickens a one at all +was goin' to ride only two, Driscoll, and one Clancy. With that then I +seen Mr. Kinahane, the Petty Sessions clerk, goin' round clearin' the +coorse, an' I gethered a few o' the neighbours, an' we walked the +fields hither and over till we seen the most of th' obstackles. + +"'Stand aisy now by the plantation,' says I; 'if they get to come as +far as this, believe me ye'll see spoort,' says I, 'an' 'twill be a +convanient spot to encourage the mare if she's anyway wake in herself,' +says I, cuttin' somethin' about five foot of an ash sapling out o' the +plantation. + +"'That's yer sort!' says owld Bocock, that was thravellin' the +racecoorse, peggin' a bit o' paper down with a thorn in front of every +lep, the way Driscoll 'd know the handiest place to face her at it. + +"Well, I hadn't barely thrimmed the ash plant----" + +"Have you any jam, Mary Kate?" interrupted Flurry, whose meal had been +in no way interfered with by either the story or the highly-scented +crowd who had come to listen to it. + +"We have no jam, only thraycle, sir," replied the invisible Mary Kate. + +"I hadn't the switch barely thrimmed," repeated Slipper firmly, "when I +heard the people screechin', an' I seen Driscoll an' Clancy comin' on, +leppin' all before them, an' owld Bocock's mare bellusin' an' +powdherin' along, an' bedad! whatever obstackle wouldn't throw _her_ +down, faith, she'd throw _it_ down, an' there's the thraffic they had +in it. + +"'I declare to me sowl,' says I, 'if they continue on this way there's +a great chance some one o' thim 'll win," says I. + +"'Ye lie!' says the bandmasther, bein' a thrifle fulsome after his +luncheon. + +"'I do not,' says I, 'in regard of seein' how soople them two boys is. +Ye might observe,' says I, 'that if they have no convanient way to sit +on the saddle, they'll ride the neck o' the horse till such time as +they gets an occasion to lave it,' says I. + +"'Arrah, shut yer mouth!' says the bandmasther; 'they're puckin' out +this way now, an' may the divil admire me!' says he, 'but Clancy has +the other bet out, and the divil such leatherin' and beltin' of owld +Bocock's mare ever you seen as what's in it!' says he. + +"Well, when I seen them comin' to me, and Driscoll about the length of +the plantation behind Clancy, I let a couple of bawls. + +"'Skelp her, ye big brute!' says I. 'What good's in ye that ye aren't +able to skelp her?'" + +The yell and the histrionic flourish of his stick with which Slipper +delivered this incident brought down the house. Leigh Kelway was +sufficiently moved to ask me in an undertone if "skelp" was a local +term. + +"Well, Mr. Flurry, and gintlemen," recommenced Slipper, "I declare to +ye when owld Bocock's mare heard thim roars she sthretched out her neck +like a gandher, and when she passed me out she give a couple of grunts, +and looked at me as ugly as a Christian. + +"'Hah!' says I, givin' her a couple o' dhraws o' th' ash plant across +the butt o' the tail, the way I wouldn't blind her; 'I'll make ye +grunt!' says I, 'I'll nourish ye!' + +"I knew well she was very frightful of th' ash plant since the winter +Tommeen Sullivan had her under a sidecar. But now, in place of havin' +any obligations to me, ye'd be surprised if ye heard the blaspheemious +expressions of that young boy that was ridin' her; and whether it was +over-anxious he was, turnin' around the way I'd hear him cursin', or +whether it was some slither or slide came to owld Bocock's mare, I +dunno, but she was bet up agin the last obstackle but two, and before +ye could say 'Schnipes,' she was standin' on her two ears beyond in th' +other field! I declare to ye, on the vartue of me oath, she stood that +way till she reconnoithered what side would Driscoll fall, an' she +turned about then and rolled on him as cosy as if he was meadow grass!" + +Slipper stopped short; the people in the doorway groaned +appreciatively; Mary Kate murmured "The Lord save us!" + +"The blood was dhruv out through his nose and ears," continued Slipper, +with a voice that indicated the cream of the narration, "and you'd hear +his bones crackin' on the ground! You'd have pitied the poor boy." + +"Good heavens!" said Leigh Kelway, sitting up very straight in his +chair. + +"Was he hurt, Slipper?" asked Flurry casually. + +"Hurt is it?" echoed Slipper in high scorn; "killed on the spot!" He +paused to relish the effect of the _dénouement_ on Leigh Kelway. "Oh, +divil so pleasant an afthernoon ever you seen; and indeed, Mr. Flurry, +it's what we were all sayin', it was a great pity your honour was not +there for the likin' you had for Driscoll." + +As he spoke the last word there was an outburst of singing and cheering +from a carload of people who had just pulled up at the door. Flurry +listened, leaned back in his chair, and began to laugh. + +"It scarcely strikes one as a comic incident," said Leigh Kelway, very +coldly to me; "in fact, it seems to me that the police ought----" + +"Show me Slipper!" bawled a voice in the shop; "show me that dirty +little undherlooper till I have his blood! Hadn't I the race won only +for he souring the mare on me! What's that you say? I tell ye he did! +He left seven slaps on her with the handle of a hay-rake----" + +There was in the room in which we were sitting a second door, leading +to the back yard, a door consecrated to the unobtrusive visits of +so-called "Sunday travellers." Through it Slipper faded away like a +dream, and, simultaneously, a tall young man, with a face like a +red-hot potato tied up in a bandage, squeezed his way from the shop +into the room. + +"Well, Driscoll," said Flurry, "since it wasn't the teeth of the rake +he left on the mare, you needn't be talking!" + +Leigh Kelway looked from one to the other with a wilder expression in +his eye than I had thought it capable of. I read in it a resolve to +abandon Ireland to her fate. + +At eight o'clock we were still waiting for the car that we had been +assured should be ours directly it returned from the races. At +half-past eight we had adopted the only possible course that remained, +and had accepted the offers of lifts on the laden cars that were +returning to Skebawn, and I presently was gratified by the spectacle of +my friend Leigh Kelway wedged between a roulette table and its +proprietor on one side of a car, with Driscoll and Slipper, +mysteriously reconciled and excessively drunk, seated, locked in each +other's arms, on the other. Flurry and I, somewhat similarly placed, +followed on two other cars. I was scarcely surprised when I was +informed that the melancholy white animal in the shafts of the leading +car was Owld Bocock's much-enduring steeplechaser. + +The night was very dark and stormy, and it is almost superfluous to say +that no one carried lamps; the rain poured upon us, and through wind +and wet Owld Bocock's mare set the pace at a rate that showed she knew +from bitter experience what was expected from her by gentlemen who had +spent the evening in a public-house; behind her the other two tired +horses followed closely, incited to emulation by shouting, singing, and +a liberal allowance of whip. We were a good ten miles from Skebawn, +and never had the road seemed so long. For mile after mile the +half-seen low walls slid past us, with occasional plunges into caverns +of darkness under trees. Sometimes from a wayside cabin a dog would +dash out to bark at us as we rattled by; sometimes our cavalcade swung +aside to pass, with yells and counter-yells, crawling carts filled with +other belated race-goers. + +I was nearly wet through, even though I received considerable shelter +from a Skebawn publican, who slept heavily and irrepressibly on my +shoulder. Driscoll, on the leading car, had struck up an approximation +to the "Wearing of the Green," when a wavering star appeared on the +road ahead of us. It grew momently larger; it came towards us apace. +Flurry, on the car behind me, shouted suddenly-- + +"That's the mail car, with one of the lamps out! Tell those fellows +ahead to look out!" + +But the warning fell on deaf ears. + + "When laws can change the blades of grass + From growing as they grow----" + +howled five discordant voices, oblivious of the towering proximity of +the star. + +A Bianconi mail car is nearly three times the size of an ordinary +outside car, and when on a dark night it advances, Cyclops-like, with +but one eye, it is difficult for even a sober driver to calculate its +bulk. Above the sounds of melody there arose the thunder of heavy +wheels, the splashing trample of three big horses, then a crash and a +turmoil of shouts. Our cars pulled up just in time, and I tore myself +from the embrace of my publican to go to Leigh Kelway's assistance. + +The wing of the Bianconi had caught the wing of the smaller car, +flinging Owld Bocock's mare on her side and throwing her freight +headlong on top of her, the heap being surmounted by the roulette +table. The driver of the mail car unshipped his solitary lamp and +turned it on the disaster. I saw that Flurry had already got hold of +Leigh Kelway by the heels, and was dragging him from under the others. +He struggled up hatless, muddy, and gasping, with Driscoll hanging on +by his neck, still singing the "Wearing of the Green." + +A voice from the mail car said incredulously, "_Leigh Kelway!_" A +spectacled face glared down upon him from under the dripping spikes of +an umbrella. + +It was the Right Honourable the Earl of Waterbury, Leigh Kelway's +chief, returning from his fishing excursion. + +Meanwhile Slipper, in the ditch, did not cease to announce that "Divil +so pleasant an afthernoon ever ye seen as what was in it!" + + + + +VI +PHILIPPA'S FOX-HUNT + + +No one can accuse Philippa and me of having married in haste. As a +matter of fact, it was but little under five years from that autumn +evening on the river when I had said what is called in Ireland "the +hard word," to the day in August when I was led to the altar by my best +man, and was subsequently led away from it by Mrs. Sinclair Yeates. +About two years out of the five had been spent by me at Shreelane in +ceaseless warfare with drains, eaveshoots, chimneys, pumps; all those +fundamentals, in short, that the ingenuous and improving tenant expects +to find established as a basis from which to rise to higher things. As +far as rising to higher things went, frequent ascents to the roof to +search for leaks summed up my achievements; in fact, I suffered so +general a shrinkage of my ideals that the triumph of making the +hall-door bell ring blinded me to the fact that the rat-holes in the +hall floor were nailed up with pieces of tin biscuit boxes, and that +the casual visitor could, instead of leaving a card, have easily +written his name in the damp on the walls. + +Philippa, however, proved adorably callous to these and similar +shortcomings. She regarded Shreelane and its floundering, foundering +ménage of incapables in the light of a gigantic picnic in a foreign +land; she held long conversations daily with Mrs. Cadogan, in order, as +she informed me, to acquire the language; without any ulterior domestic +intention she engaged kitchen-maids because of the beauty of their +eyes, and housemaids because they had such delightfully picturesque old +mothers, and she declined to correct the phraseology of the +parlour-maid, whose painful habit it was to whisper "Do ye choose +cherry or clarry?" when proffering the wine. Fast-days, perhaps, +afforded my wife her first insight into the sterner realities of Irish +housekeeping. Philippa had what are known as High Church proclivities, +and took the matter seriously. + +"I don't know how we are to manage for the servants' dinner to-morrow, +Sinclair," she said, coming in to my office one Thursday morning; +"Julia says she 'promised God this long time that she wouldn't eat an +egg on a fast-day,' and the kitchen-maid says she won't eat herrings +'without they're fried with onions,' and Mrs. Cadogan says she will +'not go to them extremes for servants.'" + +"I should let Mrs. Cadogan settle the menu herself," I suggested. + +"I asked her to do that," replied Philippa, "and she only said she +'thanked God she had no appetite!'" + +The lady of the house here fell away into unseasonable laughter. + +I made the demoralising suggestion that, as we were going away for a +couple of nights, we might safely leave them to fight it out, and the +problem was abandoned. + +Philippa had been much called on by the neighbourhood in all its shades +and grades, and daily she and her trousseau frocks presented themselves +at hall-doors of varying dimensions in due acknowledgment of +civilities. In Ireland, it may be noted, the process known in England +as "summering and wintering" a newcomer does not obtain; sociability +and curiosity alike forbid delay. The visit to which we owed our +escape from the intricacies of the fast-day was to the Knoxes of Castle +Knox, relations in some remote and tribal way of my landlord, Mr. +Flurry of that ilk. It involved a short journey by train, and my +wife's longest basket-trunk; it also, which was more serious, involved +my being lent a horse to go out cubbing the following morning. + +At Castle Knox we sank into an almost forgotten environment of +draught-proof windows and doors, of deep carpets, of silent servants +instead of clattering belligerents. Philippa told me afterwards that +it had only been by an effort that she had restrained herself from +snatching up the train of her wedding-gown as she paced across the wide +hall on little Sir Valentine's arm. After three weeks at Shreelane she +found it difficult to remember that the floor was neither damp nor +dusty. + +I had the good fortune to be of the limited number of those who got on +with Lady Knox, chiefly, I imagine, because I was as a worm before her, +and thankfully permitted her to do all the talking. + +"Your wife is extremely pretty," she pronounced autocratically, +surveying Philippa between the candle-shades; "does she ride?" + +Lady Knox was a short square lady, with a weather-beaten face, and an +eye decisive from long habit of taking her own line across country and +elsewhere. She would have made a very imposing little coachman, and +would have caused her stable helpers to rue the day they had the +presumption to be born; it struck me that Sir Valentine sometimes did +so. + +"I'm glad you like her looks," I replied, "as I fear you will find her +thoroughly despicable otherwise; for one thing, she not only can't +ride, but she believes that I can!" + +"Oh come, you're not as bad as all that!" my hostess was good enough to +say; "I'm going to put you up on Sorcerer to-morrow, and we'll see you +at the top of the hunt--if there is one. That young Knox hasn't a +notion how to draw these woods." + +"Well, the best run we had last year out of this place was with +Flurry's hounds," struck in Miss Sally, sole daughter of Sir +Valentine's house and home, from her place half-way down the table. It +was not difficult to see that she and her mother held different views +on the subject of Mr. Flurry Knox. + +"I call it a criminal thing in any one's great-great-grandfather to +rear up a preposterous troop of sons and plant them all out in his own +country," Lady Knox said to me with apparent irrelevance. "I detest +collaterals. Blood may be thicker than water, but it is also a great +deal nastier. In this country I find that fifteenth cousins consider +themselves near relations if they live within twenty miles of one!" + +Having before now taken in the position with regard to Flurry Knox, I +took care to accept these remarks as generalities, and turned the +conversation to other themes. + +"I see Mrs. Yeates is doing wonders with Mr. Hamilton," said Lady Knox +presently, following the direction of my eyes, which had strayed away +to where Philippa was beaming upon her left-hand neighbour, a +mildewed-looking old clergyman, who was delivering a long dissertation, +the purport of which we were happily unable to catch. + +"She has always had a gift for the Church," I said. + +"Not curates?" said Lady Knox, in her deep voice. + +I made haste to reply that it was the elders of the Church who were +venerated by my wife. + +"Well, she has her fancy in old Eustace Hamilton; he's elderly enough!" +said Lady Knox. "I wonder if she'd venerate him as much if she knew +that he had fought with his sister-in-law, and they haven't spoken for +thirty years! though for the matter of that," she added, "I think it +shows his good sense!" + +"Mrs. Knox is rather a friend of mine," I ventured. + +"Is she? H'm! Well, she's not one of mine!" replied my hostess, with +her usual definiteness. "I'll say one thing for her, I believe she's +always been a sportswoman. She's very rich, you know, and they say she +only married old Badger Knox to save his hounds from being sold to pay +his debts, and then she took the horn from him and hunted them herself. +Has she been rude to your wife yet? No? Oh, well, she will. It's a +mere question of time. She hates all English people. You know the +story they tell of her? She was coming home from London, and when she +was getting her ticket the man asked if she had said a ticket for York. +'No, thank God, Cork!' says Mrs. Knox." + +"Well, I rather agree with her!" said I; "but why did she fight with +Mr. Hamilton?" + +"Oh, nobody knows. I don't believe they know themselves! Whatever it +was, the old lady drives five miles to Fortwilliam every Sunday, rather +than go to his church, just outside her own back gates," Lady Knox said +with a laugh like a terrier's bark. "I wish I'd fought with him +myself," she said; "he gives us forty minutes every Sunday." + +As I struggled into my boots the following morning, I felt that Sir +Valentine's acid confidences on cub-hunting, bestowed on me at +midnight, did credit to his judgment. "A very moderate amusement, my +dear Major," he had said, in his dry little voice; "you should stick to +shooting. No one expects you to shoot before daybreak." + +It was six o'clock as I crept downstairs, and found Lady Knox and Miss +Sally at breakfast, with two lamps on the table, and a foggy daylight +oozing in from under the half-raised blinds. Philippa was already in +the hall, pumping up her bicycle, in a state of excitement at the +prospect of her first experience of hunting that would have been more +comprehensible to me had she been going to ride a strange horse, as I +was. As I bolted my food I saw the horses being led past the windows, +and a faint twang of a horn told that Flurry Knox and his hounds were +not far off. + +Miss Sally jumped up. + +"If I'm not on the Cockatoo before the hounds come up, I shall never +get there!" she said, hobbling out of the room in the toils of her +safety habit. Her small, alert face looked very childish under her +riding-hat; the lamp-light struck sparks out of her thick coil of +golden-red hair: I wondered how I had ever thought her like her prim +little father. + +She was already on her white cob when I got to the hall-door, and +Flurry Knox was riding over the glistening wet grass with his hounds, +while his whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, was having a stirring time with the +young entry and the rabbit-holes. They moved on without stopping, up a +back avenue, under tall and dripping trees, to a thick laurel covert, +at some little distance from the house. Into this the hounds were +thrown, and the usual period of fidgety inaction set in for the riders, +of whom, all told, there were about half-a-dozen. Lady Knox, square +and solid, on her big, confidential iron-grey, was near me, and her +eyes were on me and my mount; with her rubicund face and white collar +she was more than ever like a coachman. + +"Sorcerer looks as if he suited you well," she said, after a few +minutes of silence, during which the hounds rustled and crackled +steadily through the laurels; "he's a little high on the leg, and so +are you, you know, so you show each other off." + +Sorcerer was standing like a rock, with his good-looking head in the +air and his eyes fastened on the covert. His manners, so far, had been +those of a perfect gentleman, and were in marked contrast to those of +Miss Sally's cob, who was sidling, hopping, and snatching unappeasably +at his bit. Philippa had disappeared from view down the avenue ahead. +The fog was melting, and the sun threw long blades of light through the +trees; everything was quiet, and in the distance the curtained windows +of the house marked the warm repose of Sir Valentine, and those of the +party who shared his opinion of cubbing. + +"Hark! hark to cry there!" + +It was Flurry's voice, away at the other side of the covert. The +rustling and brushing through the laurels became more vehement, then +passed out of hearing. + +"He never will leave his hounds alone," said Lady Knox disapprovingly. + +Miss Sally and the Cockatoo moved away in a series of heraldic capers +towards the end of the laurel plantation, and at the same moment I saw +Philippa on her bicycle shoot into view on the drive ahead of us. + +"I've seen a fox!" she screamed, white with what I believe to have been +personal terror, though she says it was excitement; "it passed quite +close to me!" + +"What way did he go?" bellowed a voice which I recognised as Dr. +Hickey's, somewhere in the deep of the laurels. + +"Down the drive!" returned Philippa, with a pea-hen quality in her +tones with which I was quite unacquainted. + +An electrifying screech of "Gone away!" was projected from the laurels +by Dr. Hickey. + +"Gone away!" chanted Flurry's horn at the top of the covert. + +"This is what he calls cubbing!" said Lady Knox, "a mere farce!" but +none the less she loosed her sedate monster into a canter. + +Sorcerer got his hind-legs under him, and hardened his crest against +the bit, as we all hustled along the drive after the flying figure of +my wife. I knew very little about horses, but I realised that even +with the hounds tumbling hysterically out of the covert, and the +Cockatoo kicking the gravel into his face, Sorcerer comported himself +with the manners of the best society. Up a side road I saw Flurry Knox +opening half of a gate and cramming through it; in a moment we also had +crammed through, and the turf of a pasture field was under our feet. +Dr. Hickey leaned forward and took hold of his horse; I did likewise, +with the trifling difference that my horse took hold of me, and I +steered for Flurry Knox with single-hearted purpose, the hounds, +already a field ahead, being merely an exciting and noisy accompaniment +of this endeavour. A heavy stone wall was the first occurrence of +note. Flurry chose a place where the top was loose, and his +clumsy-looking brown mare changed feet on the rattling stones like a +fairy. Sorcerer came at it, tense and collected as a bow at full +stretch, and sailed steeply into the air; I saw the wall far beneath +me, with an unsuspected ditch on the far side, and I felt my hat +following me at the full stretch of its guard as we swept over it, +then, with a long slant, we descended to earth some sixteen feet from +where we had left it, and I was possessor of the gratifying fact that I +had achieved a good-sized "fly," and had not perceptibly moved in my +saddle. Subsequent disillusioning experience has taught me that but +few horses jump like Sorcerer, so gallantly, so sympathetically, and +with such supreme mastery of the subject; but none the less the +enthusiasm that he imparted to me has never been extinguished, and that +October morning ride revealed to me the unsuspected intoxication of +fox-hunting. + +Behind me I heard the scrabbling of the Cockatoo's little hoofs among +the loose stones, and Lady Knox, galloping on my left, jerked a +maternal chin over her shoulder to mark her daughter's progress. For +my part, had there been an entire circus behind me, I was far too much +occupied with ramming on my hat and trying to hold Sorcerer, to have +looked round, and all my spare faculties were devoted to steering for +Flurry, who had taken a right-handed turn, and was at that moment +surmounting a bank of uncertain and briary aspect. I surmounted it +also, with the swiftness and simplicity for which the Quaker's methods +of bank jumping had not prepared me, and two or three fields, traversed +at the same steeplechase pace, brought us to a road and to an abrupt +check. There, suddenly, were the hounds, scrambling in baffled silence +down into the road from the opposite bank, to look for the line they +had overrun, and there, amazingly, was Philippa, engaged in excited +converse with several men with spades over their shoulders. + +"Did ye see the fox, boys?" shouted Flurry, addressing the group. + +"We did! we did!" cried my wife and her friends in chorus; "he ran up +the road!" + +"We'd be badly off without Mrs. Yeates!" said Flurry, as he whirled his +mare round and clattered up the road with a hustle of hounds after him. + +It occurred to me as forcibly as any mere earthly thing can occur to +those who are wrapped in the sublimities of a run, that, for a young +woman who had never before seen a fox out of a cage at the Zoo, +Philippa was taking to hunting very kindly. Her cheeks were a most +brilliant pink, her blue eyes shone. + +"Oh, Sinclair!" she exclaimed, "they say he's going for Aussolas, and +there's a road I can ride all the way!" + +"Ye can, Miss! Sure we'll show you!" chorussed her cortège. + +Her foot was on the pedal ready to mount. Decidedly my wife was in no +need of assistance from me. + +Up the road a hound gave a yelp of discovery, and flung himself over a +stile into the fields; the rest of the pack went squealing and jostling +after him, and I followed Flurry over one of those infinitely varied +erections, pleasantly termed "gaps" in Ireland. On this occasion the +gap was made of three razor-edged slabs of slate leaning against an +iron bar, and Sorcerer conveyed to me his thorough knowledge of the +matter by a lift of his hind-quarters that made me feel as if I were +being skilfully kicked downstairs. To what extent I looked it, I +cannot say, nor providentially can Philippa, as she had already +started. I only know that undeserved good luck restored to me my +stirrup before Sorcerer got away with me in the next field. + +What followed was, I am told, a very fast fifteen minutes; for me time +was not; the empty fields rushed past uncounted, fences came and went +in a flash, while the wind sang in my ears, and the dazzle of the early +sun was in my eyes. I saw the hounds occasionally, sometimes pouring +over a green bank, as the charging breaker lifts and flings itself, +sometimes driving across a field, as the white tongues of foam slide +racing over the sand; and always ahead of me was Flurry Knox, going as +a man goes who knows his country, who knows his horse, and whose heart +is wholly and absolutely in the right place. + +Do what I would, Sorcerer's implacable stride carried me closer and +closer to the brown mare, till, as I thundered down the slope of a long +field, I was not twenty yards behind Flurry. Sorcerer had stiffened +his neck to iron, and to slow him down was beyond me; but I fought his +head away to the right, and found myself coming hard and steady at a +stonefaced bank with broken ground in front of it. Flurry bore away to +the left, shouting something that I did not understand. That Sorcerer +shortened his stride at the right moment was entirely due to his own +judgment; standing well away from the jump, he rose like a stag out of +the tussocky ground, and as he swung my twelve stone six into the air +the obstacle revealed itself to him and me as consisting not of one +bank but of two, and between the two lay a deep grassy lane, half +choked with furze. I have often been asked to state the width of the +bohereen, and can only reply that in my opinion it was at least +eighteen feet; Flurry Knox and Dr. Hickey, who did not jump it, say +that it is not more than five. What Sorcerer did with it I cannot say; +the sensation was of a towering flight with a kick back in it, a +biggish drop, and a landing on cee-springs, still on the downhill +grade. That was how one of the best horses in Ireland took one of +Ireland's most ignorant riders over a very nasty place. + +A sombre line of fir-wood lay ahead, rimmed with a grey wall, and in +another couple of minutes we had pulled up on the Aussolas road, and +were watching the hounds struggling over the wall into Aussolas demesne. + +"No hurry now," said Flurry, turning in his saddle to watch the +Cockatoo jump into the road, "he's to ground in the big earth inside. +Well, Major, it's well for you that's a big-jumped horse. I thought +you were a dead man a while ago when you faced him at the bohereen!" + +I was disclaiming intention in the matter when Lady Knox and the others +joined us. + +"I thought you told me your wife was no sportswoman," she said to me, +critically scanning Sorcerer's legs for cuts the while, "but when I saw +her a minute ago she had abandoned her bicycle and was running across +country like----" + +"Look at her now!" interrupted Miss Sally. "Oh!--oh!" In the interval +between these exclamations my incredulous eyes beheld my wife in +mid-air, hand in hand with a couple of stalwart country boys, with whom +she was leaping in unison from the top of a bank on to the road. + +Every one, even the saturnine Dr. Hickey, began to laugh; I rode back +to Philippa, who was exchanging compliments and congratulations with +her escort. + +"Oh, Sinclair!" she cried, "wasn't it splendid? I saw you jumping, and +everything! Where are they going now?" + +"My dear girl," I said, with marital disapproval, "you're killing +yourself. Where's your bicycle?" + +"Oh, it's punctured in a sort of lane, back there. It's all right; and +then they"--she breathlessly waved her hand at her attendants--"they +showed me the way." + +"Begor! you proved very good, Miss!" said a grinning cavalier. + +"Faith she did!" said another, polishing his shining brow with his +white flannel coat-sleeve, "she lepped like a haarse!" + +"And may I ask how you propose to go home?" said I. + +"I don't know and I don't care! I'm not going home!" She cast an +entirely disobedient eye at me. "And your eye-glass is hanging down +your back and your tie is bulging out over your waistcoat!" + +The little group of riders had begun to move away. + +"We're going on into Aussolas," called out Flurry; "come on, and make +my grandmother give you some breakfast, Mrs. Yeates; she always has it +at eight o'clock." + +The front gates were close at hand, and we turned in under the tall +beech-trees, with the unswept leaves rustling round the horses' feet, +and the lovely blue of the October morning sky filling the spaces +between smooth grey branches and golden leaves. The woods rang with +the voices of the hounds, enjoying an untrammelled rabbit hunt, while +the Master and the Whip, both on foot, strolled along unconcernedly +with their bridles over their arms, making themselves agreeable to my +wife, an occasional touch of Flurry's horn, or a crack of Dr. Rickey's +whip, just indicating to the pack that the authorities still took a +friendly interest in their doings. + +Down a grassy glade in the wood a party of old Mrs. Knox's young horses +suddenly swept into view, headed by an old mare, who, with her tail +over her back, stampeded ponderously past our cavalcade, shaking and +swinging her handsome old head, while her youthful friends bucked and +kicked and snapped at each other round her with the ferocious humour of +their kind. + +"Here, Jerome, take the horn," said Flurry to Dr. Hickey; "I'm going to +see Mrs. Yeates up to the house, the way these tomfools won't gallop on +top of her." + +From this point it seems to me that Philippa's adventures are more +worthy of record than mine, and as she has favoured me with a full +account of them, I venture to think my version may be relied on. + +Mrs. Knox was already at breakfast when Philippa was led, quaking, into +her formidable presence. My wife's acquaintance with Mrs. Knox was, so +far, limited to a state visit on either side, and she found but little +comfort in Flurry's assurances that his grandmother wouldn't mind if he +brought all the hounds in to breakfast, coupled with the statement that +she would put her eyes on sticks for the Major. + +Whatever the truth of this may have been, Mrs. Knox received her guest +with an equanimity quite unshaken by the fact that her boots were in +the fender instead of on her feet, and that a couple of shawls of +varying dimensions and degrees of age did not conceal the inner +presence of a magenta flannel dressing-jacket. She installed Philippa +at the table and plied her with food, oblivious as to whether the +needful implements with which to eat it were forthcoming or no. She +told Flurry where a vixen had reared her family, and she watched him +ride away, with some biting comments on his mare's hocks screamed after +him from the window. + +The dining-room at Aussolas Castle is one of the many rooms in Ireland +in which Cromwell is said to have stabled his horse (and probably no +one would have objected less than Mrs. Knox had she been consulted in +the matter). Philippa questions if the room had ever been tidied up +since, and she endorses Flurry's observation that "there wasn't a day +in the year you wouldn't get feeding for a hen and chickens on the +floor." Opposite to Philippa, on a Louis Quinze chair, sat Mrs. Knox's +woolly dog, its suspicious little eyes peering at her out of their +setting of pink lids and dirty white wool. A couple of young horses +outside the windows tore at the matted creepers on the walls, or thrust +faces that were half-shy, half-impudent, into the room. Portly pigeons +waddled to and fro on the broad window-sill, sometimes flying in to +perch on the picture-frames, while they kept up incessantly a hoarse +and pompous cooing. + +Animals and children are, as a rule, alike destructive to conversation; +but Mrs. Knox, when she chose, _bien entendu_, could have made herself +agreeable in a Noah's ark, and Philippa has a gift of sympathetic +attention that personal experience has taught me to regard with +distrust as well as respect, while it has often made me realise the +worldly wisdom of Kingsley's injunction: + + "Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever." + + +Family prayers, declaimed by Mrs. Knox with alarming austerity, +followed close on breakfast, Philippa and a vinegar-faced henchwoman +forming the family. The prayers were long, and through the open window +as they progressed came distantly a whoop or two; the declamatory tones +staggered a little, and then continued at a distinctly higher rate of +speed. + +"Ma'am! Ma'am!" whispered a small voice at the window. + +Mrs. Knox made a repressive gesture and held on her way. A sudden +outcry of hounds followed, and the owner of the whisper, a small boy +with a face freckled like a turkey's egg, darted from the window and +dragged a donkey and bath-chair into view. Philippa admits to having +lost the thread of the discourse, but she thinks that the "Amen" that +immediately ensued can hardly have come in its usual place. Mrs. Knox +shut the book abruptly, scrambled up from her knees, and said, "They've +found!" + +In a surprisingly short space of time she had added to her attire her +boots, a fur cape, and a garden hat, and was in the bath-chair, the +small boy stimulating the donkey with the success peculiar to his +class, while Philippa hung on behind. + +The woods of Aussolas are hilly and extensive, and on that particular +morning it seemed that they held as many foxes as hounds. In vain was +the horn blown, and the whips cracked, small rejoicing parties of +hounds, each with a fox of its own, scoured to and fro: every labourer +in the vicinity had left his work, and was sedulously heading every fox +with yells that would have befitted a tiger hunt, and sticks and stones +when occasion served. + +"Will I pull out as far as the big rosy-dandhrum, ma'am?" inquired the +small boy; "I seen three of the dogs go in it, and they yowling." + +"You will," said Mrs. Knox, thumping the donkey on the back with her +umbrella; "here! Jeremiah Regan! Come down out of that with that +pitchfork! Do you want to kill the fox, you fool?" + +"I do not, your honour, ma'am," responded Jeremiah Regan, a tall young +countryman, emerging from a bramble brake. + +"Did you see him?" said Mrs. Knox eagerly. + +"I seen himself and his ten pups drinking below at the lake ere +yestherday, your honour, ma'am, and he as big as a chestnut horse!" +said Jeremiah. + +"Faugh! Yesterday!" snorted Mrs. Knox; "go on to the rhododendrons, +Johnny!" + +The party, reinforced by Jeremiah and the pitchfork, progressed at a +high rate of speed along the shrubbery path, encountering _en route_ +Lady Knox, stooping on to her horse's neck under the sweeping branches +of the laurels. + +"Your horse is too high for my coverts, Lady Knox," said the Lady of +the Manor, with a malicious eye at Lady Knox's flushed face and dinged +hat; "I'm afraid you will be left behind like Absalom when the hounds +go away!" + +"As they never do anything here but hunt rabbits," retorted her +ladyship, "I don't think that's likely." + +Mrs. Knox gave her donkey another whack, and passed on. + +"Rabbits, my dear!" she said scornfully to Philippa. "That's all she +knows about it. I declare it disgusts me to see a woman of that age +making such a Judy of herself! Rabbits indeed!" + +Down in the thicket of rhododendron everything was very quiet for a +time. Philippa strained her eyes in vain to see any of the riders; the +horn blowing and the whip cracking passed on almost out of hearing. +Once or twice a hound worked through the rhododendrons, glanced at the +party, and hurried on, immersed in business. All at once Johnny, the +donkey-boy, whispered excitedly: + +"Look at he! Look at he!" and pointed to a boulder of grey rock that +stood out among the dark evergreens. A big yellow cub was crouching on +it; he instantly slid into the shelter of the bushes, and the +irrepressible Jeremiah, uttering a rending shriek, plunged into the +thicket after him. Two or three hounds came rushing at the sound, and +after this Philippa says she finds some difficulty in recalling the +proper order of events; chiefly, she confesses, because of the wholly +ridiculous tears of excitement that blurred her eyes. + +"We ran," she said, "we simply tore, and the donkey galloped, and as +for that old Mrs. Knox, she was giving cracked screams to the hounds +all the time, and they were screaming too; and then somehow we were all +out on the road!" + +What seems to have occurred was that three couple of hounds, Jeremiah +Regan, and Mrs. Knox's equipage, amongst them somehow hustled the cub +out of Aussolas demesne and up on to a hill on the farther side of the +road. Jeremiah was sent back by his mistress to fetch Flurry, and the +rest of the party pursued a thrilling course along the road, parallel +with that of the hounds, who were hunting slowly through the gorse on +the hillside. + +"Upon my honour and word, Mrs. Yeates, my dear, we have the hunt to +ourselves!" said Mrs. Knox to the panting Philippa, as they pounded +along the road. "Johnny, d'ye see the fox?" + +"I do, ma'am!" shrieked Johnny, who possessed the usual field-glass +vision bestowed upon his kind. "Look at him over-right us on the hill +above! Hi! The spotty dog have him! No, he's gone from him! _Gwan +out o' that_!" This to the donkey, with blows that sounded like the +beating of carpets, and produced rather more dust. + +They had left Aussolas some half a mile behind, when, from a strip of +wood on their right, the fox suddenly slipped over the bank on to the +road just ahead of them, ran up it for a few yards and whisked in at a +small entrance gate, with the three couple of hounds yelling on a +red-hot scent, not thirty yards behind. The bath-chair party whirled +in at their heels, Philippa and the donkey considerably blown, Johnny +scarlet through his freckles, but as fresh as paint, the old lady blind +and deaf to all things save the chase. The hounds went raging through +the shrubs beside the drive, and away down a grassy slope towards a +shallow glen, in the bottom of which ran a little stream, and after +them over the grass bumped the bath-chair. At the stream they turned +sharply and ran up the glen towards the avenue, which crossed it by +means of a rough stone viaduct. + +"'Pon me conscience, he's into the old culvert!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox; +"there was one of my hounds choked there once, long ago! Beat on the +donkey, Johnny!" + +At this juncture Philippa's narrative again becomes incoherent, not to +say breathless. She is, however, positive that it was somewhere about +here that the upset of the bath-chair occurred, but she cannot be clear +as to whether she picked up the donkey or Mrs. Knox, or whether she +herself was picked up by Johnny while Mrs. Knox picked up the donkey. +From my knowledge of Mrs. Knox I should say she picked up herself and +no one else. At all events, the next salient point is the palpitating +moment when Mrs. Knox, Johnny, and Philippa successively applying an +eye to the opening of the culvert by which the stream trickled under +the viaduct, while five dripping hounds bayed and leaped around them, +discovered by more senses than that of sight that the fox was in it, +and furthermore that one of the hounds was in it too. + +"There's a sthrong grating before him at the far end," said Johnny, his +head in at the mouth of the hole, his voice sounding as if he were +talking into a jug, "the two of them's fighting in it; they'll be +choked surely!" + +"Then don't stand gabbling there, you little fool, but get in and pull +the hound out!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox, who was balancing herself on a +stone in the stream. + +"I'd be in dread, ma'am," whined Johnny. + +"Balderdash!" said the implacable Mrs. Knox. "In with you!" + +I understand that Philippa assisted Johnny into the culvert, and +presume that it was in so doing that she acquired the two Robinson +Crusoe bare footprints which decorated her jacket when I next met her. + +"Have you got hold of him yet, Johnny?" cried Mrs. Knox up the culvert. + +"I have, ma'am, by the tail," responded Johnny's voice, sepulchral in +the depths. + +"Can you stir him, Johnny?" + +"I cannot, ma'am, and the wather is rising in it." + +"Well, please God, they'll not open the mill dam!" remarked Mrs. Knox +philosophically to Philippa, as she caught hold of Johnny's dirty +ankles. "Hold on to the tail, Johnny!" + +She hauled, with, as might be expected, no appreciable result. "Run, +my dear, and look for somebody, and we'll have that fox yet!" + +Philippa ran, whither she knew not, pursued by fearful visions of +bursting mill-dams, and maddened foxes at bay. As she sped up the +avenue she heard voices, robust male voices, in a shrubbery, and made +for them. Advancing along an embowered walk towards her was what she +took for one wild instant to be a funeral; a second glance showed her +that it was a party of clergymen of all ages, walking by twos and +threes in the dappled shade of the over-arching trees. Obviously she +had intruded her sacrilegious presence into a Clerical Meeting. She +acknowledges that at this awe-inspiring spectacle she faltered, but the +thought of Johnny, the hound, and the fox, suffocating, possibly +drowning together in the culvert, nerved her. She does not remember +what she said or how she said it, but I fancy she must have conveyed to +them the impression that old Mrs. Knox was being drowned, as she +immediately found herself heading a charge of the Irish Church towards +the scene of disaster. + +Fate has not always used me well, but on this occasion it was +mercifully decreed that I and the other members of the hunt should be +privileged to arrive in time to see my wife and her rescue party +precipitating themselves down the glen. + +"Holy Biddy!" ejaculated Flurry, "is she running a paper-chase with all +the parsons? But look! For pity's sake will you look at my +grandmother and my Uncle Eustace?" + +Mrs. Knox and her sworn enemy the old clergyman, whom I had met at +dinner the night before, were standing, apparently in the stream, +tugging at two bare legs that projected from a hole in the viaduct, and +arguing at the top of their voices. The bath-chair lay on its side +with the donkey grazing beside it, on the bank a stout Archdeacon was +tendering advice, and the hounds danced and howled round the entire +group. + +"I tell you, Eliza, you had better let the Archdeacon try," thundered +Mr. Hamilton. + +"Then I tell you I will not!" vociferated Mrs. Knox, with a tug at the +end of the sentence that elicited a subterranean lament from Johnny. +"Now who was right about the second grating? I told you so twenty +years ago!" + +Exactly as Philippa and her rescue party arrived, the efforts of Mrs. +Knox and her brother-in-law triumphed. The struggling, sopping form of +Johnny was slowly drawn from the hole, drenched, speechless, but +clinging to the stern of a hound, who, in its turn, had its jaws fast +in the hind-quarters of a limp, yellow cub. + +"Oh, it's dead!" wailed Philippa, "I _did_ think I should have been in +time to save it!" + +"Well, if that doesn't beat all!" said Dr. Hickey. + + + + +VII +A MISDEAL + + +The wagonette slewed and slackened mysteriously on the top of the long +hill above Drumcurran. So many remarkable things had happened since we +had entrusted ourselves to the guidance of Mr. Bernard Shute that I +rose in my place and possessed myself of the brake, and in so doing saw +the horses with their heads hard in against their chests, and their +quarters jammed crookedly against the splashboard, being apparently +tied into knots by some inexplicable power. + +"Some one's pulling the reins out of my hand!" exclaimed Mr. Shute. + +The horses and pole were by this time making an acute angle with the +wagonette, and the groom plunged from the box to their heads. Miss +Sally Knox, who was sitting beside me, looked over the edge. + +"Put on the brake! the reins are twisted round the axle!" she cried, +and fell into a fit of laughter. + +We all--that is to say, Philippa, Miss Shute, Miss Knox, and I--got out +as speedily as might be; but, I think, without panic; Mr. Shute alone +stuck to the ship, with the horses struggling and rearing below him. +The groom and I contrived to back them, and by so doing caused the +reins to unwind themselves from the axle. + +"It was my fault," said Mr. Shute, hauling them in as fast as we could +give them to him; "I broke the reins yesterday, and these are the +phaeton ones, and about six fathoms long at that, and I forgot and let +the slack go overboard. It's all right, I won't do it again." + +With this reassurance we confided ourselves once more to the wagonette. + +As we neared the town of Drumcurran the fact that we were on our way to +a horse fair became alarmingly apparent. It is impossible to imagine +how we pursued an uninjured course through the companies of horsemen, +the crowded carts, the squealing colts, the irresponsible led horses, +and, most immutable of all obstacles, the groups of countrywomen, with +the hoods of their heavy blue cloaks over their heads. They looked +like nuns of some obscure order; they were deaf and blind as ramparts +of sandbags; nothing less callous to human life than a Parisian +cabdriver could have burst a way through them. Many times during that +drive I had cause to be thankful for the sterling qualities of Mr. +Shute's brake; with its aid he dragged his over-fed bays into a crawl +that finally, and not without injury to the varnish, took the wagonette +to the Royal Hotel. Every available stall in the yard was by that time +filled, and it was only by virtue of the fact that the kitchenmaid was +nearly related to my cook that the indignant groom was permitted to +stable the bays in a den known as the calf-house. + +That I should have lent myself to such an expedition was wholly due to +my wife. Since Philippa had taken up her residence in Ireland she had +discovered a taste for horses that was not to be extinguished, even by +an occasional afternoon on the Quaker, whose paces had become harder +than rock in his many journeys to Petty Sessions; she had also +discovered the Shutes, newcomers on the outer edge of our vast visiting +district, and between them this party to Drumcurran Horse Fair had been +devised. Philippa proposed to buy herself a hunter. Bernard Shute +wished to do the same, possibly two hunters, money being no difficulty +with this fortunate young man. Miss Sally Knox was of the company, and +I also had been kindly invited, as to a missionary meeting, to come, +and bring my cheque-book. The only saving clause in the affair was the +fact that Mr. Flurry Knox was to meet us at the scene of action. + +The fair was held in a couple of large fields outside the town, and on +the farther bank of the Curranhilty River. Across a wide and +glittering ford, horses of all sizes and sorts were splashing, and a +long row of stepping-stones was hopped, and staggered, and scrambled +over by a ceaseless variety of foot-passengers. A man with a cart +plied as a ferry boat, doing a heavy trade among the applewomen and +vendors of "crubeens," _alias_ pigs' feet, a grisly delicacy peculiar +to Irish open-air holiday-making, and the July sun blazed on a scene +that even Miss Cecilia Shute found to be almost repayment enough for +the alarms of the drive. + +"As a rule, I am so bored by driving that I find it reviving to be +frightened," she said to me, as we climbed to safety on a heathery +ridge above the fields dedicated to galloping the horses; "but when my +brother scraped all those people off one side of that car, and ran the +pole into the cart of lemonade-bottles, I began to wish for courage to +tell him I was going to get out and walk home." + +"Well, if you only knew it," said Bernard, who was spreading rugs over +the low furze bushes in the touching belief that the prickles would not +come through, "the time you came nearest to walking home was when the +lash of the whip got twisted round Nancy's tail. Miss Knox, you're an +authority on these things--don't you think it would be a good scheme to +have a light anchor in the trap, and when the horses began to play the +fool, you'd heave the anchor over the fence and bring them up all +standing?" + +"They wouldn't stand very long," remarked Miss Sally. + +"Oh, that's all right," returned the inventor; "I'd have a dodge to +cast them loose, with the pole and the splinter-bar." + +"You'd never see them again," responded Miss Knox demurely, "if you +thought that mattered." + +"It would be the brightest feature of the case," said Miss Shute. + +She was surveying Miss Sally through her pince-nez as she spoke, and +was, I have reason to believe, deciding that by the end of the day her +brother would be well on in the first stages of his fifteenth love +affair. + +It has possibly been suspected that Mr. Bernard Shute was a sailor, had +been a sailor rather, until within the last year, when he had tumbled +into a fortune and a property, and out of the navy, in the shortest +time on record. His enthusiasm for horses had been nourished by the +hirelings of Malta, and other resorts of her Majesty's ships, and his +knowledge of them was, so far, bounded by the fact that it was more +usual to come off over their heads than their tails. For the rest, he +was a clean-shaved and personable youth, with a laugh which I may, +without offensive intention, define as possessing a what-cheeriness +special to his profession, and a habit, engendered no doubt by long +sojourns at the Antipodes, of getting his clothes in large hideous +consignments from a naval outfitter. + +It was eleven o'clock, and the fair was in full swing. Its vortex was +in the centre of the field below us, where a low bank of sods and earth +had been erected as a trial jump, with a yelling crowd of men and boys +at either end, acting instead of the usual wings to prevent a swerve. +Strings of reluctant horses were scourged over the bank by dozens of +willing hands, while exhortation, cheers, and criticism were freely +showered upon each performance. + +"Give the knees to the saddle, boy, and leave the heels slack." +"That's a nice horse. He'd keep a jock on his back where another'd +throw him!" "Well jumped, begor! She fled that fairly!" as an +ungainly three-year-old flounced over the bank without putting a hoof +on it. Then her owner, unloosing his pride in simile after the manner +of his race, + +"Ah ha! when she give a lep, man, she's that free, she's like a hare +for it!" + +A giggling group of country girls elbowed their way past us out of the +crowd of spectators, one of the number inciting her fellows to hurry on +to the other field "until they'd see the lads galloping the horses," to +which another responding that she'd "be skinned alive for the horses," +the party sped on their way. We--_i.e._ my wife, Miss Knox, Bernard +Shute, and myself--followed in their wake, a matter by no means as easy +as it looked. Miss Shute had exhibited her wonted intelligence by +remaining on the hilltop with the "Spectator"; she had not reached the +happy point of possessing a mind ten years older than her age, and a +face ten years younger, without also developing the gift of scenting +boredom from afar. We squeezed past the noses and heels of fidgety +horses, and circumnavigated their attendant groups of critics, while +half-trained brutes in snaffles bolted to nowhere and back again, and +whinnying foals ran to and fro in search of their mothers. + +A moderate bank divided the upper from the lower fields, and as every +feasible spot in it was commanded by a refusing horse, the choice of a +place and moment for crossing it required judgment. I got Philippa +across it in safety; Miss Knox, though as capable as any young woman in +Ireland of getting over a bank, either on horseback or on her own legs, +had to submit to the assistance of Mr. Shute, and the laws of dynamics +decreed that a force sufficient to raise a bower anchor should hoist +her seven stone odd to the top of the bank with such speed that she +landed half on her knees and half in the arms of her pioneer. A group +of portentously quiet men stood near, their eyes on the ground, their +hands in their pockets; they were all dressed so much alike that I did +not at first notice that Flurry Knox was among them; when I did, I +perceived that his eyes, instead of being on the ground, were surveying +Mr. Shute with that measure of disapproval that he habitually bestowed +upon strange men. + +"You're later than I thought you'd be," he said. "I have a horse +half-bought for Mrs. Yeates. It's that old mare of Bobby Bennett's; +she makes a little noise, but she's a good mare, and you couldn't throw +her down if you tried. Bobby wants thirty pounds for her, but I think +you might get her for less. She's in the hotel stables, and you can +see her when you go to lunch." + +We moved on towards the rushy bank of the river, and Philippa and Sally +Knox seated themselves on a low rock, looking, in their white frocks, +as incongruous in that dingy preoccupied assemblage as the dreamy +meadow-sweet and purple spires of loosestrife that thronged the river +banks. Bernard Shute had been lost in the shifting maze of men and +horses, who were, for the most part, galloping with the blind fury of +charging bulls; but presently, among a party who seemed to be riding +the finish of a race, we descried our friend, and a second or two later +he hauled a brown mare to a standstill in front of us. + +"The fellow's asking forty-five pounds for her," he said to Miss Sally; +"she's a nailer to gallop. I don't think it's too much?" + +"Her grandsire was the Mountain Hare," said the owner of the mare, +hurrying up to continue her family history, "and he was the grandest +horse in the four baronies. He was forty-two years of age when he +died, and they waked him the same as ye'd wake a Christian. They had +whisky and porther--and bread--and a piper in it." + +"Thim Mountain Hare colts is no great things," interrupted Mr. Shute's +groom contemptuously. "I seen a colt once that was one of his stock, +and if there was forty men and their wives, and they after him with +sticks, he wouldn't lep a sod of turf." + +"Lep, is it!" ejaculated the owner in a voice shrill with outrage. +"You may lead that mare out through the counthry, and there isn't a +fence in it that she wouldn't go up to it as indepindent as if she was +going to her bed, and your honour's ladyship knows that dam well, Miss +Knox." + +"You want too much money for her, McCarthy," returned Miss Sally, with +her little air of preternatural wisdom. + +"God pardon you, Miss Knox! Sure a lady like you knows well that +forty-five pounds is no money for that mare. Forty-five pounds!" He +laughed. "It'd be as good for me to make her a present to the +gentleman all out as take three farthings less for her! She's too +grand entirely for a poor farmer like me, and if it wasn't for the long +weak family I have, I wouldn't part with her under twice the money." + +"Three fine lumps of daughters in America paying his rent for him," +commented Flurry in the background. "That's the long weak family!" + +Bernard dismounted and slapped the mare's ribs approvingly. + +"I haven't had such a gallop since I was at Rio," he said. "What do +you think of her, Miss Knox?" Then, without waiting for an answer, "I +like her. I think I may as well give him the forty-five and have done +with it!" + +At these ingenuous words I saw a spasm of anguish cross the countenance +of McCarthy, easily interpreted as the first pang of a life-long regret +that he had not asked twice the money. Flurry Knox put up an eyebrow +and winked at me; Mr. Shute's groom turned away for very shame. Sally +Knox laughed with the deplorable levity of nineteen. + +Thus, with a brevity absolutely scandalous in the eyes of all +beholders, the bargain was concluded. + +Flurry strolled up to Philippa, observing an elaborate remoteness from +Miss Sally and Mr. Shute. + +"I believe I'm selling a horse here myself to-day," he said; "would you +like to have a look at him, Mrs. Yeates?" + +"Oh, are you selling, Knox?" struck in Bernard, to whose brain the +glory of buying a horse had obviously mounted like new wine; "I want +another, and I know yours are the right sort." + +"Well, as you seem fond of galloping," said Flurry sardonically, "this +one might suit you." + +"You don't mean the Moonlighter?" said Miss Knox, looking fixedly at +him. + +"Supposing I did, have you anything to say against him?" replied Flurry. + +Decidedly he was in a very bad temper. Miss Sally shrugged her +shoulders, and gave a little shred of a laugh, but said no more. + +In a comparatively secluded corner of the field we came upon +Moonlighter, sidling and fussing, with flickering ears, his tail +tightly tucked in and his strong back humped in a manner that boded +little good. Even to my untutored eye, he appeared to be an uncommonly +good-looking animal, a well-bred grey, with shoulders that raked back +as far as the eye could wish, the true Irish jumping hindquarters, and +a showy head and neck; it was obvious that nothing except Michael +Hallahane's adroit chucks at his bridle kept him from displaying his +jumping powers free of charge. Bernard stared at him in silence; not +the pregnant and intimidating silence of the connoisseur, but the +tongue-tied muteness of helpless ignorance. His eye for horses had +most probably been formed on circus posters, and the advertisements of +a well-known embrocation, and Moonlighter approximated in colour and +conduct to these models. + +"I can see he's a ripping fine horse," he said at length; "I think I +should like to try him." + +Miss Knox changed countenance perceptibly, and gave a perturbed glance +at Flurry. Flurry remained impenetrably unamiable. + +"I don't pretend to be a judge of horses," went on Mr. Shute. "I dare +say I needn't tell you that!" with a very engaging smile at Miss Sally; +"but I like this one awfully." + +As even Philippa said afterwards, she would not have given herself away +like that over buying a reel of cotton. + +"Are you quite sure that he's really the sort of horse you want?" said +Miss Knox, with rather more colour in her face than usual; "he's only +four years old, and he's hardly a finished hunter." + +The object of her philanthropy looked rather puzzled. "What! can't he +jump?" he said. + +"Is it jump?" exclaimed Michael Hallahane, unable any longer to contain +himself; "is it the horse that jumped five foot of a clothes line in +Heffernan's yard, and not a one on his back but himself, and didn't +leave so much as the thrack of his hoof on the quilt that was hanging +on it!" + +"That's about good enough," said Mr. Shute, with his large friendly +laugh; "what's your price, Knox? I must have the horse that jumped the +quilt! I'd like to try him, if you don't mind. There are some +jolly-looking banks over there." + +"My price is a hundred sovereigns," said Flurry; "you can try him if +you like." + +"Oh, don't!" cried Sally impulsively; but Bernard's foot was already in +the stirrup. "I call it disgraceful!" I heard her say in a low voice +to her kinsman--"you know he can't ride." + +The kinsman permitted himself a malign smile. "That's his look-out," +he said. + +Perhaps the unexpected docility with which Moonlighter allowed himself +to be manoeuvred through the crowd was due to Bernard's thirteen stone; +at all events, his progress through a gate into the next field was +unexceptionable. Bernard, however, had no idea of encouraging this +tranquillity. He had come out to gallop, and without further ceremony +he drove his heels into Moonlighter's sides, and took the consequences +in the shape of a very fine and able buck. How he remained within even +visiting distance of the saddle it is impossible to explain; perhaps +his early experience in the rigging stood him in good stead in the +matter of hanging on by his hands; but, however preserved, he did +remain, and went away down the field at what he himself subsequently +described as "the rate of knots." + +Flurry flung away his cigarette and ran to a point of better +observation. We all ran, including Michael Hallahane and various +onlookers, and were in time to see Mr. Shute charging the least +advantageous spot in a hollow-faced furzy bank. Nothing but the grey +horse's extreme activity got the pair safely over; he jumped it on a +slant, changed feet in the heart of a furze-bush, and was lost to view. +In what relative positions Bernard and his steed alighted was to us a +matter of conjecture; when we caught sight of them again, Moonlighter +was running away, with his rider still on his back, while the slope of +the ground lent wings to his flight. + +"That young gentleman will be apt to be killed," said Michael Hallahane +with composure, not to say enjoyment. + +"He'll be into the long bog with him pretty soon," said Flurry, his +keen eye tracking the fugitive. + +"Oh!--I thought he was off that time!" exclaimed Miss Sally, with a +gasp in which consternation and amusement were blended. "There! He +_is_ into the bog!" + +It did not take us long to arrive at the scene of disaster, to which, +as to a dog-fight, other foot-runners were already hurrying, and on our +arrival we found things looking remarkably unpleasant for Mr. Shute and +Moonlighter. The latter was sunk to his withers in the sheet of black +slime into which he had stampeded; the former, submerged to the waist +three yards farther away in the bog, was trying to drag himself towards +firm ground by the aid of tussocks of wiry grass. + +"Hit him!" shouted Flurry. "Hit him! he'll sink if he stops there!" + +Mr. Shute turned on his adviser a face streaming with black mud, out of +which his brown eyes and white teeth gleamed with undaunted +cheerfulness. + +"All jolly fine," he called back; "if I let go this grass I'll sink +too!" + +A shout of laughter from the male portion of the spectators +sympathetically greeted this announcement, and a dozen equally futile +methods of escape were suggested. Among those who had joined us was, +fortunately, one of the many boys who pervaded the fair selling +halters, and, by means of several of these knotted together, a line of +communication was established. Moonlighter, who had fallen into the +state of inane stupor in which horses in his plight so often indulge, +was roused to activity by showers of stones and imprecations but +faintly chastened by the presence of ladies. Bernard, hanging on to +his tail, belaboured him with a cane, and, finally, the reins proving +good, the task of towing the victims ashore was achieved. + +"He's mine, Knox, you know," were Mr. Shute's first words as he +scrambled to his feet; "he's the best horse I ever got across--worth +twice the money!" + +"Faith, he's aisy plased!" remarked a bystander. + +"Oh, do go and borrow some dry clothes," interposed Philippa +practically; "surely there must be some one----" + +"There's a shop in the town where he can strip a peg for 13_s._ 9_d._," +said Flurry grimly; "I wouldn't care myself about the clothes you'd +borrow here!" + +The morning sun shone jovially upon Moonlighter and his rider, caking +momently the black bog stuff with which both were coated, and as the +group disintegrated, and we turned to go back, every man present was +pleasurably aware that the buttons of Mr. Shute's riding breeches had +burst at the knee, causing a large triangular hiatus above his gaiter. + +"Well," said Flurry conclusively to me as we retraced our steps, "I +always thought the fellow was a fool, but I never thought he was such a +damned fool." + +It seemed an interminable time since breakfast when our party, somewhat +shattered by the stirring events of the morning, found itself gathered +in an upstairs room at the Royal Hotel, waiting for a meal that had +been ordained some two hours before. The air was charged with the +mingled odours of boiling cabbage and frying mutton; we affected to +speak of them with disgust, but our souls yearned to them. Female +ministrants, with rustling skirts and pounding feet, raced along the +passages with trays that were never for us, and opening doors released +roaring gusts of conversation, blended with the clatter of knives and +forks, and still we starved. Even the ginger-coloured check suit, +lately labelled "The Sandringham. Wonderful value, 16_s._ 9_d._" in +the window of Drumcurran's leading mart, and now displayed upon Mr. +Shute's all too lengthy limbs, had lost its power to charm. + +"Oh, don't tear that bell quite out by the roots, Bernard," said his +sister, from the heart of a lamentable yawn. "I dare say it only +amuses them when we ring, but it may remind them that we are still +alive. Major Yeates, do you or do you not regret the pigs' feet?" + +"More than I can express," I said, turning from the window, where I had +been looking down at the endless succession of horses' backs and men's +hats, moving in two opposing currents in the street below. "I dare say +if we talk about them for a little we shall feel ill, and that will be +better than nothing." + +At this juncture, however, a heavy-laden tray thumped against the door, +and our repast was borne into the room by a hot young woman in creaking +boots, who hoarsely explained that what kept her was waiting on the +potatoes, and that the ould pan that was in it was playing Puck with +the beefsteaks. + +"Well," said Miss Shute, as she began to try conclusions between a +blunt knife and a bullet-proof mutton chop, "I have never lived in the +country before, but I have always been given to understand that the +village inn was one of its chief attractions." She delicately moved +the potato dish so as to cover the traces of a bygone egg, and her +glance lingered on the flies that dragged their way across a melting +mound of salt butter. "I like local colour, but I don't care about it +on the tablecloth." + +"Well, I'm feeling quite anxious about Irish country hotels now," said +Bernard; "they're getting so civilised and respectable. After all, +when you go back to England no one cares a pin to hear that you've been +done up to the knocker. That don't amuse them a bit. But all my +friends are as pleased as anything when I tell them of the pothouse +where I slept in my clothes rather than face the sheets, or how, when I +complained to the landlady next day, she said, 'Cock ye up! Wasn't it +his Reverence the Dean of Kilcoe had them last!'" + +We smiled wanly; what I chiefly felt was respect for any hungry man who +could jest in presence of such a meal. + +"All this time my hunter hasn't been bought," said Philippa presently, +leaning back in her chair, and abandoning the unequal contest with her +beefsteak. "Who is Bobby Bennett? Will his horse carry a lady?" + +Sally Knox looked at me and began to laugh. + +"You should ask Major Yeates about Bobby Bennett," she said. + +Confound Miss Sally! It had never seemed worth while to tell Philippa +all that story about my doing up Miss Bobby Bennett's hair, and I sank +my face in my tumbler of stagnant whisky-and-soda to conceal the colour +that suddenly adorned it. Any intelligent man will understand that it +was a situation calculated to amuse the ungodly, but without any real +fun in it. I explained Miss Bennett as briefly as possible, and at all +the more critical points Miss Sally's hazel-green eyes roamed slowly +and mercilessly towards me. + +"You haven't told Mrs. Yeates that she's one of the greatest +horse-copers in the country," she said, when I had got through somehow; +"she can sell you a very good horse sometimes, and a very bad one too, +if she gets the chance." + +"No one will ever explain to me," said Miss Shute, scanning us all with +her dark, half-amused, and wholly sophisticated eyes, "why horse-coping +is more respectable than cheating at cards. I rather respect people +who are able to cheat at cards; if every one did, it would make whist +so much more cheerful; but there is no forgiveness for dealing yourself +the right card, and there is no condemnation for dealing your neighbour +a very wrong horse!" + +"Your neighbour is supposed to be able to take care of himself," said +Bernard. + +"Well, why doesn't that apply to card-players?" returned his sister; +"are they all in a state of helpless innocence?" + +"I'm helplessly innocent," announced Philippa, "so I hope Miss Bennett +won't deal me a wrong horse." + +"Oh, her mare is one of the right ones," said Miss Sally; "she's a +lovely jumper, and her manners are the very best." + +The door opened, and Flurry Knox put in his head. "Bobby Bennett's +downstairs," he said to me mysteriously. + +I got up, not without consciousness of Miss Sally's eye, and prepared +to follow him. "You'd better come too, Mrs. Yeates, to keep an eye on +him. Don't let him give her more than thirty, and if he gives that she +should return him two sovereigns." This last injunction was bestowed +in a whisper as we descended the stairs. + +Miss Bennett was in the crowded yard of the hotel, looking handsome and +overdressed, and she greeted me with just that touch of Auld Lang Syne +in her manner that I could best have dispensed with. I turned to the +business in hand without delay. The brown mare was led forth from the +stable and paraded for our benefit; she was one of those inconspicuous, +meritorious animals about whom there seems nothing particular to say, +and I felt her legs and looked hard at her hocks, and was not much the +wiser. + +"It's no use my saying she doesn't make a noise," said Miss Bobby, +"because every one in the country will tell you she does. You can have +a vet. if you like, and that's the only fault he can find with her. +But if Mrs. Yeates hasn't hunted before now, I'll guarantee Cruiskeen +as just the thing for her. She's really safe and confidential. My +little brother Georgie has hunted her--_you_ remember Georgie, Major +Yeates?--the night of the ball, you know--and he's only eleven. Mr. +Knox can tell you what sort she is." + +"Oh, she's a grand mare," said Mr. Knox, thus appealed to; "you'd hear +her coming three fields off like a German band!" + +"And well for you if you could keep within three fields of her!" +retorted Miss Bennett. "At all events, she's not like the hunter you +sold Uncle, that used to kick the stars as soon as I put my foot in the +stirrup!" + +"'Twas the size of the foot frightened him," said Flurry. + +"Do you know how Uncle cured him?" said Miss Bennett, turning her back +on her adversary; "he had him tied head and tail across the yard gate, +and every man that came in had to get over his back!" + +"That's no bad one!" said Flurry. + +Philippa looked from one to the other in bewilderment, while the +badinage continued, swift and unsmiling, as became two hierarchs of +horse-dealing; it went on at intervals for the next ten minutes, and at +the end of that time I had bought the mare for thirty pounds. As Miss +Bennett said nothing about giving me back two of them, I had not the +nerve to suggest it. + +After this Flurry and Miss Bennett went away, and were swallowed up in +the fair; we returned to our friends upstairs, and began to arrange +about getting home. This, among other difficulties, involved the +tracking and capture of the Shutes' groom, and took so long that it +necessitated tea. Bernard and I had settled to ride our new purchases +home, and the groom was to drive the wagonette--an alteration ardently +furthered by Miss Shute. The afternoon was well advanced when Bernard +and I struggled through the turmoil of the hotel yard in search of our +horses, and, the hotel hostler being nowhere to be found, the Shutes' +man saddled our animals for us, and then withdrew, to grapple +single-handed with the bays in the calf-house. + +"Good business for me, that Knox is sending the grey horse home for +me," remarked Bernard, as his new mare followed him tractably out of +the stall. "He'd have been rather a handful in this hole of a place." + +He shoved his way out of the yard in front of me, seemingly quite +comfortable and at home upon the descendant of the Mountain Hare, and I +followed as closely as drunken carmen and shafts of erratic carts would +permit. Cruiskeen evinced a decided tendency to turn to the right on +leaving the yard, but she took my leftward tug in good part, and we +moved on through the streets of Drumcurran with a dignity that was only +impaired by the irrepressible determination of Mr. Shute's new trousers +to run up his leg. It was a trifle disappointing that Cruiskeen should +carry her nose in the air like a camel, but I set it down to my own bad +hands, and to that cause I also imputed her frequent desire to stop, a +desire that appeared to coincide with every fourth or fifth +public-house on the line of march. Indeed, at the last corner before +we left the town, Miss Bennett's mare and I had a serious difference of +opinion, in the course of which she mounted the pavement and remained +planted in front of a very disreputable public-house, whose owner had +been before me several times for various infringements of the Licensing +Acts. Bernard and the corner-boys were of course much pleased; I +inwardly resolved to let Miss Bennett know how her groom occupied his +time in Drumcurran. + +We got out into the calm of the country roads without further incident, +and I there discovered that Cruiskeen was possessed of a dromedary +swiftness in trotting, that the action was about as comfortable as the +dromedary's, and that it was extremely difficult to moderate the pace. + +"I say! This is something like going!" said Bernard, cantering hard +beside me with slack rein and every appearance of happiness. "Do you +mean to keep it up all the way?" + +"You'd better ask this devil," I replied, hauling on the futile ring +snaffle. "Miss Bennett must have an arm like a prize-fighter. If this +is what she calls confidential, I don't want her confidences." + +After another half-mile, during which I cursed Flurry Knox, and +registered a vow that Philippa should ride Cruiskeen in a cavalry bit, +we reached the cross-roads at which Bernard's way parted from mine. +Another difference of opinion between my wife's hunter and me here took +place, this time on the subject of parting from our companion, and I +experienced that peculiar inward sinking that accompanies the birth of +the conviction one has been stuck. There were still some eight miles +between me and home, but I had at least the consolation of knowing that +the brown mare would easily cover it in forty minutes. But in this +also disappointment awaited me. Dropping her head to about the level +of her knees, the mare subsided into a walk as slow as that of the +slowest cow, and very similar in general style. In this manner I +progressed for a further mile, breathing forth, like St. Paul, +threatenings and slaughters against Bobby Bennett and all her +confederates; and then the idea occurred to me that many really +first-class hunters were very poor hacks. I consoled myself with this +for a further period, and presently an opportunity for testing it +presented itself. The road made a long loop round the flank of a hill, +and it was possible to save half a mile or so by getting into the +fields. It was a short cut I had often taken on the Quaker, and it +involved nothing more serious than a couple of low stone "gaps" and an +infantine bank. I turned Cruiskeen at the first of these. She was +evidently surprised. Being in an excessively bad temper, I beat her in +a way that surprised her even more, and she jumped the stones +precipitately and with an ease that showed she knew quite well what she +was about. I vented some further emotion upon her by the convenient +medium of my cane, and galloped her across the field and over the bank, +which, as they say in these parts, she "fled" without putting an iron +on it. It was not the right way to jump it, but it was inspiriting, +and when she had disposed of the next gap without hesitation my waning +confidence in Miss Bennett began to revive. I cantered over the ridge +of the hill, and down it towards the cottage near which I was +accustomed to get out on to the road again. As I neared my wonted +opening in the fence, I saw that it had been filled by a stout pole, +well fixed into the bank at each end, but not more than three feet +high. Cruiskeen pricked her ears at it with intelligence; I trotted +her at it, and gave her a whack. + +Ages afterwards there was some one speaking on the blurred edge of a +dream that I was dreaming about nothing in particular. I went on +dreaming, and was impressed by the shape of a fat jug, mottled white +and blue, that intruded itself painfully, and I again heard voices, +very urgent and full of effort, but quite outside any concern of mine. + +I also made an effort of some kind; I was doing my very best to be good +and polite, but I was dreaming in a place that whirred, and was +engrossing, and daylight was cold and let in some unknown +unpleasantness. For that time the dream got the better of the +daylight, and then, _apropos_ of nothing, I was standing up in a house +with some one's arm round me; the mottled jug was there, so was the +unpleasantness, and I was talking with most careful, old-world +politeness. + +"Sit down now, you're all right," said Miss Bobby Bennett, who was +mopping my face with a handkerchief dipped in the jug. + +I perceived that I was asking what had happened. + +"She fell over the stick with you," said Miss Bennett; "the dirty +brute!" + +With another great effort I hooked myself on to the march of events, as +a truck is dragged out of a siding and hooked to a train. + +"Oh, the Lord save us!" said a grey-haired woman who held the jug, +"ye're desthroyed entirely, asthore! Oh, glory be to the merciful will +of God, me heart lepped across me shesht when I seen him undher the +horse!" + +"Go out and see if the trap's coming," said Miss Bennett; "he should +have found the doctor by this." She stared very closely at my face, +and seemed to find it easier to talk in short sentences. + +"We must get those cuts looking better before Mrs. Yeates comes." + +After an interval, during which unexpected places in my head ached from +the cold water, the desire to be polite and coherent again came upon me. + +"I am sure it was not your mare's fault," I said. + +Miss Bennett laughed a very little. I was glad to see her laugh; it +had struck me her face was strangely haggard and frightened. + +"Well, of course it wasn't poor Cruiskeen's fault," she said. "She's +nearly home with Mr. Shute by now. That's why I came after you!" + +"Mr. Shute!" I said; "wasn't he at the fair that day?" + +"He was," answered Miss Bobby, looking at me with very compassionate +eyes; "you and he got on each other's horses by mistake at the hotel, +and you got the worst of the exchange!" + +"Oh!" I said, without even trying to understand. + +"He's here within, your honour's ladyship, Mrs. Yeates, ma'am," shouted +the grey-haired woman at the door; "don't be unaisy, achudth; he's +doing grand. Sure, I'm telling Miss Binnitt if she was his wife +itself, she couldn't give him betther care!" + +The grey-haired woman laughed. + + + + +VIII +THE HOLY ISLAND + + +For three days of November a white fog stood motionless over the +country. All day and all night smothered booms and bangs away to the +south-west told that the Fastnet gun was hard at work, and the sirens +of the American liners uplifted their monstrous female voices as they +felt their way along the coast of Cork. On the third afternoon the +wind began to whine about the windows of Shreelane, and the barometer +fell like a stone. At 11 P.M. the storm rushed upon us with the roar +and the suddenness of a train; the chimneys bellowed, the tall old +house quivered, and the yelling wind drove against it, as a man puts +his shoulder against a door to burst it in. + +We none of us got much sleep, and if Mrs. Cadogan is to be +believed--which experience assures me she is not--she spent the night +in devotional exercises, and in ministering to the panic-stricken +kitchen-maid by the light of a Blessed candle. All that day the storm +screamed on, dry-eyed; at nightfall the rain began, and next morning, +which happened to be Sunday, every servant in the house was a messenger +of Job, laden with tales of leakages, floods, and fallen trees, and +inflated with the ill-concealed glory of their kind in evil tidings. +To Peter Cadogan, who had been to early Mass, was reserved the crowning +satisfaction of reporting that a big vessel had gone on the rocks at +Yokahn Point the evening before, and was breaking up fast; it was +rumoured that the crew had got ashore, but this feature, being +favourable and uninteresting, was kept as much as possible in the +background. Mrs. Cadogan, who had been to America in an ocean liner, +became at once the latest authority on shipwrecks, and was of opinion +that "whoever would be dhrownded, it wouldn't be thim lads o' sailors. +Sure wasn't there the greatest storm ever was in it the time meself was +on the say, and what'd thim fellows do but to put us below entirely in +the ship, and close down the doors on us, the way theirselves'd leg it +when we'd be dhrownding!" + +This view of the position was so startlingly novel that Philippa +withdrew suddenly from the task of ordering dinner, and fell up the +kitchen stairs in unsuitable laughter. Philippa has not the most +rudimentary capacity for keeping her countenance. + +That afternoon I was wrapped in the slumber, balmiest and most +profound, that follows on a wet Sunday luncheon, when Murray, our D.I. +of police, drove up in uniform, and came into the house on the top of a +gust that set every door banging and every picture dancing on the +walls. He looked as if his eyes had been blown out of his head, and he +wanted something to eat very badly. + +"I've been down at the wreck since ten o'clock this morning," he said, +"waiting for her to break up, and once she does there'll be trouble. +She's an American ship, and she's full up with rum, and bacon, and +butter, and all sorts. Bosanquet is there with all his coastguards, +and there are five hundred country people on the strand at this moment, +waiting for the fun to begin. I've got ten of my fellows there, and I +wish I had as many more. You'd better come back with me, Yeates, we +may want the Riot Act before all's done!" + +The heavy rain had ceased, but it seemed as if it had fed the wind +instead of calming it, and when Murray and I drove out of Shreelane, +the whole dirty sky was moving, full sailed, in from the south-west, +and the telegraph wires were hanging in a loop from the post outside +the gate. Nothing except a Skebawn car-horse would have faced the +whooping charges of the wind that came at us across Corran Lake; +stimulated mysteriously by whistles from the driver, Murray's yellow +hireling pounded woodenly along against the blast, till the smell of +the torn sea-weed was borne upon it, and we saw the Atlantic waves come +towering into the bay of Tralagough. + +The ship was, or had been, a three-masted barque; two of her masts were +gone, and her bows stood high out of water on the reef that forms one +of the shark-like jaws of the bay. The long strand was crowded with +black groups of people, from the bank of heavy shingle that had been +hurled over on to the road, down to the slope where the waves pitched +themselves and climbed and fought and tore the gravel back with them, +as though they had dug their fingers in. The people were nearly all +men, dressed solemnly and hideously in their Sunday clothes; most of +them had come straight from Mass without any dinner, true to that Irish +instinct that places its fun before its food. That the wreck was +regarded as a spree of the largest kind was sufficiently obvious. Our +car pulled up at a public-house that stood askew between the road and +the shingle; it was humming with those whom Irish publicans are pleased +to call "Bonâ feeds," and sundry of the same class were clustered round +the door. Under the wall on the lee-side was seated a bagpiper, +droning out "The Irish Washerwoman" with nodding head and tapping heel, +and a young man was cutting a few steps of a jig for the delectation of +a group of girls. + +So far Murray's constabulary had done nothing but exhibit their +imposing chest measurement and spotless uniforms to the Atlantic, and +Bosanquet's coastguards had only salvaged some spars, the debris of a +boat, and a dead sheep, but their time was coming. As we stumbled down +over the shingle, battered by the wind and pelted by clots of foam, +some one beside me shouted, "She's gone!" A hill of water had +smothered the wreck, and when it fell from her again nothing was left +but the bows, with the bowsprit hanging from them in a tangle of +rigging. The clouds, bronzed by an unseen sunset, hung low over her; +in that greedy pack of waves, with the remorseless rocks above and +below her, she seemed the most lonely and tormented of creatures. + +About half-an-hour afterwards the cargo began to come ashore on the top +of the rising tide. Barrels were plunging and diving in the trough of +the waves, like a school of porpoises; they were pitched up the beach +in waist-deep rushes of foam; they rolled down again, and were swung up +and shouldered by the next wave, playing a kind of Tom Tiddler's ground +with the coastguards. Some of the barrels were big and dangerous, some +were small and nimble like young pigs, and the bluejackets were up to +their middles as their prey dodged and ducked, and the police lined out +along the beach to keep back the people. Ten men of the R.I.C. can do +a great deal, but they cannot be in more than twenty or thirty places +at the same instant; therefore they could hardly cope with a scattered +and extremely active mob of four or five hundred, many of whom had +taken advantage of their privileges as "bonâ-fide travellers," and all +of whom were determined on getting at the rum. + +As the dusk fell the thing got more and more out of hand; the people +had found out that the big puncheons held the rum, and had succeeded in +capturing one. In the twinkling of an eye it was broached, and fifty +backs were shoving round it like a football scrummage. I have heard +many rows in my time: I have seen two Irish regiments--one of them +Militia--at each other's throats in Fermoy barracks; I have heard +Philippa's water spaniel and two fox-terriers hunting a strange cat +round the dairy; but never have I known such untrammelled bedlam as +that which yelled round the rum-casks on Tralagough strand. For it was +soon not a question of one broached cask, or even of two. The barrels +were coming in fast, so fast that it was impossible for the +representatives of law and order to keep on any sort of terms with +them. The people, shouting with laughter, stove in the casks, and +drank rum at 34° above proof, out of their hands, out of their hats, +out of their boots. Women came fluttering over the hillsides through +the twilight, carrying jugs, milk-pails, anything that would hold the +liquor; I saw one of them, roaring with laughter, tilt a filthy zinc +bucket to an old man's lips. + +With the darkness came anarchy. The rising tide brought more and yet +more booty: great spars came lunging in on the lap of the waves, mixed +up with cabin furniture, seamen's chests, and the black and slippery +barrels, and the country people continued to flock in, and the drinking +became more and more unbridled. Murray sent for more men and a doctor, +and we slaved on hopelessly in the dark, collaring half-drunken men, +shoving pig-headed casks up hills of shingle, hustling in among groups +of roaring drinkers--we rescued perhaps one barrel in half-a-dozen. I +began to know that there were men there who were not drunk and were not +idle; I was also aware, as the strenuous hours of darkness passed, of +an occasional rumble of cart wheels on the road. It was evident that +the casks which were broached were the least part of the looting, but +even they were beyond our control. The most that Bosanquet, Murray, +and I could do was to concentrate our forces on the casks that had been +secured, and to organise charges upon the swilling crowds in order to +upset the casks that they had broached. Already men and boys were +lying about, limp as leeches, motionless as the dead. + +"They'll kill themselves before morning, at this rate!" shouted Murray +to me. "They're drinking it by the quart! Here's another barrel; come +on!" + +We rallied our small forces, and after a brief but furious struggle +succeeded in capsizing it. It poured away in a flood over the stones, +over the prostrate figures that sprawled on them, and a howl of +reproach followed. + +"If ye pour away any more o' that, Major," said an unctuous voice in my +ear, "ye'll intoxicate the stones and they'll be getting up and +knocking us down!" + +I had been aware of a fat shoulder next to mine in the throng as we +heaved the puncheon over, and I now recognised the ponderous wit and +Falstaffian figure of Mr. James Canty, a noted member of the Skebawn +Board of Guardians, and the owner of a large farm near at hand. + +"I never saw worse work on this strand," he went on. "I considher +these debaucheries a disgrace to the counthry." + +Mr. Canty was famous as an orator, and I presume that it was from long +practice among his fellow P.L.G.'s that he was able, without apparent +exertion, to out-shout the storm. + +At this juncture the long-awaited reinforcements arrived, and along +with them came Dr. Jerome Hickey, armed with a black bag. Having +mentioned that the bag contained a pump--not one of the common or +garden variety--and that no pump on board a foundering ship had more +arduous labours to perform, I prefer to pass to other themes. The +wreck, which had at first appeared to be as inexhaustible and as +variously stocked as that in the "Swiss Family Robinson," was beginning +to fail in its supply. The crowd were by this time for the most part +incapable from drink, and the fresh contingent of police tackled their +work with some prospect of success by the light of a tar barrel, +contributed by the owner of the public-house. At about the same time I +began to be aware that I was aching with fatigue, that my clothes hung +heavy and soaked upon me, that my face was stiff with the salt spray +and the bitter wind, and that it was two hours past dinner-time. The +possibility of fried salt herrings and hot whisky and water at the +public-house rose dazzlingly before my mind, when Mr. Canty again +crossed my path. + +"In my opinion ye have the whole cargo under conthrol now, Major," he +said, "and the police and the sailors should be able to account for it +all now by the help of the light. Wasn't I the finished fool that I +didn't think to send up to my house for a tar barrel before now! +Well--we're all foolish sometimes! But indeed it's time for us to give +over, and that's what I'm after saying to the Captain and Mr. Murray. +You're exhausted now the three of ye, and if I might make so bold, I'd +suggest that ye'd come up to my little place and have what'd warm ye +before ye'd go home. It's only a few perches up the road." + +The tide had turned, the rain had begun again, and the tar barrel +illumined the fact that Dr. Hickey's dreadful duties alone were +pressing. We held a council and finally followed Mr. Canty, picking +our way through wreckage of all kinds, including the human variety. +Near the public-house I stumbled over something that was soft and had a +squeak in it; it was the piper, with his head and shoulders in an +overturned rum-barrel, and the bagpipes still under his arm. + +I knew the outward appearance of Mr. Canty's house very well. It was a +typical southern farm-house, with dirty whitewashed walls, a slated +roof, and small, hermetically-sealed windows staring at the morass of +manure which constituted the yard. We followed Mr. Canty up the filthy +lane that led to it, picked our way round vague and squelching spurs of +the manure heap, and were finally led through the kitchen into a +stifling best parlour. Mrs. Canty, a vast and slatternly matron, had +evidently made preparations for us; there was a newly-lighted fire +pouring flame up the chimney from layers of bogwood, there were whisky +and brandy on the table, and a plateful of biscuits sugared in white +and pink. Upon our hostess was a black silk dress which indifferently +concealed the fact that she was short of boot-laces, and that the boots +themselves had made many excursions to the yard and none to the +blacking-bottle. Her manners, however, were admirable, and while I +live I shall not forget her potato cakes. They came in hot and hot +from a pot-oven, they were speckled with caraway seeds, they swam in +salt butter, and we ate them shamelessly and greasily, and washed them +down with hot whisky and water; I knew to a nicety how ill I should be +next day, and heeded not. + +"Well, gentlemen," remarked Mr. Canty later on, in his best Board of +Guardians' manner, "I've seen many wrecks between this and the Mizen +Head, but I never witnessed a scene of more disgraceful ex-cess than +what was in it to-night." + +"Hear, hear!" murmured Bosanquet with unseemly levity. + +"I should say," went on Mr. Canty, "there was at one time to-night +upwards of one hundhred men dead dhrunk on the strand, or anyway so +dhrunk that if they'd attempt to spake they'd foam at the mouth." + +"The craytures!" interjected Mrs. Canty sympathetically. + +"But if they're dhrunk to-day," continued our host, "it's nothing at +all to what they'll be to-morrow and afther to-morrow, and it won't be +on the strand they'll be dhrinkin' it." + +"Why, where will it be?" said Bosanquet, with his disconcerting English +way of asking a point-blank question. + +Mr. Canty passed his hand over his red cheeks. + +"There'll be plenty asking that before all's said and done, Captain," +he said, with a compassionate smile, "and there'll be plenty that could +give the answer if they'll like, but by dam I don't think ye'll be apt +to get much out of the Yokahn boys!" + +"The Lord save us, 'twould be better to keep out from the likes o' +thim!" put in Mrs. Canty, sliding a fresh avalanche of potato cakes on +to the dish; "didn't they pull the clothes off the gauger and pour +potheen down his throath till he ran screeching through the streets o' +Skebawn!" + +James Canty chuckled. + +"I remember there was a wreck here one time, and the undherwriters put +me in charge of the cargo. Brandy it was--cases of the best Frinch +brandy. The people had a song about it, what's this the first verse +was-- + + "One night to the rocks of Yokahn + Came the barque _Isabella_ so dandy, + To pieces she went before dawn, + Herself and her cargo of brandy. + And all met a wathery grave + Excepting the vessel's car_pen_ther, + Poor fellow, so far from his home." + + +Mr. Canty chanted these touching lines in a tuneful if wheezy tenor. +"Well, gentlemen, we're all friends here," he continued, "and it's no +harm to mention that this man below at the public-house came askin' me +would I let him have some of it for a consideration. 'Sullivan,' says +I to him, 'if ye ran down gold in a cup in place of the brandy, I +wouldn't give it to you. Of coorse,' says I, 'I'm not sayin' but that +if a bottle was to get a crack of a stick, and it to be broken, and a +man to drink a glass out of it, that would be no more than an +accident.' 'That's no good to me,' says he, 'but if I had twelve +gallons of that brandy in Cork,' says he, 'by the Holy German!' says +he, saying an awful curse, 'I'd sell twenty-five out of it!' Well, +indeed, it was true for him; it was grand stuff. As the saying is, it +would make a horse out of a cow!" + +"It appears to be a handy sort of place for keeping a pub," said +Bosanquet. + +"Shut to the door, Margaret," said Mr. Canty with elaborate caution. +"It'd be a queer place that wouldn't be handy for Sullivan!" + +A further tale of great length was in progress when Dr. Hickey's +Mephistophelian nose was poked into the best parlour. + +"Hullo, Hickey! Pumped out? eh?" said Murray. + +"If I am, there's plenty more like me," replied the Doctor +enigmatically, "and some of them three times over! James, did these +gentlemen leave you a drop of anything that you'd offer me?" + +"Maybe ye'd like a glass of rum, Doctor?" said Mr. Canty with a wink at +his other guests. + +Dr. Hickey shuddered. + +I had next morning precisely the kind of mouth that I had anticipated, +and it being my duty to spend the better part of the day administering +justice in Skebawn, I received from Mr. Flurry Knox and other of my +brother magistrates precisely the class of condolences on my "Monday +head" that I found least amusing. It was unavailing to point out the +resemblance between hot potato cakes and molten lead, or to dilate on +their equal power of solidifying; the collective wisdom of the Bench +decided that I was suffering from contraband rum, and rejoiced over me +accordingly. + +During the next three weeks Murray and Bosanquet put in a time only to +be equalled by that of the heroes in detective romances. They began by +acting on the hint offered by Mr. Canty, and were rewarded by finding +eight barrels of bacon and three casks of rum in the heart of Mr. +Sullivan's turf rick, placed there, so Mr. Sullivan explained with much +detail, by enemies, with the object of getting his licence taken away. +They stabbed potato gardens with crowbars to find the buried barrels, +they explored the chimneys, they raided the cow-houses; and in every +possible and impossible place they found some of the cargo of the late +barque _John D. Williams_, and, as the sympathetic Mr. Canty said, "For +as much as they found, they left five times as much afther them!" + +It was a wet, lingering autumn, but towards the end of November the +rain dried up, the weather stiffened, and a week of light frosts and +blue skies was offered as a tardy apology. Philippa possesses, in +common with many of her sex, an inappeasable passion for picnics, and +her ingenuity for devising occasions for them is only equalled by her +gift for enduring their rigours. I have seen her tackle a moist +chicken pie with a splinter of slate and my stylograph pen. I have +known her to take the tea-basket to an auction, and make tea in a +four-wheeled inside car, regardless of the fact that it was coming +under the hammer in ten minutes, and that the kettle took twenty +minutes to boil. It will therefore be readily understood that the rare +occasions when I was free to go out with a gun were not allowed to pass +uncelebrated by the tea-basket. + +"You'd much better shoot Corran Lake to-morrow," my wife said to me one +brilliant afternoon. "We could send the punt over, and I could meet +you on Holy Island with----" + +The rest of the sentence was concerned with ways, means, and the +tea-basket, and need not be recorded. + +I had taken the shooting of a long snipe bog that trailed from Corran +Lake almost to the sea at Tralagough, and it was my custom to begin to +shoot from the seaward end of it, and finally to work round the lake +after duck. + +To-morrow proved a heavenly morning, touched with frost, gilt with sun. +I started early, and the mists were still smoking up from the calm, +all-reflecting lake, as the Quaker stepped out along the level road, +smashing the thin ice on the puddles with his big feet. Behind the +calves of my legs sat Maria, Philippa's brown Irish water-spaniel, +assiduously licking the barrels of my gun, as was her custom when the +ecstasy of going out shooting was hers. Maria had been given to +Philippa as a wedding-present, and since then it had been my wife's +ambition that she should conform to the Beth Gelert standard of being +"a lamb at home, a lion in the chase." Maria did pretty well as a +lion: she hunted all dogs unmistakably smaller than herself, and +whenever it was reasonably possible to do so she devoured the spoils of +the chase, notably jack snipe. It was as a lamb that she failed; +objectionable as I have no doubt a lamb would be as a domestic pet, it +at least would not snatch the cold beef from the luncheon-table, nor +yet, if banished for its crimes, would it spend the night in scratching +the paint off the hall door. Maria bit beggars (who valued their +disgusting limbs at five shillings the square inch), she bullied the +servants, she concealed ducks' claws and fishes' backbones behind the +sofa cushions, and yet, when she laid her brown snout upon my knee, and +rolled her blackguard amber eyes upon me, and smote me with her +feathered paw, it was impossible to remember her iniquities against +her. On shooting mornings Maria ceased to be a buccaneer, a glutton, +and a hypocrite. From the moment when I put my gun together her +breakfast stood untouched until it suffered the final degradation of +being eaten by the cats, and now in the trap she was shivering with +excitement, and agonising in her soul lest she should even yet be left +behind. + +Slipper met me at the cross roads from which I had sent back the trap; +Slipper, redder in the nose than anything I had ever seen off the +stage, very husky as to the voice, and going rather tender on both +feet. He informed me that I should have a grand day's shooting, the +head-poacher of the locality having, in a most gentlemanlike manner, +refrained from exercising his sporting rights the day before, on +hearing that I was coming. I understood that this was to be considered +as a mark of high personal esteem, and I set to work at the bog with +suitable gratitude. + +In spite of Mr. O'Driscoll's magnanimity, I had not a very good +morning. The snipe were there, but in the perfect stillness of the +weather it was impossible to get near them, and five times out of six +they were up, flickering and dodging, before I was within shot. Maria +became possessed of seven devils and broke away from heel the first +time I let off my gun, ranging far and wide in search of the bird I had +missed, and putting up every live thing for half a mile round, as she +went splashing and steeple-chasing through the bog. Slipper expressed +his opinion of her behaviour in language more appallingly picturesque +and resourceful than any I have heard, even in the Skebawn Courthouse; +I admit that at the time I thought he spoke very suitably. Before she +was recaptured every remaining snipe within earshot was lifted out of +it by Slipper's steam-engine whistles and my own infuriated bellows; it +was fortunate that the bog was spacious and that there was still a long +tract of it ahead, where beyond these voices there was peace. + +I worked my way on, jumping treacle-dark drains, floundering through +the rustling yellow rushes, circumnavigating the bog-holes, and taking +every possible and impossible chance of a shot; by the time I had +reached Corran Lake I had got two and a half brace, retrieved by Maria +with a perfection that showed what her powers were when the sinuous +adroitness of Slipper's woodbine stick was fresh in her mind. But with +Maria it was always the unexpected that happened. My last snipe, a +jack, fell in the lake, and Maria, bursting through the reeds with +kangaroo bounds, and cleaving the water like a torpedo-boat, was a +model of all the virtues of her kind. She picked up the bird with a +snake-like dart of her head, clambered with it on to a tussock, and +there, well out of reach of the arm of the law, before our indignant +eyes crunched it twice and bolted it. + +"Well," said Slipper complacently, some ten minutes afterwards, "divil +such a bating ever I gave a dog since the day Prince killed owld Mrs. +Knox's paycock! Prince was a lump of a brown tarrier I had one time, +and faith I kicked the toes out o' me owld boots on him before I had +the owld lady composed!" + +However composing Slipper's methods may have been to Mrs. Knox, they +had quite the contrary effect upon a family party of duck that had been +lying in the reeds. With horrified outcries they broke into flight, +and now were far away on the ethereal mirror of the lake, among strings +of their fellows that were floating and quacking in preoccupied +indifference to my presence. + +A promenade along the lake-shore demonstrated the fact that without a +boat there was no more shooting for me; I looked across to the island +where, some time ago, I had seen Philippa and her punt arrive. The +boat was tied to an overhanging tree, but my wife was nowhere to be +seen. I was opening my mouth to give a hail, when I saw her emerge +precipitately from among the trees and jump into the boat; Philippa had +not in vain spent many summers on the Thames, she was under way in a +twinkling, sculled a score of strokes at the rate of a finish, then +stopped and stared at the peaceful island. I called to her, and in a +minute or two the punt had crackled through the reeds, and shoved its +blunt nose ashore at the spot where I was standing. + +"Sinclair," said Philippa in awe-struck tones, "there's something on +the island!" + +"I hope there's something to eat there," said I. + +"I tell you there _is_ something there, alive," said my wife with her +eyes as large as saucers; "it's making an awful sound like snoring." + +"That's the fairies, ma'am," said Slipper with complete certainty; +"sure I known them that seen fairies in that island as thick as the +grass, and every one o' them with little caps on them." + +Philippa's wide gaze wandered to Slipper's hideous pug face and back to +me. + +"It was not a human being, Sinclair!" she said combatively, though I +had not uttered a word. + +Maria had already, after the manner of dogs, leaped, dripping, into the +boat: I prepared to follow her example. + +"Major," said Slipper, in a tragic whisper, "there was a man was a +night on that island one time, watching duck, and Thim People cot him, +and dhragged him through Hell and through Death, and threw him in the +tide----" + +"Shove off the boat," I said, too hungry for argument. + +Slipper obeyed, throwing his knee over the gunwale as he did so, and +tumbling into the bow; we could have done without him very comfortably, +but his devotion was touching. + +Holy Island was perhaps a hundred yards long, and about half as many +broad; it was covered with trees and a dense growth of rhododendrons; +somewhere in the jungle was a ruined fragment of a chapel, smothered in +ivy and briars, and in a little glade in the heart of the island there +was a holy well. We landed, and it was obviously a sore humiliation to +Philippa that not a sound was to be heard in the spell-bound silence of +the island, save the cough of a heron on a tree-top. + +"It _was_ there," she said, with an unconvinced glance at the +surrounding thickets. + +"Sure, I'll give a thrawl through the island, ma'am," volunteered +Slipper with unexpected gallantry, "an' if it's the divil himself is in +it, I'll rattle him into the lake!" + +He went swaggering on his search, shouting, "Hi, cock!" and whacking +the rhododendrons with his stick, and after an interval returned and +assured us that the island was uninhabited. Being provided with +refreshments he again withdrew, and Philippa and Maria and I fed +variously and at great length, and washed the plates with water from +the holy well. I was smoking a cigarette when we heard Slipper +addressing the solitudes at the farther end of the island, and ending +with one of his whisky-throated crows of laughter. + +He presently came lurching towards us through the bushes, and a glance +sufficed to show even Philippa--who was as incompetent a judge of such +matters as many of her sex--that he was undeniably screwed. + +"Major Yeates!" he began, "and Mrs. Major Yeates, with respex to ye, +I'm bastely dhrunk! Me head is light since the 'fluenzy, and the +docthor told me I should carry a little bottle-een o' sperrits----" + +"Look here," I said to Philippa, "I'll take him across, and bring the +boat back for you." + +"Sinclair," responded my wife with concentrated emotion, "I would +rather die than stay on this island alone!" + +Slipper was getting drunker every moment, but I managed to stow him on +his back in the bows of the punt, in which position he at once began to +uplift husky and wandering strains of melody. To this accompaniment +we, as Tennyson says, + + "moved from the brink like some full-breasted swan, + That, fluting a wild carol ere her death, + Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood + With swarthy web." + +Slipper would certainly have been none the worse for taking the flood, +and, as the burden of "Lannigan's Ball" strengthened and spread along +the tranquil lake, and the duck once more fled in justifiable +consternation, I felt much inclined to make him do so. + +We made for the end of the lake that was nearest Shreelane, and, as we +rounded the point of the island, another boat presented itself to our +view. It contained my late entertainer, Mrs. Canty, seated bulkily in +the stern, while a small boy bowed himself between the two heavy oars. + +"It's a lovely evening, Major Yeates," she called out. "I'm just going +to the island to get some water from the holy well for me daughter that +has an impression on her chest. Indeed, I thought 'twas yourself was +singing a song for Mrs. Yeates when I heard you coming, but sure +Slipper is a great warrant himself for singing." + +"May the divil crack the two legs undher ye!" bawled Slipper in +acknowledgment of the compliment. + +Mrs. Canty laughed genially, and her boat lumbered away. + +I shoved Slipper ashore at the nearest point; Philippa and I paddled to +the end of the lake, and abandoning the duck as a bad business, walked +home. + +A few days afterwards it happened that it was incumbent upon me to +attend the funeral of the Roman Catholic Bishop of the diocese. It was +what is called in France "_un bel enterrement_," with inky flocks of +tall-hatted priests, and countless yards of white scarves, and a repast +of monumental solidity at the Bishop's residence. The actual interment +was to take place in Cork, and we moved in long and imposing procession +to the railway station, where a special train awaited the cortège. My +friend Mr. James Canty was among the mourners: an important and active +personage, exchanging condolences with the priests, giving directions +to porters, and blowing his nose with a trumpeting mournfulness that +penetrated all the other noises of the platform. He was condescending +enough to notice my presence, and found time to tell me that he had +given Mr. Murray "a sure word" with regard to some of "_the +wreckage_"--this with deep significance, and a wink of an inflamed and +tearful eye. I saw him depart in a first-class carriage, and the odour +of sanctity; seeing that he was accompanied by seven priests, and that +both windows were shut, the latter must have been considerable. + +Afterwards, in the town, I met Murray, looking more pleased with +himself than I had seen him since he had taken up the unprofitable task +of smuggler-hunting. + +"Come along and have some lunch," he said, "I've got a real good thing +on this time! That chap Canty came to me late last night, and told me +that he knew for a fact that the island on Corran Lake was just stiff +with barrels of bacon and rum, and that I'd better send every man I +could spare to-day to get them into the town. I sent the men out at +eight o'clock this morning; I think I've gone one better than Bosanquet +this time!" + +I began to realise that Philippa was going to score heavily on the +subject of the fairies that she had heard snoring on the island, and I +imparted to Murray the leading features of our picnic there. + +"Oh, Slipper's been up to his chin in that rum from the first," said +Murray. "I'd like to know who his sleeping partner was!" + +It was beginning to get dark before the loaded carts of the salvage +party came lumbering past Murray's windows and into the yard of the +police-barrack. We followed them, and in so doing picked up Flurry +Knox, who was sauntering in the same direction. It was a good haul, +five big casks of rum, and at least a dozen smaller barrels of bacon +and butter, and Murray and his Chief Constable smiled seraphically on +one another as the spoil was unloaded and stowed in a shed. + +"Wouldn't it be as well to see how the butter is keeping?" remarked +Flurry, who had been looking on silently, with, as I had noticed, a +still and amused eye. "The rim of that small keg there looks as if it +had been shifted lately." + +The sergeant looked hard at Flurry; he knew as well as most people that +a hint from Mr. Knox was usually worth taking. He turned to Murray. + +"Will I open it, sir?" + +"Oh! open it if Mr. Knox wishes," said Murray, who was not famous for +appreciating other people's suggestions. + +The keg was opened. + +"Funny butter," said Flurry. + +The sergeant said nothing. The keg was full of black bog-mould. +Another was opened, and another, all with the same result. + +"Damnation!" said Murray, suddenly losing his temper. "What's the use +of going on with those? Try one of the rum casks." + +A few moments passed in total silence while a tap and a spigot were +sent for and applied to the barrel. The sergeant drew off a mugful and +put his nose to it with the deliberation of a connoisseur. + +"Water, sir," he pronounced, "dirty water, with a small indication of +sperrits." + +A junior constable tittered explosively, met the light blue glare of +Murray's eye, and withered away. + +"Perhaps it's holy water!" said I, with a wavering voice. + +Murray's glance pinned me like an assegai, and I also faded into the +background. + +"Well," said Flurry in dulcet tones, "if you want to know where the +stuff is that was in those barrels, I can tell you, for I was told it +myself half-an-hour ago. It's gone to Cork with the Bishop by special +train!" + + +Mr. Canty was undoubtedly a man of resource. Mrs. Canty had mistakenly +credited me with an intelligence equal to her own, and on receiving +from Slipper a highly coloured account of how audibly Mr. Canty had +slept off his potations, had regarded the secret of Holy Island as +having been given away. That night and the two succeeding ones were +spent in the transfer of the rum to bottles, and the bottles and the +butter to fish boxes; these were, by means of a slight lubrication of +the railway underlings, loaded into a truck as "Fresh Fish, Urgent," +and attached to the Bishop's funeral train, while the police, decoyed +far from the scene of action, were breaking their backs over barrels of +bog-water. "I suppose," continued Flurry pleasantly, "you don't know +the pub that Canty's brother has in Cork. Well, I do. I'm going to +buy some rum there next week, cheap." + +"I shall proceed against Canty," said Murray, with fateful calm. + +"You won't proceed far," said Flurry; "you'll not get as much evidence +out of the whole country as'd hang a cat." + +"Who was your informant?" demanded Murray. + +Flurry laughed. "Well, by the time the train was in Cork, yourself and +the Major were the only two men in the town that weren't talking about +it." + + + + +IX +THE POLICY OF THE CLOSED DOOR + + +The disasters and humiliations that befell me at Drumcurran Fair may +yet be remembered. They certainly have not been forgotten in the +regions about Skebawn, where the tale of how Bernard Shute and I stole +each other's horses has passed into history. The grand-daughter of the +Mountain Hare, bought by Mr. Shute with such light-hearted enthusiasm, +was restored to that position between the shafts of a cart that she was +so well fitted to grace; Moonlighter, his other purchase, spent the two +months following on the fair in "favouring" a leg with a strained +sinew, and in receiving visits from the local vet., who, however +uncertain in his diagnosis of Moonlighter's leg, had accurately +estimated the length of Bernard's foot. + +Miss Bennett's mare Cruiskeen, alone of the trio, was immediately and +thoroughly successful. She went in harness like a hero, she carried +Philippa like an elder sister, she was never sick or sorry; as Peter +Cadogan summed her up, "That one 'd live where another 'd die." In her +safe keeping Philippa made her début with hounds at an uneventful +morning's cubbing, with no particular result, except that Philippa +returned home so stiff that she had to go to bed for a day, and arose +more determined than ever to be a fox-hunter. + +The opening meet of Mr. Knox's foxhounds was on November 1, and on that +morning Philippa on Cruiskeen, accompanied by me on the Quaker, set out +for Ardmeen Cross, the time-honoured fixture for All Saints' Day. The +weather was grey and quiet, and full of all the moist sweetness of an +Irish autumn. There had been a great deal of rain during the past +month; it had turned the bracken to a purple brown, and had filled the +hollows with shining splashes of water. The dead leaves were slippery +under foot, and the branches above were thinly decked with yellow, +where the pallid survivors of summer still clung to their posts. As +Philippa and I sedately approached the meet the red coats of Flurry +Knox and his whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, were to be seen on the road at +the top of the hill; Cruiskeen put her head in the air, and stared at +them with eyes that understood all they portended. + +"Sinclair," said my wife hurriedly, as a straggling hound, flogged in +by Dr. Hickey, uttered a grievous and melodious howl, "remember, if +they find, it's no use to talk to me, for I shan't be able to speak." + +I was sufficiently acquainted with Philippa in moments of enthusiasm to +exhibit silently the corner of a clean pocket-handkerchief; I have seen +her cry when a police constable won a bicycle race in Skebawn; she has +wept at hearing Sir Valentine Knox's health drunk with musical honours +at a tenants' dinner. It is an amiable custom, but, as she herself +admits, it is unbecoming. + +An imposing throng, in point of numbers, was gathered at the +cross-roads, the riders being almost swamped in the crowd of traps, +outside cars, bicyclists, and people on foot. The field was an +eminently representative one. The Clan Knox was, as usual, there in +force, its more aristocratic members dingily respectable in black coats +and tall hats that went impartially to weddings, funerals, and hunts, +and, like a horse that is past mark of mouth, were no longer to be +identified with any special epoch; there was a humbler squireen element +in tweeds and flat-brimmed pot-hats, and a good muster of farmers, men +of the spare, black-muzzled, West of Ireland type, on horses that +ranged from the cart mare, clipped trace high, to shaggy and leggy +three-year-olds, none of them hunters, but all of them able to hunt. +Philippa and I worked our way to the heart of things, where was Flurry, +seated on his brown mare, in what appeared to be a somewhat moody +silence. As we exchanged greetings I was aware that his eye was +resting with extreme disfavour upon two approaching figures. I put up +my eye-glass, and perceived that one of them was Miss Sally Knox, on a +tall grey horse; the other was Mr. Bernard Shute, in all the flawless +beauty of his first pink coat, mounted on Stockbroker, a well-known, +hard-mouthed, big-jumping bay, recently purchased from Dr. Hickey. + +During the languors of a damp autumn the neighbourhood had been much +nourished and sustained by the privilege of observing and diagnosing +the progress of Mr. Shute's flirtation with Miss Sally Knox. What made +it all the more enjoyable for the lookers-on--or most of them--was, +that although Bernard's courtship was of the nature of a proclamation +from the housetops, Miss Knox's attitude left everything to the +imagination. To Flurry Knox the romantic but despicable position of +slighted rival was comfortably allotted; his sole sympathisers were +Philippa and old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas, but no one knew if he needed +sympathisers. Flurry was a man of mystery. + +Mr. Shute and Miss Knox approached us rapidly, the latter's mount +pulling hard. + +"Flurry," I said, "isn't that grey the horse Shute bought from you last +July at the fair?" + +Flurry did not answer me. His face was as black as thunder. He turned +his horse round, cursing two country boys who got in his way, with low +and concentrated venom, and began to move forward, followed by the +hounds. If his wish was to avoid speaking to Miss Sally it was not to +be gratified. + +"Good-morning, Flurry," she began, sitting close down to Moonlighter's +ramping jog as she rode up beside her cousin. "What a hurry you're in! +We passed no end of people on the road who won't be here for another +ten minutes." + +"No more will I," was Mr. Knox's cryptic reply, as he spurred the brown +mare into a trot. + +Moonlighter made a vigorous but frustrated effort to buck, and +indemnified himself by a successful kick at a hound. + +"Bother you, Flurry! Can't you walk for a minute?" exclaimed Miss +Sally, who looked about as large, in relation to her horse, as the +conventional tomtit on a round of beef. "You might have more sense +than to crack your whip under this horse's nose! I don't believe you +know what horse it is even!" + +I was not near enough to catch Flurry's reply. + +"Well, if you didn't want him to be lent to me you shouldn't have sold +him to Mr. Shute!" retorted Miss Knox, in her clear, provoking little +voice. + +"I suppose he's afraid to ride him himself," said Flurry, turning his +horse in at a gate. "Get ahead there, Jerome, can't you? It's better +to put them in at this end than to have every one riding on top of +them!" + +Miss Sally's cheeks were still very pink when I came up and began to +talk to her, and her grey-green eyes had a look in them like those of +an angry kitten. + +The riders moved slowly down a rough pasture-field, and took up their +position along the brow of Ardmeen covert, into which the hounds had +already hurled themselves with their customary contempt for the +convenances. Flurry's hounds, true to their nationality, were in the +habit of doing the right thing in the wrong way. + +Untouched by autumn, the furze bushes of Ardmeen covert were darkly +green, save for a golden fleck of blossom here and there, and the +glistening grey cobwebs that stretched from spike to spike. The look +of the ordinary gorse covert is familiar to most people as a tidy +enclosure of an acre or so, filled with low plants of well-educated +gorse; not so many will be found who have experience of it as a rocky, +sedgy wilderness, half a mile square, garrisoned with brigades of furze +bushes, some of them higher than a horse's head, lean, strong, and +cunning, like the foxes that breed in them, impenetrable, with their +bristling spikes, as a hedge of bayonets. By dint of infinite leisure +and obstinate greed, the cattle had made paths for themselves through +the bushes to the patches of grass that they hemmed in; their +hoofprints were guides to the explorer, down muddy staircases of rock, +and across black intervals of unplumbed bog. The whole covert slanted +gradually down to a small river that raced round three sides of it, and +beyond the stream, in agreeable contrast, lay a clean and wholesome +country of grass fields and banks. + +The hounds drew slowly along and down the hill towards the river, and +the riders hung about outside the covert, and tried--I can answer for +at least one of them--to decide which was the least odious of the ways +through it, in the event of the fox breaking at the far side. Miss +Sally took up a position not very far from me, and it was easy to see +that she had her hands full with her borrowed mount, on whose temper +the delay and suspense were visibly telling. His iron-grey neck was +white from the chafing of the reins; had the ground under his feet been +red-hot he could hardly have sidled and hopped more uncontrollably; +nothing but the most impassioned conjugation of the verb to condemn +could have supplied any human equivalent for the manner in which he +tore holes in the sedgy grass with a furious forefoot. Those who were +even superficial judges of character gave his heels a liberal allowance +of sea-room, and Mr. Shute, who could not be numbered among such, and +had, as usual, taken up a position as near Miss Sally as possible, was +rewarded by a double knock on his horse's ribs that was a cause of +heartless mirth to the lady of his affections. + +Not a hound had as yet spoken, but they were forcing their way through +the gorse forest and shoving each other jealously aside with growing +excitement, and Flurry could be seen at intervals, moving forward in +the direction they were indicating. It was at this juncture that the +ubiquitous Slipper presented himself at my horse's shoulder. + +"'Tis for the river he's making, Major," he said, with an upward roll +of his squinting eyes, that nearly made me sea-sick. "He's a Castle +Knox fox that came in this morning, and ye should get ahead down to the +ford!" + +A tip from Slipper was not to be neglected, and Philippa and I began a +cautious progress through the gorse, followed by Miss Knox as quietly +as Moonlighter's nerves would permit. + +"Wishful has it!" she exclaimed, as a hound came out into view, uttered +a sharp yelp, and drove forward. + +"Hark! hark!" roared Flurry with at least three r's reverberating in +each "hark"; at the same instant came a holloa from the farther side of +the river, and Dr. Hickey's renowned and blood-curdling screech was +uplifted at the bottom of the covert. Then babel broke forth, as the +hounds, converging from every quarter, flung themselves shrieking on +the line. Moonlighter went straight up on his hind-legs, and dropped +again with a bound that sent him crushing past Philippa and Cruiskeen; +he did it a second time, and was almost on to the tail of the Quaker, +whose bulky person was not to be hurried in any emergency. + +"Get on if you can, Major Yeates!" called out Sally, steadying the grey +as well as she could in the narrow pathway between the great gorse +bushes. + +Other horses were thundering behind us, men were shouting to each other +in similar passages right and left of us, the cry of the hounds filled +the air with a kind of delirium. A low wall with a stick laid along it +barred the passage in front of me, and the Quaker firmly and +immediately decided not to have it until some one else had dislodged +the pole. + +"Go ahead!" I shouted, squeezing to one side with heroic disregard of +the furze bushes and my new tops. + +The words were hardly out of my mouth when Moonlighter, mad with +thwarted excitement, shot by me, hurtled over the obstacle with +extravagant fury, landed twelve feet beyond it on clattering slippery +rock, saved himself from falling with an eel-like forward buck on to +sedgy ground, and bolted at full speed down the muddy cattle track. +There are corners--rocky, most of them--in that cattle track, that +Sally has told me she will remember to her dying day; boggy holes of +any depth, ranging between two feet and half-way to Australia, that she +says she does not fail to mention in the General Thanksgiving; but at +the time they occupied mere fractions of the strenuous seconds in which +it was hopeless for her to do anything but try to steer, trust to luck, +sit hard down into the saddle and try to stay there. (For my part, I +would as soon try to adhere to the horns of a charging bull as to the +crutches of a side-saddle, but happily the necessity is not likely to +arise.) I saw Flurry Knox a little ahead of her on the same track, +jamming his mare into the furze bushes to get out of her way; he +shouted something after her about the ford, and started to gallop for +it himself by a breakneck short cut. + +The hounds were already across the river, and it was obvious that, ford +or no ford, Moonlighter's intentions might be simply expressed in the +formula "Be with them I will." It was all down-hill to the river, and +among the furze bushes and rocks there was neither time nor place to +turn him. He rushed at it with a shattering slip upon a streak of +rock, with a heavy plunge in the deep ground by the brink; it was as +bad a take-off for twenty feet of water as could well be found. The +grey horse rose out of the boggy stuff with all the impetus that pace +and temper could give, but it was not enough. For one instant the +twisting, sliding current was under Sally, the next a veil of water +sprang up all round her, and Moonlighter was rolling and lurching in +the desperate effort to find foothold in the rocky bed of the stream. + +I was following at the best pace I could kick out of the Quaker, and +saw the water swirl into her lap as her horse rolled to the near-side. +She caught the mane to save herself, but he struggled on to his legs +again, and came floundering broadside on to the farther bank. In three +seconds she had got out of the saddle and flung herself at the bank, +grasping the rushes, and trying, in spite of the sodden weight of her +habit, to drag herself out of the water. + +At the same instant I saw Flurry and the brown mare dashing through the +ford, twenty yards higher up. He was off his horse and beside her with +that uncanny quickness that Flurry reserved for moments of emergency, +and, catching her by the arms, swung her on to the bank as easily as if +she had been the kennel terrier. + +"Catch the horse!" she called out, scrambling to her feet. + +"Damn the horse!" returned Flurry, in the rage that is so often the +reaction from a bad scare. + +I turned along the bank and made for the ford; by this time it was full +of hustling, splashing riders, through whom Bernard Shute, furiously +picking up a bad start, drove a devastating way. He tried to turn his +horse down the bank towards Miss Knox, but the hounds were running +hard, and, to my intense amusement, Stockbroker refused to abandon the +chase, and swept his rider away in the wake of his stable companion, +Dr. Hickey's young chestnut. By this time two country boys had, as is +usual in such cases, risen from the earth, and fished Moonlighter out +of the stream. Miss Sally wound up an acrimonious argument with her +cousin by observing that she didn't care what he said, and placing her +water-logged boot in his obviously unwilling hand, in a second was +again in the saddle, gathering up the wet reins with the trembling, +clumsy fingers of a person who is thoroughly chilled and in a violent +hurry. She set Moonlighter going, and was away in a moment, galloping +him at the first fence at a pace that suited his steeple-chasing ideas. + +"Mr. Knox!" panted Philippa, who had by this time joined us, "make her +go home!" + +"She can go where she likes as far as I'm concerned," responded Mr. +Knox, pitching himself on his mare's back and digging in the spurs. + +Moonlighter had already glided over the bank in front of us, with a +perfunctory flick at it with his heels; Flurry's mare and Cruiskeen +jumped it side by side with equal precision. It was a bank of some +five feet high; the Quaker charged it enthusiastically, refused it +abruptly, and, according to his infuriating custom at such moments, +proceeded to tear hurried mouthfuls of grass. + +"Will I give him a couple o' belts, your Honour?" shouted one of the +running accompaniment of country boys. + +"You will!" said I, with some further remarks to the Quaker that I need +not commit to paper. + +Swish! Whack! The sound was music in my ears, as the good, +remorseless ash sapling bent round the Quaker's dappled hind-quarters. +At the third stripe he launched both his heels in the operator's face; +at the fourth he reared undecidedly; at the fifth he bundled over the +bank in a manner purged of hesitation. + +"Ha!" yelled my assistants, "that'll put the fear o' God in him!" as +the Quaker fled headlong after the hunt. "He'll be the betther o' that +while he lives!" + +Without going quite as far as this, I must admit that for the next +half-hour he was astonishingly the better of it. + +The Castle Knox fox was making a very pretty line of it over the seven +miles that separated him from his home. He headed through a grassy +country of Ireland's mild and brilliant green, fenced with sound and +buxom banks, enlivened by stone walls, uncompromised by the presence of +gates, and yet comfortably laced with lanes for the furtherance of +those who had laid to heart Wolsey's valuable advice: "Fling away +ambition: by that sin fell the angels." The flotsam and jetsam of the +hunt pervaded the landscape: standing on one long bank, three +dismounted farmers flogged away at the refusing steeds below them, like +anglers trying to rise a sulky fish; half-a-dozen hats, bobbing in a +string, showed where the road riders followed the delusive windings of +a bohereen. It was obvious that in the matter of ambition they would +not have caused Cardinal Wolsey a moment's uneasiness; whether angels +or otherwise, they were not going to run any risk of falling. + +Flurry's red coat was like a beacon two fields ahead of me, with +Philippa following in his tracks; it was the first run worthy of the +name that Philippa had ridden, and I blessed Miss Bobby Bennett as I +saw Cruiskeen's undefeated fencing. An encouraging twang of the +Doctor's horn notified that the hounds were giving us a chance; even +the Quaker pricked his blunt ears and swerved in his stride to the +sound. A stone wall, a rough patch of heather, a boggy field, dinted +deep and black with hoof marks, and the stern chase was at an end. The +hounds had checked on the outskirts of a small wood, and the field, +thinned down to a panting dozen or so, viewed us with the disfavour +shown by the first flight towards those who unexpectedly add to their +select number. In the depths of the wood Dr. Hickey might be heard +uttering those singular little yelps of encouragement that to the +irreverent suggest a milkman in his dotage. Bernard Shute, who neither +knew nor cared what the hounds were doing, was expatiating at great +length to an uninterested squireen upon the virtues and perfections of +his new mount. + +"I did all I knew to come and help you at the river," he said, riding +up to the splashed and still dripping Sally, "but Stockbroker wouldn't +hear of it. I pulled his ugly head round till his nose was on my boot, +but he galloped away just the same!" + +"He was quite right," said Miss Sally; "I didn't want you in the least." + +As Miss Sally's red gold coil of hair was turned towards me during this +speech, I could only infer the glance with which it was delivered, from +the fact that Mr. Shute responded to it with one of those firm gazes of +adoration in which the neighbourhood took such an interest, and +crumbled away into incoherency. + +A shout from the top of a hill interrupted the amenities of the check; +Flurry was out of the wood in half-a-dozen seconds, blowing shattering +blasts upon his horn, and the hounds rushed to him, knowing the "gone +away" note that was never blown in vain. The brown mare came out +through the trees and the undergrowth like a woodcock down the wind, +and jumped across a stream on to a more than questionable bank; the +hounds splashed and struggled after him, and, as they landed, the first +ecstatic whimpers broke forth. In a moment it was full cry, +discordant, beautiful, and soul-stirring, as the pack spread and sped, +and settled to the line. I saw the absurd dazzle of tears in +Philippa's eyes, and found time for the insulting proffer of the clean +pocket-handkerchief, as we all galloped hard to get away on good terms +with the hounds. + +It was one of those elect moments in fox-hunting when the fittest alone +have survived; even the Quaker's sluggish blood was stirred by good +company, and possibly by the remembrance of the singing ash-plant, and +he lumbered up tall stone-faced banks and down heavy drops, and across +wide ditches, in astounding adherence to the line cut out by Flurry. +Cruiskeen went like a book--a story for girls, very pleasant and safe, +but rather slow. Moonlighter was pulling Miss Sally on to the sterns +of the hounds, flying his banks, rocketing like a pheasant over +three-foot walls--committing, in fact, all the crimes induced by youth +and over-feeding; he would have done very comfortably with another six +or seven stone on his back. + +Why Bernard Shute did not come off at every fence and generally die a +thousand deaths I cannot explain. Occasionally I rather wished he +would, as, from my secure position in the rear, I saw him charging his +fences at whatever pace and place seemed good to the thoroughly +demoralised Stockbroker, and in so doing cannon heavily against Dr. +Hickey on landing over a rotten ditch, jump a wall with his spur +rowelling Charlie Knox's boot, and cut in at top speed in front of +Flurry, who was scientifically cramming his mare up a very awkward +scramble. In so far as I could think of anything beyond Philippa and +myself and the next fence, I thought there would be trouble for Mr. +Shute in consequence of this last feat. It was a half-hour long to be +remembered, in spite of the Quaker's ponderous and unalterable gallop, +in spite of the thump with which he came down off his banks, in spite +of the confiding manner in which he hung upon my hand. + +We were nearing Castle Knox, and the riders began to edge away from the +hounds towards a gate that broke the long barrier of the demesne wall. +Steaming horses and purple-faced riders clattered and crushed in at the +gate; there was a moment of pulling up and listening, in which +quivering tails and pumping sides told their own story. Cruiskeen's +breathing suggested a cross between a grampus and a gramophone; +Philippa's hair had come down, and she had a stitch in her side. +Moonlighter, fresher than ever, stamped and dragged at his bit; I +thought little Miss Sally looked very white. The bewildering clamour +of the hounds was all through the wide laurel plantations. At a word +from Flurry, Dr. Hickey shoved his horse ahead and turned down a ride, +followed by most of the field. + +"Philippa," I said severely, "you've had enough, and you know it." + +"Do go up to the house and make them give you something to eat," struck +in Miss Sally, twisting Moonlighter round to keep his mind occupied. + +"And as for you, Miss Sally," I went on, in the manner of Mr. +Fairchild, "the sooner you get off that horse and out of those wet +things the better." + +Flurry, who was just in front of us, said nothing, but gave a short and +most disagreeable laugh. Philippa accepted my suggestion with the +meekness of exhaustion, but under the circumstances it did not surprise +me that Miss Sally did not follow her example. + +Then ensued an hour of woodland hunting at its worst and most +bewildering. I galloped after Flurry and Miss Sally up and down long +glittering lanes of laurel, at every other moment burying my face in +the Quaker's coarse white mane to avoid the slash of the branches, and +receiving down the back of my neck showers of drops stored up from the +rain of the day before; playing an endless game of hide-and-seek with +the hounds, and never getting any nearer to them, as they turned and +doubled through the thickets of evergreens. Even to my limited +understanding of the situation it became clear at length that two foxes +were on foot; most of the hounds were hard at work a quarter of a mile +away, but Flurry, with a grim face and a faithful three couple, stuck +to the failing line of the hunted fox. + +There came a moment when Miss Sally and I--who through many +vicissitudes had clung to each other--found ourselves at a spot where +two rides crossed. Flurry was waiting there, and a little way up one +of the rides a couple of hounds were hustling to and fro, with the +thwarted whimpers half breaking from them; he held up his hand to stop +us, and at that identical moment Bernard Shute, like a bolt from the +blue, burst upon our vision. It need scarcely be mentioned that he was +going at full gallop--I have rarely seen him ride at any other +pace--and as he bore down upon Flurry and the hounds, ducking and +dodging to avoid the branches, he shouted something about a fox having +gone away at the other side of the covert. + +"Hold hard!" roared Flurry; "don't you see the hounds, you fool?" + +Mr. Shute, to do him justice, held hard with all the strength of his +body, but it was of no avail. The bay horse had got his head down and +his tail up, there was a piercing yell from a hound as it was ridden +over, and Flurry's brown mare will not soon forget the moment when +Stockbroker's shoulder took her on the point of the hip and sent her +staggering into the laurel branches. As she swung round, Flurry's whip +went up, and with a swift backhander the cane and the looped thong +caught Bernard across his broad shoulders. + +"O Mr. Shute!" shrieked Miss Sally, as I stared dumfoundered; "did that +branch hurt you?" + +"All right! Nothing to signify!" he called out as he bucketed past, +tugging at his horse's head. "Thought some one had hit me at first! +Come on, we'll catch 'em up this way!" + +He swung perilously into the main ride and was gone, totally unaware of +the position that Miss Sally's quickness had saved. + +Flurry rode straight up to his cousin, with a pale, dangerous face. + +"I suppose you think I'm to stand being ridden over and having my +hounds killed to please you," he said; "but you're mistaken. You were +very smart, and you may think you've saved him his licking, but you +needn't think he won't get it. He'll have it in spite of you, before +he goes to his bed this night!" + +A man who loses his temper badly because he is badly in love is +inevitably ridiculous, far though he may be from thinking himself so. +He is also a highly unpleasant person to argue with, and Miss Sally and +I held our peace respectfully. He turned his horse and rode away. + +Almost instantly the three couple of hounds opened in the underwood +near us with a deafening crash, and not twenty yards ahead the hunted +fox, dark with wet and mud, slunk across the ride. The hounds were +almost on his brush; Moonlighter reared and chafed; the din was +redoubled, passed away to a little distance, and suddenly seemed +stationary in the middle of the laurels. + +"Could he have got into the old ice-house?" exclaimed Miss Sally, with +reviving excitement. She pushed ahead, and turned down the narrowest +of all the rides that had that day been my portion. At the end of the +green tunnel there was a comparatively open space; Flurry's mare was +standing in it, riderless, and Flurry himself was hammering with a +stone at the padlock of a door that seemed to lead into the heart of a +laurel clump. The hounds were baying furiously somewhere back of the +entrance, among the laurel stems. + +"He's got in by the old ice drain," said Flurry, addressing himself +sulkily to me, and ignoring Miss Sally. He had not the least idea of +how absurd was his scowling face, draped by the luxuriant +hart's-tongues that overhung the doorway. + +The padlock yielded, and the opening door revealed a low, dark passage, +into which Flurry disappeared, lugging a couple of hounds with him by +the scruff of the neck; the remaining two couple bayed implacably at +the mouth of the drain. The croak of a rusty bolt told of a second +door at the inner end of the passage. + +"Look out for the steps, Flurry, they're all broken," called out Miss +Sally in tones of honey. + +There was no answer. Miss Sally looked at me; her face was serious, +but her mischievous eyes made a confederate of me. + +"He's in an _awful_ rage!" she said. "I'm afraid there will certainly +be a row." + +A row there certainly was, but it was in the cavern of the ice-house, +where the fox had evidently been discovered. Miss Sally suddenly flung +Moonlighter's reins to me and slipped off his back. + +"Hold him!" she said, and dived into the doorway under the overhanging +branches. + +Things happened after that with astonishing simultaneousness. There +was a shrill exclamation from Miss Sally, the inner door was slammed +and bolted, and at one and the same moment the fox darted from the +entry, and was away into the wood before one could wink. + +"What's happened?" I called out, playing the refractory Moonlighter +like a salmon. + +Miss Sally appeared at the doorway, looking half scared and half +delighted. + +"I've bolted him in, and I won't let him out till he promises to be +good! I was only just in time to slam the door after the fox bolted +out!" + +"Great Scott!" I said helplessly. + +Miss Sally vanished again into the passage, and the imprisoned hounds +continued to express their emotions in the echoing vault of the +ice-house. Their master remained mute as the dead, and I trembled. + +"Flurry!" I heard Miss Sally say. "Flurry, I--I've locked you in!" + +This self-evident piece of information met with no response. + +"Shall I tell you why?" + +A keener note seemed to indicate that a hound had been kicked. + +"I don't care whether you answer me or not, I'm going to tell you!" + +There was a pause; apparently telling him was not as simple as had been +expected. + +"I won't let you out till you promise me something. Ah, Flurry, don't +be so cross! What do you say?---- Oh, that's a ridiculous thing to +say. You know quite well it's not on his account!" + +There was another considerable pause. + +"Flurry!" said Miss Sally again, in tones that would have wiled a +badger from his earth. "Dear Flurry--" + +At this point I hurriedly flung Moonlighter's bridle over a branch and +withdrew. + +My own subsequent adventures are quite immaterial, until the moment +when I encountered Miss Sally on the steps of the hall door at Castle +Knox. + +"I'm just going in to take off these wet things," she said airily. + +This was no way to treat a confederate. + +"Well?" I said, barring her progress. + +"Oh--he--he promised. It's all right," she replied, rather +breathlessly. + +There was no one about; I waited resolutely for further information. +It did not come. + +"Did he try to make his own terms?" said I, looking hard at her. + +"Yes, he did." She tried to pass me. + +"And what did you do?" + +"I refused them!" she said, with the sudden stagger of a sob in her +voice, as she escaped into the house. + +Now what on earth was Sally Knox crying about? + + + + +X +THE HOUSE OF FAHY + + +Nothing could shake the conviction of Maria that she was by nature and +by practice a house dog. Every one of Shreelane's many doors had, at +one time or another, slammed upon her expulsion, and each one of them +had seen her stealthy, irrepressible return to the sphere that she felt +herself so eminently qualified to grace. For her the bone, thriftily +interred by Tim Connor's terrier, was a mere diversion; even the +fruitage of the ashpit had little charm for an accomplished _habitué_ +of the kitchen. She knew to a nicety which of the doors could be burst +open by assault, at which it was necessary to whine sycophantically; +and the clinical thermometer alone could furnish a parallel for her +perception of mood in those in authority. In the case of Mrs. Cadogan +she knew that there were seasons when instant and complete +self-effacement was the only course to pursue; therefore when, on a +certain morning in July, on my way through the downstairs regions to my +office, I saw her approach the kitchen door with her usual +circumspection, and, on hearing her name enunciated indignantly by my +cook, withdraw swiftly to a city of refuge at the back of the hayrick, +I drew my own conclusions. + +Had she remained, as I did, she would have heard the disclosure of a +crime that lay more heavily on her digestion than her conscience. + +"I can't put a thing out o' me hand but he's watching me to whip it +away!" declaimed Mrs. Cadogan, with all the disregard of her kind for +the accident of sex in the brute creation. "'Twas only last night I +was back in the scullery when I heard Bridget let a screech, and there +was me brave dog up on the table eating the roast beef that was after +coming out from the dinner!" + +"Brute!" interjected Philippa, with what I well knew to be a simulated +wrath. + +"And I had planned that bit of beef for the luncheon," continued Mrs. +Cadogan in impassioned lamentation, "the way we wouldn't have to +inthrude on the cold turkey! Sure he has it that dhragged, that all we +can do with it now is run it through the mincing machine for the +Major's sandwiches." + +At this appetising suggestion I thought fit to intervene in the +deliberations. + +"One thing," I said to Philippa afterwards, as I wrapped up a bottle of +Yanatas in a Cardigan jacket and rammed it into an already apoplectic +Gladstone bag, "that I do draw the line at, is taking that dog with us. +The whole business is black enough as it is." + +"Dear," said my wife, looking at me with almost clairvoyant +abstraction, "I could manage a second evening dress if you didn't mind +putting my tea-jacket in your portmanteau." + +Little, thank Heaven! as I know about yachting, I knew enough to make +pertinent remarks on the incongruity of an ancient 60-ton hireling and +a fleet of smart evening dresses; but none the less I left a pair of +indispensable boots behind, and the tea-jacket went into my portmanteau. + +It is doing no more than the barest justice to the officers of the +Royal Navy to say that, so far as I know them, they cherish no mistaken +enthusiasm for a home on the rolling deep when a home anywhere else +presents itself. Bernard Shute had unfortunately proved an exception +to this rule. During the winter, the invitation to go for a cruise in +the yacht that was in process of building for him hung over me like a +cloud; a timely strike in the builder's yard brought a respite, and, in +fact, placed the completion of the yacht at so safe a distance that I +was betrayed into specious regrets, echoed with an atrocious sincerity +by Philippa. Into a life pastorally compounded of Petty Sessions and +lawn-tennis parties, retribution fell when it was least expected. +Bernard Shute hired a yacht in Queenstown, and one short week +afterwards the worst had happened, and we were packing our things for a +cruise in her, the only alleviation being the knowledge that, whether +by sea or land, I was bound to return to my work in four days. + +We left Shreelane at twelve o'clock, a specially depressing hour for a +start, when breakfast has died in you, and lunch is still remote. My +last act before mounting the dogcart was to put her collar and chain on +Maria and immure her in the potato-house, whence, as we drove down the +avenue, her wails rent the heart of Philippa and rejoiced mine. It was +a very hot day, with a cloudless sky; the dust lay thick on the white +road, and on us also, as, during two baking hours, we drove up and down +the long hills and remembered things that had been left behind, and +grew hungry enough to eat sandwiches that tasted suspiciously of roast +beef. + +The yacht was moored in Clountiss Harbour; we drove through the village +street, a narrow and unlovely thoroughfare, studded with public-houses, +swarming with children and poultry, down through an ever-growing smell +of fish, to the quay. + +Thence we first viewed our fate, a dingy-looking schooner, and the hope +I had secretly been nourishing that there was not wind enough for her +to start, was dispelled by the sight of her topsail going up. More +than ever at that radiant moment--as the reflection of the white sail +quivered on the tranquil blue, and the still water flattered all it +reproduced, like a fashionable photographer--did I agree with George +Herbert's advice, "Praise the sea, but stay on shore." + +"We must hail her, I suppose," I said drearily. I assailed the _Eileen +Oge_, such being her inappropriate name, with desolate cries, but +achieved no immediate result beyond the assembling of some village +children round us and our luggage. + +"Mr. Shute and the two ladies was after screeching here for the boat +awhile ago," volunteered a horrid little girl, whom I had already twice +frustrated in the attempt to seat an infant relative on our bundle of +rugs. "Timsy Hallahane says 'twould be as good for them to stay +ashore, for there isn't as much wind outside as'd out a candle." + +With this encouraging statement the little girl devoted herself to the +alternate consumption of gooseberries and cockles. + +All things come to those who wait, and to us arrived at length the gig +of the _Eileen Oge_, and such, by this time, were the temperature and +the smells of the quay that I actually welcomed the moment that found +us leaving it for the yacht. + +"Now, Sinclair, aren't you glad we came?" remarked Philippa, as the +clear green water deepened under us, and a light briny air came coolly +round us with the motion of the boat. + +As she spoke, there was an outburst of screams from the children on the +quay, followed by a heavy splash. + +"Oh stop!" cried Philippa in an agony; "one of them has fallen in! I +can see its poor little brown head!" + +"'Tis a dog, ma'am," said briefly the man who was rowing stroke. + +"One might have wished it had been that little girl," said I, as I +steered to the best of my ability for the yacht. + +We had traversed another twenty yards or so, when Philippa, in a voice +in which horror and triumph were strangely blended, exclaimed, "She's +following us!" + +"Who? The little girl?" I asked callously. + +"No," returned Philippa; "worse." + +I looked round, not without a prevision of what I was to see, and +beheld the faithful Maria swimming steadily after us, with her brown +muzzle thrust out in front of her, ripping through the reflections like +a plough. + +"Go home!" I roared, standing up and gesticulating in fury that I well +know to be impotent. "Go home, you brute!" + +Maria redoubled her efforts, and Philippa murmured uncontrollably-- + +"Well, she _is_ a dear!" + +Had I had a sword in my hand I should undoubtedly have slain Philippa; +but before I could express my sentiments in any way, a violent shock +flung me endways on top of the man who was pulling stroke. Thanks to +Maria, we had reached our destination all unawares; the two men, +respectfully awaiting my instructions, had rowed on with disciplined +steadiness, and, as a result, we had rammed the _Eileen Oge_ amidships, +with a vigour that brought Mr. Shute tumbling up the companion to see +what had happened. + +"Oh, it's you, is it?" he said, with his mouth full. "Come in; don't +knock! Delighted to see you, Mrs. Yeates; don't apologise. There's +nothing like a hired ship after all--it's quite jolly to see the +splinters fly--shows you're getting your money's worth. Hullo! who's +this?" + +This was Maria, feigning exhaustion, and noisily treading water at the +boat's side. + +"What, poor old Maria? Wanted to send her ashore, did he? Heartless +ruffian!" + +Thus was Maria installed on board the _Eileen Oge_, and the element of +fatality had already begun to work. + +There was just enough wind to take us out of Clountiss Harbour, and +with the last of the out-running tide we crept away to the west. The +party on board consisted of our host's sister, Miss Cecilia Shute, Miss +Sally Knox, and ourselves; we sat about in conventional attitudes in +deck chairs and on adamantine deck bosses, and I talked to Miss Shute +with feverish brilliancy, and wished the patience-cards were not in the +cabin; I knew the supreme importance of keeping one's mind occupied, +but I dared not face the cabin. There was a long, almost imperceptible +swell, with little queer seabirds that I have never seen before--and +trust I never shall again--dotted about on its glassy slopes. The +coast-line looked low and grey and dull, as, I think, coast-lines +always do when viewed from the deep. The breeze that Bernard had +promised us we should find outside was barely enough to keep us moving. +The burning sun of four o'clock focussed its heat on the deck; Bernard +stood up among us, engaged in what he was pleased to call "handling the +stick," and beamed almost as offensively as the sun. + +"Oh, we're slipping along," he said, his odiously healthy face glowing +like copper against the blazing blue sky. "You're going a great deal +faster than you think, and the men say we'll pick up a breeze once +we're round the Mizen." + +I made no reply; I was not feeling ill, merely thoroughly disinclined +for conversation. Miss Sally smiled wanly, and closing her eyes, laid +her head on Philippa's knee. Instructed by a dread freemasonry, I knew +that for her the moment had come when she could no longer bear to see +the rail rise slowly above the horizon, and with an equal rhythmic +slowness sink below it. Maria moved restlessly to and fro, panting and +yawning, and occasionally rearing herself on her hind-legs against the +side, and staring forth with wild eyes at the headachy sliding of the +swell. Perhaps she was meditating suicide; if so I sympathised with +her, and since she was obviously going to be sick I trusted that she +would bring off the suicide with as little delay as possible. Philippa +and Miss Shute sat in unaffected serenity in deck chairs, and stitched +at white things--teacloths for the _Eileen Oge_, I believe, things in +themselves a mockery--and talked untiringly, with that singular +indifference to their marine surroundings that I have often observed in +ladies who are not sea-sick. It always stirs me afresh to wonder why +they have not remained ashore; nevertheless, I prefer their tranquil +and total lack of interest in seafaring matters to the blatant +Vikingism of the average male who is similarly placed. + +Somehow, I know not how, we crawled onwards, and by about five o'clock +we had rounded the Mizen, a gaunt spike of a headland that starts up +like a boar's tusk above the ragged lip of the Irish coast, and the +_Eileen Oge_ was beginning to swing and wallop in the long sluggish +rollers that the American liners know and despise. I was very far from +despising them. Down in the west, resting on the sea's rim, a purple +bank of clouds lay awaiting the descent of the sun, as seductively and +as malevolently as a damp bed at a hotel awaits a traveller. + +The end, so far as I was concerned, came at tea-time. The meal had +been prepared in the saloon, and thither it became incumbent on me to +accompany my hostess and my wife. Miss Sally, long past speech, +opened, at the suggestion of tea, one eye, and disclosed a look of +horror. As I tottered down the companion I respected her good sense. +The _Eileen Oge_ had been built early in the sixties, and headroom was +not her strong point; neither, apparently, was ventilation. I began by +dashing my forehead against the frame of the cabin door, and then, +shattered morally and physically, entered into the atmosphere of the +pit. After which things, and the sight of a plate of rich cake, I +retired in good order to my cabin, and began upon the Yanatas. + +I pass over some painful intermediate details and resume at the moment +when Bernard Shute woke me from a drugged slumber to announce that +dinner was over. + +"It's been raining pretty hard," he said, swaying easily with the swing +of the yacht; "but we've got a clinking breeze, and we ought to make +Lurriga Harbour to-night. There's good anchorage there, the men say. +They're rather a lot of swabs, but they know this coast, and I don't. +I took 'em over with the ship all standing." + +"Where are we now?" I asked, something heartened by the blessed word +"anchorage." + +"You're running up Sheepskin Bay--it's a thundering big bay; Lurriga's +up at the far end of it, and the night's as black as the inside of a +cow. Dig out and get something to eat, and come on deck---- What! no +dinner?"--I had spoken morosely, with closed eyes--"Oh, rot! you're on +an even keel now. I promised Mrs. Yeates I'd make you dig out. You're +as bad as a soldier officer that we were ferrying to Malta one time in +the old Tamar. He got one leg out of his berth when we were going down +the Channel, and he was too sick to pull it in again till we got to +Gib!" + +I compromised on a drink and some biscuits. The ship was certainly +steadier, and I felt sufficiently restored to climb weakly on deck. It +was by this time past ten o'clock, and heavy clouds blotted out the +last of the afterglow, and smothered the stars at their birth. A wet +warm wind was lashing the _Eileen Oge_ up a wide estuary; the waves +were hunting her, hissing under her stern, racing up to her, crested +with the white glow of phosphorus, as she fled before them. I dimly +discerned in the greyness the more solid greyness of the shore. The +mainsail loomed out into the darkness, nearly at right angles to the +yacht, with the boom creaking as the following wind gave us an +additional shove. I know nothing of yacht sailing, but I can +appreciate the grand fact that in running before a wind the boom is +removed from its usual sphere of devastation. + +I sat down beside a bundle of rugs that I had discovered to be my wife, +and thought of my whitewashed office at Shreelane and its bare but +stationary floor, with a yearning that was little short of passion. +Miss Sally had long since succumbed; Miss Shute was tired, and had +turned in soon after dinner. + +"I suppose she's overdone by the delirious gaiety of the afternoon," +said I acridly, in reply to this information. + +Philippa cautiously poked forth her head from the rugs, like a tortoise +from under its shell, to see that Bernard, who was standing near the +steersman, was out of hearing. + +"In all your life, Sinclair," she said impressively, "you never knew +such a time as Cecilia and I have had down there! We've had to wash +_everything_ in the cabins, and remake the beds, and _hurl_ the sheets +away--they were covered with black finger-marks--and while we were +doing that, in came the creature that calls himself the steward, to ask +if he might get something of his that he had left in Miss Shute's +'birthplace'! and he rooted out from under Cecilia's mattress a pair of +socks and half a loaf of bread!" + +"Consolation to Miss Shute to know her berth has been well aired," I +said, with the nearest approach to enjoyment I had known since I came +on board; "and has Sally made any equally interesting discoveries?" + +"She said she didn't care what her bed was like; she just dropped into +it. I must say I am sorry for her," went on Philippa; "she hated +coming. Her mother made her accept." + +"I wonder if Lady Knox will make her accept _him_!" I said. "How often +has Sally refused him, does any one know?" + +"Oh, about once a week," replied Philippa; "just the way I kept on +refusing you, you know!" + +Something cold and wet was thrust into my hand, and the aroma of damp +dog arose upon the night air; Maria had issued from some lair at the +sound of our voices, and was now, with palsied tremblings, slowly +trying to drag herself on to my lap. + +"Poor thing, she's been so dreadfully ill," said Philippa. "Don't send +her away, Sinclair. Mr. Shute found her lying on his berth not able to +move; didn't you, Mr. Shute?" + +"She found out that she was able to move," said Bernard, who had +crossed to our side of the deck; "it was somehow borne in upon her when +I got at her with a boot-tree. I wouldn't advise you to keep her in +your lap, Yeates. She stole half a ham after dinner, and she might +take a notion to make the only reparation in her power." + +I stood up and stretched myself stiffly. The wind was freshening, and +though the growing smoothness of the water told that we were making +shelter of some kind, for all that I could see of land we might as well +have been in mid-ocean. The heaving lift of the deck under my feet, +and the lurching swing when a stronger gust filled the ghostly sails, +were more disquieting to me in suggestion than in reality, and, to my +surprise, I found something almost enjoyable in rushing through +darkness at the pace at which we were going. + +"We're a small bit short of the mouth of Lurriga Harbour yet, sir," +said the man who was steering, in reply to a question from Bernard. "I +can see the shore well enough; sure I know every yard of wather in the +bay----" + +As he spoke he sat down abruptly and violently; so did Bernard, so did +I. The bundle that contained Philippa collapsed upon Maria. + +"Main sheet!" bellowed Bernard, on his feet in an instant, as the boom +swung in and out again with a terrific jerk. "We're ashore!" + +In response to this order three men in succession fell over me while I +was still struggling on the deck, and something that was either +Philippa's elbow, or the acutest angle of Maria's skull, hit me in the +face. As I found my feet the cabin skylight was suddenly illuminated +by a wavering glare. I got across the slanting deck somehow, through +the confusion of shouting men and the flapping thunder of the sails, +and saw through the skylight a gush of flame rising from a pool of +fire, around an overturned lamp on the swing-table. I avalanched down +the companion and was squandered like an avalanche on the floor at the +foot of it. Even as I fell, McCarthy the steward dragged the strip of +carpet from the cabin floor and threw it on the blaze; I found myself, +in some unexplained way, snatching a railway rug from Miss Shute and +applying it to the same purpose, and in half-a-dozen seconds we had +smothered the flame and were left in total darkness. The most striking +feature of the situation was the immovability of the yacht. + +"Great Ned!" said McCarthy, invoking I know not what heathen deity, "it +is on the bottom of the say we are? Well, whether or no, thank God we +have the fire quinched!" + +We were not, so far, at the bottom of the sea, but during the next ten +minutes the chances seemed in favour of our getting there. The yacht +had run her bows upon a sunken ridge of rock, and after a period of +feminine indecision as to whether she were going to slide off again, or +roll over into deep water, she elected to stay where she was, and the +gig was lowered with all speed, in order to tow her off before the tide +left her. + +My recollection of this interval is but hazy, but I can certify that in +ten minutes I had swept together an assortment of necessaries and +knotted them into my counterpane, had broken the string of my +eye-glass, and lost my silver matchbox; had found Philippa's +curling-tongs and put them in my pocket; had carted all the luggage on +deck; had then applied myself to the manly duty of reassuring the +ladies, and had found Miss Shute merely bored, Philippa +enthusiastically anxious to be allowed to help to pull the gig, and +Miss Sally radiantly restored to health and spirits by the cessation of +movement and the probability of an early escape from the yacht. + +The rain had, with its usual opportuneness, begun again; we stood in it +under umbrellas, and watched the gig jumping on its tow-rope like a dog +on a string, as the crew plied the labouring oar in futile endeavour to +move the _Eileen Oge_. We had run on the rock at half-tide, and the +increasing slant of the deck as the tide fell brought home to us the +pleasing probability that at low water--viz. about 2 A.M.--we should +roll off the rock and go to the bottom. Had Bernard Shute wished to +show himself in the most advantageous light to Miss Sally he could +scarcely have bettered the situation. I looked on in helpless respect +while he whom I had known as the scourge of the hunting field, the +terror of the shooting party, rose to the top of a difficult position +and kept there, and my respect was, if possible, increased by the +presence of mind with which he availed himself of all critical moments +to place a protecting arm round Miss Knox. + +By about 1 A.M. the two gaffs with which Bernard had contrived to shore +up the slowly heeling yacht began to show signs of yielding, and, in +approved shipwreck fashion, we took to the boats, the yacht's crew in +the gig remaining in attendance on what seemed likely to be the last +moments of the _Eileen Oge_, while we, in the dinghy, sought for the +harbour. Owing to the tilt of the yacht's deck, and the roughness of +the broken water round her, getting into the boat was no mean feat of +gymnastics. Miss Sally did it like a bird, alighting in the inevitable +arms of Bernard; Miss Shute followed very badly, but, by innate force +of character, successfully; Philippa, who was enjoying every moment of +her shipwreck, came last, launching herself into the dinghy with my +silver shoe-horn clutched in one hand, and in the other the tea-basket. +I heard the hollow clank of its tin cups as she sprang, and appreciated +the heroism with which Bernard received one of its corners in his +waist. How or when Maria left the yacht I know not, but when I applied +myself to the bow oar I led off with three crabs, owing to the devotion +with which she thrust her head into my lap. + +I am no judge of these matters, but in my opinion we ought to have been +swamped several times during that row. There was nothing but the +phosphorus of breaking waves to tell us where the rocks were, and +nothing to show where the harbour was except a solitary light, a +masthead light, as we supposed. The skipper had assured us that we +could not go wrong if we kept "a westerly course with a little northing +in it;" but it seemed simpler to steer for the light, and we did so. +The dinghy climbed along over the waves with an agility that was safer +than it felt; the rain fell without haste and without rest, the oars +were as inflexible as crowbars, and somewhat resembled them in shape +and weight; nevertheless, it was Elysium when compared with the +afternoon leisure of the deck of the _Eileen Oge_. + +At last we came, unexplainably, into smooth water, and it was at about +this time that we were first aware that the darkness was less dense +than it had been, and that the rain had ceased. By imperceptible +degrees a greyness touched the back of the waves, more a dreariness +than a dawn, but more welcome than thousands of gold and silver. I +looked over my shoulder and discerned vague bulky things ahead; as I +did so, my oar was suddenly wrapped in seaweed. We crept on; Maria +stood up with her paws on the gunwale, and whined in high agitation. +The dark objects ahead resolved themselves into rocks, and without more +ado Maria pitched herself into the water. In half a minute we heard +her shaking herself on shore. We slid on; the water swelled under the +dinghy, and lifted her keel on to grating gravel. + +"We couldn't have done it better if we'd been the Hydrographer Royal," +said Bernard, wading knee-deep in a light wash of foam, with the +painter in his hand; "but all the same, that masthead light is some +one's bedroom candle!" + +We landed, hauled up the boat, and then feebly sat down on our +belongings to review the situation, and Maria came and shook herself +over each of us in turn. We had run into a little cove, guided by the +philanthropic beam of a candle in the upper window of a house about a +hundred yards away. The candle still burned on, and the anæmic +daylight exhibited to us our surroundings, and we debated as to whether +we could at 2.45 A.M. present ourselves as objects of compassion to the +owner of the candle. I need hardly say that it was the ladies who +decided on making the attempt, having, like most of their sex, a +courage incomparably superior to ours in such matters; Bernard and I +had not a grain of genuine compunction in our souls, but we failed in +nerve. + +We trailed up from the cove, laden with emigrants' bundles, stumbling +on wet rocks in the half-light, and succeeded in making our way to the +house. + +It was a small two-storied building, of that hideous breed of +architecture usually dedicated to the rectories of the Irish Church; we +felt that there was something friendly in the presence of a pair of +carpet slippers in the porch, but there was a hint of exclusiveness in +the fact that there was no knocker and that the bell was broken. The +light still burned in the upper window, and with a faltering hand I +flung gravel at the glass. This summons was appallingly responded to +by a shriek; there was a flutter of white at the panes, and the candle +was extinguished. + +"Come away!" exclaimed Miss Shute, "it's a lunatic asylum!" + +We stood our ground, however, and presently heard a footstep within, a +blind was poked aside in another window, and we were inspected by an +unseen inmate; then some one came downstairs, and the hall-door was +opened by a small man with a bald head and a long sandy beard. He was +attired in a brief dressing-gown, and on his shoulder sat, like an +angry ghost, a large white cockatoo. Its crest was up on end, its beak +was a good two inches long and curved like a Malay kris; its claws +gripped the little man's shoulder. Maria uttered in the background a +low and thunderous growl. + +"Don't take any notice of the bird, please," said the little man +nervously, seeing our united gaze fixed upon this apparition; "he's +extremely fierce if annoyed." + +The majority of our party here melted away to either side of the +hall-door, and I was left to do the explaining. The tale of our +misfortunes had its due effect, and we were ushered into a small +drawing-room, our host holding open the door for us, like a nightmare +footman with bare shins, a gnome-like bald head, and an unclean spirit +swaying on his shoulder. He opened the shutters, and we sat decorously +round the room, as at an afternoon party, while the situation was +further expounded on both sides. Our entertainer, indeed, favoured us +with the leading items of his family history, amongst them the facts +that he was a Dr. Fahy from Cork, who had taken somebody's rectory for +the summer, and had been prevailed on by some of his patients to permit +them to join him as paying guests. + +"I said it was a lunatic asylum," murmured Miss Shute to me. + +"In point of fact," went on our host, "there isn't an empty room in the +house, which is why I can only offer your party the use of this room +and the kitchen fire, which I make a point of keeping burning all +night." + +He leaned back complacently in his chair, and crossed his legs; then, +obviously remembering his costume, sat bolt upright again. We owed the +guiding beams of the candle to the owner of the cockatoo, an old Mrs. +Buck, who was, we gathered, the most paying of all the patients, and +also, obviously, the one most feared and cherished by Dr. Fahy. "She +has a candle burning all night for the bird, and her door open to let +him walk about the house when he likes," said Dr. Fahy; "indeed, I may +say her passion for him amounts to dementia. He's very fond of me, and +Mrs. Fahy's always telling me I should be thankful, as whatever he did +we'd be bound to put up with it!" + +Dr. Fahy had evidently a turn for conversation that was unaffected by +circumstance; the first beams of the early sun were lighting up the rep +chair covers before the door closed upon his brown dressing-gown, and +upon the stately white back of the cockatoo, and the demoniac +possession of laughter that had wrought in us during the interview +burst forth unchecked. It was most painful and exhausting, as such +laughter always is; but by far the most serious part of it was that +Miss Sally, who was sitting in the window, somehow drove her elbow +through a pane of glass, and Bernard, in pulling down the blind to +conceal the damage, tore it off the roller. + +There followed on this catastrophe a period during which reason +tottered and Maria barked furiously. Philippa was the first to pull +herself together, and to suggest an adjournment to the kitchen fire +that, in honour of the paying guests, was never quenched, and, +respecting the repose of the household, we proceeded thither with a +stealth that convinced Maria we were engaged in a rat hunt. The boots +of paying guests littered the floor, the debris of their last repast +covered the table; a cat in some unseen fastness crooned a war song to +Maria, who feigned unconsciousness and fell to scientific research in +the scullery. + +We roasted our boots at the range, and Bernard, with all a sailor's +gift for exploration and theft, prowled in noisome purlieus and emerged +with a jug of milk and a lump of salt butter. No one who has not been +a burglar can at all realise what it was to roam through Dr. Fahy's +basement storey, with the rookery of paying guests asleep above, and to +feel that, so far, we had repaid his confidence by breaking a pane of +glass and a blind, and putting the scullery tap out of order. I have +always maintained that there was something wrong with it before I +touched it, but the fact remains that when I had filled Philippa's +kettle, no human power could prevail upon it to stop flowing. For all +I know to the contrary it is running still. + +It was in the course of our furtive return to the drawing-room that we +were again confronted by Mrs. Buck's cockatoo. It was standing in +malign meditation on the stairs, and on seeing us it rose, without a +word of warning, upon the wing, and with a long screech flung itself at +Miss Sally's golden-red head, which a ray of sunlight had chanced to +illumine. There was a moment of stampede, as the selected victim, +pursued by the cockatoo, fled into the drawing-room; two chairs were +upset (one, I think, broken), Miss Sally enveloped herself in a window +curtain, Philippa and Miss Shute effaced themselves beneath a table; +the cockatoo, foiled of its prey, skimmed, still screeching, round the +ceiling. It was Bernard who, with a well-directed sofa-cushion, drove +the enemy from the room. There was only a chink of the door open, but +the cockatoo turned on his side as he flew, and swung through it like a +woodcock. + +We slammed the door behind him, and at the same instant there came a +thumping on the floor overhead, muffled, yet peremptory. + +"That's Mrs. Buck!" said Miss Shute, crawling from under the table; +"the room over this is the one that had the candle in it." + +We sat for a time in awful stillness, but nothing further happened, +save a distant shriek overhead, that told the cockatoo had sought and +found sanctuary in his owner's room. We had tea _sotto voce_, and +then, one by one, despite the amazing discomfort of the drawing-room +chairs, we dozed off to sleep. + +It was at about five o'clock that I woke with a stiff neck and an +uneasy remembrance that I had last seen Maria in the kitchen. The +others, looking, each of them, about twenty years older than their age, +slept in various attitudes of exhaustion. Bernard opened his eyes as I +stole forth to look for Maria, but none of the ladies awoke. I went +down the evil-smelling passage that led to the kitchen stairs, and, +there on a mat, regarding me with intelligent affection, was Maria; but +what--oh what was the white thing that lay between her forepaws? + +The situation was too serious to be coped with alone. I fled +noiselessly back to the drawing-room and put my head in; Bernard's +eyes--blessed be the light sleep of sailors!--opened again, and there +was that in mine that summoned him forth. (Blessed also be the light +step of sailors!) + +We took the corpse from Maria, withholding perforce the language and +the slaughtering that our hearts ached to bestow. For a minute or two +our eyes communed. + +"I'll get the kitchen shovel," breathed Bernard; "you open the +hall-door!" + +A moment later we passed like spirits into the open air, and on into a +little garden at the end of the house. Maria followed us, licking her +lips. There were beds of nasturtiums, and of purple stocks, and of +marigolds. We chose a bed of stocks, a plump bed, that looked like +easy digging. The windows were all tightly shut and shuttered, and I +took the cockatoo from under my coat and hid it, temporarily, behind a +box border. Bernard had brought a shovel and a coal scoop. We dug +like badgers. At eighteen inches we got down into shale and stones, +and the coal scoop struck work. + +"Never mind," said Bernard; "we'll plant the stocks on top of him." + +It was a lovely morning, with a new-born blue sky and a light northerly +breeze. As we returned to the house, we looked across the wavelets of +the little cove and saw, above the rocky point round which we had +groped last night, a triangular white patch moving slowly along. + +"The tide's lifted her!" said Bernard, standing stock-still. He looked +at Mrs. Buck's window and at me. "Yeates!" he whispered, "let's quit!" + +It was now barely six o'clock, and not a soul was stirring. We woke +the ladies and convinced them of the high importance of catching the +tide. Bernard left a note on the hall table for Dr. Fahy, a beautiful +note of leave-taking and gratitude, and apology for the broken window +(for which he begged to enclose half-a-crown). No allusion was made to +the other casualties. As we neared the strand he found an occasion to +say to me: + +"I put in a postscript that I thought it best to mention that I had +seen the cockatoo in the garden, and hoped it would get back all right. +That's quite true, you know! But look here, whatever you do, you must +keep it all dark from the ladies----" + +At this juncture Maria overtook us with the cockatoo in her mouth. + + + + +XI +OCCASIONAL LICENSES + + +"It's out of the question," I said, looking forbiddingly at Mrs. +Moloney through the spokes of the bicycle that I was pumping up outside +the grocer's in Skebawn. + +"Well, indeed, Major Yeates," said Mrs. Moloney, advancing excitedly, +and placing on the nickel plating a hand that I had good and recent +cause to know was warm, "sure I know well that if th' angel Gabriel +came down from heaven looking for a license for the races, your honour +wouldn't give it to him without a charackther, but as for Michael! +Sure, the world knows what Michael is!" + +I had been waiting for Philippa for already nearly half-an-hour, and my +temper was not at its best. + +"Character or no character, Mrs. Moloney," said I with asperity, "the +magistrates have settled to give no occasional licenses, and if Michael +were as sober as----" + +"Is it sober! God help us!" exclaimed Mrs. Moloney with an upward +rolling of her eye to the Recording Angel; "I'll tell your honour the +truth. I'm his wife, now, fifteen years, and I never seen the sign of +dhrink on Michael only once, and that was when he went out o' +good-nature helping Timsy Ryan to whitewash his house, and Timsy and +himself had a couple o' pots o' porther, and look, he was as little +used to it that his head got light, and he walked away out to dhrive in +the cows and it no more than eleven o'clock in the day! And the cows, +the craytures, as much surprised, goin' hither and over the four +corners of the road from him! Faith, ye'd have to laugh. 'Michael,' +says I to him, 'ye're dhrunk!' 'I am,' says he, and the tears rained +from his eyes. I turned the cows from him. 'Go home,' I says, 'and +lie down on Willy Tom's bed----'" + +At this affecting point my wife came out of the grocer's with a large +parcel to be strapped to my handlebar, and the history of Mr. Moloney's +solitary lapse from sobriety got no further than Willy Tom's bed. + +"You see," I said to Philippa, as we bicycled quietly home through the +hot June afternoon, "we've settled we'll give no licenses for the +sports. Why even young Sheehy, who owns three pubs in Skebawn, came to +me and said he hoped the magistrates would be firm about it, as these +one-day licenses were quite unnecessary, and only led to drunkenness +and fighting, and every man on the Bench has joined in promising not to +grant any." + +"How nice, dear!" said Philippa absently. "Do you know Mrs. McDonnell +can only let me have three dozen cups and saucers; I wonder if that +will be enough?" + +"Do you mean to say you expect three dozen people?" said I. + +"Oh, it's always well to be prepared," replied my wife evasively. + +During the next few days I realised the true inwardness of what it was +to be prepared for an entertainment of this kind. Games were not at a +high level in my district. Football, of a wild, guerilla species, was +waged intermittently, blended in some inextricable way with Home Rule +and a brass band, and on Sundays gatherings of young men rolled a heavy +round stone along the roads, a rudimentary form of sport, whose +fascination lay primarily in the fact that it was illegal, and, in +lesser degree, in betting on the length of each roll. I had had a +period of enthusiasm, during which I thought I was going to be the +apostle of cricket in the neighbourhood, but my mission dwindled to +single wicket with Peter Cadogan, who was indulgent but bored, and I +swiped the ball through the dining-room window, and some one took one +of the stumps to poke the laundry fire. Once a year, however, on that +festival of the Roman Catholic Church which is familiarly known as +"Pether and Paul's day," the district was wont to make a spasmodic +effort at athletic sports, which were duly patronised by the gentry and +promoted by the publicans, and this year the honour of a steward's +green rosette was conferred upon me. Philippa's genius for hospitality +here saw its chance, and broke forth into unbridled tea-party in +connection with the sports, even involving me in the hire of a tent, +the conveyance of chairs and tables, and other large operations. + +It chanced that Flurry Knox had on this occasion lent the fields for +the sports, with the proviso that horse-races and a tug-of-war were to +be added to the usual programme; Flurry's participation in events of +this kind seldom failed to be of an inflaming character. As he and I +planted larch spars for the high jump, and stuck furze-bushes into +hurdles (locally known as "hurrls"), and skirmished hourly with people +who wanted to sell drink on the course, I thought that my next summer +leave would singularly coincide with the festival consecrated to St. +Peter and St. Paul. We made a grand stand of quite four feet high, out +of old fish-boxes, which smelt worse and worse as the day wore on, but +was, none the less, as sought after by those for whom it was not +intended, as is the Royal enclosure at Ascot; we broke gaps in all the +fences to allow carriages on to the ground, we armed a gang of the +worst blackguards in Skebawn with cart-whips, to keep the course, and +felt that organisation could go no further. + +The momentous day of Pether and Paul opened badly, with heavy clouds +and every indication of rain, but after a few thunder showers things +brightened, and it seemed within the bounds of possibility that the +weather might hold up. When I got down to the course on the day of the +sports the first thing I saw was a tent of that peculiar filthy grey +that usually enshrines the sale of porter, with an array of barrels in +a crate beside it; I bore down upon it in all the indignant majesty of +the law, and in so doing came upon Flurry Knox, who was engaged in +flogging boys off the Grand Stand. + +"Sheehy's gone one better than you!" he said, without taking any +trouble to conceal the fact that he was amused. + +"Sheehy!" I said; "why, Sheehy was the man who went to every magistrate +in the country to ask them to refuse a license for the sports." + +"Yes, he took some trouble to prevent any one else having a look in," +replied Flurry; "he asked every magistrate but one, and that was the +one that gave him the license." + +"You don't mean to say that it was you?" I demanded in high wrath and +suspicion, remembering that Sheehy bred horses, and that my friend Mr. +Knox was a person of infinite resource in the matter of a deal. + +"Well, well," said Flurry, rearranging a disordered fish-box, "and me +that's a church-warden, and sprained my ankle a month ago with running +downstairs at my grandmother's to be in time for prayers! Where's the +use of a good character in this country?" + +"Not much when you keep it eating its head off for want of exercise," I +retorted; "but if it wasn't you, who was it?" + +"Do you remember old Moriarty out at Castle Ire?" + +I remembered him extremely well as one of those representatives of the +people with whom a paternal Government had leavened the effete ranks of +the Irish magistracy. + +"Well," resumed Flurry, "that license was as good as a five-pound note +in his pocket." + +I permitted myself a comment on Mr. Moriarty suitable to the occasion. + +"Oh, that's nothing," said Flurry easily; "he told me one day when he +was half screwed that his Commission of the Peace was worth a hundred +and fifty a year to him in turkeys and whisky, and he was telling the +truth for once." + +At this point Flurry's eye wandered, and following its direction I saw +Lady Knox's smart 'bus cleaving its way through the throng of country +people, lurching over the ups and downs of the field like a ship in a +sea. I was too blind to make out the component parts of the white +froth that crowned it on top, and seethed forth from it when it had +taken up a position near the tent in which Philippa was even now +propping the legs of the tea-table, but from the fact that Flurry +addressed himself to the door, I argued that Miss Sally had gone inside. + +Lady Knox's manner had something more than its usual bleakness. She +had brought, as she promised, a large contingent, but from the way that +the strangers within her gates melted impalpably and left me to deal +with her single-handed, I drew the further deduction that all was not +well. + +"Did you ever in your life see such a gang of women as I have brought +with me?" she began with her wonted directness, as I piloted her to the +Grand Stand, and placed her on the stoutest looking of the fish-boxes. +"I have no patience with men who yacht! Bernard Shute has gone off to +the Clyde, and I had counted on his being a man at my dance next week. +I suppose you'll tell me you're going away too." + +I assured Lady Knox that I would be a man to the best of my ability. + +"This is the last dance I shall give," went on her ladyship, +unappeased; "the men in this country consist of children and cads." + +I admitted that we were but a poor lot, "but," I said, "Miss Sally told +me----" + +"Sally's a fool!" said Lady Knox, with a falcon eye at her daughter, +who happened to be talking to her distant kinsman, Mr. Flurry of that +ilk. + +The races had by this time begun with a competition known as the "Hop, +Step, and Lep"; this, judging by the yells, was a highly interesting +display, but as it was conducted between two impervious rows of +onlookers, the aristocracy on the fish-boxes saw nothing save the +occasional purple face of a competitor, starting into view above the +wall of backs like a jack-in-the-box. For me, however, the odorous +sanctuary of the fish-boxes was not to be. I left it guarded by +Slipper with a cart-whip of flail-like dimensions, as disreputable an +object as could be seen out of low comedy, with some one's old white +cords on his bandy legs, butcher-boots three sizes too big for him, and +a black eye. The small boys fled before him; in the glory of his +office he would have flailed his own mother off the fish-boxes had +occasion served. + +I had an afternoon of decidedly mixed enjoyment. My stewardship +blossomed forth like Aaron's rod, and added to itself the duties of +starter, handicapper, general referee, and chucker-out, besides which I +from time to time strove with emissaries who came from Philippa with +messages about water and kettles. Flurry and I had to deal +single-handed with the foot-races (our brothers in office being +otherwise engaged at Mr. Sheehy's), a task of many difficulties, +chiefest being that the spectators all swept forward at the word "Go!" +and ran the race with the competitors, yelling curses, blessings, and +advice upon them, taking short cuts over anything and everybody, and +mingling inextricably with the finish. By fervent applications of the +whips, the course was to some extent purged for the quarter-mile, and +it would, I believe, have been a triumph of handicapping had not an +unforeseen disaster overtaken the favourite--old Mrs. Knox's bath-chair +boy. Whether, as was alleged, his braces had or had not been tampered +with by a rival was a matter that the referee had subsequently to deal +with in the thick of a free fight; but the painful fact remained that +in the course of the first lap what were described as "his galluses" +abruptly severed their connection with the garments for whose safety +they were responsible, and the favourite was obliged to seek seclusion +in the crowd. + +The tug-of-war followed close on this _contre-temps_, and had the +excellent effect of drawing away, like a blister, the inflammation set +up by the grievances of the bath-chair boy. I cannot at this moment +remember of how many men each team consisted; my sole aim was to keep +the numbers even, and to baffle the volunteers who, in an ecstasy of +sympathy, attached themselves to the tail of the rope at moments when +their champions weakened. The rival forces dug their heels in and +tugged, in an uproar that drew forth the innermost line of customers +from Mr. Sheehy's porter tent, and even attracted "the quality" from +the haven of the fish-boxes, Slipper, in the capacity of Squire of +Dames, pioneering Lady Knox through the crowd with the cart-whip, and +with language whose nature was providentially veiled, for the most +part, by the din. The tug-of-war continued unabated. One team was +getting the worst of it, but hung doggedly on, sinking lower and lower +till they gradually sat down; nothing short of the trump of judgment +could have conveyed to them that they were breaking rules, and both +teams settled down by slow degrees on to their sides, with the rope +under them, and their heels still planted in the ground, bringing about +complete deadlock. I do not know the record duration for a tug-of-war, +but I can certify that the Cullinagh and Knockranny teams lay on the +ground at full tension for half-an-hour, like men in apoplectic fits, +each man with his respective adherents howling over him, blessing him, +and adjuring him to continue. + +With my own nauseated eyes I saw a bearded countryman, obviously one of +Mr. Sheehy's best customers, fling himself on his knees beside one of +the combatants, and kiss his crimson and streaming face in a rapture of +encouragement. As he shoved unsteadily past me on his return journey +to Mr. Sheehy's, I heard him informing a friend that "he cried a +handful over Danny Mulloy, when he seen the poor brave boy so +shtubborn, and, indeed, he couldn't say why he cried." + +"For good-nature ye'd cry," suggested the friend. + +"Well, just that, I suppose," returned Danny Mulloy's admirer +resignedly; "indeed, if it was only two cocks ye seen fightin' on the +road, yer heart'd take part with one o' them!" + +I had begun to realise that I might as well abandon the tug-of-war and +occupy myself elsewhere, when my wife's much harassed messenger brought +me the portentous tidings that Mrs. Yeates wanted me at the tent at +once. When I arrived I found the tent literally bulging with +Philippa's guests; Lady Knox, seated on a hamper, was taking off her +gloves, and loudly announcing her desire for tea, and Philippa, with a +flushed face and a crooked hat, breathed into my ear the awful news +that both the cream and the milk had been forgotten. + +"But Flurry Knox says he can get me some," she went on; "he's gone to +send people to milk a cow that lives near here. Go out and see if he's +coming." + +I went out and found, in the first instance, Mrs. Cadogan, who greeted +me with the prayer that the divil might roast Julia McCarthy, that +legged it away to the races like a wild goose, and left the cream +afther her on the servants' hall table. "Sure, Misther Flurry's gone +looking for a cow, and what cow would there be in a backwards place +like this? And look at me shtriving to keep the kettle simpering on +the fire, and not as much coals undher it as'd redden a pipe!" + +"Where's Mr. Knox?" I asked. + +"Himself and Slipper's galloping the counthry like the deer. I believe +it's to the house above they went, sir." + +I followed up a rocky hill to the house above, and there found Flurry +and Slipper engaged in the patriarchal task of driving two brace of +coupled and spancelled goats into a shed. + +"It's the best we can do," said Flurry briefly; "there isn't a cow to +be found, and the people are all down at the sports. Be d----d to you, +Slipper, don't let them go from you!" as the goats charged and doubled +like football players. + +"But goats' milk!" I said, paralysed by horrible memories of what tea +used to taste like at Gib. + +"They'll never know it!" said Flurry, cornering a venerable nanny; +"here, hold this divil, and hold her tight!" + +I have no time to dwell upon the pastoral scene that followed. Suffice +it to say, that at the end of ten minutes of scorching profanity from +Slipper, and incessant warfare with the goats, the latter had +reluctantly yielded two small jugfuls, and the dairymaids had exhibited +a nerve and skill in their trade that won my lasting respect. + +"I knew I could trust _you_, Mr. Knox!" said Philippa, with shining +eyes, as we presented her with the two foaming beakers. I suppose a +man is never a hero to his wife, but if she could have realised the +bruises on my legs, I think she would have reserved a blessing for me +also. + +What was thought of the goats' milk I gathered symptomatically from a +certain fixity of expression that accompanied the first sip of the tea, +and from observing that comparatively few ventured on second cups. I +also noted that after a brief conversation with Flurry, Miss Sally +poured hers secretly on to the grass. Lady Knox had throughout the day +preserved an aspect so threatening that no change was perceptible in +her demeanour. In the throng of hungry guests I did not for some time +notice that Mr. Knox had withdrawn until something in Miss Sally's eye +summoned me to her, and she told me she had a message from him for me. + +"Couldn't we come outside?" she said. + +Outside the tent, within less than six yards of her mother, Miss Sally +confided to me a scheme that made my hair stand on end. Summarised, it +amounted to this: That, first, she was in the primary stage of a deal +with Sheehy for a four-year-old chestnut colt, for which Sheehy was +asking double its value on the assumption that it had no rival in the +country; that, secondly, they had just heard it was going to run in the +first race; and, thirdly and lastly, that as there was no other horse +available, Flurry was going to take old Sultan out of the 'bus and ride +him in the race; and that Mrs. Yeates had promised to keep mamma safe +in the tent, while the race was going on, and "you know, Major Yeates, +it would be delightful to beat Sheehy after his getting the better of +you all about the license!" + +With this base appeal to my professional feelings, Miss Knox paused, +and looked at me insinuatingly. Her eyes were greeny-grey, and very +beguiling. + +"Come on," she said; "they want you to start them!" + +Pursued by visions of the just wrath of Lady Knox, I weakly followed +Miss Sally to the farther end of the second field, from which point the +race was to start. The course was not a serious one: two or three +natural banks, a stone wall, and a couple of "hurrls." There were but +four riders, including Flurry, who was seated composedly on Sultan, +smoking a cigarette and talking confidentially to Slipper. Sultan, +although something stricken in years and touched in the wind, was a +brown horse who in his day had been a hunter of no mean repute; even +now he occasionally carried Lady Knox in a sedate and gentlemanly +manner, but it struck me that it was trying him rather high to take him +from the pole of the 'bus after twelve miles on a hilly road, and +hustle him over a country against a four-year-old. My acutest anxiety, +however, was to start the race as quickly as possible, and to get back +to the tent in time to establish an alibi; therefore I repressed my +private sentiments, and, tying my handkerchief to a stick, determined +that no time should be fashionably frittered away in false starts. + +They got away somehow; I believe Sheehy's colt was facing the wrong way +at the moment when I dropped the flag, but a friend turned him with a +stick, and, with a cordial and timely whack, speeded him on his way on +sufficiently level terms, and then somehow, instead of returning to the +tent, I found myself with Miss Sally on the top of a tall narrow bank, +in a precarious line of other spectators, with whom we toppled and +swayed, and, in moments of acuter emotion, held on to each other in +unaffected comradeship. + +Flurry started well, and from our commanding position we could see him +methodically riding at the first fence at a smart hunting canter, +closely attended by James Canty's brother on a young black mare, and by +an unknown youth on a big white horse. The hope of Sheehy's stable, a +leggy chestnut, ridden by a cadet of the house of Sheehy, went away +from the friend's stick like a rocket, and had already refused the +first bank twice before old Sultan decorously changed feet on it and +dropped down into the next field with tranquil precision. The white +horse scrambled over it on his stomach, but landed safely, despite the +fact that his rider clasped him round the neck during the process; the +black mare and the chestnut shouldered one another over at the hole the +white horse had left, and the whole party went away in a bunch and +jumped the ensuing hurdle without disaster. Flurry continued to ride +at the same steady hunting pace, accompanied respectfully by the white +horse and by Jerry Canty on the black mare. Sheehy's colt had clearly +the legs of the party, and did some showy galloping between the jumps, +but as he refused to face the banks without a lead, the end of the +first round found the field still a sociable party personally conducted +by Mr. Knox. + +"That's a dam nice horse," said one of my hangers-on, looking +approvingly at Sultan as he passed us at the beginning of the second +round, making a good deal of noise but apparently going at his ease; +"you might depind your life on him, and he have the crabbedest jock in +the globe of Ireland on him this minute." + +"Canty's mare's very sour," said another; "look at her now, baulking +the bank! she's as cross as a bag of weasels." + +"Begob, I wouldn't say but she's a little sign lame," resumed the +first; "she was going light on one leg on the road a while ago." + +"I tell you what it is," said Miss Sally, very seriously, in my ear, +"that chestnut of Sheehy's is settling down. I'm afraid he'll gallop +away from Sultan at the finish, and the wall won't stop him. Flurry +can't get another inch out of Sultan. He's riding him well," she ended +in a critical voice, which yet was not quite like her own. Perhaps I +should not have noticed it but for the fact that the hand that held my +arm was trembling. As for me, I thought of Lady Knox, and trembled too. + +There now remained but one bank, the trampled remnant of the furze +hurdle, and the stone wall. The pace was beginning to improve, and the +other horses drew away from Sultan; they charged the bank at full +gallop, the black mare and the chestnut flying it perilously, with a +windmill flourish of legs and arms from their riders, the white horse +racing up to it with a gallantry that deserted him at the critical +moment, with the result that his rider turned a somersault over his +head and landed, amidst the roars of the onlookers, sitting on the +fence facing his horse's nose. With creditable presence of mind he +remained on the bank, towed the horse over, scrambled on to his back +again and started afresh. Sultan, thirty yards to the bad, pounded +doggedly on, and Flurry's cane and heels remained idle; the old horse, +obviously blown, slowed cautiously coming in at the jump. Sally's grip +tightened on my arm, and the crowd yelled as Sultan, answering to a +hint from the spurs and a touch at his mouth, heaved himself on to the +bank. Nothing but sheer riding on Flurry's part got him safe off it, +and saved him from the consequences of a bad peck on landing; none the +less, he pulled himself together and went away down the hill for the +stone wall as stoutly as ever. The high-road skirted the last two +fields, and there was a gate in the roadside fence beside the place +where the stone wall met it at right angles. I had noticed this gate, +because during the first round Slipper had been sitting on it, +demonstrating with his usual fervour. Sheeny's colt was leading, with +his nose in the air, his rider's hands going like a circular saw, and +his temper, as a bystander remarked, "up on end"; the black mare, half +mad from spurring, was going hard at his heels, completely out of hand; +the white horse was steering steadily for the wrong side of the flag, +and Flurry, by dint of cutting corners and of saving every yard of +ground, was close enough to keep his antagonists' heads over their +shoulders, while their right arms rose and fell in unceasing +flagellation. + +"There'll be a smash when they come to the wall! If one falls they'll +all go!" panted Sally. "Oh!---- Now! Flurry! Flurry!----" + +What had happened was that the chestnut colt had suddenly perceived +that the gate at right angles to the wall was standing wide open, and, +swinging away from the jump, he had bolted headlong out on to the road, +and along it at top speed for his home. After him fled Canty's black +mare, and with her, carried away by the spirit of stampede, went the +white horse. + +Flurry stood up in his stirrups and gave a view-halloa as he cantered +down to the wall. Sultan came at it with the send of the hill behind +him, and jumped it with a skill that intensified, if that were +possible, the volume of laughter and yells around us. By the time the +black mare and the white horse had returned and ignominiously bundled +over the wall to finish as best they might, Flurry was leading Sultan +towards us. + +"That blackguard, Slipper!" he said, grinning; "every one'll say I told +him to open the gate! But look here, I'm afraid we're in for trouble. +Sultan's given himself a bad over-reach; you could never drive him home +to-night. And I've just seen Norris lying blind drunk under a wall!" + +Now Norris was Lady Knox's coachman. We stood aghast at this "horror +on horror's head," the blood trickled down Sultan's heel, and the +lather lay in flecks on his dripping, heaving sides, in irrefutable +witness to the iniquity of Lady Knox's only daughter. Then Flurry said: + +"Thank the Lord, here's the rain!" + +At the moment I admit that I failed to see any cause for gratitude in +this occurrence, but later on I appreciated Flurry's grasp of +circumstances. + +That appreciation was, I think, at its highest development about +half-an-hour afterwards, when I, an unwilling conspirator (a part with +which my acquaintance with Mr. Knox had rendered me but too familiar) +unfurled Mrs. Cadogan's umbrella over Lady Knox's head, and hurried her +through the rain from the tent to the 'bus, keeping it and my own +person well between her and the horses. I got her in, with the rest of +her bedraggled and exhausted party, and slammed the door. + +"Remember, Major Yeates," she said through the window, "you are the +_only_ person here in whom I have any confidence. I don't wish _any_ +one else to touch the reins!" this with a glance towards Flurry, who +was standing near. + +"I'm afraid I'm only a moderate whip," I said. + +"My dear man," replied Lady Knox testily, "those horses could drive +themselves!" + +I slunk round to the front of the 'bus. Two horses, carefully rugged, +were in it, with the inevitable Slipper at their heads. + +"Slipper's going with you," whispered Flurry, stepping up to me; "she +won't have me at any price. He'll throw the rugs over them when you +get to the house, and if you hold the umbrella well over her she'll +never see. I'll manage to get Sultan over somehow, when Norris is +sober. That will be all right." + +I climbed to the box without answering, my soul being bitter within me, +as is the soul of a man who has been persuaded by womankind against his +judgment. + +"Never again!" I said to myself, picking up the reins; "let her marry +him or Bernard Shute, or both of them if she likes, but I won't be +roped into this kind of business again!" + +Slipper drew the rugs from the horses, revealing on the near side Lady +Knox's majestic carriage horse, and on the off, a thick-set brown mare +of about fifteen hands. + +"What brute is this?" said I to Slipper, as he swarmed up beside me. + +"I don't rightly know where Misther Flurry got her," said Slipper, with +one of his hiccoughing crows of laughter; "give her the whip, Major, +and"--here he broke into song: + + "Howld to the shteel, + Honamaundhiaoul; she'll run off like an eel!" + + +"If you don't shut your mouth," said I, with pent-up ferocity, "I'll +chuck you off the 'bus." + +Slipper was but slightly drunk, and, taking this delicate rebuke in +good part, he relapsed into silence. + +Wherever the brown mare came from, I can certify that it was not out of +double harness. Though humble and anxious to oblige, she pulled away +from the pole as if it were red hot, and at critical moments had a +tendency to sit down. However, we squeezed without misadventure among +the donkey carts and between the groups of people, and bumped at length +in safety out on to the high-road. + +Here I thought it no harm to take Slipper's advice, and I applied the +whip to the brown mare, who seemed inclined to turn round. She +immediately fell into an uncertain canter that no effort of mine could +frustrate; I could only hope that Miss Sally would foster conversation +inside the 'bus and create a distraction; but judging from my last view +of the party, and of Lady Knox in particular, I thought she was not +likely to be successful. Fortunately the rain was heavy and thick, and +a rising west wind gave every promise of its continuance. I had little +doubt but that I should catch cold, but I took it to my bosom with +gratitude as I reflected how it was drumming on the roof of the 'bus +and blurring the windows. + +We had reached the foot of a hill, about a quarter of a mile from the +racecourse; the Castle Knox horse addressed himself to it with +dignified determination, but the mare showed a sudden and alarming +tendency to jib. + +"Belt her, Major!" vociferated Slipper, as she hung back from the pole +chain, with the collar half-way up her ewe neck, "and give it to the +horse, too! He'll dhrag her!" + +I was in the act of "belting," when a squealing whinny struck upon my +ear, accompanied by a light pattering gallop on the road behind us; +there was an answering roar from the brown mare, a roar, as I realised +with a sudden drop of the heart, of outraged maternal feeling, and in +another instant a pale, yellow foal sprinted up beside us, with shrill +whickerings of joy. Had there at this moment been a boghole handy, I +should have turned the 'bus into it without hesitation; as there was no +accommodation of the kind, I laid the whip severely into everything I +could reach, including the foal. The result was that we topped the +hill at a gallop, three abreast, like a Russian troitska; it was like +my usual luck that at this identical moment we should meet the police +patrol, who saluted respectfully. + +"That the divil may blisther Michael Moloney!" ejaculated Slipper, +holding on to the rail; "didn't I give him the foaleen and a halther on +him to keep him! I'll howld you a pint 'twas the wife let him go, for +she being vexed about the license! Sure that one's a March foal, an' +he'd run from here to Cork!" + +There was no sign from my inside passengers, and I held on at a round +pace, the mother and child galloping absurdly, the carriage horse +pulling hard, but behaving like a gentleman. I wildly revolved plans +of how I would make Slipper turn the foal in at the first gate we came +to, of what I should say to Lady Knox supposing the worst happened and +the foal accompanied us to her hall door, and of how I would have +Flurry's blood at the earliest possible opportunity, and here the +fateful sound of galloping behind us was again heard. + +"It's impossible!" I said to myself; "she can't have twins!" + +The galloping came nearer, and Slipper looked back. + +"Murdher alive!" he said in a stage whisper; "Tom Sheehy's afther us on +the butcher's pony!" + +"What's that to me?" I said, dragging my team aside to let him pass; "I +suppose he's drunk, like every one else!" + +Then the voice of Tom Sheehy made itself heard. + +"Shtop! Shtop thief!" he was bawling; "give up my mare! How will I +get me porther home!" + + +That was the closest shave I have ever had, and nothing could have +saved the position but the torrential nature of the rain and the fact +that Lady Knox had on a new bonnet. I explained to her at the door of +the 'bus that Sheehy was drunk (which was the one unassailable feature +of the case), and had come after his foal, which, with the fatuity of +its kind, had escaped from a field and followed us. I did not mention +to Lady Knox that when Mr. Sheehy retreated, apologetically, dragging +the foal after him in a halter belonging to one of her own carriage +horses, he had a sovereign of mine in his pocket, and during the +narration I avoided Miss Sally's eye as carefully as she avoided mine. + +The only comments on the day's events that are worthy of record were +that Philippa said to me that she had not been able to understand what +the curious taste in the tea had been till Sally told her it was +turf-smoke, and that Mrs. Cadogan said to Philippa that night that "the +Major was that dhrinched that if he had a shirt between his skin and +himself he could have wrung it," and that Lady Knox said to a mutual +friend that though Major Yeates had been extremely kind and obliging, +he was an uncommonly bad whip. + + + + +XII +"OH LOVE! OH FIRE!" + + +It was on one of the hottest days of a hot August that I walked over to +Tory Lodge to inform Mr. Flurry Knox, M.F.H., that the limits of human +endurance had been reached, and that either Venus and her family, or I +and mine, must quit Shreelane. In a moment of impulse I had accepted +her and her numerous progeny as guests in my stable-yard, since when +Mrs. Cadogan had given warning once or twice a week, and Maria, lawful +autocrat of the ashpit, had had--I quote the kitchen-maid--"tin battles +for every male she'd ate." + +The walk over the hills was not of a nature to lower the temperature, +moral or otherwise. The grassy path was as slippery as glass, the +rocks radiated heat, the bracken radiated horseflies. There was no +need to nurse my wrath to keep it warm. + +I found Flurry seated in the kennel-yard in a long and unclean white +linen coat, engaged in clipping hieroglyphics on the ears of a young +outgoing draft, an occupation in itself unfavourable to argument. The +young draft had already monopolised all possible forms of remonstrance, +from snarling in the obscurity behind the meal sack in the +boiler-house, to hysterical yelling as they were dragged forth by the +tail; but through these alarms and excursions I denounced Venus and all +her works, from slaughtered Wyandottes to broken dishes. Even as I did +so I was conscious of something chastened in Mr. Knox's demeanour, some +touch of remoteness and melancholy with which I was quite unfamiliar; +my indictment weakened and my grievances became trivial when laid +before this grave and almost religiously gentle young man. + +"I'm sorry you and Mrs. Yeates should be vexed by her. Send her back +when you like. I'll keep her. Maybe it'll not be for so long after +all." + +When pressed to expound this dark saying, Flurry smiled wanly and +snipped a second line in the hair of the puppy that was pinned between +his legs. I was almost relieved when a hard try to bite on the part of +the puppy imparted to Flurry's language a transient warmth; but the +reaction was only temporary. + +"It'd be as good for me to make a present of this lot to old Welby as +to take the price he's offering me," he went on, as he got up and took +off his highly-scented kennel-coat; "but I couldn't be bothered +fighting him. Come on in and have something. I drink tea myself at +this hour." + +If he had said toast and water it would have seemed no more than was +suitable to such a frame of mind. As I followed him to the house I +thought that when the day came that Flurry Knox could not be bothered +with fighting old Welby things were becoming serious, but I kept this +opinion to myself and merely offered an admiring comment on the roses +that were blooming on the front of the house. + +"I put up every stick of that trellis myself with my own hands," said +Flurry, still gloomily; "the roses were trailing all over the place for +the want of it. Would you like to have a look at the garden while +they're getting tea? I settled it up a bit since you saw it last." + +I acceded to this almost alarmingly ladylike suggestion, marvelling +greatly. + +Flurry certainly was a changed man, and his garden was a changed +garden. It was a very old garden, with unexpected arbours madly +overgrown with flowering climbers, and a flight of grey steps leading +to a terrace, where a moss-grown sundial and ancient herbaceous plants +strove with nettles and briars; but I chiefly remembered it as a place +where washing was wont to hang on black-currant bushes, and the kennel +terrier matured his bones and hunted chickens. There was now rabbit +wire on the gate, the walks were cleaned, the beds weeded. There was +even a bed of mignonette, a row of sweet pea, and a blazing party of +sunflowers, and Michael, once second in command in many a filibustering +expedition, was now on his knees, ingloriously tying carnations to +little pieces of cane. + +We walked up the steps to the terrace. Down below us the rich and +southern blue of the sea filled the gaps between scattered fir-trees; +the hillside above was purple with heather; a bay mare and her foal +were moving lazily through the bracken, with the sun glistening on it +and them. I looked back at the house, nestling in the hollow of the +hill, I smelled the smell of the mignonette in the air, I regarded +Michael's labouring back among the carnations, and without any +connection of ideas I seemed to see Miss Sally Knox, with her +golden-red hair and slight figure, standing on the terrace beside her +kinsman. + +"Michael! Do ye know where's Misther Flurry?" squalled a voice from +the garden gate, the untrammelled voice of the female domestic at large +among her fellows. "The tay's wet, and there's a man over with a +message from Aussolas. He was tellin' me the owld hairo beyant is +givin' out invitations----" + +A stricken silence fell, induced, no doubt, by hasty danger signals +from Michael. + +"Who's 'the old hero beyant'?" I asked, as we turned toward the house. + +"My grandmother," said Flurry, permitting himself a smile that had +about as much sociability in it as skim milk; "she's giving a tenants' +dance at Aussolas. She gave one about five years ago, and I declare +you might as well get the influenza into the country, or a mission at +the chapel. There won't be a servant in the place will be able to +answer their name for a week after it, what with toothache and +headache, and blathering in the kitchen!" + +We had tea in the drawing-room, a solemnity which I could not but be +aware was due to the presence of a new carpet, a new wall-paper, and a +new piano. Flurry made no comment on these things, but something told +me that I was expected to do so, and I did. + +"I'd sell you the lot to-morrow for half what I gave for them," said my +host, eyeing them with morose respect as he poured out his third cup of +tea. + +I have all my life been handicapped by not having the courage of my +curiosity. Those who have the nerve to ask direct questions on matters +that do not concern them seldom fail to extract direct answers, but in +my lack of this enviable gift I went home in the dark as to what had +befallen my landlord, and fully aware of how my wife would despise me +for my shortcomings. Philippa always says that she never asks +questions, but she seems none the less to get a lot of answers. + +On my own avenue I met Miss Sally Knox riding away from the house on +her white cob; she had found no one at home, and she would not turn +back with me, but she did not seem to be in any hurry to ride away. I +told her that I had just been over to see her relative, Mr. Knox, who +had informed me that he meant to give up the hounds, a fact in which +she seemed only conventionally interested. She looked pale, and her +eyelids were slightly pink; I checked myself on the verge of asking her +if she had hay-fever, and inquired instead if she had heard of the +tenants' dance at Aussolas. She did not answer at first, but rubbed +her cane up and down the cob's clipped toothbrush of a mane. Then she +said: + +"Major Yeates--look here--there's a most awful row at home!" + +I expressed incoherent regret, and wished to my heart that Philippa had +been there to cope with the situation. + +"It began when mamma found out about Flurry's racing Sultan, and then +came our dance----" + +Miss Sally stopped; I nodded, remembering certain episodes of Lady +Knox's dance. + +"And--mamma says--she says----" + +I waited respectfully to hear what mamma had said; the cob fidgeted +under the attentions of the horseflies, and nearly trod on my toe. + +"Well, the end of it is," she said with a gulp, "she said such things +to Flurry that he can't come near the house again, and I'm to go over +to England to Aunt Dora, next week. Will you tell Philippa I came to +say good-bye to her? I don't think I can get over here again." + +Miss Sally was a sufficiently old friend of mine for me to take her +hand and press it in a fatherly manner, but for the life of me I could +not think of anything to say, unless I expressed my sympathy with her +mother's point of view about detrimentals, which was obviously not the +thing to do. + +Philippa accorded to my news the rare tribute of speechless attention, +and then was despicable enough to say that she had foreseen the whole +affair from the beginning. + +"From the day that she refused him in the ice-house, I suppose," said I +sarcastically. + +"That _was_ the beginning," replied Philippa. + +"Well," I went on judicially, "whenever it began, it was high time for +it to end. She can do a good deal better than Flurry." + +Philippa became rather red in the face. + +"I call that a thoroughly commonplace thing to say," she said. "I dare +say he has not many ideas beyond horses, but no more has she, and he +really does come and borrow books from me----" + +"Whitaker's Almanack," I murmured. + +"Well, I don't care, I like him very much, and I know what you're going +to say, and you're wrong, and I'll tell you why----" + +Here Mrs. Cadogan came into the room, her cap at rather more than its +usual warlike angle over her scarlet forehead, and in her hand a +kitchen plate, on which a note was ceremoniously laid forth. + +"But this is for you, Mrs. Cadogan," said Philippa, as she looked at it. + +"Ma'am," returned Mrs. Cadogan with immense dignity, "I have no +learning, and from what the young man's afther telling me that brought +it from Aussolas, I'd sooner yerself read it for me than thim gerrls." + +My wife opened the envelope, and drew forth a gilt-edged sheet of pink +paper. + +"Miss Margaret Nolan presents her compliments to Mrs. Cadogan," she +read, "and I have the pleasure of telling you that the servants of +Aussolas is inviting you and Mr. Peter Cadogan, Miss Mulrooney, and +Miss Gallagher"--Philippa's voice quavered perilously--"to a dance on +next Wednesday. Dancing to begin at seven o'clock, and to go on till +five.--Yours affectionately, MAGGIE NOLAN." + +"How affectionate she is!" snorted Mrs. Cadogan; "them's Dublin +manners, I dare say!" + +"P.S.," continued Philippa; "steward, Mr. Denis O'Loughlin; stewardess, +Mrs. Mahony." + +"Thoughtful provision," I remarked; "I suppose Mrs. Mahony's duties +will begin after supper." + +"Well, Mrs. Cadogan," said Philippa, quelling me with a glance, "I +suppose you'd all like to go?" + +"As for dancin'," said Mrs. Cadogan, with her eyes fixed on a level +with the curtain-pole, "I thank God I'm a widow, and the only dancin' +I'll do is to dance to my grave." + +"Well, perhaps Julia, and Annie, and Peter----" suggested Philippa, +considerably overawed. + +"I'm not one of them that holds with loud mockery and harangues," +continued Mrs. Cadogan, "but if I had any wish for dhrawing down talk I +could tell you, ma'am, that the like o' them has their share of dances +without going to Aussolas! Wasn't it only last Sunday week I wint +follyin' the turkey that's layin' out in the plantation, and the whole +o' thim hysted their sails and back with them to their lovers at the +gate-house, and the kitchen-maid having a Jew-harp to be playing for +them!" + +"That was very wrong," said the truckling Philippa. "I hope you spoke +to the kitchen-maid about it." + +"Is it spake to thim?" rejoined Mrs. Cadogan. "No, but what I done was +to dhrag the kitchenmaid round the passages by the hair o' the head!" + +"Well, after that, I think you might let her go to Aussolas," said I +venturously. + +The end of it was that every one in and about the house went to +Aussolas on the following Wednesday, including Mrs. Cadogan. Philippa +had gone over to stay at the Shutes, ostensibly to arrange about a +jumble sale, the real object being (as a matter of history) to inspect +the Scotch young lady before whom Bernard Shute had dumped his +affections in his customary manner. Being alone, with every prospect +of a bad dinner, I accepted with gratitude an invitation to dine and +sleep at Aussolas and see the dance; it is only on very special +occasions that I have the heart to remind Philippa that she had neither +part nor lot in what occurred--it is too serious a matter for trivial +gloryings. + +Mrs. Knox had asked me to dine at six o'clock, which meant that I +arrived, in blazing sunlight and evening clothes, punctually at that +hour, and that at seven o'clock I was still sitting in the library, +reading heavily-bound classics, while my hostess held loud +conversations down staircases with Denis O'Loughlin, the red-bearded +Robinson Crusoe who combined in himself the offices of coachman, +butler, and, to the best of my belief, valet to the lady of the house. +The door opened at last, and Denis, looking as furtive as his prototype +after he had sighted the footprint, put in his head and beckoned to me. + +"The misthress says will ye go to dinner without her," he said very +confidentially; "sure she's greatly vexed ye should be waitin' on her. +'Twas the kitchen chimney cot fire, and faith she's afther giving Biddy +Mahony the sack, on the head of it! Though, indeed, 'tis little we'd +regard a chimney on fire here any other day." + +Mrs. Knox's woolly dog was the sole occupant of the dining-room when I +entered it; he was sitting on his mistress's chair, with all the air of +outrage peculiar to a small and self-important dog when routine has +been interfered with. It was difficult to discover what had caused the +delay, the meal, not excepting the soup, being a cold collation; it was +heavily flavoured with soot, and was hurled on to the table by Crusoe +in spasmodic bursts, contemporaneous, no doubt, with Biddy Mahony's +fits of hysterics in the kitchen. Its most memorable feature was a +noble lake trout, which appeared in two jagged pieces, a matter lightly +alluded to by Denis as the result of "a little argument" between +himself and Biddy as to the dish on which it was to be served. Further +conversation elicited the interesting fact that the combatants had +pulled the trout in two before the matter was settled. A brief glance +at my attendant's hands decided me to let the woolly dog justify his +existence by consuming my portion for me, when Crusoe left the room. + +Old Mrs. Knox remained invisible till the end of dinner, when she +appeared in the purple velvet bonnet that she was reputed to have worn +since the famine, and a dun-coloured woollen shawl fastened by a +splendid diamond brooch, that flashed rainbow fire against the last +shafts of sunset. There was a fire in the old lady's eye, too, the +light that I had sometimes seen in Flurry's in moments of crisis. + +"I have no apologies to offer that are worth hearing," she said, "but I +have come to drink a glass of port wine with you, if you will so far +honour me, and then we must go out and see the ball. My grandson is +late, as usual." + +She crumbled a biscuit with a brown and preoccupied hand; her claw-like +fingers carried a crowded sparkle of diamonds upwards as she raised her +glass to her lips. + +The twilight was falling when we left the room and made our way +downstairs. I followed the little figure in the purple bonnet through +dark regions of passages and doorways, where strange lumber lay about; +there was a rusty suit of armour, an upturned punt, mouldering +pictures, and finally, by a door that opened into the yard, a lady's +bicycle, white with the dust of travel. I supposed this latter to have +been imported from Dublin by the fashionable Miss Maggie Nolan, but on +the other hand it was well within the bounds of possibility that it +belonged to old Mrs. Knox. The coach-house at Aussolas was on a par +with the rest of the establishment, being vast, dilapidated, and of +unknown age. Its three double doors were wide open, and the guests +overflowed through them into the cobble-stoned yard; above their heads +the tin reflectors of paraffin lamps glared at us from among the +Christmas decorations of holly and ivy that festooned the walls. The +voices of a fiddle and a concertina, combined, were uttering a polka +with shrill and hideous fluency, to which the scraping and stamping of +hobnailed boots made a ponderous bass accompaniment. + +Mrs. Knox's donkey-chair had been placed in a commanding position at +the top of the room, and she made her way slowly to it, shaking hands +with all varieties of tenants and saying right things without showing +any symptom of that flustered boredom that I have myself exhibited when +I went round the men's messes on Christmas Day. She took her seat in +the donkey-chair, with the white dog in her lap, and looked with her +hawk's eyes round the array of faces that hemmed in the space where the +dancers were solemnly bobbing and hopping. + +"Will you tell me who that tomfool is, Denis?" she said, pointing to a +young lady in a ball dress who was circling in conscious magnificence +and somewhat painful incongruity in the arms of Mr. Peter Cadogan. + +"That's the lady's-maid from Castle Knox, yer honour, ma'am," replied +Denis, with something remarkably like a wink at Mrs. Knox. + +"When did the Castle Knox servants come?" asked the old lady, very +sharply. + +"The same time yer honour left the table, and----Pillilew! What's +this?" + +There was a clatter of galloping hoofs in the courtyard, as of a troop +of cavalry, and out of the heart of it Flurry's voice shouting to Denis +to drive out the colts and shut the gates before they had the people +killed. I noticed that the colour had risen to Mrs. Knox's face, and I +put it down to anxiety about her young horses. I may admit that when I +heard Flurry's voice, and saw him collaring his grandmother's guests +and pushing them out of the way as he came into the coach-house, I +rather feared that he was in the condition so often defined to me at +Petty Sessions as "not dhrunk, but having dhrink taken." His face was +white, his eyes glittered, there was a general air of exaltation about +him that suggested the solace of the pangs of love according to the +most ancient convention. + +"Hullo!" he said, swaggering up to the orchestra, "what's this +humbugging thing they're playing? A polka, is it? Drop that, John +Casey, and play a jig." + +John Casey ceased abjectly. + +"What'll I play, Masther Flurry?" + +"What the devil do I care? Here, Yeates, put a name on it! You're a +sort of musicianer yourself!" + +I know the names of three or four Irish jigs; but on this occasion my +memory clung exclusively to one, I suppose because it was the one I +felt to be peculiarly inappropriate. + +"Oh, well, 'Haste to the Wedding,'" I said, looking away. + +Flurry gave a shout of laughter. + +"That's it!" he exclaimed. "Play it up, John! Give us 'Haste to the +Wedding.' That's Major Yeates's fancy!" + +Decidedly Flurry was drunk. + +"What's wrong with you all that you aren't dancing?" he continued, +striding up the middle of the room. "Maybe you don't know how. Here, +I'll soon get one that'll show you!" + +He advanced upon his grandmother, snatched her out of the donkey-chair, +and, amid roars of applause, led her out, while the fiddle squealed its +way through the inimitable twists of the tune, and the concertina +surged and panted after it. Whatever Mrs. Knox may have thought of her +grandson's behaviour, she was evidently going to make the best of it. +She took her station opposite to him, in the purple bonnet, the +dun-coloured shawl, and the diamonds, she picked up her skirt at each +side, affording a view of narrow feet in elastic-sided cloth boots, and +for three repeats of the tune she stood up to her grandson, and footed +it on the coach-house floor. What the cloth boots did I could not +exactly follow; they were, as well as I could see, extremely +scientific, while there was hardly so much as a nod from the plumes of +the bonnet. Flurry was also scientific, but his dancing did not alter +my opinion that he was drunk; in fact, I thought he was making rather +an exhibition of himself. They say that that jig was twenty pounds in +Mrs. Knox's pocket at the next rent day; but though this statement is +open to doubt, I believe that if she and Flurry had taken the hat round +there and then she would have got in the best part of her arrears. + +After this the company settled down to business. The dances lasted a +sweltering half-hour, old women and young dancing with equal and +tireless zest. At the end of each the gentlemen abandoned their +partners without ceremony or comment, and went out to smoke, while the +ladies retired to the laundry, where families of teapots stewed on the +long bars of the fire, and Mrs. Mahony cut up mighty "barm-bracks," and +the tea-drinking was illimitable. + +At ten o'clock Mrs. Knox withdrew from the revel; she said that she was +tired, but I have seldom seen any one look more wide awake. I thought +that I might unobtrusively follow her example, but I was intercepted by +Flurry. + +"Yeates," he said seriously, "I'll take it as a kindness if you'll see +this thing out with me. We must keep them pretty sober, and get them +out of this by daylight. I--I have to get home early." + +I at once took back my opinion that Flurry was drunk; I almost wished +he had been, as I could then have deserted him without a pang. As it +was, I addressed myself heavily to the night's enjoyment. Wan with +heat, but conscientiously cheerful, I danced with Miss Maggie Nolan, +with the Castle Knox lady's-maid, with my own kitchenmaid, who fell +into wild giggles of terror whenever I spoke to her, with Mrs. Cadogan, +who had apparently postponed the interesting feat of dancing to her +grave, and did what she could to dance me into mine. I am bound to +admit that though an ex-soldier and a major, and therefore equipped +with a ready-made character for gallantry, Mrs. Cadogan was the only +one of my partners with whom I conversed with any comfort. + +At intervals I smoked cigarettes in the yard, seated on the old +mounting-block by the gate, and overheard much conversation about the +price of pigs in Skebawn; at intervals I plunged again into the +coach-house, and led forth a perspiring wallflower into the scrimmage +of a polka, or shuffled meaninglessly opposite to her in the long +double line of dancers who were engaged with serious faces in executing +a jig or a reel, I neither knew nor cared which. Flurry remained as +undefeated as ever; I could only suppose it was his method of showing +that his broken heart had mended. + +"It's time to be making the punch, Masther Flurry," said Denis, as the +harness-room clock struck twelve; "sure the night's warm, and the men's +all gaping for it, the craytures!" + +"What'll we make it in?" said Flurry, as we followed him into the +laundry. + +"The boiler, to be sure," said Crusoe, taking up a stone of sugar, and +preparing to shoot it into the laundry copper. + +"Stop, you fool, it's full of cockroaches!" shouted Flurry, amid +sympathetic squalls from the throng of countrywomen. "Go get a bath!" + +"Sure yerself knows there's but one bath in it," retorted Denis, "and +that's within in the Major's room. Faith, the tinker got his own share +yestherday with the same bath, sthriving to quinch the holes, and they +as thick in it as the stars in the sky, and 'tis weeping still, afther +all he done!" + +"Well, then, here goes for the cockroaches!" said Flurry. "What +doesn't sicken will fatten! Give me the kettle, and come on, you Kitty +Collins, and be skimming them off!" + +There were no complaints of the punch when the brew was completed, and +the dance thundered on with a heavier stamping and a louder hilarity +than before. The night wore on; I squeezed through the unyielding pack +of frieze coats and shawls in the doorway, and with feet that momently +swelled in my pumps I limped over the cobble-stones to smoke my eighth +cigarette on the mounting-block. It was a dark, hot night. The old +castle loomed above me in piled-up roofs and gables, and high up in it +somewhere a window sent a shaft of light into the sleeping leaves of a +walnut-tree that overhung the gateway. At the bars of the gate two +young horses peered in at the medley of noise and people; away in an +outhouse a cock crew hoarsely. The gaiety in the coach-house increased +momently, till, amid shrieks and bursts of laughter, Miss Maggie Nolan +fled coquettishly from it with a long yell, like a train coming out of +a tunnel, pursued by the fascinating Peter Cadogan brandishing a twig +of mountain ash, in imitation of mistletoe. The young horses stampeded +in horror, and immediately a voice proceeded from the lighted window +above, Mrs. Knox's voice, demanding what the noise was, and announcing +that if she heard any more of it she would have the place cleared. + +An awful silence fell, to which the young horses' fleeing hoofs lent +the final touch of consternation. Then I heard the irrepressible +Maggie Nolan say: "Oh God! Merry-come-sad!" which I take to be a +reflection on the mutability of all earthly happiness. + +Mrs. Knox remained for a moment at the window, and it struck me as +remarkable that at 2.30 A.M. she should still have on her bonnet. I +thought I heard her speak to some one in the room, and there followed a +laugh, a laugh that was not a servant's, and was puzzlingly familiar. +I gave it up, and presently dropped into a cheerless doze. + +With the dawn there came a period when even Flurry showed signs of +failing. He came and sat down beside me with a yawn; it struck me that +there was more impatience and nervousness than fatigue in the yawn. + +"I think I'll turn them all out of this after the next dance is over," +he said; "I've a lot to do, and I can't stay here." + +I grunted in drowsy approval. It must have been a few minutes later +that I felt Flurry grip my shoulder. + +"Yeates!" he said, "look up at the roof. Do you see anything up there +by the kitchen chimney?" + +He was pointing at a heavy stack of chimneys in a tower that stood up +against the grey and pink of the morning sky. At the angle where one +of them joined the roof smoke was oozing busily out, and, as I stared, +a little wisp of flame stole through. + +The next thing that I distinctly remember is being in the van of a rush +through the kitchen passages, every one shouting "Water! Water!" and +not knowing where to find it, then up several flights of the narrowest +and darkest stairs it has ever been my fate to ascend, with a bucket of +water that I snatched from a woman, spilling as I ran. At the top of +the stairs came a ladder leading to a trap-door, and up in the dark +loft above was the roar and the wavering glare of flames. + +"My God! That's sthrong fire!" shouted Denis, tumbling down the ladder +with a brace of empty buckets; "we'll never save it! The lake won't +quinch it!" + +The flames were squirting out through the bricks of the chimney, +through the timbers, through the slates; it was barely possible to get +through the trap-door, and the booming and crackling strengthened every +instant. + +"A chain to the lake!" gasped Flurry, coughing in the stifling heat as +he slashed the water at the blazing rafters; "the well's no good! Go +on, Yeates!" + +The organising of a double chain out of the mob that thronged and +shouted and jammed in the passages and yard was no mean feat of +generalship; but it got done somehow. Mrs. Cadogan and Biddy Mahony +rose magnificently to the occasion, cursing, thumping, shoving; and +stable buckets, coal buckets, milk pails, and kettles were unearthed +and sent swinging down the grass slope to the lake that lay in +glittering unconcern in the morning sunshine. Men, women, and children +worked in a way that only Irish people can work on an emergency. All +their cleverness, all their good-heartedness, and all their love of a +ruction came to the front; the screaming and the exhortations were +incessant, but so were also the buckets that flew from hand to hand up +to the loft. I hardly know how long we were at it, but there came a +time when I looked up from the yard and saw that the billows of +reddened smoke from the top of the tower were dying down, and I +bethought me of old Mrs. Knox. + +I found her at the door of her room, engaged in tying up a bundle of +old clothes in a sheet; she looked as white as a corpse, but she was +not in any way quelled by the situation. + +"I'd be obliged to you all the same, Major Yeates, to throw this over +the balusters," she said, as I advanced with the news that the fire had +been got under. "'Pon my honour, I don't know when I've been as vexed +as I've been this night, what with one thing and another! 'Tis a +monstrous thing to use a guest as we've used you, but what could we do? +I threw all the silver out of the dining-room window myself, and the +poor peahen that had her nest there was hurt by an entrée dish, and +half her eggs were----" + +There was a curious sound not unlike a titter in Mrs. Knox's room. + +"However, we can't make omelettes without breaking eggs--as they say--" +she went on rather hurriedly; "I declare I don't know what I'm saying! +My old head is confused----" + +Here Mrs. Knox went abruptly into her room and shut the door. +Obviously there was nothing further to do for my hostess, and I fought +my way up the dripping back staircase to the loft. The flames had +ceased, the supply of buckets had been stopped, and Flurry, standing on +a ponderous crossbeam, was poking his head and shoulders out into the +sunlight through the hole that had been burned in the roof. Denis and +others were pouring water over charred beams, the atmosphere was still +stifling, everything was black, everything dripped with inky water. +Flurry descended from his beam and stretched himself, looking like a +drowned chimney-sweep. + +"We've made a night of it, Yeates, haven't we?" he said, "but we've +bested it anyhow. We were done for only for you!" There was more +emotion about him than the occasion seemed to warrant, and his eyes had +a Christy Minstrel brightness, not wholly to be attributed to the dirt +on his face. "What's the time?--I must get home." + +The time, incredible as it seemed, was half-past six. I could almost +have sworn that Flurry changed colour when I said so. + +"I must be off," he said; "I had no idea it was so late." + +"Why, what's the hurry?" I asked. + +He stared at me, laughed foolishly, and fell to giving directions to +Denis. Five minutes afterwards he drove out of the yard and away at a +canter down the long stretch of avenue that skirted the lake, with a +troop of young horses flying on either hand. He whirled his whip round +his head and shouted at them, and was lost to sight in a clump of +trees. It is a vision of him that remains with me, and it always +carried with it the bitter smell of wet charred wood. + +Reaction had begun to set in among the volunteers. The chain took to +sitting in the kitchen, cups of tea began mysteriously to circulate, +and personal narratives of the fire were already foreshadowing the +amazing legends that have since gathered round the night's adventure. +I left to Denis the task of clearing the house, and went up to change +my wet clothes, with a feeling that I had not been to bed for a year. +The ghost of a waiter who had drowned himself in a boghole would have +presented a cheerier aspect than I, as I surveyed myself in the +prehistoric mirror in my room, with the sunshine falling on my unshorn +face and begrimed shirt-front. + +I made my toilet at considerable length, and, it being now nearly eight +o'clock, went downstairs to look for something to eat. I had left the +house humming with people; I found it silent as Pompeii. The sheeted +bundles containing Mrs. Knox's wardrobe were lying about the hall; a +couple of ancestors who in the first alarm had been dragged from the +walls were leaning drunkenly against the bundles; last night's dessert +was still on the dining-room table. I went out on to the hall-door +steps, and saw the entrée-dishes in a glittering heap in a nasturtium +bed, and realised that there was no breakfast for me this side of lunch +at Shreelane. + +There was a sound of wheels on the avenue, and a brougham came into +view, driving fast up the long open stretch by the lake. It was the +Castle Knox brougham, driven by Norris, whom I had last seen drunk at +the athletic sports, and as it drew up at the door I saw Lady Knox +inside. + +"It's all right, the fire's out," I said, advancing genially and full +of reassurance. + +"What fire?" said Lady Knox, regarding me with an iron countenance. + +I explained. + +"Well, as the house isn't burned down," said Lady Knox, cutting short +my details, "perhaps you would kindly find out if I could see Mrs. +Knox." + +Lady Knox's face was many shades redder than usual. I began to +understand that something awful had happened, or would happen, and I +wished myself safe at Shreelane, with the bedclothes over my head. + +"If 'tis for the misthress you're looking, me lady," said Denis's voice +behind me, in tones of the utmost respect, "she went out to the kitchen +garden a while ago to get a blasht o' the fresh air afther the night. +Maybe your ladyship would sit inside in the library till I call her?" + +Lady Knox eyed Crusoe suspiciously. + +"Thank you, I'll fetch her myself," she said. + +"Oh, sure, that's too throuble----" began Denis. + +"Stay where you are!" said Lady Knox, in a voice like the slam of a +door. + +"Bedad, I'm best plased she went," whispered Denis, as Lady Knox set +forth alone down the shrubbery walk. + +"But is Mrs. Knox in the garden?" said I. + +"The Lord preserve your innocence, sir!" replied Denis, with seeming +irrelevance. + +At this moment I became aware of the incredible fact that Sally Knox +was silently descending the stairs; she stopped short as she got into +the hall, and looked almost wildly at me and Denis. Was I looking at +her wraith? There was again a sound of wheels on the gravel; she went +to the hall door, outside which was now drawn up Mrs. Knox's +donkey-carriage, as well as Lady Knox's brougham, and, as if overcome +by this imposing spectacle, she turned back and put her hands over her +face. + +"She's gone round to the garden, asthore," said Denis in a hoarse +whisper; "go in the donkey-carriage. 'Twill be all right!" He seized +her by the arm, pushed her down the steps and into the little carriage, +pulled up the hood over her to its furthest stretch, snatched the whip +out of the hand of the broadly-grinning Norris, and with terrific +objurgations lashed the donkey into a gallop. The donkey-boy grasped +the position, whatever it might be; he took up the running on the other +side, and the donkey-carriage swung away down the avenue, with all its +incongruous air of hooded and rowdy invalidism. + +I have never disguised the fact that I am a coward, and therefore when, +at this dynamitical moment, I caught a glimpse of Lady Knox's hat over +a laurustinus, as she returned at high speed from the garden, I slunk +into the house and faded away round the dining-room door. "This minute +I seen the misthress going down through the plantation beyond," said +the voice of Crusoe outside the window, "and I'm afther sending Johnny +Regan to her with the little carriage, not to put any more delay on yer +ladyship. Sure you can see him making all the haste he can. Maybe +you'd sit inside in the library till she comes." + +Silence followed. I peered cautiously round the window curtain. Lady +Knox was looking defiantly at the donkey-carriage as it reeled at top +speed into the shades of the plantation, strenuously pursued by the +woolly dog. Norris was regarding his horses' ears in expressionless +respectability. Denis was picking up the entrée-dishes with decorous +solicitude. Lady Knox turned and came into the house; she passed the +dining-room door with an ominous step, and went on into the library. + +It seemed to me that now or never was the moment to retire quietly to +my room, put my things into my portmanteau, and---- + +Denis rushed into the room with the entrée-dishes piled up to his chin. + +"She's diddled!" he whispered, crashing them down on the table. He +came at me with his hand out. "Three cheers for Masther Flurry and +Miss Sally," he hissed, wringing my hand up and down, "and 'twas +yerself called for 'Haste to the Weddin'' last night, long life to ye! +The Lord save us! There's the misthress going into the library!" + +Through the half-open door I saw old Mrs. Knox approach the library +from the staircase with a dignified slowness; she had on a wedding +garment, a long white burnous, in which she might easily have been +mistaken for a small, stout clergyman. She waved back Crusoe, the door +closed upon her, and the battle of giants was entered upon. I sat +down--it was all I was able for--and remained for a full minute in +stupefied contemplation of the entrée-dishes. + + +Perhaps of all conclusions to a situation so portentous, that which +occurred was the least possible. Twenty minutes after Mrs. Knox met +her antagonist I was summoned from strapping my portmanteau to face the +appalling duty of escorting the combatants, in Lady Knox's brougham, to +the church outside the back gate, to which Miss Sally had preceded them +in the donkey-carriage. I pulled myself together, went down stairs, +and found that the millennium had suddenly set in. It had apparently +dawned with the news that Aussolas and all things therein were +bequeathed to Flurry by his grandmother, and had established itself +finally upon the considerations that the marriage was past praying for, +and that the diamonds were intended for Miss Sally. + +We fetched the bride and bridegroom from the church; we fetched old +Eustace Hamilton, who married them; we dug out the champagne from the +cellar; we even found rice and threw it. + +The hired carriage that had been ordered to take the runaways across +country to a distant station was driven by Slipper. He was shaved; he +wore an old livery coat and a new pot hat; he was wondrous sober. On +the following morning he was found asleep on a heap of stones ten miles +away; somewhere in the neighbourhood one of the horses was grazing in a +field with a certain amount of harness hanging about it. The carriage +and the remaining horse were discovered in a roadside ditch, two miles +farther on; one of the carriage doors had been torn off, and in the +interior the hens of the vicinity were conducting an exhaustive search +after the rice that lurked in the cushions. + + + + + PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT + THE PRESS OF THE PUBLISHERS. + + + + +THE NEW NELSON CLASSICS + + +_Over 300 volumes. Cloth gilt. Each 1s. 6d. net._ + + +This famous series, which is now more attractive than ever, contains +many notable modern books, the classics of to-morrow, besides +"classics" in the accepted sense. 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Œ. Somerville and Martin Ross</title> + +<style type="text/css"> + +body { margin-left: 20%; + margin-right: 20%; + text-align: justify; } + +h1, h2, h3, h4, h5 {text-align: center; font-style: normal; font-weight: +normal; line-height: 1.5; margin-top: .5em; margin-bottom: .5em;} + +h1 {font-size: 300%; + margin-top: 0.6em; + margin-bottom: 0.6em; + letter-spacing: 0.12em; + word-spacing: 0.2em; + text-indent: 0em;} +h2 {font-size: 150%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;} +h3 {font-size: 130%; margin-top: 1em;} +h4 {font-size: 120%;} +h5 {font-size: 110%;} + +div.chapter {page-break-before: always; margin-top: 4em;} + +hr {width: 80%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em;} + +p {text-indent: 1em; + margin-top: 0.25em; + margin-bottom: 0.25em; } + +p.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: 90%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; } + +p.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +a:link {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:visited {color:blue; text-decoration:none} +a:hover {color:red} + +</style> + +</head> + +<body> + +<div style='text-align:center; font-size:1.2em; font-weight:bold'>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Some Experiences of an Irish R.M., by E. Œ. Somerville and Martin Ross</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Some Experiences of an Irish R.M.</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: E. Œ. Somerville and Martin Ross</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: January 15, 2011 [eBook #34630]<br /> +[Most recently updated: December 12, 2021]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Al Haines</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. ***</div> + +<h1> +SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. +</h1> + +<h4> +<i>by</i> +</h4> + +<h3> +E. Œ. SOMERVILLE +</h3> + +<h4> +<i>and</i> +</h4> + +<h3> +MARTIN ROSS +</h3> + +<h4> +THOMAS NELSON & SONS LTD<br/> +LONDON EDINBURGH PARIS MELBOURNE<br/> +TORONTO AND NEW YORK +</h4> + +<h5> +Reprinted by permission of<br/> +Messrs. Longmans Green & Co., Ltd.<br/> +</h5> + +<h2> +CONTENTS +</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">I. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap01">GREAT-UNCLE MCCARTHY</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">II. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap02">IN THE CURRANHILTY COUNTRY</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">III. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap03">TRINKET'S COLT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">IV. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap04">THE WATERS OF STRIFE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">V. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap05">LISHEEN RACES, SECOND-HAND</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">VI. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap06">PHILIPPA'S FOX-HUNT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">VII. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap07">A MISDEAL</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">VIII. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap08">THE HOLY ISLAND</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">IX. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap09">THE POLICY OF THE CLOSED DOOR</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">X. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap10">THE HOUSE OF FAHY</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">XI. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap11">OCCASIONAL LICENSES</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td align="right" valign="top">XII. </td> +<td align="left" valign="top"> +<a href="#chap12">"OH LOVE! OH FIRE!"</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2> +SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. +</h2> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap01"></a>I<br/> +GREAT-UNCLE McCARTHY</h2> + +<p> +A Resident Magistracy in Ireland is not an easy thing to come by +nowadays; neither is it a very attractive job; yet on the evening when +I first propounded the idea to the young lady who had recently +consented to become Mrs. Sinclair Yeates, it seemed glittering with +possibilities. There was, on that occasion, a sunset, and a string +band playing "The Gondoliers," and there was also an ingenuous belief +in the omnipotence of a godfather of Philippa's—(Philippa was the +young lady)—who had once been a member of the Government. +</p> + +<p> +I was then climbing the steep ascent of the Captains towards my +Majority. I have no fault to find with Philippa's godfather; he did +all and more than even Philippa had expected; nevertheless, I had +attained to the dignity of mud major, and had spent a good deal on +postage stamps, and on railway fares to interview people of influence, +before I found myself in the hotel at Skebawn, opening long envelopes +addressed to "Major Yeates, R.M." +</p> + +<p> +My most immediate concern, as any one who has spent nine weeks at Mrs. +Raverty's hotel will readily believe, was to leave it at the earliest +opportunity; but in those nine weeks I had learned, amongst other +painful things, a little, a very little, of the methods of the artisan +in the West of Ireland. Finding a house had been easy enough. I had +had my choice of several, each with some hundreds of acres of shooting, +thoroughly poached, and a considerable portion of the roof intact. I +had selected one; the one that had the largest extent of roof in +proportion to the shooting, and had been assured by my landlord that in +a fortnight or so it would be fit for occupation. +</p> + +<p> +"There's a few little odd things to be done," he said easily; "a lick +of paint here and there, and a slap of plaster——" +</p> + +<p> +I am short-sighted; I am also of Irish extraction; both facts that make +for toleration—but even I thought he was understating the case. So +did the contractor. +</p> + +<p> +At the end of three weeks the latter reported progress, which mainly +consisted of the facts that the plumber had accused the carpenter of +stealing sixteen feet of his inch-pipe to run a bell wire through, and +that the carpenter had replied that he wished the divil might run the +plumber through a wran's quill. The plumber having reflected upon the +carpenter's parentage, the work of renovation had merged in battle, and +at the next Petty Sessions I was reluctantly compelled to allot to each +combatant seven days, without the option of a fine. +</p> + +<p> +These and kindred difficulties extended in an unbroken chain through +the summer months, until a certain wet and windy day in October, when, +with my baggage, I drove over to establish myself at Shreelane. It was +a tall, ugly house of three storeys high, its walls faced with +weather-beaten slates, its windows staring, narrow, and vacant. Round +the house ran an area, in which grew some laurustinus and holly bushes +among ash heaps, and nettles, and broken bottles. I stood on the +steps, waiting for the door to be opened, while the rain sluiced upon +me from a broken eaveshoot that had, amongst many other things, escaped +the notice of my landlord. I thought of Philippa, and of her plan, +broached in to-day's letter, of having the hall done up as a +sitting-room. +</p> + +<p> +The door opened, and revealed the hall. It struck me that I had +perhaps overestimated its possibilities. Among them I had certainly +not included a flagged floor, sweating with damp, and a reek of cabbage +from the adjacent kitchen stairs. A large elderly woman, with a red +face, and a cap worn helmet-wise on her forehead, swept me a +magnificent curtsey as I crossed the threshold. +</p> + +<p> +"Your honour's welcome——" she began, and then every door in the house +slammed in obedience to the gust that drove through it. With something +that sounded like "Mend ye for a back door!" Mrs. Cadogan abandoned her +opening speech and made for the kitchen stairs. (Improbable as it may +appear, my housekeeper was called Cadogan, a name made locally possible +by being pronounced Caydogawn.) +</p> + +<p> +Only those who have been through a similar experience can know what +manner of afternoon I spent. I am a martyr to colds in the head, and I +felt one coming on. I made a laager in front of the dining-room fire, +with a tattered leather screen and the dinner table, and gradually, +with cigarettes and strong tea, baffled the smell of must and cats, and +fervently trusted that the rain might avert a threatened visit from my +landlord. I was then but superficially acquainted with Mr. Florence +McCarthy Knox and his habits. +</p> + +<p> +At about 4.30, when the room had warmed up, and my cold was yielding to +treatment, Mrs. Cadogan entered and informed me that "Mr. Flurry" was +in the yard, and would be thankful if I'd go out to him, for he +couldn't come in. Many are the privileges of the female sex; had I +been a woman I should unhesitatingly have said that I had a cold in my +head. Being a man, I huddled on a mackintosh, and went out into the +yard. +</p> + +<p> +My landlord was there on horseback, and with him there was a man +standing at the head of a stout grey animal. I recognised with despair +that I was about to be compelled to buy a horse. +</p> + +<p> +"Good afternoon, Major," said Mr. Knox in his slow, sing-song brogue; +"it's rather soon to be paying you a visit, but I thought you might be +in a hurry to see the horse I was telling you of." +</p> + +<p> +I could have laughed. As if I were ever in a hurry to see a horse! I +thanked him, and suggested that it was rather wet for horse-dealing. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, it's nothing when you're used to it," replied Mr. Knox. His +gloveless hands were red and wet, the rain ran down his nose, and his +covert coat was soaked to a sodden brown. I thought that I did not +want to become used to it. My relations with horses have been of a +purely military character, I have endured the Sandhurst riding-school, +I have galloped for an impetuous general, I have been steward at +regimental races, but none of these feats have altered my opinion that +the horse, as a means of locomotion, is obsolete. Nevertheless, the +man who accepts a resident magistracy in the south-west of Ireland +voluntarily retires into the prehistoric age; to institute a stable +became inevitable. +</p> + +<p> +"You ought to throw a leg over him," said Mr. Knox, "and you're welcome +to take him over a fence or two if you like. He's a nice flippant +jumper." +</p> + +<p> +Even to my unexacting eye the grey horse did not seem to promise +flippancy, nor did I at all desire to find that quality in him. I +explained that I wanted something to drive, and not to ride. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, that's a fine raking horse in harness," said Mr. Knox, looking +at me with his serious grey eyes, "and you'd drive him with a sop of +hay in his mouth. Bring him up here, Michael." +</p> + +<p> +Michael abandoned his efforts to kick the grey horse's forelegs into a +becoming position, and led him up to me. +</p> + +<p> +I regarded him from under my umbrella with a quite unreasonable +disfavour. He had the dreadful beauty of a horse in a toy-shop, as +chubby, as wooden, and as conscientiously dappled, but it was +unreasonable to urge this as an objection, and I was incapable of +finding any more technical drawback. Yielding to circumstance, I +"threw my leg" over the brute, and after pacing gravely round the +quadrangle that formed the yard, and jolting to my entrance gate and +back, I decided that as he had neither fallen down nor kicked me off, +it was worth paying twenty-five pounds for him, if only to get in out +of the rain. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Knox accompanied me into the house and had a drink. He was a fair, +spare young man, who looked like a stable boy among gentlemen, and a +gentleman among stable boys. He belonged to a clan that cropped up in +every grade of society in the county, from Sir Valentine Knox of Castle +Knox down to the auctioneer Knox, who bore the attractive title of +Larry the Liar. So far as I could judge, Florence McCarthy of that ilk +occupied a shifting position about midway in the tribe. I had met him +at dinner at Sir Valentine's, I had heard of him at an illicit auction, +held by Larry the Liar, of brandy stolen from a wreck. They were +"Black Protestants," all of them, in virtue of their descent from a +godly soldier of Cromwell, and all were prepared at any moment of the +day or night to sell a horse. +</p> + +<p> +"You'll be apt to find this place a bit lonesome after the hotel," +remarked Mr. Flurry, sympathetically, as he placed his foot in its +steaming boot on the hob, "but it's a fine sound house anyway, and lots +of rooms in it, though indeed, to tell you the truth, I never was +through the whole of them since the time my great-uncle, Denis +McCarthy, died here. The dear knows I had enough of it that time." He +paused, and lit a cigarette—one of my best, and quite thrown away upon +him. "Those top floors, now," he resumed, "I wouldn't make too free +with them. There's some of them would jump under you like a spring +bed. Many's the night I was in and out of those attics, following my +poor uncle when he had a bad turn on him—the horrors, y' know—there +were nights he never stopped walking through the house. Good Lord! +will I ever forget the morning he said he saw the devil coming up the +avenue! 'Look at the two horns on him,' says he, and he out with his +gun and shot him, and, begad, it was his own donkey!" +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Knox gave a couple of short laughs. He seldom laughed, having in +unusual perfection, the gravity of manner that is bred by +horse-dealing, probably from the habitual repression of all emotion +save disparagement. +</p> + +<p> +The autumn evening, grey with rain, was darkening in the tall windows, +and the wind was beginning to make bullying rushes among the shrubs in +the area; a shower of soot rattled down the chimney and fell on the +hearthrug. +</p> + +<p> +"More rain coming," said Mr. Knox, rising composedly; "you'll have to +put a goose down these chimneys some day soon, it's the only way in the +world to clean them. Well, I'm for the road. You'll come out on the +grey next week, I hope; the hounds'll be meeting here. Give a roar at +him coming in at his jumps." He threw his cigarette into the fire and +extended a hand to me. "Good-bye, Major, you'll see plenty of me and +my hounds before you're done. There's a power of foxes in the +plantations here." +</p> + +<p> +This was scarcely reassuring for a man who hoped to shoot woodcock, and +I hinted as much. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, is it the cock?" said Mr. Flurry; "b'leeve me, there never was a +woodcock yet that minded hounds, now, no more than they'd mind rabbits! +The best shoots ever I had here, the hounds were in it the day before." +</p> + +<p> +When Mr. Knox had gone, I began to picture myself going across country +roaring, like a man on a fire-engine, while Philippa put the goose down +the chimney; but when I sat down to write to her I did not feel equal +to being humorous about it. I dilated ponderously on my cold, my hard +work, and my loneliness, and eventually went to bed at ten o'clock full +of cold shivers and hot whisky-and-water. +</p> + +<p> +After a couple of hours of feverish dozing, I began to understand what +had driven Great-Uncle McCarthy to perambulate the house by night. +Mrs. Cadogan had assured me that the Pope of Rome hadn't a betther bed +undher him than myself; wasn't I down on the new flog mattherass the +old masther bought in Father Scanlan's auction? By the smell I +recognised that "flog" meant flock, otherwise I should have said my +couch was stuffed with old boots. I have seldom spent a more wretched +night. The rain drummed with soft fingers on my window panes; the +house was full of noises. I seemed to see Great-Uncle McCarthy ranging +the passages with Flurry at his heels; several times I thought I heard +him. Whisperings seemed borne on the wind through my keyhole, boards +creaked in the room overhead, and once I could have sworn that a hand +passed, groping, over the panels of my door. I am, I may admit, a +believer in ghosts; I even take in a paper that deals with their +culture, but I cannot pretend that on that night I looked forward to a +manifestation of Great-Uncle McCarthy with any enthusiasm. +</p> + +<p> +The morning broke stormily, and I woke to find Mrs. Cadogan's +understudy, a grimy nephew of about eighteen, standing by my bedside, +with a black bottle in his hand. +</p> + +<p> +"There's no bath in the house, sir," was his reply to my command; "but +me A'nt said, would ye like a taggeen?" +</p> + +<p> +This alternative proved to be a glass of raw whisky. I declined it. +</p> + +<p> +I look back to that first week of housekeeping at Shreelane as to a +comedy excessively badly staged, and striped with lurid melodrama. +Towards its close I was positively home-sick for Mrs. Raverty's, and I +had not a single clean pair of boots. I am not one of those who hold +the convention that in Ireland the rain never ceases, day or night, but +I must say that my first November at Shreelane was composed of weather +of which my friend Flurry Knox remarked that you wouldn't meet a +Christian out of doors, unless it was a snipe or a dispensary doctor. +To this lamentable category might be added a resident magistrate. +Daily, shrouded in mackintosh, I set forth for the Petty Sessions +Courts of my wide district; daily, in the inevitable atmosphere of wet +frieze and perjury, I listened to indictments of old women who plucked +geese alive, of publicans whose hospitality to their friends broke +forth uncontrollably on Sunday afternoons, of "parties" who, in the +language of the police sergeant, were subtly defined as "not to say +dhrunk, but in good fighting thrim." +</p> + +<p> +I got used to it all in time—I suppose one can get used to anything—I +even became callous to the surprises of Mrs. Cadogan's cooking. As the +weather hardened and the woodcock came in, and one by one I discovered +and nailed up the rat holes, I began to find life endurable, and even +to feel some remote sensation of home-coming when the grey horse turned +in at the gate of Shreelane. +</p> + +<p> +The one feature of my establishment to which I could not become inured +was the pervading sub-presence of some thing or things which, for my +own convenience, I summarised as Great-Uncle McCarthy. There were +nights on which I was certain that I heard the inebriate shuffle of his +foot overhead, the touch of his fumbling hand against the walls. There +were dark times before the dawn when sounds went to and fro, the moving +of weights, the creaking of doors, a far-away rapping in which was a +workmanlike suggestion of the undertaker, a rumble of wheels on the +avenue. Once I was impelled to the perhaps imprudent measure of +cross-examining Mrs. Cadogan. Mrs. Cadogan, taking the preliminary +precaution of crossing herself, asked me fatefully what day of the week +it was. +</p> + +<p> +"Friday!" she repeated after me. "Friday! The Lord save us! 'Twas a +Friday the old masther was buried!" +</p> + +<p> +At this point a saucepan opportunely boiled over, and Mrs. Cadogan fled +with it to the scullery, and was seen no more. +</p> + +<p> +In the process of time I brought Great-Uncle McCarthy down to a fine +point. On Friday nights he made coffins and drove hearses; during the +rest of the week he rarely did more than patter and shuffle in the +attics over my head. +</p> + +<p> +One night, about the middle of December, I awoke, suddenly aware that +some noise had fallen like a heavy stone into my dreams. As I felt for +the matches it came again, the long, grudging groan and the +uncompromising bang of the cross door at the head of the kitchen +stairs. I told myself that it was a draught that had done it, but it +was a perfectly still night. Even as I listened, a sound of wheels on +the avenue shook the stillness. The thing was getting past a joke. In +a few minutes I was stealthily groping my way down my own staircase, +with a box of matches in my hand, enforced by scientific curiosity, but +none the less armed with a stick. I stood in the dark at the top of +the back stairs and listened; the snores of Mrs. Cadogan and her nephew +Peter rose tranquilly from their respective lairs. I descended to the +kitchen and lit a candle; there was nothing unusual there, except a +great portion of the Cadogan wearing apparel, which was arranged at the +fire, and was being serenaded by two crickets. Whatever had opened the +door, my household was blameless. The kitchen was not attractive, yet +I felt indisposed to leave it. None the less, it appeared to be my +duty to inspect the yard. I put the candle on the table and went forth +into the outer darkness. Not a sound was to be heard. The night was +very cold, and so dark, that I could scarcely distinguish the roofs of +the stables against the sky; the house loomed tall and oppressive above +me; I was conscious of how lonely it stood in the dumb and barren +country. Spirits were certainly futile creatures, childish in their +manifestations, stupidly content with the old machinery of raps and +rumbles. I thought how fine a scene might be played on a stage like +this; if I were a ghost, how bluely I would glimmer at the windows, how +whimperingly chatter in the wind. Something whirled out of the +darkness above me, and fell with a flop on the ground, just at my feet. +I jumped backwards, in point of fact I made for the kitchen door, and, +with my hand on the latch, stood still and waited. Nothing further +happened; the thing that lay there did not stir. I struck a match. +The moment of tension turned to bathos as the light flickered on +nothing more fateful than a dead crow. +</p> + +<p> +Dead it certainly was. I could have told that without looking at it; +but why should it, at some considerable period after its death, fall +from the clouds at my feet. But did it fall from the clouds? I struck +another match, and stared up at the impenetrable face of the house. +There was no hint of solution in the dark windows, but I determined to +go up and search the rooms that gave upon the yard. +</p> + +<p> +How cold it was! I can feel now the frozen musty air of those attics, +with their rat-eaten floors and wall-papers furred with damp. I went +softly from one to another, feeling like a burglar in my own house, and +found nothing in elucidation of the mystery. The windows were +hermetically shut, and sealed with cobwebs. There was no furniture, +except in the end room, where a wardrobe without doors stood in a +corner, empty save for the solemn presence of a monstrous tall hat. I +went back to bed, cursing those powers of darkness that had got me out +of it, and heard no more. +</p> + +<p> +My landlord had not failed of his promise to visit my coverts with his +hounds; in fact, he fulfilled it rather more conscientiously than +seemed to me quite wholesome for the cock-shooting. I maintained a +silence which I felt to be magnanimous on the part of a man who cared +nothing for hunting and a great deal for shooting, and wished the +hounds more success in the slaughter of my foxes than seemed to be +granted to them. I met them all, one red frosty evening, as I drove +down the long hill to my demesne gates, Flurry at their head, in his +shabby pink coat and dingy breeches, the hounds trailing dejectedly +behind him and his half-dozen companions. +</p> + +<p> +"What luck?" I called out, drawing rein as I met them. +</p> + +<p> +"None," said Mr. Flurry briefly. He did not stop, neither did he +remove his pipe from the down-twisted corner of his mouth; his eye at +me was cold and sour. The other members of the hunt passed me with +equal hauteur; I thought they took their ill luck very badly. +</p> + +<p> +On foot, among the last of the straggling hounds, cracking a carman's +whip, and swearing comprehensively at them all, slouched my friend +Slipper. Our friendship had begun in Court, the relative positions of +the dock and the judgment-seat forming no obstacle to its progress, and +had been cemented during several days' tramping after snipe. He was, +as usual, a little drunk, and he hailed me as though I were a ship. +</p> + +<p> +"Ahoy, Major Yeates!" he shouted, bringing himself up with a lurch +against my cart; "it's hunting you should be, in place of sending poor +divils to gaol!" +</p> + +<p> +"But I hear you had no hunting," I said. +</p> + +<p> +"Ye heard that, did ye?" Slipper rolled upon me an eye like that of a +profligate pug. "Well, begor, ye heard no more than the thruth." +</p> + +<p> +"But where are all the foxes?" said I. +</p> + +<p> +"Begor, I don't know no more than your honour. And Shreelane—that +there used to be as many foxes in it as there's crosses in a yard of +check! Well, well, I'll say nothin' for it, only that it's quare! +Here, Vaynus! Naygress!" Slipper uttered a yell, hoarse with whisky, +in adjuration of two elderly ladies of the pack who had profited by our +conversation to stray away into an adjacent cottage. "Well, +good-night, Major. Mr. Flurry's as cross as briars, and he'll have me +ate!" +</p> + +<p> +He set off at a surprisingly steady run, cracking his whip, and +whooping like a madman. I hope that when I also am fifty I shall be +able to run like Slipper. +</p> + +<p> +That frosty evening was followed by three others like unto it, and a +flight of woodcock came in. I calculated that I could do with five +guns, and I despatched invitations to shoot and dine on the following +day to four of the local sportsmen, among whom was, of course, my +landlord. I remember that in my letter to the latter I expressed a +facetious hope that my bag of cock would be more successful than his of +foxes had been. +</p> + +<p> +The answers to my invitations were not what I expected. All, without +so much as a conventional regret, declined my invitation; Mr. Knox +added that he hoped the bag of cock would be to my liking, and that I +need not be "affraid" that the hounds would trouble my coverts any +more. Here was war! I gazed in stupefaction at the crooked scrawl in +which my landlord had declared it. It was wholly and entirely +inexplicable, and instead of going to sleep comfortably over the fire +and my newspaper as a gentleman should, I spent the evening in +irritated ponderings over this bewildering and exasperating change of +front on the part of my friendly squireens. +</p> + +<p> +My shoot the next day was scarcely a success. I shot the woods in +company with my gamekeeper, Tim Connor, a gentleman whose duties mainly +consisted in limiting the poaching privileges to his personal friends, +and whatever my offence might have been, Mr. Knox could have wished me +no bitterer punishment than hearing the unavailing shouts of "Mark +cock!" and seeing my birds winging their way from the coverts, far out +of shot. Tim Connor and I got ten couple between us; it might have +been thirty if my neighbours had not boycotted me, for what I could +only suppose was the slackness of their hounds. +</p> + +<p> +I was dog-tired that night, having walked enough for three men, and I +slept the deep, insatiable sleep that I had earned. It was somewhere +about 3 A.M. that I was gradually awakened by a continuous knocking, +interspersed with muffled calls. Great-Uncle McCarthy had never before +given tongue, and I freed one ear from blankets to listen. Then I +remembered that Peter had told me the sweep had promised to arrive that +morning, and to arrive early. Blind with sleep and fury I went to the +passage window, and thence desired the sweep to go to the devil. It +availed me little. For the remainder of the night I could hear him +pacing round the house, trying the windows, banging at the doors, and +calling upon Peter Cadogan as the priests of Baal called upon their +god. At six o'clock I had fallen into a troubled doze, when Mrs. +Cadogan knocked at my door and imparted the information that the sweep +had arrived. My answer need not be recorded, but in spite of it the +door opened, and my housekeeper, in a weird <i>déshabille</i>, effectively +lighted by the orange beams of her candle, entered my room. +</p> + +<p> +"God forgive me, I never seen one I'd hate as much as that sweep!" she +began; "he's these three hours—arrah, what, three hours!—no, but all +night, raising tallywack and tandem round the house to get at the +chimbleys." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, for Heaven's sake let him get at the chimneys and let me go to +sleep," I answered, goaded to desperation, "and you may tell him from +me that if I hear his voice again I'll shoot him!" +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Cadogan silently left my bedside, and as she closed the door she +said to herself, "The Lord save us!" +</p> + +<p> +Subsequent events may be briefly summarised. At 7.30 I was awakened +anew by a thunderous sound in the chimney, and a brick crashed into the +fireplace, followed at a short interval by two dead jackdaws and their +nests. At eight, I was informed by Peter that there was no hot water, +and that he wished the divil would roast the same sweep. At 9.30, when +I came down to breakfast, there was no fire anywhere, and my coffee, +made in the coachhouse, tasted of soot. I put on an overcoat and +opened my letters. About fourth or fifth in the uninteresting heap +came one in an egregiously disguised hand. +</p> + +<p> +"Sir," it began, "this is to inform you your unsportsmanlike conduct +has been discovered. You have been suspected this good while of +shooting the Shreelane foxes, it is known now you do worse. Parties +have seen your gamekeeper going regular to meet the Saturday early +train at Salters Hill Station, with your grey horse under a cart, and +your labels on the boxes, and we know as well as <i>your agent in Cork</i> +what it is you have in those boxes. Be warned in time.—Your +Wellwisher." +</p> + +<p> +I read this through twice before its drift became apparent, and I +realised that I was accused of improving my shooting and my finances by +the simple expedient of selling my foxes. That is to say, I was in a +worse position than if I had stolen a horse, or murdered Mrs. Cadogan, +or got drunk three times a week in Skebawn. +</p> + +<p> +For a few moments I fell into wild laughter, and then, aware that it +was rather a bad business to let a lie of this kind get a start, I sat +down to demolish the preposterous charge in a letter to Flurry Knox. +Somehow, as I selected my sentences, it was borne in upon me that, if +the letter spoke the truth, circumstantial evidence was rather against +me. Mere lofty repudiation would be unavailing, and by my infernal +facetiousness about the woodcock I had effectively filled in the case +against myself. At all events, the first thing to do was to establish +a basis, and have it out with Tim Connor. I rang the bell. +</p> + +<p> +"Peter, is Tim Connor about the place?" +</p> + +<p> +"He is not, sir. I heard him say he was going west the hill to mend +the bounds fence." Peter's face was covered with soot, his eyes were +red, and he coughed ostentatiously. "The sweep's after breaking one of +his brushes within in yer bedroom chimney, sir," he went on, with all +the satisfaction of his class in announcing domestic calamity; "he's +above on the roof now, and he'd be thankful to you to go up to him." +</p> + +<p> +I followed him upstairs in that state of simmering patience that any +employer of Irish labour must know and sympathise with. I climbed the +rickety ladder and squeezed through the dirty trapdoor involved in the +ascent to the roof, and was confronted by the hideous face of the +sweep, black against the frosty blue sky. He had encamped with all his +paraphernalia on the flat top of the roof, and was good enough to rise +and put his pipe in his pocket on my arrival. +</p> + +<p> +"Good morning, Major. That's a grand view you have up here," said the +sweep. He was evidently far too well bred to talk shop. "I thravelled +every roof in this counthry, and there isn't one where you'd get as +handsome a prospect!" +</p> + +<p> +Theoretically he was right, but I had not come up to the roof to +discuss scenery, and demanded brutally why he had sent for me. The +explanation involved a recital of the special genius required to sweep +the Shreelane chimneys; of the fact that the sweep had in infancy been +sent up and down every one of them by Great-Uncle McCarthy; of the +three ass-loads of soot that by his peculiar skill he had this morning +taken from the kitchen chimney; of its present purity, the draught +being such that it would "dhraw up a young cat with it." +Finally—realising that I could endure no more—he explained that my +bedroom chimney had got what he called "a wynd" in it, and he proposed +to climb down a little way in the stack to try "would he get to come at +the brush." The sweep was very small, the chimney very large. I +stipulated that he should have a rope round his waist, and despite the +illegality, I let him go. He went down like a monkey, digging his toes +and fingers into the niches made for the purpose in the old chimney; +Peter held the rope. I lit a cigarette and waited. +</p> + +<p> +Certainly the view from the roof was worth coming up to look at. It +was rough, heathery country on one side, with a string of little blue +lakes running like a turquoise necklet round the base of a firry hill, +and patches of pale green pasture were set amidst the rocks and +heather. A silvery flash behind the undulations of the hills told +where the Atlantic lay in immense plains of sunlight. I turned to +survey with an owner's eye my own grey woods and straggling plantations +of larch, and espied a man coming out of the western wood. He had +something on his back, and he was walking very fast; a rabbit poacher +no doubt. As he passed out of sight into the back avenue he was +beginning to run. At the same instant I saw on the hill beyond my +western boundaries half-a-dozen horsemen scrambling by zigzag ways down +towards the wood. There was one red coat among them; it came first at +the gap in the fence that Tim Connor had gone out to mend, and with the +others was lost to sight in the covert, from which, in another instant, +came clearly through the frosty air a shout of "Gone to ground!" +Tremendous horn blowings followed, then, all in the same moment, I saw +the hounds break in full cry from the wood, and come stringing over the +grass and up the back avenue towards the yard gate. Were they running +a fresh fox into the stables? +</p> + +<p> +I do not profess to be a hunting-man, but I am an Irishman, and so, it +is perhaps superfluous to state, is Peter. We forgot the sweep as if +he had never existed, and precipitated ourselves down the ladder, down +the stairs, and out into the yard. One side of the yard is formed by +the coach-house and a long stable, with a range of lofts above them, +planned on the heroic scale in such matters that obtained in Ireland +formerly. These join the house at the corner by the back door. A long +flight of stone steps leads to the lofts, and up these, as Peter and I +emerged from the back door, the hounds were struggling helter-skelter. +Almost simultaneously there was a confused clatter of hoofs in the back +avenue, and Flurry Knox came stooping at a gallop under the archway +followed by three or four other riders. They flung themselves from +their horses and made for the steps of the loft; more hounds pressed, +yelling, on their heels, the din was indescribable, and justified Mrs. +Cadogan's subsequent remark that "when she heard the noise she thought +'twas the end of the world and the divil collecting his own!" +</p> + +<p> +I jostled in the wake of the party, and found myself in the loft, +wading in hay, and nearly deafened by the clamour that was bandied +about the high roof and walls. At the farther end of the loft the +hounds were raging in the hay, encouraged thereto by the whoops and +screeches of Flurry and his friends. High up in the gable of the loft, +where it joined the main wall of the house, there was a small door, and +I noted with a transient surprise that there was a long ladder leading +up to it. Even as it caught my eye a hound fought his way out of a +drift of hay and began to jump at the ladder, throwing his tongue +vociferously, and even clambering up a few rungs in his excitement. +</p> + +<p> +"There's the way he's gone!" roared Flurry, striving through hounds and +hay towards the ladder, "Trumpeter has him! What's up there, back of +the door, Major? I don't remember it at all." +</p> + +<p> +My crimes had evidently been forgotten in the supremacy of the moment. +While I was futilely asserting that had the fox gone up the ladder he +could not possibly have opened the door and shut it after him, even if +the door led anywhere, which, to the best of my belief, it did not, the +door in question opened, and to my amazement the sweep appeared at it. +He gesticulated violently, and over the tumult was heard to asseverate +that there was nothing above there, only a way into the flue, and any +one would be destroyed with the soot—— +</p> + +<p> +"Ah, go to blazes with your soot!" interrupted Flurry, already half-way +up the ladder. +</p> + +<p> +I followed him, the other men pressing up behind me. That Trumpeter +had made no mistake was instantly brought home to our noses by the reek +of fox that met us at the door. Instead of a chimney, we found +ourselves in a dilapidated bedroom full of people. Tim Connor was +there, the sweep was there, and a squalid elderly man and woman on whom +I had never set eyes before. There was a large open fireplace, black +with the soot the sweep had brought down with him, and on the table +stood a bottle of my own special Scotch whisky. In one corner of the +room was a pile of broken packing-cases, and beside these on the floor +lay a bag in which something kicked. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry, looking more uncomfortable and nonplussed than I could have +believed possible, listened in silence to the ceaseless harangue of the +elderly woman. The hounds were yelling like lost spirits in the loft +below, but her voice pierced the uproar like a bagpipe. It was an +unspeakably vulgar voice, yet it was not the voice of a countrywoman, +and there were frowzy remnants of respectability about her general +aspect. +</p> + +<p> +"And is it you, Flurry Knox, that's calling me a disgrace! Disgrace, +indeed, am I? Me that was your poor mother's own uncle's daughter, and +as good a McCarthy as ever stood in Shreelane!" +</p> + +<p> +What followed I could not comprehend, owing to the fact that the sweep +kept up a perpetual undercurrent of explanation to me as to how he had +got down the wrong chimney. I noticed that his breath stank of +whisky—Scotch, not the native variety. +</p> + +<hr /> + +<p> +Never, as long as Flurry Knox lives to blow a horn, will he hear the +last of the day that he ran his mother's first cousin to ground in the +attic. Never, while Mrs. Cadogan can hold a basting spoon, will she +cease to recount how, on the same occasion, she plucked and roasted ten +couple of woodcock in one torrid hour to provide luncheon for the hunt. +In the glory of this achievement her confederacy with the stowaways in +the attic is wholly slurred over, in much the same manner as the +startling outburst of summons for trespass, brought by Tim Connor +during the remainder of the shooting season, obscured the unfortunate +episode of the bagged fox. It was, of course, zeal for my shooting +that induced him to assist Mr. Knox's disreputable relations in the +deportation of my foxes; and I have allowed it to remain at that. +</p> + +<p> +In fact, the only things not allowed to remain were Mr. and Mrs. +McCarthy Gannon. They, as my landlord informed me, in the midst of +vast apologies, had been permitted to squat at Shreelane until my +tenancy began, and having then ostentatiously and abusively left the +house, they had, with the connivance of the Cadogans, secretly returned +to roost in the corner attic, to sell foxes under the ægis of my name, +and to make inroads on my belongings. They retained connection with +the outer world by means of the ladder and the loft, and with the house +in general, and my whisky in particular, by a door into the other +attics—a door concealed by the wardrobe in which reposed Great-Uncle +McCarthy's tall hat. +</p> + +<p> +It is with the greatest regret that I relinquish the prospect of +writing a monograph on Great-Uncle McCarthy for a Spiritualistic +Journal, but with the departure of his relations he ceased to manifest +himself, and neither the nailing up of packing-cases, nor the rumble of +the cart that took them to the station, disturbed my sleep for the +future. +</p> + +<p> +I understand that the task of clearing out the McCarthy Gannon's +effects was of a nature that necessitated two glasses of whisky per +man; and if the remnants of rabbit and jackdaw disinterred in the +process were anything like the crow that was thrown out of the window +at my feet, I do not grudge the restorative. +</p> + +<p> +As Mrs. Cadogan remarked to the sweep, "A Turk couldn't stand it." +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap02"></a>II<br/> +IN THE CURRANHILTY COUNTRY</h2> + +<p> +It is hardly credible that I should have been induced to depart from my +usual walk of life by a creature so uninspiring as the grey horse that +I bought from Flurry Knox for £25. +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps it was the monotony of being questioned by every other person +with whom I had five minutes' conversation, as to when I was coming out +with the hounds, and being further informed that in the days when +Captain Browne, the late Coastguard officer, had owned the grey, there +was not a fence between this and Mallow big enough to please them. At +all events, there came an epoch-making day when I mounted the Quaker +and presented myself at a meet of Mr. Knox's hounds. It is my belief +that six out of every dozen people who go out hunting are disagreeably +conscious of a nervous system, and two out of the six are in what is +brutally called "a blue funk." I was not in a blue funk, but I was +conscious not only of a nervous system, but of the anatomical fact that +I possessed large, round legs, handsome in their way, even admirable in +their proper sphere, but singularly ill adapted for adhering to the +slippery surfaces of a saddle. By a fatal intervention of Providence, +the sport, on this my first day in the hunting-field, was such as I +could have enjoyed from a bath-chair. The hunting-field was, on this +occasion, a relative term, implying long stretches of unfenced moorland +and bog, anything, in fact, save a field, the hunt itself might also +have been termed a relative one, being mainly composed of Mr. Knox's +relations in all degrees of cousinhood. It was a day when frost and +sunshine combined went to one's head like iced champagne; the distant +sea looked like the Mediterranean, and for four sunny hours the Knox +relatives and I followed nine couple of hounds at a tranquil footpace +along the hills, our progress mildly enlivened by one or two scrambles +in the shape of jumps. At three o'clock I jogged home, and felt within +me the newborn desire to brag to Peter Cadogan of the Quaker's doings, +as I dismounted rather stiffly in my own yard. +</p> + +<p> +I little thought that the result would be that three weeks later I +should find myself in a railway carriage at an early hour of a December +morning, in company with Flurry Knox and four or five of his clan, +journeying towards an unknown town, named Drumcurran, with an +appropriate number of horses in boxes behind us and a van full of +hounds in front. Mr. Knox's hounds were on their way, by invitation, +to have a day in the country of their neighbours, the Curranhilty +Harriers, and with amazing fatuity I had allowed myself to be cajoled +into joining the party. A northerly shower was striking in long spikes +on the glass of the window, the atmosphere of the carriage was blue +with tobacco smoke, and my feet, in a pair of new blucher boots, had +sunk into a species of Arctic sleep. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, you got my letter about the dance at the hotel to-night?" said +Flurry Knox, breaking off a whispered conversation with his amateur +whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, and sitting down beside me. "And we're to go +out with the Harriers to-day, and they've a sure fox for our hounds +to-morrow. I tell you you'll have the best fun ever you had. It's a +great country to ride. Fine honest banks, that you can come racing at +anywhere you like." +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Hickey, a saturnine young man, with a long nose and a black torpedo +beard, returned to his pocket the lancet with which he had been +trimming his nails. +</p> + +<p> +"They're like the Tipperary banks," he said; "you climb down nine feet +and you fall the rest." +</p> + +<p> +It occurred to me that the Quaker and I would most probably fall all +the way, but I said nothing. +</p> + +<p> +"I hear Tomsy Flood has a good horse this season," resumed Flurry. +</p> + +<p> +"Then it's not the one you sold him," said the Doctor. +</p> + +<p> +"I'll take my oath it's not," said Flurry with a grin. "I believe he +has it in for me still over that one." +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Jerome's moustache went up under his nose and showed his white +teeth. +</p> + +<p> +"Small blame to him! when you sold him a mare that was wrong of both +her hind-legs. Do you know what he did, Major Yeates? The mare was +lame going into the fair, and he took the two hind-shoes off her and +told poor Flood she kicked them off in the box, and that was why she +was going tender, and he was so drunk he believed him." +</p> + +<p> +The conversation here deepened into trackless obscurities of +horse-dealing. I took out my stylograph pen, and finished a letter to +Philippa, with a feeling that it would probably be my last. +</p> + +<p> +The next step in the day's enjoyment consisted in trotting in cavalcade +through the streets of Drumcurran, with another northerly shower +descending upon us, the mud splashing in my face, and my feet coming +torturingly to life. Every man and boy in the town ran with us; the +Harriers were somewhere in the tumult ahead, and the Quaker began to +pull and hump his back ominously. I arrived at the meet considerably +heated, and found myself one of some thirty or forty riders, who, with +traps and bicycles and footpeople, were jammed in a narrow, muddy road. +We were late, and a move was immediately made across a series of grass +fields, all considerately furnished with gates. There was a glacial +gleam of sunshine and people began to turn down the collars of their +coats. As they spread over the field I observed that Mr. Knox was no +longer riding with old Captain Handcock, the Master of the Harriers, +but had attached himself to a square-shouldered young lady with +effective coils of dark hair and a grey habit. She was riding a +fidgety black mare with great decision and a not disagreeable swagger. +</p> + +<p> +It was at about this moment that the hounds began to run, fast and +silently, and every one began to canter. +</p> + +<p> +"This is nothing at all," said Dr. Hickey, thundering alongside of me +on a huge young chestnut; "there might have been a hare here last week, +or a red herring this morning. I wouldn't care if we only got what'd +warm us. For the matter of that, I'd as soon hunt a cat as a hare." +</p> + +<p> +I was already getting quite enough to warm me. The Quaker's +respectable grey head had twice disappeared between his forelegs in a +brace of most unsettling bucks, and all my experiences at the +riding-school at Sandhurst did not prepare me for the sensation of +jumping a briary wall with a heavy drop into a lane so narrow that each +horse had to turn at right angles as he landed. I did not so turn, but +saved myself from entire disgrace by a timely clutch at the mane. We +scrambled out of the lane over a pile of stones and furze bushes, and +at the end of the next field were confronted by a tall, stone-faced +bank. Everyone, always excepting myself, was riding with that furious +valour which is so conspicuous when neighbouring hunts meet, and the +leading half-dozen charged the obstacle at steeplechase speed. I +caught a glimpse of the young lady in the grey habit, sitting square +and strong as her mare topped the bank, with Flurry and the redoubtable +Mr. Tomsy Flood riding on either hand; I followed in their wake, with a +blind confidence in the Quaker, and none at all in myself. He refused +it. I suppose it was in token of affection and gratitude that I fell +upon his neck; at all events, I had reason to respect his judgment, as, +before I had recovered myself, the hounds were straggling back into the +field by a gap lower down. +</p> + +<p> +It finally appeared that the hounds could do no more with the line they +had been hunting, and we proceeded to jog interminably, I knew not +whither. During this unpleasant process Flurry Knox bestowed on me +many items of information, chiefly as to the pangs of jealousy he was +inflicting on Mr. Flood by his attentions to the lady in the grey +habit, Miss "Bobbie" Bennett. +</p> + +<p> +"She'll have all old Handcock's money one of these days—she's his +niece, y' know—and she's a good girl to ride, but she's not as young +as she was ten years ago. You'd be looking at a chicken a long time +before you thought of her! She might take Tomsy some day if she can't +do any better." He stopped and looked at me with a gleam in his eye. +"Come on, and I'll introduce you to her!" +</p> + +<p> +Before, however, this privilege could be mine, the whole cavalcade was +stopped by a series of distant yells, which apparently conveyed +information to the hunt, though to me they only suggested a Red Indian +scalping his enemy. The yells travelled rapidly nearer, and a young +man with a scarlet face and a long stick sprang upon the fence, and +explained that he and Patsy Lorry were after chasing a hare two miles +down out of the hill above, and ne'er a dog nor a one with them but +themselves, and she was lying, beat out, under a bush, and Patsy Lorry +was minding her until the hounds would come. I had a vision of the +humane Patsy Lorry fanning the hare with his hat, but apparently nobody +else found the fact unusual. The hounds were hurried into the fields, +the hare was again spurred into action, and I was again confronted with +the responsibilities of the chase. After the first five minutes I had +discovered several facts about the Quaker. If the bank was above a +certain height he refused it irrevocably, if it accorded with his ideas +he got his forelegs over and ploughed through the rest of it on his +stifle-joints, or, if a gripe made this inexpedient, he remained poised +on top till the fabric crumbled under his weight. In the case of walls +he butted them down with his knees, or squandered them with his +hind-legs. These operations took time, and the leaders of the hunt +streamed farther and farther away over the crest of a hill, while the +Quaker pursued at the equable gallop of a horse in the Bayeux Tapestry. +</p> + +<p> +I began to perceive that I had been adopted as a pioneer by a small +band of followers, who, as one of their number candidly explained +"liked to have some one ahead of them to soften the banks," and +accordingly waited respectfully till the Quaker had made the rough +places smooth, and taken the raw edge off the walls. They, in their +turn, showed me alternative routes when the obstacle proved above the +Quaker's limit; thus, in ignoble confederacy, I and the offscourings of +the Curranhilty hunt pursued our way across some four miles of country. +When at length we parted it was with extreme regret on both sides. A +river crossed our course, with boggy banks pitted deep with the +hoof-marks of our forerunners; I suggested it to the Quaker, and +discovered that Nature had not in vain endued him with the hindquarters +of the hippopotamus. I presume the others had jumped it; the Quaker, +with abysmal flounderings, walked through and heaved himself to safety +on the farther bank. It was the dividing of the ways. My friendly +company turned aside as one man, and I was left with the world before +me, and no guide save the hoof-marks in the grass. These presently led +me to a road, on the other side of which was a bank, that was at once +added to the Quaker's black list. The rain had again begun to fall +heavily, and was soaking in about my elbows; I suddenly asked myself +why, in Heaven's name, I should go any farther. No adequate reason +occurred to me, and I turned in what I believed to be the direction of +Drumcurran. +</p> + +<p> +I rode on for possibly two or three miles without seeing a human being, +until, from the top of a hill I descried a solitary lady rider. I +started in pursuit. The rain kept blurring my eye-glass, but it seemed +to me that the rider was a schoolgirl with hair hanging down her back, +and that her horse was a trifle lame. I pressed on to ask my way, and +discovered that I had been privileged to overtake no less a person than +Miss Bobbie Bennett. +</p> + +<p> +My question as to the route led to information of a varied character. +Miss Bennett was going that way herself; her mare had given her what +she called "a toss and a half," whereby she had strained her arm and +the mare her shoulder, her habit had been torn, and she had lost all +her hairpins. +</p> + +<p> +"I'm an awful object," she concluded; "my hair's the plague of my life +out hunting! I declare I wish to goodness I was bald!" +</p> + +<p> +I struggled to the level of the occasion with an appropriate protest. +She had really very brilliant grey eyes, and her complexion was +undeniable. Philippa has since explained to me that it is a mere male +fallacy that any woman can look well with her hair down her back, but I +have always maintained that Miss Bobbie Bennett, with the rain +glistening on her dark tresses, looked uncommonly well. +</p> + +<p> +"I shall never get it dry for the dance to-night," she complained. +</p> + +<p> +"I wish I could help you," said I. +</p> + +<p> +"Perhaps you've got a hairpin or two about you!" said she, with a +glance that had certainly done great execution before now. +</p> + +<p> +I disclaimed the possession of any such tokens, but volunteered to go +and look for some at a neighbouring cottage. +</p> + +<p> +The cottage door was shut, and my knockings were answered by a +stupefied-looking elderly man. Conscious of my own absurdity, I asked +him if he had any hairpins. +</p> + +<p> +"I didn't see a hare this week!" he responded in a slow bellow. +</p> + +<p> +"Hairpins!" I roared; "has your wife any hairpins?" +</p> + +<p> +"She has not." Then, as an after-thought, "She's dead these ten years." +</p> + +<p> +At this point a young woman emerged from the cottage, and, with many +coy grins, plucked from her own head some half-dozen hairpins, crooked, +and grey with age, but still hairpins, and as such well worth my +shilling. I returned with my spoil to Miss Bennett, only to be +confronted with a fresh difficulty. The arm that she had strained was +too stiff to raise to her head. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Bobbie turned her handsome eyes upon me. "It's no use," she said +plaintively, "I can't do it!" +</p> + +<p> +I looked up and down the road; there was no one in sight. I offered to +do it for her. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Bennett's hair was long, thick, and soft; it was also slippery +with rain. I twisted it conscientiously, as if it were a hay rope, +until Miss Bennett, with an irrepressible shriek, told me it would +break off. I coiled the rope with some success, and proceeded to nail +it to her head with the hairpins. At all the most critical points one, +if not both, of the horses moved; hairpins were driven home into Miss +Bennett's skull, and were with difficulty plucked forth again; in fact, +a more harrowing performance can hardly be imagined, but Miss Bennett +bore it with the heroism of a pin-cushion. +</p> + +<p> +I was putting the finishing touches to the coiffure when some sound +made me look round, and I beheld at a distance of some fifty yards the +entire hunt approaching us at a foot-pace. I lost my head, and, +instead of continuing my task, I dropped the last hairpin as if it were +red-hot, and kicked the Quaker away to the far side of the road, thus, +if it were possible, giving the position away a shade more generously. +</p> + +<p> +There were fifteen riders in the group that overtook us, and fourteen +of them, including the Whip, were grinning from ear to ear; the +fifteenth was Mr. Tomsy Flood, and he showed no sign of appreciation. +He shoved his horse past me and up to Miss Bennett, his red moustache +bristling, truculence in every outline of his heavy shoulders. His +green coat was muddy, and his hat had a cave in it. Things had +apparently gone ill with him. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry's witticisms held out for about two miles and a half; I do not +give them, because they were not amusing, but they all dealt ultimately +with the animosity that I, in common with himself, should henceforth +have to fear from Mr. Flood. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, he's a holy terror!" he said conclusively; "he was riding the +tails off the hounds to-day to best me. He was near killing me twice. +We had some words about it, I can tell you. I very near took my whip +to him. Such a bull-rider of a fellow I never saw! He wouldn't so +much as stop to catch Bobbie Bennett's horse when I picked her up, he +was riding so jealous. His own girl, mind you! And such a crumpler as +she got too! I declare she knocked a groan out of the road when she +struck it!" +</p> + +<p> +"She doesn't seem so much hurt?" I said. +</p> + +<p> +"Hurt!" said Flurry, flicking casually at a hound. "You couldn't hurt +that one unless you took a hatchet to her!" +</p> + +<p> +The rain had reached a pitch that put further hunting out of the +question, and we bumped home at that intolerable pace known as a +"hound's jog." I spent the remainder of the afternoon over a fire in +my bedroom in the Royal Hotel, Drumcurran, official letters to write +having mercifully provided me with an excuse for seclusion, while the +bar and the billiard-room hummed below, and the Quaker's three-cornered +gallop wreaked its inevitable revenge upon my person. As this process +continued, and I became proportionately embittered, I asked myself, not +for the first time, what Philippa would say when introduced to my +present circle of acquaintances. +</p> + +<p> +I have already mentioned that a dance was to take place at the hotel, +given, as far as I could gather, by the leading lights of the +Curranhilty Hunt. A less jocund guest than the wreck who at the +pastoral hour of nine crept stiffly down to "chase the glowing hours +with flying feet" could hardly have been encountered. The dance was +held in the coffee-room, and a conspicuous object outside the door was +a saucer bath full of something that looked like flour. +</p> + +<p> +"Rub your feet in that," said Flurry; "that's French chalk! They +hadn't time to do the floor, so they hit on this dodge." +</p> + +<p> +I complied with this encouraging direction, and followed him into the +room. Dancing had already begun, and the first sight that met my eyes +was Miss Bennett, in a yellow dress, waltzing with Mr. Tomsy Flood. +She looked very handsome, and, in spite of her accident, she was +getting round the sticky floor and her still more sticky partner with +the swing of a racing cutter. Her eye caught mine immediately, and +with confidence. Clearly our acquaintance that, in the space of twenty +minutes, had blossomed tropically into hair-dressing, was not to be +allowed to wither. Nor was I myself allowed to wither. Men, known and +unknown, plied me with partners, till my shirt cuff was black with +names, and the number of dances stretched away into the blue distance +of to-morrow morning. The music was supplied by the organist of the +church, who played with religious unction and at the pace of a +processional hymn. I put forth into the mêlée with a junior Bennett, +inferior in calibre to Miss Bobbie, but a strong goer, and, I fear, +made but a sorry début in the eyes of Drumcurran. At every other +moment I bumped into the unforeseen orbits of those who reversed, and +of those who walked their partners backwards down the room with faces +of ineffable supremacy. Being unskilled in these intricacies of an +elder civilisation, the younger Miss Bennett fared but ingloriously at +my hands; the music pounded interminably on, until the heel of Mr. +Flood put a period to our sufferings. +</p> + +<p> +"The nasty dirty filthy brute!" shrieked the younger Miss Bennett in a +single breath; "he's torn the gown off my back!" +</p> + +<p> +She whirled me to the cloak-room; we parted, mutually unregretted, at +its door, and by, I fear, common consent, evaded our second dance +together. +</p> + +<p> +Many, many times during the evening I asked myself why I did not go to +bed. Perhaps it was the remembrance that my bed was situated some ten +feet above the piano in a direct line; but, whatever was the reason, +the night wore on and found me still working my way down my shirt cuff. +I sat out as much as possible, and found my partners to be, as a body, +pretty, talkative, and ill dressed, and during the evening I had many +and varied opportunities of observing the rapid progress of Mr. Knox's +flirtation with Miss Bobbie Bennett. From No. 4 to No. 8 they were +invisible; that they were behind a screen in the commercial-room might +be inferred from Mr. Flood's thundercloud presence in the passage +outside. +</p> + +<p> +At No. 9 the young lady emerged for one of her dances with me; it was a +barn dance, and particularly trying to my momently stiffening muscles; +but Miss Bobbie, whether in dancing or sitting out, went in for "the +rigour of the game." She was in as hard condition as one of her +uncle's hounds, and for a full fifteen minutes I capered and swooped +beside her, larding the lean earth as I went, and replying but +spasmodically to her even flow of conversation. +</p> + +<p> +"That'll take the stiffness out of you!" she exclaimed, as the organist +slowed down reverentially to a conclusion. "I had a bet with Flurry +Knox over that dance. He said you weren't up to my weight at the pace!" +</p> + +<p> +I led her forth to the refreshment table, and was watching with awe her +fearless consumption of claret cup that I would not have touched for a +sovereign, when Flurry, with a partner on his arm, strolled past us. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, you won the gloves, Miss Bobbie!" he said. "Don't you wish you +may get them!" +</p> + +<p> +"Gloves without the <i>g</i>, Mr. Knox!" replied Miss Bennett, in a voice +loud enough to reach the end of the passage, where Mr. Thomas Flood was +burying his nose in a very brown whisky-and-soda. +</p> + +<p> +"Your hair's coming down!" retorted Flurry. "Ask Major Yeates if he +can spare you a few hairpins!" +</p> + +<p> +Swifter than lightning Miss Bennett hurled a macaroon at her retreating +foe, missed him, and subsided laughing on to a sofa. I mopped my brow +and took my seat beside her, wondering how much longer I could live up +to the social exigencies of Drumcurran. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Bennett, however, proved excellent company. She told me artfully, +and inch by inch, all that Mr. Flood had said to her on the subject of +my hair-dressing; she admitted that she had, as a punishment, cut him +out of three dances and given them to Flurry Knox. When I remarked +that in fairness they should have been given to me, she darted a very +attractive glance at me, and pertinently observed that I had not asked +for them. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +As steals the dawn into a fevered room,<br/> +And says "Be of good cheer, the day is born!" +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +so did the rumour of supper pass among the chaperons, male and female. +It was obviously due to a sense of the fitness of things that Mrs. +Bennett was apportioned to me, and I found myself in the gratifying +position of heading with her the procession to supper. My impressions +of Mrs. Bennett are few but salient. She wore an apple-green satin +dress and filled it tightly; wisely mistrusting the hotel supper, she +had imported sandwiches and cake in a pocket-handkerchief, and, warmed +by two glasses of sherry, she made me the recipient of the remarkable +confidence that she had but two back teeth in her head, but, thank God, +they met. When, with the other starving men, I fell upon the remains +of the feast, I regretted that I had declined her offer of a sandwich. +</p> + +<p> +Of the remainder of the evening I am unable to give a detailed account. +Let it not for one instant be imagined that I had looked upon the wine +of the Royal Hotel when it was red, or, indeed, any other colour; as a +matter of fact, I had espied an inconspicuous corner in the entrance +hall, and there I first smoked a cigarette, and subsequently sank into +uneasy sleep. Through my dreams I was aware of the measured pounding +of the piano, of the clatter of glasses at the bar, of wheels in the +street, and then, more clearly, of Flurry's voice assuring Miss Bennett +that if she'd only wait for another dance he'd get the R.M. out of bed +to do her hair for her—then again oblivion. +</p> + +<p> +At some later period I was dropping down a chasm on the Quaker's back, +and landing with a shock; I was twisting his mane into a chignon, when +he turned round his head and caught my arm in his teeth. I awoke with +the dew of terror on my forehead, to find Miss Bennett leaning over me +in a scarlet cloak with a hood over her head, and shaking me by my coat +sleeve. +</p> + +<p> +"Major Yeates," she began at once in a hurried whisper, "I want you to +find Flurry Knox, and tell him there's a plan to feed his hounds at six +o'clock this morning so as to spoil their hunting!" +</p> + +<p> +"How do you know?" I asked, jumping up. +</p> + +<p> +"My little brother told me. He came in with us to-night to see the +dance, and he was hanging round in the stables, and he heard one of the +men telling another there was a dead mule in an outhouse in Bride's +Alley, all cut up ready to give to Mr. Knox's hounds." +</p> + +<p> +"But why shouldn't they get it?" I asked in sleepy stupidity. +</p> + +<p> +"Is it fill them up with an old mule just before they're going out +hunting?" flashed Miss Bennett. "Hurry and tell Mr. Knox; don't let +Tomsy Flood see you telling him—or any one else." +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, then it's Mr. Flood's game?" I said, grasping the situation at +length. +</p> + +<p> +"It is," said Miss Bennett, suddenly turning scarlet; "he's a disgrace! +I'm ashamed of him! I'm done with him!" +</p> + +<p> +I resisted a strong disposition to shake Miss Bennett by the hand. +</p> + +<p> +"I can't wait," she continued. "I made my mother drive back a +mile—she doesn't know a thing about it—I said I'd left my purse in +the cloak-room. Good-night! Don't tell a soul but Flurry!" +</p> + +<p> +She was off, and upon my incapable shoulders rested the responsibility +of the enterprise. +</p> + +<p> +It was past four o'clock, and the last bars of the last waltz were +being played. At the bar a knot of men, with Flurry in their midst, +were tossing "Odd man out" for a bottle of champagne. Flurry was not +in the least drunk, a circumstance worthy of remark in his present +company, and I got him out into the hall and unfolded my tidings. The +light of battle lit in his eye as he listened. +</p> + +<p> +"I knew by Tomsy he was shaping for mischief," he said coolly; "he's +taken as much liquor as'd stiffen a tinker, and he's only half-drunk +this minute. Hold on till I get Jerome Hickey and Charlie +Knox—they're sober; I'll be back in a minute." +</p> + +<p> +I was not present at the council of war thus hurriedly convened; I was +merely informed when they returned that we were all to "hurry on." My +best evening pumps have never recovered the subsequent proceedings. +They, with my swelled and aching feet inside them, were raced down one +filthy lane after another, until, somewhere on the outskirts of +Drumcurran, Flurry pushed open the gate of a yard and went in. It was +nearly five o'clock on that raw December morning; low down in the sky a +hazy moon shed a diffused light; all the surrounding houses were still +and dark. At our footsteps an angry bark or two came from inside the +stable. +</p> + +<p> +"Whisht!" said Flurry, "I'll say a word to them before I open the door." +</p> + +<p> +At his voice a chorus of hysterical welcome arose; without more delay +he flung open the stable door, and instantly we were all knee-deep in a +rush of hounds. There was not a moment lost. Flurry started at a +quick run out of the yard with the whole pack pattering at his heels. +Charley Knox vanished; Dr. Hickey and I followed the hounds, splashing +into puddles and hobbling over patches of broken stones, till we left +the town behind and hedges arose on either hand. +</p> + +<p> +"Here's the house!" said Flurry, stopping short at a low entrance gate; +"many's the time I've been here when his father had it; it'll be a +queer thing if I can't find a window I can manage, and the old cook he +has is as deaf as the dead." +</p> + +<p> +He and Doctor Hickey went in at the gate with the hounds; I hesitated +ignobly in the mud. +</p> + +<p> +"This isn't an R.M.'s job," said Flurry in a whisper, closing the gate +in my face; "you'd best keep clear of house-breaking." +</p> + +<p> +I accepted his advice, but I may admit that before I turned for home a +sash was gently raised, a light had sprung up in one of the lower +windows, and I heard Flurry's voice saying, "Over, over, over!" to his +hounds. +</p> + +<p> +There seemed to me to be no interval at all between these events and +the moment when I woke in bright sunlight to find Dr. Hickey standing +by my bedside in a red coat with a tall glass in his hand. +</p> + +<p> +"It's nine o'clock," he said. "I'm just after waking Flurry Knox. +There wasn't one stirring in the hotel till I went down and pulled the +'boots' from under the kitchen table! It's well for us the meet's in +the town; and, by-the-bye, your grey horse has four legs on him the +size of bolsters this morning; he won't be fit to go out, I'm afraid. +Drink this anyway, you're in the want of it." +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Hickey's eyelids were rather pink, but his hand was as steady as a +rock. The whisky-and-soda was singularly untempting. +</p> + +<p> +"What happened last night?" I asked eagerly as I gulped it. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, it all went off very nicely, thank you," said Hickey, twisting his +black beard to a point. "We benched as many of the hounds in Flood's +bed as'd fit, and we shut the lot into the room. We had them just +comfortable when we heard his latchkey below at the door." He broke +off and began to snigger. +</p> + +<p> +"Well?" I said, sitting bolt upright. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, he got in at last, and he lit a candle then. That took him five +minutes. He was pretty tight. We were looking at him over the +banisters until he started to come up, and according as he came up, we +went on up the top flight. He stood admiring his candle for a while on +the landing, and we wondered he didn't hear the hounds snuffing under +the door. He opened it then, and, on the minute, three of them bolted +out between his legs." Dr. Hickey again paused to indulge in +Mephistophelian laughter. "Well, you know," he went on, "when a man in +poor Tomsy's condition sees six dogs jumping out of his bed he's apt to +make a wrong diagnosis. He gave a roar, and pitched the candlestick at +them, and ran for his life downstairs, and all the hounds after him. +'Gone away!' screeches that devil Flurry, pelting downstairs on top of +them in the dark. I believe I screeched too." +</p> + +<p> +"Good heavens!" I gasped, "I was well out of that!" +</p> + +<p> +"Well, you were," admitted the Doctor. "However, Tomsy bested them in +the dark, and he got to ground in the pantry. I heard the cups and +saucers go as he slammed the door on the hounds' noses, and the minute +he was in Flurry turned the key on him. 'They're real dogs, Tomsy, my +buck!' says Flurry, just to quiet him; and there we left him." +</p> + +<p> +"Was he hurt?" I asked, conscious of the triviality of the question. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, he lost his brush," replied Dr. Hickey. "Old Merrylegs tore the +coat-tails off him; we got them on the floor when we struck a light; +Flurry has them to nail on his kennel door. Charley Knox had a +pleasant time too," he went on, "with the man that brought the +barrow-load of meat to the stable. We picked out the tastiest bits and +arranged them round Flood's breakfast table for him. They smelt very +nice. Well, I'm delaying you with my talking——" +</p> + +<p> +Flurry's hounds had the run of the season that day. I saw it admirably +throughout—from Miss Bennett's pony cart. She drove extremely well, +in spite of her strained arm. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap03"></a>III<br/> +TRINKET'S COLT</h2> + +<p> +It was Petty Sessions day in Skebawn, a cold, grey day of February. A +case of trespass had dragged its burden of cross summonses and cross +swearing far into the afternoon, and when I left the bench my head was +singing from the bellowings of the attorneys, and the smell of their +clients was heavy upon my palate. +</p> + +<p> +The streets still testified to the fact that it was market day, and I +evaded with difficulty the sinuous course of carts full of soddenly +screwed people, and steered an equally devious one for myself among the +groups anchored round the doors of the public-houses. Skebawn +possesses, among its legion of public-houses, one establishment which +timorously, and almost imperceptibly, proffers tea to the thirsty. I +turned in there, as was my custom on court days, and found the little +dingy den, known as the Ladies' Coffee-Room, in the occupancy of my +friend Mr. Florence McCarthy Knox, who was drinking strong tea and +eating buns with serious simplicity. It was a first and quite +unexpected glimpse of that domesticity that has now become a marked +feature in his character. +</p> + +<p> +"You're the very man I wanted to see," I said as I sat down beside him +at the oilcloth-covered table; "a man I know in England who is not much +of a judge of character has asked me to buy him a four-year-old down +here, and as I should rather be stuck by a friend than a dealer, I wish +you'd take over the job." +</p> + +<p> +Flurry poured himself out another cup of tea, and dropped three lumps +of sugar into it in silence. +</p> + +<p> +Finally he said, "There isn't a four-year-old in this country that I'd +be seen dead with at a pig fair." +</p> + +<p> +This was discouraging, from the premier authority on horse-flesh in the +district. +</p> + +<p> +"But it isn't six weeks since you told me you had the finest filly in +your stables that was ever foaled in the County Cork," I protested: +"what's wrong with her?" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, is it that filly?" said Mr. Knox with a lenient smile; "she's gone +these three weeks from me. I swapped her and £6 for a three-year-old +Ironmonger colt, and after that I swapped the colt and £19 for that +Bandon horse I rode last week at your place, and after that again I +sold the Bandon horse for £75 to old Welply, and I had to give him back +a couple of sovereigns luck-money. You see I did pretty well with the +filly after all." +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, yes—oh rather," I assented, as one dizzily accepts the +propositions of a bimetallist; "and you don't know of anything +else——?" +</p> + +<p> +The room in which we were seated was closely screened from the shop by +a door with a muslin-curtained window in it; several of the panes were +broken, and at this juncture two voices that had for some time carried +on a discussion forced themselves upon our attention. +</p> + +<p> +"Begging your pardon for contradicting you, ma'am," said the voice of +Mrs. McDonald, proprietress of the tea-shop, and a leading light in +Skebawn Dissenting circles, shrilly tremulous with indignation, "if the +servants I recommend you won't stop with you, it's no fault of mine. +If respectable young girls are set picking grass out of your gravel, in +place of their proper work, certainly they will give warning!" +</p> + +<p> +The voice that replied struck me as being a notable one, well-bred and +imperious. +</p> + +<p> +"When I take a barefooted slut out of a cabin, I don't expect her to +dictate to me what her duties are!" +</p> + +<p> +Flurry jerked up his chin in a noiseless laugh. "It's my grandmother!" +he whispered. "I bet you Mrs. McDonald don't get much change out of +her!" +</p> + +<p> +"If I set her to clean the pig-sty I expect her to obey me," continued +the voice in accents that would have made me clean forty pig-sties had +she desired me to do so. +</p> + +<p> +"Very well, ma'am," retorted Mrs. McDonald, "if that's the way you +treat your servants, you needn't come here again looking for them. I +consider your conduct is neither that of a lady nor a Christian!" +</p> + +<p> +"Don't you, indeed?" replied Flurry's grandmother. "Well, your opinion +doesn't greatly distress me, for, to tell you the truth, I don't think +you're much of a judge." +</p> + +<p> +"Didn't I tell you she'd score?" murmured Flurry, who was by this time +applying his eye to a hole in the muslin curtain. "She's off," he went +on, returning to his tea. "She's a great character! She's +eighty-three if she's a day, and she's as sound on her legs as a +three-year-old! Did you see that old shandrydan of hers in the street +a while ago, and a fellow on the box with a red beard on him like +Robinson Crusoe? That old mare that was on the near side—Trinket her +name is—is mighty near clean bred. I can tell you her foals are worth +a bit of money." +</p> + +<p> +I had heard of old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas; indeed, I had seldom dined +out in the neighbourhood without hearing some new story of her and her +remarkable ménage, but it had not yet been my privilege to meet her. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, now," went on Flurry in his slow voice, "I'll tell you a thing +that's just come into my head. My grandmother promised me a foal of +Trinket's the day I was one-and-twenty, and that's five years ago, and +deuce a one I've got from her yet. You never were at Aussolas? No, +you were not. Well, I tell you the place there is like a circus with +horses. She has a couple of score of them running wild in the woods, +like deer." +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, come," I said, "I'm a bit of a liar myself—" +</p> + +<p> +"Well, she has a dozen of them anyhow, rattling good colts too, some of +them, but they might as well be donkeys for all the good they are to me +or any one. It's not once in three years she sells one, and there she +has them walking after her for bits of sugar, like a lot of dirty +lapdogs," ended Flurry with disgust. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, what's your plan? Do you want me to make her a bid for one of +the lapdogs?" +</p> + +<p> +"I was thinking," replied Flurry, with great deliberation, "that my +birthday's this week, and maybe I could work a four-year-old colt of +Trinket's she has out of her in honour of the occasion." +</p> + +<p> +"And sell your grandmother's birthday present to me?" +</p> + +<p> +"Just that, I suppose," answered Flurry with a slow wink. +</p> + +<p> +A few days afterwards a letter from Mr. Knox informed me that he had +"squared the old lady, and it would be all right about the colt." He +further told me that Mrs. Knox had been good enough to offer me, with +him, a day's snipe shooting on the celebrated Aussolas bogs, and he +proposed to drive me there the following Monday, if convenient. Most +people found it convenient to shoot the Aussolas snipe bog when they +got the chance. Eight o'clock on the following Monday morning saw +Flurry, myself, and a groom packed into a dogcart, with portmanteaus, +gun-cases, and two rampant red setters. +</p> + +<p> +It was a long drive, twelve miles at least, and a very cold one. We +passed through long tracts of pasture country, fraught, for Flurry, +with memories of runs, which were recorded for me, fence by fence, in +every one of which the biggest dog-fox in the country had gone to +ground, with not two feet—measured accurately on the handle of the +whip—between him and the leading hound; through bogs that +imperceptibly melted into lakes, and finally down and down into a +valley, where the fir-trees of Aussolas clustered darkly round a +glittering lake, and all but hid the grey roofs and pointed gables of +Aussolas Castle. +</p> + +<p> +"There's a nice stretch of a demesne for you," remarked Flurry, +pointing downwards with the whip, "and one little old woman holding it +all in the heel of her fist. Well able to hold it she is, too, and +always was, and she'll live twenty years yet, if it's only to spite the +whole lot of us, and when all's said and done goodness knows how she'll +leave it!" +</p> + +<p> +"It strikes me you were lucky to keep her up to her promise about the +colt," I said. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry administered a composing kick to the ceaseless strivings of the +red setters under the seat. +</p> + +<p> +"I used to be rather a pet with her," he said, after a pause; "but mind +you, I haven't got him yet, and if she gets any notion I want to sell +him I'll never get him, so say nothing about the business to her." +</p> + +<p> +The tall gates of Aussolas shrieked on their hinges as they admitted +us, and shut with a clang behind us, in the faces of an old mare and a +couple of young horses, who, foiled in their break for the excitements +of the outer world, turned and galloped defiantly on either side of us. +Flurry's admirable cob hammered on, regardless of all things save his +duty. +</p> + +<p> +"He's the only one I have that I'd trust myself here with," said his +master, flicking him approvingly with the whip; "there are plenty of +people afraid to come here at all, and when my grandmother goes out +driving she has a boy on the box with a basket full of stones to peg at +them. Talk of the dickens, here she is herself!" +</p> + +<p> +A short, upright old woman was approaching, preceded by a white woolly +dog with sore eyes and a bark like a tin trumpet; we both got out of +the trap and advanced to meet the lady of the manor. +</p> + +<p> +I may summarise her attire by saying that she looked as if she had +robbed a scarecrow; her face was small and incongruously refined, the +skinny hand that she extended to me had the grubby tan that bespoke the +professional gardener, and was decorated with a magnificent diamond +ring. On her head was a massive purple velvet bonnet. +</p> + +<p> +"I am very glad to meet you, Major Yeates," she said with an +old-fashioned precision of utterance; "your grandfather was a dancing +partner of mine in old days at the Castle, when he was a handsome young +aide-de-camp there, and I was——you may judge for yourself what I was." +</p> + +<p> +She ended with a startling little hoot of laughter, and I was aware +that she quite realised the world's opinion of her, and was indifferent +to it. +</p> + +<p> +Our way to the bogs took us across Mrs. Knox's home farm, and through a +large field in which several young horses were grazing. +</p> + +<p> +"There now, that's my fellow," said Flurry, pointing to a fine-looking +colt, "the chestnut with the white diamond on his forehead. He'll run +into three figures before he's done, but we'll not tell that to the old +lady!" +</p> + +<p> +The famous Aussolas bogs were as full of snipe as usual, and a good +deal fuller of water than any bogs I had ever shot before. I was on my +day, and Flurry was not, and as he is ordinarily an infinitely better +snipe shot than I, I felt at peace with the world and all men as we +walked back, wet through, at five o'clock. +</p> + +<p> +The sunset had waned, and a big white moon was making the eastern tower +of Aussolas look like a thing in a fairy tale or a play when we arrived +at the hall door. An individual, whom I recognised as the Robinson +Crusoe coachman, admitted us to a hall, the like of which one does not +often see. The walls were panelled with dark oak up to the gallery +that ran round three sides of it, the balusters of the wide staircase +were heavily carved, and blackened portraits of Flurry's ancestors on +the spindle side stared sourly down on their descendant as he tramped +upstairs with the bog mould on his hobnailed boots. +</p> + +<p> +We had just changed into dry clothes when Robinson Crusoe shoved his +red beard round the corner of the door, with the information that the +mistress said we were to stay for dinner. My heart sank. It was then +barely half-past five. I said something about having no evening +clothes and having to get home early. +</p> + +<p> +"Sure the dinner'll be in another half-hour," said Robinson Crusoe, joining +hospitably in the conversation; "and as for evening clothes——God +bless ye!" +</p> + +<p> +The door closed behind him. +</p> + +<p> +"Never mind," said Flurry, "I dare say you'll be glad enough to eat +another dinner by the time you get home." He laughed. "Poor Slipper!" +he added inconsequently, and only laughed again when I asked for an +explanation. +</p> + +<p> +Old Mrs. Knox received us in the library, where she was seated by a +roaring turf fire, which lit the room a good deal more effectively than +the pair of candles that stood beside her in tall silver candlesticks. +Ceaseless and implacable growls from under her chair indicated the +presence of the woolly dog. She talked with confounding culture of the +books that rose all round her to the ceiling; her evening dress was +accomplished by means of an additional white shawl, rather dirtier than +its congeners; as I took her in to dinner she quoted Virgil to me, and +in the same breath screeched an objurgation at a being whose matted +head rose suddenly into view from behind an ancient Chinese screen, as +I have seen the head of a Zulu woman peer over a bush. +</p> + +<p> +Dinner was as incongruous as everything else. Detestable soup in a +splendid old silver tureen that was nearly as dark in hue as Robinson +Crusoe's thumb; a perfect salmon, perfectly cooked, on a chipped +kitchen dish; such cut glass as is not easy to find nowadays; sherry +that, as Flurry subsequently remarked, would burn the shell off an egg; +and a bottle of port, draped in immemorial cobwebs, wan with age, and +probably priceless. Throughout the vicissitudes of the meal Mrs. +Knox's conversation flowed on undismayed, directed sometimes at me—she +had installed me in the position of friend of her youth, and talked to +me as if I were my own grandfather—sometimes at Crusoe, with whom she +had several heated arguments, and sometimes she would make a statement +of remarkable frankness on the subject of her horse-farming affairs to +Flurry, who, very much on his best behaviour, agreed with all she said, +and risked no original remark. As I listened to them both, I +remembered with infinite amusement how he had told me once that "a pet +name she had for him was 'Tony Lumpkin,' and no one but herself knew +what she meant by it." It seemed strange that she made no allusion to +Trinket's colt or to Flurry's birthday, but, mindful of my +instructions, I held my peace. +</p> + +<p> +As, at about half-past eight, we drove away in the moonlight, Flurry +congratulated me solemnly on my success with his grandmother. He was +good enough to tell me that she would marry me to-morrow if I asked +her, and he wished I would, even if it was only to see what a nice +grandson he'd be for me. A sympathetic giggle behind me told me that +Michael, on the back seat, had heard and relished the jest. +</p> + +<p> +We had left the gates of Aussolas about half a mile behind when, at the +corner of a by-road, Flurry pulled up. A short squat figure arose from +the black shadow of a furze bush and came out into the moonlight, +swinging its arms like a cabman and cursing audibly. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh murdher, oh murdher, Misther Flurry! What kept ye at all? 'Twould +perish the crows to be waiting here the way I am these two hours——" +</p> + +<p> +"Ah, shut your mouth, Slipper!" said Flurry, who, to my surprise, had +turned back the rug and was taking off his driving coat, "I couldn't +help it. Come on, Yeates, we've got to get out here." +</p> + +<p> +"What for?" I asked, in not unnatural bewilderment. +</p> + +<p> +"It's all right. I'll tell you as we go along," replied my companion, +who was already turning to follow Slipper up the by-road. "Take the +trap on, Michael, and wait at the River's Cross." He waited for me to +come up with him, and then put his hand on my arm. "You see, Major, +this is the way it is. My grandmother's given me that colt right +enough, but if I waited for her to send him over to me I'd never see a +hair of his tail. So I just thought that as we were over here we might +as well take him back with us, and maybe you'll give us a help with +him; he'll not be altogether too handy for a first go off." +</p> + +<p> +I was staggered. An infant in arms could scarcely have failed to +discern the fishiness of the transaction, and I begged Mr. Knox not to +put himself to this trouble on my account, as I had no doubt I could +find a horse for my friend elsewhere. Mr. Knox assured me that it was +no trouble at all, quite the contrary, and that, since his grandmother +had given him the colt, he saw no reason why he should not take him +when he wanted him; also, that if I didn't want him he'd be glad enough +to keep him himself; and finally, that I wasn't the chap to go back on +a friend, but I was welcome to drive back to Shreelane with Michael +this minute if I liked. +</p> + +<p> +Of course I yielded in the end. I told Flurry I should lose my job +over the business, and he said I could then marry his grandmother, and +the discussion was abruptly closed by the necessity of following +Slipper over a locked five-barred gate. +</p> + +<p> +Our pioneer took us over about half a mile of country, knocking down +stone gaps where practicable and scrambling over tall banks in the +deceptive moonlight. We found ourselves at length in a field with a +shed in one corner of it; in a dim group of farm buildings a little way +off a light was shining. +</p> + +<p> +"Wait here," said Flurry to me in a whisper; "the less noise the +better. It's an open shed, and we'll just slip in and coax him out." +</p> + +<p> +Slipper unwound from his waist a halter, and my colleagues glided like +spectres into the shadow of the shed, leaving me to meditate on my +duties as Resident Magistrate, and on the questions that would be asked +in the House by our local member when Slipper had given away the +adventure in his cups. +</p> + +<p> +In less than a minute three shadows emerged from the shed, where two +had gone in. They had got the colt. +</p> + +<p> +"He came out as quiet as a calf when he winded the sugar," said Flurry; +"it was well for me I filled my pockets from grandmamma's sugar basin." +</p> + +<p> +He and Slipper had a rope from each side of the colt's head; they took +him quickly across a field towards a gate. The colt stepped daintily +between them over the moonlit grass; he snorted occasionally, but +appeared on the whole amenable. +</p> + +<p> +The trouble began later, and was due, as trouble often is, to the +beguilements of a short cut. Against the maturer judgment of Slipper, +Flurry insisted on following a route that he assured us he knew as well +as his own pocket, and the consequence was that in about five minutes I +found myself standing on top of a bank hanging on to a rope, on the +other end of which the colt dangled and danced, while Flurry, with the +other rope, lay prone in the ditch, and Slipper administered to the +bewildered colt's hindquarters such chastisement as could be ventured +on. +</p> + +<p> +I have no space to narrate in detail the atrocious difficulties and +disasters of the short cut. How the colt set to work to buck, and went +away across a field, dragging the faithful Slipper, literally +<i>ventre-à-terre</i>, after him, while I picked myself in ignominy out of a +briar patch, and Flurry cursed himself black in the face. How we were +attacked by ferocious cur dogs, and I lost my eyeglass; and how, as we +neared the River's Cross, Flurry espied the police patrol on the road, +and we all hid behind a rick of turf, while I realised in fulness what +an exceptional ass I was, to have been beguiled into an enterprise that +involved hiding with Slipper from the Royal Irish Constabulary. +</p> + +<p> +Let it suffice to say that Trinket's infernal offspring was finally +handed over on the high-road to Michael and Slipper, and Flurry drove +me home in a state of mental and physical overthrow. +</p> + +<p> +I saw nothing of my friend Mr. Knox for the next couple of days, by the +end of which time I had worked up a high polish on my misgivings, and +had determined to tell him that under no circumstances would I have +anything to say to his grandmother's birthday present. It was like my +usual luck that, instead of writing a note to this effect, I thought it +would be good for my liver to walk across the hills to Tory Cottage and +tell Flurry so in person. +</p> + +<p> +It was a bright, blustery morning, after a muggy day. The feeling of +spring was in the air, the daffodils were already in bud, and crocuses +showed purple in the grass on either side of the avenue. It was only a +couple of miles to Tory Cottage by the way across the hills; I walked +fast, and it was barely twelve o'clock when I saw its pink walls and +clumps of evergreens below me. As I looked down at it the chiming of +Flurry's hounds in the kennels came to me on the wind; I stood still to +listen, and could almost have sworn that I was hearing again the clash +of Magdalen bells, hard at work on May morning. +</p> + +<p> +The path that I was following led downwards through a larch plantation +to Flurry's back gate. Hot wafts from some hideous caldron at the +other side of a wall apprised me of the vicinity of the kennels and +their cuisine, and the fir-trees round were hung with gruesome and +unknown joints. I thanked Heaven that I was not a master of hounds, +and passed on as quickly as might be to the hall door. +</p> + +<p> +I rang two or three times without response; then the door opened a +couple of inches and was instantly slammed in my face. I heard the +hurried paddling of bare feet on oilcloth, and a voice, "Hurry, +Bridgie, hurry! There's quality at the door!" +</p> + +<p> +Bridgie, holding a dirty cap on with one hand, presently arrived and +informed me that she believed Mr. Knox was out about the place. She +seemed perturbed, and she cast scared glances down the drive while +speaking to me. +</p> + +<p> +I knew enough of Flurry's habits to shape a tolerably direct course for +his whereabouts. He was, as I had expected, in the training paddock, a +field behind the stable-yard, in which he had put up practice jumps for +his horses. It was a good-sized field with clumps of furze in it, and +Flurry was standing near one of these with his hands in his pockets, +singularly unoccupied. I supposed that he was prospecting for a place +to put up another jump. He did not see me coming, and turned with a +start as I spoke to him. There was a queer expression of mingled guilt +and what I can only describe as divilment in his grey eyes as he +greeted me. In my dealings with Flurry Knox, I have since formed the +habit of sitting tight, in a general way, when I see that expression. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, who's coming next, I wonder!" he said, as he shook hands with +me; "it's not ten minutes since I had two of your d—d peelers here +searching the whole place for my grandmother's colt!" +</p> + +<p> +"What!" I exclaimed, feeling cold all down my back; "do you mean the +police have got hold of it?" +</p> + +<p> +"They haven't got hold of the colt anyway," said Flurry, looking +sideways at me from under the peak of his cap, with the glint of the +sun in his eye. "I got word in time before they came." +</p> + +<p> +"What do you mean?" I demanded; "where is he? For Heaven's sake don't +tell me you've sent the brute over to my place!" +</p> + +<p> +"It's a good job for you I didn't," replied Flurry, "as the police are +on their way to Shreelane this minute to consult you about it. <i>You</i>!" +He gave utterance to one of his short diabolical fits of laughter. +"He's where they'll not find him, anyhow. Ho! ho! It's the funniest +hand I ever played!" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh yes, it's devilish funny, I've no doubt," I retorted, beginning to +lose my temper, as is the manner of many people when they are +frightened; "but I give you fair warning that if Mrs. Knox asks me any +questions about it, I shall tell her the whole story." +</p> + +<p> +"All right," responded Flurry; "and when you do, don't forget to tell +her how you flogged the colt out on to the road over her own bounds +ditch." +</p> + +<p> +"Very well," I said hotly, "I may as well go home and send in my +papers. They'll break me over this——" +</p> + +<p> +"Ah, hold on, Major," said Flurry soothingly, "it'll be all right. No +one knows anything. It's only on spec the old lady sent the bobbies +here. If you'll keep quiet it'll all blow over." +</p> + +<p> +"I don't care," I said, struggling hopelessly in the toils; "if I meet +your grandmother, and she asks me about it, I shall tell her all I +know." +</p> + +<p> +"Please God you'll not meet her! After all, it's not once in a blue +moon that she—" began Flurry. Even as he said the words his face +changed. "Holy fly!" he ejaculated, "isn't that her dog coming into +the field? Look at her bonnet over the wall! Hide, hide for your +life!" He caught me by the shoulder and shoved me down among the furze +bushes before I realised what had happened. +</p> + +<p> +"Get in there! I'll talk to her." +</p> + +<p> +I may as well confess that at the mere sight of Mrs. Knox's purple +bonnet my heart had turned to water. In that moment I knew what it +would be like to tell her how I, having eaten her salmon, and capped +her quotations, and drunk her best port, had gone forth and helped to +steal her horse. I abandoned my dignity, my sense of honour; I took +the furze prickles to my breast and wallowed in them. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox had advanced with vengeful speed; already she was in high +altercation with Flurry at no great distance from where I lay; varying +sounds of battle reached me, and I gathered that Flurry was not—to put +it mildly—shrinking from that economy of truth that the situation +required. +</p> + +<p> +"Is it that curby, long-backed brute? You promised him to me long ago, +but I wouldn't be bothered with him!" +</p> + +<p> +The old lady uttered a laugh of shrill derision. "Is it likely I'd +promise you my best colt? And still more, is it likely that you'd +refuse him if I did?" +</p> + +<p> +"Very well, ma'am." Flurry's voice was admirably indignant. "Then I +suppose I'm a liar and a thief." +</p> + +<p> +"I'd be more obliged to you for the information if I hadn't known it +before," responded his grandmother with lightning speed; "if you swore +to me on a stack of Bibles you knew nothing about my colt I wouldn't +believe you! I shall go straight to Major Yeates and ask his advice. +I believe <i>him</i> to be a gentleman, in spite of the company he keeps!" +</p> + +<p> +I writhed deeper into the furze bushes, and thereby discovered a sandy +rabbit run, along which I crawled, with my cap well over my eyes, and +the furze needles stabbing me through my stockings. The ground shelved +a little, promising profounder concealment, but the bushes were very +thick, and I laid hold of the bare stem of one to help my progress. It +lifted out of the ground in my hand, revealing a freshly-cut stump. +Something snorted, not a yard away; I glared through the opening, and +was confronted by the long, horrified face of Mrs. Knox's colt, +mysteriously on a level with my own. +</p> + +<p> +Even without the white diamond on his forehead I should have divined +the truth; but how in the name of wonder had Flurry persuaded him to +couch like a woodcock in the heart of a furze brake? For a full minute +I lay as still as death for fear of frightening him, while the voices +of Flurry and his grandmother raged on alarmingly close to me. The +colt snorted, and blew long breaths through his wide nostrils, but he +did not move. I crawled an inch or two nearer, and after a few seconds +of cautious peering I grasped the position. They had buried him. +</p> + +<p> +A small sandpit among the furze had been utilised as a grave; they had +filled him in up to his withers with sand, and a few furze bushes, +artistically disposed round the pit, had done the rest. As the depth +of Flurry's guile was revealed, laughter came upon me like a flood; I +gurgled and shook apoplectically, and the colt gazed at me with serious +surprise, until a sudden outburst of barking close to my elbow +administered a fresh shock to my tottering nerves. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox's woolly dog had tracked me into the furze, and was now +baying the colt and me with mingled terror and indignation. I +addressed him in a whisper, with perfidious endearments, advancing a +crafty hand towards him the while, made a snatch for the back of his +neck, missed it badly, and got him by the ragged fleece of his +hind-quarters as he tried to flee. If I had flayed him alive he could +hardly have uttered a more deafening series of yells, but, like a fool, +instead of letting him go, I dragged him towards me, and tried to +stifle the noise by holding his muzzle. The tussle lasted engrossingly +for a few seconds, and then the climax of the nightmare arrived. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox's voice, close behind me, said, "Let go my dog this instant, +sir! Who are you——" +</p> + +<p> +Her voice faded away, and I knew that she also had seen the colt's head. +</p> + +<p> +I positively felt sorry for her. At her age there was no knowing what +effect the shock might have on her. I scrambled to my feet and +confronted her. +</p> + +<p> +"Major Yeates!" she said. There was a deathly pause. "Will you kindly +tell me," said Mrs. Knox slowly, "am I in Bedlam, or are you? And +<i>what is that</i>?" +</p> + +<p> +She pointed to the colt, and that unfortunate animal, recognising the +voice of his mistress, uttered a hoarse and lamentable whinny. Mrs. +Knox felt around her for support, found only furze prickles, gazed +speechlessly at me, and then, to her eternal honour, fell into wild +cackles of laughter. +</p> + +<p> +So, I may say, did Flurry and I. I embarked on my explanation and +broke down; Flurry followed suit and broke down too. Overwhelming +laughter held us all three, disintegrating our very souls. Mrs. Knox +pulled herself together first. +</p> + +<p> +"I acquit you, Major Yeates, I acquit you, though appearances are +against you. It's clear enough to me you've fallen among thieves." +She stopped and glowered at Flurry. Her purple bonnet was over one +eye. "I'll thank you, sir," she said, "to dig out that horse before I +leave this place. And when you've dug him out you may keep him. I'll +be no receiver of stolen goods!" +</p> + +<p> +She broke off and shook her fist at him. "Upon my conscience, Tony, +I'd give a guinea to have thought of it myself!" +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap04"></a>IV<br/> +THE WATERS OF STRIFE</h2> + +<p> +I knew Bat Callaghan's face long before I was able to put a name to it. +There was seldom a court day in Skebawn that I was not aware of his +level brows and superfluously intense expression somewhere among the +knot of corner-boys who patronised the weekly sittings of the bench of +magistrates. His social position appeared to fluctuate: I have seen +him driving a car; he sometimes held my horse for me—that is to say, +he sat on the counter of a public-house while the Quaker slumbered in +the gutter; and, on one occasion, he retired, at my bidding, to Cork +gaol, there to meditate upon the inadvisability of defending a friend +from the attentions of the police with the tailboard of a cart. +</p> + +<p> +He next obtained prominence in my regard at a regatta held under the +auspices of "The Sons of Liberty," a local football club that justified +its title by the patriot green of its jerseys and its free +interpretation of the rules of the game. The announcement of my name +on the posters as a patron—a privilege acquired at the cost of a +reluctant half-sovereign—made it incumbent on me to put in an +appearance, even though the festival coincided with my Petty Sessions +day at Skebawn; and at some five of the clock on a brilliant September +afternoon I found myself driving down the stony road that dropped in +zigzags to the borders of the lake on which the races were to come off. +</p> + +<p> +I believe that the selection of Lough Lonen as the scene of the regatta +was not unconnected with the fact that the secretary of the club owned +a public-house at the cross roads at one end of it; none the less, the +president of the Royal Academy could scarcely have chosen more +picturesque surroundings. A mountain towered steeply up from the +lake's edge, dark with the sad green of beech-trees in September; fir +woods followed the curve of the shore, and leaned far over the +answering darkness of the water; and above the trees rose the toppling +steepnesses of the hill, painted with a purple glow of heather. The +lake was about a mile long, and, tumbling from its farther end, a +fierce and narrow river fled away west to the sea, some four or five +miles off. +</p> + +<p> +I had not seen a boat race since I was at Oxford, and the words still +called up before my eyes a vision of smart parasols, of gorgeous +barges, of snowy-clad youths, and of low slim outriggers, winged with +the level flight of oars, slitting the water to the sway of the line of +flat backs. Certainly undreamed-of possibilities in aquatics were +revealed to me as I reined in the Quaker on the outskirts of the crowd, +and saw below me the festival of the Sons of Liberty in full swing. +Boats of all shapes and sizes, outrageously overladen, moved about the +lake, with oars flourishing to the strains of concertinas. Black +swarms of people seethed along the water's edge, congesting here and +there round the dingy tents and stalls of green apples; and the club's +celebrated brass band, enthroned in a wagonette, and stimulated by the +presence of a barrel of porter on the box-seat, was belching forth "The +Boys of Wexford," under the guidance of a disreputable ex-militia +drummer, in a series of crashing discords. +</p> + +<p> +Almost as I arrived a pistol-shot set the echoes clattering round the +lake, and three boats burst out abreast from the throng into the open +water. Two of the crews were in shirt-sleeves, the third wore the +green jerseys of the football club; the boats were of the heavy +sea-going build, and pulled six oars apiece, oars of which the looms +were scarcely narrower than the blades, and were, of the two, but a +shade heavier. None the less the rowers started dauntlessly at +thirty-five strokes a minute, quickening up, incredible as it may seem, +as they rounded the mark boat in the first lap of the two-mile course. +The rowing was, in general style, more akin to the action of beating up +eggs with a fork than to any other form of athletic exercise; but in +its unorthodox way it kicked the heavy boats along at a surprising +pace. The oars squeaked and grunted against the thole-pins, the +coxswains kept up an unceasing flow of oratory, and superfluous little +boys in punts contrived to intervene at all the more critical +turning-points of the race, only evading the flail of the oncoming oars +by performing prodigies of "waggling" with a single oar at the stern. +I took out my watch and counted the strokes when they were passing the +mark boat for the second time; they were pulling a fraction over forty; +one of the shirt-sleeved crews was obviously in trouble, the other, +with humped backs and jerking oars, was holding its own against the +green jerseys amid the blended yells of friends and foes. When for the +last time they rounded the green flag there were but two boats in the +race, and the foul that had been imminent throughout was at length +achieved with a rattle of oars and a storm of curses. They were clear +again in a moment, the shirt-sleeved crew getting away with a distinct +lead, and it was at about this juncture that I became aware that the +coxswains had abandoned their long-handled tillers, and were standing +over their respective "strokes," shoving frantically at their oars, and +maintaining the while a ceaseless bawl of encouragement and defiance. +It looked like a foregone conclusion for the leaders, and the war of +cheers rose to frenzy. The word "cheering," indeed, is but an +euphuism, and in no way expresses the serrated yell, composed of +epithets, advice, and imprecations, that was flung like a live thing at +the oncoming boats. The green jerseys answered to this stimulant with +a wild spurt that drove the bow of their boat within a measurable +distance of their opponents' stroke oar. In another second a +thoroughly successful foul would have been effected, but the cox of the +leading boat proved himself equal to the emergency by unshipping his +tiller, and with it dealing "bow" of the green jerseys such a blow over +the head as effectually dismissed him from the sphere of practical +politics. +</p> + +<p> +A great roar of laughter greeted this feat of arms, and a voice at my +dogcart's wheel pierced the clamour— +</p> + +<p> +"More power to ye, Larry, me owld darlin'!" +</p> + +<p> +I looked down and saw Bat Callaghan, with shining eyes, and a face +white with excitement, poising himself on one foot on the box of my +wheel in order to get a better view of the race. Almost before I had +time to recognise him, a man in a green jersey caught him round the +legs and jerked him down. Callaghan fell into the throng, recovered +himself in an instant, and rushed, white and dangerous, at his +assailant. The Son of Liberty was no less ready for the fray, and what +is known in Ireland as "the father and mother of a row" was imminent. +Already, however, one of those unequalled judges of the moral +temperature of a crowd, a sergeant of the R.I.C., had quietly +interposed his bulky person between the combatants, and the coming +trouble was averted. +</p> + +<p> +Elsewhere battle was raging. The race was over, and the committee boat +was hemmed in by the rival crews, supplemented by craft of all kinds. +The "objection" was being lodged, and in its turn objected to, and I +can only liken the process to the screaming warfare of seagulls round a +piece of carrion. The tumult was still at its height when out of its +very heart two four-oared boats broke forth, and a pistol shot +proclaimed that another race had begun, the public interest in which +was specially keen, owing to the fact that the rowers were stalwart +country girls, who made up in energy what they lacked in skill. It was +a short race, once round the mark boat only, and, like a successful +farce, it "went with a roar" from start to finish. Foul after foul, +each followed by a healing interval of calm, during which the crews, +who had all caught crabs, were recovering themselves and their oars, +marked its progress; and when the two boats, locked in an inextricable +embrace, at length passed the winning flag, and the crews, oblivious of +judges and public, fell to untrammelled personal abuse and to doing up +their hair, I decided that I had seen the best of the fun, and prepared +to go home. +</p> + +<p> +It was, as it happened, the last race of the day, and nothing remained +in the way of excitement save the greased pole with the pig slung in a +bag at the end of it. My final impression of the Lough Lonen Regatta +was of Callaghan's lithe figure, sleek and dripping, against the yellow +sky, as he poised on the swaying pole with the broken gold of the water +beneath him. +</p> + +<p> +Limited as was my experience of the Southwest of Ireland, I was in no +way surprised to hear on the following afternoon from Peter Cadogan +that there had been "sthrokes" the night before, when the boys were +going home from the regatta, and that the police were searching for one +Jimmy Foley. +</p> + +<p> +"What do they want him for?" I asked. +</p> + +<p> +"Sure it's according as a man that was bringing a car of bogwood was +tellin' me, sir," answered Peter, pursuing his occupation of washing +the dogcart with unabated industry; "they say Jimmy's wife went roaring +to the police, saying she could get no account of her husband." +</p> + +<p> +"I suppose he's beaten some fellow and is hiding," I suggested. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, that might be, sir," asserted Peter respectfully. He plied his +mop vigorously in intricate places about the springs, which would, I +knew, have never been explored save for my presence. +</p> + +<p> +"It's what John Hennessy was saying, that he was hard set to get his +horse past Cluin Cross, the way the blood was sthrewn about the road," +resumed Peter; "sure they were fighting like wasps in it half the +night." +</p> + +<p> +"Who were fighting?" +</p> + +<p> +"I couldn't say, indeed, sir. Some o' thim low rakish lads from the +town, I suppose," replied Peter with virtuous respectability. +</p> + +<p> +When Peter Cadogan was quietly and intelligently candid, to pursue an +inquiry was seldom of much avail. +</p> + +<p> +Next day in Skebawn I met little Murray, the district inspector, very +alert and smart in his rifle-green uniform, going forth to collect +evidence about the fight. He told me that the police were pretty +certain that one of the Sons of Liberty, named Foley, had been +murdered, but, as usual, the difficulty was to get any one to give +information; all that was known was that he was gone, and that his wife +had identified his cap, which had been found, drenched with blood, by +the roadside. Murray gave it as his opinion that the whole business +had arisen out of the row over the disputed race, and that there must +have been a dozen people looking on when the murder was done; but so +far no evidence was forthcoming, and after a day and a night of search +the police had not been able to find the body. +</p> + +<p> +"No," said Flurry Knox, who had joined us, "and if it was any of those +mountainy men did away with him you might scrape Ireland with a +small-tooth comb and you'll not get him!" +</p> + +<p> +That evening I smoked an after-dinner cigarette out of doors in the +mild starlight, strolling about the rudimentary paths of what would, I +hoped, some day be Philippa's garden. The bats came stooping at the +red end of my cigarette, and from the covert behind the house I heard +once or twice the delicate bark of a fox. Civilisation seemed a +thousand miles off, as far away as the falling star that had just drawn +a line of pale fire half-way down the northern sky. I had been nearly +a year at Shreelane House by myself now, and the time seemed very long +to me. It was slow work putting by money, even under the austerities +of Mrs. Cadogan's <i>régime</i>, and though I had warned Philippa I meant to +marry her after Christmas, there were moments, and this was one of +them, when it seemed an idle threat. +</p> + +<p> +"Pether!" the strident voice of Mrs. Cadogan intruded upon my +meditations. "Go tell the Major his coffee is waitin' on him!" +</p> + +<p> +I went gloomily into the house, and, with a resignation born of +adversity, swallowed the mixture of chicory and liquorice which my +housekeeper possessed the secret of distilling from the best and most +expensive coffee. My theory about it was that it added to the illusion +that I had dined, and moreover, that it kept me awake, and I generally +had a good deal of writing to do after dinner. +</p> + +<p> +Having swallowed it I went downstairs and out past the kitchen regions +to my office, a hideous whitewashed room, in which I interviewed +policemen, and took affidavits, and did most of my official writing. +It had a door that opened into the yard, and a window that looked out +in the other direction, among lanky laurels and scrubby hollies, where +lay the cats' main thoroughfare from the scullery window to the rabbit +holes in the wood. I had a good deal of work to do, and the time +passed quickly. It was Friday night, and from the kitchen at the end +of the passage came the gabbling murmur, in two alternate keys, that I +had learned to recognise as the recital of a litany by my housekeeper +and her nephew Peter. This performance was followed by some of those +dreary and heart-rending yawns that are, I think, peculiar to Irish +kitchens, then such of the cats as had returned from the chase were +loudly shepherded into the back scullery, the kitchen door shut with a +slam, and my retainers retired to repose. +</p> + +<p> +It was nearly half-an-hour afterwards when I finished the notes I had +been making on an adjourned case of "stroke-hauling" salmon in the +Lonen River. I leaned back in my chair and lighted a cigarette +preparatory to turning in; my thoughts had again wandered on a +sentimental journey across the Irish Channel, when I heard a slight +stir of some kind outside the open window. In the wilds of Ireland no +one troubles themselves about burglars; "more cats," I thought, "I must +shut the window before I go to bed." +</p> + +<p> +Almost immediately there followed a faint tap on the window, and then a +voice said in a hoarse and hurried whisper, "Them that wants Jim Foley, +let them look in the river!" +</p> + +<p> +If I had kept my head I should have sat still and encouraged a further +confidence, but unfortunately I acted on the impulse of the natural +man, and was at the window in a jump, knocking down my chair, and +making noise enough to scare a far less shy bird than an Irish +informer. Of course there was no one there. I listened, with every +nerve as taut as a violin string. It was quite dark; there was just +breeze enough to make a rustling in the evergreens, so that a man might +brush through them without being heard; and while I debated on a plan +of action there came from beyond the shrubbery the jar and twang of a +loose strand of wire in the paling by the wood. My informant, whoever +he might be, had vanished into the darkness from which he had come as +irrecoverably as had the falling star that had written its brief +message across the sky, and gone out again into infinity. +</p> + +<p> +I got up very early next morning and drove to Skebawn to see Murray, +and offer him my mysterious information for what it was worth. +Personally I did not think it worth much, and was disposed to regard it +as a red herring drawn across the trail. Murray, however, was not in a +mood to despise anything that had a suggestion to make, having been out +till nine o'clock the night before without being able to find any clue +to the hiding-place of James Foley. +</p> + +<p> +"The river's a good mile from the place where the fight was," he said, +straddling his compasses over the Ordnance Survey map, "and there's no +sort of a road they could have taken him along, but a tip like this is +always worth trying. I remember in the Land League time how a man came +one Saturday night to my window and told me there were holes drilled in +the chapel door to shoot a boycotted man through while he was at mass. +The holes were there right enough, and you may be quite sure that chap +found excellent reasons for having family prayers at home next day!" +</p> + +<p> +I had sessions to attend on the extreme outskirts of my district, and +could not wait, as Murray suggested, to see the thing out. I did not +get home till the following day, and when I arrived I found a letter +from Murray awaiting me. +</p> + +<p> +"Your pal was right. We found Foley's body in the river, knocking +about against the posts of the weir. The head was wrapped in his own +green jersey, and had been smashed in by a stone. We suspect a fellow +named Bat Callaghan, who has bolted, but there were a lot of them in +it. Possibly it was Callaghan himself who gave you the tip; you never +can tell how superstition is going to take them next. The inquest will +be held to-morrow." +</p> + +<p> +The coroner's jury took a cautious view of the cause of the +catastrophe, and brought in a verdict of "death by misadventure," and I +presently found it to be my duty to call a magisterial inquiry to +further investigate the matter. A few days before this was to take +place, I was engaged in the delicate task of displaying to my landlord, +Mr. Flurry Knox, the defects of the pantry sink, when Mrs. Cadogan +advanced upon us with the information that the Widow Callaghan from +Cluin would be thankful to speak to me, and had brought me a present of +"a fine young goose." +</p> + +<p> +"Is she come over here looking for Bat?" said Flurry, withdrawing his +arm and the longest kitchen-ladle from the pipe that he had been +probing; "she knows you're handy at hiding your friends, Mary; maybe +it's he that's stopping the drain!" +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Cadogan turned her large red face upon her late employer. +</p> + +<p> +"God knows I wish yerself was stuck in it, Master Flurry, the way ye'd +hear Pether cursin' the full o' the house when he's striving to wash +the things in that unnatural little trough." +</p> + +<p> +"Are you sure it's Peter does all the cursing?" retorted Flurry. "I +hear Father Scanlan has it in for you this long time for not going to +confession." +</p> + +<p> +"And how can I walk two miles to the chapel with God's burden on me +feet?" demanded Mrs. Cadogan in purple indignation; "the Blessed Virgin +and Docthor Hickey knows well the hardship I gets from them. If it +wasn't for a pair of the Major's boots he gave me, I'd be hard set to +thravel the house itself!" +</p> + +<p> +The contest might have been continued indefinitely, had I not struck up +the swords with a request that Mrs. Callaghan might be sent round to +the hall door. There we found a tall, grey-haired countrywoman waiting +for us at the foot of the steps, in the hooded blue cloak that is +peculiar to the south of Ireland; from the fact that she clutched a +pocket-handkerchief in her right hand I augured a stormy interview, but +nothing could have been more self-restrained and even imposing than the +reverence with which she greeted Flurry and me. +</p> + +<p> +"Good-morning to your honours," she began, with a dignified and +extremely imminent snuffle. "I ask your pardon for troubling you, +Major Yeates, but I haven't a one in the counthry to give me an adwice, +and I have no confidence only in your honour's experiments." +</p> + +<p> +"Experience, she means," prompted Flurry. "Didn't you get advice +enough out of Mr. Murray yesterday?" he went on aloud. "I heard he was +at Cluin to see you." +</p> + +<p> +"And if he was itself, it's little adwantage any one'd get out of that +little whipper-shnapper of a shnap-dhragon!" responded Mrs. Callaghan +tartly; "he was with me for a half-hour giving me every big rock of +English till I had a reel in me head. I declare to ye, Mr. Flurry, +after he had gone out o' the house, ye wouldn't throw three farthings +for me!" +</p> + +<p> +The pocket-handkerchief was here utilised, after which, with a heavy +groan, Mrs. Callaghan again took up her parable. +</p> + +<p> +"I towld him first and last I'd lose me life if I had to go into the +coort, and if I did itself sure th' attorneys could rip no more out o' +me than what he did himself." +</p> + +<p> +"Did you tell him where was Bat?" inquired Flurry casually. +</p> + +<p> +At this Mrs. Callaghan immediately dissolved into tears. +</p> + +<p> +"Is it Bat?" she howled. "If the twelve Apostles came down from heaven +asking me where was Bat, I could give them no satisfaction. The divil +a know I know what's happened him. He came home with me sober and +good-natured from the rogatta, and the next morning he axed a fresh egg +for his breakfast, and God forgive me, I wouldn't break the score I was +taking to the hotel, and with that he slapped the cup o' tay into the +fire and went out the door, and I never got a word of him since, good +nor bad. God knows 'tis I got throuble with that poor boy, and he the +only one I have to look to in the world!" +</p> + +<p> +I cut the matter short by asking her what she wanted me to do for her, +and sifted out from amongst much extraneous detail the fact that she +relied upon my renowned wisdom and clemency to preserve her from being +called as a witness at the coming inquiry. The gift of the goose +served its intended purpose of embarrassing my position, but in spite +of it I broke to the Widow Callaghan my inability to help her. She did +not, of course, believe me, but she was too well-bred to say so. In +Ireland one becomes accustomed to this attitude. +</p> + +<p> +As it turned out, however, Bat Callaghan's mother had nothing to fear +from the inquiry. She was by turns deaf, imbecile, garrulously candid, +and furiously abusive of Murray's principal witness, a frightened lad +of seventeen, who had sworn to having seen Bat Callaghan and Jimmy +Foley "shaping at one another to fight," at an hour when, according to +Mrs. Callaghan, Bat was "lying sthretched on the beddeen with a sick +shtomach" in consequence of the malignant character of the porter +supplied by the last witness's father. It all ended, as such cases so +often do in Ireland, in complete moral certainty in the minds of all +concerned as to the guilt of the accused, and entire impotence on the +part of the law to prove it. A warrant was issued for the arrest of +Bartholomew Callaghan; and the clans of Callaghan and Foley fought +rather more bloodily than usual, as occasion served; and at intervals +during the next few months Murray used to ask me if my friend the +murderer had dropped in lately, to which I was wont to reply with +condolences on the failure of the R.I.C. to find the Widow Callaghan's +only son for her; and that was about all that came of it. +</p> + +<p> +Events with which the present story has no concern took me to England +towards the end of the following March. It so happened that my old +regiment, the ——th Fusiliers, was quartered at Whincastle, within a +couple of hours by rail of Philippa's home, where I was staying, and, +since my wedding was now within measurable distance, my former +brothers-in-arms invited me over to dine and sleep, and to receive a +valedictory silver claret jug that they were magnanimous enough to +bestow upon a backslider. I enjoyed the dinner as much as any man can +enjoy his dinner when he knows he has to make a speech at the end of +it; through much and varied conversation I strove, like a nervous +mother who cannot trust her offspring out of her sight, to keep before +my mind's eye the opening sentences that I had composed in the train; I +felt that if I could only "get away" satisfactorily I might trust the +Ayala ('89) to do the rest, and of that fount of inspiration there was +no lack. As it turned out, I got away all right, though the sight of +the double line of expectant faces and red mess jackets nearly +scattered those precious opening sentences, and I am afraid that so far +as the various subsequent points went that I had intended to make, I +stayed away; however, neither Demosthenes, nor a Nationalist member at +a Cork election, could have been listened to with more gratifying +attention, and I sat down, hot and happy, to be confronted with my own +flushed visage, hideously reflected in the glittering paunch of the +claret jug. +</p> + +<p> +Once safely over the presentation, the evening mellowed into frivolity, +and it was pretty late before I found myself settled down to whist, at +sixpenny points, in the ancient familiar way, while most of the others +fell to playing pool in the billiard-room next door. I have played +whist from my youth up; with the preternatural seriousness of a +subaltern, with the self-assurance of a senior captain, with the +privileged irascibility of a major; and my eighteen months of +abstinence at Shreelane had only whetted my appetite for what I +consider the best of games. After the long lonely evenings there, with +rats for company, and, for relaxation, a "deck" of that specially +demoniacal American variety of patience known as "Fooly Ann," it was +wondrous agreeable to sit again among my fellows, and "lay the longs" +on a severely scientific rubber of whist, as though Mrs. Cadogan and +the Skebawn Bench of Magistrates had never existed. +</p> + +<p> +We were in the first game of the second rubber, and I was holding a +very nice playing hand; I had early in the game moved forth my trumps +to battle, and I was now in the ineffable position of scoring with the +small cards of my long suit. The cards fell and fell in silence, and +Ballantyne, my partner, raked in the tricks like a machine. The +concentrated quiet of the game was suddenly arrested by a sharp, +unmistakable sound from the barrack yard outside, the snap of a +Lee-Metford rifle. +</p> + +<p> +"What was that?" exclaimed Moffat, the senior major. +</p> + +<p> +Before he had finished speaking there was a second shot. +</p> + +<p> +"By Jove, those were rifle-shots! Perhaps I'd better go and see what's +up," said Ballantyne, who was captain of the week, throwing down his +cards and making a bolt for the door. +</p> + +<p> +He had hardly got out of the room when the first long high note of the +"assembly" sang out, sudden and clear. We all sprang to our feet, and +as the bugle-call went shrilly on, the other men came pouring in from +the billiard-room, and stampeded to their quarters to get their swords. +At the same moment the mess sergeant appeared at the outer door with a +face as white as his shirt-front. +</p> + +<p> +"The sentry on the magazine guard has been shot, sir!" he said +excitedly to Moffat. "They say he's dead!" +</p> + +<p> +We were all out in the barrack square in an instant; it was clear +moonlight, and the square was already alive with hurrying figures +cramming on clothes and caps as they ran to fall in. I was a free +agent these times, and I followed the mess sergeant across the square +towards the distant corner where the magazine stands. As we doubled +round the end of the men's quarters, we nearly ran into a small party +of men who were advancing slowly and heavily in our direction. +</p> + +<p> +"'Ere he is, sir!" said the mess sergeant, stopping himself abruptly. +</p> + +<p> +They were carrying the sentry to the hospital. His busby had fallen +off; the moon shone mildly on his pale, convulsed face, and foam and +strange inhuman sounds came from his lips. His head was rolling from +side to side on the arm of one of the men who was carrying him; as it +turned towards me I was struck by something disturbingly familiar in +the face, and I wondered if he had been in my old company. +</p> + +<p> +"What's his name, sergeant?" I said to the mess sergeant. +</p> + +<p> +"Private Harris, sir," replied the sergeant; "he's only lately come up +from the depôt, and this was his first time on sentry by himself." +</p> + +<p> +I went back to the mess, and in process of time the others straggled +in, thirsting for whiskies-and-sodas, and full of such information as +there was to give. Private Harris was not wounded; both the shots had +been fired by him, as was testified by the state of his rifle and the +fact that two of the cartridges were missing from the packet in his +pouch. +</p> + +<p> +"I hear he was a queer, sulky sort of chap always," said Tomkinson, the +subaltern of the day, "but if he was having a try at suicide he made a +bally bad fist of it." +</p> + +<p> +"He made as good a fist of it as you did of putting on your sword, +Tommy," remarked Ballantyne, indicating a dangling white strap of +webbing, that hung down like a tail below Mr. Tomkinson's mess jacket. +"Nerves, obviously, in both cases!" +</p> + +<p> +The exquisite satisfaction afforded by this discovery to Mr. +Tomkinson's brother officers found its natural outlet in a bear fight +that threatened to become more or less general, and in the course of +which I slid away unostentatiously to bed in Ballantyne's quarters, and +took the precaution of barricading my door. +</p> + +<p> +Next morning, when I got down to breakfast, I found Ballantyne and two +or three others in the mess room, and my first inquiry was for Private +Harris. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, the poor chap's dead," said Ballantyne; "it's a very queer +business altogether. I think he must have been wrong in the top +storey. The doctor was with him when he came to out of the fit, or +whatever it was, and O'Reilly—that's the doctor y' know, Irish of +course, and, by the way, poor Harris was an Irishman too—says that he +could only jibber at first, but then he got better, and he got out of +him that when he had been on sentry-go for about half-an-hour, he +happened to look up at the angle of the barrack wall near where it +joins the magazine tower, and saw a face looking at him over it. He +challenged and got no answer, but the face just stuck there staring at +him; he challenged again, and then, as O'Reilly said, he 'just oop with +his royfle and blazed at it.'" Ballantyne was not above the common +English delusion that he could imitate an Irish brogue. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, what happened then?" +</p> + +<p> +"Well, according to the poor devil's own story, the face just kept on +looking at him and he had another shot at it, and 'My God Almighty,' he +said to O'Reilly, 'it was there always!' While he was saying that to +O'Reilly he began to chuck another fit, and apparently went on chucking +them till he died a couple of hours ago." +</p> + +<p> +"One result of it is," said another man, "that they couldn't get a man +to go on sentry there alone last night. I expect we shall have to +double the sentries there every night as long as we're here." +</p> + +<p> +"Silly asses!" remarked Tomkinson, but he said it without conviction. +</p> + +<p> +After breakfast we went out to look at the wall by the magazine. It +was about eleven feet high, with a coped top, and they told me there +was a deep and wide dry ditch on the outside. A ladder was brought, +and we examined the angle of the wall at which Harris said the face had +appeared. He had made a beautiful shot, one of his bullets having +flicked a piece off the ridge of the coping exactly at the corner. +</p> + +<p> +"It's not the kind of shot a man would make if he had been drinking," +said Moffat, regretfully abandoning his first simple hypothesis; "he +must have been mad." +</p> + +<p> +"I wish I could find out who his people are," said Brownlow, the +adjutant, who had joined us; "they found in his box a letter to him +from his mother, but we can't make out the name of the place. By Jove, +Yeates, you're an Irishman, perhaps you can help us." +</p> + +<p> +He handed me a letter in a dirty envelope. There was no address given, +the contents were very short, and I may be forgiven if I transcribe +them:— +</p> + +<p> +"My dear Son, I hope you are well as this leaves me at present, thanks +be to God for it. I am very much unaisy about the cow. She swelled up +this morning, she ran in and was frauding and I did not do but to run +up for torn sweeney in the minute. We are thinking it is too much +lairels or an eirub she took. I do not know what I will do with her. +God help one that's alone with himself I had not a days luck since ye +went away. I am thinkin' them that wants ye is tired lookin' for ye. +And so I remain, +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +"YOUR FOND MOTHER." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, you don't get much of a lead from the cow, do you? And what the +deuce is an eirub?" said Brownlow. +</p> + +<p> +"It's another way of spelling herb," I said, turning over the envelope +abstractedly. The postmark was almost obliterated, but it struck me it +might be construed into the word Skebawn. +</p> + +<p> +"Look here," I said suddenly, "let me see Harris. It's just possible I +may know something about him." +</p> + +<p> +The sentry's body had been laid in the dead-house near the hospital, +and Brownlow fetched the key. It was a grim little whitewashed +building, without windows, save a small one of lancet shape, high up in +one gable, through which a streak of April sunlight fell sharp and +slender on the whitewashed wall. The long figure of the sentry lay +sheeted on a stone slab, and Brownlow, with his cap in his hand, gently +uncovered the face. +</p> + +<p> +I leaned over and looked at it—at the heavy brows, the short nose, the +small moustache lying black above the pale mouth, the deep-set eyes +sealed in appalling peacefulness. There rose before me the wild dark +face of the young man who had hung on my wheel and yelled encouragement +to the winning coxswain at the Lough Lonen Regatta. +</p> + +<p> +"I know him," I said, "his name is Callaghan." +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap05"></a>V<br/> +LISHEEN RACES, SECOND-HAND</h2> + +<p> +It may or may not be agreeable to have attained the age of +thirty-eight, but, judging from old photographs, the privilege of being +nineteen has also its drawbacks. I turned over page after page of an +ancient book in which were enshrined portraits of the friends of my +youth, singly, in David and Jonathan couples, and in groups in which I, +as it seemed to my mature and possibly jaundiced perception, always +contrived to look the most immeasurable young bounder of the lot. Our +faces were fat, and yet I cannot remember ever having been considered +fat in my life; we indulged in low-necked shirts, in "Jemima" ties with +diagonal stripes; we wore coats that seemed three sizes too small, and +trousers that were three sizes too big; we also wore small whiskers. +</p> + +<p> +I stopped at last at one of the David and Jonathan memorial portraits. +Yes, here was the object of my researches; this stout and earnestly +romantic youth was Leigh Kelway, and that fatuous and chubby young +person seated on the arm of his chair was myself. Leigh Kelway was a +young man ardently believed in by a large circle of admirers, headed by +himself and seconded by me, and for some time after I had left Magdalen +for Sandhurst, I maintained a correspondence with him on large and +abstract subjects. This phase of our friendship did not survive; I +went soldiering to India, and Leigh Kelway took honours and moved +suitably on into politics, as is the duty of an earnest young Radical +with useful family connections and an independent income. Since then I +had at intervals seen in the papers the name of the Honourable Basil +Leigh Kelway mentioned as a speaker at elections, as a writer of +thoughtful articles in the reviews, but we had never met, and nothing +could have been less expected by me than the letter, written from Mrs. +Raverty's Hotel, Skebawn, in which he told me he was making a tour in +Ireland with Lord Waterbury, to whom he was private secretary. Lord +Waterbury was at present having a few days' fishing near Killarney, and +he himself, not being a fisherman, was collecting statistics for his +chief on various points connected with the Liquor Question in Ireland. +He had heard that I was in the neighbourhood, and was kind enough to +add that it would give him much pleasure to meet me again. +</p> + +<p> +With a stir of the old enthusiasm I wrote begging him to be my guest +for as long as it suited him, and the following afternoon he arrived at +Shreelane. The stout young friend of my youth had changed +considerably. His important nose and slightly prominent teeth +remained, but his wavy hair had withdrawn intellectually from his +temples; his eyes had acquired a statesmanlike absence of expression, +and his neck had grown long and bird-like. It was his first visit to +Ireland, as he lost no time in telling me, and he and his chief had +already collected much valuable information on the subject to which +they had dedicated the Easter recess. He further informed me that he +thought of popularising the subject in a novel, and therefore intended +to, as he put it, "master the brogue" before his return. +</p> + +<p> +During the next few days I did my best for Leigh Kelway. I turned him +loose on Father Scanlan; I showed him Mohona, our champion village, +that boasts fifteen public-houses out of twenty buildings of sorts and +a railway station; I took him to hear the prosecution of a publican for +selling drink on a Sunday, which gave him an opportunity of studying +perjury as a fine art, and of hearing a lady, on whom police suspicion +justly rested, profoundly summed up by the sergeant as "a woman who had +th' appairance of having knocked at a back door." +</p> + +<p> +The net result of these experiences has not yet been given to the world +by Leigh Kelway. For my own part, I had at the end of three days +arrived at the conclusion that his society, when combined with a +note-book and a thirst for statistics, was not what I used to find it +at Oxford. I therefore welcomed a suggestion from Mr. Flurry Knox that +we should accompany him to some typical country races, got up by the +farmers at a place called Lisheen, some twelve miles away. It was the +worst road in the district, the races of the most grossly unorthodox +character; in fact, it was the very place for Leigh Kelway to collect +impressions of Irish life, and in any case it was a blessed opportunity +of disposing of him for the day. +</p> + +<p> +In my guest's attire next morning I discerned an unbending from the +role of cabinet minister towards that of sportsman; the outlines of the +note-book might be traced in his breast pocket, but traversing it was +the strap of a pair of field-glasses, and his light grey suit was smart +enough for Goodwood. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry was to drive us to the races at one o'clock, and we walked to +Tory Cottage by the short cut over the hill, in the sunny beauty of an +April morning. Up to the present the weather had kept me in a more or +less apologetic condition; any one who has entertained a guest in the +country knows the unjust weight of responsibility that rests on the +shoulders of the host in the matter of climate, and Leigh Kelway, after +two drenchings, had become sarcastically resigned to what I felt he +regarded as my mismanagement. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry took us into the house for a drink and a biscuit, to keep us +going, as he said, till "we lifted some luncheon out of the Castle Knox +people at the races," and it was while we were thus engaged that the +first disaster of the day occurred. The dining-room door was open, so +also was the window of the little staircase just outside it, and +through the window travelled sounds that told of the close proximity of +the stable-yard; the clattering of hoofs on cobble stones, and voices +uplifted in loud conversation. Suddenly from this region there arose a +screech of the laughter peculiar to kitchen flirtation, followed by the +clank of a bucket, the plunging of a horse, and then an uproar of +wheels and galloping hoofs. An instant afterwards Flurry's chestnut +cob, in a dogcart, dashed at full gallop into view, with the reins +streaming behind him, and two men in hot pursuit. Almost before I had +time to realise what had happened, Flurry jumped through the +half-opened window of the dining-room like a clown at a pantomime, and +joined in the chase; but the cob was resolved to make the most of his +chance, and went away down the drive and out of sight at a pace that +distanced every one save the kennel terrier, who sped in shrieking +ecstasy beside him. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh merciful hour!" exclaimed a female voice behind me. Leigh Kelway +and I were by this time watching the progress of events from the +gravel, in company with the remainder of Flurry's household. "The +horse is desthroyed! Wasn't that the quare start he took! And all in +the world I done was to slap a bucket of wather at Michael out the +windy, and 'twas himself got it in place of Michael!" +</p> + +<p> +"Ye'll never ate another bit, Bridgie Dunnigan," replied the cook, with +the exulting pessimism of her kind. "The Master'll have your life!" +</p> + +<p> +Both speakers shouted at the top of their voices, probably because in +spirit they still followed afar the flight of the cob. +</p> + +<p> +Leigh Kelway looked serious as we walked on down the drive. I almost +dared to hope that a note on the degrading oppression of Irish +retainers was shaping itself. Before we reached the bend of the drive +the rescue party was returning with the fugitive, all, with the +exception of the kennel terrier, looking extremely gloomy. The cob had +been confronted by a wooden gate, which he had unhesitatingly taken in +his stride, landing on his head on the farther side with the gate and +the cart on top of him, and had arisen with a lame foreleg, a cut on +his nose, and several other minor wounds. +</p> + +<p> +"You'd think the brute had been fighting the cats, with all the +scratches and scrapes he has on him!" said Flurry, casting a vengeful +eye at Michael, "and one shaft's broken and so is the dashboard. I +haven't another horse in the place; they're all out at grass, and so +there's an end of the races!" +</p> + +<p> +We all three stood blankly on the hall-door steps and watched the wreck +of the trap being trundled up the avenue. +</p> + +<p> +"I'm very sorry you're done out of your sport," said Flurry to Leigh +Kelway, in tones of deplorable sincerity; "perhaps, as there's nothing +else to do, you'd like to see the hounds——?" +</p> + +<p> +I felt for Flurry, but of the two I felt more for Leigh Kelway as he +accepted this alleviation. He disliked dogs, and held the newest views +on sanitation, and I knew what Flurry's kennels could smell like. I +was lighting a precautionary cigarette, when we caught sight of an old +man riding up the drive. Flurry stopped short. +</p> + +<p> +"Hold on a minute," he said; "here's an old chap that often brings me +horses for the kennels; I must see what he wants." +</p> + +<p> +The man dismounted and approached Mr. Knox, hat in hand, towing after +him a gaunt and ancient black mare with a big knee. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, Barrett," began Flurry, surveying the mare with his hands in his +pockets, "I'm not giving the hounds meat this month, or only very +little." +</p> + +<p> +"Ah, Master Flurry," answered Barrett, "it's you that's pleasant! Is +it give the like o' this one for the dogs to ate! She's a vallyble +strong young mare, no more than shixteen years of age, and ye'd sooner +be lookin' at her goin' under a side-car than eatin' your dinner." +</p> + +<p> +"There isn't as much meat on her as 'd fatten a jackdaw," said Flurry, +clinking the silver in his pockets as he searched for a matchbox. +"What are you asking for her?" +</p> + +<p> +The old man drew cautiously up to him. +</p> + +<p> +"Master Flurry," he said solemnly, "I'll sell her to your honour for +five pounds, and she'll be worth ten after you give her a month's +grass." +</p> + +<p> +Flurry lit his cigarette; then he said imperturbably, "I'll give you +seven shillings for her." +</p> + +<p> +Old Barrett put on his hat in silence, and in silence buttoned his coat +and took hold of the stirrup leather. Flurry remained immovable. +"Master Flurry," said old Barrett suddenly, with tears in his voice, +"you must make it eight, sir!" +</p> + +<p> +"Michael!" called out Flurry with apparent irrelevance, "run up to your +father's and ask him would he lend me a loan of his side-car." +</p> + +<p> +Half-an-hour later we were, improbable as it may seem, on our way to +Lisheen races. We were seated upon an outside-car of immemorial age, +whose joints seemed to open and close again as it swung in and out of +the ruts, whose tattered cushions stank of rats and mildew, whose +wheels staggered and rocked like the legs of a drunken man. Between +the shafts jogged the latest addition to the kennel larder, the +eight-shilling mare. Flurry sat on one side, and kept her going at a +rate of not less than four miles an hour; Leigh Kelway and I held on to +the other. +</p> + +<p> +"She'll get us as far as Lynch's anyway," said Flurry, abandoning his +first contention that she could do the whole distance, as he pulled her +on to her legs after her fifteenth stumble, "and he'll lend us some +sort of a horse, if it was only a mule." +</p> + +<p> +"Do you notice that these cushions are very damp?" said Leigh Kelway to +me, in a hollow undertone. +</p> + +<p> +"Small blame to them if they are!" replied Flurry. "I've no doubt but +they were out under the rain all day yesterday at Mrs. Hurly's funeral." +</p> + +<p> +Leigh Kelway made no reply, but he took his note-book out of his pocket +and sat on it. +</p> + +<p> +We arrived at Lynch's at a little past three, and were there confronted +by the next disappointment of this disastrous day. The door of Lynch's +farmhouse was locked, and nothing replied to our knocking except a +puppy, who barked hysterically from within. +</p> + +<p> +"All gone to the races," said Flurry philosophically, picking his way +round the manure heap. "No matter, here's the filly in the shed here. +I know he's had her under a car." +</p> + +<p> +An agitating ten minutes ensued, during which Leigh Kelway and I got +the eight-shilling mare out of the shafts and the harness, and Flurry, +with our inefficient help, crammed the young mare into them. As Flurry +had stated that she had been driven before, I was bound to believe him, +but the difficulty of getting the bit into her mouth was remarkable, +and so also was the crab-like manner in which she sidled out of the +yard, with Flurry and myself at her head, and Leigh Kelway hanging on +to the back of the car to keep it from jamming in the gateway. +</p> + +<p> +"Sit up on the car now," said Flurry when we got out on to the road; +"I'll lead her on a bit. She's been ploughed anyway; one side of her +mouth's as tough as a gad!" +</p> + +<p> +Leigh Kelway threw away the wisp of grass with which he had been +cleaning his hands, and mopped his intellectual forehead; he was very +silent. We both mounted the car, and Flurry, with the reins in his +hand, walked beside the filly, who, with her tail clasped in, moved +onward in a succession of short jerks. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, she's all right!" said Flurry, beginning to run, and dragging the +filly into a trot; "once she gets started—" Here the filly spied a +pig in a neighbouring field, and despite the fact that she had probably +eaten out of the same trough with it, she gave a violent side spring, +and broke into a gallop. +</p> + +<p> +"Now we're off!" shouted Flurry, making a jump at the car and +clambering on; "if the traces hold we'll do!" +</p> + +<p> +The English language is powerless to suggest the view-halloo with which +Mr. Knox ended his speech, or to do more than indicate the rigid +anxiety of Leigh Kelway's face as he regained his balance after the +preliminary jerk, and clutched the back rail. It must be said for +Lynch's filly that she did not kick; she merely fled, like a dog with a +kettle tied to its tail, from the pursuing rattle and jingle behind +her, with the shafts buffeting her dusty sides as the car swung to and +fro. Whenever she showed any signs of slackening, Flurry loosed +another yell at her that renewed her panic, and thus we precariously +covered another two or three miles of our journey. +</p> + +<p> +Had it not been for a large stone lying on the road, and had the filly +not chosen to swerve so as to bring the wheel on top of it, I dare say +we might have got to the races; but by an unfortunate coincidence both +these things occurred, and when we recovered from the consequent shock, +the tire of one of the wheels had come off, and was trundling with +cumbrous gaiety into the ditch. Flurry stopped the filly and began to +laugh; Leigh Kelway said something startlingly unparliamentary under +his breath. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, it might be worse," Flurry said consolingly as he lifted the +tire on to the car; "we're not half a mile from a forge." +</p> + +<p> +We walked that half-mile in funereal procession behind the car; the +glory had departed from the weather, and an ugly wall of cloud was +rising up out of the west to meet the sun; the hills had darkened and +lost colour, and the white bog cotton shivered in a cold wind that +smelt of rain. +</p> + +<p> +By a miracle the smith was not at the races, owing, as he explained, to +his having "the toothaches," the two facts combined producing in him a +morosity only equalled by that of Leigh Kelway. The smith's sole +comment on the situation was to unharness the filly, and drag her into +the forge, where he tied her up. He then proceeded to whistle +viciously on his fingers in the direction of a cottage, and to command, +in tones of thunder, some unseen creature to bring over a couple of +baskets of turf. The turf arrived in process of time, on a woman's +back, and was arranged in a circle in a yard at the back of the forge. +The tire was bedded in it, and the turf was with difficulty kindled at +different points. +</p> + +<p> +"Ye'll not get to the races this day," said the smith, yielding to a +sardonic satisfaction; "the turf's wet, and I haven't one to do a +hand's turn for me." He laid the wheel on the ground and lit his pipe. +</p> + +<p> +Leigh Kelway looked pallidly about him over the spacious empty +landscape of brown mountain slopes patched with golden furze and seamed +with grey walls; I wondered if he were as hungry as I. We sat on +stones opposite the smouldering ring of turf and smoked, and Flurry +beguiled the smith into grim and calumnious confidences about every +horse in the country. After about an hour, during which the turf went +out three times, and the weather became more and more threatening, a +girl with a red petticoat over her head appeared at the gate of the +yard, and said to the smith: +</p> + +<p> +"The horse is gone away from ye." +</p> + +<p> +"Where?" exclaimed Flurry, springing to his feet. +</p> + +<p> +"I met him walking wesht the road there below, and when I thought to +turn him he commenced to gallop." +</p> + +<p> +"Pulled her head out of the headstall," said Flurry, after a rapid +survey of the forge. "She's near home by now." +</p> + +<p> +It was at this moment that the rain began; the situation could scarcely +have been better stage-managed. After reviewing the position, Flurry +and I decided that the only thing to do was to walk to a public-house a +couple of miles farther on, feed there if possible, hire a car, and go +home. +</p> + +<p> +It was an uphill walk, with mild generous raindrops striking thicker +and thicker on our faces; no one talked, and the grey clouds crowded up +from behind the hills like billows of steam. Leigh Kelway bore it all +with egregious resignation. I cannot pretend that I was at heart +sympathetic, but by virtue of being his host I felt responsible for the +breakdown, for his light suit, for everything, and divined his +sentiment of horror at the first sight of the public-house. +</p> + +<p> +It was a long, low cottage, with a line of dripping elm-trees +overshadowing it; empty cars and carts round its door, and a babel from +within made it evident that the race-goers were pursuing a gradual +homeward route. The shop was crammed with steaming countrymen, whose +loud brawling voices, all talking together, roused my English friend to +his first remark since we had left the forge. +</p> + +<p> +"Surely, Yeates, we are not going into that place?" he said severely; +"those men are all drunk." +</p> + +<p> +"Ah, nothing to signify!" said Flurry, plunging in and driving his way +through the throng like a plough. "Here, Mary Kate!" he called to the +girl behind the counter, "tell your mother we want some tea and bread +and butter in the room inside." +</p> + +<p> +The smell of bad tobacco and spilt porter was choking; we worked our +way through it after him towards the end of the shop, intersecting at +every hand discussions about the races. +</p> + +<p> +"Tom was very nice. He spared his horse all along, and then he put +into him—" "Well, at Goggin's corner the third horse was before the +second, but he was goin' wake in himself." "I tell ye the mare had the +hind leg fasht in the fore." "Clancy was dipping in the saddle." +"'Twas a dam nice race whatever——" +</p> + +<p> +We gained the inner room at last, a cheerless apartment, adorned with +sacred pictures, a sewing-machine, and an array of supplementary +tumblers and wineglasses; but, at all events, we had it so far to +ourselves. At intervals during the next half-hour Mary Kate burst in +with cups and plates, cast them on the table and disappeared, but of +food there was no sign. After a further period of starvation and of +listening to the noise in the shop, Flurry made a sortie, and, after +lengthy and unknown adventures, reappeared carrying a huge brown +teapot, and driving before him Mary Kate with the remainder of the +repast. The bread tasted of mice, the butter of turf-smoke, the tea of +brown paper, but we had got past the critical stage. I had entered +upon my third round of bread and butter when the door was flung open, +and my valued acquaintance, Slipper, slightly advanced in liquor, +presented himself to our gaze. His bandy legs sprawled +consequentially, his nose was redder than a coal of fire, his prominent +eyes rolled crookedly upon us, and his left hand swept behind him the +attempt of Mary Kate to frustrate his entrance. +</p> + +<p> +"Good-evening to my vinerable friend, Mr. Flurry Knox!" he began, in +the voice of a town crier, "and to the Honourable Major Yeates, and the +English gintleman!" +</p> + +<p> +This impressive opening immediately attracted an audience from the +shop, and the doorway filled with grinning faces as Slipper advanced +farther into the room. +</p> + +<p> +"Why weren't ye at the races, Mr. Flurry?" he went on, his roving eye +taking a grip of us all at the same time; "sure the Miss Bennetts and +all the ladies was asking where were ye." +</p> + +<p> +"It'd take some time to tell them that," said Flurry, with his mouth +full; "but what about the races, Slipper? Had you good sport?" +</p> + +<p> +"Sport is it? Divil so pleasant an afternoon ever you seen," replied +Slipper. He leaned against a side table, and all the glasses on it +jingled. "Does your honour know O'Driscoll?" he went on irrelevantly. +"Sure you do. He was in your honour's stable. It's what we were all +sayin'; it was a great pity your honour was not there, for the likin' +you had to Driscoll." +</p> + +<p> +"That's thrue," said a voice at the door. +</p> + +<p> +"There wasn't one in the Barony but was gethered in it, through and +fro," continued Slipper, with a quelling glance at the interrupter; +"and there was tints for sellin' porther, and whisky as pliable as new +milk, and boys gain' round the tints outside, feeling for heads with +the big ends of their blackthorns, and all kinds of recreations, and +the Sons of Liberty's piffler and dhrum band from Skebawn; though +faith! there was more of thim runnin' to look at the races than what +was playin' in it; not to mintion different occasions that the +bandmasther was atin' his lunch within in the whisky tint." +</p> + +<p> +"But what about Driscoll?" said Flurry. +</p> + +<p> +"Sure it's about him I'm tellin' ye," replied Slipper, with the +practised orator's watchful eye on his growing audience. "'Twas within +in the same whisky tint meself was, with the bandmasther and a few of +the lads, an' we buyin' a ha'porth o' crackers, when I seen me brave +Driscoll landin' into the tint, and a pair o' thim long boots on him; +him that hadn't a shoe nor a stocking to his foot when your honour had +him picking grass out o' the stones behind in your yard. 'Well,' says +I to meself, 'we'll knock some spoort out of Driscoll!' +</p> + +<p> +"'Come here to me, acushla!' says I to him; 'I suppose it's some way +wake in the legs y'are,' says I, 'an' the docthor put them on ye the +way the people wouldn't thrample ye!' +</p> + +<p> +"'May the divil choke ye!' says he, pleasant enough, but I knew by the +blush he had he was vexed. +</p> + +<p> +"'Then I suppose 'tis a left-tenant colonel y'are,' says I; 'yer mother +must be proud out o' ye!' says I, 'an' maybe ye'll lend her a loan o' +thim waders when she's rinsin' yer bauneen in the river!' says I. +</p> + +<p> +"'There'll be work out o' this!' says he, lookin' at me both sour and +bitther. +</p> + +<p> +"'Well indeed, I was thinkin' you were blue moulded for want of a +batin',' says I. He was for fightin' us then, but afther we had him +pacificated with about a quarther of a naggin o' sperrits, he told us +he was goin' ridin' in a race. +</p> + +<p> +"'An' what'll ye ride?' says I. +</p> + +<p> +"'Owld Bocock's mare,' says he. +</p> + +<p> +"'Knipes!' says I, sayin' a great curse; 'is it that little staggeen +from the mountains; sure she's somethin' about the one age with +meself,' says I. 'Many's the time Jamesy Geoghegan and meself used to +be dhrivin' her to Macroom with pigs an' all soorts,' says I; 'an' is +it leppin' stone walls ye want her to go now?' +</p> + +<p> +"'Faith, there's walls and every vari'ty of obstackle in it,' says he. +</p> + +<p> +"'It'll be the best o' your play, so,' says I, 'to leg it away home out +o' this.' +</p> + +<p> +"'An' who'll ride her, so?' says he. +</p> + +<p> +"'Let the divil ride her,' says I." +</p> + +<p> +Leigh Kelway, who had been leaning back seemingly half asleep, obeyed +the hypnotism of Slipper's gaze, and opened his eyes. +</p> + +<p> +"That was now all the conversation that passed between himself and +meself," resumed Slipper, "and there was no great delay afther that +till they said there was a race startin' and the dickens a one at all +was goin' to ride only two, Driscoll, and one Clancy. With that then I +seen Mr. Kinahane, the Petty Sessions clerk, goin' round clearin' the +coorse, an' I gethered a few o' the neighbours, an' we walked the +fields hither and over till we seen the most of th' obstackles. +</p> + +<p> +"'Stand aisy now by the plantation,' says I; 'if they get to come as +far as this, believe me ye'll see spoort,' says I, 'an' 'twill be a +convanient spot to encourage the mare if she's anyway wake in herself,' +says I, cuttin' somethin' about five foot of an ash sapling out o' the +plantation. +</p> + +<p> +"'That's yer sort!' says owld Bocock, that was thravellin' the +racecoorse, peggin' a bit o' paper down with a thorn in front of every +lep, the way Driscoll 'd know the handiest place to face her at it. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, I hadn't barely thrimmed the ash plant——" +</p> + +<p> +"Have you any jam, Mary Kate?" interrupted Flurry, whose meal had been +in no way interfered with by either the story or the highly-scented +crowd who had come to listen to it. +</p> + +<p> +"We have no jam, only thraycle, sir," replied the invisible Mary Kate. +</p> + +<p> +"I hadn't the switch barely thrimmed," repeated Slipper firmly, "when I +heard the people screechin', an' I seen Driscoll an' Clancy comin' on, +leppin' all before them, an' owld Bocock's mare bellusin' an' +powdherin' along, an' bedad! whatever obstackle wouldn't throw <i>her</i> +down, faith, she'd throw <i>it</i> down, an' there's the thraffic they had +in it. +</p> + +<p> +"'I declare to me sowl,' says I, 'if they continue on this way there's +a great chance some one o' thim 'll win," says I. +</p> + +<p> +"'Ye lie!' says the bandmasther, bein' a thrifle fulsome after his +luncheon. +</p> + +<p> +"'I do not,' says I, 'in regard of seein' how soople them two boys is. +Ye might observe,' says I, 'that if they have no convanient way to sit +on the saddle, they'll ride the neck o' the horse till such time as +they gets an occasion to lave it,' says I. +</p> + +<p> +"'Arrah, shut yer mouth!' says the bandmasther; 'they're puckin' out +this way now, an' may the divil admire me!' says he, 'but Clancy has +the other bet out, and the divil such leatherin' and beltin' of owld +Bocock's mare ever you seen as what's in it!' says he. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, when I seen them comin' to me, and Driscoll about the length of +the plantation behind Clancy, I let a couple of bawls. +</p> + +<p> +"'Skelp her, ye big brute!' says I. 'What good's in ye that ye aren't +able to skelp her?'" +</p> + +<p> +The yell and the histrionic flourish of his stick with which Slipper +delivered this incident brought down the house. Leigh Kelway was +sufficiently moved to ask me in an undertone if "skelp" was a local +term. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, Mr. Flurry, and gintlemen," recommenced Slipper, "I declare to +ye when owld Bocock's mare heard thim roars she sthretched out her neck +like a gandher, and when she passed me out she give a couple of grunts, +and looked at me as ugly as a Christian. +</p> + +<p> +"'Hah!' says I, givin' her a couple o' dhraws o' th' ash plant across +the butt o' the tail, the way I wouldn't blind her; 'I'll make ye +grunt!' says I, 'I'll nourish ye!' +</p> + +<p> +"I knew well she was very frightful of th' ash plant since the winter +Tommeen Sullivan had her under a sidecar. But now, in place of havin' +any obligations to me, ye'd be surprised if ye heard the blaspheemious +expressions of that young boy that was ridin' her; and whether it was +over-anxious he was, turnin' around the way I'd hear him cursin', or +whether it was some slither or slide came to owld Bocock's mare, I +dunno, but she was bet up agin the last obstackle but two, and before +ye could say 'Schnipes,' she was standin' on her two ears beyond in th' +other field! I declare to ye, on the vartue of me oath, she stood that +way till she reconnoithered what side would Driscoll fall, an' she +turned about then and rolled on him as cosy as if he was meadow grass!" +</p> + +<p> +Slipper stopped short; the people in the doorway groaned +appreciatively; Mary Kate murmured "The Lord save us!" +</p> + +<p> +"The blood was dhruv out through his nose and ears," continued Slipper, +with a voice that indicated the cream of the narration, "and you'd hear +his bones crackin' on the ground! You'd have pitied the poor boy." +</p> + +<p> +"Good heavens!" said Leigh Kelway, sitting up very straight in his +chair. +</p> + +<p> +"Was he hurt, Slipper?" asked Flurry casually. +</p> + +<p> +"Hurt is it?" echoed Slipper in high scorn; "killed on the spot!" He +paused to relish the effect of the <i>dénouement</i> on Leigh Kelway. "Oh, +divil so pleasant an afthernoon ever you seen; and indeed, Mr. Flurry, +it's what we were all sayin', it was a great pity your honour was not +there for the likin' you had for Driscoll." +</p> + +<p> +As he spoke the last word there was an outburst of singing and cheering +from a carload of people who had just pulled up at the door. Flurry +listened, leaned back in his chair, and began to laugh. +</p> + +<p> +"It scarcely strikes one as a comic incident," said Leigh Kelway, very +coldly to me; "in fact, it seems to me that the police ought——" +</p> + +<p> +"Show me Slipper!" bawled a voice in the shop; "show me that dirty +little undherlooper till I have his blood! Hadn't I the race won only +for he souring the mare on me! What's that you say? I tell ye he did! +He left seven slaps on her with the handle of a hay-rake——" +</p> + +<p> +There was in the room in which we were sitting a second door, leading +to the back yard, a door consecrated to the unobtrusive visits of +so-called "Sunday travellers." Through it Slipper faded away like a +dream, and, simultaneously, a tall young man, with a face like a +red-hot potato tied up in a bandage, squeezed his way from the shop +into the room. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, Driscoll," said Flurry, "since it wasn't the teeth of the rake +he left on the mare, you needn't be talking!" +</p> + +<p> +Leigh Kelway looked from one to the other with a wilder expression in +his eye than I had thought it capable of. I read in it a resolve to +abandon Ireland to her fate. +</p> + +<p> +At eight o'clock we were still waiting for the car that we had been +assured should be ours directly it returned from the races. At +half-past eight we had adopted the only possible course that remained, +and had accepted the offers of lifts on the laden cars that were +returning to Skebawn, and I presently was gratified by the spectacle of +my friend Leigh Kelway wedged between a roulette table and its +proprietor on one side of a car, with Driscoll and Slipper, +mysteriously reconciled and excessively drunk, seated, locked in each +other's arms, on the other. Flurry and I, somewhat similarly placed, +followed on two other cars. I was scarcely surprised when I was +informed that the melancholy white animal in the shafts of the leading +car was Owld Bocock's much-enduring steeplechaser. +</p> + +<p> +The night was very dark and stormy, and it is almost superfluous to say +that no one carried lamps; the rain poured upon us, and through wind +and wet Owld Bocock's mare set the pace at a rate that showed she knew +from bitter experience what was expected from her by gentlemen who had +spent the evening in a public-house; behind her the other two tired +horses followed closely, incited to emulation by shouting, singing, and +a liberal allowance of whip. We were a good ten miles from Skebawn, +and never had the road seemed so long. For mile after mile the +half-seen low walls slid past us, with occasional plunges into caverns +of darkness under trees. Sometimes from a wayside cabin a dog would +dash out to bark at us as we rattled by; sometimes our cavalcade swung +aside to pass, with yells and counter-yells, crawling carts filled with +other belated race-goers. +</p> + +<p> +I was nearly wet through, even though I received considerable shelter +from a Skebawn publican, who slept heavily and irrepressibly on my +shoulder. Driscoll, on the leading car, had struck up an approximation +to the "Wearing of the Green," when a wavering star appeared on the +road ahead of us. It grew momently larger; it came towards us apace. +Flurry, on the car behind me, shouted suddenly— +</p> + +<p> +"That's the mail car, with one of the lamps out! Tell those fellows +ahead to look out!" +</p> + +<p> +But the warning fell on deaf ears. +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +"When laws can change the blades of grass<br/> +From growing as they grow——" +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +howled five discordant voices, oblivious of the towering proximity of +the star. +</p> + +<p> +A Bianconi mail car is nearly three times the size of an ordinary +outside car, and when on a dark night it advances, Cyclops-like, with +but one eye, it is difficult for even a sober driver to calculate its +bulk. Above the sounds of melody there arose the thunder of heavy +wheels, the splashing trample of three big horses, then a crash and a +turmoil of shouts. Our cars pulled up just in time, and I tore myself +from the embrace of my publican to go to Leigh Kelway's assistance. +</p> + +<p> +The wing of the Bianconi had caught the wing of the smaller car, +flinging Owld Bocock's mare on her side and throwing her freight +headlong on top of her, the heap being surmounted by the roulette +table. The driver of the mail car unshipped his solitary lamp and +turned it on the disaster. I saw that Flurry had already got hold of +Leigh Kelway by the heels, and was dragging him from under the others. +He struggled up hatless, muddy, and gasping, with Driscoll hanging on +by his neck, still singing the "Wearing of the Green." +</p> + +<p> +A voice from the mail car said incredulously, "<i>Leigh Kelway!</i>" A +spectacled face glared down upon him from under the dripping spikes of +an umbrella. +</p> + +<p> +It was the Right Honourable the Earl of Waterbury, Leigh Kelway's +chief, returning from his fishing excursion. +</p> + +<p> +Meanwhile Slipper, in the ditch, did not cease to announce that "Divil +so pleasant an afthernoon ever ye seen as what was in it!" +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap06"></a>VI<br/> +PHILIPPA'S FOX-HUNT</h2> + +<p> +No one can accuse Philippa and me of having married in haste. As a +matter of fact, it was but little under five years from that autumn +evening on the river when I had said what is called in Ireland "the +hard word," to the day in August when I was led to the altar by my best +man, and was subsequently led away from it by Mrs. Sinclair Yeates. +About two years out of the five had been spent by me at Shreelane in +ceaseless warfare with drains, eaveshoots, chimneys, pumps; all those +fundamentals, in short, that the ingenuous and improving tenant expects +to find established as a basis from which to rise to higher things. As +far as rising to higher things went, frequent ascents to the roof to +search for leaks summed up my achievements; in fact, I suffered so +general a shrinkage of my ideals that the triumph of making the +hall-door bell ring blinded me to the fact that the rat-holes in the +hall floor were nailed up with pieces of tin biscuit boxes, and that +the casual visitor could, instead of leaving a card, have easily +written his name in the damp on the walls. +</p> + +<p> +Philippa, however, proved adorably callous to these and similar +shortcomings. She regarded Shreelane and its floundering, foundering +ménage of incapables in the light of a gigantic picnic in a foreign +land; she held long conversations daily with Mrs. Cadogan, in order, as +she informed me, to acquire the language; without any ulterior domestic +intention she engaged kitchen-maids because of the beauty of their +eyes, and housemaids because they had such delightfully picturesque old +mothers, and she declined to correct the phraseology of the +parlour-maid, whose painful habit it was to whisper "Do ye choose +cherry or clarry?" when proffering the wine. Fast-days, perhaps, +afforded my wife her first insight into the sterner realities of Irish +housekeeping. Philippa had what are known as High Church proclivities, +and took the matter seriously. +</p> + +<p> +"I don't know how we are to manage for the servants' dinner to-morrow, +Sinclair," she said, coming in to my office one Thursday morning; +"Julia says she 'promised God this long time that she wouldn't eat an +egg on a fast-day,' and the kitchen-maid says she won't eat herrings +'without they're fried with onions,' and Mrs. Cadogan says she will +'not go to them extremes for servants.'" +</p> + +<p> +"I should let Mrs. Cadogan settle the menu herself," I suggested. +</p> + +<p> +"I asked her to do that," replied Philippa, "and she only said she +'thanked God she had no appetite!'" +</p> + +<p> +The lady of the house here fell away into unseasonable laughter. +</p> + +<p> +I made the demoralising suggestion that, as we were going away for a +couple of nights, we might safely leave them to fight it out, and the +problem was abandoned. +</p> + +<p> +Philippa had been much called on by the neighbourhood in all its shades +and grades, and daily she and her trousseau frocks presented themselves +at hall-doors of varying dimensions in due acknowledgment of +civilities. In Ireland, it may be noted, the process known in England +as "summering and wintering" a newcomer does not obtain; sociability +and curiosity alike forbid delay. The visit to which we owed our +escape from the intricacies of the fast-day was to the Knoxes of Castle +Knox, relations in some remote and tribal way of my landlord, Mr. +Flurry of that ilk. It involved a short journey by train, and my +wife's longest basket-trunk; it also, which was more serious, involved +my being lent a horse to go out cubbing the following morning. +</p> + +<p> +At Castle Knox we sank into an almost forgotten environment of +draught-proof windows and doors, of deep carpets, of silent servants +instead of clattering belligerents. Philippa told me afterwards that +it had only been by an effort that she had restrained herself from +snatching up the train of her wedding-gown as she paced across the wide +hall on little Sir Valentine's arm. After three weeks at Shreelane she +found it difficult to remember that the floor was neither damp nor +dusty. +</p> + +<p> +I had the good fortune to be of the limited number of those who got on +with Lady Knox, chiefly, I imagine, because I was as a worm before her, +and thankfully permitted her to do all the talking. +</p> + +<p> +"Your wife is extremely pretty," she pronounced autocratically, +surveying Philippa between the candle-shades; "does she ride?" +</p> + +<p> +Lady Knox was a short square lady, with a weather-beaten face, and an +eye decisive from long habit of taking her own line across country and +elsewhere. She would have made a very imposing little coachman, and +would have caused her stable helpers to rue the day they had the +presumption to be born; it struck me that Sir Valentine sometimes did +so. +</p> + +<p> +"I'm glad you like her looks," I replied, "as I fear you will find her +thoroughly despicable otherwise; for one thing, she not only can't +ride, but she believes that I can!" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh come, you're not as bad as all that!" my hostess was good enough to +say; "I'm going to put you up on Sorcerer to-morrow, and we'll see you +at the top of the hunt—if there is one. That young Knox hasn't a +notion how to draw these woods." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, the best run we had last year out of this place was with +Flurry's hounds," struck in Miss Sally, sole daughter of Sir +Valentine's house and home, from her place half-way down the table. It +was not difficult to see that she and her mother held different views +on the subject of Mr. Flurry Knox. +</p> + +<p> +"I call it a criminal thing in any one's great-great-grandfather to +rear up a preposterous troop of sons and plant them all out in his own +country," Lady Knox said to me with apparent irrelevance. "I detest +collaterals. Blood may be thicker than water, but it is also a great +deal nastier. In this country I find that fifteenth cousins consider +themselves near relations if they live within twenty miles of one!" +</p> + +<p> +Having before now taken in the position with regard to Flurry Knox, I +took care to accept these remarks as generalities, and turned the +conversation to other themes. +</p> + +<p> +"I see Mrs. Yeates is doing wonders with Mr. Hamilton," said Lady Knox +presently, following the direction of my eyes, which had strayed away +to where Philippa was beaming upon her left-hand neighbour, a +mildewed-looking old clergyman, who was delivering a long dissertation, +the purport of which we were happily unable to catch. +</p> + +<p> +"She has always had a gift for the Church," I said. +</p> + +<p> +"Not curates?" said Lady Knox, in her deep voice. +</p> + +<p> +I made haste to reply that it was the elders of the Church who were +venerated by my wife. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, she has her fancy in old Eustace Hamilton; he's elderly enough!" +said Lady Knox. "I wonder if she'd venerate him as much if she knew +that he had fought with his sister-in-law, and they haven't spoken for +thirty years! though for the matter of that," she added, "I think it +shows his good sense!" +</p> + +<p> +"Mrs. Knox is rather a friend of mine," I ventured. +</p> + +<p> +"Is she? H'm! Well, she's not one of mine!" replied my hostess, with +her usual definiteness. "I'll say one thing for her, I believe she's +always been a sportswoman. She's very rich, you know, and they say she +only married old Badger Knox to save his hounds from being sold to pay +his debts, and then she took the horn from him and hunted them herself. +Has she been rude to your wife yet? No? Oh, well, she will. It's a +mere question of time. She hates all English people. You know the +story they tell of her? She was coming home from London, and when she +was getting her ticket the man asked if she had said a ticket for York. +'No, thank God, Cork!' says Mrs. Knox." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, I rather agree with her!" said I; "but why did she fight with +Mr. Hamilton?" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, nobody knows. I don't believe they know themselves! Whatever it +was, the old lady drives five miles to Fortwilliam every Sunday, rather +than go to his church, just outside her own back gates," Lady Knox said +with a laugh like a terrier's bark. "I wish I'd fought with him +myself," she said; "he gives us forty minutes every Sunday." +</p> + +<p> +As I struggled into my boots the following morning, I felt that Sir +Valentine's acid confidences on cub-hunting, bestowed on me at +midnight, did credit to his judgment. "A very moderate amusement, my +dear Major," he had said, in his dry little voice; "you should stick to +shooting. No one expects you to shoot before daybreak." +</p> + +<p> +It was six o'clock as I crept downstairs, and found Lady Knox and Miss +Sally at breakfast, with two lamps on the table, and a foggy daylight +oozing in from under the half-raised blinds. Philippa was already in +the hall, pumping up her bicycle, in a state of excitement at the +prospect of her first experience of hunting that would have been more +comprehensible to me had she been going to ride a strange horse, as I +was. As I bolted my food I saw the horses being led past the windows, +and a faint twang of a horn told that Flurry Knox and his hounds were +not far off. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sally jumped up. +</p> + +<p> +"If I'm not on the Cockatoo before the hounds come up, I shall never +get there!" she said, hobbling out of the room in the toils of her +safety habit. Her small, alert face looked very childish under her +riding-hat; the lamp-light struck sparks out of her thick coil of +golden-red hair: I wondered how I had ever thought her like her prim +little father. +</p> + +<p> +She was already on her white cob when I got to the hall-door, and +Flurry Knox was riding over the glistening wet grass with his hounds, +while his whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, was having a stirring time with the +young entry and the rabbit-holes. They moved on without stopping, up a +back avenue, under tall and dripping trees, to a thick laurel covert, +at some little distance from the house. Into this the hounds were +thrown, and the usual period of fidgety inaction set in for the riders, +of whom, all told, there were about half-a-dozen. Lady Knox, square +and solid, on her big, confidential iron-grey, was near me, and her +eyes were on me and my mount; with her rubicund face and white collar +she was more than ever like a coachman. +</p> + +<p> +"Sorcerer looks as if he suited you well," she said, after a few +minutes of silence, during which the hounds rustled and crackled +steadily through the laurels; "he's a little high on the leg, and so +are you, you know, so you show each other off." +</p> + +<p> +Sorcerer was standing like a rock, with his good-looking head in the +air and his eyes fastened on the covert. His manners, so far, had been +those of a perfect gentleman, and were in marked contrast to those of +Miss Sally's cob, who was sidling, hopping, and snatching unappeasably +at his bit. Philippa had disappeared from view down the avenue ahead. +The fog was melting, and the sun threw long blades of light through the +trees; everything was quiet, and in the distance the curtained windows +of the house marked the warm repose of Sir Valentine, and those of the +party who shared his opinion of cubbing. +</p> + +<p> +"Hark! hark to cry there!" +</p> + +<p> +It was Flurry's voice, away at the other side of the covert. The +rustling and brushing through the laurels became more vehement, then +passed out of hearing. +</p> + +<p> +"He never will leave his hounds alone," said Lady Knox disapprovingly. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sally and the Cockatoo moved away in a series of heraldic capers +towards the end of the laurel plantation, and at the same moment I saw +Philippa on her bicycle shoot into view on the drive ahead of us. +</p> + +<p> +"I've seen a fox!" she screamed, white with what I believe to have been +personal terror, though she says it was excitement; "it passed quite +close to me!" +</p> + +<p> +"What way did he go?" bellowed a voice which I recognised as Dr. +Hickey's, somewhere in the deep of the laurels. +</p> + +<p> +"Down the drive!" returned Philippa, with a pea-hen quality in her +tones with which I was quite unacquainted. +</p> + +<p> +An electrifying screech of "Gone away!" was projected from the laurels +by Dr. Hickey. +</p> + +<p> +"Gone away!" chanted Flurry's horn at the top of the covert. +</p> + +<p> +"This is what he calls cubbing!" said Lady Knox, "a mere farce!" but +none the less she loosed her sedate monster into a canter. +</p> + +<p> +Sorcerer got his hind-legs under him, and hardened his crest against +the bit, as we all hustled along the drive after the flying figure of +my wife. I knew very little about horses, but I realised that even +with the hounds tumbling hysterically out of the covert, and the +Cockatoo kicking the gravel into his face, Sorcerer comported himself +with the manners of the best society. Up a side road I saw Flurry Knox +opening half of a gate and cramming through it; in a moment we also had +crammed through, and the turf of a pasture field was under our feet. +Dr. Hickey leaned forward and took hold of his horse; I did likewise, +with the trifling difference that my horse took hold of me, and I +steered for Flurry Knox with single-hearted purpose, the hounds, +already a field ahead, being merely an exciting and noisy accompaniment +of this endeavour. A heavy stone wall was the first occurrence of +note. Flurry chose a place where the top was loose, and his +clumsy-looking brown mare changed feet on the rattling stones like a +fairy. Sorcerer came at it, tense and collected as a bow at full +stretch, and sailed steeply into the air; I saw the wall far beneath +me, with an unsuspected ditch on the far side, and I felt my hat +following me at the full stretch of its guard as we swept over it, +then, with a long slant, we descended to earth some sixteen feet from +where we had left it, and I was possessor of the gratifying fact that I +had achieved a good-sized "fly," and had not perceptibly moved in my +saddle. Subsequent disillusioning experience has taught me that but +few horses jump like Sorcerer, so gallantly, so sympathetically, and +with such supreme mastery of the subject; but none the less the +enthusiasm that he imparted to me has never been extinguished, and that +October morning ride revealed to me the unsuspected intoxication of +fox-hunting. +</p> + +<p> +Behind me I heard the scrabbling of the Cockatoo's little hoofs among +the loose stones, and Lady Knox, galloping on my left, jerked a +maternal chin over her shoulder to mark her daughter's progress. For +my part, had there been an entire circus behind me, I was far too much +occupied with ramming on my hat and trying to hold Sorcerer, to have +looked round, and all my spare faculties were devoted to steering for +Flurry, who had taken a right-handed turn, and was at that moment +surmounting a bank of uncertain and briary aspect. I surmounted it +also, with the swiftness and simplicity for which the Quaker's methods +of bank jumping had not prepared me, and two or three fields, traversed +at the same steeplechase pace, brought us to a road and to an abrupt +check. There, suddenly, were the hounds, scrambling in baffled silence +down into the road from the opposite bank, to look for the line they +had overrun, and there, amazingly, was Philippa, engaged in excited +converse with several men with spades over their shoulders. +</p> + +<p> +"Did ye see the fox, boys?" shouted Flurry, addressing the group. +</p> + +<p> +"We did! we did!" cried my wife and her friends in chorus; "he ran up +the road!" +</p> + +<p> +"We'd be badly off without Mrs. Yeates!" said Flurry, as he whirled his +mare round and clattered up the road with a hustle of hounds after him. +</p> + +<p> +It occurred to me as forcibly as any mere earthly thing can occur to +those who are wrapped in the sublimities of a run, that, for a young +woman who had never before seen a fox out of a cage at the Zoo, +Philippa was taking to hunting very kindly. Her cheeks were a most +brilliant pink, her blue eyes shone. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, Sinclair!" she exclaimed, "they say he's going for Aussolas, and +there's a road I can ride all the way!" +</p> + +<p> +"Ye can, Miss! Sure we'll show you!" chorussed her cortège. +</p> + +<p> +Her foot was on the pedal ready to mount. Decidedly my wife was in no +need of assistance from me. +</p> + +<p> +Up the road a hound gave a yelp of discovery, and flung himself over a +stile into the fields; the rest of the pack went squealing and jostling +after him, and I followed Flurry over one of those infinitely varied +erections, pleasantly termed "gaps" in Ireland. On this occasion the +gap was made of three razor-edged slabs of slate leaning against an +iron bar, and Sorcerer conveyed to me his thorough knowledge of the +matter by a lift of his hind-quarters that made me feel as if I were +being skilfully kicked downstairs. To what extent I looked it, I +cannot say, nor providentially can Philippa, as she had already +started. I only know that undeserved good luck restored to me my +stirrup before Sorcerer got away with me in the next field. +</p> + +<p> +What followed was, I am told, a very fast fifteen minutes; for me time +was not; the empty fields rushed past uncounted, fences came and went +in a flash, while the wind sang in my ears, and the dazzle of the early +sun was in my eyes. I saw the hounds occasionally, sometimes pouring +over a green bank, as the charging breaker lifts and flings itself, +sometimes driving across a field, as the white tongues of foam slide +racing over the sand; and always ahead of me was Flurry Knox, going as +a man goes who knows his country, who knows his horse, and whose heart +is wholly and absolutely in the right place. +</p> + +<p> +Do what I would, Sorcerer's implacable stride carried me closer and +closer to the brown mare, till, as I thundered down the slope of a long +field, I was not twenty yards behind Flurry. Sorcerer had stiffened +his neck to iron, and to slow him down was beyond me; but I fought his +head away to the right, and found myself coming hard and steady at a +stonefaced bank with broken ground in front of it. Flurry bore away to +the left, shouting something that I did not understand. That Sorcerer +shortened his stride at the right moment was entirely due to his own +judgment; standing well away from the jump, he rose like a stag out of +the tussocky ground, and as he swung my twelve stone six into the air +the obstacle revealed itself to him and me as consisting not of one +bank but of two, and between the two lay a deep grassy lane, half +choked with furze. I have often been asked to state the width of the +bohereen, and can only reply that in my opinion it was at least +eighteen feet; Flurry Knox and Dr. Hickey, who did not jump it, say +that it is not more than five. What Sorcerer did with it I cannot say; +the sensation was of a towering flight with a kick back in it, a +biggish drop, and a landing on cee-springs, still on the downhill +grade. That was how one of the best horses in Ireland took one of +Ireland's most ignorant riders over a very nasty place. +</p> + +<p> +A sombre line of fir-wood lay ahead, rimmed with a grey wall, and in +another couple of minutes we had pulled up on the Aussolas road, and +were watching the hounds struggling over the wall into Aussolas demesne. +</p> + +<p> +"No hurry now," said Flurry, turning in his saddle to watch the +Cockatoo jump into the road, "he's to ground in the big earth inside. +Well, Major, it's well for you that's a big-jumped horse. I thought +you were a dead man a while ago when you faced him at the bohereen!" +</p> + +<p> +I was disclaiming intention in the matter when Lady Knox and the others +joined us. +</p> + +<p> +"I thought you told me your wife was no sportswoman," she said to me, +critically scanning Sorcerer's legs for cuts the while, "but when I saw +her a minute ago she had abandoned her bicycle and was running across +country like——" +</p> + +<p> +"Look at her now!" interrupted Miss Sally. "Oh!—oh!" In the interval +between these exclamations my incredulous eyes beheld my wife in +mid-air, hand in hand with a couple of stalwart country boys, with whom +she was leaping in unison from the top of a bank on to the road. +</p> + +<p> +Every one, even the saturnine Dr. Hickey, began to laugh; I rode back +to Philippa, who was exchanging compliments and congratulations with +her escort. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, Sinclair!" she cried, "wasn't it splendid? I saw you jumping, and +everything! Where are they going now?" +</p> + +<p> +"My dear girl," I said, with marital disapproval, "you're killing +yourself. Where's your bicycle?" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, it's punctured in a sort of lane, back there. It's all right; and +then they"—she breathlessly waved her hand at her attendants—"they +showed me the way." +</p> + +<p> +"Begor! you proved very good, Miss!" said a grinning cavalier. +</p> + +<p> +"Faith she did!" said another, polishing his shining brow with his +white flannel coat-sleeve, "she lepped like a haarse!" +</p> + +<p> +"And may I ask how you propose to go home?" said I. +</p> + +<p> +"I don't know and I don't care! I'm not going home!" She cast an +entirely disobedient eye at me. "And your eye-glass is hanging down +your back and your tie is bulging out over your waistcoat!" +</p> + +<p> +The little group of riders had begun to move away. +</p> + +<p> +"We're going on into Aussolas," called out Flurry; "come on, and make +my grandmother give you some breakfast, Mrs. Yeates; she always has it +at eight o'clock." +</p> + +<p> +The front gates were close at hand, and we turned in under the tall +beech-trees, with the unswept leaves rustling round the horses' feet, +and the lovely blue of the October morning sky filling the spaces +between smooth grey branches and golden leaves. The woods rang with +the voices of the hounds, enjoying an untrammelled rabbit hunt, while +the Master and the Whip, both on foot, strolled along unconcernedly +with their bridles over their arms, making themselves agreeable to my +wife, an occasional touch of Flurry's horn, or a crack of Dr. Rickey's +whip, just indicating to the pack that the authorities still took a +friendly interest in their doings. +</p> + +<p> +Down a grassy glade in the wood a party of old Mrs. Knox's young horses +suddenly swept into view, headed by an old mare, who, with her tail +over her back, stampeded ponderously past our cavalcade, shaking and +swinging her handsome old head, while her youthful friends bucked and +kicked and snapped at each other round her with the ferocious humour of +their kind. +</p> + +<p> +"Here, Jerome, take the horn," said Flurry to Dr. Hickey; "I'm going to +see Mrs. Yeates up to the house, the way these tomfools won't gallop on +top of her." +</p> + +<p> +From this point it seems to me that Philippa's adventures are more +worthy of record than mine, and as she has favoured me with a full +account of them, I venture to think my version may be relied on. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox was already at breakfast when Philippa was led, quaking, into +her formidable presence. My wife's acquaintance with Mrs. Knox was, so +far, limited to a state visit on either side, and she found but little +comfort in Flurry's assurances that his grandmother wouldn't mind if he +brought all the hounds in to breakfast, coupled with the statement that +she would put her eyes on sticks for the Major. +</p> + +<p> +Whatever the truth of this may have been, Mrs. Knox received her guest +with an equanimity quite unshaken by the fact that her boots were in +the fender instead of on her feet, and that a couple of shawls of +varying dimensions and degrees of age did not conceal the inner +presence of a magenta flannel dressing-jacket. She installed Philippa +at the table and plied her with food, oblivious as to whether the +needful implements with which to eat it were forthcoming or no. She +told Flurry where a vixen had reared her family, and she watched him +ride away, with some biting comments on his mare's hocks screamed after +him from the window. +</p> + +<p> +The dining-room at Aussolas Castle is one of the many rooms in Ireland +in which Cromwell is said to have stabled his horse (and probably no +one would have objected less than Mrs. Knox had she been consulted in +the matter). Philippa questions if the room had ever been tidied up +since, and she endorses Flurry's observation that "there wasn't a day +in the year you wouldn't get feeding for a hen and chickens on the +floor." Opposite to Philippa, on a Louis Quinze chair, sat Mrs. Knox's +woolly dog, its suspicious little eyes peering at her out of their +setting of pink lids and dirty white wool. A couple of young horses +outside the windows tore at the matted creepers on the walls, or thrust +faces that were half-shy, half-impudent, into the room. Portly pigeons +waddled to and fro on the broad window-sill, sometimes flying in to +perch on the picture-frames, while they kept up incessantly a hoarse +and pompous cooing. +</p> + +<p> +Animals and children are, as a rule, alike destructive to conversation; +but Mrs. Knox, when she chose, <i>bien entendu</i>, could have made herself +agreeable in a Noah's ark, and Philippa has a gift of sympathetic +attention that personal experience has taught me to regard with +distrust as well as respect, while it has often made me realise the +worldly wisdom of Kingsley's injunction: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +"Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever." +</p> + +<p> +Family prayers, declaimed by Mrs. Knox with alarming austerity, +followed close on breakfast, Philippa and a vinegar-faced henchwoman +forming the family. The prayers were long, and through the open window +as they progressed came distantly a whoop or two; the declamatory tones +staggered a little, and then continued at a distinctly higher rate of +speed. +</p> + +<p> +"Ma'am! Ma'am!" whispered a small voice at the window. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox made a repressive gesture and held on her way. A sudden +outcry of hounds followed, and the owner of the whisper, a small boy +with a face freckled like a turkey's egg, darted from the window and +dragged a donkey and bath-chair into view. Philippa admits to having +lost the thread of the discourse, but she thinks that the "Amen" that +immediately ensued can hardly have come in its usual place. Mrs. Knox +shut the book abruptly, scrambled up from her knees, and said, "They've +found!" +</p> + +<p> +In a surprisingly short space of time she had added to her attire her +boots, a fur cape, and a garden hat, and was in the bath-chair, the +small boy stimulating the donkey with the success peculiar to his +class, while Philippa hung on behind. +</p> + +<p> +The woods of Aussolas are hilly and extensive, and on that particular +morning it seemed that they held as many foxes as hounds. In vain was +the horn blown, and the whips cracked, small rejoicing parties of +hounds, each with a fox of its own, scoured to and fro: every labourer +in the vicinity had left his work, and was sedulously heading every fox +with yells that would have befitted a tiger hunt, and sticks and stones +when occasion served. +</p> + +<p> +"Will I pull out as far as the big rosy-dandhrum, ma'am?" inquired the +small boy; "I seen three of the dogs go in it, and they yowling." +</p> + +<p> +"You will," said Mrs. Knox, thumping the donkey on the back with her +umbrella; "here! Jeremiah Regan! Come down out of that with that +pitchfork! Do you want to kill the fox, you fool?" +</p> + +<p> +"I do not, your honour, ma'am," responded Jeremiah Regan, a tall young +countryman, emerging from a bramble brake. +</p> + +<p> +"Did you see him?" said Mrs. Knox eagerly. +</p> + +<p> +"I seen himself and his ten pups drinking below at the lake ere +yestherday, your honour, ma'am, and he as big as a chestnut horse!" +said Jeremiah. +</p> + +<p> +"Faugh! Yesterday!" snorted Mrs. Knox; "go on to the rhododendrons, +Johnny!" +</p> + +<p> +The party, reinforced by Jeremiah and the pitchfork, progressed at a +high rate of speed along the shrubbery path, encountering <i>en route</i> +Lady Knox, stooping on to her horse's neck under the sweeping branches +of the laurels. +</p> + +<p> +"Your horse is too high for my coverts, Lady Knox," said the Lady of +the Manor, with a malicious eye at Lady Knox's flushed face and dinged +hat; "I'm afraid you will be left behind like Absalom when the hounds +go away!" +</p> + +<p> +"As they never do anything here but hunt rabbits," retorted her +ladyship, "I don't think that's likely." +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox gave her donkey another whack, and passed on. +</p> + +<p> +"Rabbits, my dear!" she said scornfully to Philippa. "That's all she +knows about it. I declare it disgusts me to see a woman of that age +making such a Judy of herself! Rabbits indeed!" +</p> + +<p> +Down in the thicket of rhododendron everything was very quiet for a +time. Philippa strained her eyes in vain to see any of the riders; the +horn blowing and the whip cracking passed on almost out of hearing. +Once or twice a hound worked through the rhododendrons, glanced at the +party, and hurried on, immersed in business. All at once Johnny, the +donkey-boy, whispered excitedly: +</p> + +<p> +"Look at he! Look at he!" and pointed to a boulder of grey rock that +stood out among the dark evergreens. A big yellow cub was crouching on +it; he instantly slid into the shelter of the bushes, and the +irrepressible Jeremiah, uttering a rending shriek, plunged into the +thicket after him. Two or three hounds came rushing at the sound, and +after this Philippa says she finds some difficulty in recalling the +proper order of events; chiefly, she confesses, because of the wholly +ridiculous tears of excitement that blurred her eyes. +</p> + +<p> +"We ran," she said, "we simply tore, and the donkey galloped, and as +for that old Mrs. Knox, she was giving cracked screams to the hounds +all the time, and they were screaming too; and then somehow we were all +out on the road!" +</p> + +<p> +What seems to have occurred was that three couple of hounds, Jeremiah +Regan, and Mrs. Knox's equipage, amongst them somehow hustled the cub +out of Aussolas demesne and up on to a hill on the farther side of the +road. Jeremiah was sent back by his mistress to fetch Flurry, and the +rest of the party pursued a thrilling course along the road, parallel +with that of the hounds, who were hunting slowly through the gorse on +the hillside. +</p> + +<p> +"Upon my honour and word, Mrs. Yeates, my dear, we have the hunt to +ourselves!" said Mrs. Knox to the panting Philippa, as they pounded +along the road. "Johnny, d'ye see the fox?" +</p> + +<p> +"I do, ma'am!" shrieked Johnny, who possessed the usual field-glass +vision bestowed upon his kind. "Look at him over-right us on the hill +above! Hi! The spotty dog have him! No, he's gone from him! <i>Gwan +out o' that</i>!" This to the donkey, with blows that sounded like the +beating of carpets, and produced rather more dust. +</p> + +<p> +They had left Aussolas some half a mile behind, when, from a strip of +wood on their right, the fox suddenly slipped over the bank on to the +road just ahead of them, ran up it for a few yards and whisked in at a +small entrance gate, with the three couple of hounds yelling on a +red-hot scent, not thirty yards behind. The bath-chair party whirled +in at their heels, Philippa and the donkey considerably blown, Johnny +scarlet through his freckles, but as fresh as paint, the old lady blind +and deaf to all things save the chase. The hounds went raging through +the shrubs beside the drive, and away down a grassy slope towards a +shallow glen, in the bottom of which ran a little stream, and after +them over the grass bumped the bath-chair. At the stream they turned +sharply and ran up the glen towards the avenue, which crossed it by +means of a rough stone viaduct. +</p> + +<p> +"'Pon me conscience, he's into the old culvert!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox; +"there was one of my hounds choked there once, long ago! Beat on the +donkey, Johnny!" +</p> + +<p> +At this juncture Philippa's narrative again becomes incoherent, not to +say breathless. She is, however, positive that it was somewhere about +here that the upset of the bath-chair occurred, but she cannot be clear +as to whether she picked up the donkey or Mrs. Knox, or whether she +herself was picked up by Johnny while Mrs. Knox picked up the donkey. +From my knowledge of Mrs. Knox I should say she picked up herself and +no one else. At all events, the next salient point is the palpitating +moment when Mrs. Knox, Johnny, and Philippa successively applying an +eye to the opening of the culvert by which the stream trickled under +the viaduct, while five dripping hounds bayed and leaped around them, +discovered by more senses than that of sight that the fox was in it, +and furthermore that one of the hounds was in it too. +</p> + +<p> +"There's a sthrong grating before him at the far end," said Johnny, his +head in at the mouth of the hole, his voice sounding as if he were +talking into a jug, "the two of them's fighting in it; they'll be +choked surely!" +</p> + +<p> +"Then don't stand gabbling there, you little fool, but get in and pull +the hound out!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox, who was balancing herself on a +stone in the stream. +</p> + +<p> +"I'd be in dread, ma'am," whined Johnny. +</p> + +<p> +"Balderdash!" said the implacable Mrs. Knox. "In with you!" +</p> + +<p> +I understand that Philippa assisted Johnny into the culvert, and +presume that it was in so doing that she acquired the two Robinson +Crusoe bare footprints which decorated her jacket when I next met her. +</p> + +<p> +"Have you got hold of him yet, Johnny?" cried Mrs. Knox up the culvert. +</p> + +<p> +"I have, ma'am, by the tail," responded Johnny's voice, sepulchral in +the depths. +</p> + +<p> +"Can you stir him, Johnny?" +</p> + +<p> +"I cannot, ma'am, and the wather is rising in it." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, please God, they'll not open the mill dam!" remarked Mrs. Knox +philosophically to Philippa, as she caught hold of Johnny's dirty +ankles. "Hold on to the tail, Johnny!" +</p> + +<p> +She hauled, with, as might be expected, no appreciable result. "Run, +my dear, and look for somebody, and we'll have that fox yet!" +</p> + +<p> +Philippa ran, whither she knew not, pursued by fearful visions of +bursting mill-dams, and maddened foxes at bay. As she sped up the +avenue she heard voices, robust male voices, in a shrubbery, and made +for them. Advancing along an embowered walk towards her was what she +took for one wild instant to be a funeral; a second glance showed her +that it was a party of clergymen of all ages, walking by twos and +threes in the dappled shade of the over-arching trees. Obviously she +had intruded her sacrilegious presence into a Clerical Meeting. She +acknowledges that at this awe-inspiring spectacle she faltered, but the +thought of Johnny, the hound, and the fox, suffocating, possibly +drowning together in the culvert, nerved her. She does not remember +what she said or how she said it, but I fancy she must have conveyed to +them the impression that old Mrs. Knox was being drowned, as she +immediately found herself heading a charge of the Irish Church towards +the scene of disaster. +</p> + +<p> +Fate has not always used me well, but on this occasion it was +mercifully decreed that I and the other members of the hunt should be +privileged to arrive in time to see my wife and her rescue party +precipitating themselves down the glen. +</p> + +<p> +"Holy Biddy!" ejaculated Flurry, "is she running a paper-chase with all +the parsons? But look! For pity's sake will you look at my +grandmother and my Uncle Eustace?" +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox and her sworn enemy the old clergyman, whom I had met at +dinner the night before, were standing, apparently in the stream, +tugging at two bare legs that projected from a hole in the viaduct, and +arguing at the top of their voices. The bath-chair lay on its side +with the donkey grazing beside it, on the bank a stout Archdeacon was +tendering advice, and the hounds danced and howled round the entire +group. +</p> + +<p> +"I tell you, Eliza, you had better let the Archdeacon try," thundered +Mr. Hamilton. +</p> + +<p> +"Then I tell you I will not!" vociferated Mrs. Knox, with a tug at the +end of the sentence that elicited a subterranean lament from Johnny. +"Now who was right about the second grating? I told you so twenty +years ago!" +</p> + +<p> +Exactly as Philippa and her rescue party arrived, the efforts of Mrs. +Knox and her brother-in-law triumphed. The struggling, sopping form of +Johnny was slowly drawn from the hole, drenched, speechless, but +clinging to the stern of a hound, who, in its turn, had its jaws fast +in the hind-quarters of a limp, yellow cub. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, it's dead!" wailed Philippa, "I <i>did</i> think I should have been in +time to save it!" +</p> + +<p> +"Well, if that doesn't beat all!" said Dr. Hickey. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap07"></a>VII<br/> +A MISDEAL</h2> + +<p> +The wagonette slewed and slackened mysteriously on the top of the long +hill above Drumcurran. So many remarkable things had happened since we +had entrusted ourselves to the guidance of Mr. Bernard Shute that I +rose in my place and possessed myself of the brake, and in so doing saw +the horses with their heads hard in against their chests, and their +quarters jammed crookedly against the splashboard, being apparently +tied into knots by some inexplicable power. +</p> + +<p> +"Some one's pulling the reins out of my hand!" exclaimed Mr. Shute. +</p> + +<p> +The horses and pole were by this time making an acute angle with the +wagonette, and the groom plunged from the box to their heads. Miss +Sally Knox, who was sitting beside me, looked over the edge. +</p> + +<p> +"Put on the brake! the reins are twisted round the axle!" she cried, +and fell into a fit of laughter. +</p> + +<p> +We all—that is to say, Philippa, Miss Shute, Miss Knox, and I—got out +as speedily as might be; but, I think, without panic; Mr. Shute alone +stuck to the ship, with the horses struggling and rearing below him. +The groom and I contrived to back them, and by so doing caused the +reins to unwind themselves from the axle. +</p> + +<p> +"It was my fault," said Mr. Shute, hauling them in as fast as we could +give them to him; "I broke the reins yesterday, and these are the +phaeton ones, and about six fathoms long at that, and I forgot and let +the slack go overboard. It's all right, I won't do it again." +</p> + +<p> +With this reassurance we confided ourselves once more to the wagonette. +</p> + +<p> +As we neared the town of Drumcurran the fact that we were on our way to +a horse fair became alarmingly apparent. It is impossible to imagine +how we pursued an uninjured course through the companies of horsemen, +the crowded carts, the squealing colts, the irresponsible led horses, +and, most immutable of all obstacles, the groups of countrywomen, with +the hoods of their heavy blue cloaks over their heads. They looked +like nuns of some obscure order; they were deaf and blind as ramparts +of sandbags; nothing less callous to human life than a Parisian +cabdriver could have burst a way through them. Many times during that +drive I had cause to be thankful for the sterling qualities of Mr. +Shute's brake; with its aid he dragged his over-fed bays into a crawl +that finally, and not without injury to the varnish, took the wagonette +to the Royal Hotel. Every available stall in the yard was by that time +filled, and it was only by virtue of the fact that the kitchenmaid was +nearly related to my cook that the indignant groom was permitted to +stable the bays in a den known as the calf-house. +</p> + +<p> +That I should have lent myself to such an expedition was wholly due to +my wife. Since Philippa had taken up her residence in Ireland she had +discovered a taste for horses that was not to be extinguished, even by +an occasional afternoon on the Quaker, whose paces had become harder +than rock in his many journeys to Petty Sessions; she had also +discovered the Shutes, newcomers on the outer edge of our vast visiting +district, and between them this party to Drumcurran Horse Fair had been +devised. Philippa proposed to buy herself a hunter. Bernard Shute +wished to do the same, possibly two hunters, money being no difficulty +with this fortunate young man. Miss Sally Knox was of the company, and +I also had been kindly invited, as to a missionary meeting, to come, +and bring my cheque-book. The only saving clause in the affair was the +fact that Mr. Flurry Knox was to meet us at the scene of action. +</p> + +<p> +The fair was held in a couple of large fields outside the town, and on +the farther bank of the Curranhilty River. Across a wide and +glittering ford, horses of all sizes and sorts were splashing, and a +long row of stepping-stones was hopped, and staggered, and scrambled +over by a ceaseless variety of foot-passengers. A man with a cart +plied as a ferry boat, doing a heavy trade among the applewomen and +vendors of "crubeens," <i>alias</i> pigs' feet, a grisly delicacy peculiar +to Irish open-air holiday-making, and the July sun blazed on a scene +that even Miss Cecilia Shute found to be almost repayment enough for +the alarms of the drive. +</p> + +<p> +"As a rule, I am so bored by driving that I find it reviving to be +frightened," she said to me, as we climbed to safety on a heathery +ridge above the fields dedicated to galloping the horses; "but when my +brother scraped all those people off one side of that car, and ran the +pole into the cart of lemonade-bottles, I began to wish for courage to +tell him I was going to get out and walk home." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, if you only knew it," said Bernard, who was spreading rugs over +the low furze bushes in the touching belief that the prickles would not +come through, "the time you came nearest to walking home was when the +lash of the whip got twisted round Nancy's tail. Miss Knox, you're an +authority on these things—don't you think it would be a good scheme to +have a light anchor in the trap, and when the horses began to play the +fool, you'd heave the anchor over the fence and bring them up all +standing?" +</p> + +<p> +"They wouldn't stand very long," remarked Miss Sally. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, that's all right," returned the inventor; "I'd have a dodge to +cast them loose, with the pole and the splinter-bar." +</p> + +<p> +"You'd never see them again," responded Miss Knox demurely, "if you +thought that mattered." +</p> + +<p> +"It would be the brightest feature of the case," said Miss Shute. +</p> + +<p> +She was surveying Miss Sally through her pince-nez as she spoke, and +was, I have reason to believe, deciding that by the end of the day her +brother would be well on in the first stages of his fifteenth love +affair. +</p> + +<p> +It has possibly been suspected that Mr. Bernard Shute was a sailor, had +been a sailor rather, until within the last year, when he had tumbled +into a fortune and a property, and out of the navy, in the shortest +time on record. His enthusiasm for horses had been nourished by the +hirelings of Malta, and other resorts of her Majesty's ships, and his +knowledge of them was, so far, bounded by the fact that it was more +usual to come off over their heads than their tails. For the rest, he +was a clean-shaved and personable youth, with a laugh which I may, +without offensive intention, define as possessing a what-cheeriness +special to his profession, and a habit, engendered no doubt by long +sojourns at the Antipodes, of getting his clothes in large hideous +consignments from a naval outfitter. +</p> + +<p> +It was eleven o'clock, and the fair was in full swing. Its vortex was +in the centre of the field below us, where a low bank of sods and earth +had been erected as a trial jump, with a yelling crowd of men and boys +at either end, acting instead of the usual wings to prevent a swerve. +Strings of reluctant horses were scourged over the bank by dozens of +willing hands, while exhortation, cheers, and criticism were freely +showered upon each performance. +</p> + +<p> +"Give the knees to the saddle, boy, and leave the heels slack." +"That's a nice horse. He'd keep a jock on his back where another'd +throw him!" "Well jumped, begor! She fled that fairly!" as an +ungainly three-year-old flounced over the bank without putting a hoof +on it. Then her owner, unloosing his pride in simile after the manner +of his race, +</p> + +<p> +"Ah ha! when she give a lep, man, she's that free, she's like a hare +for it!" +</p> + +<p> +A giggling group of country girls elbowed their way past us out of the +crowd of spectators, one of the number inciting her fellows to hurry on +to the other field "until they'd see the lads galloping the horses," to +which another responding that she'd "be skinned alive for the horses," +the party sped on their way. We—<i>i.e.</i> my wife, Miss Knox, Bernard +Shute, and myself—followed in their wake, a matter by no means as easy +as it looked. Miss Shute had exhibited her wonted intelligence by +remaining on the hilltop with the "Spectator"; she had not reached the +happy point of possessing a mind ten years older than her age, and a +face ten years younger, without also developing the gift of scenting +boredom from afar. We squeezed past the noses and heels of fidgety +horses, and circumnavigated their attendant groups of critics, while +half-trained brutes in snaffles bolted to nowhere and back again, and +whinnying foals ran to and fro in search of their mothers. +</p> + +<p> +A moderate bank divided the upper from the lower fields, and as every +feasible spot in it was commanded by a refusing horse, the choice of a +place and moment for crossing it required judgment. I got Philippa +across it in safety; Miss Knox, though as capable as any young woman in +Ireland of getting over a bank, either on horseback or on her own legs, +had to submit to the assistance of Mr. Shute, and the laws of dynamics +decreed that a force sufficient to raise a bower anchor should hoist +her seven stone odd to the top of the bank with such speed that she +landed half on her knees and half in the arms of her pioneer. A group +of portentously quiet men stood near, their eyes on the ground, their +hands in their pockets; they were all dressed so much alike that I did +not at first notice that Flurry Knox was among them; when I did, I +perceived that his eyes, instead of being on the ground, were surveying +Mr. Shute with that measure of disapproval that he habitually bestowed +upon strange men. +</p> + +<p> +"You're later than I thought you'd be," he said. "I have a horse +half-bought for Mrs. Yeates. It's that old mare of Bobby Bennett's; +she makes a little noise, but she's a good mare, and you couldn't throw +her down if you tried. Bobby wants thirty pounds for her, but I think +you might get her for less. She's in the hotel stables, and you can +see her when you go to lunch." +</p> + +<p> +We moved on towards the rushy bank of the river, and Philippa and Sally +Knox seated themselves on a low rock, looking, in their white frocks, +as incongruous in that dingy preoccupied assemblage as the dreamy +meadow-sweet and purple spires of loosestrife that thronged the river +banks. Bernard Shute had been lost in the shifting maze of men and +horses, who were, for the most part, galloping with the blind fury of +charging bulls; but presently, among a party who seemed to be riding +the finish of a race, we descried our friend, and a second or two later +he hauled a brown mare to a standstill in front of us. +</p> + +<p> +"The fellow's asking forty-five pounds for her," he said to Miss Sally; +"she's a nailer to gallop. I don't think it's too much?" +</p> + +<p> +"Her grandsire was the Mountain Hare," said the owner of the mare, +hurrying up to continue her family history, "and he was the grandest +horse in the four baronies. He was forty-two years of age when he +died, and they waked him the same as ye'd wake a Christian. They had +whisky and porther—and bread—and a piper in it." +</p> + +<p> +"Thim Mountain Hare colts is no great things," interrupted Mr. Shute's +groom contemptuously. "I seen a colt once that was one of his stock, +and if there was forty men and their wives, and they after him with +sticks, he wouldn't lep a sod of turf." +</p> + +<p> +"Lep, is it!" ejaculated the owner in a voice shrill with outrage. +"You may lead that mare out through the counthry, and there isn't a +fence in it that she wouldn't go up to it as indepindent as if she was +going to her bed, and your honour's ladyship knows that dam well, Miss +Knox." +</p> + +<p> +"You want too much money for her, McCarthy," returned Miss Sally, with +her little air of preternatural wisdom. +</p> + +<p> +"God pardon you, Miss Knox! Sure a lady like you knows well that +forty-five pounds is no money for that mare. Forty-five pounds!" He +laughed. "It'd be as good for me to make her a present to the +gentleman all out as take three farthings less for her! She's too +grand entirely for a poor farmer like me, and if it wasn't for the long +weak family I have, I wouldn't part with her under twice the money." +</p> + +<p> +"Three fine lumps of daughters in America paying his rent for him," +commented Flurry in the background. "That's the long weak family!" +</p> + +<p> +Bernard dismounted and slapped the mare's ribs approvingly. +</p> + +<p> +"I haven't had such a gallop since I was at Rio," he said. "What do +you think of her, Miss Knox?" Then, without waiting for an answer, "I +like her. I think I may as well give him the forty-five and have done +with it!" +</p> + +<p> +At these ingenuous words I saw a spasm of anguish cross the countenance +of McCarthy, easily interpreted as the first pang of a life-long regret +that he had not asked twice the money. Flurry Knox put up an eyebrow +and winked at me; Mr. Shute's groom turned away for very shame. Sally +Knox laughed with the deplorable levity of nineteen. +</p> + +<p> +Thus, with a brevity absolutely scandalous in the eyes of all +beholders, the bargain was concluded. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry strolled up to Philippa, observing an elaborate remoteness from +Miss Sally and Mr. Shute. +</p> + +<p> +"I believe I'm selling a horse here myself to-day," he said; "would you +like to have a look at him, Mrs. Yeates?" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, are you selling, Knox?" struck in Bernard, to whose brain the +glory of buying a horse had obviously mounted like new wine; "I want +another, and I know yours are the right sort." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, as you seem fond of galloping," said Flurry sardonically, "this +one might suit you." +</p> + +<p> +"You don't mean the Moonlighter?" said Miss Knox, looking fixedly at +him. +</p> + +<p> +"Supposing I did, have you anything to say against him?" replied Flurry. +</p> + +<p> +Decidedly he was in a very bad temper. Miss Sally shrugged her +shoulders, and gave a little shred of a laugh, but said no more. +</p> + +<p> +In a comparatively secluded corner of the field we came upon +Moonlighter, sidling and fussing, with flickering ears, his tail +tightly tucked in and his strong back humped in a manner that boded +little good. Even to my untutored eye, he appeared to be an uncommonly +good-looking animal, a well-bred grey, with shoulders that raked back +as far as the eye could wish, the true Irish jumping hindquarters, and +a showy head and neck; it was obvious that nothing except Michael +Hallahane's adroit chucks at his bridle kept him from displaying his +jumping powers free of charge. Bernard stared at him in silence; not +the pregnant and intimidating silence of the connoisseur, but the +tongue-tied muteness of helpless ignorance. His eye for horses had +most probably been formed on circus posters, and the advertisements of +a well-known embrocation, and Moonlighter approximated in colour and +conduct to these models. +</p> + +<p> +"I can see he's a ripping fine horse," he said at length; "I think I +should like to try him." +</p> + +<p> +Miss Knox changed countenance perceptibly, and gave a perturbed glance +at Flurry. Flurry remained impenetrably unamiable. +</p> + +<p> +"I don't pretend to be a judge of horses," went on Mr. Shute. "I dare +say I needn't tell you that!" with a very engaging smile at Miss Sally; +"but I like this one awfully." +</p> + +<p> +As even Philippa said afterwards, she would not have given herself away +like that over buying a reel of cotton. +</p> + +<p> +"Are you quite sure that he's really the sort of horse you want?" said +Miss Knox, with rather more colour in her face than usual; "he's only +four years old, and he's hardly a finished hunter." +</p> + +<p> +The object of her philanthropy looked rather puzzled. "What! can't he +jump?" he said. +</p> + +<p> +"Is it jump?" exclaimed Michael Hallahane, unable any longer to contain +himself; "is it the horse that jumped five foot of a clothes line in +Heffernan's yard, and not a one on his back but himself, and didn't +leave so much as the thrack of his hoof on the quilt that was hanging +on it!" +</p> + +<p> +"That's about good enough," said Mr. Shute, with his large friendly +laugh; "what's your price, Knox? I must have the horse that jumped the +quilt! I'd like to try him, if you don't mind. There are some +jolly-looking banks over there." +</p> + +<p> +"My price is a hundred sovereigns," said Flurry; "you can try him if +you like." +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, don't!" cried Sally impulsively; but Bernard's foot was already in +the stirrup. "I call it disgraceful!" I heard her say in a low voice +to her kinsman—"you know he can't ride." +</p> + +<p> +The kinsman permitted himself a malign smile. "That's his look-out," +he said. +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps the unexpected docility with which Moonlighter allowed himself +to be manoeuvred through the crowd was due to Bernard's thirteen stone; +at all events, his progress through a gate into the next field was +unexceptionable. Bernard, however, had no idea of encouraging this +tranquillity. He had come out to gallop, and without further ceremony +he drove his heels into Moonlighter's sides, and took the consequences +in the shape of a very fine and able buck. How he remained within even +visiting distance of the saddle it is impossible to explain; perhaps +his early experience in the rigging stood him in good stead in the +matter of hanging on by his hands; but, however preserved, he did +remain, and went away down the field at what he himself subsequently +described as "the rate of knots." +</p> + +<p> +Flurry flung away his cigarette and ran to a point of better +observation. We all ran, including Michael Hallahane and various +onlookers, and were in time to see Mr. Shute charging the least +advantageous spot in a hollow-faced furzy bank. Nothing but the grey +horse's extreme activity got the pair safely over; he jumped it on a +slant, changed feet in the heart of a furze-bush, and was lost to view. +In what relative positions Bernard and his steed alighted was to us a +matter of conjecture; when we caught sight of them again, Moonlighter +was running away, with his rider still on his back, while the slope of +the ground lent wings to his flight. +</p> + +<p> +"That young gentleman will be apt to be killed," said Michael Hallahane +with composure, not to say enjoyment. +</p> + +<p> +"He'll be into the long bog with him pretty soon," said Flurry, his +keen eye tracking the fugitive. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh!—I thought he was off that time!" exclaimed Miss Sally, with a +gasp in which consternation and amusement were blended. "There! He +<i>is</i> into the bog!" +</p> + +<p> +It did not take us long to arrive at the scene of disaster, to which, +as to a dog-fight, other foot-runners were already hurrying, and on our +arrival we found things looking remarkably unpleasant for Mr. Shute and +Moonlighter. The latter was sunk to his withers in the sheet of black +slime into which he had stampeded; the former, submerged to the waist +three yards farther away in the bog, was trying to drag himself towards +firm ground by the aid of tussocks of wiry grass. +</p> + +<p> +"Hit him!" shouted Flurry. "Hit him! he'll sink if he stops there!" +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Shute turned on his adviser a face streaming with black mud, out of +which his brown eyes and white teeth gleamed with undaunted +cheerfulness. +</p> + +<p> +"All jolly fine," he called back; "if I let go this grass I'll sink +too!" +</p> + +<p> +A shout of laughter from the male portion of the spectators +sympathetically greeted this announcement, and a dozen equally futile +methods of escape were suggested. Among those who had joined us was, +fortunately, one of the many boys who pervaded the fair selling +halters, and, by means of several of these knotted together, a line of +communication was established. Moonlighter, who had fallen into the +state of inane stupor in which horses in his plight so often indulge, +was roused to activity by showers of stones and imprecations but +faintly chastened by the presence of ladies. Bernard, hanging on to +his tail, belaboured him with a cane, and, finally, the reins proving +good, the task of towing the victims ashore was achieved. +</p> + +<p> +"He's mine, Knox, you know," were Mr. Shute's first words as he +scrambled to his feet; "he's the best horse I ever got across—worth +twice the money!" +</p> + +<p> +"Faith, he's aisy plased!" remarked a bystander. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, do go and borrow some dry clothes," interposed Philippa +practically; "surely there must be some one——" +</p> + +<p> +"There's a shop in the town where he can strip a peg for 13<i>s.</i> 9<i>d.</i>," +said Flurry grimly; "I wouldn't care myself about the clothes you'd +borrow here!" +</p> + +<p> +The morning sun shone jovially upon Moonlighter and his rider, caking +momently the black bog stuff with which both were coated, and as the +group disintegrated, and we turned to go back, every man present was +pleasurably aware that the buttons of Mr. Shute's riding breeches had +burst at the knee, causing a large triangular hiatus above his gaiter. +</p> + +<p> +"Well," said Flurry conclusively to me as we retraced our steps, "I +always thought the fellow was a fool, but I never thought he was such a +damned fool." +</p> + +<p> +It seemed an interminable time since breakfast when our party, somewhat +shattered by the stirring events of the morning, found itself gathered +in an upstairs room at the Royal Hotel, waiting for a meal that had +been ordained some two hours before. The air was charged with the +mingled odours of boiling cabbage and frying mutton; we affected to +speak of them with disgust, but our souls yearned to them. Female +ministrants, with rustling skirts and pounding feet, raced along the +passages with trays that were never for us, and opening doors released +roaring gusts of conversation, blended with the clatter of knives and +forks, and still we starved. Even the ginger-coloured check suit, +lately labelled "The Sandringham. Wonderful value, 16<i>s.</i> 9<i>d.</i>" in +the window of Drumcurran's leading mart, and now displayed upon Mr. +Shute's all too lengthy limbs, had lost its power to charm. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, don't tear that bell quite out by the roots, Bernard," said his +sister, from the heart of a lamentable yawn. "I dare say it only +amuses them when we ring, but it may remind them that we are still +alive. Major Yeates, do you or do you not regret the pigs' feet?" +</p> + +<p> +"More than I can express," I said, turning from the window, where I had +been looking down at the endless succession of horses' backs and men's +hats, moving in two opposing currents in the street below. "I dare say +if we talk about them for a little we shall feel ill, and that will be +better than nothing." +</p> + +<p> +At this juncture, however, a heavy-laden tray thumped against the door, +and our repast was borne into the room by a hot young woman in creaking +boots, who hoarsely explained that what kept her was waiting on the +potatoes, and that the ould pan that was in it was playing Puck with +the beefsteaks. +</p> + +<p> +"Well," said Miss Shute, as she began to try conclusions between a +blunt knife and a bullet-proof mutton chop, "I have never lived in the +country before, but I have always been given to understand that the +village inn was one of its chief attractions." She delicately moved +the potato dish so as to cover the traces of a bygone egg, and her +glance lingered on the flies that dragged their way across a melting +mound of salt butter. "I like local colour, but I don't care about it +on the tablecloth." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, I'm feeling quite anxious about Irish country hotels now," said +Bernard; "they're getting so civilised and respectable. After all, +when you go back to England no one cares a pin to hear that you've been +done up to the knocker. That don't amuse them a bit. But all my +friends are as pleased as anything when I tell them of the pothouse +where I slept in my clothes rather than face the sheets, or how, when I +complained to the landlady next day, she said, 'Cock ye up! Wasn't it +his Reverence the Dean of Kilcoe had them last!'" +</p> + +<p> +We smiled wanly; what I chiefly felt was respect for any hungry man who +could jest in presence of such a meal. +</p> + +<p> +"All this time my hunter hasn't been bought," said Philippa presently, +leaning back in her chair, and abandoning the unequal contest with her +beefsteak. "Who is Bobby Bennett? Will his horse carry a lady?" +</p> + +<p> +Sally Knox looked at me and began to laugh. +</p> + +<p> +"You should ask Major Yeates about Bobby Bennett," she said. +</p> + +<p> +Confound Miss Sally! It had never seemed worth while to tell Philippa +all that story about my doing up Miss Bobby Bennett's hair, and I sank +my face in my tumbler of stagnant whisky-and-soda to conceal the colour +that suddenly adorned it. Any intelligent man will understand that it +was a situation calculated to amuse the ungodly, but without any real +fun in it. I explained Miss Bennett as briefly as possible, and at all +the more critical points Miss Sally's hazel-green eyes roamed slowly +and mercilessly towards me. +</p> + +<p> +"You haven't told Mrs. Yeates that she's one of the greatest +horse-copers in the country," she said, when I had got through somehow; +"she can sell you a very good horse sometimes, and a very bad one too, +if she gets the chance." +</p> + +<p> +"No one will ever explain to me," said Miss Shute, scanning us all with +her dark, half-amused, and wholly sophisticated eyes, "why horse-coping +is more respectable than cheating at cards. I rather respect people +who are able to cheat at cards; if every one did, it would make whist +so much more cheerful; but there is no forgiveness for dealing yourself +the right card, and there is no condemnation for dealing your neighbour +a very wrong horse!" +</p> + +<p> +"Your neighbour is supposed to be able to take care of himself," said +Bernard. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, why doesn't that apply to card-players?" returned his sister; +"are they all in a state of helpless innocence?" +</p> + +<p> +"I'm helplessly innocent," announced Philippa, "so I hope Miss Bennett +won't deal me a wrong horse." +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, her mare is one of the right ones," said Miss Sally; "she's a +lovely jumper, and her manners are the very best." +</p> + +<p> +The door opened, and Flurry Knox put in his head. "Bobby Bennett's +downstairs," he said to me mysteriously. +</p> + +<p> +I got up, not without consciousness of Miss Sally's eye, and prepared +to follow him. "You'd better come too, Mrs. Yeates, to keep an eye on +him. Don't let him give her more than thirty, and if he gives that she +should return him two sovereigns." This last injunction was bestowed +in a whisper as we descended the stairs. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Bennett was in the crowded yard of the hotel, looking handsome and +overdressed, and she greeted me with just that touch of Auld Lang Syne +in her manner that I could best have dispensed with. I turned to the +business in hand without delay. The brown mare was led forth from the +stable and paraded for our benefit; she was one of those inconspicuous, +meritorious animals about whom there seems nothing particular to say, +and I felt her legs and looked hard at her hocks, and was not much the +wiser. +</p> + +<p> +"It's no use my saying she doesn't make a noise," said Miss Bobby, +"because every one in the country will tell you she does. You can have +a vet. if you like, and that's the only fault he can find with her. +But if Mrs. Yeates hasn't hunted before now, I'll guarantee Cruiskeen +as just the thing for her. She's really safe and confidential. My +little brother Georgie has hunted her—<i>you</i> remember Georgie, Major +Yeates?—the night of the ball, you know—and he's only eleven. Mr. +Knox can tell you what sort she is." +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, she's a grand mare," said Mr. Knox, thus appealed to; "you'd hear +her coming three fields off like a German band!" +</p> + +<p> +"And well for you if you could keep within three fields of her!" +retorted Miss Bennett. "At all events, she's not like the hunter you +sold Uncle, that used to kick the stars as soon as I put my foot in the +stirrup!" +</p> + +<p> +"'Twas the size of the foot frightened him," said Flurry. +</p> + +<p> +"Do you know how Uncle cured him?" said Miss Bennett, turning her back +on her adversary; "he had him tied head and tail across the yard gate, +and every man that came in had to get over his back!" +</p> + +<p> +"That's no bad one!" said Flurry. +</p> + +<p> +Philippa looked from one to the other in bewilderment, while the +badinage continued, swift and unsmiling, as became two hierarchs of +horse-dealing; it went on at intervals for the next ten minutes, and at +the end of that time I had bought the mare for thirty pounds. As Miss +Bennett said nothing about giving me back two of them, I had not the +nerve to suggest it. +</p> + +<p> +After this Flurry and Miss Bennett went away, and were swallowed up in +the fair; we returned to our friends upstairs, and began to arrange +about getting home. This, among other difficulties, involved the +tracking and capture of the Shutes' groom, and took so long that it +necessitated tea. Bernard and I had settled to ride our new purchases +home, and the groom was to drive the wagonette—an alteration ardently +furthered by Miss Shute. The afternoon was well advanced when Bernard +and I struggled through the turmoil of the hotel yard in search of our +horses, and, the hotel hostler being nowhere to be found, the Shutes' +man saddled our animals for us, and then withdrew, to grapple +single-handed with the bays in the calf-house. +</p> + +<p> +"Good business for me, that Knox is sending the grey horse home for +me," remarked Bernard, as his new mare followed him tractably out of +the stall. "He'd have been rather a handful in this hole of a place." +</p> + +<p> +He shoved his way out of the yard in front of me, seemingly quite +comfortable and at home upon the descendant of the Mountain Hare, and I +followed as closely as drunken carmen and shafts of erratic carts would +permit. Cruiskeen evinced a decided tendency to turn to the right on +leaving the yard, but she took my leftward tug in good part, and we +moved on through the streets of Drumcurran with a dignity that was only +impaired by the irrepressible determination of Mr. Shute's new trousers +to run up his leg. It was a trifle disappointing that Cruiskeen should +carry her nose in the air like a camel, but I set it down to my own bad +hands, and to that cause I also imputed her frequent desire to stop, a +desire that appeared to coincide with every fourth or fifth +public-house on the line of march. Indeed, at the last corner before +we left the town, Miss Bennett's mare and I had a serious difference of +opinion, in the course of which she mounted the pavement and remained +planted in front of a very disreputable public-house, whose owner had +been before me several times for various infringements of the Licensing +Acts. Bernard and the corner-boys were of course much pleased; I +inwardly resolved to let Miss Bennett know how her groom occupied his +time in Drumcurran. +</p> + +<p> +We got out into the calm of the country roads without further incident, +and I there discovered that Cruiskeen was possessed of a dromedary +swiftness in trotting, that the action was about as comfortable as the +dromedary's, and that it was extremely difficult to moderate the pace. +</p> + +<p> +"I say! This is something like going!" said Bernard, cantering hard +beside me with slack rein and every appearance of happiness. "Do you +mean to keep it up all the way?" +</p> + +<p> +"You'd better ask this devil," I replied, hauling on the futile ring +snaffle. "Miss Bennett must have an arm like a prize-fighter. If this +is what she calls confidential, I don't want her confidences." +</p> + +<p> +After another half-mile, during which I cursed Flurry Knox, and +registered a vow that Philippa should ride Cruiskeen in a cavalry bit, +we reached the cross-roads at which Bernard's way parted from mine. +Another difference of opinion between my wife's hunter and me here took +place, this time on the subject of parting from our companion, and I +experienced that peculiar inward sinking that accompanies the birth of +the conviction one has been stuck. There were still some eight miles +between me and home, but I had at least the consolation of knowing that +the brown mare would easily cover it in forty minutes. But in this +also disappointment awaited me. Dropping her head to about the level +of her knees, the mare subsided into a walk as slow as that of the +slowest cow, and very similar in general style. In this manner I +progressed for a further mile, breathing forth, like St. Paul, +threatenings and slaughters against Bobby Bennett and all her +confederates; and then the idea occurred to me that many really +first-class hunters were very poor hacks. I consoled myself with this +for a further period, and presently an opportunity for testing it +presented itself. The road made a long loop round the flank of a hill, +and it was possible to save half a mile or so by getting into the +fields. It was a short cut I had often taken on the Quaker, and it +involved nothing more serious than a couple of low stone "gaps" and an +infantine bank. I turned Cruiskeen at the first of these. She was +evidently surprised. Being in an excessively bad temper, I beat her in +a way that surprised her even more, and she jumped the stones +precipitately and with an ease that showed she knew quite well what she +was about. I vented some further emotion upon her by the convenient +medium of my cane, and galloped her across the field and over the bank, +which, as they say in these parts, she "fled" without putting an iron +on it. It was not the right way to jump it, but it was inspiriting, +and when she had disposed of the next gap without hesitation my waning +confidence in Miss Bennett began to revive. I cantered over the ridge +of the hill, and down it towards the cottage near which I was +accustomed to get out on to the road again. As I neared my wonted +opening in the fence, I saw that it had been filled by a stout pole, +well fixed into the bank at each end, but not more than three feet +high. Cruiskeen pricked her ears at it with intelligence; I trotted +her at it, and gave her a whack. +</p> + +<p> +Ages afterwards there was some one speaking on the blurred edge of a +dream that I was dreaming about nothing in particular. I went on +dreaming, and was impressed by the shape of a fat jug, mottled white +and blue, that intruded itself painfully, and I again heard voices, +very urgent and full of effort, but quite outside any concern of mine. +</p> + +<p> +I also made an effort of some kind; I was doing my very best to be good +and polite, but I was dreaming in a place that whirred, and was +engrossing, and daylight was cold and let in some unknown +unpleasantness. For that time the dream got the better of the +daylight, and then, <i>apropos</i> of nothing, I was standing up in a house +with some one's arm round me; the mottled jug was there, so was the +unpleasantness, and I was talking with most careful, old-world +politeness. +</p> + +<p> +"Sit down now, you're all right," said Miss Bobby Bennett, who was +mopping my face with a handkerchief dipped in the jug. +</p> + +<p> +I perceived that I was asking what had happened. +</p> + +<p> +"She fell over the stick with you," said Miss Bennett; "the dirty +brute!" +</p> + +<p> +With another great effort I hooked myself on to the march of events, as +a truck is dragged out of a siding and hooked to a train. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, the Lord save us!" said a grey-haired woman who held the jug, +"ye're desthroyed entirely, asthore! Oh, glory be to the merciful will +of God, me heart lepped across me shesht when I seen him undher the +horse!" +</p> + +<p> +"Go out and see if the trap's coming," said Miss Bennett; "he should +have found the doctor by this." She stared very closely at my face, +and seemed to find it easier to talk in short sentences. +</p> + +<p> +"We must get those cuts looking better before Mrs. Yeates comes." +</p> + +<p> +After an interval, during which unexpected places in my head ached from +the cold water, the desire to be polite and coherent again came upon me. +</p> + +<p> +"I am sure it was not your mare's fault," I said. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Bennett laughed a very little. I was glad to see her laugh; it +had struck me her face was strangely haggard and frightened. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, of course it wasn't poor Cruiskeen's fault," she said. "She's +nearly home with Mr. Shute by now. That's why I came after you!" +</p> + +<p> +"Mr. Shute!" I said; "wasn't he at the fair that day?" +</p> + +<p> +"He was," answered Miss Bobby, looking at me with very compassionate +eyes; "you and he got on each other's horses by mistake at the hotel, +and you got the worst of the exchange!" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh!" I said, without even trying to understand. +</p> + +<p> +"He's here within, your honour's ladyship, Mrs. Yeates, ma'am," shouted +the grey-haired woman at the door; "don't be unaisy, achudth; he's +doing grand. Sure, I'm telling Miss Binnitt if she was his wife +itself, she couldn't give him betther care!" +</p> + +<p> +The grey-haired woman laughed. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap08"></a>VIII<br/> +THE HOLY ISLAND</h2> + +<p> +For three days of November a white fog stood motionless over the +country. All day and all night smothered booms and bangs away to the +south-west told that the Fastnet gun was hard at work, and the sirens +of the American liners uplifted their monstrous female voices as they +felt their way along the coast of Cork. On the third afternoon the +wind began to whine about the windows of Shreelane, and the barometer +fell like a stone. At 11 P.M. the storm rushed upon us with the roar +and the suddenness of a train; the chimneys bellowed, the tall old +house quivered, and the yelling wind drove against it, as a man puts +his shoulder against a door to burst it in. +</p> + +<p> +We none of us got much sleep, and if Mrs. Cadogan is to be +believed—which experience assures me she is not—she spent the night +in devotional exercises, and in ministering to the panic-stricken +kitchen-maid by the light of a Blessed candle. All that day the storm +screamed on, dry-eyed; at nightfall the rain began, and next morning, +which happened to be Sunday, every servant in the house was a messenger +of Job, laden with tales of leakages, floods, and fallen trees, and +inflated with the ill-concealed glory of their kind in evil tidings. +To Peter Cadogan, who had been to early Mass, was reserved the crowning +satisfaction of reporting that a big vessel had gone on the rocks at +Yokahn Point the evening before, and was breaking up fast; it was +rumoured that the crew had got ashore, but this feature, being +favourable and uninteresting, was kept as much as possible in the +background. Mrs. Cadogan, who had been to America in an ocean liner, +became at once the latest authority on shipwrecks, and was of opinion +that "whoever would be dhrownded, it wouldn't be thim lads o' sailors. +Sure wasn't there the greatest storm ever was in it the time meself was +on the say, and what'd thim fellows do but to put us below entirely in +the ship, and close down the doors on us, the way theirselves'd leg it +when we'd be dhrownding!" +</p> + +<p> +This view of the position was so startlingly novel that Philippa +withdrew suddenly from the task of ordering dinner, and fell up the +kitchen stairs in unsuitable laughter. Philippa has not the most +rudimentary capacity for keeping her countenance. +</p> + +<p> +That afternoon I was wrapped in the slumber, balmiest and most +profound, that follows on a wet Sunday luncheon, when Murray, our D.I. +of police, drove up in uniform, and came into the house on the top of a +gust that set every door banging and every picture dancing on the +walls. He looked as if his eyes had been blown out of his head, and he +wanted something to eat very badly. +</p> + +<p> +"I've been down at the wreck since ten o'clock this morning," he said, +"waiting for her to break up, and once she does there'll be trouble. +She's an American ship, and she's full up with rum, and bacon, and +butter, and all sorts. Bosanquet is there with all his coastguards, +and there are five hundred country people on the strand at this moment, +waiting for the fun to begin. I've got ten of my fellows there, and I +wish I had as many more. You'd better come back with me, Yeates, we +may want the Riot Act before all's done!" +</p> + +<p> +The heavy rain had ceased, but it seemed as if it had fed the wind +instead of calming it, and when Murray and I drove out of Shreelane, +the whole dirty sky was moving, full sailed, in from the south-west, +and the telegraph wires were hanging in a loop from the post outside +the gate. Nothing except a Skebawn car-horse would have faced the +whooping charges of the wind that came at us across Corran Lake; +stimulated mysteriously by whistles from the driver, Murray's yellow +hireling pounded woodenly along against the blast, till the smell of +the torn sea-weed was borne upon it, and we saw the Atlantic waves come +towering into the bay of Tralagough. +</p> + +<p> +The ship was, or had been, a three-masted barque; two of her masts were +gone, and her bows stood high out of water on the reef that forms one +of the shark-like jaws of the bay. The long strand was crowded with +black groups of people, from the bank of heavy shingle that had been +hurled over on to the road, down to the slope where the waves pitched +themselves and climbed and fought and tore the gravel back with them, +as though they had dug their fingers in. The people were nearly all +men, dressed solemnly and hideously in their Sunday clothes; most of +them had come straight from Mass without any dinner, true to that Irish +instinct that places its fun before its food. That the wreck was +regarded as a spree of the largest kind was sufficiently obvious. Our +car pulled up at a public-house that stood askew between the road and +the shingle; it was humming with those whom Irish publicans are pleased +to call "Bonâ feeds," and sundry of the same class were clustered round +the door. Under the wall on the lee-side was seated a bagpiper, +droning out "The Irish Washerwoman" with nodding head and tapping heel, +and a young man was cutting a few steps of a jig for the delectation of +a group of girls. +</p> + +<p> +So far Murray's constabulary had done nothing but exhibit their +imposing chest measurement and spotless uniforms to the Atlantic, and +Bosanquet's coastguards had only salvaged some spars, the debris of a +boat, and a dead sheep, but their time was coming. As we stumbled down +over the shingle, battered by the wind and pelted by clots of foam, +some one beside me shouted, "She's gone!" A hill of water had +smothered the wreck, and when it fell from her again nothing was left +but the bows, with the bowsprit hanging from them in a tangle of +rigging. The clouds, bronzed by an unseen sunset, hung low over her; +in that greedy pack of waves, with the remorseless rocks above and +below her, she seemed the most lonely and tormented of creatures. +</p> + +<p> +About half-an-hour afterwards the cargo began to come ashore on the top +of the rising tide. Barrels were plunging and diving in the trough of +the waves, like a school of porpoises; they were pitched up the beach +in waist-deep rushes of foam; they rolled down again, and were swung up +and shouldered by the next wave, playing a kind of Tom Tiddler's ground +with the coastguards. Some of the barrels were big and dangerous, some +were small and nimble like young pigs, and the bluejackets were up to +their middles as their prey dodged and ducked, and the police lined out +along the beach to keep back the people. Ten men of the R.I.C. can do +a great deal, but they cannot be in more than twenty or thirty places +at the same instant; therefore they could hardly cope with a scattered +and extremely active mob of four or five hundred, many of whom had +taken advantage of their privileges as "bonâ-fide travellers," and all +of whom were determined on getting at the rum. +</p> + +<p> +As the dusk fell the thing got more and more out of hand; the people +had found out that the big puncheons held the rum, and had succeeded in +capturing one. In the twinkling of an eye it was broached, and fifty +backs were shoving round it like a football scrummage. I have heard +many rows in my time: I have seen two Irish regiments—one of them +Militia—at each other's throats in Fermoy barracks; I have heard +Philippa's water spaniel and two fox-terriers hunting a strange cat +round the dairy; but never have I known such untrammelled bedlam as +that which yelled round the rum-casks on Tralagough strand. For it was +soon not a question of one broached cask, or even of two. The barrels +were coming in fast, so fast that it was impossible for the +representatives of law and order to keep on any sort of terms with +them. The people, shouting with laughter, stove in the casks, and +drank rum at 34° above proof, out of their hands, out of their hats, +out of their boots. Women came fluttering over the hillsides through +the twilight, carrying jugs, milk-pails, anything that would hold the +liquor; I saw one of them, roaring with laughter, tilt a filthy zinc +bucket to an old man's lips. +</p> + +<p> +With the darkness came anarchy. The rising tide brought more and yet +more booty: great spars came lunging in on the lap of the waves, mixed +up with cabin furniture, seamen's chests, and the black and slippery +barrels, and the country people continued to flock in, and the drinking +became more and more unbridled. Murray sent for more men and a doctor, +and we slaved on hopelessly in the dark, collaring half-drunken men, +shoving pig-headed casks up hills of shingle, hustling in among groups +of roaring drinkers—we rescued perhaps one barrel in half-a-dozen. I +began to know that there were men there who were not drunk and were not +idle; I was also aware, as the strenuous hours of darkness passed, of +an occasional rumble of cart wheels on the road. It was evident that +the casks which were broached were the least part of the looting, but +even they were beyond our control. The most that Bosanquet, Murray, +and I could do was to concentrate our forces on the casks that had been +secured, and to organise charges upon the swilling crowds in order to +upset the casks that they had broached. Already men and boys were +lying about, limp as leeches, motionless as the dead. +</p> + +<p> +"They'll kill themselves before morning, at this rate!" shouted Murray +to me. "They're drinking it by the quart! Here's another barrel; come +on!" +</p> + +<p> +We rallied our small forces, and after a brief but furious struggle +succeeded in capsizing it. It poured away in a flood over the stones, +over the prostrate figures that sprawled on them, and a howl of +reproach followed. +</p> + +<p> +"If ye pour away any more o' that, Major," said an unctuous voice in my +ear, "ye'll intoxicate the stones and they'll be getting up and +knocking us down!" +</p> + +<p> +I had been aware of a fat shoulder next to mine in the throng as we +heaved the puncheon over, and I now recognised the ponderous wit and +Falstaffian figure of Mr. James Canty, a noted member of the Skebawn +Board of Guardians, and the owner of a large farm near at hand. +</p> + +<p> +"I never saw worse work on this strand," he went on. "I considher +these debaucheries a disgrace to the counthry." +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Canty was famous as an orator, and I presume that it was from long +practice among his fellow P.L.G.'s that he was able, without apparent +exertion, to out-shout the storm. +</p> + +<p> +At this juncture the long-awaited reinforcements arrived, and along +with them came Dr. Jerome Hickey, armed with a black bag. Having +mentioned that the bag contained a pump—not one of the common or +garden variety—and that no pump on board a foundering ship had more +arduous labours to perform, I prefer to pass to other themes. The +wreck, which had at first appeared to be as inexhaustible and as +variously stocked as that in the "Swiss Family Robinson," was beginning +to fail in its supply. The crowd were by this time for the most part +incapable from drink, and the fresh contingent of police tackled their +work with some prospect of success by the light of a tar barrel, +contributed by the owner of the public-house. At about the same time I +began to be aware that I was aching with fatigue, that my clothes hung +heavy and soaked upon me, that my face was stiff with the salt spray +and the bitter wind, and that it was two hours past dinner-time. The +possibility of fried salt herrings and hot whisky and water at the +public-house rose dazzlingly before my mind, when Mr. Canty again +crossed my path. +</p> + +<p> +"In my opinion ye have the whole cargo under conthrol now, Major," he +said, "and the police and the sailors should be able to account for it +all now by the help of the light. Wasn't I the finished fool that I +didn't think to send up to my house for a tar barrel before now! +Well—we're all foolish sometimes! But indeed it's time for us to give +over, and that's what I'm after saying to the Captain and Mr. Murray. +You're exhausted now the three of ye, and if I might make so bold, I'd +suggest that ye'd come up to my little place and have what'd warm ye +before ye'd go home. It's only a few perches up the road." +</p> + +<p> +The tide had turned, the rain had begun again, and the tar barrel +illumined the fact that Dr. Hickey's dreadful duties alone were +pressing. We held a council and finally followed Mr. Canty, picking +our way through wreckage of all kinds, including the human variety. +Near the public-house I stumbled over something that was soft and had a +squeak in it; it was the piper, with his head and shoulders in an +overturned rum-barrel, and the bagpipes still under his arm. +</p> + +<p> +I knew the outward appearance of Mr. Canty's house very well. It was a +typical southern farm-house, with dirty whitewashed walls, a slated +roof, and small, hermetically-sealed windows staring at the morass of +manure which constituted the yard. We followed Mr. Canty up the filthy +lane that led to it, picked our way round vague and squelching spurs of +the manure heap, and were finally led through the kitchen into a +stifling best parlour. Mrs. Canty, a vast and slatternly matron, had +evidently made preparations for us; there was a newly-lighted fire +pouring flame up the chimney from layers of bogwood, there were whisky +and brandy on the table, and a plateful of biscuits sugared in white +and pink. Upon our hostess was a black silk dress which indifferently +concealed the fact that she was short of boot-laces, and that the boots +themselves had made many excursions to the yard and none to the +blacking-bottle. Her manners, however, were admirable, and while I +live I shall not forget her potato cakes. They came in hot and hot +from a pot-oven, they were speckled with caraway seeds, they swam in +salt butter, and we ate them shamelessly and greasily, and washed them +down with hot whisky and water; I knew to a nicety how ill I should be +next day, and heeded not. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, gentlemen," remarked Mr. Canty later on, in his best Board of +Guardians' manner, "I've seen many wrecks between this and the Mizen +Head, but I never witnessed a scene of more disgraceful ex-cess than +what was in it to-night." +</p> + +<p> +"Hear, hear!" murmured Bosanquet with unseemly levity. +</p> + +<p> +"I should say," went on Mr. Canty, "there was at one time to-night +upwards of one hundhred men dead dhrunk on the strand, or anyway so +dhrunk that if they'd attempt to spake they'd foam at the mouth." +</p> + +<p> +"The craytures!" interjected Mrs. Canty sympathetically. +</p> + +<p> +"But if they're dhrunk to-day," continued our host, "it's nothing at +all to what they'll be to-morrow and afther to-morrow, and it won't be +on the strand they'll be dhrinkin' it." +</p> + +<p> +"Why, where will it be?" said Bosanquet, with his disconcerting English +way of asking a point-blank question. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Canty passed his hand over his red cheeks. +</p> + +<p> +"There'll be plenty asking that before all's said and done, Captain," +he said, with a compassionate smile, "and there'll be plenty that could +give the answer if they'll like, but by dam I don't think ye'll be apt +to get much out of the Yokahn boys!" +</p> + +<p> +"The Lord save us, 'twould be better to keep out from the likes o' +thim!" put in Mrs. Canty, sliding a fresh avalanche of potato cakes on +to the dish; "didn't they pull the clothes off the gauger and pour +potheen down his throath till he ran screeching through the streets o' +Skebawn!" +</p> + +<p> +James Canty chuckled. +</p> + +<p> +"I remember there was a wreck here one time, and the undherwriters put +me in charge of the cargo. Brandy it was—cases of the best Frinch +brandy. The people had a song about it, what's this the first verse +was— +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +"One night to the rocks of Yokahn<br/> +Came the barque <i>Isabella</i> so dandy,<br/> +To pieces she went before dawn,<br/> +Herself and her cargo of brandy.<br/> +And all met a wathery grave<br/> +Excepting the vessel's car<i>pen</i>ther,<br/> +Poor fellow, so far from his home." +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Canty chanted these touching lines in a tuneful if wheezy tenor. +"Well, gentlemen, we're all friends here," he continued, "and it's no +harm to mention that this man below at the public-house came askin' me +would I let him have some of it for a consideration. 'Sullivan,' says +I to him, 'if ye ran down gold in a cup in place of the brandy, I +wouldn't give it to you. Of coorse,' says I, 'I'm not sayin' but that +if a bottle was to get a crack of a stick, and it to be broken, and a +man to drink a glass out of it, that would be no more than an +accident.' 'That's no good to me,' says he, 'but if I had twelve +gallons of that brandy in Cork,' says he, 'by the Holy German!' says +he, saying an awful curse, 'I'd sell twenty-five out of it!' Well, +indeed, it was true for him; it was grand stuff. As the saying is, it +would make a horse out of a cow!" +</p> + +<p> +"It appears to be a handy sort of place for keeping a pub," said +Bosanquet. +</p> + +<p> +"Shut to the door, Margaret," said Mr. Canty with elaborate caution. +"It'd be a queer place that wouldn't be handy for Sullivan!" +</p> + +<p> +A further tale of great length was in progress when Dr. Hickey's +Mephistophelian nose was poked into the best parlour. +</p> + +<p> +"Hullo, Hickey! Pumped out? eh?" said Murray. +</p> + +<p> +"If I am, there's plenty more like me," replied the Doctor +enigmatically, "and some of them three times over! James, did these +gentlemen leave you a drop of anything that you'd offer me?" +</p> + +<p> +"Maybe ye'd like a glass of rum, Doctor?" said Mr. Canty with a wink at +his other guests. +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Hickey shuddered. +</p> + +<p> +I had next morning precisely the kind of mouth that I had anticipated, +and it being my duty to spend the better part of the day administering +justice in Skebawn, I received from Mr. Flurry Knox and other of my +brother magistrates precisely the class of condolences on my "Monday +head" that I found least amusing. It was unavailing to point out the +resemblance between hot potato cakes and molten lead, or to dilate on +their equal power of solidifying; the collective wisdom of the Bench +decided that I was suffering from contraband rum, and rejoiced over me +accordingly. +</p> + +<p> +During the next three weeks Murray and Bosanquet put in a time only to +be equalled by that of the heroes in detective romances. They began by +acting on the hint offered by Mr. Canty, and were rewarded by finding +eight barrels of bacon and three casks of rum in the heart of Mr. +Sullivan's turf rick, placed there, so Mr. Sullivan explained with much +detail, by enemies, with the object of getting his licence taken away. +They stabbed potato gardens with crowbars to find the buried barrels, +they explored the chimneys, they raided the cow-houses; and in every +possible and impossible place they found some of the cargo of the late +barque <i>John D. Williams</i>, and, as the sympathetic Mr. Canty said, "For +as much as they found, they left five times as much afther them!" +</p> + +<p> +It was a wet, lingering autumn, but towards the end of November the +rain dried up, the weather stiffened, and a week of light frosts and +blue skies was offered as a tardy apology. Philippa possesses, in +common with many of her sex, an inappeasable passion for picnics, and +her ingenuity for devising occasions for them is only equalled by her +gift for enduring their rigours. I have seen her tackle a moist +chicken pie with a splinter of slate and my stylograph pen. I have +known her to take the tea-basket to an auction, and make tea in a +four-wheeled inside car, regardless of the fact that it was coming +under the hammer in ten minutes, and that the kettle took twenty +minutes to boil. It will therefore be readily understood that the rare +occasions when I was free to go out with a gun were not allowed to pass +uncelebrated by the tea-basket. +</p> + +<p> +"You'd much better shoot Corran Lake to-morrow," my wife said to me one +brilliant afternoon. "We could send the punt over, and I could meet +you on Holy Island with——" +</p> + +<p> +The rest of the sentence was concerned with ways, means, and the +tea-basket, and need not be recorded. +</p> + +<p> +I had taken the shooting of a long snipe bog that trailed from Corran +Lake almost to the sea at Tralagough, and it was my custom to begin to +shoot from the seaward end of it, and finally to work round the lake +after duck. +</p> + +<p> +To-morrow proved a heavenly morning, touched with frost, gilt with sun. +I started early, and the mists were still smoking up from the calm, +all-reflecting lake, as the Quaker stepped out along the level road, +smashing the thin ice on the puddles with his big feet. Behind the +calves of my legs sat Maria, Philippa's brown Irish water-spaniel, +assiduously licking the barrels of my gun, as was her custom when the +ecstasy of going out shooting was hers. Maria had been given to +Philippa as a wedding-present, and since then it had been my wife's +ambition that she should conform to the Beth Gelert standard of being +"a lamb at home, a lion in the chase." Maria did pretty well as a +lion: she hunted all dogs unmistakably smaller than herself, and +whenever it was reasonably possible to do so she devoured the spoils of +the chase, notably jack snipe. It was as a lamb that she failed; +objectionable as I have no doubt a lamb would be as a domestic pet, it +at least would not snatch the cold beef from the luncheon-table, nor +yet, if banished for its crimes, would it spend the night in scratching +the paint off the hall door. Maria bit beggars (who valued their +disgusting limbs at five shillings the square inch), she bullied the +servants, she concealed ducks' claws and fishes' backbones behind the +sofa cushions, and yet, when she laid her brown snout upon my knee, and +rolled her blackguard amber eyes upon me, and smote me with her +feathered paw, it was impossible to remember her iniquities against +her. On shooting mornings Maria ceased to be a buccaneer, a glutton, +and a hypocrite. From the moment when I put my gun together her +breakfast stood untouched until it suffered the final degradation of +being eaten by the cats, and now in the trap she was shivering with +excitement, and agonising in her soul lest she should even yet be left +behind. +</p> + +<p> +Slipper met me at the cross roads from which I had sent back the trap; +Slipper, redder in the nose than anything I had ever seen off the +stage, very husky as to the voice, and going rather tender on both +feet. He informed me that I should have a grand day's shooting, the +head-poacher of the locality having, in a most gentlemanlike manner, +refrained from exercising his sporting rights the day before, on +hearing that I was coming. I understood that this was to be considered +as a mark of high personal esteem, and I set to work at the bog with +suitable gratitude. +</p> + +<p> +In spite of Mr. O'Driscoll's magnanimity, I had not a very good +morning. The snipe were there, but in the perfect stillness of the +weather it was impossible to get near them, and five times out of six +they were up, flickering and dodging, before I was within shot. Maria +became possessed of seven devils and broke away from heel the first +time I let off my gun, ranging far and wide in search of the bird I had +missed, and putting up every live thing for half a mile round, as she +went splashing and steeple-chasing through the bog. Slipper expressed +his opinion of her behaviour in language more appallingly picturesque +and resourceful than any I have heard, even in the Skebawn Courthouse; +I admit that at the time I thought he spoke very suitably. Before she +was recaptured every remaining snipe within earshot was lifted out of +it by Slipper's steam-engine whistles and my own infuriated bellows; it +was fortunate that the bog was spacious and that there was still a long +tract of it ahead, where beyond these voices there was peace. +</p> + +<p> +I worked my way on, jumping treacle-dark drains, floundering through +the rustling yellow rushes, circumnavigating the bog-holes, and taking +every possible and impossible chance of a shot; by the time I had +reached Corran Lake I had got two and a half brace, retrieved by Maria +with a perfection that showed what her powers were when the sinuous +adroitness of Slipper's woodbine stick was fresh in her mind. But with +Maria it was always the unexpected that happened. My last snipe, a +jack, fell in the lake, and Maria, bursting through the reeds with +kangaroo bounds, and cleaving the water like a torpedo-boat, was a +model of all the virtues of her kind. She picked up the bird with a +snake-like dart of her head, clambered with it on to a tussock, and +there, well out of reach of the arm of the law, before our indignant +eyes crunched it twice and bolted it. +</p> + +<p> +"Well," said Slipper complacently, some ten minutes afterwards, "divil +such a bating ever I gave a dog since the day Prince killed owld Mrs. +Knox's paycock! Prince was a lump of a brown tarrier I had one time, +and faith I kicked the toes out o' me owld boots on him before I had +the owld lady composed!" +</p> + +<p> +However composing Slipper's methods may have been to Mrs. Knox, they +had quite the contrary effect upon a family party of duck that had been +lying in the reeds. With horrified outcries they broke into flight, +and now were far away on the ethereal mirror of the lake, among strings +of their fellows that were floating and quacking in preoccupied +indifference to my presence. +</p> + +<p> +A promenade along the lake-shore demonstrated the fact that without a +boat there was no more shooting for me; I looked across to the island +where, some time ago, I had seen Philippa and her punt arrive. The +boat was tied to an overhanging tree, but my wife was nowhere to be +seen. I was opening my mouth to give a hail, when I saw her emerge +precipitately from among the trees and jump into the boat; Philippa had +not in vain spent many summers on the Thames, she was under way in a +twinkling, sculled a score of strokes at the rate of a finish, then +stopped and stared at the peaceful island. I called to her, and in a +minute or two the punt had crackled through the reeds, and shoved its +blunt nose ashore at the spot where I was standing. +</p> + +<p> +"Sinclair," said Philippa in awe-struck tones, "there's something on +the island!" +</p> + +<p> +"I hope there's something to eat there," said I. +</p> + +<p> +"I tell you there <i>is</i> something there, alive," said my wife with her +eyes as large as saucers; "it's making an awful sound like snoring." +</p> + +<p> +"That's the fairies, ma'am," said Slipper with complete certainty; +"sure I known them that seen fairies in that island as thick as the +grass, and every one o' them with little caps on them." +</p> + +<p> +Philippa's wide gaze wandered to Slipper's hideous pug face and back to +me. +</p> + +<p> +"It was not a human being, Sinclair!" she said combatively, though I +had not uttered a word. +</p> + +<p> +Maria had already, after the manner of dogs, leaped, dripping, into the +boat: I prepared to follow her example. +</p> + +<p> +"Major," said Slipper, in a tragic whisper, "there was a man was a +night on that island one time, watching duck, and Thim People cot him, +and dhragged him through Hell and through Death, and threw him in the +tide——" +</p> + +<p> +"Shove off the boat," I said, too hungry for argument. +</p> + +<p> +Slipper obeyed, throwing his knee over the gunwale as he did so, and +tumbling into the bow; we could have done without him very comfortably, +but his devotion was touching. +</p> + +<p> +Holy Island was perhaps a hundred yards long, and about half as many +broad; it was covered with trees and a dense growth of rhododendrons; +somewhere in the jungle was a ruined fragment of a chapel, smothered in +ivy and briars, and in a little glade in the heart of the island there +was a holy well. We landed, and it was obviously a sore humiliation to +Philippa that not a sound was to be heard in the spell-bound silence of +the island, save the cough of a heron on a tree-top. +</p> + +<p> +"It <i>was</i> there," she said, with an unconvinced glance at the +surrounding thickets. +</p> + +<p> +"Sure, I'll give a thrawl through the island, ma'am," volunteered +Slipper with unexpected gallantry, "an' if it's the divil himself is in +it, I'll rattle him into the lake!" +</p> + +<p> +He went swaggering on his search, shouting, "Hi, cock!" and whacking +the rhododendrons with his stick, and after an interval returned and +assured us that the island was uninhabited. Being provided with +refreshments he again withdrew, and Philippa and Maria and I fed +variously and at great length, and washed the plates with water from +the holy well. I was smoking a cigarette when we heard Slipper +addressing the solitudes at the farther end of the island, and ending +with one of his whisky-throated crows of laughter. +</p> + +<p> +He presently came lurching towards us through the bushes, and a glance +sufficed to show even Philippa—who was as incompetent a judge of such +matters as many of her sex—that he was undeniably screwed. +</p> + +<p> +"Major Yeates!" he began, "and Mrs. Major Yeates, with respex to ye, +I'm bastely dhrunk! Me head is light since the 'fluenzy, and the +docthor told me I should carry a little bottle-een o' sperrits——" +</p> + +<p> +"Look here," I said to Philippa, "I'll take him across, and bring the +boat back for you." +</p> + +<p> +"Sinclair," responded my wife with concentrated emotion, "I would +rather die than stay on this island alone!" +</p> + +<p> +Slipper was getting drunker every moment, but I managed to stow him on +his back in the bows of the punt, in which position he at once began to +uplift husky and wandering strains of melody. To this accompaniment +we, as Tennyson says, +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +"moved from the brink like some full-breasted swan,<br/> +That, fluting a wild carol ere her death,<br/> +Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood<br/> +With swarthy web." +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +Slipper would certainly have been none the worse for taking the flood, +and, as the burden of "Lannigan's Ball" strengthened and spread along +the tranquil lake, and the duck once more fled in justifiable +consternation, I felt much inclined to make him do so. +</p> + +<p> +We made for the end of the lake that was nearest Shreelane, and, as we +rounded the point of the island, another boat presented itself to our +view. It contained my late entertainer, Mrs. Canty, seated bulkily in +the stern, while a small boy bowed himself between the two heavy oars. +</p> + +<p> +"It's a lovely evening, Major Yeates," she called out. "I'm just going +to the island to get some water from the holy well for me daughter that +has an impression on her chest. Indeed, I thought 'twas yourself was +singing a song for Mrs. Yeates when I heard you coming, but sure +Slipper is a great warrant himself for singing." +</p> + +<p> +"May the divil crack the two legs undher ye!" bawled Slipper in +acknowledgment of the compliment. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Canty laughed genially, and her boat lumbered away. +</p> + +<p> +I shoved Slipper ashore at the nearest point; Philippa and I paddled to +the end of the lake, and abandoning the duck as a bad business, walked +home. +</p> + +<p> +A few days afterwards it happened that it was incumbent upon me to +attend the funeral of the Roman Catholic Bishop of the diocese. It was +what is called in France "<i>un bel enterrement</i>," with inky flocks of +tall-hatted priests, and countless yards of white scarves, and a repast +of monumental solidity at the Bishop's residence. The actual interment +was to take place in Cork, and we moved in long and imposing procession +to the railway station, where a special train awaited the cortège. My +friend Mr. James Canty was among the mourners: an important and active +personage, exchanging condolences with the priests, giving directions +to porters, and blowing his nose with a trumpeting mournfulness that +penetrated all the other noises of the platform. He was condescending +enough to notice my presence, and found time to tell me that he had +given Mr. Murray "a sure word" with regard to some of "<i>the +wreckage</i>"—this with deep significance, and a wink of an inflamed and +tearful eye. I saw him depart in a first-class carriage, and the odour +of sanctity; seeing that he was accompanied by seven priests, and that +both windows were shut, the latter must have been considerable. +</p> + +<p> +Afterwards, in the town, I met Murray, looking more pleased with +himself than I had seen him since he had taken up the unprofitable task +of smuggler-hunting. +</p> + +<p> +"Come along and have some lunch," he said, "I've got a real good thing +on this time! That chap Canty came to me late last night, and told me +that he knew for a fact that the island on Corran Lake was just stiff +with barrels of bacon and rum, and that I'd better send every man I +could spare to-day to get them into the town. I sent the men out at +eight o'clock this morning; I think I've gone one better than Bosanquet +this time!" +</p> + +<p> +I began to realise that Philippa was going to score heavily on the +subject of the fairies that she had heard snoring on the island, and I +imparted to Murray the leading features of our picnic there. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, Slipper's been up to his chin in that rum from the first," said +Murray. "I'd like to know who his sleeping partner was!" +</p> + +<p> +It was beginning to get dark before the loaded carts of the salvage +party came lumbering past Murray's windows and into the yard of the +police-barrack. We followed them, and in so doing picked up Flurry +Knox, who was sauntering in the same direction. It was a good haul, +five big casks of rum, and at least a dozen smaller barrels of bacon +and butter, and Murray and his Chief Constable smiled seraphically on +one another as the spoil was unloaded and stowed in a shed. +</p> + +<p> +"Wouldn't it be as well to see how the butter is keeping?" remarked +Flurry, who had been looking on silently, with, as I had noticed, a +still and amused eye. "The rim of that small keg there looks as if it +had been shifted lately." +</p> + +<p> +The sergeant looked hard at Flurry; he knew as well as most people that +a hint from Mr. Knox was usually worth taking. He turned to Murray. +</p> + +<p> +"Will I open it, sir?" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh! open it if Mr. Knox wishes," said Murray, who was not famous for +appreciating other people's suggestions. +</p> + +<p> +The keg was opened. +</p> + +<p> +"Funny butter," said Flurry. +</p> + +<p> +The sergeant said nothing. The keg was full of black bog-mould. +Another was opened, and another, all with the same result. +</p> + +<p> +"Damnation!" said Murray, suddenly losing his temper. "What's the use +of going on with those? Try one of the rum casks." +</p> + +<p> +A few moments passed in total silence while a tap and a spigot were +sent for and applied to the barrel. The sergeant drew off a mugful and +put his nose to it with the deliberation of a connoisseur. +</p> + +<p> +"Water, sir," he pronounced, "dirty water, with a small indication of +sperrits." +</p> + +<p> +A junior constable tittered explosively, met the light blue glare of +Murray's eye, and withered away. +</p> + +<p> +"Perhaps it's holy water!" said I, with a wavering voice. +</p> + +<p> +Murray's glance pinned me like an assegai, and I also faded into the +background. +</p> + +<p> +"Well," said Flurry in dulcet tones, "if you want to know where the +stuff is that was in those barrels, I can tell you, for I was told it +myself half-an-hour ago. It's gone to Cork with the Bishop by special +train!" +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Canty was undoubtedly a man of resource. Mrs. Canty had mistakenly +credited me with an intelligence equal to her own, and on receiving +from Slipper a highly coloured account of how audibly Mr. Canty had +slept off his potations, had regarded the secret of Holy Island as +having been given away. That night and the two succeeding ones were +spent in the transfer of the rum to bottles, and the bottles and the +butter to fish boxes; these were, by means of a slight lubrication of +the railway underlings, loaded into a truck as "Fresh Fish, Urgent," +and attached to the Bishop's funeral train, while the police, decoyed +far from the scene of action, were breaking their backs over barrels of +bog-water. "I suppose," continued Flurry pleasantly, "you don't know +the pub that Canty's brother has in Cork. Well, I do. I'm going to +buy some rum there next week, cheap." +</p> + +<p> +"I shall proceed against Canty," said Murray, with fateful calm. +</p> + +<p> +"You won't proceed far," said Flurry; "you'll not get as much evidence +out of the whole country as'd hang a cat." +</p> + +<p> +"Who was your informant?" demanded Murray. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry laughed. "Well, by the time the train was in Cork, yourself and +the Major were the only two men in the town that weren't talking about +it." +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap09"></a>IX<br/> +THE POLICY OF THE CLOSED DOOR</h2> + +<p> +The disasters and humiliations that befell me at Drumcurran Fair may +yet be remembered. They certainly have not been forgotten in the +regions about Skebawn, where the tale of how Bernard Shute and I stole +each other's horses has passed into history. The grand-daughter of the +Mountain Hare, bought by Mr. Shute with such light-hearted enthusiasm, +was restored to that position between the shafts of a cart that she was +so well fitted to grace; Moonlighter, his other purchase, spent the two +months following on the fair in "favouring" a leg with a strained +sinew, and in receiving visits from the local vet., who, however +uncertain in his diagnosis of Moonlighter's leg, had accurately +estimated the length of Bernard's foot. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Bennett's mare Cruiskeen, alone of the trio, was immediately and +thoroughly successful. She went in harness like a hero, she carried +Philippa like an elder sister, she was never sick or sorry; as Peter +Cadogan summed her up, "That one 'd live where another 'd die." In her +safe keeping Philippa made her début with hounds at an uneventful +morning's cubbing, with no particular result, except that Philippa +returned home so stiff that she had to go to bed for a day, and arose +more determined than ever to be a fox-hunter. +</p> + +<p> +The opening meet of Mr. Knox's foxhounds was on November 1, and on that +morning Philippa on Cruiskeen, accompanied by me on the Quaker, set out +for Ardmeen Cross, the time-honoured fixture for All Saints' Day. The +weather was grey and quiet, and full of all the moist sweetness of an +Irish autumn. There had been a great deal of rain during the past +month; it had turned the bracken to a purple brown, and had filled the +hollows with shining splashes of water. The dead leaves were slippery +under foot, and the branches above were thinly decked with yellow, +where the pallid survivors of summer still clung to their posts. As +Philippa and I sedately approached the meet the red coats of Flurry +Knox and his whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, were to be seen on the road at +the top of the hill; Cruiskeen put her head in the air, and stared at +them with eyes that understood all they portended. +</p> + +<p> +"Sinclair," said my wife hurriedly, as a straggling hound, flogged in +by Dr. Hickey, uttered a grievous and melodious howl, "remember, if +they find, it's no use to talk to me, for I shan't be able to speak." +</p> + +<p> +I was sufficiently acquainted with Philippa in moments of enthusiasm to +exhibit silently the corner of a clean pocket-handkerchief; I have seen +her cry when a police constable won a bicycle race in Skebawn; she has +wept at hearing Sir Valentine Knox's health drunk with musical honours +at a tenants' dinner. It is an amiable custom, but, as she herself +admits, it is unbecoming. +</p> + +<p> +An imposing throng, in point of numbers, was gathered at the +cross-roads, the riders being almost swamped in the crowd of traps, +outside cars, bicyclists, and people on foot. The field was an +eminently representative one. The Clan Knox was, as usual, there in +force, its more aristocratic members dingily respectable in black coats +and tall hats that went impartially to weddings, funerals, and hunts, +and, like a horse that is past mark of mouth, were no longer to be +identified with any special epoch; there was a humbler squireen element +in tweeds and flat-brimmed pot-hats, and a good muster of farmers, men +of the spare, black-muzzled, West of Ireland type, on horses that +ranged from the cart mare, clipped trace high, to shaggy and leggy +three-year-olds, none of them hunters, but all of them able to hunt. +Philippa and I worked our way to the heart of things, where was Flurry, +seated on his brown mare, in what appeared to be a somewhat moody +silence. As we exchanged greetings I was aware that his eye was +resting with extreme disfavour upon two approaching figures. I put up +my eye-glass, and perceived that one of them was Miss Sally Knox, on a +tall grey horse; the other was Mr. Bernard Shute, in all the flawless +beauty of his first pink coat, mounted on Stockbroker, a well-known, +hard-mouthed, big-jumping bay, recently purchased from Dr. Hickey. +</p> + +<p> +During the languors of a damp autumn the neighbourhood had been much +nourished and sustained by the privilege of observing and diagnosing +the progress of Mr. Shute's flirtation with Miss Sally Knox. What made +it all the more enjoyable for the lookers-on—or most of them—was, +that although Bernard's courtship was of the nature of a proclamation +from the housetops, Miss Knox's attitude left everything to the +imagination. To Flurry Knox the romantic but despicable position of +slighted rival was comfortably allotted; his sole sympathisers were +Philippa and old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas, but no one knew if he needed +sympathisers. Flurry was a man of mystery. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Shute and Miss Knox approached us rapidly, the latter's mount +pulling hard. +</p> + +<p> +"Flurry," I said, "isn't that grey the horse Shute bought from you last +July at the fair?" +</p> + +<p> +Flurry did not answer me. His face was as black as thunder. He turned +his horse round, cursing two country boys who got in his way, with low +and concentrated venom, and began to move forward, followed by the +hounds. If his wish was to avoid speaking to Miss Sally it was not to +be gratified. +</p> + +<p> +"Good-morning, Flurry," she began, sitting close down to Moonlighter's +ramping jog as she rode up beside her cousin. "What a hurry you're in! +We passed no end of people on the road who won't be here for another +ten minutes." +</p> + +<p> +"No more will I," was Mr. Knox's cryptic reply, as he spurred the brown +mare into a trot. +</p> + +<p> +Moonlighter made a vigorous but frustrated effort to buck, and +indemnified himself by a successful kick at a hound. +</p> + +<p> +"Bother you, Flurry! Can't you walk for a minute?" exclaimed Miss +Sally, who looked about as large, in relation to her horse, as the +conventional tomtit on a round of beef. "You might have more sense +than to crack your whip under this horse's nose! I don't believe you +know what horse it is even!" +</p> + +<p> +I was not near enough to catch Flurry's reply. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, if you didn't want him to be lent to me you shouldn't have sold +him to Mr. Shute!" retorted Miss Knox, in her clear, provoking little +voice. +</p> + +<p> +"I suppose he's afraid to ride him himself," said Flurry, turning his +horse in at a gate. "Get ahead there, Jerome, can't you? It's better +to put them in at this end than to have every one riding on top of +them!" +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sally's cheeks were still very pink when I came up and began to +talk to her, and her grey-green eyes had a look in them like those of +an angry kitten. +</p> + +<p> +The riders moved slowly down a rough pasture-field, and took up their +position along the brow of Ardmeen covert, into which the hounds had +already hurled themselves with their customary contempt for the +convenances. Flurry's hounds, true to their nationality, were in the +habit of doing the right thing in the wrong way. +</p> + +<p> +Untouched by autumn, the furze bushes of Ardmeen covert were darkly +green, save for a golden fleck of blossom here and there, and the +glistening grey cobwebs that stretched from spike to spike. The look +of the ordinary gorse covert is familiar to most people as a tidy +enclosure of an acre or so, filled with low plants of well-educated +gorse; not so many will be found who have experience of it as a rocky, +sedgy wilderness, half a mile square, garrisoned with brigades of furze +bushes, some of them higher than a horse's head, lean, strong, and +cunning, like the foxes that breed in them, impenetrable, with their +bristling spikes, as a hedge of bayonets. By dint of infinite leisure +and obstinate greed, the cattle had made paths for themselves through +the bushes to the patches of grass that they hemmed in; their +hoofprints were guides to the explorer, down muddy staircases of rock, +and across black intervals of unplumbed bog. The whole covert slanted +gradually down to a small river that raced round three sides of it, and +beyond the stream, in agreeable contrast, lay a clean and wholesome +country of grass fields and banks. +</p> + +<p> +The hounds drew slowly along and down the hill towards the river, and +the riders hung about outside the covert, and tried—I can answer for +at least one of them—to decide which was the least odious of the ways +through it, in the event of the fox breaking at the far side. Miss +Sally took up a position not very far from me, and it was easy to see +that she had her hands full with her borrowed mount, on whose temper +the delay and suspense were visibly telling. His iron-grey neck was +white from the chafing of the reins; had the ground under his feet been +red-hot he could hardly have sidled and hopped more uncontrollably; +nothing but the most impassioned conjugation of the verb to condemn +could have supplied any human equivalent for the manner in which he +tore holes in the sedgy grass with a furious forefoot. Those who were +even superficial judges of character gave his heels a liberal allowance +of sea-room, and Mr. Shute, who could not be numbered among such, and +had, as usual, taken up a position as near Miss Sally as possible, was +rewarded by a double knock on his horse's ribs that was a cause of +heartless mirth to the lady of his affections. +</p> + +<p> +Not a hound had as yet spoken, but they were forcing their way through +the gorse forest and shoving each other jealously aside with growing +excitement, and Flurry could be seen at intervals, moving forward in +the direction they were indicating. It was at this juncture that the +ubiquitous Slipper presented himself at my horse's shoulder. +</p> + +<p> +"'Tis for the river he's making, Major," he said, with an upward roll +of his squinting eyes, that nearly made me sea-sick. "He's a Castle +Knox fox that came in this morning, and ye should get ahead down to the +ford!" +</p> + +<p> +A tip from Slipper was not to be neglected, and Philippa and I began a +cautious progress through the gorse, followed by Miss Knox as quietly +as Moonlighter's nerves would permit. +</p> + +<p> +"Wishful has it!" she exclaimed, as a hound came out into view, uttered +a sharp yelp, and drove forward. +</p> + +<p> +"Hark! hark!" roared Flurry with at least three r's reverberating in +each "hark"; at the same instant came a holloa from the farther side of +the river, and Dr. Hickey's renowned and blood-curdling screech was +uplifted at the bottom of the covert. Then babel broke forth, as the +hounds, converging from every quarter, flung themselves shrieking on +the line. Moonlighter went straight up on his hind-legs, and dropped +again with a bound that sent him crushing past Philippa and Cruiskeen; +he did it a second time, and was almost on to the tail of the Quaker, +whose bulky person was not to be hurried in any emergency. +</p> + +<p> +"Get on if you can, Major Yeates!" called out Sally, steadying the grey +as well as she could in the narrow pathway between the great gorse +bushes. +</p> + +<p> +Other horses were thundering behind us, men were shouting to each other +in similar passages right and left of us, the cry of the hounds filled +the air with a kind of delirium. A low wall with a stick laid along it +barred the passage in front of me, and the Quaker firmly and +immediately decided not to have it until some one else had dislodged +the pole. +</p> + +<p> +"Go ahead!" I shouted, squeezing to one side with heroic disregard of +the furze bushes and my new tops. +</p> + +<p> +The words were hardly out of my mouth when Moonlighter, mad with +thwarted excitement, shot by me, hurtled over the obstacle with +extravagant fury, landed twelve feet beyond it on clattering slippery +rock, saved himself from falling with an eel-like forward buck on to +sedgy ground, and bolted at full speed down the muddy cattle track. +There are corners—rocky, most of them—in that cattle track, that +Sally has told me she will remember to her dying day; boggy holes of +any depth, ranging between two feet and half-way to Australia, that she +says she does not fail to mention in the General Thanksgiving; but at +the time they occupied mere fractions of the strenuous seconds in which +it was hopeless for her to do anything but try to steer, trust to luck, +sit hard down into the saddle and try to stay there. (For my part, I +would as soon try to adhere to the horns of a charging bull as to the +crutches of a side-saddle, but happily the necessity is not likely to +arise.) I saw Flurry Knox a little ahead of her on the same track, +jamming his mare into the furze bushes to get out of her way; he +shouted something after her about the ford, and started to gallop for +it himself by a breakneck short cut. +</p> + +<p> +The hounds were already across the river, and it was obvious that, ford +or no ford, Moonlighter's intentions might be simply expressed in the +formula "Be with them I will." It was all down-hill to the river, and +among the furze bushes and rocks there was neither time nor place to +turn him. He rushed at it with a shattering slip upon a streak of +rock, with a heavy plunge in the deep ground by the brink; it was as +bad a take-off for twenty feet of water as could well be found. The +grey horse rose out of the boggy stuff with all the impetus that pace +and temper could give, but it was not enough. For one instant the +twisting, sliding current was under Sally, the next a veil of water +sprang up all round her, and Moonlighter was rolling and lurching in +the desperate effort to find foothold in the rocky bed of the stream. +</p> + +<p> +I was following at the best pace I could kick out of the Quaker, and +saw the water swirl into her lap as her horse rolled to the near-side. +She caught the mane to save herself, but he struggled on to his legs +again, and came floundering broadside on to the farther bank. In three +seconds she had got out of the saddle and flung herself at the bank, +grasping the rushes, and trying, in spite of the sodden weight of her +habit, to drag herself out of the water. +</p> + +<p> +At the same instant I saw Flurry and the brown mare dashing through the +ford, twenty yards higher up. He was off his horse and beside her with +that uncanny quickness that Flurry reserved for moments of emergency, +and, catching her by the arms, swung her on to the bank as easily as if +she had been the kennel terrier. +</p> + +<p> +"Catch the horse!" she called out, scrambling to her feet. +</p> + +<p> +"Damn the horse!" returned Flurry, in the rage that is so often the +reaction from a bad scare. +</p> + +<p> +I turned along the bank and made for the ford; by this time it was full +of hustling, splashing riders, through whom Bernard Shute, furiously +picking up a bad start, drove a devastating way. He tried to turn his +horse down the bank towards Miss Knox, but the hounds were running +hard, and, to my intense amusement, Stockbroker refused to abandon the +chase, and swept his rider away in the wake of his stable companion, +Dr. Hickey's young chestnut. By this time two country boys had, as is +usual in such cases, risen from the earth, and fished Moonlighter out +of the stream. Miss Sally wound up an acrimonious argument with her +cousin by observing that she didn't care what he said, and placing her +water-logged boot in his obviously unwilling hand, in a second was +again in the saddle, gathering up the wet reins with the trembling, +clumsy fingers of a person who is thoroughly chilled and in a violent +hurry. She set Moonlighter going, and was away in a moment, galloping +him at the first fence at a pace that suited his steeple-chasing ideas. +</p> + +<p> +"Mr. Knox!" panted Philippa, who had by this time joined us, "make her +go home!" +</p> + +<p> +"She can go where she likes as far as I'm concerned," responded Mr. +Knox, pitching himself on his mare's back and digging in the spurs. +</p> + +<p> +Moonlighter had already glided over the bank in front of us, with a +perfunctory flick at it with his heels; Flurry's mare and Cruiskeen +jumped it side by side with equal precision. It was a bank of some +five feet high; the Quaker charged it enthusiastically, refused it +abruptly, and, according to his infuriating custom at such moments, +proceeded to tear hurried mouthfuls of grass. +</p> + +<p> +"Will I give him a couple o' belts, your Honour?" shouted one of the +running accompaniment of country boys. +</p> + +<p> +"You will!" said I, with some further remarks to the Quaker that I need +not commit to paper. +</p> + +<p> +Swish! Whack! The sound was music in my ears, as the good, +remorseless ash sapling bent round the Quaker's dappled hind-quarters. +At the third stripe he launched both his heels in the operator's face; +at the fourth he reared undecidedly; at the fifth he bundled over the +bank in a manner purged of hesitation. +</p> + +<p> +"Ha!" yelled my assistants, "that'll put the fear o' God in him!" as +the Quaker fled headlong after the hunt. "He'll be the betther o' that +while he lives!" +</p> + +<p> +Without going quite as far as this, I must admit that for the next +half-hour he was astonishingly the better of it. +</p> + +<p> +The Castle Knox fox was making a very pretty line of it over the seven +miles that separated him from his home. He headed through a grassy +country of Ireland's mild and brilliant green, fenced with sound and +buxom banks, enlivened by stone walls, uncompromised by the presence of +gates, and yet comfortably laced with lanes for the furtherance of +those who had laid to heart Wolsey's valuable advice: "Fling away +ambition: by that sin fell the angels." The flotsam and jetsam of the +hunt pervaded the landscape: standing on one long bank, three +dismounted farmers flogged away at the refusing steeds below them, like +anglers trying to rise a sulky fish; half-a-dozen hats, bobbing in a +string, showed where the road riders followed the delusive windings of +a bohereen. It was obvious that in the matter of ambition they would +not have caused Cardinal Wolsey a moment's uneasiness; whether angels +or otherwise, they were not going to run any risk of falling. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry's red coat was like a beacon two fields ahead of me, with +Philippa following in his tracks; it was the first run worthy of the +name that Philippa had ridden, and I blessed Miss Bobby Bennett as I +saw Cruiskeen's undefeated fencing. An encouraging twang of the +Doctor's horn notified that the hounds were giving us a chance; even +the Quaker pricked his blunt ears and swerved in his stride to the +sound. A stone wall, a rough patch of heather, a boggy field, dinted +deep and black with hoof marks, and the stern chase was at an end. The +hounds had checked on the outskirts of a small wood, and the field, +thinned down to a panting dozen or so, viewed us with the disfavour +shown by the first flight towards those who unexpectedly add to their +select number. In the depths of the wood Dr. Hickey might be heard +uttering those singular little yelps of encouragement that to the +irreverent suggest a milkman in his dotage. Bernard Shute, who neither +knew nor cared what the hounds were doing, was expatiating at great +length to an uninterested squireen upon the virtues and perfections of +his new mount. +</p> + +<p> +"I did all I knew to come and help you at the river," he said, riding +up to the splashed and still dripping Sally, "but Stockbroker wouldn't +hear of it. I pulled his ugly head round till his nose was on my boot, +but he galloped away just the same!" +</p> + +<p> +"He was quite right," said Miss Sally; "I didn't want you in the least." +</p> + +<p> +As Miss Sally's red gold coil of hair was turned towards me during this +speech, I could only infer the glance with which it was delivered, from +the fact that Mr. Shute responded to it with one of those firm gazes of +adoration in which the neighbourhood took such an interest, and +crumbled away into incoherency. +</p> + +<p> +A shout from the top of a hill interrupted the amenities of the check; +Flurry was out of the wood in half-a-dozen seconds, blowing shattering +blasts upon his horn, and the hounds rushed to him, knowing the "gone +away" note that was never blown in vain. The brown mare came out +through the trees and the undergrowth like a woodcock down the wind, +and jumped across a stream on to a more than questionable bank; the +hounds splashed and struggled after him, and, as they landed, the first +ecstatic whimpers broke forth. In a moment it was full cry, +discordant, beautiful, and soul-stirring, as the pack spread and sped, +and settled to the line. I saw the absurd dazzle of tears in +Philippa's eyes, and found time for the insulting proffer of the clean +pocket-handkerchief, as we all galloped hard to get away on good terms +with the hounds. +</p> + +<p> +It was one of those elect moments in fox-hunting when the fittest alone +have survived; even the Quaker's sluggish blood was stirred by good +company, and possibly by the remembrance of the singing ash-plant, and +he lumbered up tall stone-faced banks and down heavy drops, and across +wide ditches, in astounding adherence to the line cut out by Flurry. +Cruiskeen went like a book—a story for girls, very pleasant and safe, +but rather slow. Moonlighter was pulling Miss Sally on to the sterns +of the hounds, flying his banks, rocketing like a pheasant over +three-foot walls—committing, in fact, all the crimes induced by youth +and over-feeding; he would have done very comfortably with another six +or seven stone on his back. +</p> + +<p> +Why Bernard Shute did not come off at every fence and generally die a +thousand deaths I cannot explain. Occasionally I rather wished he +would, as, from my secure position in the rear, I saw him charging his +fences at whatever pace and place seemed good to the thoroughly +demoralised Stockbroker, and in so doing cannon heavily against Dr. +Hickey on landing over a rotten ditch, jump a wall with his spur +rowelling Charlie Knox's boot, and cut in at top speed in front of +Flurry, who was scientifically cramming his mare up a very awkward +scramble. In so far as I could think of anything beyond Philippa and +myself and the next fence, I thought there would be trouble for Mr. +Shute in consequence of this last feat. It was a half-hour long to be +remembered, in spite of the Quaker's ponderous and unalterable gallop, +in spite of the thump with which he came down off his banks, in spite +of the confiding manner in which he hung upon my hand. +</p> + +<p> +We were nearing Castle Knox, and the riders began to edge away from the +hounds towards a gate that broke the long barrier of the demesne wall. +Steaming horses and purple-faced riders clattered and crushed in at the +gate; there was a moment of pulling up and listening, in which +quivering tails and pumping sides told their own story. Cruiskeen's +breathing suggested a cross between a grampus and a gramophone; +Philippa's hair had come down, and she had a stitch in her side. +Moonlighter, fresher than ever, stamped and dragged at his bit; I +thought little Miss Sally looked very white. The bewildering clamour +of the hounds was all through the wide laurel plantations. At a word +from Flurry, Dr. Hickey shoved his horse ahead and turned down a ride, +followed by most of the field. +</p> + +<p> +"Philippa," I said severely, "you've had enough, and you know it." +</p> + +<p> +"Do go up to the house and make them give you something to eat," struck +in Miss Sally, twisting Moonlighter round to keep his mind occupied. +</p> + +<p> +"And as for you, Miss Sally," I went on, in the manner of Mr. +Fairchild, "the sooner you get off that horse and out of those wet +things the better." +</p> + +<p> +Flurry, who was just in front of us, said nothing, but gave a short and +most disagreeable laugh. Philippa accepted my suggestion with the +meekness of exhaustion, but under the circumstances it did not surprise +me that Miss Sally did not follow her example. +</p> + +<p> +Then ensued an hour of woodland hunting at its worst and most +bewildering. I galloped after Flurry and Miss Sally up and down long +glittering lanes of laurel, at every other moment burying my face in +the Quaker's coarse white mane to avoid the slash of the branches, and +receiving down the back of my neck showers of drops stored up from the +rain of the day before; playing an endless game of hide-and-seek with +the hounds, and never getting any nearer to them, as they turned and +doubled through the thickets of evergreens. Even to my limited +understanding of the situation it became clear at length that two foxes +were on foot; most of the hounds were hard at work a quarter of a mile +away, but Flurry, with a grim face and a faithful three couple, stuck +to the failing line of the hunted fox. +</p> + +<p> +There came a moment when Miss Sally and I—who through many +vicissitudes had clung to each other—found ourselves at a spot where +two rides crossed. Flurry was waiting there, and a little way up one +of the rides a couple of hounds were hustling to and fro, with the +thwarted whimpers half breaking from them; he held up his hand to stop +us, and at that identical moment Bernard Shute, like a bolt from the +blue, burst upon our vision. It need scarcely be mentioned that he was +going at full gallop—I have rarely seen him ride at any other +pace—and as he bore down upon Flurry and the hounds, ducking and +dodging to avoid the branches, he shouted something about a fox having +gone away at the other side of the covert. +</p> + +<p> +"Hold hard!" roared Flurry; "don't you see the hounds, you fool?" +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Shute, to do him justice, held hard with all the strength of his +body, but it was of no avail. The bay horse had got his head down and +his tail up, there was a piercing yell from a hound as it was ridden +over, and Flurry's brown mare will not soon forget the moment when +Stockbroker's shoulder took her on the point of the hip and sent her +staggering into the laurel branches. As she swung round, Flurry's whip +went up, and with a swift backhander the cane and the looped thong +caught Bernard across his broad shoulders. +</p> + +<p> +"O Mr. Shute!" shrieked Miss Sally, as I stared dumfoundered; "did that +branch hurt you?" +</p> + +<p> +"All right! Nothing to signify!" he called out as he bucketed past, +tugging at his horse's head. "Thought some one had hit me at first! +Come on, we'll catch 'em up this way!" +</p> + +<p> +He swung perilously into the main ride and was gone, totally unaware of +the position that Miss Sally's quickness had saved. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry rode straight up to his cousin, with a pale, dangerous face. +</p> + +<p> +"I suppose you think I'm to stand being ridden over and having my +hounds killed to please you," he said; "but you're mistaken. You were +very smart, and you may think you've saved him his licking, but you +needn't think he won't get it. He'll have it in spite of you, before +he goes to his bed this night!" +</p> + +<p> +A man who loses his temper badly because he is badly in love is +inevitably ridiculous, far though he may be from thinking himself so. +He is also a highly unpleasant person to argue with, and Miss Sally and +I held our peace respectfully. He turned his horse and rode away. +</p> + +<p> +Almost instantly the three couple of hounds opened in the underwood +near us with a deafening crash, and not twenty yards ahead the hunted +fox, dark with wet and mud, slunk across the ride. The hounds were +almost on his brush; Moonlighter reared and chafed; the din was +redoubled, passed away to a little distance, and suddenly seemed +stationary in the middle of the laurels. +</p> + +<p> +"Could he have got into the old ice-house?" exclaimed Miss Sally, with +reviving excitement. She pushed ahead, and turned down the narrowest +of all the rides that had that day been my portion. At the end of the +green tunnel there was a comparatively open space; Flurry's mare was +standing in it, riderless, and Flurry himself was hammering with a +stone at the padlock of a door that seemed to lead into the heart of a +laurel clump. The hounds were baying furiously somewhere back of the +entrance, among the laurel stems. +</p> + +<p> +"He's got in by the old ice drain," said Flurry, addressing himself +sulkily to me, and ignoring Miss Sally. He had not the least idea of +how absurd was his scowling face, draped by the luxuriant +hart's-tongues that overhung the doorway. +</p> + +<p> +The padlock yielded, and the opening door revealed a low, dark passage, +into which Flurry disappeared, lugging a couple of hounds with him by +the scruff of the neck; the remaining two couple bayed implacably at +the mouth of the drain. The croak of a rusty bolt told of a second +door at the inner end of the passage. +</p> + +<p> +"Look out for the steps, Flurry, they're all broken," called out Miss +Sally in tones of honey. +</p> + +<p> +There was no answer. Miss Sally looked at me; her face was serious, +but her mischievous eyes made a confederate of me. +</p> + +<p> +"He's in an <i>awful</i> rage!" she said. "I'm afraid there will certainly +be a row." +</p> + +<p> +A row there certainly was, but it was in the cavern of the ice-house, +where the fox had evidently been discovered. Miss Sally suddenly flung +Moonlighter's reins to me and slipped off his back. +</p> + +<p> +"Hold him!" she said, and dived into the doorway under the overhanging +branches. +</p> + +<p> +Things happened after that with astonishing simultaneousness. There +was a shrill exclamation from Miss Sally, the inner door was slammed +and bolted, and at one and the same moment the fox darted from the +entry, and was away into the wood before one could wink. +</p> + +<p> +"What's happened?" I called out, playing the refractory Moonlighter +like a salmon. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sally appeared at the doorway, looking half scared and half +delighted. +</p> + +<p> +"I've bolted him in, and I won't let him out till he promises to be +good! I was only just in time to slam the door after the fox bolted +out!" +</p> + +<p> +"Great Scott!" I said helplessly. +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sally vanished again into the passage, and the imprisoned hounds +continued to express their emotions in the echoing vault of the +ice-house. Their master remained mute as the dead, and I trembled. +</p> + +<p> +"Flurry!" I heard Miss Sally say. "Flurry, I—I've locked you in!" +</p> + +<p> +This self-evident piece of information met with no response. +</p> + +<p> +"Shall I tell you why?" +</p> + +<p> +A keener note seemed to indicate that a hound had been kicked. +</p> + +<p> +"I don't care whether you answer me or not, I'm going to tell you!" +</p> + +<p> +There was a pause; apparently telling him was not as simple as had been +expected. +</p> + +<p> +"I won't let you out till you promise me something. Ah, Flurry, don't +be so cross! What do you say?—— Oh, that's a ridiculous thing to +say. You know quite well it's not on his account!" +</p> + +<p> +There was another considerable pause. +</p> + +<p> +"Flurry!" said Miss Sally again, in tones that would have wiled a +badger from his earth. "Dear Flurry—" +</p> + +<p> +At this point I hurriedly flung Moonlighter's bridle over a branch and +withdrew. +</p> + +<p> +My own subsequent adventures are quite immaterial, until the moment +when I encountered Miss Sally on the steps of the hall door at Castle +Knox. +</p> + +<p> +"I'm just going in to take off these wet things," she said airily. +</p> + +<p> +This was no way to treat a confederate. +</p> + +<p> +"Well?" I said, barring her progress. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh—he—he promised. It's all right," she replied, rather +breathlessly. +</p> + +<p> +There was no one about; I waited resolutely for further information. +It did not come. +</p> + +<p> +"Did he try to make his own terms?" said I, looking hard at her. +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, he did." She tried to pass me. +</p> + +<p> +"And what did you do?" +</p> + +<p> +"I refused them!" she said, with the sudden stagger of a sob in her +voice, as she escaped into the house. +</p> + +<p> +Now what on earth was Sally Knox crying about? +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap10"></a>X<br/> +THE HOUSE OF FAHY</h2> + +<p> +Nothing could shake the conviction of Maria that she was by nature and +by practice a house dog. Every one of Shreelane's many doors had, at +one time or another, slammed upon her expulsion, and each one of them +had seen her stealthy, irrepressible return to the sphere that she felt +herself so eminently qualified to grace. For her the bone, thriftily +interred by Tim Connor's terrier, was a mere diversion; even the +fruitage of the ashpit had little charm for an accomplished <i>habitué</i> +of the kitchen. She knew to a nicety which of the doors could be burst +open by assault, at which it was necessary to whine sycophantically; +and the clinical thermometer alone could furnish a parallel for her +perception of mood in those in authority. In the case of Mrs. Cadogan +she knew that there were seasons when instant and complete +self-effacement was the only course to pursue; therefore when, on a +certain morning in July, on my way through the downstairs regions to my +office, I saw her approach the kitchen door with her usual +circumspection, and, on hearing her name enunciated indignantly by my +cook, withdraw swiftly to a city of refuge at the back of the hayrick, +I drew my own conclusions. +</p> + +<p> +Had she remained, as I did, she would have heard the disclosure of a +crime that lay more heavily on her digestion than her conscience. +</p> + +<p> +"I can't put a thing out o' me hand but he's watching me to whip it +away!" declaimed Mrs. Cadogan, with all the disregard of her kind for +the accident of sex in the brute creation. "'Twas only last night I +was back in the scullery when I heard Bridget let a screech, and there +was me brave dog up on the table eating the roast beef that was after +coming out from the dinner!" +</p> + +<p> +"Brute!" interjected Philippa, with what I well knew to be a simulated +wrath. +</p> + +<p> +"And I had planned that bit of beef for the luncheon," continued Mrs. +Cadogan in impassioned lamentation, "the way we wouldn't have to +inthrude on the cold turkey! Sure he has it that dhragged, that all we +can do with it now is run it through the mincing machine for the +Major's sandwiches." +</p> + +<p> +At this appetising suggestion I thought fit to intervene in the +deliberations. +</p> + +<p> +"One thing," I said to Philippa afterwards, as I wrapped up a bottle of +Yanatas in a Cardigan jacket and rammed it into an already apoplectic +Gladstone bag, "that I do draw the line at, is taking that dog with us. +The whole business is black enough as it is." +</p> + +<p> +"Dear," said my wife, looking at me with almost clairvoyant +abstraction, "I could manage a second evening dress if you didn't mind +putting my tea-jacket in your portmanteau." +</p> + +<p> +Little, thank Heaven! as I know about yachting, I knew enough to make +pertinent remarks on the incongruity of an ancient 60-ton hireling and +a fleet of smart evening dresses; but none the less I left a pair of +indispensable boots behind, and the tea-jacket went into my portmanteau. +</p> + +<p> +It is doing no more than the barest justice to the officers of the +Royal Navy to say that, so far as I know them, they cherish no mistaken +enthusiasm for a home on the rolling deep when a home anywhere else +presents itself. Bernard Shute had unfortunately proved an exception +to this rule. During the winter, the invitation to go for a cruise in +the yacht that was in process of building for him hung over me like a +cloud; a timely strike in the builder's yard brought a respite, and, in +fact, placed the completion of the yacht at so safe a distance that I +was betrayed into specious regrets, echoed with an atrocious sincerity +by Philippa. Into a life pastorally compounded of Petty Sessions and +lawn-tennis parties, retribution fell when it was least expected. +Bernard Shute hired a yacht in Queenstown, and one short week +afterwards the worst had happened, and we were packing our things for a +cruise in her, the only alleviation being the knowledge that, whether +by sea or land, I was bound to return to my work in four days. +</p> + +<p> +We left Shreelane at twelve o'clock, a specially depressing hour for a +start, when breakfast has died in you, and lunch is still remote. My +last act before mounting the dogcart was to put her collar and chain on +Maria and immure her in the potato-house, whence, as we drove down the +avenue, her wails rent the heart of Philippa and rejoiced mine. It was +a very hot day, with a cloudless sky; the dust lay thick on the white +road, and on us also, as, during two baking hours, we drove up and down +the long hills and remembered things that had been left behind, and +grew hungry enough to eat sandwiches that tasted suspiciously of roast +beef. +</p> + +<p> +The yacht was moored in Clountiss Harbour; we drove through the village +street, a narrow and unlovely thoroughfare, studded with public-houses, +swarming with children and poultry, down through an ever-growing smell +of fish, to the quay. +</p> + +<p> +Thence we first viewed our fate, a dingy-looking schooner, and the hope +I had secretly been nourishing that there was not wind enough for her +to start, was dispelled by the sight of her topsail going up. More +than ever at that radiant moment—as the reflection of the white sail +quivered on the tranquil blue, and the still water flattered all it +reproduced, like a fashionable photographer—did I agree with George +Herbert's advice, "Praise the sea, but stay on shore." +</p> + +<p> +"We must hail her, I suppose," I said drearily. I assailed the <i>Eileen +Oge</i>, such being her inappropriate name, with desolate cries, but +achieved no immediate result beyond the assembling of some village +children round us and our luggage. +</p> + +<p> +"Mr. Shute and the two ladies was after screeching here for the boat +awhile ago," volunteered a horrid little girl, whom I had already twice +frustrated in the attempt to seat an infant relative on our bundle of +rugs. "Timsy Hallahane says 'twould be as good for them to stay +ashore, for there isn't as much wind outside as'd out a candle." +</p> + +<p> +With this encouraging statement the little girl devoted herself to the +alternate consumption of gooseberries and cockles. +</p> + +<p> +All things come to those who wait, and to us arrived at length the gig +of the <i>Eileen Oge</i>, and such, by this time, were the temperature and +the smells of the quay that I actually welcomed the moment that found +us leaving it for the yacht. +</p> + +<p> +"Now, Sinclair, aren't you glad we came?" remarked Philippa, as the +clear green water deepened under us, and a light briny air came coolly +round us with the motion of the boat. +</p> + +<p> +As she spoke, there was an outburst of screams from the children on the +quay, followed by a heavy splash. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh stop!" cried Philippa in an agony; "one of them has fallen in! I +can see its poor little brown head!" +</p> + +<p> +"'Tis a dog, ma'am," said briefly the man who was rowing stroke. +</p> + +<p> +"One might have wished it had been that little girl," said I, as I +steered to the best of my ability for the yacht. +</p> + +<p> +We had traversed another twenty yards or so, when Philippa, in a voice +in which horror and triumph were strangely blended, exclaimed, "She's +following us!" +</p> + +<p> +"Who? The little girl?" I asked callously. +</p> + +<p> +"No," returned Philippa; "worse." +</p> + +<p> +I looked round, not without a prevision of what I was to see, and +beheld the faithful Maria swimming steadily after us, with her brown +muzzle thrust out in front of her, ripping through the reflections like +a plough. +</p> + +<p> +"Go home!" I roared, standing up and gesticulating in fury that I well +know to be impotent. "Go home, you brute!" +</p> + +<p> +Maria redoubled her efforts, and Philippa murmured uncontrollably— +</p> + +<p> +"Well, she <i>is</i> a dear!" +</p> + +<p> +Had I had a sword in my hand I should undoubtedly have slain Philippa; +but before I could express my sentiments in any way, a violent shock +flung me endways on top of the man who was pulling stroke. Thanks to +Maria, we had reached our destination all unawares; the two men, +respectfully awaiting my instructions, had rowed on with disciplined +steadiness, and, as a result, we had rammed the <i>Eileen Oge</i> amidships, +with a vigour that brought Mr. Shute tumbling up the companion to see +what had happened. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, it's you, is it?" he said, with his mouth full. "Come in; don't +knock! Delighted to see you, Mrs. Yeates; don't apologise. There's +nothing like a hired ship after all—it's quite jolly to see the +splinters fly—shows you're getting your money's worth. Hullo! who's +this?" +</p> + +<p> +This was Maria, feigning exhaustion, and noisily treading water at the +boat's side. +</p> + +<p> +"What, poor old Maria? Wanted to send her ashore, did he? Heartless +ruffian!" +</p> + +<p> +Thus was Maria installed on board the <i>Eileen Oge</i>, and the element of +fatality had already begun to work. +</p> + +<p> +There was just enough wind to take us out of Clountiss Harbour, and +with the last of the out-running tide we crept away to the west. The +party on board consisted of our host's sister, Miss Cecilia Shute, Miss +Sally Knox, and ourselves; we sat about in conventional attitudes in +deck chairs and on adamantine deck bosses, and I talked to Miss Shute +with feverish brilliancy, and wished the patience-cards were not in the +cabin; I knew the supreme importance of keeping one's mind occupied, +but I dared not face the cabin. There was a long, almost imperceptible +swell, with little queer seabirds that I have never seen before—and +trust I never shall again—dotted about on its glassy slopes. The +coast-line looked low and grey and dull, as, I think, coast-lines +always do when viewed from the deep. The breeze that Bernard had +promised us we should find outside was barely enough to keep us moving. +The burning sun of four o'clock focussed its heat on the deck; Bernard +stood up among us, engaged in what he was pleased to call "handling the +stick," and beamed almost as offensively as the sun. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, we're slipping along," he said, his odiously healthy face glowing +like copper against the blazing blue sky. "You're going a great deal +faster than you think, and the men say we'll pick up a breeze once +we're round the Mizen." +</p> + +<p> +I made no reply; I was not feeling ill, merely thoroughly disinclined +for conversation. Miss Sally smiled wanly, and closing her eyes, laid +her head on Philippa's knee. Instructed by a dread freemasonry, I knew +that for her the moment had come when she could no longer bear to see +the rail rise slowly above the horizon, and with an equal rhythmic +slowness sink below it. Maria moved restlessly to and fro, panting and +yawning, and occasionally rearing herself on her hind-legs against the +side, and staring forth with wild eyes at the headachy sliding of the +swell. Perhaps she was meditating suicide; if so I sympathised with +her, and since she was obviously going to be sick I trusted that she +would bring off the suicide with as little delay as possible. Philippa +and Miss Shute sat in unaffected serenity in deck chairs, and stitched +at white things—teacloths for the <i>Eileen Oge</i>, I believe, things in +themselves a mockery—and talked untiringly, with that singular +indifference to their marine surroundings that I have often observed in +ladies who are not sea-sick. It always stirs me afresh to wonder why +they have not remained ashore; nevertheless, I prefer their tranquil +and total lack of interest in seafaring matters to the blatant +Vikingism of the average male who is similarly placed. +</p> + +<p> +Somehow, I know not how, we crawled onwards, and by about five o'clock +we had rounded the Mizen, a gaunt spike of a headland that starts up +like a boar's tusk above the ragged lip of the Irish coast, and the +<i>Eileen Oge</i> was beginning to swing and wallop in the long sluggish +rollers that the American liners know and despise. I was very far from +despising them. Down in the west, resting on the sea's rim, a purple +bank of clouds lay awaiting the descent of the sun, as seductively and +as malevolently as a damp bed at a hotel awaits a traveller. +</p> + +<p> +The end, so far as I was concerned, came at tea-time. The meal had +been prepared in the saloon, and thither it became incumbent on me to +accompany my hostess and my wife. Miss Sally, long past speech, +opened, at the suggestion of tea, one eye, and disclosed a look of +horror. As I tottered down the companion I respected her good sense. +The <i>Eileen Oge</i> had been built early in the sixties, and headroom was +not her strong point; neither, apparently, was ventilation. I began by +dashing my forehead against the frame of the cabin door, and then, +shattered morally and physically, entered into the atmosphere of the +pit. After which things, and the sight of a plate of rich cake, I +retired in good order to my cabin, and began upon the Yanatas. +</p> + +<p> +I pass over some painful intermediate details and resume at the moment +when Bernard Shute woke me from a drugged slumber to announce that +dinner was over. +</p> + +<p> +"It's been raining pretty hard," he said, swaying easily with the swing +of the yacht; "but we've got a clinking breeze, and we ought to make +Lurriga Harbour to-night. There's good anchorage there, the men say. +They're rather a lot of swabs, but they know this coast, and I don't. +I took 'em over with the ship all standing." +</p> + +<p> +"Where are we now?" I asked, something heartened by the blessed word +"anchorage." +</p> + +<p> +"You're running up Sheepskin Bay—it's a thundering big bay; Lurriga's +up at the far end of it, and the night's as black as the inside of a +cow. Dig out and get something to eat, and come on deck—— What! no +dinner?"—I had spoken morosely, with closed eyes—"Oh, rot! you're on +an even keel now. I promised Mrs. Yeates I'd make you dig out. You're +as bad as a soldier officer that we were ferrying to Malta one time in +the old Tamar. He got one leg out of his berth when we were going down +the Channel, and he was too sick to pull it in again till we got to +Gib!" +</p> + +<p> +I compromised on a drink and some biscuits. The ship was certainly +steadier, and I felt sufficiently restored to climb weakly on deck. It +was by this time past ten o'clock, and heavy clouds blotted out the +last of the afterglow, and smothered the stars at their birth. A wet +warm wind was lashing the <i>Eileen Oge</i> up a wide estuary; the waves +were hunting her, hissing under her stern, racing up to her, crested +with the white glow of phosphorus, as she fled before them. I dimly +discerned in the greyness the more solid greyness of the shore. The +mainsail loomed out into the darkness, nearly at right angles to the +yacht, with the boom creaking as the following wind gave us an +additional shove. I know nothing of yacht sailing, but I can +appreciate the grand fact that in running before a wind the boom is +removed from its usual sphere of devastation. +</p> + +<p> +I sat down beside a bundle of rugs that I had discovered to be my wife, +and thought of my whitewashed office at Shreelane and its bare but +stationary floor, with a yearning that was little short of passion. +Miss Sally had long since succumbed; Miss Shute was tired, and had +turned in soon after dinner. +</p> + +<p> +"I suppose she's overdone by the delirious gaiety of the afternoon," +said I acridly, in reply to this information. +</p> + +<p> +Philippa cautiously poked forth her head from the rugs, like a tortoise +from under its shell, to see that Bernard, who was standing near the +steersman, was out of hearing. +</p> + +<p> +"In all your life, Sinclair," she said impressively, "you never knew +such a time as Cecilia and I have had down there! We've had to wash +<i>everything</i> in the cabins, and remake the beds, and <i>hurl</i> the sheets +away—they were covered with black finger-marks—and while we were +doing that, in came the creature that calls himself the steward, to ask +if he might get something of his that he had left in Miss Shute's +'birthplace'! and he rooted out from under Cecilia's mattress a pair of +socks and half a loaf of bread!" +</p> + +<p> +"Consolation to Miss Shute to know her berth has been well aired," I +said, with the nearest approach to enjoyment I had known since I came +on board; "and has Sally made any equally interesting discoveries?" +</p> + +<p> +"She said she didn't care what her bed was like; she just dropped into +it. I must say I am sorry for her," went on Philippa; "she hated +coming. Her mother made her accept." +</p> + +<p> +"I wonder if Lady Knox will make her accept <i>him</i>!" I said. "How often +has Sally refused him, does any one know?" +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, about once a week," replied Philippa; "just the way I kept on +refusing you, you know!" +</p> + +<p> +Something cold and wet was thrust into my hand, and the aroma of damp +dog arose upon the night air; Maria had issued from some lair at the +sound of our voices, and was now, with palsied tremblings, slowly +trying to drag herself on to my lap. +</p> + +<p> +"Poor thing, she's been so dreadfully ill," said Philippa. "Don't send +her away, Sinclair. Mr. Shute found her lying on his berth not able to +move; didn't you, Mr. Shute?" +</p> + +<p> +"She found out that she was able to move," said Bernard, who had +crossed to our side of the deck; "it was somehow borne in upon her when +I got at her with a boot-tree. I wouldn't advise you to keep her in +your lap, Yeates. She stole half a ham after dinner, and she might +take a notion to make the only reparation in her power." +</p> + +<p> +I stood up and stretched myself stiffly. The wind was freshening, and +though the growing smoothness of the water told that we were making +shelter of some kind, for all that I could see of land we might as well +have been in mid-ocean. The heaving lift of the deck under my feet, +and the lurching swing when a stronger gust filled the ghostly sails, +were more disquieting to me in suggestion than in reality, and, to my +surprise, I found something almost enjoyable in rushing through +darkness at the pace at which we were going. +</p> + +<p> +"We're a small bit short of the mouth of Lurriga Harbour yet, sir," +said the man who was steering, in reply to a question from Bernard. "I +can see the shore well enough; sure I know every yard of wather in the +bay——" +</p> + +<p> +As he spoke he sat down abruptly and violently; so did Bernard, so did +I. The bundle that contained Philippa collapsed upon Maria. +</p> + +<p> +"Main sheet!" bellowed Bernard, on his feet in an instant, as the boom +swung in and out again with a terrific jerk. "We're ashore!" +</p> + +<p> +In response to this order three men in succession fell over me while I +was still struggling on the deck, and something that was either +Philippa's elbow, or the acutest angle of Maria's skull, hit me in the +face. As I found my feet the cabin skylight was suddenly illuminated +by a wavering glare. I got across the slanting deck somehow, through +the confusion of shouting men and the flapping thunder of the sails, +and saw through the skylight a gush of flame rising from a pool of +fire, around an overturned lamp on the swing-table. I avalanched down +the companion and was squandered like an avalanche on the floor at the +foot of it. Even as I fell, McCarthy the steward dragged the strip of +carpet from the cabin floor and threw it on the blaze; I found myself, +in some unexplained way, snatching a railway rug from Miss Shute and +applying it to the same purpose, and in half-a-dozen seconds we had +smothered the flame and were left in total darkness. The most striking +feature of the situation was the immovability of the yacht. +</p> + +<p> +"Great Ned!" said McCarthy, invoking I know not what heathen deity, "it +is on the bottom of the say we are? Well, whether or no, thank God we +have the fire quinched!" +</p> + +<p> +We were not, so far, at the bottom of the sea, but during the next ten +minutes the chances seemed in favour of our getting there. The yacht +had run her bows upon a sunken ridge of rock, and after a period of +feminine indecision as to whether she were going to slide off again, or +roll over into deep water, she elected to stay where she was, and the +gig was lowered with all speed, in order to tow her off before the tide +left her. +</p> + +<p> +My recollection of this interval is but hazy, but I can certify that in +ten minutes I had swept together an assortment of necessaries and +knotted them into my counterpane, had broken the string of my +eye-glass, and lost my silver matchbox; had found Philippa's +curling-tongs and put them in my pocket; had carted all the luggage on +deck; had then applied myself to the manly duty of reassuring the +ladies, and had found Miss Shute merely bored, Philippa +enthusiastically anxious to be allowed to help to pull the gig, and +Miss Sally radiantly restored to health and spirits by the cessation of +movement and the probability of an early escape from the yacht. +</p> + +<p> +The rain had, with its usual opportuneness, begun again; we stood in it +under umbrellas, and watched the gig jumping on its tow-rope like a dog +on a string, as the crew plied the labouring oar in futile endeavour to +move the <i>Eileen Oge</i>. We had run on the rock at half-tide, and the +increasing slant of the deck as the tide fell brought home to us the +pleasing probability that at low water—viz. about 2 A.M.—we should +roll off the rock and go to the bottom. Had Bernard Shute wished to +show himself in the most advantageous light to Miss Sally he could +scarcely have bettered the situation. I looked on in helpless respect +while he whom I had known as the scourge of the hunting field, the +terror of the shooting party, rose to the top of a difficult position +and kept there, and my respect was, if possible, increased by the +presence of mind with which he availed himself of all critical moments +to place a protecting arm round Miss Knox. +</p> + +<p> +By about 1 A.M. the two gaffs with which Bernard had contrived to shore +up the slowly heeling yacht began to show signs of yielding, and, in +approved shipwreck fashion, we took to the boats, the yacht's crew in +the gig remaining in attendance on what seemed likely to be the last +moments of the <i>Eileen Oge</i>, while we, in the dinghy, sought for the +harbour. Owing to the tilt of the yacht's deck, and the roughness of +the broken water round her, getting into the boat was no mean feat of +gymnastics. Miss Sally did it like a bird, alighting in the inevitable +arms of Bernard; Miss Shute followed very badly, but, by innate force +of character, successfully; Philippa, who was enjoying every moment of +her shipwreck, came last, launching herself into the dinghy with my +silver shoe-horn clutched in one hand, and in the other the tea-basket. +I heard the hollow clank of its tin cups as she sprang, and appreciated +the heroism with which Bernard received one of its corners in his +waist. How or when Maria left the yacht I know not, but when I applied +myself to the bow oar I led off with three crabs, owing to the devotion +with which she thrust her head into my lap. +</p> + +<p> +I am no judge of these matters, but in my opinion we ought to have been +swamped several times during that row. There was nothing but the +phosphorus of breaking waves to tell us where the rocks were, and +nothing to show where the harbour was except a solitary light, a +masthead light, as we supposed. The skipper had assured us that we +could not go wrong if we kept "a westerly course with a little northing +in it;" but it seemed simpler to steer for the light, and we did so. +The dinghy climbed along over the waves with an agility that was safer +than it felt; the rain fell without haste and without rest, the oars +were as inflexible as crowbars, and somewhat resembled them in shape +and weight; nevertheless, it was Elysium when compared with the +afternoon leisure of the deck of the <i>Eileen Oge</i>. +</p> + +<p> +At last we came, unexplainably, into smooth water, and it was at about +this time that we were first aware that the darkness was less dense +than it had been, and that the rain had ceased. By imperceptible +degrees a greyness touched the back of the waves, more a dreariness +than a dawn, but more welcome than thousands of gold and silver. I +looked over my shoulder and discerned vague bulky things ahead; as I +did so, my oar was suddenly wrapped in seaweed. We crept on; Maria +stood up with her paws on the gunwale, and whined in high agitation. +The dark objects ahead resolved themselves into rocks, and without more +ado Maria pitched herself into the water. In half a minute we heard +her shaking herself on shore. We slid on; the water swelled under the +dinghy, and lifted her keel on to grating gravel. +</p> + +<p> +"We couldn't have done it better if we'd been the Hydrographer Royal," +said Bernard, wading knee-deep in a light wash of foam, with the +painter in his hand; "but all the same, that masthead light is some +one's bedroom candle!" +</p> + +<p> +We landed, hauled up the boat, and then feebly sat down on our +belongings to review the situation, and Maria came and shook herself +over each of us in turn. We had run into a little cove, guided by the +philanthropic beam of a candle in the upper window of a house about a +hundred yards away. The candle still burned on, and the anæmic +daylight exhibited to us our surroundings, and we debated as to whether +we could at 2.45 A.M. present ourselves as objects of compassion to the +owner of the candle. I need hardly say that it was the ladies who +decided on making the attempt, having, like most of their sex, a +courage incomparably superior to ours in such matters; Bernard and I +had not a grain of genuine compunction in our souls, but we failed in +nerve. +</p> + +<p> +We trailed up from the cove, laden with emigrants' bundles, stumbling +on wet rocks in the half-light, and succeeded in making our way to the +house. +</p> + +<p> +It was a small two-storied building, of that hideous breed of +architecture usually dedicated to the rectories of the Irish Church; we +felt that there was something friendly in the presence of a pair of +carpet slippers in the porch, but there was a hint of exclusiveness in +the fact that there was no knocker and that the bell was broken. The +light still burned in the upper window, and with a faltering hand I +flung gravel at the glass. This summons was appallingly responded to +by a shriek; there was a flutter of white at the panes, and the candle +was extinguished. +</p> + +<p> +"Come away!" exclaimed Miss Shute, "it's a lunatic asylum!" +</p> + +<p> +We stood our ground, however, and presently heard a footstep within, a +blind was poked aside in another window, and we were inspected by an +unseen inmate; then some one came downstairs, and the hall-door was +opened by a small man with a bald head and a long sandy beard. He was +attired in a brief dressing-gown, and on his shoulder sat, like an +angry ghost, a large white cockatoo. Its crest was up on end, its beak +was a good two inches long and curved like a Malay kris; its claws +gripped the little man's shoulder. Maria uttered in the background a +low and thunderous growl. +</p> + +<p> +"Don't take any notice of the bird, please," said the little man +nervously, seeing our united gaze fixed upon this apparition; "he's +extremely fierce if annoyed." +</p> + +<p> +The majority of our party here melted away to either side of the +hall-door, and I was left to do the explaining. The tale of our +misfortunes had its due effect, and we were ushered into a small +drawing-room, our host holding open the door for us, like a nightmare +footman with bare shins, a gnome-like bald head, and an unclean spirit +swaying on his shoulder. He opened the shutters, and we sat decorously +round the room, as at an afternoon party, while the situation was +further expounded on both sides. Our entertainer, indeed, favoured us +with the leading items of his family history, amongst them the facts +that he was a Dr. Fahy from Cork, who had taken somebody's rectory for +the summer, and had been prevailed on by some of his patients to permit +them to join him as paying guests. +</p> + +<p> +"I said it was a lunatic asylum," murmured Miss Shute to me. +</p> + +<p> +"In point of fact," went on our host, "there isn't an empty room in the +house, which is why I can only offer your party the use of this room +and the kitchen fire, which I make a point of keeping burning all +night." +</p> + +<p> +He leaned back complacently in his chair, and crossed his legs; then, +obviously remembering his costume, sat bolt upright again. We owed the +guiding beams of the candle to the owner of the cockatoo, an old Mrs. +Buck, who was, we gathered, the most paying of all the patients, and +also, obviously, the one most feared and cherished by Dr. Fahy. "She +has a candle burning all night for the bird, and her door open to let +him walk about the house when he likes," said Dr. Fahy; "indeed, I may +say her passion for him amounts to dementia. He's very fond of me, and +Mrs. Fahy's always telling me I should be thankful, as whatever he did +we'd be bound to put up with it!" +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Fahy had evidently a turn for conversation that was unaffected by +circumstance; the first beams of the early sun were lighting up the rep +chair covers before the door closed upon his brown dressing-gown, and +upon the stately white back of the cockatoo, and the demoniac +possession of laughter that had wrought in us during the interview +burst forth unchecked. It was most painful and exhausting, as such +laughter always is; but by far the most serious part of it was that +Miss Sally, who was sitting in the window, somehow drove her elbow +through a pane of glass, and Bernard, in pulling down the blind to +conceal the damage, tore it off the roller. +</p> + +<p> +There followed on this catastrophe a period during which reason +tottered and Maria barked furiously. Philippa was the first to pull +herself together, and to suggest an adjournment to the kitchen fire +that, in honour of the paying guests, was never quenched, and, +respecting the repose of the household, we proceeded thither with a +stealth that convinced Maria we were engaged in a rat hunt. The boots +of paying guests littered the floor, the debris of their last repast +covered the table; a cat in some unseen fastness crooned a war song to +Maria, who feigned unconsciousness and fell to scientific research in +the scullery. +</p> + +<p> +We roasted our boots at the range, and Bernard, with all a sailor's +gift for exploration and theft, prowled in noisome purlieus and emerged +with a jug of milk and a lump of salt butter. No one who has not been +a burglar can at all realise what it was to roam through Dr. Fahy's +basement storey, with the rookery of paying guests asleep above, and to +feel that, so far, we had repaid his confidence by breaking a pane of +glass and a blind, and putting the scullery tap out of order. I have +always maintained that there was something wrong with it before I +touched it, but the fact remains that when I had filled Philippa's +kettle, no human power could prevail upon it to stop flowing. For all +I know to the contrary it is running still. +</p> + +<p> +It was in the course of our furtive return to the drawing-room that we +were again confronted by Mrs. Buck's cockatoo. It was standing in +malign meditation on the stairs, and on seeing us it rose, without a +word of warning, upon the wing, and with a long screech flung itself at +Miss Sally's golden-red head, which a ray of sunlight had chanced to +illumine. There was a moment of stampede, as the selected victim, +pursued by the cockatoo, fled into the drawing-room; two chairs were +upset (one, I think, broken), Miss Sally enveloped herself in a window +curtain, Philippa and Miss Shute effaced themselves beneath a table; +the cockatoo, foiled of its prey, skimmed, still screeching, round the +ceiling. It was Bernard who, with a well-directed sofa-cushion, drove +the enemy from the room. There was only a chink of the door open, but +the cockatoo turned on his side as he flew, and swung through it like a +woodcock. +</p> + +<p> +We slammed the door behind him, and at the same instant there came a +thumping on the floor overhead, muffled, yet peremptory. +</p> + +<p> +"That's Mrs. Buck!" said Miss Shute, crawling from under the table; +"the room over this is the one that had the candle in it." +</p> + +<p> +We sat for a time in awful stillness, but nothing further happened, +save a distant shriek overhead, that told the cockatoo had sought and +found sanctuary in his owner's room. We had tea <i>sotto voce</i>, and +then, one by one, despite the amazing discomfort of the drawing-room +chairs, we dozed off to sleep. +</p> + +<p> +It was at about five o'clock that I woke with a stiff neck and an +uneasy remembrance that I had last seen Maria in the kitchen. The +others, looking, each of them, about twenty years older than their age, +slept in various attitudes of exhaustion. Bernard opened his eyes as I +stole forth to look for Maria, but none of the ladies awoke. I went +down the evil-smelling passage that led to the kitchen stairs, and, +there on a mat, regarding me with intelligent affection, was Maria; but +what—oh what was the white thing that lay between her forepaws? +</p> + +<p> +The situation was too serious to be coped with alone. I fled +noiselessly back to the drawing-room and put my head in; Bernard's +eyes—blessed be the light sleep of sailors!—opened again, and there +was that in mine that summoned him forth. (Blessed also be the light +step of sailors!) +</p> + +<p> +We took the corpse from Maria, withholding perforce the language and +the slaughtering that our hearts ached to bestow. For a minute or two +our eyes communed. +</p> + +<p> +"I'll get the kitchen shovel," breathed Bernard; "you open the +hall-door!" +</p> + +<p> +A moment later we passed like spirits into the open air, and on into a +little garden at the end of the house. Maria followed us, licking her +lips. There were beds of nasturtiums, and of purple stocks, and of +marigolds. We chose a bed of stocks, a plump bed, that looked like +easy digging. The windows were all tightly shut and shuttered, and I +took the cockatoo from under my coat and hid it, temporarily, behind a +box border. Bernard had brought a shovel and a coal scoop. We dug +like badgers. At eighteen inches we got down into shale and stones, +and the coal scoop struck work. +</p> + +<p> +"Never mind," said Bernard; "we'll plant the stocks on top of him." +</p> + +<p> +It was a lovely morning, with a new-born blue sky and a light northerly +breeze. As we returned to the house, we looked across the wavelets of +the little cove and saw, above the rocky point round which we had +groped last night, a triangular white patch moving slowly along. +</p> + +<p> +"The tide's lifted her!" said Bernard, standing stock-still. He looked +at Mrs. Buck's window and at me. "Yeates!" he whispered, "let's quit!" +</p> + +<p> +It was now barely six o'clock, and not a soul was stirring. We woke +the ladies and convinced them of the high importance of catching the +tide. Bernard left a note on the hall table for Dr. Fahy, a beautiful +note of leave-taking and gratitude, and apology for the broken window +(for which he begged to enclose half-a-crown). No allusion was made to +the other casualties. As we neared the strand he found an occasion to +say to me: +</p> + +<p> +"I put in a postscript that I thought it best to mention that I had +seen the cockatoo in the garden, and hoped it would get back all right. +That's quite true, you know! But look here, whatever you do, you must +keep it all dark from the ladies——" +</p> + +<p> +At this juncture Maria overtook us with the cockatoo in her mouth. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap11"></a>XI<br/> +OCCASIONAL LICENSES</h2> + +<p> +"It's out of the question," I said, looking forbiddingly at Mrs. +Moloney through the spokes of the bicycle that I was pumping up outside +the grocer's in Skebawn. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, indeed, Major Yeates," said Mrs. Moloney, advancing excitedly, +and placing on the nickel plating a hand that I had good and recent +cause to know was warm, "sure I know well that if th' angel Gabriel +came down from heaven looking for a license for the races, your honour +wouldn't give it to him without a charackther, but as for Michael! +Sure, the world knows what Michael is!" +</p> + +<p> +I had been waiting for Philippa for already nearly half-an-hour, and my +temper was not at its best. +</p> + +<p> +"Character or no character, Mrs. Moloney," said I with asperity, "the +magistrates have settled to give no occasional licenses, and if Michael +were as sober as——" +</p> + +<p> +"Is it sober! God help us!" exclaimed Mrs. Moloney with an upward +rolling of her eye to the Recording Angel; "I'll tell your honour the +truth. I'm his wife, now, fifteen years, and I never seen the sign of +dhrink on Michael only once, and that was when he went out o' +good-nature helping Timsy Ryan to whitewash his house, and Timsy and +himself had a couple o' pots o' porther, and look, he was as little +used to it that his head got light, and he walked away out to dhrive in +the cows and it no more than eleven o'clock in the day! And the cows, +the craytures, as much surprised, goin' hither and over the four +corners of the road from him! Faith, ye'd have to laugh. 'Michael,' +says I to him, 'ye're dhrunk!' 'I am,' says he, and the tears rained +from his eyes. I turned the cows from him. 'Go home,' I says, 'and +lie down on Willy Tom's bed——'" +</p> + +<p> +At this affecting point my wife came out of the grocer's with a large +parcel to be strapped to my handlebar, and the history of Mr. Moloney's +solitary lapse from sobriety got no further than Willy Tom's bed. +</p> + +<p> +"You see," I said to Philippa, as we bicycled quietly home through the +hot June afternoon, "we've settled we'll give no licenses for the +sports. Why even young Sheehy, who owns three pubs in Skebawn, came to +me and said he hoped the magistrates would be firm about it, as these +one-day licenses were quite unnecessary, and only led to drunkenness +and fighting, and every man on the Bench has joined in promising not to +grant any." +</p> + +<p> +"How nice, dear!" said Philippa absently. "Do you know Mrs. McDonnell +can only let me have three dozen cups and saucers; I wonder if that +will be enough?" +</p> + +<p> +"Do you mean to say you expect three dozen people?" said I. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, it's always well to be prepared," replied my wife evasively. +</p> + +<p> +During the next few days I realised the true inwardness of what it was +to be prepared for an entertainment of this kind. Games were not at a +high level in my district. Football, of a wild, guerilla species, was +waged intermittently, blended in some inextricable way with Home Rule +and a brass band, and on Sundays gatherings of young men rolled a heavy +round stone along the roads, a rudimentary form of sport, whose +fascination lay primarily in the fact that it was illegal, and, in +lesser degree, in betting on the length of each roll. I had had a +period of enthusiasm, during which I thought I was going to be the +apostle of cricket in the neighbourhood, but my mission dwindled to +single wicket with Peter Cadogan, who was indulgent but bored, and I +swiped the ball through the dining-room window, and some one took one +of the stumps to poke the laundry fire. Once a year, however, on that +festival of the Roman Catholic Church which is familiarly known as +"Pether and Paul's day," the district was wont to make a spasmodic +effort at athletic sports, which were duly patronised by the gentry and +promoted by the publicans, and this year the honour of a steward's +green rosette was conferred upon me. Philippa's genius for hospitality +here saw its chance, and broke forth into unbridled tea-party in +connection with the sports, even involving me in the hire of a tent, +the conveyance of chairs and tables, and other large operations. +</p> + +<p> +It chanced that Flurry Knox had on this occasion lent the fields for +the sports, with the proviso that horse-races and a tug-of-war were to +be added to the usual programme; Flurry's participation in events of +this kind seldom failed to be of an inflaming character. As he and I +planted larch spars for the high jump, and stuck furze-bushes into +hurdles (locally known as "hurrls"), and skirmished hourly with people +who wanted to sell drink on the course, I thought that my next summer +leave would singularly coincide with the festival consecrated to St. +Peter and St. Paul. We made a grand stand of quite four feet high, out +of old fish-boxes, which smelt worse and worse as the day wore on, but +was, none the less, as sought after by those for whom it was not +intended, as is the Royal enclosure at Ascot; we broke gaps in all the +fences to allow carriages on to the ground, we armed a gang of the +worst blackguards in Skebawn with cart-whips, to keep the course, and +felt that organisation could go no further. +</p> + +<p> +The momentous day of Pether and Paul opened badly, with heavy clouds +and every indication of rain, but after a few thunder showers things +brightened, and it seemed within the bounds of possibility that the +weather might hold up. When I got down to the course on the day of the +sports the first thing I saw was a tent of that peculiar filthy grey +that usually enshrines the sale of porter, with an array of barrels in +a crate beside it; I bore down upon it in all the indignant majesty of +the law, and in so doing came upon Flurry Knox, who was engaged in +flogging boys off the Grand Stand. +</p> + +<p> +"Sheehy's gone one better than you!" he said, without taking any +trouble to conceal the fact that he was amused. +</p> + +<p> +"Sheehy!" I said; "why, Sheehy was the man who went to every magistrate +in the country to ask them to refuse a license for the sports." +</p> + +<p> +"Yes, he took some trouble to prevent any one else having a look in," +replied Flurry; "he asked every magistrate but one, and that was the +one that gave him the license." +</p> + +<p> +"You don't mean to say that it was you?" I demanded in high wrath and +suspicion, remembering that Sheehy bred horses, and that my friend Mr. +Knox was a person of infinite resource in the matter of a deal. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, well," said Flurry, rearranging a disordered fish-box, "and me +that's a church-warden, and sprained my ankle a month ago with running +downstairs at my grandmother's to be in time for prayers! Where's the +use of a good character in this country?" +</p> + +<p> +"Not much when you keep it eating its head off for want of exercise," I +retorted; "but if it wasn't you, who was it?" +</p> + +<p> +"Do you remember old Moriarty out at Castle Ire?" +</p> + +<p> +I remembered him extremely well as one of those representatives of the +people with whom a paternal Government had leavened the effete ranks of +the Irish magistracy. +</p> + +<p> +"Well," resumed Flurry, "that license was as good as a five-pound note +in his pocket." +</p> + +<p> +I permitted myself a comment on Mr. Moriarty suitable to the occasion. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, that's nothing," said Flurry easily; "he told me one day when he +was half screwed that his Commission of the Peace was worth a hundred +and fifty a year to him in turkeys and whisky, and he was telling the +truth for once." +</p> + +<p> +At this point Flurry's eye wandered, and following its direction I saw +Lady Knox's smart 'bus cleaving its way through the throng of country +people, lurching over the ups and downs of the field like a ship in a +sea. I was too blind to make out the component parts of the white +froth that crowned it on top, and seethed forth from it when it had +taken up a position near the tent in which Philippa was even now +propping the legs of the tea-table, but from the fact that Flurry +addressed himself to the door, I argued that Miss Sally had gone inside. +</p> + +<p> +Lady Knox's manner had something more than its usual bleakness. She +had brought, as she promised, a large contingent, but from the way that +the strangers within her gates melted impalpably and left me to deal +with her single-handed, I drew the further deduction that all was not +well. +</p> + +<p> +"Did you ever in your life see such a gang of women as I have brought +with me?" she began with her wonted directness, as I piloted her to the +Grand Stand, and placed her on the stoutest looking of the fish-boxes. +"I have no patience with men who yacht! Bernard Shute has gone off to +the Clyde, and I had counted on his being a man at my dance next week. +I suppose you'll tell me you're going away too." +</p> + +<p> +I assured Lady Knox that I would be a man to the best of my ability. +</p> + +<p> +"This is the last dance I shall give," went on her ladyship, +unappeased; "the men in this country consist of children and cads." +</p> + +<p> +I admitted that we were but a poor lot, "but," I said, "Miss Sally told +me——" +</p> + +<p> +"Sally's a fool!" said Lady Knox, with a falcon eye at her daughter, +who happened to be talking to her distant kinsman, Mr. Flurry of that +ilk. +</p> + +<p> +The races had by this time begun with a competition known as the "Hop, +Step, and Lep"; this, judging by the yells, was a highly interesting +display, but as it was conducted between two impervious rows of +onlookers, the aristocracy on the fish-boxes saw nothing save the +occasional purple face of a competitor, starting into view above the +wall of backs like a jack-in-the-box. For me, however, the odorous +sanctuary of the fish-boxes was not to be. I left it guarded by +Slipper with a cart-whip of flail-like dimensions, as disreputable an +object as could be seen out of low comedy, with some one's old white +cords on his bandy legs, butcher-boots three sizes too big for him, and +a black eye. The small boys fled before him; in the glory of his +office he would have flailed his own mother off the fish-boxes had +occasion served. +</p> + +<p> +I had an afternoon of decidedly mixed enjoyment. My stewardship +blossomed forth like Aaron's rod, and added to itself the duties of +starter, handicapper, general referee, and chucker-out, besides which I +from time to time strove with emissaries who came from Philippa with +messages about water and kettles. Flurry and I had to deal +single-handed with the foot-races (our brothers in office being +otherwise engaged at Mr. Sheehy's), a task of many difficulties, +chiefest being that the spectators all swept forward at the word "Go!" +and ran the race with the competitors, yelling curses, blessings, and +advice upon them, taking short cuts over anything and everybody, and +mingling inextricably with the finish. By fervent applications of the +whips, the course was to some extent purged for the quarter-mile, and +it would, I believe, have been a triumph of handicapping had not an +unforeseen disaster overtaken the favourite—old Mrs. Knox's bath-chair +boy. Whether, as was alleged, his braces had or had not been tampered +with by a rival was a matter that the referee had subsequently to deal +with in the thick of a free fight; but the painful fact remained that +in the course of the first lap what were described as "his galluses" +abruptly severed their connection with the garments for whose safety +they were responsible, and the favourite was obliged to seek seclusion +in the crowd. +</p> + +<p> +The tug-of-war followed close on this <i>contre-temps</i>, and had the +excellent effect of drawing away, like a blister, the inflammation set +up by the grievances of the bath-chair boy. I cannot at this moment +remember of how many men each team consisted; my sole aim was to keep +the numbers even, and to baffle the volunteers who, in an ecstasy of +sympathy, attached themselves to the tail of the rope at moments when +their champions weakened. The rival forces dug their heels in and +tugged, in an uproar that drew forth the innermost line of customers +from Mr. Sheehy's porter tent, and even attracted "the quality" from +the haven of the fish-boxes, Slipper, in the capacity of Squire of +Dames, pioneering Lady Knox through the crowd with the cart-whip, and +with language whose nature was providentially veiled, for the most +part, by the din. The tug-of-war continued unabated. One team was +getting the worst of it, but hung doggedly on, sinking lower and lower +till they gradually sat down; nothing short of the trump of judgment +could have conveyed to them that they were breaking rules, and both +teams settled down by slow degrees on to their sides, with the rope +under them, and their heels still planted in the ground, bringing about +complete deadlock. I do not know the record duration for a tug-of-war, +but I can certify that the Cullinagh and Knockranny teams lay on the +ground at full tension for half-an-hour, like men in apoplectic fits, +each man with his respective adherents howling over him, blessing him, +and adjuring him to continue. +</p> + +<p> +With my own nauseated eyes I saw a bearded countryman, obviously one of +Mr. Sheehy's best customers, fling himself on his knees beside one of +the combatants, and kiss his crimson and streaming face in a rapture of +encouragement. As he shoved unsteadily past me on his return journey +to Mr. Sheehy's, I heard him informing a friend that "he cried a +handful over Danny Mulloy, when he seen the poor brave boy so +shtubborn, and, indeed, he couldn't say why he cried." +</p> + +<p> +"For good-nature ye'd cry," suggested the friend. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, just that, I suppose," returned Danny Mulloy's admirer +resignedly; "indeed, if it was only two cocks ye seen fightin' on the +road, yer heart'd take part with one o' them!" +</p> + +<p> +I had begun to realise that I might as well abandon the tug-of-war and +occupy myself elsewhere, when my wife's much harassed messenger brought +me the portentous tidings that Mrs. Yeates wanted me at the tent at +once. When I arrived I found the tent literally bulging with +Philippa's guests; Lady Knox, seated on a hamper, was taking off her +gloves, and loudly announcing her desire for tea, and Philippa, with a +flushed face and a crooked hat, breathed into my ear the awful news +that both the cream and the milk had been forgotten. +</p> + +<p> +"But Flurry Knox says he can get me some," she went on; "he's gone to +send people to milk a cow that lives near here. Go out and see if he's +coming." +</p> + +<p> +I went out and found, in the first instance, Mrs. Cadogan, who greeted +me with the prayer that the divil might roast Julia McCarthy, that +legged it away to the races like a wild goose, and left the cream +afther her on the servants' hall table. "Sure, Misther Flurry's gone +looking for a cow, and what cow would there be in a backwards place +like this? And look at me shtriving to keep the kettle simpering on +the fire, and not as much coals undher it as'd redden a pipe!" +</p> + +<p> +"Where's Mr. Knox?" I asked. +</p> + +<p> +"Himself and Slipper's galloping the counthry like the deer. I believe +it's to the house above they went, sir." +</p> + +<p> +I followed up a rocky hill to the house above, and there found Flurry +and Slipper engaged in the patriarchal task of driving two brace of +coupled and spancelled goats into a shed. +</p> + +<p> +"It's the best we can do," said Flurry briefly; "there isn't a cow to +be found, and the people are all down at the sports. Be d——d to you, +Slipper, don't let them go from you!" as the goats charged and doubled +like football players. +</p> + +<p> +"But goats' milk!" I said, paralysed by horrible memories of what tea +used to taste like at Gib. +</p> + +<p> +"They'll never know it!" said Flurry, cornering a venerable nanny; +"here, hold this divil, and hold her tight!" +</p> + +<p> +I have no time to dwell upon the pastoral scene that followed. Suffice +it to say, that at the end of ten minutes of scorching profanity from +Slipper, and incessant warfare with the goats, the latter had +reluctantly yielded two small jugfuls, and the dairymaids had exhibited +a nerve and skill in their trade that won my lasting respect. +</p> + +<p> +"I knew I could trust <i>you</i>, Mr. Knox!" said Philippa, with shining +eyes, as we presented her with the two foaming beakers. I suppose a +man is never a hero to his wife, but if she could have realised the +bruises on my legs, I think she would have reserved a blessing for me +also. +</p> + +<p> +What was thought of the goats' milk I gathered symptomatically from a +certain fixity of expression that accompanied the first sip of the tea, +and from observing that comparatively few ventured on second cups. I +also noted that after a brief conversation with Flurry, Miss Sally +poured hers secretly on to the grass. Lady Knox had throughout the day +preserved an aspect so threatening that no change was perceptible in +her demeanour. In the throng of hungry guests I did not for some time +notice that Mr. Knox had withdrawn until something in Miss Sally's eye +summoned me to her, and she told me she had a message from him for me. +</p> + +<p> +"Couldn't we come outside?" she said. +</p> + +<p> +Outside the tent, within less than six yards of her mother, Miss Sally +confided to me a scheme that made my hair stand on end. Summarised, it +amounted to this: That, first, she was in the primary stage of a deal +with Sheehy for a four-year-old chestnut colt, for which Sheehy was +asking double its value on the assumption that it had no rival in the +country; that, secondly, they had just heard it was going to run in the +first race; and, thirdly and lastly, that as there was no other horse +available, Flurry was going to take old Sultan out of the 'bus and ride +him in the race; and that Mrs. Yeates had promised to keep mamma safe +in the tent, while the race was going on, and "you know, Major Yeates, +it would be delightful to beat Sheehy after his getting the better of +you all about the license!" +</p> + +<p> +With this base appeal to my professional feelings, Miss Knox paused, +and looked at me insinuatingly. Her eyes were greeny-grey, and very +beguiling. +</p> + +<p> +"Come on," she said; "they want you to start them!" +</p> + +<p> +Pursued by visions of the just wrath of Lady Knox, I weakly followed +Miss Sally to the farther end of the second field, from which point the +race was to start. The course was not a serious one: two or three +natural banks, a stone wall, and a couple of "hurrls." There were but +four riders, including Flurry, who was seated composedly on Sultan, +smoking a cigarette and talking confidentially to Slipper. Sultan, +although something stricken in years and touched in the wind, was a +brown horse who in his day had been a hunter of no mean repute; even +now he occasionally carried Lady Knox in a sedate and gentlemanly +manner, but it struck me that it was trying him rather high to take him +from the pole of the 'bus after twelve miles on a hilly road, and +hustle him over a country against a four-year-old. My acutest anxiety, +however, was to start the race as quickly as possible, and to get back +to the tent in time to establish an alibi; therefore I repressed my +private sentiments, and, tying my handkerchief to a stick, determined +that no time should be fashionably frittered away in false starts. +</p> + +<p> +They got away somehow; I believe Sheehy's colt was facing the wrong way +at the moment when I dropped the flag, but a friend turned him with a +stick, and, with a cordial and timely whack, speeded him on his way on +sufficiently level terms, and then somehow, instead of returning to the +tent, I found myself with Miss Sally on the top of a tall narrow bank, +in a precarious line of other spectators, with whom we toppled and +swayed, and, in moments of acuter emotion, held on to each other in +unaffected comradeship. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry started well, and from our commanding position we could see him +methodically riding at the first fence at a smart hunting canter, +closely attended by James Canty's brother on a young black mare, and by +an unknown youth on a big white horse. The hope of Sheehy's stable, a +leggy chestnut, ridden by a cadet of the house of Sheehy, went away +from the friend's stick like a rocket, and had already refused the +first bank twice before old Sultan decorously changed feet on it and +dropped down into the next field with tranquil precision. The white +horse scrambled over it on his stomach, but landed safely, despite the +fact that his rider clasped him round the neck during the process; the +black mare and the chestnut shouldered one another over at the hole the +white horse had left, and the whole party went away in a bunch and +jumped the ensuing hurdle without disaster. Flurry continued to ride +at the same steady hunting pace, accompanied respectfully by the white +horse and by Jerry Canty on the black mare. Sheehy's colt had clearly +the legs of the party, and did some showy galloping between the jumps, +but as he refused to face the banks without a lead, the end of the +first round found the field still a sociable party personally conducted +by Mr. Knox. +</p> + +<p> +"That's a dam nice horse," said one of my hangers-on, looking +approvingly at Sultan as he passed us at the beginning of the second +round, making a good deal of noise but apparently going at his ease; +"you might depind your life on him, and he have the crabbedest jock in +the globe of Ireland on him this minute." +</p> + +<p> +"Canty's mare's very sour," said another; "look at her now, baulking +the bank! she's as cross as a bag of weasels." +</p> + +<p> +"Begob, I wouldn't say but she's a little sign lame," resumed the +first; "she was going light on one leg on the road a while ago." +</p> + +<p> +"I tell you what it is," said Miss Sally, very seriously, in my ear, +"that chestnut of Sheehy's is settling down. I'm afraid he'll gallop +away from Sultan at the finish, and the wall won't stop him. Flurry +can't get another inch out of Sultan. He's riding him well," she ended +in a critical voice, which yet was not quite like her own. Perhaps I +should not have noticed it but for the fact that the hand that held my +arm was trembling. As for me, I thought of Lady Knox, and trembled too. +</p> + +<p> +There now remained but one bank, the trampled remnant of the furze +hurdle, and the stone wall. The pace was beginning to improve, and the +other horses drew away from Sultan; they charged the bank at full +gallop, the black mare and the chestnut flying it perilously, with a +windmill flourish of legs and arms from their riders, the white horse +racing up to it with a gallantry that deserted him at the critical +moment, with the result that his rider turned a somersault over his +head and landed, amidst the roars of the onlookers, sitting on the +fence facing his horse's nose. With creditable presence of mind he +remained on the bank, towed the horse over, scrambled on to his back +again and started afresh. Sultan, thirty yards to the bad, pounded +doggedly on, and Flurry's cane and heels remained idle; the old horse, +obviously blown, slowed cautiously coming in at the jump. Sally's grip +tightened on my arm, and the crowd yelled as Sultan, answering to a +hint from the spurs and a touch at his mouth, heaved himself on to the +bank. Nothing but sheer riding on Flurry's part got him safe off it, +and saved him from the consequences of a bad peck on landing; none the +less, he pulled himself together and went away down the hill for the +stone wall as stoutly as ever. The high-road skirted the last two +fields, and there was a gate in the roadside fence beside the place +where the stone wall met it at right angles. I had noticed this gate, +because during the first round Slipper had been sitting on it, +demonstrating with his usual fervour. Sheeny's colt was leading, with +his nose in the air, his rider's hands going like a circular saw, and +his temper, as a bystander remarked, "up on end"; the black mare, half +mad from spurring, was going hard at his heels, completely out of hand; +the white horse was steering steadily for the wrong side of the flag, +and Flurry, by dint of cutting corners and of saving every yard of +ground, was close enough to keep his antagonists' heads over their +shoulders, while their right arms rose and fell in unceasing +flagellation. +</p> + +<p> +"There'll be a smash when they come to the wall! If one falls they'll +all go!" panted Sally. "Oh!—— Now! Flurry! Flurry!——" +</p> + +<p> +What had happened was that the chestnut colt had suddenly perceived +that the gate at right angles to the wall was standing wide open, and, +swinging away from the jump, he had bolted headlong out on to the road, +and along it at top speed for his home. After him fled Canty's black +mare, and with her, carried away by the spirit of stampede, went the +white horse. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry stood up in his stirrups and gave a view-halloa as he cantered +down to the wall. Sultan came at it with the send of the hill behind +him, and jumped it with a skill that intensified, if that were +possible, the volume of laughter and yells around us. By the time the +black mare and the white horse had returned and ignominiously bundled +over the wall to finish as best they might, Flurry was leading Sultan +towards us. +</p> + +<p> +"That blackguard, Slipper!" he said, grinning; "every one'll say I told +him to open the gate! But look here, I'm afraid we're in for trouble. +Sultan's given himself a bad over-reach; you could never drive him home +to-night. And I've just seen Norris lying blind drunk under a wall!" +</p> + +<p> +Now Norris was Lady Knox's coachman. We stood aghast at this "horror +on horror's head," the blood trickled down Sultan's heel, and the +lather lay in flecks on his dripping, heaving sides, in irrefutable +witness to the iniquity of Lady Knox's only daughter. Then Flurry said: +</p> + +<p> +"Thank the Lord, here's the rain!" +</p> + +<p> +At the moment I admit that I failed to see any cause for gratitude in +this occurrence, but later on I appreciated Flurry's grasp of +circumstances. +</p> + +<p> +That appreciation was, I think, at its highest development about +half-an-hour afterwards, when I, an unwilling conspirator (a part with +which my acquaintance with Mr. Knox had rendered me but too familiar) +unfurled Mrs. Cadogan's umbrella over Lady Knox's head, and hurried her +through the rain from the tent to the 'bus, keeping it and my own +person well between her and the horses. I got her in, with the rest of +her bedraggled and exhausted party, and slammed the door. +</p> + +<p> +"Remember, Major Yeates," she said through the window, "you are the +<i>only</i> person here in whom I have any confidence. I don't wish <i>any</i> +one else to touch the reins!" this with a glance towards Flurry, who +was standing near. +</p> + +<p> +"I'm afraid I'm only a moderate whip," I said. +</p> + +<p> +"My dear man," replied Lady Knox testily, "those horses could drive +themselves!" +</p> + +<p> +I slunk round to the front of the 'bus. Two horses, carefully rugged, +were in it, with the inevitable Slipper at their heads. +</p> + +<p> +"Slipper's going with you," whispered Flurry, stepping up to me; "she +won't have me at any price. He'll throw the rugs over them when you +get to the house, and if you hold the umbrella well over her she'll +never see. I'll manage to get Sultan over somehow, when Norris is +sober. That will be all right." +</p> + +<p> +I climbed to the box without answering, my soul being bitter within me, +as is the soul of a man who has been persuaded by womankind against his +judgment. +</p> + +<p> +"Never again!" I said to myself, picking up the reins; "let her marry +him or Bernard Shute, or both of them if she likes, but I won't be +roped into this kind of business again!" +</p> + +<p> +Slipper drew the rugs from the horses, revealing on the near side Lady +Knox's majestic carriage horse, and on the off, a thick-set brown mare +of about fifteen hands. +</p> + +<p> +"What brute is this?" said I to Slipper, as he swarmed up beside me. +</p> + +<p> +"I don't rightly know where Misther Flurry got her," said Slipper, with +one of his hiccoughing crows of laughter; "give her the whip, Major, +and"—here he broke into song: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +"Howld to the shteel,<br/> +Honamaundhiaoul; she'll run off like an eel!" +</p> + +<p> +"If you don't shut your mouth," said I, with pent-up ferocity, "I'll +chuck you off the 'bus." +</p> + +<p> +Slipper was but slightly drunk, and, taking this delicate rebuke in +good part, he relapsed into silence. +</p> + +<p> +Wherever the brown mare came from, I can certify that it was not out of +double harness. Though humble and anxious to oblige, she pulled away +from the pole as if it were red hot, and at critical moments had a +tendency to sit down. However, we squeezed without misadventure among +the donkey carts and between the groups of people, and bumped at length +in safety out on to the high-road. +</p> + +<p> +Here I thought it no harm to take Slipper's advice, and I applied the +whip to the brown mare, who seemed inclined to turn round. She +immediately fell into an uncertain canter that no effort of mine could +frustrate; I could only hope that Miss Sally would foster conversation +inside the 'bus and create a distraction; but judging from my last view +of the party, and of Lady Knox in particular, I thought she was not +likely to be successful. Fortunately the rain was heavy and thick, and +a rising west wind gave every promise of its continuance. I had little +doubt but that I should catch cold, but I took it to my bosom with +gratitude as I reflected how it was drumming on the roof of the 'bus +and blurring the windows. +</p> + +<p> +We had reached the foot of a hill, about a quarter of a mile from the +racecourse; the Castle Knox horse addressed himself to it with +dignified determination, but the mare showed a sudden and alarming +tendency to jib. +</p> + +<p> +"Belt her, Major!" vociferated Slipper, as she hung back from the pole +chain, with the collar half-way up her ewe neck, "and give it to the +horse, too! He'll dhrag her!" +</p> + +<p> +I was in the act of "belting," when a squealing whinny struck upon my +ear, accompanied by a light pattering gallop on the road behind us; +there was an answering roar from the brown mare, a roar, as I realised +with a sudden drop of the heart, of outraged maternal feeling, and in +another instant a pale, yellow foal sprinted up beside us, with shrill +whickerings of joy. Had there at this moment been a boghole handy, I +should have turned the 'bus into it without hesitation; as there was no +accommodation of the kind, I laid the whip severely into everything I +could reach, including the foal. The result was that we topped the +hill at a gallop, three abreast, like a Russian troitska; it was like +my usual luck that at this identical moment we should meet the police +patrol, who saluted respectfully. +</p> + +<p> +"That the divil may blisther Michael Moloney!" ejaculated Slipper, +holding on to the rail; "didn't I give him the foaleen and a halther on +him to keep him! I'll howld you a pint 'twas the wife let him go, for +she being vexed about the license! Sure that one's a March foal, an' +he'd run from here to Cork!" +</p> + +<p> +There was no sign from my inside passengers, and I held on at a round +pace, the mother and child galloping absurdly, the carriage horse +pulling hard, but behaving like a gentleman. I wildly revolved plans +of how I would make Slipper turn the foal in at the first gate we came +to, of what I should say to Lady Knox supposing the worst happened and +the foal accompanied us to her hall door, and of how I would have +Flurry's blood at the earliest possible opportunity, and here the +fateful sound of galloping behind us was again heard. +</p> + +<p> +"It's impossible!" I said to myself; "she can't have twins!" +</p> + +<p> +The galloping came nearer, and Slipper looked back. +</p> + +<p> +"Murdher alive!" he said in a stage whisper; "Tom Sheehy's afther us on +the butcher's pony!" +</p> + +<p> +"What's that to me?" I said, dragging my team aside to let him pass; "I +suppose he's drunk, like every one else!" +</p> + +<p> +Then the voice of Tom Sheehy made itself heard. +</p> + +<p> +"Shtop! Shtop thief!" he was bawling; "give up my mare! How will I +get me porther home!" +</p> + +<p> +That was the closest shave I have ever had, and nothing could have +saved the position but the torrential nature of the rain and the fact +that Lady Knox had on a new bonnet. I explained to her at the door of +the 'bus that Sheehy was drunk (which was the one unassailable feature +of the case), and had come after his foal, which, with the fatuity of +its kind, had escaped from a field and followed us. I did not mention +to Lady Knox that when Mr. Sheehy retreated, apologetically, dragging +the foal after him in a halter belonging to one of her own carriage +horses, he had a sovereign of mine in his pocket, and during the +narration I avoided Miss Sally's eye as carefully as she avoided mine. +</p> + +<p> +The only comments on the day's events that are worthy of record were +that Philippa said to me that she had not been able to understand what +the curious taste in the tea had been till Sally told her it was +turf-smoke, and that Mrs. Cadogan said to Philippa that night that "the +Major was that dhrinched that if he had a shirt between his skin and +himself he could have wrung it," and that Lady Knox said to a mutual +friend that though Major Yeates had been extremely kind and obliging, +he was an uncommonly bad whip. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap12"></a>XII<br/> +"OH LOVE! OH FIRE!"</h2> + +<p> +It was on one of the hottest days of a hot August that I walked over to +Tory Lodge to inform Mr. Flurry Knox, M.F.H., that the limits of human +endurance had been reached, and that either Venus and her family, or I +and mine, must quit Shreelane. In a moment of impulse I had accepted +her and her numerous progeny as guests in my stable-yard, since when +Mrs. Cadogan had given warning once or twice a week, and Maria, lawful +autocrat of the ashpit, had had—I quote the kitchen-maid—"tin battles +for every male she'd ate." +</p> + +<p> +The walk over the hills was not of a nature to lower the temperature, +moral or otherwise. The grassy path was as slippery as glass, the +rocks radiated heat, the bracken radiated horseflies. There was no +need to nurse my wrath to keep it warm. +</p> + +<p> +I found Flurry seated in the kennel-yard in a long and unclean white +linen coat, engaged in clipping hieroglyphics on the ears of a young +outgoing draft, an occupation in itself unfavourable to argument. The +young draft had already monopolised all possible forms of remonstrance, +from snarling in the obscurity behind the meal sack in the +boiler-house, to hysterical yelling as they were dragged forth by the +tail; but through these alarms and excursions I denounced Venus and all +her works, from slaughtered Wyandottes to broken dishes. Even as I did +so I was conscious of something chastened in Mr. Knox's demeanour, some +touch of remoteness and melancholy with which I was quite unfamiliar; +my indictment weakened and my grievances became trivial when laid +before this grave and almost religiously gentle young man. +</p> + +<p> +"I'm sorry you and Mrs. Yeates should be vexed by her. Send her back +when you like. I'll keep her. Maybe it'll not be for so long after +all." +</p> + +<p> +When pressed to expound this dark saying, Flurry smiled wanly and +snipped a second line in the hair of the puppy that was pinned between +his legs. I was almost relieved when a hard try to bite on the part of +the puppy imparted to Flurry's language a transient warmth; but the +reaction was only temporary. +</p> + +<p> +"It'd be as good for me to make a present of this lot to old Welby as +to take the price he's offering me," he went on, as he got up and took +off his highly-scented kennel-coat; "but I couldn't be bothered +fighting him. Come on in and have something. I drink tea myself at +this hour." +</p> + +<p> +If he had said toast and water it would have seemed no more than was +suitable to such a frame of mind. As I followed him to the house I +thought that when the day came that Flurry Knox could not be bothered +with fighting old Welby things were becoming serious, but I kept this +opinion to myself and merely offered an admiring comment on the roses +that were blooming on the front of the house. +</p> + +<p> +"I put up every stick of that trellis myself with my own hands," said +Flurry, still gloomily; "the roses were trailing all over the place for +the want of it. Would you like to have a look at the garden while +they're getting tea? I settled it up a bit since you saw it last." +</p> + +<p> +I acceded to this almost alarmingly ladylike suggestion, marvelling +greatly. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry certainly was a changed man, and his garden was a changed +garden. It was a very old garden, with unexpected arbours madly +overgrown with flowering climbers, and a flight of grey steps leading +to a terrace, where a moss-grown sundial and ancient herbaceous plants +strove with nettles and briars; but I chiefly remembered it as a place +where washing was wont to hang on black-currant bushes, and the kennel +terrier matured his bones and hunted chickens. There was now rabbit +wire on the gate, the walks were cleaned, the beds weeded. There was +even a bed of mignonette, a row of sweet pea, and a blazing party of +sunflowers, and Michael, once second in command in many a filibustering +expedition, was now on his knees, ingloriously tying carnations to +little pieces of cane. +</p> + +<p> +We walked up the steps to the terrace. Down below us the rich and +southern blue of the sea filled the gaps between scattered fir-trees; +the hillside above was purple with heather; a bay mare and her foal +were moving lazily through the bracken, with the sun glistening on it +and them. I looked back at the house, nestling in the hollow of the +hill, I smelled the smell of the mignonette in the air, I regarded +Michael's labouring back among the carnations, and without any +connection of ideas I seemed to see Miss Sally Knox, with her +golden-red hair and slight figure, standing on the terrace beside her +kinsman. +</p> + +<p> +"Michael! Do ye know where's Misther Flurry?" squalled a voice from +the garden gate, the untrammelled voice of the female domestic at large +among her fellows. "The tay's wet, and there's a man over with a +message from Aussolas. He was tellin' me the owld hairo beyant is +givin' out invitations——" +</p> + +<p> +A stricken silence fell, induced, no doubt, by hasty danger signals +from Michael. +</p> + +<p> +"Who's 'the old hero beyant'?" I asked, as we turned toward the house. +</p> + +<p> +"My grandmother," said Flurry, permitting himself a smile that had +about as much sociability in it as skim milk; "she's giving a tenants' +dance at Aussolas. She gave one about five years ago, and I declare +you might as well get the influenza into the country, or a mission at +the chapel. There won't be a servant in the place will be able to +answer their name for a week after it, what with toothache and +headache, and blathering in the kitchen!" +</p> + +<p> +We had tea in the drawing-room, a solemnity which I could not but be +aware was due to the presence of a new carpet, a new wall-paper, and a +new piano. Flurry made no comment on these things, but something told +me that I was expected to do so, and I did. +</p> + +<p> +"I'd sell you the lot to-morrow for half what I gave for them," said my +host, eyeing them with morose respect as he poured out his third cup of +tea. +</p> + +<p> +I have all my life been handicapped by not having the courage of my +curiosity. Those who have the nerve to ask direct questions on matters +that do not concern them seldom fail to extract direct answers, but in +my lack of this enviable gift I went home in the dark as to what had +befallen my landlord, and fully aware of how my wife would despise me +for my shortcomings. Philippa always says that she never asks +questions, but she seems none the less to get a lot of answers. +</p> + +<p> +On my own avenue I met Miss Sally Knox riding away from the house on +her white cob; she had found no one at home, and she would not turn +back with me, but she did not seem to be in any hurry to ride away. I +told her that I had just been over to see her relative, Mr. Knox, who +had informed me that he meant to give up the hounds, a fact in which +she seemed only conventionally interested. She looked pale, and her +eyelids were slightly pink; I checked myself on the verge of asking her +if she had hay-fever, and inquired instead if she had heard of the +tenants' dance at Aussolas. She did not answer at first, but rubbed +her cane up and down the cob's clipped toothbrush of a mane. Then she +said: +</p> + +<p> +"Major Yeates—look here—there's a most awful row at home!" +</p> + +<p> +I expressed incoherent regret, and wished to my heart that Philippa had +been there to cope with the situation. +</p> + +<p> +"It began when mamma found out about Flurry's racing Sultan, and then +came our dance——" +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sally stopped; I nodded, remembering certain episodes of Lady +Knox's dance. +</p> + +<p> +"And—mamma says—she says——" +</p> + +<p> +I waited respectfully to hear what mamma had said; the cob fidgeted +under the attentions of the horseflies, and nearly trod on my toe. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, the end of it is," she said with a gulp, "she said such things +to Flurry that he can't come near the house again, and I'm to go over +to England to Aunt Dora, next week. Will you tell Philippa I came to +say good-bye to her? I don't think I can get over here again." +</p> + +<p> +Miss Sally was a sufficiently old friend of mine for me to take her +hand and press it in a fatherly manner, but for the life of me I could +not think of anything to say, unless I expressed my sympathy with her +mother's point of view about detrimentals, which was obviously not the +thing to do. +</p> + +<p> +Philippa accorded to my news the rare tribute of speechless attention, +and then was despicable enough to say that she had foreseen the whole +affair from the beginning. +</p> + +<p> +"From the day that she refused him in the ice-house, I suppose," said I +sarcastically. +</p> + +<p> +"That <i>was</i> the beginning," replied Philippa. +</p> + +<p> +"Well," I went on judicially, "whenever it began, it was high time for +it to end. She can do a good deal better than Flurry." +</p> + +<p> +Philippa became rather red in the face. +</p> + +<p> +"I call that a thoroughly commonplace thing to say," she said. "I dare +say he has not many ideas beyond horses, but no more has she, and he +really does come and borrow books from me——" +</p> + +<p> +"Whitaker's Almanack," I murmured. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, I don't care, I like him very much, and I know what you're going +to say, and you're wrong, and I'll tell you why——" +</p> + +<p> +Here Mrs. Cadogan came into the room, her cap at rather more than its +usual warlike angle over her scarlet forehead, and in her hand a +kitchen plate, on which a note was ceremoniously laid forth. +</p> + +<p> +"But this is for you, Mrs. Cadogan," said Philippa, as she looked at it. +</p> + +<p> +"Ma'am," returned Mrs. Cadogan with immense dignity, "I have no +learning, and from what the young man's afther telling me that brought +it from Aussolas, I'd sooner yerself read it for me than thim gerrls." +</p> + +<p> +My wife opened the envelope, and drew forth a gilt-edged sheet of pink +paper. +</p> + +<p> +"Miss Margaret Nolan presents her compliments to Mrs. Cadogan," she +read, "and I have the pleasure of telling you that the servants of +Aussolas is inviting you and Mr. Peter Cadogan, Miss Mulrooney, and +Miss Gallagher"—Philippa's voice quavered perilously—"to a dance on +next Wednesday. Dancing to begin at seven o'clock, and to go on till +five.—Yours affectionately, MAGGIE NOLAN." +</p> + +<p> +"How affectionate she is!" snorted Mrs. Cadogan; "them's Dublin +manners, I dare say!" +</p> + +<p> +"P.S.," continued Philippa; "steward, Mr. Denis O'Loughlin; stewardess, +Mrs. Mahony." +</p> + +<p> +"Thoughtful provision," I remarked; "I suppose Mrs. Mahony's duties +will begin after supper." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, Mrs. Cadogan," said Philippa, quelling me with a glance, "I +suppose you'd all like to go?" +</p> + +<p> +"As for dancin'," said Mrs. Cadogan, with her eyes fixed on a level +with the curtain-pole, "I thank God I'm a widow, and the only dancin' +I'll do is to dance to my grave." +</p> + +<p> +"Well, perhaps Julia, and Annie, and Peter——" suggested Philippa, +considerably overawed. +</p> + +<p> +"I'm not one of them that holds with loud mockery and harangues," +continued Mrs. Cadogan, "but if I had any wish for dhrawing down talk I +could tell you, ma'am, that the like o' them has their share of dances +without going to Aussolas! Wasn't it only last Sunday week I wint +follyin' the turkey that's layin' out in the plantation, and the whole +o' thim hysted their sails and back with them to their lovers at the +gate-house, and the kitchen-maid having a Jew-harp to be playing for +them!" +</p> + +<p> +"That was very wrong," said the truckling Philippa. "I hope you spoke +to the kitchen-maid about it." +</p> + +<p> +"Is it spake to thim?" rejoined Mrs. Cadogan. "No, but what I done was +to dhrag the kitchenmaid round the passages by the hair o' the head!" +</p> + +<p> +"Well, after that, I think you might let her go to Aussolas," said I +venturously. +</p> + +<p> +The end of it was that every one in and about the house went to +Aussolas on the following Wednesday, including Mrs. Cadogan. Philippa +had gone over to stay at the Shutes, ostensibly to arrange about a +jumble sale, the real object being (as a matter of history) to inspect +the Scotch young lady before whom Bernard Shute had dumped his +affections in his customary manner. Being alone, with every prospect +of a bad dinner, I accepted with gratitude an invitation to dine and +sleep at Aussolas and see the dance; it is only on very special +occasions that I have the heart to remind Philippa that she had neither +part nor lot in what occurred—it is too serious a matter for trivial +gloryings. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox had asked me to dine at six o'clock, which meant that I +arrived, in blazing sunlight and evening clothes, punctually at that +hour, and that at seven o'clock I was still sitting in the library, +reading heavily-bound classics, while my hostess held loud +conversations down staircases with Denis O'Loughlin, the red-bearded +Robinson Crusoe who combined in himself the offices of coachman, +butler, and, to the best of my belief, valet to the lady of the house. +The door opened at last, and Denis, looking as furtive as his prototype +after he had sighted the footprint, put in his head and beckoned to me. +</p> + +<p> +"The misthress says will ye go to dinner without her," he said very +confidentially; "sure she's greatly vexed ye should be waitin' on her. +'Twas the kitchen chimney cot fire, and faith she's afther giving Biddy +Mahony the sack, on the head of it! Though, indeed, 'tis little we'd +regard a chimney on fire here any other day." +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox's woolly dog was the sole occupant of the dining-room when I +entered it; he was sitting on his mistress's chair, with all the air of +outrage peculiar to a small and self-important dog when routine has +been interfered with. It was difficult to discover what had caused the +delay, the meal, not excepting the soup, being a cold collation; it was +heavily flavoured with soot, and was hurled on to the table by Crusoe +in spasmodic bursts, contemporaneous, no doubt, with Biddy Mahony's +fits of hysterics in the kitchen. Its most memorable feature was a +noble lake trout, which appeared in two jagged pieces, a matter lightly +alluded to by Denis as the result of "a little argument" between +himself and Biddy as to the dish on which it was to be served. Further +conversation elicited the interesting fact that the combatants had +pulled the trout in two before the matter was settled. A brief glance +at my attendant's hands decided me to let the woolly dog justify his +existence by consuming my portion for me, when Crusoe left the room. +</p> + +<p> +Old Mrs. Knox remained invisible till the end of dinner, when she +appeared in the purple velvet bonnet that she was reputed to have worn +since the famine, and a dun-coloured woollen shawl fastened by a +splendid diamond brooch, that flashed rainbow fire against the last +shafts of sunset. There was a fire in the old lady's eye, too, the +light that I had sometimes seen in Flurry's in moments of crisis. +</p> + +<p> +"I have no apologies to offer that are worth hearing," she said, "but I +have come to drink a glass of port wine with you, if you will so far +honour me, and then we must go out and see the ball. My grandson is +late, as usual." +</p> + +<p> +She crumbled a biscuit with a brown and preoccupied hand; her claw-like +fingers carried a crowded sparkle of diamonds upwards as she raised her +glass to her lips. +</p> + +<p> +The twilight was falling when we left the room and made our way +downstairs. I followed the little figure in the purple bonnet through +dark regions of passages and doorways, where strange lumber lay about; +there was a rusty suit of armour, an upturned punt, mouldering +pictures, and finally, by a door that opened into the yard, a lady's +bicycle, white with the dust of travel. I supposed this latter to have +been imported from Dublin by the fashionable Miss Maggie Nolan, but on +the other hand it was well within the bounds of possibility that it +belonged to old Mrs. Knox. The coach-house at Aussolas was on a par +with the rest of the establishment, being vast, dilapidated, and of +unknown age. Its three double doors were wide open, and the guests +overflowed through them into the cobble-stoned yard; above their heads +the tin reflectors of paraffin lamps glared at us from among the +Christmas decorations of holly and ivy that festooned the walls. The +voices of a fiddle and a concertina, combined, were uttering a polka +with shrill and hideous fluency, to which the scraping and stamping of +hobnailed boots made a ponderous bass accompaniment. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox's donkey-chair had been placed in a commanding position at +the top of the room, and she made her way slowly to it, shaking hands +with all varieties of tenants and saying right things without showing +any symptom of that flustered boredom that I have myself exhibited when +I went round the men's messes on Christmas Day. She took her seat in +the donkey-chair, with the white dog in her lap, and looked with her +hawk's eyes round the array of faces that hemmed in the space where the +dancers were solemnly bobbing and hopping. +</p> + +<p> +"Will you tell me who that tomfool is, Denis?" she said, pointing to a +young lady in a ball dress who was circling in conscious magnificence +and somewhat painful incongruity in the arms of Mr. Peter Cadogan. +</p> + +<p> +"That's the lady's-maid from Castle Knox, yer honour, ma'am," replied +Denis, with something remarkably like a wink at Mrs. Knox. +</p> + +<p> +"When did the Castle Knox servants come?" asked the old lady, very +sharply. +</p> + +<p> +"The same time yer honour left the table, and——Pillilew! What's +this?" +</p> + +<p> +There was a clatter of galloping hoofs in the courtyard, as of a troop +of cavalry, and out of the heart of it Flurry's voice shouting to Denis +to drive out the colts and shut the gates before they had the people +killed. I noticed that the colour had risen to Mrs. Knox's face, and I +put it down to anxiety about her young horses. I may admit that when I +heard Flurry's voice, and saw him collaring his grandmother's guests +and pushing them out of the way as he came into the coach-house, I +rather feared that he was in the condition so often defined to me at +Petty Sessions as "not dhrunk, but having dhrink taken." His face was +white, his eyes glittered, there was a general air of exaltation about +him that suggested the solace of the pangs of love according to the +most ancient convention. +</p> + +<p> +"Hullo!" he said, swaggering up to the orchestra, "what's this +humbugging thing they're playing? A polka, is it? Drop that, John +Casey, and play a jig." +</p> + +<p> +John Casey ceased abjectly. +</p> + +<p> +"What'll I play, Masther Flurry?" +</p> + +<p> +"What the devil do I care? Here, Yeates, put a name on it! You're a +sort of musicianer yourself!" +</p> + +<p> +I know the names of three or four Irish jigs; but on this occasion my +memory clung exclusively to one, I suppose because it was the one I +felt to be peculiarly inappropriate. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, well, 'Haste to the Wedding,'" I said, looking away. +</p> + +<p> +Flurry gave a shout of laughter. +</p> + +<p> +"That's it!" he exclaimed. "Play it up, John! Give us 'Haste to the +Wedding.' That's Major Yeates's fancy!" +</p> + +<p> +Decidedly Flurry was drunk. +</p> + +<p> +"What's wrong with you all that you aren't dancing?" he continued, +striding up the middle of the room. "Maybe you don't know how. Here, +I'll soon get one that'll show you!" +</p> + +<p> +He advanced upon his grandmother, snatched her out of the donkey-chair, +and, amid roars of applause, led her out, while the fiddle squealed its +way through the inimitable twists of the tune, and the concertina +surged and panted after it. Whatever Mrs. Knox may have thought of her +grandson's behaviour, she was evidently going to make the best of it. +She took her station opposite to him, in the purple bonnet, the +dun-coloured shawl, and the diamonds, she picked up her skirt at each +side, affording a view of narrow feet in elastic-sided cloth boots, and +for three repeats of the tune she stood up to her grandson, and footed +it on the coach-house floor. What the cloth boots did I could not +exactly follow; they were, as well as I could see, extremely +scientific, while there was hardly so much as a nod from the plumes of +the bonnet. Flurry was also scientific, but his dancing did not alter +my opinion that he was drunk; in fact, I thought he was making rather +an exhibition of himself. They say that that jig was twenty pounds in +Mrs. Knox's pocket at the next rent day; but though this statement is +open to doubt, I believe that if she and Flurry had taken the hat round +there and then she would have got in the best part of her arrears. +</p> + +<p> +After this the company settled down to business. The dances lasted a +sweltering half-hour, old women and young dancing with equal and +tireless zest. At the end of each the gentlemen abandoned their +partners without ceremony or comment, and went out to smoke, while the +ladies retired to the laundry, where families of teapots stewed on the +long bars of the fire, and Mrs. Mahony cut up mighty "barm-bracks," and +the tea-drinking was illimitable. +</p> + +<p> +At ten o'clock Mrs. Knox withdrew from the revel; she said that she was +tired, but I have seldom seen any one look more wide awake. I thought +that I might unobtrusively follow her example, but I was intercepted by +Flurry. +</p> + +<p> +"Yeates," he said seriously, "I'll take it as a kindness if you'll see +this thing out with me. We must keep them pretty sober, and get them +out of this by daylight. I—I have to get home early." +</p> + +<p> +I at once took back my opinion that Flurry was drunk; I almost wished +he had been, as I could then have deserted him without a pang. As it +was, I addressed myself heavily to the night's enjoyment. Wan with +heat, but conscientiously cheerful, I danced with Miss Maggie Nolan, +with the Castle Knox lady's-maid, with my own kitchenmaid, who fell +into wild giggles of terror whenever I spoke to her, with Mrs. Cadogan, +who had apparently postponed the interesting feat of dancing to her +grave, and did what she could to dance me into mine. I am bound to +admit that though an ex-soldier and a major, and therefore equipped +with a ready-made character for gallantry, Mrs. Cadogan was the only +one of my partners with whom I conversed with any comfort. +</p> + +<p> +At intervals I smoked cigarettes in the yard, seated on the old +mounting-block by the gate, and overheard much conversation about the +price of pigs in Skebawn; at intervals I plunged again into the +coach-house, and led forth a perspiring wallflower into the scrimmage +of a polka, or shuffled meaninglessly opposite to her in the long +double line of dancers who were engaged with serious faces in executing +a jig or a reel, I neither knew nor cared which. Flurry remained as +undefeated as ever; I could only suppose it was his method of showing +that his broken heart had mended. +</p> + +<p> +"It's time to be making the punch, Masther Flurry," said Denis, as the +harness-room clock struck twelve; "sure the night's warm, and the men's +all gaping for it, the craytures!" +</p> + +<p> +"What'll we make it in?" said Flurry, as we followed him into the +laundry. +</p> + +<p> +"The boiler, to be sure," said Crusoe, taking up a stone of sugar, and +preparing to shoot it into the laundry copper. +</p> + +<p> +"Stop, you fool, it's full of cockroaches!" shouted Flurry, amid +sympathetic squalls from the throng of countrywomen. "Go get a bath!" +</p> + +<p> +"Sure yerself knows there's but one bath in it," retorted Denis, "and +that's within in the Major's room. Faith, the tinker got his own share +yestherday with the same bath, sthriving to quinch the holes, and they +as thick in it as the stars in the sky, and 'tis weeping still, afther +all he done!" +</p> + +<p> +"Well, then, here goes for the cockroaches!" said Flurry. "What +doesn't sicken will fatten! Give me the kettle, and come on, you Kitty +Collins, and be skimming them off!" +</p> + +<p> +There were no complaints of the punch when the brew was completed, and +the dance thundered on with a heavier stamping and a louder hilarity +than before. The night wore on; I squeezed through the unyielding pack +of frieze coats and shawls in the doorway, and with feet that momently +swelled in my pumps I limped over the cobble-stones to smoke my eighth +cigarette on the mounting-block. It was a dark, hot night. The old +castle loomed above me in piled-up roofs and gables, and high up in it +somewhere a window sent a shaft of light into the sleeping leaves of a +walnut-tree that overhung the gateway. At the bars of the gate two +young horses peered in at the medley of noise and people; away in an +outhouse a cock crew hoarsely. The gaiety in the coach-house increased +momently, till, amid shrieks and bursts of laughter, Miss Maggie Nolan +fled coquettishly from it with a long yell, like a train coming out of a +tunnel, pursued by the fascinating Peter Cadogan brandishing a twig of +mountain ash, in imitation of mistletoe. The young horses stampeded in +horror, and immediately a voice proceeded from the lighted window +above, Mrs. Knox's voice, demanding what the noise was, and announcing +that if she heard any more of it she would have the place cleared. +</p> + +<p> +An awful silence fell, to which the young horses' fleeing hoofs lent +the final touch of consternation. Then I heard the irrepressible +Maggie Nolan say: "Oh God! Merry-come-sad!" which I take to be a +reflection on the mutability of all earthly happiness. +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Knox remained for a moment at the window, and it struck me as +remarkable that at 2.30 A.M. she should still have on her bonnet. I +thought I heard her speak to some one in the room, and there followed a +laugh, a laugh that was not a servant's, and was puzzlingly familiar. +I gave it up, and presently dropped into a cheerless doze. +</p> + +<p> +With the dawn there came a period when even Flurry showed signs of +failing. He came and sat down beside me with a yawn; it struck me that +there was more impatience and nervousness than fatigue in the yawn. +</p> + +<p> +"I think I'll turn them all out of this after the next dance is over," +he said; "I've a lot to do, and I can't stay here." +</p> + +<p> +I grunted in drowsy approval. It must have been a few minutes later +that I felt Flurry grip my shoulder. +</p> + +<p> +"Yeates!" he said, "look up at the roof. Do you see anything up there +by the kitchen chimney?" +</p> + +<p> +He was pointing at a heavy stack of chimneys in a tower that stood up +against the grey and pink of the morning sky. At the angle where one +of them joined the roof smoke was oozing busily out, and, as I stared, +a little wisp of flame stole through. +</p> + +<p> +The next thing that I distinctly remember is being in the van of a rush +through the kitchen passages, every one shouting "Water! Water!" and +not knowing where to find it, then up several flights of the narrowest +and darkest stairs it has ever been my fate to ascend, with a bucket of +water that I snatched from a woman, spilling as I ran. At the top of +the stairs came a ladder leading to a trap-door, and up in the dark +loft above was the roar and the wavering glare of flames. +</p> + +<p> +"My God! That's sthrong fire!" shouted Denis, tumbling down the ladder +with a brace of empty buckets; "we'll never save it! The lake won't +quinch it!" +</p> + +<p> +The flames were squirting out through the bricks of the chimney, +through the timbers, through the slates; it was barely possible to get +through the trap-door, and the booming and crackling strengthened every +instant. +</p> + +<p> +"A chain to the lake!" gasped Flurry, coughing in the stifling heat as +he slashed the water at the blazing rafters; "the well's no good! Go +on, Yeates!" +</p> + +<p> +The organising of a double chain out of the mob that thronged and +shouted and jammed in the passages and yard was no mean feat of +generalship; but it got done somehow. Mrs. Cadogan and Biddy Mahony +rose magnificently to the occasion, cursing, thumping, shoving; and +stable buckets, coal buckets, milk pails, and kettles were unearthed +and sent swinging down the grass slope to the lake that lay in +glittering unconcern in the morning sunshine. Men, women, and children +worked in a way that only Irish people can work on an emergency. All +their cleverness, all their good-heartedness, and all their love of a +ruction came to the front; the screaming and the exhortations were +incessant, but so were also the buckets that flew from hand to hand up +to the loft. I hardly know how long we were at it, but there came a +time when I looked up from the yard and saw that the billows of +reddened smoke from the top of the tower were dying down, and I +bethought me of old Mrs. Knox. +</p> + +<p> +I found her at the door of her room, engaged in tying up a bundle of +old clothes in a sheet; she looked as white as a corpse, but she was +not in any way quelled by the situation. +</p> + +<p> +"I'd be obliged to you all the same, Major Yeates, to throw this over +the balusters," she said, as I advanced with the news that the fire had +been got under. "'Pon my honour, I don't know when I've been as vexed +as I've been this night, what with one thing and another! 'Tis a +monstrous thing to use a guest as we've used you, but what could we do? +I threw all the silver out of the dining-room window myself, and the +poor peahen that had her nest there was hurt by an entrée dish, and +half her eggs were——" +</p> + +<p> +There was a curious sound not unlike a titter in Mrs. Knox's room. +</p> + +<p> +"However, we can't make omelettes without breaking eggs—as they say—" +she went on rather hurriedly; "I declare I don't know what I'm saying! +My old head is confused——" +</p> + +<p> +Here Mrs. Knox went abruptly into her room and shut the door. +Obviously there was nothing further to do for my hostess, and I fought +my way up the dripping back staircase to the loft. The flames had +ceased, the supply of buckets had been stopped, and Flurry, standing on +a ponderous crossbeam, was poking his head and shoulders out into the +sunlight through the hole that had been burned in the roof. Denis and +others were pouring water over charred beams, the atmosphere was still +stifling, everything was black, everything dripped with inky water. +Flurry descended from his beam and stretched himself, looking like a +drowned chimney-sweep. +</p> + +<p> +"We've made a night of it, Yeates, haven't we?" he said, "but we've +bested it anyhow. We were done for only for you!" There was more +emotion about him than the occasion seemed to warrant, and his eyes had +a Christy Minstrel brightness, not wholly to be attributed to the dirt +on his face. "What's the time?—I must get home." +</p> + +<p> +The time, incredible as it seemed, was half-past six. I could almost +have sworn that Flurry changed colour when I said so. +</p> + +<p> +"I must be off," he said; "I had no idea it was so late." +</p> + +<p> +"Why, what's the hurry?" I asked. +</p> + +<p> +He stared at me, laughed foolishly, and fell to giving directions to +Denis. Five minutes afterwards he drove out of the yard and away at a +canter down the long stretch of avenue that skirted the lake, with a +troop of young horses flying on either hand. He whirled his whip round +his head and shouted at them, and was lost to sight in a clump of +trees. It is a vision of him that remains with me, and it always +carried with it the bitter smell of wet charred wood. +</p> + +<p> +Reaction had begun to set in among the volunteers. The chain took to +sitting in the kitchen, cups of tea began mysteriously to circulate, +and personal narratives of the fire were already foreshadowing the +amazing legends that have since gathered round the night's adventure. +I left to Denis the task of clearing the house, and went up to change +my wet clothes, with a feeling that I had not been to bed for a year. +The ghost of a waiter who had drowned himself in a boghole would have +presented a cheerier aspect than I, as I surveyed myself in the +prehistoric mirror in my room, with the sunshine falling on my unshorn +face and begrimed shirt-front. +</p> + +<p> +I made my toilet at considerable length, and, it being now nearly eight +o'clock, went downstairs to look for something to eat. I had left the +house humming with people; I found it silent as Pompeii. The sheeted +bundles containing Mrs. Knox's wardrobe were lying about the hall; a +couple of ancestors who in the first alarm had been dragged from the +walls were leaning drunkenly against the bundles; last night's dessert +was still on the dining-room table. I went out on to the hall-door +steps, and saw the entrée-dishes in a glittering heap in a nasturtium +bed, and realised that there was no breakfast for me this side of lunch +at Shreelane. +</p> + +<p> +There was a sound of wheels on the avenue, and a brougham came into +view, driving fast up the long open stretch by the lake. It was the +Castle Knox brougham, driven by Norris, whom I had last seen drunk at +the athletic sports, and as it drew up at the door I saw Lady Knox +inside. +</p> + +<p> +"It's all right, the fire's out," I said, advancing genially and full +of reassurance. +</p> + +<p> +"What fire?" said Lady Knox, regarding me with an iron countenance. +</p> + +<p> +I explained. +</p> + +<p> +"Well, as the house isn't burned down," said Lady Knox, cutting short +my details, "perhaps you would kindly find out if I could see Mrs. +Knox." +</p> + +<p> +Lady Knox's face was many shades redder than usual. I began to +understand that something awful had happened, or would happen, and I +wished myself safe at Shreelane, with the bedclothes over my head. +</p> + +<p> +"If 'tis for the misthress you're looking, me lady," said Denis's voice +behind me, in tones of the utmost respect, "she went out to the kitchen +garden a while ago to get a blasht o' the fresh air afther the night. +Maybe your ladyship would sit inside in the library till I call her?" +</p> + +<p> +Lady Knox eyed Crusoe suspiciously. +</p> + +<p> +"Thank you, I'll fetch her myself," she said. +</p> + +<p> +"Oh, sure, that's too throuble——" began Denis. +</p> + +<p> +"Stay where you are!" said Lady Knox, in a voice like the slam of a +door. +</p> + +<p> +"Bedad, I'm best plased she went," whispered Denis, as Lady Knox set +forth alone down the shrubbery walk. +</p> + +<p> +"But is Mrs. Knox in the garden?" said I. +</p> + +<p> +"The Lord preserve your innocence, sir!" replied Denis, with seeming +irrelevance. +</p> + +<p> +At this moment I became aware of the incredible fact that Sally Knox +was silently descending the stairs; she stopped short as she got into +the hall, and looked almost wildly at me and Denis. Was I looking at +her wraith? There was again a sound of wheels on the gravel; she went +to the hall door, outside which was now drawn up Mrs. Knox's +donkey-carriage, as well as Lady Knox's brougham, and, as if overcome +by this imposing spectacle, she turned back and put her hands over her +face. +</p> + +<p> +"She's gone round to the garden, asthore," said Denis in a hoarse +whisper; "go in the donkey-carriage. 'Twill be all right!" He seized +her by the arm, pushed her down the steps and into the little carriage, +pulled up the hood over her to its furthest stretch, snatched the whip +out of the hand of the broadly-grinning Norris, and with terrific +objurgations lashed the donkey into a gallop. The donkey-boy grasped +the position, whatever it might be; he took up the running on the other +side, and the donkey-carriage swung away down the avenue, with all its +incongruous air of hooded and rowdy invalidism. +</p> + +<p> +I have never disguised the fact that I am a coward, and therefore when, +at this dynamitical moment, I caught a glimpse of Lady Knox's hat over +a laurustinus, as she returned at high speed from the garden, I slunk +into the house and faded away round the dining-room door. "This minute +I seen the misthress going down through the plantation beyond," said +the voice of Crusoe outside the window, "and I'm afther sending Johnny +Regan to her with the little carriage, not to put any more delay on yer +ladyship. Sure you can see him making all the haste he can. Maybe +you'd sit inside in the library till she comes." +</p> + +<p> +Silence followed. I peered cautiously round the window curtain. Lady +Knox was looking defiantly at the donkey-carriage as it reeled at top +speed into the shades of the plantation, strenuously pursued by the +woolly dog. Norris was regarding his horses' ears in expressionless +respectability. Denis was picking up the entrée-dishes with decorous +solicitude. Lady Knox turned and came into the house; she passed the +dining-room door with an ominous step, and went on into the library. +</p> + +<p> +It seemed to me that now or never was the moment to retire quietly to +my room, put my things into my portmanteau, and—— +</p> + +<p> +Denis rushed into the room with the entrée-dishes piled up to his chin. +</p> + +<p> +"She's diddled!" he whispered, crashing them down on the table. He +came at me with his hand out. "Three cheers for Masther Flurry and +Miss Sally," he hissed, wringing my hand up and down, "and 'twas +yerself called for 'Haste to the Weddin'' last night, long life to ye! +The Lord save us! There's the misthress going into the library!" +</p> + +<p> +Through the half-open door I saw old Mrs. Knox approach the library +from the staircase with a dignified slowness; she had on a wedding +garment, a long white burnous, in which she might easily have been +mistaken for a small, stout clergyman. She waved back Crusoe, the door +closed upon her, and the battle of giants was entered upon. I sat +down—it was all I was able for—and remained for a full minute in +stupefied contemplation of the entrée-dishes. +</p> + +<p> +Perhaps of all conclusions to a situation so portentous, that which +occurred was the least possible. Twenty minutes after Mrs. Knox met +her antagonist I was summoned from strapping my portmanteau to face the +appalling duty of escorting the combatants, in Lady Knox's brougham, to +the church outside the back gate, to which Miss Sally had preceded them +in the donkey-carriage. I pulled myself together, went down stairs, +and found that the millennium had suddenly set in. It had apparently +dawned with the news that Aussolas and all things therein were +bequeathed to Flurry by his grandmother, and had established itself +finally upon the considerations that the marriage was past praying for, +and that the diamonds were intended for Miss Sally. +</p> + +<p> +We fetched the bride and bridegroom from the church; we fetched old +Eustace Hamilton, who married them; we dug out the champagne from the +cellar; we even found rice and threw it. +</p> + +<p> +The hired carriage that had been ordered to take the runaways across +country to a distant station was driven by Slipper. He was shaved; he +wore an old livery coat and a new pot hat; he was wondrous sober. On +the following morning he was found asleep on a heap of stones ten miles +away; somewhere in the neighbourhood one of the horses was grazing in a +field with a certain amount of harness hanging about it. The carriage +and the remaining horse were discovered in a roadside ditch, two miles +farther on; one of the carriage doors had been torn off, and in the +interior the hens of the vicinity were conducting an exhaustive search +after the rice that lurked in the cushions. +</p> + +<h5> +PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT<br/> +THE PRESS OF THE PUBLISHERS.<br/> +</h5> + +<hr /> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>THE NEW NELSON CLASSICS</h2> + +<p class="noindent"> +<i>Over 300 volumes. Cloth gilt. Each 1s. 6d. net.</i> +</p> + +<p class="noindent"> +This famous series, which is now more attractive than ever, contains +many notable modern books, the classics of to-morrow, besides +"classics" in the accepted sense. 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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3a0e6ca --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #34630 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/34630) diff --git a/old/34630-8.txt b/old/34630-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f7c4429 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/34630-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8258 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Some Experiences of an Irish R.M., by +E. OE. Somerville and Martin Ross + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Some Experiences of an Irish R.M. + +Author: E. OE. Somerville + Martin Ross + +Release Date: January 15, 2011 [EBook #34630] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + +SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. + + +by + +E. OE. SOMERVILLE + +and + +MARTIN ROSS + + + + +THOMAS NELSON & SONS LTD + +LONDON EDINBURGH PARIS MELBOURNE + +TORONTO AND NEW YORK + + + + + Reprinted by permission of + Messrs. Longmans Green & Co., Ltd. + + + + +CONTENTS + + I. GREAT-UNCLE MCCARTHY + II. IN THE CURRANHILTY COUNTRY + III. TRINKET'S COLT + IV. THE WATERS OF STRIFE + V. LISHEEN RACES, SECOND-HAND + VI. PHILIPPA'S FOX-HUNT + VII. A MISDEAL + VIII. THE HOLY ISLAND + IX. THE POLICY OF THE CLOSED DOOR + X. THE HOUSE OF FAHY + XI. OCCASIONAL LICENSES + XII. "OH LOVE! OH FIRE!" + + + + +SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. + + + +I + +GREAT-UNCLE McCARTHY + +A Resident Magistracy in Ireland is not an easy thing to come by +nowadays; neither is it a very attractive job; yet on the evening when +I first propounded the idea to the young lady who had recently +consented to become Mrs. Sinclair Yeates, it seemed glittering with +possibilities. There was, on that occasion, a sunset, and a string +band playing "The Gondoliers," and there was also an ingenuous belief +in the omnipotence of a godfather of Philippa's--(Philippa was the +young lady)--who had once been a member of the Government. + +I was then climbing the steep ascent of the Captains towards my +Majority. I have no fault to find with Philippa's godfather; he did +all and more than even Philippa had expected; nevertheless, I had +attained to the dignity of mud major, and had spent a good deal on +postage stamps, and on railway fares to interview people of influence, +before I found myself in the hotel at Skebawn, opening long envelopes +addressed to "Major Yeates, R.M." + +My most immediate concern, as any one who has spent nine weeks at Mrs. +Raverty's hotel will readily believe, was to leave it at the earliest +opportunity; but in those nine weeks I had learned, amongst other +painful things, a little, a very little, of the methods of the artisan +in the West of Ireland. Finding a house had been easy enough. I had +had my choice of several, each with some hundreds of acres of shooting, +thoroughly poached, and a considerable portion of the roof intact. I +had selected one; the one that had the largest extent of roof in +proportion to the shooting, and had been assured by my landlord that in +a fortnight or so it would be fit for occupation. + +"There's a few little odd things to be done," he said easily; "a lick +of paint here and there, and a slap of plaster----" + +I am short-sighted; I am also of Irish extraction; both facts that make +for toleration--but even I thought he was understating the case. So +did the contractor. + +At the end of three weeks the latter reported progress, which mainly +consisted of the facts that the plumber had accused the carpenter of +stealing sixteen feet of his inch-pipe to run a bell wire through, and +that the carpenter had replied that he wished the divil might run the +plumber through a wran's quill. The plumber having reflected upon the +carpenter's parentage, the work of renovation had merged in battle, and +at the next Petty Sessions I was reluctantly compelled to allot to each +combatant seven days, without the option of a fine. + +These and kindred difficulties extended in an unbroken chain through +the summer months, until a certain wet and windy day in October, when, +with my baggage, I drove over to establish myself at Shreelane. It was +a tall, ugly house of three storeys high, its walls faced with +weather-beaten slates, its windows staring, narrow, and vacant. Round +the house ran an area, in which grew some laurustinus and holly bushes +among ash heaps, and nettles, and broken bottles. I stood on the +steps, waiting for the door to be opened, while the rain sluiced upon +me from a broken eaveshoot that had, amongst many other things, escaped +the notice of my landlord. I thought of Philippa, and of her plan, +broached in to-day's letter, of having the hall done up as a +sitting-room. + +The door opened, and revealed the hall. It struck me that I had +perhaps overestimated its possibilities. Among them I had certainly +not included a flagged floor, sweating with damp, and a reek of cabbage +from the adjacent kitchen stairs. A large elderly woman, with a red +face, and a cap worn helmet-wise on her forehead, swept me a +magnificent curtsey as I crossed the threshold. + +"Your honour's welcome----" she began, and then every door in the house +slammed in obedience to the gust that drove through it. With something +that sounded like "Mend ye for a back door!" Mrs. Cadogan abandoned her +opening speech and made for the kitchen stairs. (Improbable as it may +appear, my housekeeper was called Cadogan, a name made locally possible +by being pronounced Caydogawn.) + +Only those who have been through a similar experience can know what +manner of afternoon I spent. I am a martyr to colds in the head, and I +felt one coming on. I made a laager in front of the dining-room fire, +with a tattered leather screen and the dinner table, and gradually, +with cigarettes and strong tea, baffled the smell of must and cats, and +fervently trusted that the rain might avert a threatened visit from my +landlord. I was then but superficially acquainted with Mr. Florence +McCarthy Knox and his habits. + +At about 4.30, when the room had warmed up, and my cold was yielding to +treatment, Mrs. Cadogan entered and informed me that "Mr. Flurry" was +in the yard, and would be thankful if I'd go out to him, for he +couldn't come in. Many are the privileges of the female sex; had I +been a woman I should unhesitatingly have said that I had a cold in my +head. Being a man, I huddled on a mackintosh, and went out into the +yard. + +My landlord was there on horseback, and with him there was a man +standing at the head of a stout grey animal. I recognised with despair +that I was about to be compelled to buy a horse. + +"Good afternoon, Major," said Mr. Knox in his slow, sing-song brogue; +"it's rather soon to be paying you a visit, but I thought you might be +in a hurry to see the horse I was telling you of." + +I could have laughed. As if I were ever in a hurry to see a horse! I +thanked him, and suggested that it was rather wet for horse-dealing. + +"Oh, it's nothing when you're used to it," replied Mr. Knox. His +gloveless hands were red and wet, the rain ran down his nose, and his +covert coat was soaked to a sodden brown. I thought that I did not +want to become used to it. My relations with horses have been of a +purely military character, I have endured the Sandhurst riding-school, +I have galloped for an impetuous general, I have been steward at +regimental races, but none of these feats have altered my opinion that +the horse, as a means of locomotion, is obsolete. Nevertheless, the +man who accepts a resident magistracy in the south-west of Ireland +voluntarily retires into the prehistoric age; to institute a stable +became inevitable. + +"You ought to throw a leg over him," said Mr. Knox, "and you're welcome +to take him over a fence or two if you like. He's a nice flippant +jumper." + +Even to my unexacting eye the grey horse did not seem to promise +flippancy, nor did I at all desire to find that quality in him. I +explained that I wanted something to drive, and not to ride. + +"Well, that's a fine raking horse in harness," said Mr. Knox, looking +at me with his serious grey eyes, "and you'd drive him with a sop of +hay in his mouth. Bring him up here, Michael." + +Michael abandoned his efforts to kick the grey horse's forelegs into a +becoming position, and led him up to me. + +I regarded him from under my umbrella with a quite unreasonable +disfavour. He had the dreadful beauty of a horse in a toy-shop, as +chubby, as wooden, and as conscientiously dappled, but it was +unreasonable to urge this as an objection, and I was incapable of +finding any more technical drawback. Yielding to circumstance, I +"threw my leg" over the brute, and after pacing gravely round the +quadrangle that formed the yard, and jolting to my entrance gate and +back, I decided that as he had neither fallen down nor kicked me off, +it was worth paying twenty-five pounds for him, if only to get in out +of the rain. + +Mr. Knox accompanied me into the house and had a drink. He was a fair, +spare young man, who looked like a stable boy among gentlemen, and a +gentleman among stable boys. He belonged to a clan that cropped up in +every grade of society in the county, from Sir Valentine Knox of Castle +Knox down to the auctioneer Knox, who bore the attractive title of +Larry the Liar. So far as I could judge, Florence McCarthy of that ilk +occupied a shifting position about midway in the tribe. I had met him +at dinner at Sir Valentine's, I had heard of him at an illicit auction, +held by Larry the Liar, of brandy stolen from a wreck. They were +"Black Protestants," all of them, in virtue of their descent from a +godly soldier of Cromwell, and all were prepared at any moment of the +day or night to sell a horse. + +"You'll be apt to find this place a bit lonesome after the hotel," +remarked Mr. Flurry, sympathetically, as he placed his foot in its +steaming boot on the hob, "but it's a fine sound house anyway, and lots +of rooms in it, though indeed, to tell you the truth, I never was +through the whole of them since the time my great-uncle, Denis +McCarthy, died here. The dear knows I had enough of it that time." He +paused, and lit a cigarette--one of my best, and quite thrown away upon +him. "Those top floors, now," he resumed, "I wouldn't make too free +with them. There's some of them would jump under you like a spring +bed. Many's the night I was in and out of those attics, following my +poor uncle when he had a bad turn on him--the horrors, y' know--there +were nights he never stopped walking through the house. Good Lord! +will I ever forget the morning he said he saw the devil coming up the +avenue! 'Look at the two horns on him,' says he, and he out with his +gun and shot him, and, begad, it was his own donkey!" + +Mr. Knox gave a couple of short laughs. He seldom laughed, having in +unusual perfection, the gravity of manner that is bred by +horse-dealing, probably from the habitual repression of all emotion +save disparagement. + +The autumn evening, grey with rain, was darkening in the tall windows, +and the wind was beginning to make bullying rushes among the shrubs in +the area; a shower of soot rattled down the chimney and fell on the +hearthrug. + +"More rain coming," said Mr. Knox, rising composedly; "you'll have to +put a goose down these chimneys some day soon, it's the only way in the +world to clean them. Well, I'm for the road. You'll come out on the +grey next week, I hope; the hounds'll be meeting here. Give a roar at +him coming in at his jumps." He threw his cigarette into the fire and +extended a hand to me. "Good-bye, Major, you'll see plenty of me and +my hounds before you're done. There's a power of foxes in the +plantations here." + +This was scarcely reassuring for a man who hoped to shoot woodcock, and +I hinted as much. + +"Oh, is it the cock?" said Mr. Flurry; "b'leeve me, there never was a +woodcock yet that minded hounds, now, no more than they'd mind rabbits! +The best shoots ever I had here, the hounds were in it the day before." + +When Mr. Knox had gone, I began to picture myself going across country +roaring, like a man on a fire-engine, while Philippa put the goose down +the chimney; but when I sat down to write to her I did not feel equal +to being humorous about it. I dilated ponderously on my cold, my hard +work, and my loneliness, and eventually went to bed at ten o'clock full +of cold shivers and hot whisky-and-water. + +After a couple of hours of feverish dozing, I began to understand what +had driven Great-Uncle McCarthy to perambulate the house by night. +Mrs. Cadogan had assured me that the Pope of Rome hadn't a betther bed +undher him than myself; wasn't I down on the new flog mattherass the +old masther bought in Father Scanlan's auction? By the smell I +recognised that "flog" meant flock, otherwise I should have said my +couch was stuffed with old boots. I have seldom spent a more wretched +night. The rain drummed with soft fingers on my window panes; the +house was full of noises. I seemed to see Great-Uncle McCarthy ranging +the passages with Flurry at his heels; several times I thought I heard +him. Whisperings seemed borne on the wind through my keyhole, boards +creaked in the room overhead, and once I could have sworn that a hand +passed, groping, over the panels of my door. I am, I may admit, a +believer in ghosts; I even take in a paper that deals with their +culture, but I cannot pretend that on that night I looked forward to a +manifestation of Great-Uncle McCarthy with any enthusiasm. + +The morning broke stormily, and I woke to find Mrs. Cadogan's +understudy, a grimy nephew of about eighteen, standing by my bedside, +with a black bottle in his hand. + +"There's no bath in the house, sir," was his reply to my command; "but +me A'nt said, would ye like a taggeen?" + +This alternative proved to be a glass of raw whisky. I declined it. + +I look back to that first week of housekeeping at Shreelane as to a +comedy excessively badly staged, and striped with lurid melodrama. +Towards its close I was positively home-sick for Mrs. Raverty's, and I +had not a single clean pair of boots. I am not one of those who hold +the convention that in Ireland the rain never ceases, day or night, but +I must say that my first November at Shreelane was composed of weather +of which my friend Flurry Knox remarked that you wouldn't meet a +Christian out of doors, unless it was a snipe or a dispensary doctor. +To this lamentable category might be added a resident magistrate. +Daily, shrouded in mackintosh, I set forth for the Petty Sessions +Courts of my wide district; daily, in the inevitable atmosphere of wet +frieze and perjury, I listened to indictments of old women who plucked +geese alive, of publicans whose hospitality to their friends broke +forth uncontrollably on Sunday afternoons, of "parties" who, in the +language of the police sergeant, were subtly defined as "not to say +dhrunk, but in good fighting thrim." + +I got used to it all in time--I suppose one can get used to anything--I +even became callous to the surprises of Mrs. Cadogan's cooking. As the +weather hardened and the woodcock came in, and one by one I discovered +and nailed up the rat holes, I began to find life endurable, and even +to feel some remote sensation of home-coming when the grey horse turned +in at the gate of Shreelane. + +The one feature of my establishment to which I could not become inured +was the pervading sub-presence of some thing or things which, for my +own convenience, I summarised as Great-Uncle McCarthy. There were +nights on which I was certain that I heard the inebriate shuffle of his +foot overhead, the touch of his fumbling hand against the walls. There +were dark times before the dawn when sounds went to and fro, the moving +of weights, the creaking of doors, a far-away rapping in which was a +workmanlike suggestion of the undertaker, a rumble of wheels on the +avenue. Once I was impelled to the perhaps imprudent measure of +cross-examining Mrs. Cadogan. Mrs. Cadogan, taking the preliminary +precaution of crossing herself, asked me fatefully what day of the week +it was. + +"Friday!" she repeated after me. "Friday! The Lord save us! 'Twas a +Friday the old masther was buried!" + +At this point a saucepan opportunely boiled over, and Mrs. Cadogan fled +with it to the scullery, and was seen no more. + +In the process of time I brought Great-Uncle McCarthy down to a fine +point. On Friday nights he made coffins and drove hearses; during the +rest of the week he rarely did more than patter and shuffle in the +attics over my head. + +One night, about the middle of December, I awoke, suddenly aware that +some noise had fallen like a heavy stone into my dreams. As I felt for +the matches it came again, the long, grudging groan and the +uncompromising bang of the cross door at the head of the kitchen +stairs. I told myself that it was a draught that had done it, but it +was a perfectly still night. Even as I listened, a sound of wheels on +the avenue shook the stillness. The thing was getting past a joke. In +a few minutes I was stealthily groping my way down my own staircase, +with a box of matches in my hand, enforced by scientific curiosity, but +none the less armed with a stick. I stood in the dark at the top of +the back stairs and listened; the snores of Mrs. Cadogan and her nephew +Peter rose tranquilly from their respective lairs. I descended to the +kitchen and lit a candle; there was nothing unusual there, except a +great portion of the Cadogan wearing apparel, which was arranged at the +fire, and was being serenaded by two crickets. Whatever had opened the +door, my household was blameless. The kitchen was not attractive, yet +I felt indisposed to leave it. None the less, it appeared to be my +duty to inspect the yard. I put the candle on the table and went forth +into the outer darkness. Not a sound was to be heard. The night was +very cold, and so dark, that I could scarcely distinguish the roofs of +the stables against the sky; the house loomed tall and oppressive above +me; I was conscious of how lonely it stood in the dumb and barren +country. Spirits were certainly futile creatures, childish in their +manifestations, stupidly content with the old machinery of raps and +rumbles. I thought how fine a scene might be played on a stage like +this; if I were a ghost, how bluely I would glimmer at the windows, how +whimperingly chatter in the wind. Something whirled out of the +darkness above me, and fell with a flop on the ground, just at my feet. +I jumped backwards, in point of fact I made for the kitchen door, and, +with my hand on the latch, stood still and waited. Nothing further +happened; the thing that lay there did not stir. I struck a match. +The moment of tension turned to bathos as the light flickered on +nothing more fateful than a dead crow. + +Dead it certainly was. I could have told that without looking at it; +but why should it, at some considerable period after its death, fall +from the clouds at my feet. But did it fall from the clouds? I struck +another match, and stared up at the impenetrable face of the house. +There was no hint of solution in the dark windows, but I determined to +go up and search the rooms that gave upon the yard. + +How cold it was! I can feel now the frozen musty air of those attics, +with their rat-eaten floors and wall-papers furred with damp. I went +softly from one to another, feeling like a burglar in my own house, and +found nothing in elucidation of the mystery. The windows were +hermetically shut, and sealed with cobwebs. There was no furniture, +except in the end room, where a wardrobe without doors stood in a +corner, empty save for the solemn presence of a monstrous tall hat. I +went back to bed, cursing those powers of darkness that had got me out +of it, and heard no more. + +My landlord had not failed of his promise to visit my coverts with his +hounds; in fact, he fulfilled it rather more conscientiously than +seemed to me quite wholesome for the cock-shooting. I maintained a +silence which I felt to be magnanimous on the part of a man who cared +nothing for hunting and a great deal for shooting, and wished the +hounds more success in the slaughter of my foxes than seemed to be +granted to them. I met them all, one red frosty evening, as I drove +down the long hill to my demesne gates, Flurry at their head, in his +shabby pink coat and dingy breeches, the hounds trailing dejectedly +behind him and his half-dozen companions. + +"What luck?" I called out, drawing rein as I met them. + +"None," said Mr. Flurry briefly. He did not stop, neither did he +remove his pipe from the down-twisted corner of his mouth; his eye at +me was cold and sour. The other members of the hunt passed me with +equal hauteur; I thought they took their ill luck very badly. + +On foot, among the last of the straggling hounds, cracking a carman's +whip, and swearing comprehensively at them all, slouched my friend +Slipper. Our friendship had begun in Court, the relative positions of +the dock and the judgment-seat forming no obstacle to its progress, and +had been cemented during several days' tramping after snipe. He was, +as usual, a little drunk, and he hailed me as though I were a ship. + +"Ahoy, Major Yeates!" he shouted, bringing himself up with a lurch +against my cart; "it's hunting you should be, in place of sending poor +divils to gaol!" + +"But I hear you had no hunting," I said. + +"Ye heard that, did ye?" Slipper rolled upon me an eye like that of a +profligate pug. "Well, begor, ye heard no more than the thruth." + +"But where are all the foxes?" said I. + +"Begor, I don't know no more than your honour. And Shreelane--that +there used to be as many foxes in it as there's crosses in a yard of +check! Well, well, I'll say nothin' for it, only that it's quare! +Here, Vaynus! Naygress!" Slipper uttered a yell, hoarse with whisky, +in adjuration of two elderly ladies of the pack who had profited by our +conversation to stray away into an adjacent cottage. "Well, +good-night, Major. Mr. Flurry's as cross as briars, and he'll have me +ate!" + +He set off at a surprisingly steady run, cracking his whip, and +whooping like a madman. I hope that when I also am fifty I shall be +able to run like Slipper. + +That frosty evening was followed by three others like unto it, and a +flight of woodcock came in. I calculated that I could do with five +guns, and I despatched invitations to shoot and dine on the following +day to four of the local sportsmen, among whom was, of course, my +landlord. I remember that in my letter to the latter I expressed a +facetious hope that my bag of cock would be more successful than his of +foxes had been. + +The answers to my invitations were not what I expected. All, without +so much as a conventional regret, declined my invitation; Mr. Knox +added that he hoped the bag of cock would be to my liking, and that I +need not be "affraid" that the hounds would trouble my coverts any +more. Here was war! I gazed in stupefaction at the crooked scrawl in +which my landlord had declared it. It was wholly and entirely +inexplicable, and instead of going to sleep comfortably over the fire +and my newspaper as a gentleman should, I spent the evening in +irritated ponderings over this bewildering and exasperating change of +front on the part of my friendly squireens. + +My shoot the next day was scarcely a success. I shot the woods in +company with my gamekeeper, Tim Connor, a gentleman whose duties mainly +consisted in limiting the poaching privileges to his personal friends, +and whatever my offence might have been, Mr. Knox could have wished me +no bitterer punishment than hearing the unavailing shouts of "Mark +cock!" and seeing my birds winging their way from the coverts, far out +of shot. Tim Connor and I got ten couple between us; it might have +been thirty if my neighbours had not boycotted me, for what I could +only suppose was the slackness of their hounds. + +I was dog-tired that night, having walked enough for three men, and I +slept the deep, insatiable sleep that I had earned. It was somewhere +about 3 A.M. that I was gradually awakened by a continuous knocking, +interspersed with muffled calls. Great-Uncle McCarthy had never before +given tongue, and I freed one ear from blankets to listen. Then I +remembered that Peter had told me the sweep had promised to arrive that +morning, and to arrive early. Blind with sleep and fury I went to the +passage window, and thence desired the sweep to go to the devil. It +availed me little. For the remainder of the night I could hear him +pacing round the house, trying the windows, banging at the doors, and +calling upon Peter Cadogan as the priests of Baal called upon their +god. At six o'clock I had fallen into a troubled doze, when Mrs. +Cadogan knocked at my door and imparted the information that the sweep +had arrived. My answer need not be recorded, but in spite of it the +door opened, and my housekeeper, in a weird _dshabille_, effectively +lighted by the orange beams of her candle, entered my room. + +"God forgive me, I never seen one I'd hate as much as that sweep!" she +began; "he's these three hours--arrah, what, three hours!--no, but all +night, raising tallywack and tandem round the house to get at the +chimbleys." + +"Well, for Heaven's sake let him get at the chimneys and let me go to +sleep," I answered, goaded to desperation, "and you may tell him from +me that if I hear his voice again I'll shoot him!" + +Mrs. Cadogan silently left my bedside, and as she closed the door she +said to herself, "The Lord save us!" + +Subsequent events may be briefly summarised. At 7.30 I was awakened +anew by a thunderous sound in the chimney, and a brick crashed into the +fireplace, followed at a short interval by two dead jackdaws and their +nests. At eight, I was informed by Peter that there was no hot water, +and that he wished the divil would roast the same sweep. At 9.30, when +I came down to breakfast, there was no fire anywhere, and my coffee, +made in the coachhouse, tasted of soot. I put on an overcoat and +opened my letters. About fourth or fifth in the uninteresting heap +came one in an egregiously disguised hand. + +"Sir," it began, "this is to inform you your unsportsmanlike conduct +has been discovered. You have been suspected this good while of +shooting the Shreelane foxes, it is known now you do worse. Parties +have seen your gamekeeper going regular to meet the Saturday early +train at Salters Hill Station, with your grey horse under a cart, and +your labels on the boxes, and we know as well as _your agent in Cork_ +what it is you have in those boxes. Be warned in time.--Your +Wellwisher." + +I read this through twice before its drift became apparent, and I +realised that I was accused of improving my shooting and my finances by +the simple expedient of selling my foxes. That is to say, I was in a +worse position than if I had stolen a horse, or murdered Mrs. Cadogan, +or got drunk three times a week in Skebawn. + +For a few moments I fell into wild laughter, and then, aware that it +was rather a bad business to let a lie of this kind get a start, I sat +down to demolish the preposterous charge in a letter to Flurry Knox. +Somehow, as I selected my sentences, it was borne in upon me that, if +the letter spoke the truth, circumstantial evidence was rather against +me. Mere lofty repudiation would be unavailing, and by my infernal +facetiousness about the woodcock I had effectively filled in the case +against myself. At all events, the first thing to do was to establish +a basis, and have it out with Tim Connor. I rang the bell. + +"Peter, is Tim Connor about the place?" + +"He is not, sir. I heard him say he was going west the hill to mend +the bounds fence." Peter's face was covered with soot, his eyes were +red, and he coughed ostentatiously. "The sweep's after breaking one of +his brushes within in yer bedroom chimney, sir," he went on, with all +the satisfaction of his class in announcing domestic calamity; "he's +above on the roof now, and he'd be thankful to you to go up to him." + +I followed him upstairs in that state of simmering patience that any +employer of Irish labour must know and sympathise with. I climbed the +rickety ladder and squeezed through the dirty trapdoor involved in the +ascent to the roof, and was confronted by the hideous face of the +sweep, black against the frosty blue sky. He had encamped with all his +paraphernalia on the flat top of the roof, and was good enough to rise +and put his pipe in his pocket on my arrival. + +"Good morning, Major. That's a grand view you have up here," said the +sweep. He was evidently far too well bred to talk shop. "I thravelled +every roof in this counthry, and there isn't one where you'd get as +handsome a prospect!" + +Theoretically he was right, but I had not come up to the roof to +discuss scenery, and demanded brutally why he had sent for me. The +explanation involved a recital of the special genius required to sweep +the Shreelane chimneys; of the fact that the sweep had in infancy been +sent up and down every one of them by Great-Uncle McCarthy; of the +three ass-loads of soot that by his peculiar skill he had this morning +taken from the kitchen chimney; of its present purity, the draught +being such that it would "dhraw up a young cat with it." +Finally--realising that I could endure no more--he explained that my +bedroom chimney had got what he called "a wynd" in it, and he proposed +to climb down a little way in the stack to try "would he get to come at +the brush." The sweep was very small, the chimney very large. I +stipulated that he should have a rope round his waist, and despite the +illegality, I let him go. He went down like a monkey, digging his toes +and fingers into the niches made for the purpose in the old chimney; +Peter held the rope. I lit a cigarette and waited. + +Certainly the view from the roof was worth coming up to look at. It +was rough, heathery country on one side, with a string of little blue +lakes running like a turquoise necklet round the base of a firry hill, +and patches of pale green pasture were set amidst the rocks and +heather. A silvery flash behind the undulations of the hills told +where the Atlantic lay in immense plains of sunlight. I turned to +survey with an owner's eye my own grey woods and straggling plantations +of larch, and espied a man coming out of the western wood. He had +something on his back, and he was walking very fast; a rabbit poacher +no doubt. As he passed out of sight into the back avenue he was +beginning to run. At the same instant I saw on the hill beyond my +western boundaries half-a-dozen horsemen scrambling by zigzag ways down +towards the wood. There was one red coat among them; it came first at +the gap in the fence that Tim Connor had gone out to mend, and with the +others was lost to sight in the covert, from which, in another instant, +came clearly through the frosty air a shout of "Gone to ground!" +Tremendous horn blowings followed, then, all in the same moment, I saw +the hounds break in full cry from the wood, and come stringing over the +grass and up the back avenue towards the yard gate. Were they running +a fresh fox into the stables? + +I do not profess to be a hunting-man, but I am an Irishman, and so, it +is perhaps superfluous to state, is Peter. We forgot the sweep as if +he had never existed, and precipitated ourselves down the ladder, down +the stairs, and out into the yard. One side of the yard is formed by +the coach-house and a long stable, with a range of lofts above them, +planned on the heroic scale in such matters that obtained in Ireland +formerly. These join the house at the corner by the back door. A long +flight of stone steps leads to the lofts, and up these, as Peter and I +emerged from the back door, the hounds were struggling helter-skelter. +Almost simultaneously there was a confused clatter of hoofs in the back +avenue, and Flurry Knox came stooping at a gallop under the archway +followed by three or four other riders. They flung themselves from +their horses and made for the steps of the loft; more hounds pressed, +yelling, on their heels, the din was indescribable, and justified Mrs. +Cadogan's subsequent remark that "when she heard the noise she thought +'twas the end of the world and the divil collecting his own!" + +I jostled in the wake of the party, and found myself in the loft, +wading in hay, and nearly deafened by the clamour that was bandied +about the high roof and walls. At the farther end of the loft the +hounds were raging in the hay, encouraged thereto by the whoops and +screeches of Flurry and his friends. High up in the gable of the loft, +where it joined the main wall of the house, there was a small door, and +I noted with a transient surprise that there was a long ladder leading +up to it. Even as it caught my eye a hound fought his way out of a +drift of hay and began to jump at the ladder, throwing his tongue +vociferously, and even clambering up a few rungs in his excitement. + +"There's the way he's gone!" roared Flurry, striving through hounds and +hay towards the ladder, "Trumpeter has him! What's up there, back of +the door, Major? I don't remember it at all." + +My crimes had evidently been forgotten in the supremacy of the moment. +While I was futilely asserting that had the fox gone up the ladder he +could not possibly have opened the door and shut it after him, even if +the door led anywhere, which, to the best of my belief, it did not, the +door in question opened, and to my amazement the sweep appeared at it. +He gesticulated violently, and over the tumult was heard to asseverate +that there was nothing above there, only a way into the flue, and any +one would be destroyed with the soot---- + +"Ah, go to blazes with your soot!" interrupted Flurry, already half-way +up the ladder. + +I followed him, the other men pressing up behind me. That Trumpeter +had made no mistake was instantly brought home to our noses by the reek +of fox that met us at the door. Instead of a chimney, we found +ourselves in a dilapidated bedroom full of people. Tim Connor was +there, the sweep was there, and a squalid elderly man and woman on whom +I had never set eyes before. There was a large open fireplace, black +with the soot the sweep had brought down with him, and on the table +stood a bottle of my own special Scotch whisky. In one corner of the +room was a pile of broken packing-cases, and beside these on the floor +lay a bag in which something kicked. + +Flurry, looking more uncomfortable and nonplussed than I could have +believed possible, listened in silence to the ceaseless harangue of the +elderly woman. The hounds were yelling like lost spirits in the loft +below, but her voice pierced the uproar like a bagpipe. It was an +unspeakably vulgar voice, yet it was not the voice of a countrywoman, +and there were frowzy remnants of respectability about her general +aspect. + +"And is it you, Flurry Knox, that's calling me a disgrace! Disgrace, +indeed, am I? Me that was your poor mother's own uncle's daughter, and +as good a McCarthy as ever stood in Shreelane!" + +What followed I could not comprehend, owing to the fact that the sweep +kept up a perpetual undercurrent of explanation to me as to how he had +got down the wrong chimney. I noticed that his breath stank of +whisky--Scotch, not the native variety. + + * * * * * + +Never, as long as Flurry Knox lives to blow a horn, will he hear the +last of the day that he ran his mother's first cousin to ground in the +attic. Never, while Mrs. Cadogan can hold a basting spoon, will she +cease to recount how, on the same occasion, she plucked and roasted ten +couple of woodcock in one torrid hour to provide luncheon for the hunt. +In the glory of this achievement her confederacy with the stowaways in +the attic is wholly slurred over, in much the same manner as the +startling outburst of summons for trespass, brought by Tim Connor +during the remainder of the shooting season, obscured the unfortunate +episode of the bagged fox. It was, of course, zeal for my shooting +that induced him to assist Mr. Knox's disreputable relations in the +deportation of my foxes; and I have allowed it to remain at that. + +In fact, the only things not allowed to remain were Mr. and Mrs. +McCarthy Gannon. They, as my landlord informed me, in the midst of +vast apologies, had been permitted to squat at Shreelane until my +tenancy began, and having then ostentatiously and abusively left the +house, they had, with the connivance of the Cadogans, secretly returned +to roost in the corner attic, to sell foxes under the gis of my name, +and to make inroads on my belongings. They retained connection with +the outer world by means of the ladder and the loft, and with the house +in general, and my whisky in particular, by a door into the other +attics--a door concealed by the wardrobe in which reposed Great-Uncle +McCarthy's tall hat. + +It is with the greatest regret that I relinquish the prospect of +writing a monograph on Great-Uncle McCarthy for a Spiritualistic +Journal, but with the departure of his relations he ceased to manifest +himself, and neither the nailing up of packing-cases, nor the rumble of +the cart that took them to the station, disturbed my sleep for the +future. + +I understand that the task of clearing out the McCarthy Gannon's +effects was of a nature that necessitated two glasses of whisky per +man; and if the remnants of rabbit and jackdaw disinterred in the +process were anything like the crow that was thrown out of the window +at my feet, I do not grudge the restorative. + +As Mrs. Cadogan remarked to the sweep, "A Turk couldn't stand it." + + + + +II + +IN THE CURRANHILTY COUNTRY + +It is hardly credible that I should have been induced to depart from my +usual walk of life by a creature so uninspiring as the grey horse that +I bought from Flurry Knox for 25. + +Perhaps it was the monotony of being questioned by every other person +with whom I had five minutes' conversation, as to when I was coming out +with the hounds, and being further informed that in the days when +Captain Browne, the late Coastguard officer, had owned the grey, there +was not a fence between this and Mallow big enough to please them. At +all events, there came an epoch-making day when I mounted the Quaker +and presented myself at a meet of Mr. Knox's hounds. It is my belief +that six out of every dozen people who go out hunting are disagreeably +conscious of a nervous system, and two out of the six are in what is +brutally called "a blue funk." I was not in a blue funk, but I was +conscious not only of a nervous system, but of the anatomical fact that +I possessed large, round legs, handsome in their way, even admirable in +their proper sphere, but singularly ill adapted for adhering to the +slippery surfaces of a saddle. By a fatal intervention of Providence, +the sport, on this my first day in the hunting-field, was such as I +could have enjoyed from a bath-chair. The hunting-field was, on this +occasion, a relative term, implying long stretches of unfenced moorland +and bog, anything, in fact, save a field, the hunt itself might also +have been termed a relative one, being mainly composed of Mr. Knox's +relations in all degrees of cousinhood. It was a day when frost and +sunshine combined went to one's head like iced champagne; the distant +sea looked like the Mediterranean, and for four sunny hours the Knox +relatives and I followed nine couple of hounds at a tranquil footpace +along the hills, our progress mildly enlivened by one or two scrambles +in the shape of jumps. At three o'clock I jogged home, and felt within +me the newborn desire to brag to Peter Cadogan of the Quaker's doings, +as I dismounted rather stiffly in my own yard. + +I little thought that the result would be that three weeks later I +should find myself in a railway carriage at an early hour of a December +morning, in company with Flurry Knox and four or five of his clan, +journeying towards an unknown town, named Drumcurran, with an +appropriate number of horses in boxes behind us and a van full of +hounds in front. Mr. Knox's hounds were on their way, by invitation, +to have a day in the country of their neighbours, the Curranhilty +Harriers, and with amazing fatuity I had allowed myself to be cajoled +into joining the party. A northerly shower was striking in long spikes +on the glass of the window, the atmosphere of the carriage was blue +with tobacco smoke, and my feet, in a pair of new blucher boots, had +sunk into a species of Arctic sleep. + +"Well, you got my letter about the dance at the hotel to-night?" said +Flurry Knox, breaking off a whispered conversation with his amateur +whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, and sitting down beside me. "And we're to go +out with the Harriers to-day, and they've a sure fox for our hounds +to-morrow. I tell you you'll have the best fun ever you had. It's a +great country to ride. Fine honest banks, that you can come racing at +anywhere you like." + +Dr. Hickey, a saturnine young man, with a long nose and a black torpedo +beard, returned to his pocket the lancet with which he had been +trimming his nails. + +"They're like the Tipperary banks," he said; "you climb down nine feet +and you fall the rest." + +It occurred to me that the Quaker and I would most probably fall all +the way, but I said nothing. + +"I hear Tomsy Flood has a good horse this season," resumed Flurry. + +"Then it's not the one you sold him," said the Doctor. + +"I'll take my oath it's not," said Flurry with a grin. "I believe he +has it in for me still over that one." + +Dr. Jerome's moustache went up under his nose and showed his white +teeth. + +"Small blame to him! when you sold him a mare that was wrong of both +her hind-legs. Do you know what he did, Major Yeates? The mare was +lame going into the fair, and he took the two hind-shoes off her and +told poor Flood she kicked them off in the box, and that was why she +was going tender, and he was so drunk he believed him." + +The conversation here deepened into trackless obscurities of +horse-dealing. I took out my stylograph pen, and finished a letter to +Philippa, with a feeling that it would probably be my last. + +The next step in the day's enjoyment consisted in trotting in cavalcade +through the streets of Drumcurran, with another northerly shower +descending upon us, the mud splashing in my face, and my feet coming +torturingly to life. Every man and boy in the town ran with us; the +Harriers were somewhere in the tumult ahead, and the Quaker began to +pull and hump his back ominously. I arrived at the meet considerably +heated, and found myself one of some thirty or forty riders, who, with +traps and bicycles and footpeople, were jammed in a narrow, muddy road. +We were late, and a move was immediately made across a series of grass +fields, all considerately furnished with gates. There was a glacial +gleam of sunshine and people began to turn down the collars of their +coats. As they spread over the field I observed that Mr. Knox was no +longer riding with old Captain Handcock, the Master of the Harriers, +but had attached himself to a square-shouldered young lady with +effective coils of dark hair and a grey habit. She was riding a +fidgety black mare with great decision and a not disagreeable swagger. + +It was at about this moment that the hounds began to run, fast and +silently, and every one began to canter. + +"This is nothing at all," said Dr. Hickey, thundering alongside of me +on a huge young chestnut; "there might have been a hare here last week, +or a red herring this morning. I wouldn't care if we only got what'd +warm us. For the matter of that, I'd as soon hunt a cat as a hare." + +I was already getting quite enough to warm me. The Quaker's +respectable grey head had twice disappeared between his forelegs in a +brace of most unsettling bucks, and all my experiences at the +riding-school at Sandhurst did not prepare me for the sensation of +jumping a briary wall with a heavy drop into a lane so narrow that each +horse had to turn at right angles as he landed. I did not so turn, but +saved myself from entire disgrace by a timely clutch at the mane. We +scrambled out of the lane over a pile of stones and furze bushes, and +at the end of the next field were confronted by a tall, stone-faced +bank. Everyone, always excepting myself, was riding with that furious +valour which is so conspicuous when neighbouring hunts meet, and the +leading half-dozen charged the obstacle at steeplechase speed. I +caught a glimpse of the young lady in the grey habit, sitting square +and strong as her mare topped the bank, with Flurry and the redoubtable +Mr. Tomsy Flood riding on either hand; I followed in their wake, with a +blind confidence in the Quaker, and none at all in myself. He refused +it. I suppose it was in token of affection and gratitude that I fell +upon his neck; at all events, I had reason to respect his judgment, as, +before I had recovered myself, the hounds were straggling back into the +field by a gap lower down. + +It finally appeared that the hounds could do no more with the line they +had been hunting, and we proceeded to jog interminably, I knew not +whither. During this unpleasant process Flurry Knox bestowed on me +many items of information, chiefly as to the pangs of jealousy he was +inflicting on Mr. Flood by his attentions to the lady in the grey +habit, Miss "Bobbie" Bennett. + +"She'll have all old Handcock's money one of these days--she's his +niece, y' know--and she's a good girl to ride, but she's not as young +as she was ten years ago. You'd be looking at a chicken a long time +before you thought of her! She might take Tomsy some day if she can't +do any better." He stopped and looked at me with a gleam in his eye. +"Come on, and I'll introduce you to her!" + +Before, however, this privilege could be mine, the whole cavalcade was +stopped by a series of distant yells, which apparently conveyed +information to the hunt, though to me they only suggested a Red Indian +scalping his enemy. The yells travelled rapidly nearer, and a young +man with a scarlet face and a long stick sprang upon the fence, and +explained that he and Patsy Lorry were after chasing a hare two miles +down out of the hill above, and ne'er a dog nor a one with them but +themselves, and she was lying, beat out, under a bush, and Patsy Lorry +was minding her until the hounds would come. I had a vision of the +humane Patsy Lorry fanning the hare with his hat, but apparently nobody +else found the fact unusual. The hounds were hurried into the fields, +the hare was again spurred into action, and I was again confronted with +the responsibilities of the chase. After the first five minutes I had +discovered several facts about the Quaker. If the bank was above a +certain height he refused it irrevocably, if it accorded with his ideas +he got his forelegs over and ploughed through the rest of it on his +stifle-joints, or, if a gripe made this inexpedient, he remained poised +on top till the fabric crumbled under his weight. In the case of walls +he butted them down with his knees, or squandered them with his +hind-legs. These operations took time, and the leaders of the hunt +streamed farther and farther away over the crest of a hill, while the +Quaker pursued at the equable gallop of a horse in the Bayeux Tapestry. + +I began to perceive that I had been adopted as a pioneer by a small +band of followers, who, as one of their number candidly explained +"liked to have some one ahead of them to soften the banks," and +accordingly waited respectfully till the Quaker had made the rough +places smooth, and taken the raw edge off the walls. They, in their +turn, showed me alternative routes when the obstacle proved above the +Quaker's limit; thus, in ignoble confederacy, I and the offscourings of +the Curranhilty hunt pursued our way across some four miles of country. +When at length we parted it was with extreme regret on both sides. A +river crossed our course, with boggy banks pitted deep with the +hoof-marks of our forerunners; I suggested it to the Quaker, and +discovered that Nature had not in vain endued him with the hindquarters +of the hippopotamus. I presume the others had jumped it; the Quaker, +with abysmal flounderings, walked through and heaved himself to safety +on the farther bank. It was the dividing of the ways. My friendly +company turned aside as one man, and I was left with the world before +me, and no guide save the hoof-marks in the grass. These presently led +me to a road, on the other side of which was a bank, that was at once +added to the Quaker's black list. The rain had again begun to fall +heavily, and was soaking in about my elbows; I suddenly asked myself +why, in Heaven's name, I should go any farther. No adequate reason +occurred to me, and I turned in what I believed to be the direction of +Drumcurran. + +I rode on for possibly two or three miles without seeing a human being, +until, from the top of a hill I descried a solitary lady rider. I +started in pursuit. The rain kept blurring my eye-glass, but it seemed +to me that the rider was a schoolgirl with hair hanging down her back, +and that her horse was a trifle lame. I pressed on to ask my way, and +discovered that I had been privileged to overtake no less a person than +Miss Bobbie Bennett. + +My question as to the route led to information of a varied character. +Miss Bennett was going that way herself; her mare had given her what +she called "a toss and a half," whereby she had strained her arm and +the mare her shoulder, her habit had been torn, and she had lost all +her hairpins. + +"I'm an awful object," she concluded; "my hair's the plague of my life +out hunting! I declare I wish to goodness I was bald!" + +I struggled to the level of the occasion with an appropriate protest. +She had really very brilliant grey eyes, and her complexion was +undeniable. Philippa has since explained to me that it is a mere male +fallacy that any woman can look well with her hair down her back, but I +have always maintained that Miss Bobbie Bennett, with the rain +glistening on her dark tresses, looked uncommonly well. + +"I shall never get it dry for the dance to-night," she complained. + +"I wish I could help you," said I. + +"Perhaps you've got a hairpin or two about you!" said she, with a +glance that had certainly done great execution before now. + +I disclaimed the possession of any such tokens, but volunteered to go +and look for some at a neighbouring cottage. + +The cottage door was shut, and my knockings were answered by a +stupefied-looking elderly man. Conscious of my own absurdity, I asked +him if he had any hairpins. + +"I didn't see a hare this week!" he responded in a slow bellow. + +"Hairpins!" I roared; "has your wife any hairpins?" + +"She has not." Then, as an after-thought, "She's dead these ten years." + +At this point a young woman emerged from the cottage, and, with many +coy grins, plucked from her own head some half-dozen hairpins, crooked, +and grey with age, but still hairpins, and as such well worth my +shilling. I returned with my spoil to Miss Bennett, only to be +confronted with a fresh difficulty. The arm that she had strained was +too stiff to raise to her head. + +Miss Bobbie turned her handsome eyes upon me. "It's no use," she said +plaintively, "I can't do it!" + +I looked up and down the road; there was no one in sight. I offered to +do it for her. + +Miss Bennett's hair was long, thick, and soft; it was also slippery +with rain. I twisted it conscientiously, as if it were a hay rope, +until Miss Bennett, with an irrepressible shriek, told me it would +break off. I coiled the rope with some success, and proceeded to nail +it to her head with the hairpins. At all the most critical points one, +if not both, of the horses moved; hairpins were driven home into Miss +Bennett's skull, and were with difficulty plucked forth again; in fact, +a more harrowing performance can hardly be imagined, but Miss Bennett +bore it with the heroism of a pin-cushion. + +I was putting the finishing touches to the coiffure when some sound +made me look round, and I beheld at a distance of some fifty yards the +entire hunt approaching us at a foot-pace. I lost my head, and, +instead of continuing my task, I dropped the last hairpin as if it were +red-hot, and kicked the Quaker away to the far side of the road, thus, +if it were possible, giving the position away a shade more generously. + +There were fifteen riders in the group that overtook us, and fourteen +of them, including the Whip, were grinning from ear to ear; the +fifteenth was Mr. Tomsy Flood, and he showed no sign of appreciation. +He shoved his horse past me and up to Miss Bennett, his red moustache +bristling, truculence in every outline of his heavy shoulders. His +green coat was muddy, and his hat had a cave in it. Things had +apparently gone ill with him. + +Flurry's witticisms held out for about two miles and a half; I do not +give them, because they were not amusing, but they all dealt ultimately +with the animosity that I, in common with himself, should henceforth +have to fear from Mr. Flood. + +"Oh, he's a holy terror!" he said conclusively; "he was riding the +tails off the hounds to-day to best me. He was near killing me twice. +We had some words about it, I can tell you. I very near took my whip +to him. Such a bull-rider of a fellow I never saw! He wouldn't so +much as stop to catch Bobbie Bennett's horse when I picked her up, he +was riding so jealous. His own girl, mind you! And such a crumpler as +she got too! I declare she knocked a groan out of the road when she +struck it!" + +"She doesn't seem so much hurt?" I said. + +"Hurt!" said Flurry, flicking casually at a hound. "You couldn't hurt +that one unless you took a hatchet to her!" + +The rain had reached a pitch that put further hunting out of the +question, and we bumped home at that intolerable pace known as a +"hound's jog." I spent the remainder of the afternoon over a fire in +my bedroom in the Royal Hotel, Drumcurran, official letters to write +having mercifully provided me with an excuse for seclusion, while the +bar and the billiard-room hummed below, and the Quaker's three-cornered +gallop wreaked its inevitable revenge upon my person. As this process +continued, and I became proportionately embittered, I asked myself, not +for the first time, what Philippa would say when introduced to my +present circle of acquaintances. + +I have already mentioned that a dance was to take place at the hotel, +given, as far as I could gather, by the leading lights of the +Curranhilty Hunt. A less jocund guest than the wreck who at the +pastoral hour of nine crept stiffly down to "chase the glowing hours +with flying feet" could hardly have been encountered. The dance was +held in the coffee-room, and a conspicuous object outside the door was +a saucer bath full of something that looked like flour. + +"Rub your feet in that," said Flurry; "that's French chalk! They +hadn't time to do the floor, so they hit on this dodge." + +I complied with this encouraging direction, and followed him into the +room. Dancing had already begun, and the first sight that met my eyes +was Miss Bennett, in a yellow dress, waltzing with Mr. Tomsy Flood. +She looked very handsome, and, in spite of her accident, she was +getting round the sticky floor and her still more sticky partner with +the swing of a racing cutter. Her eye caught mine immediately, and +with confidence. Clearly our acquaintance that, in the space of twenty +minutes, had blossomed tropically into hair-dressing, was not to be +allowed to wither. Nor was I myself allowed to wither. Men, known and +unknown, plied me with partners, till my shirt cuff was black with +names, and the number of dances stretched away into the blue distance +of to-morrow morning. The music was supplied by the organist of the +church, who played with religious unction and at the pace of a +processional hymn. I put forth into the mle with a junior Bennett, +inferior in calibre to Miss Bobbie, but a strong goer, and, I fear, +made but a sorry dbut in the eyes of Drumcurran. At every other +moment I bumped into the unforeseen orbits of those who reversed, and +of those who walked their partners backwards down the room with faces +of ineffable supremacy. Being unskilled in these intricacies of an +elder civilisation, the younger Miss Bennett fared but ingloriously at +my hands; the music pounded interminably on, until the heel of Mr. +Flood put a period to our sufferings. + +"The nasty dirty filthy brute!" shrieked the younger Miss Bennett in a +single breath; "he's torn the gown off my back!" + +She whirled me to the cloak-room; we parted, mutually unregretted, at +its door, and by, I fear, common consent, evaded our second dance +together. + +Many, many times during the evening I asked myself why I did not go to +bed. Perhaps it was the remembrance that my bed was situated some ten +feet above the piano in a direct line; but, whatever was the reason, +the night wore on and found me still working my way down my shirt cuff. +I sat out as much as possible, and found my partners to be, as a body, +pretty, talkative, and ill dressed, and during the evening I had many +and varied opportunities of observing the rapid progress of Mr. Knox's +flirtation with Miss Bobbie Bennett. From No. 4 to No. 8 they were +invisible; that they were behind a screen in the commercial-room might +be inferred from Mr. Flood's thundercloud presence in the passage +outside. + +At No. 9 the young lady emerged for one of her dances with me; it was a +barn dance, and particularly trying to my momently stiffening muscles; +but Miss Bobbie, whether in dancing or sitting out, went in for "the +rigour of the game." She was in as hard condition as one of her +uncle's hounds, and for a full fifteen minutes I capered and swooped +beside her, larding the lean earth as I went, and replying but +spasmodically to her even flow of conversation. + +"That'll take the stiffness out of you!" she exclaimed, as the organist +slowed down reverentially to a conclusion. "I had a bet with Flurry +Knox over that dance. He said you weren't up to my weight at the pace!" + +I led her forth to the refreshment table, and was watching with awe her +fearless consumption of claret cup that I would not have touched for a +sovereign, when Flurry, with a partner on his arm, strolled past us. + +"Well, you won the gloves, Miss Bobbie!" he said. "Don't you wish you +may get them!" + +"Gloves without the _g_, Mr. Knox!" replied Miss Bennett, in a voice +loud enough to reach the end of the passage, where Mr. Thomas Flood was +burying his nose in a very brown whisky-and-soda. + +"Your hair's coming down!" retorted Flurry. "Ask Major Yeates if he +can spare you a few hairpins!" + +Swifter than lightning Miss Bennett hurled a macaroon at her retreating +foe, missed him, and subsided laughing on to a sofa. I mopped my brow +and took my seat beside her, wondering how much longer I could live up +to the social exigencies of Drumcurran. + +Miss Bennett, however, proved excellent company. She told me artfully, +and inch by inch, all that Mr. Flood had said to her on the subject of +my hair-dressing; she admitted that she had, as a punishment, cut him +out of three dances and given them to Flurry Knox. When I remarked +that in fairness they should have been given to me, she darted a very +attractive glance at me, and pertinently observed that I had not asked +for them. + + As steals the dawn into a fevered room, + And says "Be of good cheer, the day is born!" + +so did the rumour of supper pass among the chaperons, male and female. +It was obviously due to a sense of the fitness of things that Mrs. +Bennett was apportioned to me, and I found myself in the gratifying +position of heading with her the procession to supper. My impressions +of Mrs. Bennett are few but salient. She wore an apple-green satin +dress and filled it tightly; wisely mistrusting the hotel supper, she +had imported sandwiches and cake in a pocket-handkerchief, and, warmed +by two glasses of sherry, she made me the recipient of the remarkable +confidence that she had but two back teeth in her head, but, thank God, +they met. When, with the other starving men, I fell upon the remains +of the feast, I regretted that I had declined her offer of a sandwich. + +Of the remainder of the evening I am unable to give a detailed account. +Let it not for one instant be imagined that I had looked upon the wine +of the Royal Hotel when it was red, or, indeed, any other colour; as a +matter of fact, I had espied an inconspicuous corner in the entrance +hall, and there I first smoked a cigarette, and subsequently sank into +uneasy sleep. Through my dreams I was aware of the measured pounding +of the piano, of the clatter of glasses at the bar, of wheels in the +street, and then, more clearly, of Flurry's voice assuring Miss Bennett +that if she'd only wait for another dance he'd get the R.M. out of bed +to do her hair for her--then again oblivion. + +At some later period I was dropping down a chasm on the Quaker's back, +and landing with a shock; I was twisting his mane into a chignon, when +he turned round his head and caught my arm in his teeth. I awoke with +the dew of terror on my forehead, to find Miss Bennett leaning over me +in a scarlet cloak with a hood over her head, and shaking me by my coat +sleeve. + +"Major Yeates," she began at once in a hurried whisper, "I want you to +find Flurry Knox, and tell him there's a plan to feed his hounds at six +o'clock this morning so as to spoil their hunting!" + +"How do you know?" I asked, jumping up. + +"My little brother told me. He came in with us to-night to see the +dance, and he was hanging round in the stables, and he heard one of the +men telling another there was a dead mule in an outhouse in Bride's +Alley, all cut up ready to give to Mr. Knox's hounds." + +"But why shouldn't they get it?" I asked in sleepy stupidity. + +"Is it fill them up with an old mule just before they're going out +hunting?" flashed Miss Bennett. "Hurry and tell Mr. Knox; don't let +Tomsy Flood see you telling him--or any one else." + +"Oh, then it's Mr. Flood's game?" I said, grasping the situation at +length. + +"It is," said Miss Bennett, suddenly turning scarlet; "he's a disgrace! +I'm ashamed of him! I'm done with him!" + +I resisted a strong disposition to shake Miss Bennett by the hand. + +"I can't wait," she continued. "I made my mother drive back a +mile--she doesn't know a thing about it--I said I'd left my purse in +the cloak-room. Good-night! Don't tell a soul but Flurry!" + +She was off, and upon my incapable shoulders rested the responsibility +of the enterprise. + +It was past four o'clock, and the last bars of the last waltz were +being played. At the bar a knot of men, with Flurry in their midst, +were tossing "Odd man out" for a bottle of champagne. Flurry was not +in the least drunk, a circumstance worthy of remark in his present +company, and I got him out into the hall and unfolded my tidings. The +light of battle lit in his eye as he listened. + +"I knew by Tomsy he was shaping for mischief," he said coolly; "he's +taken as much liquor as'd stiffen a tinker, and he's only half-drunk +this minute. Hold on till I get Jerome Hickey and Charlie +Knox--they're sober; I'll be back in a minute." + +I was not present at the council of war thus hurriedly convened; I was +merely informed when they returned that we were all to "hurry on." My +best evening pumps have never recovered the subsequent proceedings. +They, with my swelled and aching feet inside them, were raced down one +filthy lane after another, until, somewhere on the outskirts of +Drumcurran, Flurry pushed open the gate of a yard and went in. It was +nearly five o'clock on that raw December morning; low down in the sky a +hazy moon shed a diffused light; all the surrounding houses were still +and dark. At our footsteps an angry bark or two came from inside the +stable. + +"Whisht!" said Flurry, "I'll say a word to them before I open the door." + +At his voice a chorus of hysterical welcome arose; without more delay +he flung open the stable door, and instantly we were all knee-deep in a +rush of hounds. There was not a moment lost. Flurry started at a +quick run out of the yard with the whole pack pattering at his heels. +Charley Knox vanished; Dr. Hickey and I followed the hounds, splashing +into puddles and hobbling over patches of broken stones, till we left +the town behind and hedges arose on either hand. + +"Here's the house!" said Flurry, stopping short at a low entrance gate; +"many's the time I've been here when his father had it; it'll be a +queer thing if I can't find a window I can manage, and the old cook he +has is as deaf as the dead." + +He and Doctor Hickey went in at the gate with the hounds; I hesitated +ignobly in the mud. + +"This isn't an R.M.'s job," said Flurry in a whisper, closing the gate +in my face; "you'd best keep clear of house-breaking." + +I accepted his advice, but I may admit that before I turned for home a +sash was gently raised, a light had sprung up in one of the lower +windows, and I heard Flurry's voice saying, "Over, over, over!" to his +hounds. + +There seemed to me to be no interval at all between these events and +the moment when I woke in bright sunlight to find Dr. Hickey standing +by my bedside in a red coat with a tall glass in his hand. + +"It's nine o'clock," he said. "I'm just after waking Flurry Knox. +There wasn't one stirring in the hotel till I went down and pulled the +'boots' from under the kitchen table! It's well for us the meet's in +the town; and, by-the-bye, your grey horse has four legs on him the +size of bolsters this morning; he won't be fit to go out, I'm afraid. +Drink this anyway, you're in the want of it." + +Dr. Hickey's eyelids were rather pink, but his hand was as steady as a +rock. The whisky-and-soda was singularly untempting. + +"What happened last night?" I asked eagerly as I gulped it. + +"Oh, it all went off very nicely, thank you," said Hickey, twisting his +black beard to a point. "We benched as many of the hounds in Flood's +bed as'd fit, and we shut the lot into the room. We had them just +comfortable when we heard his latchkey below at the door." He broke +off and began to snigger. + +"Well?" I said, sitting bolt upright. + +"Well, he got in at last, and he lit a candle then. That took him five +minutes. He was pretty tight. We were looking at him over the +banisters until he started to come up, and according as he came up, we +went on up the top flight. He stood admiring his candle for a while on +the landing, and we wondered he didn't hear the hounds snuffing under +the door. He opened it then, and, on the minute, three of them bolted +out between his legs." Dr. Hickey again paused to indulge in +Mephistophelian laughter. "Well, you know," he went on, "when a man in +poor Tomsy's condition sees six dogs jumping out of his bed he's apt to +make a wrong diagnosis. He gave a roar, and pitched the candlestick at +them, and ran for his life downstairs, and all the hounds after him. +'Gone away!' screeches that devil Flurry, pelting downstairs on top of +them in the dark. I believe I screeched too." + +"Good heavens!" I gasped, "I was well out of that!" + +"Well, you were," admitted the Doctor. "However, Tomsy bested them in +the dark, and he got to ground in the pantry. I heard the cups and +saucers go as he slammed the door on the hounds' noses, and the minute +he was in Flurry turned the key on him. 'They're real dogs, Tomsy, my +buck!' says Flurry, just to quiet him; and there we left him." + +"Was he hurt?" I asked, conscious of the triviality of the question. + +"Well, he lost his brush," replied Dr. Hickey. "Old Merrylegs tore the +coat-tails off him; we got them on the floor when we struck a light; +Flurry has them to nail on his kennel door. Charley Knox had a +pleasant time too," he went on, "with the man that brought the +barrow-load of meat to the stable. We picked out the tastiest bits and +arranged them round Flood's breakfast table for him. They smelt very +nice. Well, I'm delaying you with my talking----" + +Flurry's hounds had the run of the season that day. I saw it admirably +throughout--from Miss Bennett's pony cart. She drove extremely well, +in spite of her strained arm. + + + + +III + +TRINKET'S COLT + +It was Petty Sessions day in Skebawn, a cold, grey day of February. A +case of trespass had dragged its burden of cross summonses and cross +swearing far into the afternoon, and when I left the bench my head was +singing from the bellowings of the attorneys, and the smell of their +clients was heavy upon my palate. + +The streets still testified to the fact that it was market day, and I +evaded with difficulty the sinuous course of carts full of soddenly +screwed people, and steered an equally devious one for myself among the +groups anchored round the doors of the public-houses. Skebawn +possesses, among its legion of public-houses, one establishment which +timorously, and almost imperceptibly, proffers tea to the thirsty. I +turned in there, as was my custom on court days, and found the little +dingy den, known as the Ladies' Coffee-Room, in the occupancy of my +friend Mr. Florence McCarthy Knox, who was drinking strong tea and +eating buns with serious simplicity. It was a first and quite +unexpected glimpse of that domesticity that has now become a marked +feature in his character. + +"You're the very man I wanted to see," I said as I sat down beside him +at the oilcloth-covered table; "a man I know in England who is not much +of a judge of character has asked me to buy him a four-year-old down +here, and as I should rather be stuck by a friend than a dealer, I wish +you'd take over the job." + +Flurry poured himself out another cup of tea, and dropped three lumps +of sugar into it in silence. + +Finally he said, "There isn't a four-year-old in this country that I'd +be seen dead with at a pig fair." + +This was discouraging, from the premier authority on horse-flesh in the +district. + +"But it isn't six weeks since you told me you had the finest filly in +your stables that was ever foaled in the County Cork," I protested: +"what's wrong with her?" + +"Oh, is it that filly?" said Mr. Knox with a lenient smile; "she's gone +these three weeks from me. I swapped her and 6 for a three-year-old +Ironmonger colt, and after that I swapped the colt and 19 for that +Bandon horse I rode last week at your place, and after that again I +sold the Bandon horse for 75 to old Welply, and I had to give him back +a couple of sovereigns luck-money. You see I did pretty well with the +filly after all." + +"Yes, yes--oh rather," I assented, as one dizzily accepts the +propositions of a bimetallist; "and you don't know of anything +else----?" + +The room in which we were seated was closely screened from the shop by +a door with a muslin-curtained window in it; several of the panes were +broken, and at this juncture two voices that had for some time carried +on a discussion forced themselves upon our attention. + +"Begging your pardon for contradicting you, ma'am," said the voice of +Mrs. McDonald, proprietress of the tea-shop, and a leading light in +Skebawn Dissenting circles, shrilly tremulous with indignation, "if the +servants I recommend you won't stop with you, it's no fault of mine. +If respectable young girls are set picking grass out of your gravel, in +place of their proper work, certainly they will give warning!" + +The voice that replied struck me as being a notable one, well-bred and +imperious. + +"When I take a barefooted slut out of a cabin, I don't expect her to +dictate to me what her duties are!" + +Flurry jerked up his chin in a noiseless laugh. "It's my grandmother!" +he whispered. "I bet you Mrs. McDonald don't get much change out of +her!" + +"If I set her to clean the pig-sty I expect her to obey me," continued +the voice in accents that would have made me clean forty pig-sties had +she desired me to do so. + +"Very well, ma'am," retorted Mrs. McDonald, "if that's the way you +treat your servants, you needn't come here again looking for them. I +consider your conduct is neither that of a lady nor a Christian!" + +"Don't you, indeed?" replied Flurry's grandmother. "Well, your opinion +doesn't greatly distress me, for, to tell you the truth, I don't think +you're much of a judge." + +"Didn't I tell you she'd score?" murmured Flurry, who was by this time +applying his eye to a hole in the muslin curtain. "She's off," he went +on, returning to his tea. "She's a great character! She's +eighty-three if she's a day, and she's as sound on her legs as a +three-year-old! Did you see that old shandrydan of hers in the street +a while ago, and a fellow on the box with a red beard on him like +Robinson Crusoe? That old mare that was on the near side--Trinket her +name is--is mighty near clean bred. I can tell you her foals are worth +a bit of money." + +I had heard of old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas; indeed, I had seldom dined +out in the neighbourhood without hearing some new story of her and her +remarkable mnage, but it had not yet been my privilege to meet her. + +"Well, now," went on Flurry in his slow voice, "I'll tell you a thing +that's just come into my head. My grandmother promised me a foal of +Trinket's the day I was one-and-twenty, and that's five years ago, and +deuce a one I've got from her yet. You never were at Aussolas? No, +you were not. Well, I tell you the place there is like a circus with +horses. She has a couple of score of them running wild in the woods, +like deer." + +"Oh, come," I said, "I'm a bit of a liar myself--" + +"Well, she has a dozen of them anyhow, rattling good colts too, some of +them, but they might as well be donkeys for all the good they are to me +or any one. It's not once in three years she sells one, and there she +has them walking after her for bits of sugar, like a lot of dirty +lapdogs," ended Flurry with disgust. + +"Well, what's your plan? Do you want me to make her a bid for one of +the lapdogs?" + +"I was thinking," replied Flurry, with great deliberation, "that my +birthday's this week, and maybe I could work a four-year-old colt of +Trinket's she has out of her in honour of the occasion." + +"And sell your grandmother's birthday present to me?" + +"Just that, I suppose," answered Flurry with a slow wink. + +A few days afterwards a letter from Mr. Knox informed me that he had +"squared the old lady, and it would be all right about the colt." He +further told me that Mrs. Knox had been good enough to offer me, with +him, a day's snipe shooting on the celebrated Aussolas bogs, and he +proposed to drive me there the following Monday, if convenient. Most +people found it convenient to shoot the Aussolas snipe bog when they +got the chance. Eight o'clock on the following Monday morning saw +Flurry, myself, and a groom packed into a dogcart, with portmanteaus, +gun-cases, and two rampant red setters. + +It was a long drive, twelve miles at least, and a very cold one. We +passed through long tracts of pasture country, fraught, for Flurry, +with memories of runs, which were recorded for me, fence by fence, in +every one of which the biggest dog-fox in the country had gone to +ground, with not two feet--measured accurately on the handle of the +whip--between him and the leading hound; through bogs that +imperceptibly melted into lakes, and finally down and down into a +valley, where the fir-trees of Aussolas clustered darkly round a +glittering lake, and all but hid the grey roofs and pointed gables of +Aussolas Castle. + +"There's a nice stretch of a demesne for you," remarked Flurry, +pointing downwards with the whip, "and one little old woman holding it +all in the heel of her fist. Well able to hold it she is, too, and +always was, and she'll live twenty years yet, if it's only to spite the +whole lot of us, and when all's said and done goodness knows how she'll +leave it!" + +"It strikes me you were lucky to keep her up to her promise about the +colt," I said. + +Flurry administered a composing kick to the ceaseless strivings of the +red setters under the seat. + +"I used to be rather a pet with her," he said, after a pause; "but mind +you, I haven't got him yet, and if she gets any notion I want to sell +him I'll never get him, so say nothing about the business to her." + +The tall gates of Aussolas shrieked on their hinges as they admitted +us, and shut with a clang behind us, in the faces of an old mare and a +couple of young horses, who, foiled in their break for the excitements +of the outer world, turned and galloped defiantly on either side of us. +Flurry's admirable cob hammered on, regardless of all things save his +duty. + +"He's the only one I have that I'd trust myself here with," said his +master, flicking him approvingly with the whip; "there are plenty of +people afraid to come here at all, and when my grandmother goes out +driving she has a boy on the box with a basket full of stones to peg at +them. Talk of the dickens, here she is herself!" + +A short, upright old woman was approaching, preceded by a white woolly +dog with sore eyes and a bark like a tin trumpet; we both got out of +the trap and advanced to meet the lady of the manor. + +I may summarise her attire by saying that she looked as if she had +robbed a scarecrow; her face was small and incongruously refined, the +skinny hand that she extended to me had the grubby tan that bespoke the +professional gardener, and was decorated with a magnificent diamond +ring. On her head was a massive purple velvet bonnet. + +"I am very glad to meet you, Major Yeates," she said with an +old-fashioned precision of utterance; "your grandfather was a dancing +partner of mine in old days at the Castle, when he was a handsome young +aide-de-camp there, and I was----you may judge for yourself what I was." + +She ended with a startling little hoot of laughter, and I was aware +that she quite realised the world's opinion of her, and was indifferent +to it. + +Our way to the bogs took us across Mrs. Knox's home farm, and through a +large field in which several young horses were grazing. + +"There now, that's my fellow," said Flurry, pointing to a fine-looking +colt, "the chestnut with the white diamond on his forehead. He'll run +into three figures before he's done, but we'll not tell that to the old +lady!" + +The famous Aussolas bogs were as full of snipe as usual, and a good +deal fuller of water than any bogs I had ever shot before. I was on my +day, and Flurry was not, and as he is ordinarily an infinitely better +snipe shot than I, I felt at peace with the world and all men as we +walked back, wet through, at five o'clock. + +The sunset had waned, and a big white moon was making the eastern tower +of Aussolas look like a thing in a fairy tale or a play when we arrived +at the hall door. An individual, whom I recognised as the Robinson +Crusoe coachman, admitted us to a hall, the like of which one does not +often see. The walls were panelled with dark oak up to the gallery +that ran round three sides of it, the balusters of the wide staircase +were heavily carved, and blackened portraits of Flurry's ancestors on +the spindle side stared sourly down on their descendant as he tramped +upstairs with the bog mould on his hobnailed boots. + +We had just changed into dry clothes when Robinson Crusoe shoved his +red beard round the corner of the door, with the information that the +mistress said we were to stay for dinner. My heart sank. It was then +barely half-past five. I said something about having no evening +clothes and having to get home early. + +"Sure the dinner'll be in another half-hour," said Robinson Crusoe, +joining hospitably in the conversation; "and as for evening clothes---- +God bless ye!" + +The door closed behind him. + +"Never mind," said Flurry, "I dare say you'll be glad enough to eat +another dinner by the time you get home." He laughed. "Poor Slipper!" +he added inconsequently, and only laughed again when I asked for an +explanation. + +Old Mrs. Knox received us in the library, where she was seated by a +roaring turf fire, which lit the room a good deal more effectively than +the pair of candles that stood beside her in tall silver candlesticks. +Ceaseless and implacable growls from under her chair indicated the +presence of the woolly dog. She talked with confounding culture of the +books that rose all round her to the ceiling; her evening dress was +accomplished by means of an additional white shawl, rather dirtier than +its congeners; as I took her in to dinner she quoted Virgil to me, and +in the same breath screeched an objurgation at a being whose matted +head rose suddenly into view from behind an ancient Chinese screen, as +I have seen the head of a Zulu woman peer over a bush. + +Dinner was as incongruous as everything else. Detestable soup in a +splendid old silver tureen that was nearly as dark in hue as Robinson +Crusoe's thumb; a perfect salmon, perfectly cooked, on a chipped +kitchen dish; such cut glass as is not easy to find nowadays; sherry +that, as Flurry subsequently remarked, would burn the shell off an egg; +and a bottle of port, draped in immemorial cobwebs, wan with age, and +probably priceless. Throughout the vicissitudes of the meal Mrs. +Knox's conversation flowed on undismayed, directed sometimes at me--she +had installed me in the position of friend of her youth, and talked to +me as if I were my own grandfather--sometimes at Crusoe, with whom she +had several heated arguments, and sometimes she would make a statement +of remarkable frankness on the subject of her horse-farming affairs to +Flurry, who, very much on his best behaviour, agreed with all she said, +and risked no original remark. As I listened to them both, I +remembered with infinite amusement how he had told me once that "a pet +name she had for him was 'Tony Lumpkin,' and no one but herself knew +what she meant by it." It seemed strange that she made no allusion to +Trinket's colt or to Flurry's birthday, but, mindful of my +instructions, I held my peace. + +As, at about half-past eight, we drove away in the moonlight, Flurry +congratulated me solemnly on my success with his grandmother. He was +good enough to tell me that she would marry me to-morrow if I asked +her, and he wished I would, even if it was only to see what a nice +grandson he'd be for me. A sympathetic giggle behind me told me that +Michael, on the back seat, had heard and relished the jest. + +We had left the gates of Aussolas about half a mile behind when, at the +corner of a by-road, Flurry pulled up. A short squat figure arose from +the black shadow of a furze bush and came out into the moonlight, +swinging its arms like a cabman and cursing audibly. + +"Oh murdher, oh murdher, Misther Flurry! What kept ye at all? 'Twould +perish the crows to be waiting here the way I am these two hours----" + +"Ah, shut your mouth, Slipper!" said Flurry, who, to my surprise, had +turned back the rug and was taking off his driving coat, "I couldn't +help it. Come on, Yeates, we've got to get out here." + +"What for?" I asked, in not unnatural bewilderment. + +"It's all right. I'll tell you as we go along," replied my companion, +who was already turning to follow Slipper up the by-road. "Take the +trap on, Michael, and wait at the River's Cross." He waited for me to +come up with him, and then put his hand on my arm. "You see, Major, +this is the way it is. My grandmother's given me that colt right +enough, but if I waited for her to send him over to me I'd never see a +hair of his tail. So I just thought that as we were over here we might +as well take him back with us, and maybe you'll give us a help with +him; he'll not be altogether too handy for a first go off." + +I was staggered. An infant in arms could scarcely have failed to +discern the fishiness of the transaction, and I begged Mr. Knox not to +put himself to this trouble on my account, as I had no doubt I could +find a horse for my friend elsewhere. Mr. Knox assured me that it was +no trouble at all, quite the contrary, and that, since his grandmother +had given him the colt, he saw no reason why he should not take him +when he wanted him; also, that if I didn't want him he'd be glad enough +to keep him himself; and finally, that I wasn't the chap to go back on +a friend, but I was welcome to drive back to Shreelane with Michael +this minute if I liked. + +Of course I yielded in the end. I told Flurry I should lose my job +over the business, and he said I could then marry his grandmother, and +the discussion was abruptly closed by the necessity of following +Slipper over a locked five-barred gate. + +Our pioneer took us over about half a mile of country, knocking down +stone gaps where practicable and scrambling over tall banks in the +deceptive moonlight. We found ourselves at length in a field with a +shed in one corner of it; in a dim group of farm buildings a little way +off a light was shining. + +"Wait here," said Flurry to me in a whisper; "the less noise the +better. It's an open shed, and we'll just slip in and coax him out." + +Slipper unwound from his waist a halter, and my colleagues glided like +spectres into the shadow of the shed, leaving me to meditate on my +duties as Resident Magistrate, and on the questions that would be asked +in the House by our local member when Slipper had given away the +adventure in his cups. + +In less than a minute three shadows emerged from the shed, where two +had gone in. They had got the colt. + +"He came out as quiet as a calf when he winded the sugar," said Flurry; +"it was well for me I filled my pockets from grandmamma's sugar basin." + +He and Slipper had a rope from each side of the colt's head; they took +him quickly across a field towards a gate. The colt stepped daintily +between them over the moonlit grass; he snorted occasionally, but +appeared on the whole amenable. + +The trouble began later, and was due, as trouble often is, to the +beguilements of a short cut. Against the maturer judgment of Slipper, +Flurry insisted on following a route that he assured us he knew as well +as his own pocket, and the consequence was that in about five minutes I +found myself standing on top of a bank hanging on to a rope, on the +other end of which the colt dangled and danced, while Flurry, with the +other rope, lay prone in the ditch, and Slipper administered to the +bewildered colt's hindquarters such chastisement as could be ventured +on. + +I have no space to narrate in detail the atrocious difficulties and +disasters of the short cut. How the colt set to work to buck, and went +away across a field, dragging the faithful Slipper, literally +_ventre--terre_, after him, while I picked myself in ignominy out of a +briar patch, and Flurry cursed himself black in the face. How we were +attacked by ferocious cur dogs, and I lost my eyeglass; and how, as we +neared the River's Cross, Flurry espied the police patrol on the road, +and we all hid behind a rick of turf, while I realised in fulness what +an exceptional ass I was, to have been beguiled into an enterprise that +involved hiding with Slipper from the Royal Irish Constabulary. + +Let it suffice to say that Trinket's infernal offspring was finally +handed over on the high-road to Michael and Slipper, and Flurry drove +me home in a state of mental and physical overthrow. + +I saw nothing of my friend Mr. Knox for the next couple of days, by the +end of which time I had worked up a high polish on my misgivings, and +had determined to tell him that under no circumstances would I have +anything to say to his grandmother's birthday present. It was like my +usual luck that, instead of writing a note to this effect, I thought it +would be good for my liver to walk across the hills to Tory Cottage and +tell Flurry so in person. + +It was a bright, blustery morning, after a muggy day. The feeling of +spring was in the air, the daffodils were already in bud, and crocuses +showed purple in the grass on either side of the avenue. It was only a +couple of miles to Tory Cottage by the way across the hills; I walked +fast, and it was barely twelve o'clock when I saw its pink walls and +clumps of evergreens below me. As I looked down at it the chiming of +Flurry's hounds in the kennels came to me on the wind; I stood still to +listen, and could almost have sworn that I was hearing again the clash +of Magdalen bells, hard at work on May morning. + +The path that I was following led downwards through a larch plantation +to Flurry's back gate. Hot wafts from some hideous caldron at the +other side of a wall apprised me of the vicinity of the kennels and +their cuisine, and the fir-trees round were hung with gruesome and +unknown joints. I thanked Heaven that I was not a master of hounds, +and passed on as quickly as might be to the hall door. + +I rang two or three times without response; then the door opened a +couple of inches and was instantly slammed in my face. I heard the +hurried paddling of bare feet on oilcloth, and a voice, "Hurry, +Bridgie, hurry! There's quality at the door!" + +Bridgie, holding a dirty cap on with one hand, presently arrived and +informed me that she believed Mr. Knox was out about the place. She +seemed perturbed, and she cast scared glances down the drive while +speaking to me. + +I knew enough of Flurry's habits to shape a tolerably direct course for +his whereabouts. He was, as I had expected, in the training paddock, a +field behind the stable-yard, in which he had put up practice jumps for +his horses. It was a good-sized field with clumps of furze in it, and +Flurry was standing near one of these with his hands in his pockets, +singularly unoccupied. I supposed that he was prospecting for a place +to put up another jump. He did not see me coming, and turned with a +start as I spoke to him. There was a queer expression of mingled guilt +and what I can only describe as divilment in his grey eyes as he +greeted me. In my dealings with Flurry Knox, I have since formed the +habit of sitting tight, in a general way, when I see that expression. + +"Well, who's coming next, I wonder!" he said, as he shook hands with +me; "it's not ten minutes since I had two of your d--d peelers here +searching the whole place for my grandmother's colt!" + +"What!" I exclaimed, feeling cold all down my back; "do you mean the +police have got hold of it?" + +"They haven't got hold of the colt anyway," said Flurry, looking +sideways at me from under the peak of his cap, with the glint of the +sun in his eye. "I got word in time before they came." + +"What do you mean?" I demanded; "where is he? For Heaven's sake don't +tell me you've sent the brute over to my place!" + +"It's a good job for you I didn't," replied Flurry, "as the police are +on their way to Shreelane this minute to consult you about it. _You_!" +He gave utterance to one of his short diabolical fits of laughter. +"He's where they'll not find him, anyhow. Ho! ho! It's the funniest +hand I ever played!" + +"Oh yes, it's devilish funny, I've no doubt," I retorted, beginning to +lose my temper, as is the manner of many people when they are +frightened; "but I give you fair warning that if Mrs. Knox asks me any +questions about it, I shall tell her the whole story." + +"All right," responded Flurry; "and when you do, don't forget to tell +her how you flogged the colt out on to the road over her own bounds +ditch." + +"Very well," I said hotly, "I may as well go home and send in my +papers. They'll break me over this----" + +"Ah, hold on, Major," said Flurry soothingly, "it'll be all right. No +one knows anything. It's only on spec the old lady sent the bobbies +here. It you'll keep quiet it'll all blow over." + +"I don't care," I said, struggling hopelessly in the toils; "if I meet +your grandmother, and she asks me about it, I shall tell her all I +know." + +"Please God you'll not meet her! After all, it's not once in a blue +moon that she--" began Flurry. Even as he said the words his face +changed. "Holy fly!" he ejaculated, "isn't that her dog coming into +the field? Look at her bonnet over the wall! Hide, hide for your +life!" He caught me by the shoulder and shoved me down among the furze +bushes before I realised what had happened. + +"Get in there! I'll talk to her." + +I may as well confess that at the mere sight of Mrs. Knox's purple +bonnet my heart had turned to water. In that moment I knew what it +would be like to tell her how I, having eaten her salmon, and capped +her quotations, and drunk her best port, had gone forth and helped to +steal her horse. I abandoned my dignity, my sense of honour; I took +the furze prickles to my breast and wallowed in them. + +Mrs. Knox had advanced with vengeful speed; already she was in high +altercation with Flurry at no great distance from where I lay; varying +sounds of battle reached me, and I gathered that Flurry was not--to put +it mildly--shrinking from that economy of truth that the situation +required. + +"Is it that curby, long-backed brute? You promised him to me long ago, +but I wouldn't be bothered with him!" + +The old lady uttered a laugh of shrill derision. "Is it likely I'd +promise you my best colt? And still more, is it likely that you'd +refuse him if I did?" + +"Very well, ma'am." Flurry's voice was admirably indignant. "Then I +suppose I'm a liar and a thief." + +"I'd be more obliged to you for the information if I hadn't known it +before," responded his grandmother with lightning speed; "if you swore +to me on a stack of Bibles you knew nothing about my colt I wouldn't +believe you! I shall go straight to Major Yeates and ask his advice. +I believe _him_ to be a gentleman, in spite of the company he keeps!" + +I writhed deeper into the furze bushes, and thereby discovered a sandy +rabbit run, along which I crawled, with my cap well over my eyes, and +the furze needles stabbing me through my stockings. The ground shelved +a little, promising profounder concealment, but the bushes were very +thick, and I laid hold of the bare stem of one to help my progress. It +lifted out of the ground in my hand, revealing a freshly-cut stump. +Something snorted, not a yard away; I glared through the opening, and +was confronted by the long, horrified face of Mrs. Knox's colt, +mysteriously on a level with my own. + +Even without the white diamond on his forehead I should have divined +the truth; but how in the name of wonder had Flurry persuaded him to +couch like a woodcock in the heart of a furze brake? For a full minute +I lay as still as death for fear of frightening him, while the voices +of Flurry and his grandmother raged on alarmingly close to me. The +colt snorted, and blew long breaths through his wide nostrils, but he +did not move. I crawled an inch or two nearer, and after a few seconds +of cautious peering I grasped the position. They had buried him. + +A small sandpit among the furze had been utilised as a grave; they had +filled him in up to his withers with sand, and a few furze bushes, +artistically disposed round the pit, had done the rest. As the depth +of Flurry's guile was revealed, laughter came upon me like a flood; I +gurgled and shook apoplectically, and the colt gazed at me with serious +surprise, until a sudden outburst of barking close to my elbow +administered a fresh shock to my tottering nerves. + +Mrs. Knox's woolly dog had tracked me into the furze, and was now +baying the colt and me with mingled terror and indignation. I +addressed him in a whisper, with perfidious endearments, advancing a +crafty hand towards him the while, made a snatch for the back of his +neck, missed it badly, and got him by the ragged fleece of his +hind-quarters as he tried to flee. If I had flayed him alive he could +hardly have uttered a more deafening series of yells, but, like a fool, +instead of letting him go, I dragged him towards me, and tried to +stifle the noise by holding his muzzle. The tussle lasted engrossingly +for a few seconds, and then the climax of the nightmare arrived. + +Mrs. Knox's voice, close behind me, said, "Let go my dog this instant, +sir! Who are you----" + +Her voice faded away, and I knew that she also had seen the colt's head. + +I positively felt sorry for her. At her age there was no knowing what +effect the shock might have on her. I scrambled to my feet and +confronted her. + +"Major Yeates!" she said. There was a deathly pause. "Will you kindly +tell me," said Mrs. Knox slowly, "am I in Bedlam, or are you? And +_what is that_?" + +She pointed to the colt, and that unfortunate animal, recognising the +voice of his mistress, uttered a hoarse and lamentable whinny. Mrs. +Knox felt around her for support, found only furze prickles, gazed +speechlessly at me, and then, to her eternal honour, fell into wild +cackles of laughter. + +So, I may say, did Flurry and I. I embarked on my explanation and +broke down; Flurry followed suit and broke down too. Overwhelming +laughter held us all three, disintegrating our very souls. Mrs. Knox +pulled herself together first. + +"I acquit you, Major Yeates, I acquit you, though appearances are +against you. It's clear enough to me you've fallen among thieves." +She stopped and glowered at Flurry. Her purple bonnet was over one +eye. "I'll thank you, sir," she said, "to dig out that horse before I +leave this place. And when you've dug him out you may keep him. I'll +be no receiver of stolen goods!" + +She broke off and shook her fist at him. "Upon my conscience, Tony, +I'd give a guinea to have thought of it myself!" + + + + +IV + +THE WATERS OF STRIFE + +I knew Bat Callaghan's face long before I was able to put a name to it. +There was seldom a court day in Skebawn that I was not aware of his +level brows and superfluously intense expression somewhere among the +knot of corner-boys who patronised the weekly sittings of the bench of +magistrates. His social position appeared to fluctuate: I have seen +him driving a car; he sometimes held my horse for me--that is to say, +he sat on the counter of a public-house while the Quaker slumbered in +the gutter; and, on one occasion, he retired, at my bidding, to Cork +gaol, there to meditate upon the inadvisability of defending a friend +from the attentions of the police with the tailboard of a cart. + +He next obtained prominence in my regard at a regatta held under the +auspices of "The Sons of Liberty," a local football club that justified +its title by the patriot green of its jerseys and its free +interpretation of the rules of the game. The announcement of my name +on the posters as a patron--a privilege acquired at the cost of a +reluctant half-sovereign--made it incumbent on me to put in an +appearance, even though the festival coincided with my Petty Sessions +day at Skebawn; and at some five of the clock on a brilliant September +afternoon I found myself driving down the stony road that dropped in +zigzags to the borders of the lake on which the races were to come off. + +I believe that the selection of Lough Lonen as the scene of the regatta +was not unconnected with the fact that the secretary of the club owned +a public-house at the cross roads at one end of it; none the less, the +president of the Royal Academy could scarcely have chosen more +picturesque surroundings. A mountain towered steeply up from the +lake's edge, dark with the sad green of beech-trees in September; fir +woods followed the curve of the shore, and leaned far over the +answering darkness of the water; and above the trees rose the toppling +steepnesses of the hill, painted with a purple glow of heather. The +lake was about a mile long, and, tumbling from its farther end, a +fierce and narrow river fled away west to the sea, some four or five +miles off. + +I had not seen a boat race since I was at Oxford, and the words still +called up before my eyes a vision of smart parasols, of gorgeous +barges, of snowy-clad youths, and of low slim outriggers, winged with +the level flight of oars, slitting the water to the sway of the line of +flat backs. Certainly undreamed-of possibilities in aquatics were +revealed to me as I reined in the Quaker on the outskirts of the crowd, +and saw below me the festival of the Sons of Liberty in full swing. +Boats of all shapes and sizes, outrageously overladen, moved about the +lake, with oars flourishing to the strains of concertinas. Black +swarms of people seethed along the water's edge, congesting here and +there round the dingy tents and stalls of green apples; and the club's +celebrated brass band, enthroned in a wagonette, and stimulated by the +presence of a barrel of porter on the box-seat, was belching forth "The +Boys of Wexford," under the guidance of a disreputable ex-militia +drummer, in a series of crashing discords. + +Almost as I arrived a pistol-shot set the echoes clattering round the +lake, and three boats burst out abreast from the throng into the open +water. Two of the crews were in shirt-sleeves, the third wore the +green jerseys of the football club; the boats were of the heavy +sea-going build, and pulled six oars apiece, oars of which the looms +were scarcely narrower than the blades, and were, of the two, but a +shade heavier. None the less the rowers started dauntlessly at +thirty-five strokes a minute, quickening up, incredible as it may seem, +as they rounded the mark boat in the first lap of the two-mile course. +The rowing was, in general style, more akin to the action of beating up +eggs with a fork than to any other form of athletic exercise; but in +its unorthodox way it kicked the heavy boats along at a surprising +pace. The oars squeaked and grunted against the thole-pins, the +coxswains kept up an unceasing flow of oratory, and superfluous little +boys in punts contrived to intervene at all the more critical +turning-points of the race, only evading the flail of the oncoming oars +by performing prodigies of "waggling" with a single oar at the stern. +I took out my watch and counted the strokes when they were passing the +mark boat for the second time; they were pulling a fraction over forty; +one of the shirt-sleeved crews was obviously in trouble, the other, +with humped backs and jerking oars, was holding its own against the +green jerseys amid the blended yells of friends and foes. When for the +last time they rounded the green flag there were but two boats in the +race, and the foul that had been imminent throughout was at length +achieved with a rattle of oars and a storm of curses. They were clear +again in a moment, the shirt-sleeved crew getting away with a distinct +lead, and it was at about this juncture that I became aware that the +coxswains had abandoned their long-handled tillers, and were standing +over their respective "strokes," shoving frantically at their oars, and +maintaining the while a ceaseless bawl of encouragement and defiance. +It looked like a foregone conclusion for the leaders, and the war of +cheers rose to frenzy. The word "cheering," indeed, is but an +euphuism, and in no way expresses the serrated yell, composed of +epithets, advice, and imprecations, that was flung like a live thing at +the oncoming boats. The green jerseys answered to this stimulant with +a wild spurt that drove the bow of their boat within a measurable +distance of their opponents' stroke oar. In another second a +thoroughly successful foul would have been effected, but the cox of the +leading boat proved himself equal to the emergency by unshipping his +tiller, and with it dealing "bow" of the green jerseys such a blow over +the head as effectually dismissed him from the sphere of practical +politics. + +A great roar of laughter greeted this feat of arms, and a voice at my +dogcart's wheel pierced the clamour-- + +"More power to ye, Larry, me owld darlin'!" + +I looked down and saw Bat Callaghan, with shining eyes, and a face +white with excitement, poising himself on one foot on the box of my +wheel in order to get a better view of the race. Almost before I had +time to recognise him, a man in a green jersey caught him round the +legs and jerked him down. Callaghan fell into the throng, recovered +himself in an instant, and rushed, white and dangerous, at his +assailant. The Son of Liberty was no less ready for the fray, and what +is known in Ireland as "the father and mother of a row" was imminent. +Already, however, one of those unequalled judges of the moral +temperature of a crowd, a sergeant of the R.I.C., had quietly +interposed his bulky person between the combatants, and the coming +trouble was averted. + +Elsewhere battle was raging. The race was over, and the committee boat +was hemmed in by the rival crews, supplemented by craft of all kinds. +The "objection" was being lodged, and in its turn objected to, and I +can only liken the process to the screaming warfare of seagulls round a +piece of carrion. The tumult was still at its height when out of its +very heart two four-oared boats broke forth, and a pistol shot +proclaimed that another race had begun, the public interest in which +was specially keen, owing to the fact that the rowers were stalwart +country girls, who made up in energy what they lacked in skill. It was +a short race, once round the mark boat only, and, like a successful +farce, it "went with a roar" from start to finish. Foul after foul, +each followed by a healing interval of calm, during which the crews, +who had all caught crabs, were recovering themselves and their oars, +marked its progress; and when the two boats, locked in an inextricable +embrace, at length passed the winning flag, and the crews, oblivious of +judges and public, fell to untrammelled personal abuse and to doing up +their hair, I decided that I had seen the best of the fun, and prepared +to go home. + +It was, as it happened, the last race of the day, and nothing remained +in the way of excitement save the greased pole with the pig slung in a +bag at the end of it. My final impression of the Lough Lonen Regatta +was of Callaghan's lithe figure, sleek and dripping, against the yellow +sky, as he poised on the swaying pole with the broken gold of the water +beneath him. + +Limited as was my experience of the Southwest of Ireland, I was in no +way surprised to hear on the following afternoon from Peter Cadogan +that there had been "sthrokes" the night before, when the boys were +going home from the regatta, and that the police were searching for one +Jimmy Foley. + +"What do they want him for?" I asked. + +"Sure it's according as a man that was bringing a car of bogwood was +tellin' me, sir," answered Peter, pursuing his occupation of washing +the dogcart with unabated industry; "they say Jimmy's wife went roaring +to the police, saying she could get no account of her husband." + +"I suppose he's beaten some fellow and is hiding," I suggested. + +"Well, that might be, sir," asserted Peter respectfully. He plied his +mop vigorously in intricate places about the springs, which would, I +knew, have never been explored save for my presence. + +"It's what John Hennessy was saying, that he was hard set to get his +horse past Cluin Cross, the way the blood was sthrewn about the road," +resumed Peter; "sure they were fighting like wasps in it half the +night." + +"Who were fighting?" + +"I couldn't say, indeed, sir. Some o' thim low rakish lads from the +town, I suppose," replied Peter with virtuous respectability. + +When Peter Cadogan was quietly and intelligently candid, to pursue an +inquiry was seldom of much avail. + +Next day in Skebawn I met little Murray, the district inspector, very +alert and smart in his rifle-green uniform, going forth to collect +evidence about the fight. He told me that the police were pretty +certain that one of the Sons of Liberty, named Foley, had been +murdered, but, as usual, the difficulty was to get any one to give +information; all that was known was that he was gone, and that his wife +had identified his cap, which had been found, drenched with blood, by +the roadside. Murray gave it as his opinion that the whole business +had arisen out of the row over the disputed race, and that there must +have been a dozen people looking on when the murder was done; but so +far no evidence was forthcoming, and after a day and a night of search +the police had not been able to find the body. + +"No," said Flurry Knox, who had joined us, "and if it was any of those +mountainy men did away with him you might scrape Ireland with a +small-tooth comb and you'll not get him!" + +That evening I smoked an after-dinner cigarette out of doors in the +mild starlight, strolling about the rudimentary paths of what would, I +hoped, some day be Philippa's garden. The bats came stooping at the +red end of my cigarette, and from the covert behind the house I heard +once or twice the delicate bark of a fox. Civilisation seemed a +thousand miles off, as far away as the falling star that had just drawn +a line of pale fire half-way down the northern sky. I had been nearly +a year at Shreelane House by myself now, and the time seemed very long +to me. It was slow work putting by money, even under the austerities +of Mrs. Cadogan's _rgime_, and though I had warned Philippa I meant to +marry her after Christmas, there were moments, and this was one of +them, when it seemed an idle threat. + +"Pether!" the strident voice of Mrs. Cadogan intruded upon my +meditations. "Go tell the Major his coffee is waitin' on him!" + +I went gloomily into the house, and, with a resignation born of +adversity, swallowed the mixture of chicory and liquorice which my +housekeeper possessed the secret of distilling from the best and most +expensive coffee. My theory about it was that it added to the illusion +that I had dined, and moreover, that it kept me awake, and I generally +had a good deal of writing to do after dinner. + +Having swallowed it I went downstairs and out past the kitchen regions +to my office, a hideous whitewashed room, in which I interviewed +policemen, and took affidavits, and did most of my official writing. +It had a door that opened into the yard, and a window that looked out +in the other direction, among lanky laurels and scrubby hollies, where +lay the cats' main thoroughfare from the scullery window to the rabbit +holes in the wood. I had a good deal of work to do, and the time +passed quickly. It was Friday night, and from the kitchen at the end +of the passage came the gabbling murmur, in two alternate keys, that I +had learned to recognise as the recital of a litany by my housekeeper +and her nephew Peter. This performance was followed by some of those +dreary and heart-rending yawns that are, I think, peculiar to Irish +kitchens, then such of the cats as had returned from the chase were +loudly shepherded into the back scullery, the kitchen door shut with a +slam, and my retainers retired to repose. + +It was nearly half-an-hour afterwards when I finished the notes I had +been making on an adjourned case of "stroke-hauling" salmon in the +Lonen River. I leaned back in my chair and lighted a cigarette +preparatory to turning in; my thoughts had again wandered on a +sentimental journey across the Irish Channel, when I heard a slight +stir of some kind outside the open window. In the wilds of Ireland no +one troubles themselves about burglars; "more cats," I thought, "I must +shut the window before I go to bed." + +Almost immediately there followed a faint tap on the window, and then a +voice said in a hoarse and hurried whisper, "Them that wants Jim Foley, +let them look in the river!" + +If I had kept my head I should have sat still and encouraged a further +confidence, but unfortunately I acted on the impulse of the natural +man, and was at the window in a jump, knocking down my chair, and +making noise enough to scare a far less shy bird than an Irish +informer. Of course there was no one there. I listened, with every +nerve as taut as a violin string. It was quite dark; there was just +breeze enough to make a rustling in the evergreens, so that a man might +brush through them without being heard; and while I debated on a plan +of action there came from beyond the shrubbery the jar and twang of a +loose strand of wire in the paling by the wood. My informant, whoever +he might be, had vanished into the darkness from which he had come as +irrecoverably as had the falling star that had written its brief +message across the sky, and gone out again into infinity. + +I got up very early next morning and drove to Skebawn to see Murray, +and offer him my mysterious information for what it was worth. +Personally I did not think it worth much, and was disposed to regard it +as a red herring drawn across the trail. Murray, however, was not in a +mood to despise anything that had a suggestion to make, having been out +till nine o'clock the night before without being able to find any clue +to the hiding-place of James Foley. + +"The river's a good mile from the place where the fight was," he said, +straddling his compasses over the Ordnance Survey map, "and there's no +sort of a road they could have taken him along, but a tip like this is +always worth trying. I remember in the Land League time how a man came +one Saturday night to my window and told me there were holes drilled in +the chapel door to shoot a boycotted man through while he was at mass. +The holes were there right enough, and you may be quite sure that chap +found excellent reasons for having family prayers at home next day!" + +I had sessions to attend on the extreme outskirts of my district, and +could not wait, as Murray suggested, to see the thing out. I did not +get home till the following day, and when I arrived I found a letter +from Murray awaiting me. + +"Your pal was right. We found Foley's body in the river, knocking +about against the posts of the weir. The head was wrapped in his own +green jersey, and had been smashed in by a stone. We suspect a fellow +named Bat Callaghan, who has bolted, but there were a lot of them in +it. Possibly it was Callaghan himself who gave you the tip; you never +can tell how superstition is going to take them next. The inquest will +be held to-morrow." + +The coroner's jury took a cautious view of the cause of the +catastrophe, and brought in a verdict of "death by misadventure," and I +presently found it to be my duty to call a magisterial inquiry to +further investigate the matter. A few days before this was to take +place, I was engaged in the delicate task of displaying to my landlord, +Mr. Flurry Knox, the defects of the pantry sink, when Mrs. Cadogan +advanced upon us with the information that the Widow Callaghan from +Cluin would be thankful to speak to me, and had brought me a present of +"a fine young goose." + +"Is she come over here looking for Bat?" said Flurry, withdrawing his +arm and the longest kitchen-ladle from the pipe that he had been +probing; "she knows you're handy at hiding your friends, Mary; maybe +it's he that's stopping the drain!" + +Mrs. Cadogan turned her large red face upon her late employer. + +"God knows I wish yerself was stuck in it, Master Flurry, the way ye'd +hear Pether cursin' the full o' the house when he's striving to wash +the things in that unnatural little trough." + +"Are you sure it's Peter does all the cursing?" retorted Flurry. "I +hear Father Scanlan has it in for you this long time for not going to +confession." + +"And how can I walk two miles to the chapel with God's burden on me +feet?" demanded Mrs. Cadogan in purple indignation; "the Blessed Virgin +and Docthor Hickey knows well the hardship I gets from them. If it +wasn't for a pair of the Major's boots he gave me, I'd be hard set to +thravel the house itself!" + +The contest might have been continued indefinitely, had I not struck up +the swords with a request that Mrs. Callaghan might be sent round to +the hall door. There we found a tall, grey-haired countrywoman waiting +for us at the foot of the steps, in the hooded blue cloak that is +peculiar to the south of Ireland; from the fact that she clutched a +pocket-handkerchief in her right hand I augured a stormy interview, but +nothing could have been more self-restrained and even imposing than the +reverence with which she greeted Flurry and me. + +"Good-morning to your honours," she began, with a dignified and +extremely imminent snuffle. "I ask your pardon for troubling you, +Major Yeates, but I haven't a one in the counthry to give me an adwice, +and I have no confidence only in your honour's experiments." + +"Experience, she means," prompted Flurry. "Didn't you get advice +enough out of Mr. Murray yesterday?" he went on aloud. "I heard he was +at Cluin to see you." + +"And if he was itself, it's little adwantage any one'd get out of that +little whipper-shnapper of a shnap-dhragon!" responded Mrs. Callaghan +tartly; "he was with me for a half-hour giving me every big rock of +English till I had a reel in me head. I declare to ye, Mr. Flurry, +after he had gone out o' the house, ye wouldn't throw three farthings +for me!" + +The pocket-handkerchief was here utilised, after which, with a heavy +groan, Mrs. Callaghan again took up her parable. + +"I towld him first and last I'd lose me life if I had to go into the +coort, and if I did itself sure th' attorneys could rip no more out o' +me than what he did himself." + +"Did you tell him where was Bat?" inquired Flurry casually. + +At this Mrs. Callaghan immediately dissolved into tears. + +"Is it Bat?" she howled. "If the twelve Apostles came down from heaven +asking me where was Bat, I could give them no satisfaction. The divil +a know I know what's happened him. He came home with me sober and +good-natured from the rogatta, and the next morning he axed a fresh egg +for his breakfast, and God forgive me, I wouldn't break the score I was +taking to the hotel, and with that he slapped the cup o' tay into the +fire and went out the door, and I never got a word of him since, good +nor bad. God knows 'tis I got throuble with that poor boy, and he the +only one I have to look to in the world!" + +I cut the matter short by asking her what she wanted me to do for her, +and sifted out from amongst much extraneous detail the fact that she +relied upon my renowned wisdom and clemency to preserve her from being +called as a witness at the coming inquiry. The gift of the goose +served its intended purpose of embarrassing my position, but in spite +of it I broke to the Widow Callaghan my inability to help her. She did +not, of course, believe me, but she was too well-bred to say so. In +Ireland one becomes accustomed to this attitude. + +As it turned out, however, Bat Callaghan's mother had nothing to fear +from the inquiry. She was by turns deaf, imbecile, garrulously candid, +and furiously abusive of Murray's principal witness, a frightened lad +of seventeen, who had sworn to having seen Bat Callaghan and Jimmy +Foley "shaping at one another to fight," at an hour when, according to +Mrs. Callaghan, Bat was "lying sthretched on the beddeen with a sick +shtomach" in consequence of the malignant character of the porter +supplied by the last witness's father. It all ended, as such cases so +often do in Ireland, in complete moral certainty in the minds of all +concerned as to the guilt of the accused, and entire impotence on the +part of the law to prove it. A warrant was issued for the arrest of +Bartholomew Callaghan; and the clans of Callaghan and Foley fought +rather more bloodily than usual, as occasion served; and at intervals +during the next few months Murray used to ask me if my friend the +murderer had dropped in lately, to which I was wont to reply with +condolences on the failure of the R.I.C. to find the Widow Callaghan's +only son for her; and that was about all that came of it. + +Events with which the present story has no concern took me to England +towards the end of the following March. It so happened that my old +regiment, the ----th Fusiliers, was quartered at Whincastle, within a +couple of hours by rail of Philippa's home, where I was staying, and, +since my wedding was now within measurable distance, my former +brothers-in-arms invited me over to dine and sleep, and to receive a +valedictory silver claret jug that they were magnanimous enough to +bestow upon a backslider. I enjoyed the dinner as much as any man can +enjoy his dinner when he knows he has to make a speech at the end of +it; through much and varied conversation I strove, like a nervous +mother who cannot trust her offspring out of her sight, to keep before +my mind's eye the opening sentences that I had composed in the train; I +felt that if I could only "get away" satisfactorily I might trust the +Ayala ('89) to do the rest, and of that fount of inspiration there was +no lack. As it turned out, I got away all right, though the sight of +the double line of expectant faces and red mess jackets nearly +scattered those precious opening sentences, and I am afraid that so far +as the various subsequent points went that I had intended to make, I +stayed away; however, neither Demosthenes, nor a Nationalist member at +a Cork election, could have been listened to with more gratifying +attention, and I sat down, hot and happy, to be confronted with my own +flushed visage, hideously reflected in the glittering paunch of the +claret jug. + +Once safely over the presentation, the evening mellowed into frivolity, +and it was pretty late before I found myself settled down to whist, at +sixpenny points, in the ancient familiar way, while most of the others +fell to playing pool in the billiard-room next door. I have played +whist from my youth up; with the preternatural seriousness of a +subaltern, with the self-assurance of a senior captain, with the +privileged irascibility of a major; and my eighteen months of +abstinence at Shreelane had only whetted my appetite for what I +consider the best of games. After the long lonely evenings there, with +rats for company, and, for relaxation, a "deck" of that specially +demoniacal American variety of patience known as "Fooly Ann," it was +wondrous agreeable to sit again among my fellows, and "lay the longs" +on a severely scientific rubber of whist, as though Mrs. Cadogan and +the Skebawn Bench of Magistrates had never existed. + +We were in the first game of the second rubber, and I was holding a +very nice playing hand; I had early in the game moved forth my trumps +to battle, and I was now in the ineffable position of scoring with the +small cards of my long suit. The cards fell and fell in silence, and +Ballantyne, my partner, raked in the tricks like a machine. The +concentrated quiet of the game was suddenly arrested by a sharp, +unmistakable sound from the barrack yard outside, the snap of a +Lee-Metford rifle. + +"What was that?" exclaimed Moffat, the senior major. + +Before he had finished speaking there was a second shot. + +"By Jove, those were rifle-shots! Perhaps I'd better go and see what's +up," said Ballantyne, who was captain of the week, throwing down his +cards and making a bolt for the door. + +He had hardly got out of the room when the first long high note of the +"assembly" sang out, sudden and clear. We all sprang to our feet, and +as the bugle-call went shrilly on, the other men came pouring in from +the billiard-room, and stampeded to their quarters to get their swords. +At the same moment the mess sergeant appeared at the outer door with a +face as white as his shirt-front. + +"The sentry on the magazine guard has been shot, sir!" he said +excitedly to Moffat. "They say he's dead!" + +We were all out in the barrack square in an instant; it was clear +moonlight, and the square was already alive with hurrying figures +cramming on clothes and caps as they ran to fall in. I was a free +agent these times, and I followed the mess sergeant across the square +towards the distant corner where the magazine stands. As we doubled +round the end of the men's quarters, we nearly ran into a small party +of men who were advancing slowly and heavily in our direction. + +"'Ere he is, sir!" said the mess sergeant, stopping himself abruptly. + +They were carrying the sentry to the hospital. His busby had fallen +off; the moon shone mildly on his pale, convulsed face, and foam and +strange inhuman sounds came from his lips. His head was rolling from +side to side on the arm of one of the men who was carrying him; as it +turned towards me I was struck by something disturbingly familiar in +the face, and I wondered if he had been in my old company. + +"What's his name, sergeant?" I said to the mess sergeant. + +"Private Harris, sir," replied the sergeant; "he's only lately come up +from the dept, and this was his first time on sentry by himself." + +I went back to the mess, and in process of time the others straggled +in, thirsting for whiskies-and-sodas, and full of such information as +there was to give. Private Harris was not wounded; both the shots had +been fired by him, as was testified by the state of his rifle and the +fact that two of the cartridges were missing from the packet in his +pouch. + +"I hear he was a queer, sulky sort of chap always," said Tomkinson, the +subaltern of the day, "but if he was having a try at suicide he made a +bally bad fist of it." + +"He made as good a fist of it as you did of putting on your sword, +Tommy," remarked Ballantyne, indicating a dangling white strap of +webbing, that hung down like a tail below Mr. Tomkinson's mess jacket. +"Nerves, obviously, in both cases!" + +The exquisite satisfaction afforded by this discovery to Mr. +Tomkinson's brother officers found its natural outlet in a bear fight +that threatened to become more or less general, and in the course of +which I slid away unostentatiously to bed in Ballantyne's quarters, and +took the precaution of barricading my door. + +Next morning, when I got down to breakfast, I found Ballantyne and two +or three others in the mess room, and my first inquiry was for Private +Harris. + +"Oh, the poor chap's dead," said Ballantyne; "it's a very queer +business altogether. I think he must have been wrong in the top +storey. The doctor was with him when he came to out of the fit, or +whatever it was, and O'Reilly--that's the doctor y' know, Irish of +course, and, by the way, poor Harris was an Irishman too--says that he +could only jibber at first, but then he got better, and he got out of +him that when he had been on sentry-go for about half-an-hour, he +happened to look up at the angle of the barrack wall near where it +joins the magazine tower, and saw a face looking at him over it. He +challenged and got no answer, but the face just stuck there staring at +him; he challenged again, and then, as O'Reilly said, he 'just oop with +his royfle and blazed at it.'" Ballantyne was not above the common +English delusion that he could imitate an Irish brogue. + +"Well, what happened then?" + +"Well, according to the poor devil's own story, the face just kept on +looking at him and he had another shot at it, and 'My God Almighty,' he +said to O'Reilly, 'it was there always!' While he was saying that to +O'Reilly he began to chuck another fit, and apparently went on chucking +them till he died a couple of hours ago." + +"One result of it is," said another man, "that they couldn't get a man +to go on sentry there alone last night. I expect we shall have to +double the sentries there every night as long as we're here." + +"Silly asses!" remarked Tomkinson, but he said it without conviction. + +After breakfast we went out to look at the wall by the magazine. It +was about eleven feet high, with a coped top, and they told me there +was a deep and wide dry ditch on the outside. A ladder was brought, +and we examined the angle of the wall at which Harris said the face had +appeared. He had made a beautiful shot, one of his bullets having +flicked a piece off the ridge of the coping exactly at the corner. + +"It's not the kind of shot a man would make if he had been drinking," +said Moffat, regretfully abandoning his first simple hypothesis; "he +must have been mad." + +"I wish I could find out who his people are," said Brownlow, the +adjutant, who had joined us; "they found in his box a letter to him +from his mother, but we can't make out the name of the place. By Jove, +Yeates, you're an Irishman, perhaps you can help us." + +He handed me a letter in a dirty envelope. There was no address given, +the contents were very short, and I may be forgiven if I transcribe +them:-- + + +"My dear Son, I hope you are well as this leaves me at present, thanks +be to God for it. I am very much unaisy about the cow. She swelled up +this morning, she ran in and was frauding and I did not do but to run +up for torn sweeney in the minute. We are thinking it is too much +lairels or an eirub she took. I do not know what I will do with her. +God help one that's alone with himself I had not a days luck since ye +went away. I am thinkin' them that wants ye is tired lookin' for ye. +And so I remain, + +"YOUR FOND MOTHER." + + +"Well, you don't get much of a lead from the cow, do you? And what the +deuce is an eirub?" said Brownlow. + +"It's another way of spelling herb," I said, turning over the envelope +abstractedly. The postmark was almost obliterated, but it struck me it +might be construed into the word Skebawn. + +"Look here," I said suddenly, "let me see Harris. It's just possible I +may know something about him." + +The sentry's body had been laid in the dead-house near the hospital, +and Brownlow fetched the key. It was a grim little whitewashed +building, without windows, save a small one of lancet shape, high up in +one gable, through which a streak of April sunlight fell sharp and +slender on the whitewashed wall. The long figure of the sentry lay +sheeted on a stone slab, and Brownlow, with his cap in his hand, gently +uncovered the face. + +I leaned over and looked at it--at the heavy brows, the short nose, the +small moustache lying black above the pale mouth, the deep-set eyes +sealed in appalling peacefulness. There rose before me the wild dark +face of the young man who had hung on my wheel and yelled encouragement +to the winning coxswain at the Lough Lonen Regatta. + +"I know him," I said, "his name is Callaghan." + + + + +V + +LISHEEN RACES, SECOND-HAND + +It may or may not be agreeable to have attained the age of +thirty-eight, but, judging from old photographs, the privilege of being +nineteen has also its drawbacks. I turned over page after page of an +ancient book in which were enshrined portraits of the friends of my +youth, singly, in David and Jonathan couples, and in groups in which I, +as it seemed to my mature and possibly jaundiced perception, always +contrived to look the most immeasurable young bounder of the lot. Our +faces were fat, and yet I cannot remember ever having been considered +fat in my life; we indulged in low-necked shirts, in "Jemima" ties with +diagonal stripes; we wore coats that seemed three sizes too small, and +trousers that were three sizes too big; we also wore small whiskers. + +I stopped at last at one of the David and Jonathan memorial portraits. +Yes, here was the object of my researches; this stout and earnestly +romantic youth was Leigh Kelway, and that fatuous and chubby young +person seated on the arm of his chair was myself. Leigh Kelway was a +young man ardently believed in by a large circle of admirers, headed by +himself and seconded by me, and for some time after I had left Magdalen +for Sandhurst, I maintained a correspondence with him on large and +abstract subjects. This phase of our friendship did not survive; I +went soldiering to India, and Leigh Kelway took honours and moved +suitably on into politics, as is the duty of an earnest young Radical +with useful family connections and an independent income. Since then I +had at intervals seen in the papers the name of the Honourable Basil +Leigh Kelway mentioned as a speaker at elections, as a writer of +thoughtful articles in the reviews, but we had never met, and nothing +could have been less expected by me than the letter, written from Mrs. +Raverty's Hotel, Skebawn, in which he told me he was making a tour in +Ireland with Lord Waterbury, to whom he was private secretary. Lord +Waterbury was at present having a few days' fishing near Killarney, and +he himself, not being a fisherman, was collecting statistics for his +chief on various points connected with the Liquor Question in Ireland. +He had heard that I was in the neighbourhood, and was kind enough to +add that it would give him much pleasure to meet me again. + +With a stir of the old enthusiasm I wrote begging him to be my guest +for as long as it suited him, and the following afternoon he arrived at +Shreelane. The stout young friend of my youth had changed +considerably. His important nose and slightly prominent teeth +remained, but his wavy hair had withdrawn intellectually from his +temples; his eyes had acquired a statesmanlike absence of expression, +and his neck had grown long and bird-like. It was his first visit to +Ireland, as he lost no time in telling me, and he and his chief had +already collected much valuable information on the subject to which +they had dedicated the Easter recess. He further informed me that he +thought of popularising the subject in a novel, and therefore intended +to, as he put it, "master the brogue" before his return. + +During the next few days I did my best for Leigh Kelway. I turned him +loose on Father Scanlan; I showed him Mohona, our champion village, +that boasts fifteen public-houses out of twenty buildings of sorts and +a railway station; I took him to hear the prosecution of a publican for +selling drink on a Sunday, which gave him an opportunity of studying +perjury as a fine art, and of hearing a lady, on whom police suspicion +justly rested, profoundly summed up by the sergeant as "a woman who had +th' appairance of having knocked at a back door." + +The net result of these experiences has not yet been given to the world +by Leigh Kelway. For my own part, I had at the end of three days +arrived at the conclusion that his society, when combined with a +note-book and a thirst for statistics, was not what I used to find it +at Oxford. I therefore welcomed a suggestion from Mr. Flurry Knox that +we should accompany him to some typical country races, got up by the +farmers at a place called Lisheen, some twelve miles away. It was the +worst road in the district, the races of the most grossly unorthodox +character; in fact, it was the very place for Leigh Kelway to collect +impressions of Irish life, and in any case it was a blessed opportunity +of disposing of him for the day. + +In my guest's attire next morning I discerned an unbending from the +role of cabinet minister towards that of sportsman; the outlines of the +note-book might be traced in his breast pocket, but traversing it was +the strap of a pair of field-glasses, and his light grey suit was smart +enough for Goodwood. + +Flurry was to drive us to the races at one o'clock, and we walked to +Tory Cottage by the short cut over the hill, in the sunny beauty of an +April morning. Up to the present the weather had kept me in a more or +less apologetic condition; any one who has entertained a guest in the +country knows the unjust weight of responsibility that rests on the +shoulders of the host in the matter of climate, and Leigh Kelway, after +two drenchings, had become sarcastically resigned to what I felt he +regarded as my mismanagement. + +Flurry took us into the house for a drink and a biscuit, to keep us +going, as he said, till "we lifted some luncheon out of the Castle Knox +people at the races," and it was while we were thus engaged that the +first disaster of the day occurred. The dining-room door was open, so +also was the window of the little staircase just outside it, and +through the window travelled sounds that told of the close proximity of +the stable-yard; the clattering of hoofs on cobble stones, and voices +uplifted in loud conversation. Suddenly from this region there arose a +screech of the laughter peculiar to kitchen flirtation, followed by the +clank of a bucket, the plunging of a horse, and then an uproar of +wheels and galloping hoofs. An instant afterwards Flurry's chestnut +cob, in a dogcart, dashed at full gallop into view, with the reins +streaming behind him, and two men in hot pursuit. Almost before I had +time to realise what had happened, Flurry jumped through the +half-opened window of the dining-room like a clown at a pantomime, and +joined in the chase; but the cob was resolved to make the most of his +chance, and went away down the drive and out of sight at a pace that +distanced every one save the kennel terrier, who sped in shrieking +ecstasy beside him. + +"Oh merciful hour!" exclaimed a female voice behind me. Leigh Kelway +and I were by this time watching the progress of events from the +gravel, in company with the remainder of Flurry's household. "The +horse is desthroyed! Wasn't that the quare start he took! And all in +the world I done was to slap a bucket of wather at Michael out the +windy, and 'twas himself got it in place of Michael!" + +"Ye'll never ate another bit, Bridgie Dunnigan," replied the cook, with +the exulting pessimism of her kind. "The Master'll have your life!" + +Both speakers shouted at the top of their voices, probably because in +spirit they still followed afar the flight of the cob. + +Leigh Kelway looked serious as we walked on down the drive. I almost +dared to hope that a note on the degrading oppression of Irish +retainers was shaping itself. Before we reached the bend of the drive +the rescue party was returning with the fugitive, all, with the +exception of the kennel terrier, looking extremely gloomy. The cob had +been confronted by a wooden gate, which he had unhesitatingly taken in +his stride, landing on his head on the farther side with the gate and +the cart on top of him, and had arisen with a lame foreleg, a cut on +his nose, and several other minor wounds. + +"You'd think the brute had been fighting the cats, with all the +scratches and scrapes he has on him!" said Flurry, casting a vengeful +eye at Michael, "and one shaft's broken and so is the dashboard. I +haven't another horse in the place; they're all out at grass, and so +there's an end of the races!" + +We all three stood blankly on the hall-door steps and watched the wreck +of the trap being trundled up the avenue. + +"I'm very sorry you're done out of your sport," said Flurry to Leigh +Kelway, in tones of deplorable sincerity; "perhaps, as there's nothing +else to do, you'd like to see the hounds----?" + +I felt for Flurry, but of the two I felt more for Leigh Kelway as he +accepted this alleviation. He disliked dogs, and held the newest views +on sanitation, and I knew what Flurry's kennels could smell like. I +was lighting a precautionary cigarette, when we caught sight of an old +man riding up the drive. Flurry stopped short. + +"Hold on a minute," he said; "here's an old chap that often brings me +horses for the kennels; I must see what he wants." + +The man dismounted and approached Mr. Knox, hat in hand, towing after +him a gaunt and ancient black mare with a big knee. + +"Well, Barrett," began Flurry, surveying the mare with his hands in his +pockets, "I'm not giving the hounds meat this month, or only very +little." + +"Ah, Master Flurry," answered Barrett, "it's you that's pleasant! Is +it give the like o' this one for the dogs to ate! She's a vallyble +strong young mare, no more than shixteen years of age, and ye'd sooner +be lookin' at her goin' under a side-car than eatin' your dinner." + +"There isn't as much meat on her as 'd fatten a jackdaw," said Flurry, +clinking the silver in his pockets as he searched for a matchbox. +"What are you asking for her?" + +The old man drew cautiously up to him. + +"Master Flurry," he said solemnly, "I'll sell her to your honour for +five pounds, and she'll be worth ten after you give her a month's +grass." + +Flurry lit his cigarette; then he said imperturbably, "I'll give you +seven shillings for her." + +Old Barrett put on his hat in silence, and in silence buttoned his coat +and took hold of the stirrup leather. Flurry remained immovable. +"Master Flurry," said old Barrett suddenly, with tears in his voice, +"you must make it eight, sir!" + +"Michael!" called out Flurry with apparent irrelevance, "run up to your +father's and ask him would he lend me a loan of his side-car." + +Half-an-hour later we were, improbable as it may seem, on our way to +Lisheen races. We were seated upon an outside-car of immemorial age, +whose joints seemed to open and close again as it swung in and out of +the ruts, whose tattered cushions stank of rats and mildew, whose +wheels staggered and rocked like the legs of a drunken man. Between +the shafts jogged the latest addition to the kennel larder, the +eight-shilling mare. Flurry sat on one side, and kept her going at a +rate of not less than four miles an hour; Leigh Kelway and I held on to +the other. + +"She'll get us as far as Lynch's anyway," said Flurry, abandoning his +first contention that she could do the whole distance, as he pulled her +on to her legs after her fifteenth stumble, "and he'll lend us some +sort of a horse, if it was only a mule." + +"Do you notice that these cushions are very damp?" said Leigh Kelway to +me, in a hollow undertone. + +"Small blame to them if they are!" replied Flurry. "I've no doubt but +they were out under the rain all day yesterday at Mrs. Hurly's funeral." + +Leigh Kelway made no reply, but he took his note-book out of his pocket +and sat on it. + +We arrived at Lynch's at a little past three, and were there confronted +by the next disappointment of this disastrous day. The door of Lynch's +farmhouse was locked, and nothing replied to our knocking except a +puppy, who barked hysterically from within. + +"All gone to the races," said Flurry philosophically, picking his way +round the manure heap. "No matter, here's the filly in the shed here. +I know he's had her under a car." + +An agitating ten minutes ensued, during which Leigh Kelway and I got +the eight-shilling mare out of the shafts and the harness, and Flurry, +with our inefficient help, crammed the young mare into them. As Flurry +had stated that she had been driven before, I was bound to believe him, +but the difficulty of getting the bit into her mouth was remarkable, +and so also was the crab-like manner in which she sidled out of the +yard, with Flurry and myself at her head, and Leigh Kelway hanging on +to the back of the car to keep it from jamming in the gateway. + +"Sit up on the car now," said Flurry when we got out on to the road; +"I'll lead her on a bit. She's been ploughed anyway; one side of her +mouth's as tough as a gad!" + +Leigh Kelway threw away the wisp of grass with which he had been +cleaning his hands, and mopped his intellectual forehead; he was very +silent. We both mounted the car, and Flurry, with the reins in his +hand, walked beside the filly, who, with her tail clasped in, moved +onward in a succession of short jerks. + +"Oh, she's all right!" said Flurry, beginning to run, and dragging the +filly into a trot; "once she gets started--" Here the filly spied a +pig in a neighbouring field, and despite the fact that she had probably +eaten out of the same trough with it, she gave a violent side spring, +and broke into a gallop. + +"Now we're off!" shouted Flurry, making a jump at the car and +clambering on; "if the traces hold we'll do!" + +The English language is powerless to suggest the view-halloo with which +Mr. Knox ended his speech, or to do more than indicate the rigid +anxiety of Leigh Kelway's face as he regained his balance after the +preliminary jerk, and clutched the back rail. It must be said for +Lynch's filly that she did not kick; she merely fled, like a dog with a +kettle tied to its tail, from the pursuing rattle and jingle behind +her, with the shafts buffeting her dusty sides as the car swung to and +fro. Whenever she showed any signs of slackening, Flurry loosed +another yell at her that renewed her panic, and thus we precariously +covered another two or three miles of our journey. + +Had it not been for a large stone lying on the road, and had the filly +not chosen to swerve so as to bring the wheel on top of it, I dare say +we might have got to the races; but by an unfortunate coincidence both +these things occurred, and when we recovered from the consequent shock, +the tire of one of the wheels had come off, and was trundling with +cumbrous gaiety into the ditch. Flurry stopped the filly and began to +laugh; Leigh Kelway said something startlingly unparliamentary under +his breath. + +"Well, it might be worse," Flurry said consolingly as he lifted the +tire on to the car; "we're not half a mile from a forge." + +We walked that half-mile in funereal procession behind the car; the +glory had departed from the weather, and an ugly wall of cloud was +rising up out of the west to meet the sun; the hills had darkened and +lost colour, and the white bog cotton shivered in a cold wind that +smelt of rain. + +By a miracle the smith was not at the races, owing, as he explained, to +his having "the toothaches," the two facts combined producing in him a +morosity only equalled by that of Leigh Kelway. The smith's sole +comment on the situation was to unharness the filly, and drag her into +the forge, where he tied her up. He then proceeded to whistle +viciously on his fingers in the direction of a cottage, and to command, +in tones of thunder, some unseen creature to bring over a couple of +baskets of turf. The turf arrived in process of time, on a woman's +back, and was arranged in a circle in a yard at the back of the forge. +The tire was bedded in it, and the turf was with difficulty kindled at +different points. + +"Ye'll not get to the races this day," said the smith, yielding to a +sardonic satisfaction; "the turf's wet, and I haven't one to do a +hand's turn for me." He laid the wheel on the ground and lit his pipe. + +Leigh Kelway looked pallidly about him over the spacious empty +landscape of brown mountain slopes patched with golden furze and seamed +with grey walls; I wondered if he were as hungry as I. We sat on +stones opposite the smouldering ring of turf and smoked, and Flurry +beguiled the smith into grim and calumnious confidences about every +horse in the country. After about an hour, during which the turf went +out three times, and the weather became more and more threatening, a +girl with a red petticoat over her head appeared at the gate of the +yard, and said to the smith: + +"The horse is gone away from ye." + +"Where?" exclaimed Flurry, springing to his feet. + +"I met him walking wesht the road there below, and when I thought to +turn him he commenced to gallop." + +"Pulled her head out of the headstall," said Flurry, after a rapid +survey of the forge. "She's near home by now." + +It was at this moment that the rain began; the situation could scarcely +have been better stage-managed. After reviewing the position, Flurry +and I decided that the only thing to do was to walk to a public-house a +couple of miles farther on, feed there if possible, hire a car, and go +home. + +It was an uphill walk, with mild generous raindrops striking thicker +and thicker on our faces; no one talked, and the grey clouds crowded up +from behind the hills like billows of steam. Leigh Kelway bore it all +with egregious resignation. I cannot pretend that I was at heart +sympathetic, but by virtue of being his host I felt responsible for the +breakdown, for his light suit, for everything, and divined his +sentiment of horror at the first sight of the public-house. + +It was a long, low cottage, with a line of dripping elm-trees +overshadowing it; empty cars and carts round its door, and a babel from +within made it evident that the race-goers were pursuing a gradual +homeward route. The shop was crammed with steaming countrymen, whose +loud brawling voices, all talking together, roused my English friend to +his first remark since we had left the forge. + +"Surely, Yeates, we are not going into that place?" he said severely; +"those men are all drunk." + +"Ah, nothing to signify!" said Flurry, plunging in and driving his way +through the throng like a plough. "Here, Mary Kate!" he called to the +girl behind the counter, "tell your mother we want some tea and bread +and butter in the room inside." + +The smell of bad tobacco and spilt porter was choking; we worked our +way through it after him towards the end of the shop, intersecting at +every hand discussions about the races. + +"Tom was very nice. He spared his horse all along, and then he put +into him--" "Well, at Goggin's corner the third horse was before the +second, but he was goin' wake in himself." "I tell ye the mare had the +hind leg fasht in the fore." "Clancy was dipping in the saddle." +"'Twas a dam nice race whatever----" + +We gained the inner room at last, a cheerless apartment, adorned with +sacred pictures, a sewing-machine, and an array of supplementary +tumblers and wineglasses; but, at all events, we had it so far to +ourselves. At intervals during the next half-hour Mary Kate burst in +with cups and plates, cast them on the table and disappeared, but of +food there was no sign. After a further period of starvation and of +listening to the noise in the shop, Flurry made a sortie, and, after +lengthy and unknown adventures, reappeared carrying a huge brown +teapot, and driving before him Mary Kate with the remainder of the +repast. The bread tasted of mice, the butter of turf-smoke, the tea of +brown paper, but we had got past the critical stage. I had entered +upon my third round of bread and butter when the door was flung open, +and my valued acquaintance, Slipper, slightly advanced in liquor, +presented himself to our gaze. His bandy legs sprawled +consequentially, his nose was redder than a coal of fire, his prominent +eyes rolled crookedly upon us, and his left hand swept behind him the +attempt of Mary Kate to frustrate his entrance. + +"Good-evening to my vinerable friend, Mr. Flurry Knox!" he began, in +the voice of a town crier, "and to the Honourable Major Yeates, and the +English gintleman!" + +This impressive opening immediately attracted an audience from the +shop, and the doorway filled with grinning faces as Slipper advanced +farther into the room. + +"Why weren't ye at the races, Mr. Flurry?" he went on, his roving eye +taking a grip of us all at the same time; "sure the Miss Bennetts and +all the ladies was asking where were ye." + +"It'd take some time to tell them that," said Flurry, with his mouth +full; "but what about the races, Slipper? Had you good sport?" + +"Sport is it? Divil so pleasant an afternoon ever you seen," replied +Slipper. He leaned against a side table, and all the glasses on it +jingled. "Does your honour know O'Driscoll?" he went on irrelevantly. +"Sure you do. He was in your honour's stable. It's what we were all +sayin'; it was a great pity your honour was not there, for the likin' +you had to Driscoll." + +"That's thrue," said a voice at the door. + +"There wasn't one in the Barony but was gethered in it, through and +fro," continued Slipper, with a quelling glance at the interrupter; +"and there was tints for sellin' porther, and whisky as pliable as new +milk, and boys gain' round the tints outside, feeling for heads with +the big ends of their blackthorns, and all kinds of recreations, and +the Sons of Liberty's piffler and dhrum band from Skebawn; though +faith! there was more of thim runnin' to look at the races than what +was playin' in it; not to mintion different occasions that the +bandmasther was atin' his lunch within in the whisky tint." + +"But what about Driscoll?" said Flurry. + +"Sure it's about him I'm tellin' ye," replied Slipper, with the +practised orator's watchful eye on his growing audience. "'Twas within +in the same whisky tint meself was, with the bandmasther and a few of +the lads, an' we buyin' a ha'porth o' crackers, when I seen me brave +Driscoll landin' into the tint, and a pair o' thim long boots on him; +him that hadn't a shoe nor a stocking to his foot when your honour had +him picking grass out o' the stones behind in your yard. 'Well,' says +I to meself, 'we'll knock some spoort out of Driscoll!' + +"'Come here to me, acushla!' says I to him; 'I suppose it's some way +wake in the legs y'are,' says I, 'an' the docthor put them on ye the +way the people wouldn't thrample ye!' + +"'May the divil choke ye!' says he, pleasant enough, but I knew by the +blush he had he was vexed. + +"'Then I suppose 'tis a left-tenant colonel y'are,' says I; 'yer mother +must be proud out o' ye!' says I, 'an' maybe ye'll lend her a loan o' +thim waders when she's rinsin' yer bauneen in the river!' says I. + +"'There'll be work out o' this!' says he, lookin' at me both sour and +bitther. + +"'Well indeed, I was thinkin' you were blue moulded for want of a +batin',' says I. He was for fightin' us then, but afther we had him +pacificated with about a quarther of a naggin o' sperrits, he told us +he was goin' ridin' in a race. + +"'An' what'll ye ride?' says I. + +"'Owld Bocock's mare,' says he. + +"'Knipes!' says I, sayin' a great curse; 'is it that little staggeen +from the mountains; sure she's somethin' about the one age with +meself,' says I. 'Many's the time Jamesy Geoghegan and meself used to +be dhrivin' her to Macroom with pigs an' all soorts,' says I; 'an' is +it leppin' stone walls ye want her to go now?' + +"'Faith, there's walls and every vari'ty of obstackle in it,' says he. + +"'It'll be the best o' your play, so,' says I, 'to leg it away home out +o' this.' + +"'An' who'll ride her, so?' says he. + +"'Let the divil ride her,' says I." + +Leigh Kelway, who had been leaning back seemingly half asleep, obeyed +the hypnotism of Slipper's gaze, and opened his eyes. + +"That was now all the conversation that passed between himself and +meself," resumed Slipper, "and there was no great delay afther that +till they said there was a race startin' and the dickens a one at all +was goin' to ride only two, Driscoll, and one Clancy. With that then I +seen Mr. Kinahane, the Petty Sessions clerk, goin' round clearin' the +coorse, an' I gethered a few o' the neighbours, an' we walked the +fields hither and over till we seen the most of th' obstackles. + +"'Stand aisy now by the plantation,' says I; 'if they get to come as +far as this, believe me ye'll see spoort,' says I, 'an' 'twill be a +convanient spot to encourage the mare if she's anyway wake in herself,' +says I, cuttin' somethin' about five foot of an ash sapling out o' the +plantation. + +"'That's yer sort!' says owld Bocock, that was thravellin' the +racecoorse, peggin' a bit o' paper down with a thorn in front of every +lep, the way Driscoll 'd know the handiest place to face her at it. + +"Well, I hadn't barely thrimmed the ash plant----" + +"Have you any jam, Mary Kate?" interrupted Flurry, whose meal had been +in no way interfered with by either the story or the highly-scented +crowd who had come to listen to it. + +"We have no jam, only thraycle, sir," replied the invisible Mary Kate. + +"I hadn't the switch barely thrimmed," repeated Slipper firmly, "when I +heard the people screechin', an' I seen Driscoll an' Clancy comin' on, +leppin' all before them, an' owld Bocock's mare bellusin' an' +powdherin' along, an' bedad! whatever obstackle wouldn't throw _her_ +down, faith, she'd throw _it_ down, an' there's the thraffic they had +in it. + +"'I declare to me sowl,' says I, 'if they continue on this way there's +a great chance some one o' thim 'll win," says I. + +"'Ye lie!' says the bandmasther, bein' a thrifle fulsome after his +luncheon. + +"'I do not,' says I, 'in regard of seein' how soople them two boys is. +Ye might observe,' says I, 'that if they have no convanient way to sit +on the saddle, they'll ride the neck o' the horse till such time as +they gets an occasion to lave it,' says I. + +"'Arrah, shut yer mouth!' says the bandmasther; 'they're puckin' out +this way now, an' may the divil admire me!' says he, 'but Clancy has +the other bet out, and the divil such leatherin' and beltin' of owld +Bocock's mare ever you seen as what's in it!' says he. + +"Well, when I seen them comin' to me, and Driscoll about the length of +the plantation behind Clancy, I let a couple of bawls. + +"'Skelp her, ye big brute!' says I. 'What good's in ye that ye aren't +able to skelp her?'" + +The yell and the histrionic flourish of his stick with which Slipper +delivered this incident brought down the house. Leigh Kelway was +sufficiently moved to ask me in an undertone if "skelp" was a local +term. + +"Well, Mr. Flurry, and gintlemen," recommenced Slipper, "I declare to +ye when owld Bocock's mare heard thim roars she sthretched out her neck +like a gandher, and when she passed me out she give a couple of grunts, +and looked at me as ugly as a Christian. + +"'Hah!' says I, givin' her a couple o' dhraws o' th' ash plant across +the butt o' the tail, the way I wouldn't blind her; 'I'll make ye +grunt!' says I, 'I'll nourish ye!' + +"I knew well she was very frightful of th' ash plant since the winter +Tommeen Sullivan had her under a sidecar. But now, in place of havin' +any obligations to me, ye'd be surprised if ye heard the blaspheemious +expressions of that young boy that was ridin' her; and whether it was +over-anxious he was, turnin' around the way I'd hear him cursin', or +whether it was some slither or slide came to owld Bocock's mare, I +dunno, but she was bet up agin the last obstackle but two, and before +ye could say 'Schnipes,' she was standin' on her two ears beyond in th' +other field! I declare to ye, on the vartue of me oath, she stood that +way till she reconnoithered what side would Driscoll fall, an' she +turned about then and rolled on him as cosy as if he was meadow grass!" + +Slipper stopped short; the people in the doorway groaned +appreciatively; Mary Kate murmured "The Lord save us!" + +"The blood was dhruv out through his nose and ears," continued Slipper, +with a voice that indicated the cream of the narration, "and you'd hear +his bones crackin' on the ground! You'd have pitied the poor boy." + +"Good heavens!" said Leigh Kelway, sitting up very straight in his +chair. + +"Was he hurt, Slipper?" asked Flurry casually. + +"Hurt is it?" echoed Slipper in high scorn; "killed on the spot!" He +paused to relish the effect of the _dnouement_ on Leigh Kelway. "Oh, +divil so pleasant an afthernoon ever you seen; and indeed, Mr. Flurry, +it's what we were all sayin', it was a great pity your honour was not +there for the likin' you had for Driscoll." + +As he spoke the last word there was an outburst of singing and cheering +from a carload of people who had just pulled up at the door. Flurry +listened, leaned back in his chair, and began to laugh. + +"It scarcely strikes one as a comic incident," said Leigh Kelway, very +coldly to me; "in fact, it seems to me that the police ought----" + +"Show me Slipper!" bawled a voice in the shop; "show me that dirty +little undherlooper till I have his blood! Hadn't I the race won only +for he souring the mare on me! What's that you say? I tell ye he did! +He left seven slaps on her with the handle of a hay-rake----" + +There was in the room in which we were sitting a second door, leading +to the back yard, a door consecrated to the unobtrusive visits of +so-called "Sunday travellers." Through it Slipper faded away like a +dream, and, simultaneously, a tall young man, with a face like a +red-hot potato tied up in a bandage, squeezed his way from the shop +into the room. + +"Well, Driscoll," said Flurry, "since it wasn't the teeth of the rake +he left on the mare, you needn't be talking!" + +Leigh Kelway looked from one to the other with a wilder expression in +his eye than I had thought it capable of. I read in it a resolve to +abandon Ireland to her fate. + +At eight o'clock we were still waiting for the car that we had been +assured should be ours directly it returned from the races. At +half-past eight we had adopted the only possible course that remained, +and had accepted the offers of lifts on the laden cars that were +returning to Skebawn, and I presently was gratified by the spectacle of +my friend Leigh Kelway wedged between a roulette table and its +proprietor on one side of a car, with Driscoll and Slipper, +mysteriously reconciled and excessively drunk, seated, locked in each +other's arms, on the other. Flurry and I, somewhat similarly placed, +followed on two other cars. I was scarcely surprised when I was +informed that the melancholy white animal in the shafts of the leading +car was Owld Bocock's much-enduring steeplechaser. + +The night was very dark and stormy, and it is almost superfluous to say +that no one carried lamps; the rain poured upon us, and through wind +and wet Owld Bocock's mare set the pace at a rate that showed she knew +from bitter experience what was expected from her by gentlemen who had +spent the evening in a public-house; behind her the other two tired +horses followed closely, incited to emulation by shouting, singing, and +a liberal allowance of whip. We were a good ten miles from Skebawn, +and never had the road seemed so long. For mile after mile the +half-seen low walls slid past us, with occasional plunges into caverns +of darkness under trees. Sometimes from a wayside cabin a dog would +dash out to bark at us as we rattled by; sometimes our cavalcade swung +aside to pass, with yells and counter-yells, crawling carts filled with +other belated race-goers. + +I was nearly wet through, even though I received considerable shelter +from a Skebawn publican, who slept heavily and irrepressibly on my +shoulder. Driscoll, on the leading car, had struck up an approximation +to the "Wearing of the Green," when a wavering star appeared on the +road ahead of us. It grew momently larger; it came towards us apace. +Flurry, on the car behind me, shouted suddenly-- + +"That's the mail car, with one of the lamps out! Tell those fellows +ahead to look out!" + +But the warning fell on deaf ears. + + "When laws can change the blades of grass + From growing as they grow----" + +howled five discordant voices, oblivious of the towering proximity of +the star. + +A Bianconi mail car is nearly three times the size of an ordinary +outside car, and when on a dark night it advances, Cyclops-like, with +but one eye, it is difficult for even a sober driver to calculate its +bulk. Above the sounds of melody there arose the thunder of heavy +wheels, the splashing trample of three big horses, then a crash and a +turmoil of shouts. Our cars pulled up just in time, and I tore myself +from the embrace of my publican to go to Leigh Kelway's assistance. + +The wing of the Bianconi had caught the wing of the smaller car, +flinging Owld Bocock's mare on her side and throwing her freight +headlong on top of her, the heap being surmounted by the roulette +table. The driver of the mail car unshipped his solitary lamp and +turned it on the disaster. I saw that Flurry had already got hold of +Leigh Kelway by the heels, and was dragging him from under the others. +He struggled up hatless, muddy, and gasping, with Driscoll hanging on +by his neck, still singing the "Wearing of the Green." + +A voice from the mail car said incredulously, "_Leigh Kelway!_" A +spectacled face glared down upon him from under the dripping spikes of +an umbrella. + +It was the Right Honourable the Earl of Waterbury, Leigh Kelway's +chief, returning from his fishing excursion. + +Meanwhile Slipper, in the ditch, did not cease to announce that "Divil +so pleasant an afthernoon ever ye seen as what was in it!" + + + + +VI + +PHILIPPA'S FOX-HUNT + +No one can accuse Philippa and me of having married in haste. As a +matter of fact, it was but little under five years from that autumn +evening on the river when I had said what is called in Ireland "the +hard word," to the day in August when I was led to the altar by my best +man, and was subsequently led away from it by Mrs. Sinclair Yeates. +About two years out of the five had been spent by me at Shreelane in +ceaseless warfare with drains, eaveshoots, chimneys, pumps; all those +fundamentals, in short, that the ingenuous and improving tenant expects +to find established as a basis from which to rise to higher things. As +far as rising to higher things went, frequent ascents to the roof to +search for leaks summed up my achievements; in fact, I suffered so +general a shrinkage of my ideals that the triumph of making the +hall-door bell ring blinded me to the fact that the rat-holes in the +hall floor were nailed up with pieces of tin biscuit boxes, and that +the casual visitor could, instead of leaving a card, have easily +written his name in the damp on the walls. + +Philippa, however, proved adorably callous to these and similar +shortcomings. She regarded Shreelane and its floundering, foundering +mnage of incapables in the light of a gigantic picnic in a foreign +land; she held long conversations daily with Mrs. Cadogan, in order, as +she informed me, to acquire the language; without any ulterior domestic +intention she engaged kitchen-maids because of the beauty of their +eyes, and housemaids because they had such delightfully picturesque old +mothers, and she declined to correct the phraseology of the +parlour-maid, whose painful habit it was to whisper "Do ye choose +cherry or clarry?" when proffering the wine. Fast-days, perhaps, +afforded my wife her first insight into the sterner realities of Irish +housekeeping. Philippa had what are known as High Church proclivities, +and took the matter seriously. + +"I don't know how we are to manage for the servants' dinner to-morrow, +Sinclair," she said, coming in to my office one Thursday morning; +"Julia says she 'promised God this long time that she wouldn't eat an +egg on a fast-day,' and the kitchen-maid says she won't eat herrings +'without they're fried with onions,' and Mrs. Cadogan says she will +'not go to them extremes for servants.'" + +"I should let Mrs. Cadogan settle the menu herself," I suggested. + +"I asked her to do that," replied Philippa, "and she only said she +'thanked God she had no appetite!'" + +The lady of the house here fell away into unseasonable laughter. + +I made the demoralising suggestion that, as we were going away for a +couple of nights, we might safely leave them to fight it out, and the +problem was abandoned. + +Philippa had been much called on by the neighbourhood in all its shades +and grades, and daily she and her trousseau frocks presented themselves +at hall-doors of varying dimensions in due acknowledgment of +civilities. In Ireland, it may be noted, the process known in England +as "summering and wintering" a newcomer does not obtain; sociability +and curiosity alike forbid delay. The visit to which we owed our +escape from the intricacies of the fast-day was to the Knoxes of Castle +Knox, relations in some remote and tribal way of my landlord, Mr. +Flurry of that ilk. It involved a short journey by train, and my +wife's longest basket-trunk; it also, which was more serious, involved +my being lent a horse to go out cubbing the following morning. + +At Castle Knox we sank into an almost forgotten environment of +draught-proof windows and doors, of deep carpets, of silent servants +instead of clattering belligerents. Philippa told me afterwards that +it had only been by an effort that she had restrained herself from +snatching up the train of her wedding-gown as she paced across the wide +hall on little Sir Valentine's arm. After three weeks at Shreelane she +found it difficult to remember that the floor was neither damp nor +dusty. + +I had the good fortune to be of the limited number of those who got on +with Lady Knox, chiefly, I imagine, because I was as a worm before her, +and thankfully permitted her to do all the talking. + +"Your wife is extremely pretty," she pronounced autocratically, +surveying Philippa between the candle-shades; "does she ride?" + +Lady Knox was a short square lady, with a weather-beaten face, and an +eye decisive from long habit of taking her own line across country and +elsewhere. She would have made a very imposing little coachman, and +would have caused her stable helpers to rue the day they had the +presumption to be born; it struck me that Sir Valentine sometimes did +so. + +"I'm glad you like her looks," I replied, "as I fear you will find her +thoroughly despicable otherwise; for one thing, she not only can't +ride, but she believes that I can!" + +"Oh come, you're not as bad as all that!" my hostess was good enough to +say; "I'm going to put you up on Sorcerer to-morrow, and we'll see you +at the top of the hunt--if there is one. That young Knox hasn't a +notion how to draw these woods." + +"Well, the best run we had last year out of this place was with +Flurry's hounds," struck in Miss Sally, sole daughter of Sir +Valentine's house and home, from her place half-way down the table. It +was not difficult to see that she and her mother held different views +on the subject of Mr. Flurry Knox. + +"I call it a criminal thing in any one's great-great-grandfather to +rear up a preposterous troop of sons and plant them all out in his own +country," Lady Knox said to me with apparent irrelevance. "I detest +collaterals. Blood may be thicker than water, but it is also a great +deal nastier. In this country I find that fifteenth cousins consider +themselves near relations if they live within twenty miles of one!" + +Having before now taken in the position with regard to Flurry Knox, I +took care to accept these remarks as generalities, and turned the +conversation to other themes. + +"I see Mrs. Yeates is doing wonders with Mr. Hamilton," said Lady Knox +presently, following the direction of my eyes, which had strayed away +to where Philippa was beaming upon her left-hand neighbour, a +mildewed-looking old clergyman, who was delivering a long dissertation, +the purport of which we were happily unable to catch. + +"She has always had a gift for the Church," I said. + +"Not curates?" said Lady Knox, in her deep voice. + +I made haste to reply that it was the elders of the Church who were +venerated by my wife. + +"Well, she has her fancy in old Eustace Hamilton; he's elderly enough!" +said Lady Knox. "I wonder if she'd venerate him as much if she knew +that he had fought with his sister-in-law, and they haven't spoken for +thirty years! though for the matter of that," she added, "I think it +shows his good sense!" + +"Mrs. Knox is rather a friend of mine," I ventured. + +"Is she? H'm! Well, she's not one of mine!" replied my hostess, with +her usual definiteness. "I'll say one thing for her, I believe she's +always been a sportswoman. She's very rich, you know, and they say she +only married old Badger Knox to save his hounds from being sold to pay +his debts, and then she took the horn from him and hunted them herself. +Has she been rude to your wife yet? No? Oh, well, she will. It's a +mere question of time. She hates all English people. You know the +story they tell of her? She was coming home from London, and when she +was getting her ticket the man asked if she had said a ticket for York. +'No, thank God, Cork!' says Mrs. Knox." + +"Well, I rather agree with her!" said I; "but why did she fight with +Mr. Hamilton?" + +"Oh, nobody knows. I don't believe they know themselves! Whatever it +was, the old lady drives five miles to Fortwilliam every Sunday, rather +than go to his church, just outside her own back gates," Lady Knox said +with a laugh like a terrier's bark. "I wish I'd fought with him +myself," she said; "he gives us forty minutes every Sunday." + +As I struggled into my boots the following morning, I felt that Sir +Valentine's acid confidences on cub-hunting, bestowed on me at +midnight, did credit to his judgment. "A very moderate amusement, my +dear Major," he had said, in his dry little voice; "you should stick to +shooting. No one expects you to shoot before daybreak." + +It was six o'clock as I crept downstairs, and found Lady Knox and Miss +Sally at breakfast, with two lamps on the table, and a foggy daylight +oozing in from under the half-raised blinds. Philippa was already in +the hall, pumping up her bicycle, in a state of excitement at the +prospect of her first experience of hunting that would have been more +comprehensible to me had she been going to ride a strange horse, as I +was. As I bolted my food I saw the horses being led past the windows, +and a faint twang of a horn told that Flurry Knox and his hounds were +not far off. + +Miss Sally jumped up. + +"If I'm not on the Cockatoo before the hounds come up, I shall never +get there!" she said, hobbling out of the room in the toils of her +safety habit. Her small, alert face looked very childish under her +riding-hat; the lamp-light struck sparks out of her thick coil of +golden-red hair: I wondered how I had ever thought her like her prim +little father. + +She was already on her white cob when I got to the hall-door, and +Flurry Knox was riding over the glistening wet grass with his hounds, +while his whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, was having a stirring time with the +young entry and the rabbit-holes. They moved on without stopping, up a +back avenue, under tall and dripping trees, to a thick laurel covert, +at some little distance from the house. Into this the hounds were +thrown, and the usual period of fidgety inaction set in for the riders, +of whom, all told, there were about half-a-dozen. Lady Knox, square +and solid, on her big, confidential iron-grey, was near me, and her +eyes were on me and my mount; with her rubicund face and white collar +she was more than ever like a coachman. + +"Sorcerer looks as if he suited you well," she said, after a few +minutes of silence, during which the hounds rustled and crackled +steadily through the laurels; "he's a little high on the leg, and so +are you, you know, so you show each other off." + +Sorcerer was standing like a rock, with his good-looking head in the +air and his eyes fastened on the covert. His manners, so far, had been +those of a perfect gentleman, and were in marked contrast to those of +Miss Sally's cob, who was sidling, hopping, and snatching unappeasably +at his bit. Philippa had disappeared from view down the avenue ahead. +The fog was melting, and the sun threw long blades of light through the +trees; everything was quiet, and in the distance the curtained windows +of the house marked the warm repose of Sir Valentine, and those of the +party who shared his opinion of cubbing. + +"Hark! hark to cry there!" + +It was Flurry's voice, away at the other side of the covert. The +rustling and brushing through the laurels became more vehement, then +passed out of hearing. + +"He never will leave his hounds alone," said Lady Knox disapprovingly. + +Miss Sally and the Cockatoo moved away in a series of heraldic capers +towards the end of the laurel plantation, and at the same moment I saw +Philippa on her bicycle shoot into view on the drive ahead of us. + +"I've seen a fox!" she screamed, white with what I believe to have been +personal terror, though she says it was excitement; "it passed quite +close to me!" + +"What way did he go?" bellowed a voice which I recognised as Dr. +Hickey's, somewhere in the deep of the laurels. + +"Down the drive!" returned Philippa, with a pea-hen quality in her +tones with which I was quite unacquainted. + +An electrifying screech of "Gone away!" was projected from the laurels +by Dr. Hickey. + +"Gone away!" chanted Flurry's horn at the top of the covert. + +"This is what he calls cubbing!" said Lady Knox, "a mere farce!" but +none the less she loosed her sedate monster into a canter. + +Sorcerer got his hind-legs under him, and hardened his crest against +the bit, as we all hustled along the drive after the flying figure of +my wife. I knew very little about horses, but I realised that even +with the hounds tumbling hysterically out of the covert, and the +Cockatoo kicking the gravel into his face, Sorcerer comported himself +with the manners of the best society. Up a side road I saw Flurry Knox +opening half of a gate and cramming through it; in a moment we also had +crammed through, and the turf of a pasture field was under our feet. +Dr. Hickey leaned forward and took hold of his horse; I did likewise, +with the trifling difference that my horse took hold of me, and I +steered for Flurry Knox with single-hearted purpose, the hounds, +already a field ahead, being merely an exciting and noisy accompaniment +of this endeavour. A heavy stone wall was the first occurrence of +note. Flurry chose a place where the top was loose, and his +clumsy-looking brown mare changed feet on the rattling stones like a +fairy. Sorcerer came at it, tense and collected as a bow at full +stretch, and sailed steeply into the air; I saw the wall far beneath +me, with an unsuspected ditch on the far side, and I felt my hat +following me at the full stretch of its guard as we swept over it, +then, with a long slant, we descended to earth some sixteen feet from +where we had left it, and I was possessor of the gratifying fact that I +had achieved a good-sized "fly," and had not perceptibly moved in my +saddle. Subsequent disillusioning experience has taught me that but +few horses jump like Sorcerer, so gallantly, so sympathetically, and +with such supreme mastery of the subject; but none the less the +enthusiasm that he imparted to me has never been extinguished, and that +October morning ride revealed to me the unsuspected intoxication of +fox-hunting. + +Behind me I heard the scrabbling of the Cockatoo's little hoofs among +the loose stones, and Lady Knox, galloping on my left, jerked a +maternal chin over her shoulder to mark her daughter's progress. For +my part, had there been an entire circus behind me, I was far too much +occupied with ramming on my hat and trying to hold Sorcerer, to have +looked round, and all my spare faculties were devoted to steering for +Flurry, who had taken a right-handed turn, and was at that moment +surmounting a bank of uncertain and briary aspect. I surmounted it +also, with the swiftness and simplicity for which the Quaker's methods +of bank jumping had not prepared me, and two or three fields, traversed +at the same steeplechase pace, brought us to a road and to an abrupt +check. There, suddenly, were the hounds, scrambling in baffled silence +down into the road from the opposite bank, to look for the line they +had overrun, and there, amazingly, was Philippa, engaged in excited +converse with several men with spades over their shoulders. + +"Did ye see the fox, boys?" shouted Flurry, addressing the group. + +"We did! we did!" cried my wife and her friends in chorus; "he ran up +the road!" + +"We'd be badly off without Mrs. Yeates!" said Flurry, as he whirled his +mare round and clattered up the road with a hustle of hounds after him. + +It occurred to me as forcibly as any mere earthly thing can occur to +those who are wrapped in the sublimities of a run, that, for a young +woman who had never before seen a fox out of a cage at the Zoo, +Philippa was taking to hunting very kindly. Her cheeks were a most +brilliant pink, her blue eyes shone. + +"Oh, Sinclair!" she exclaimed, "they say he's going for Aussolas, and +there's a road I can ride all the way!" + +"Ye can, Miss! Sure we'll show you!" chorussed her cortge. + +Her foot was on the pedal ready to mount. Decidedly my wife was in no +need of assistance from me. + +Up the road a hound gave a yelp of discovery, and flung himself over a +stile into the fields; the rest of the pack went squealing and jostling +after him, and I followed Flurry over one of those infinitely varied +erections, pleasantly termed "gaps" in Ireland. On this occasion the +gap was made of three razor-edged slabs of slate leaning against an +iron bar, and Sorcerer conveyed to me his thorough knowledge of the +matter by a lift of his hind-quarters that made me feel as if I were +being skilfully kicked downstairs. To what extent I looked it, I +cannot say, nor providentially can Philippa, as she had already +started. I only know that undeserved good luck restored to me my +stirrup before Sorcerer got away with me in the next field. + +What followed was, I am told, a very fast fifteen minutes; for me time +was not; the empty fields rushed past uncounted, fences came and went +in a flash, while the wind sang in my ears, and the dazzle of the early +sun was in my eyes. I saw the hounds occasionally, sometimes pouring +over a green bank, as the charging breaker lifts and flings itself, +sometimes driving across a field, as the white tongues of foam slide +racing over the sand; and always ahead of me was Flurry Knox, going as +a man goes who knows his country, who knows his horse, and whose heart +is wholly and absolutely in the right place. + +Do what I would, Sorcerer's implacable stride carried me closer and +closer to the brown mare, till, as I thundered down the slope of a long +field, I was not twenty yards behind Flurry. Sorcerer had stiffened +his neck to iron, and to slow him down was beyond me; but I fought his +head away to the right, and found myself coming hard and steady at a +stonefaced bank with broken ground in front of it. Flurry bore away to +the left, shouting something that I did not understand. That Sorcerer +shortened his stride at the right moment was entirely due to his own +judgment; standing well away from the jump, he rose like a stag out of +the tussocky ground, and as he swung my twelve stone six into the air +the obstacle revealed itself to him and me as consisting not of one +bank but of two, and between the two lay a deep grassy lane, half +choked with furze. I have often been asked to state the width of the +bohereen, and can only reply that in my opinion it was at least +eighteen feet; Flurry Knox and Dr. Hickey, who did not jump it, say +that it is not more than five. What Sorcerer did with it I cannot say; +the sensation was of a towering flight with a kick back in it, a +biggish drop, and a landing on cee-springs, still on the downhill +grade. That was how one of the best horses in Ireland took one of +Ireland's most ignorant riders over a very nasty place. + +A sombre line of fir-wood lay ahead, rimmed with a grey wall, and in +another couple of minutes we had pulled up on the Aussolas road, and +were watching the hounds struggling over the wall into Aussolas demesne. + +"No hurry now," said Flurry, turning in his saddle to watch the +Cockatoo jump into the road, "he's to ground in the big earth inside. +Well, Major, it's well for you that's a big-jumped horse. I thought +you were a dead man a while ago when you faced him at the bohereen!" + +I was disclaiming intention in the matter when Lady Knox and the others +joined us. + +"I thought you told me your wife was no sportswoman," she said to me, +critically scanning Sorcerer's legs for cuts the while, "but when I saw +her a minute ago she had abandoned her bicycle and was running across +country like----" + +"Look at her now!" interrupted Miss Sally. "Oh!--oh!" In the interval +between these exclamations my incredulous eyes beheld my wife in +mid-air, hand in hand with a couple of stalwart country boys, with whom +she was leaping in unison from the top of a bank on to the road. + +Every one, even the saturnine Dr. Hickey, began to laugh; I rode back +to Philippa, who was exchanging compliments and congratulations with +her escort. + +"Oh, Sinclair!" she cried, "wasn't it splendid? I saw you jumping, and +everything! Where are they going now?" + +"My dear girl," I said, with marital disapproval, "you're killing +yourself. Where's your bicycle?" + +"Oh, it's punctured in a sort of lane, back there. It's all right; and +then they"--she breathlessly waved her hand at her attendants--"they +showed me the way." + +"Begor! you proved very good, Miss!" said a grinning cavalier. + +"Faith she did!" said another, polishing his shining brow with his +white flannel coat-sleeve, "she lepped like a haarse!" + +"And may I ask how you propose to go home?" said I. + +"I don't know and I don't care! I'm not going home!" She cast an +entirely disobedient eye at me. "And your eye-glass is hanging down +your back and your tie is bulging out over your waistcoat!" + +The little group of riders had begun to move away. + +"We're going on into Aussolas," called out Flurry; "come on, and make +my grandmother give you some breakfast, Mrs. Yeates; she always has it +at eight o'clock." + +The front gates were close at hand, and we turned in under the tall +beech-trees, with the unswept leaves rustling round the horses' feet, +and the lovely blue of the October morning sky filling the spaces +between smooth grey branches and golden leaves. The woods rang with +the voices of the hounds, enjoying an untrammelled rabbit hunt, while +the Master and the Whip, both on foot, strolled along unconcernedly +with their bridles over their arms, making themselves agreeable to my +wife, an occasional touch of Flurry's horn, or a crack of Dr. Rickey's +whip, just indicating to the pack that the authorities still took a +friendly interest in their doings. + +Down a grassy glade in the wood a party of old Mrs. Knox's young horses +suddenly swept into view, headed by an old mare, who, with her tail +over her back, stampeded ponderously past our cavalcade, shaking and +swinging her handsome old head, while her youthful friends bucked and +kicked and snapped at each other round her with the ferocious humour of +their kind. + +"Here, Jerome, take the horn," said Flurry to Dr. Hickey; "I'm going to +see Mrs. Yeates up to the house, the way these tomfools won't gallop on +top of her." + +From this point it seems to me that Philippa's adventures are more +worthy of record than mine, and as she has favoured me with a full +account of them, I venture to think my version may be relied on. + +Mrs. Knox was already at breakfast when Philippa was led, quaking, into +her formidable presence. My wife's acquaintance with Mrs. Knox was, so +far, limited to a state visit on either side, and she found but little +comfort in Flurry's assurances that his grandmother wouldn't mind if he +brought all the hounds in to breakfast, coupled with the statement that +she would put her eyes on sticks for the Major. + +Whatever the truth of this may have been, Mrs. Knox received her guest +with an equanimity quite unshaken by the fact that her boots were in +the fender instead of on her feet, and that a couple of shawls of +varying dimensions and degrees of age did not conceal the inner +presence of a magenta flannel dressing-jacket. She installed Philippa +at the table and plied her with food, oblivious as to whether the +needful implements with which to eat it were forthcoming or no. She +told Flurry where a vixen had reared her family, and she watched him +ride away, with some biting comments on his mare's hocks screamed after +him from the window. + +The dining-room at Aussolas Castle is one of the many rooms in Ireland +in which Cromwell is said to have stabled his horse (and probably no +one would have objected less than Mrs. Knox had she been consulted in +the matter). Philippa questions if the room had ever been tidied up +since, and she endorses Flurry's observation that "there wasn't a day +in the year you wouldn't get feeding for a hen and chickens on the +floor." Opposite to Philippa, on a Louis Quinze chair, sat Mrs. Knox's +woolly dog, its suspicious little eyes peering at her out of their +setting of pink lids and dirty white wool. A couple of young horses +outside the windows tore at the matted creepers on the walls, or thrust +faces that were half-shy, half-impudent, into the room. Portly pigeons +waddled to and fro on the broad window-sill, sometimes flying in to +perch on the picture-frames, while they kept up incessantly a hoarse +and pompous cooing. + +Animals and children are, as a rule, alike destructive to conversation; +but Mrs. Knox, when she chose, _bien entendu_, could have made herself +agreeable in a Noah's ark, and Philippa has a gift of sympathetic +attention that personal experience has taught me to regard with +distrust as well as respect, while it has often made me realise the +worldly wisdom of Kingsley's injunction: + + "Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever." + + +Family prayers, declaimed by Mrs. Knox with alarming austerity, +followed close on breakfast, Philippa and a vinegar-faced henchwoman +forming the family. The prayers were long, and through the open window +as they progressed came distantly a whoop or two; the declamatory tones +staggered a little, and then continued at a distinctly higher rate of +speed. + +"Ma'am! Ma'am!" whispered a small voice at the window. + +Mrs. Knox made a repressive gesture and held on her way. A sudden +outcry of hounds followed, and the owner of the whisper, a small boy +with a face freckled like a turkey's egg, darted from the window and +dragged a donkey and bath-chair into view. Philippa admits to having +lost the thread of the discourse, but she thinks that the "Amen" that +immediately ensued can hardly have come in its usual place. Mrs. Knox +shut the book abruptly, scrambled up from her knees, and said, "They've +found!" + +In a surprisingly short space of time she had added to her attire her +boots, a fur cape, and a garden hat, and was in the bath-chair, the +small boy stimulating the donkey with the success peculiar to his +class, while Philippa hung on behind. + +The woods of Aussolas are hilly and extensive, and on that particular +morning it seemed that they held as many foxes as hounds. In vain was +the horn blown, and the whips cracked, small rejoicing parties of +hounds, each with a fox of its own, scoured to and fro: every labourer +in the vicinity had left his work, and was sedulously heading every fox +with yells that would have befitted a tiger hunt, and sticks and stones +when occasion served. + +"Will I pull out as far as the big rosy-dandhrum, ma'am?" inquired the +small boy; "I seen three of the dogs go in it, and they yowling." + +"You will," said Mrs. Knox, thumping the donkey on the back with her +umbrella; "here! Jeremiah Regan! Come down out of that with that +pitchfork! Do you want to kill the fox, you fool?" + +"I do not, your honour, ma'am," responded Jeremiah Regan, a tall young +countryman, emerging from a bramble brake. + +"Did you see him?" said Mrs. Knox eagerly. + +"I seen himself and his ten pups drinking below at the lake ere +yestherday, your honour, ma'am, and he as big as a chestnut horse!" +said Jeremiah. + +"Faugh! Yesterday!" snorted Mrs. Knox; "go on to the rhododendrons, +Johnny!" + +The party, reinforced by Jeremiah and the pitchfork, progressed at a +high rate of speed along the shrubbery path, encountering _en route_ +Lady Knox, stooping on to her horse's neck under the sweeping branches +of the laurels. + +"Your horse is too high for my coverts, Lady Knox," said the Lady of +the Manor, with a malicious eye at Lady Knox's flushed face and dinged +hat; "I'm afraid you will be left behind like Absalom when the hounds +go away!" + +"As they never do anything here but hunt rabbits," retorted her +ladyship, "I don't think that's likely." + +Mrs. Knox gave her donkey another whack, and passed on. + +"Rabbits, my dear!" she said scornfully to Philippa. "That's all she +knows about it. I declare it disgusts me to see a woman of that age +making such a Judy of herself! Rabbits indeed!" + +Down in the thicket of rhododendron everything was very quiet for a +time. Philippa strained her eyes in vain to see any of the riders; the +horn blowing and the whip cracking passed on almost out of hearing. +Once or twice a hound worked through the rhododendrons, glanced at the +party, and hurried on, immersed in business. All at once Johnny, the +donkey-boy, whispered excitedly: + +"Look at he! Look at he!" and pointed to a boulder of grey rock that +stood out among the dark evergreens. A big yellow cub was crouching on +it; he instantly slid into the shelter of the bushes, and the +irrepressible Jeremiah, uttering a rending shriek, plunged into the +thicket after him. Two or three hounds came rushing at the sound, and +after this Philippa says she finds some difficulty in recalling the +proper order of events; chiefly, she confesses, because of the wholly +ridiculous tears of excitement that blurred her eyes. + +"We ran," she said, "we simply tore, and the donkey galloped, and as +for that old Mrs. Knox, she was giving cracked screams to the hounds +all the time, and they were screaming too; and then somehow we were all +out on the road!" + +What seems to have occurred was that three couple of hounds, Jeremiah +Regan, and Mrs. Knox's equipage, amongst them somehow hustled the cub +out of Aussolas demesne and up on to a hill on the farther side of the +road. Jeremiah was sent back by his mistress to fetch Flurry, and the +rest of the party pursued a thrilling course along the road, parallel +with that of the hounds, who were hunting slowly through the gorse on +the hillside. + +"Upon my honour and word, Mrs. Yeates, my dear, we have the hunt to +ourselves!" said Mrs. Knox to the panting Philippa, as they pounded +along the road. "Johnny, d'ye see the fox?" + +"I do, ma'am!" shrieked Johnny, who possessed the usual field-glass +vision bestowed upon his kind. "Look at him over-right us on the hill +above! Hi! The spotty dog have him! No, he's gone from him! _Gwan +out o' that_!" This to the donkey, with blows that sounded like the +beating of carpets, and produced rather more dust. + +They had left Aussolas some half a mile behind, when, from a strip of +wood on their right, the fox suddenly slipped over the bank on to the +road just ahead of them, ran up it for a few yards and whisked in at a +small entrance gate, with the three couple of hounds yelling on a +red-hot scent, not thirty yards behind. The bath-chair party whirled +in at their heels, Philippa and the donkey considerably blown, Johnny +scarlet through his freckles, but as fresh as paint, the old lady blind +and deaf to all things save the chase. The hounds went raging through +the shrubs beside the drive, and away down a grassy slope towards a +shallow glen, in the bottom of which ran a little stream, and after +them over the grass bumped the bath-chair. At the stream they turned +sharply and ran up the glen towards the avenue, which crossed it by +means of a rough stone viaduct. + +"'Pon me conscience, he's into the old culvert!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox; +"there was one of my hounds choked there once, long ago! Beat on the +donkey, Johnny!" + +At this juncture Philippa's narrative again becomes incoherent, not to +say breathless. She is, however, positive that it was somewhere about +here that the upset of the bath-chair occurred, but she cannot be clear +as to whether she picked up the donkey or Mrs. Knox, or whether she +herself was picked up by Johnny while Mrs. Knox picked up the donkey. +From my knowledge of Mrs. Knox I should say she picked up herself and +no one else. At all events, the next salient point is the palpitating +moment when Mrs. Knox, Johnny, and Philippa successively applying an +eye to the opening of the culvert by which the stream trickled under +the viaduct, while five dripping hounds bayed and leaped around them, +discovered by more senses than that of sight that the fox was in it, +and furthermore that one of the hounds was in it too. + +"There's a sthrong grating before him at the far end," said Johnny, his +head in at the mouth of the hole, his voice sounding as if he were +talking into a jug, "the two of them's fighting in it; they'll be +choked surely!" + +"Then don't stand gabbling there, you little fool, but get in and pull +the hound out!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox, who was balancing herself on a +stone in the stream. + +"I'd be in dread, ma'am," whined Johnny. + +"Balderdash!" said the implacable Mrs. Knox. "In with you!" + +I understand that Philippa assisted Johnny into the culvert, and +presume that it was in so doing that she acquired the two Robinson +Crusoe bare footprints which decorated her jacket when I next met her. + +"Have you got hold of him yet, Johnny?" cried Mrs. Knox up the culvert. + +"I have, ma'am, by the tail," responded Johnny's voice, sepulchral in +the depths. + +"Can you stir him, Johnny?" + +"I cannot, ma'am, and the wather is rising in it." + +"Well, please God, they'll not open the mill dam!" remarked Mrs. Knox +philosophically to Philippa, as she caught hold of Johnny's dirty +ankles. "Hold on to the tail, Johnny!" + +She hauled, with, as might be expected, no appreciable result. "Run, +my dear, and look for somebody, and we'll have that fox yet!" + +Philippa ran, whither she knew not, pursued by fearful visions of +bursting mill-dams, and maddened foxes at bay. As she sped up the +avenue she heard voices, robust male voices, in a shrubbery, and made +for them. Advancing along an embowered walk towards her was what she +took for one wild instant to be a funeral; a second glance showed her +that it was a party of clergymen of all ages, walking by twos and +threes in the dappled shade of the over-arching trees. Obviously she +had intruded her sacrilegious presence into a Clerical Meeting. She +acknowledges that at this awe-inspiring spectacle she faltered, but the +thought of Johnny, the hound, and the fox, suffocating, possibly +drowning together in the culvert, nerved her. She does not remember +what she said or how she said it, but I fancy she must have conveyed to +them the impression that old Mrs. Knox was being drowned, as she +immediately found herself heading a charge of the Irish Church towards +the scene of disaster. + +Fate has not always used me well, but on this occasion it was +mercifully decreed that I and the other members of the hunt should be +privileged to arrive in time to see my wife and her rescue party +precipitating themselves down the glen. + +"Holy Biddy!" ejaculated Flurry, "is she running a paper-chase with all +the parsons? But look! For pity's sake will you look at my +grandmother and my Uncle Eustace?" + +Mrs. Knox and her sworn enemy the old clergyman, whom I had met at +dinner the night before, were standing, apparently in the stream, +tugging at two bare legs that projected from a hole in the viaduct, and +arguing at the top of their voices. The bath-chair lay on its side +with the donkey grazing beside it, on the bank a stout Archdeacon was +tendering advice, and the hounds danced and howled round the entire +group. + +"I tell you, Eliza, you had better let the Archdeacon try," thundered +Mr. Hamilton. + +"Then I tell you I will not!" vociferated Mrs. Knox, with a tug at the +end of the sentence that elicited a subterranean lament from Johnny. +"Now who was right about the second grating? I told you so twenty +years ago!" + +Exactly as Philippa and her rescue party arrived, the efforts of Mrs. +Knox and her brother-in-law triumphed. The struggling, sopping form of +Johnny was slowly drawn from the hole, drenched, speechless, but +clinging to the stern of a hound, who, in its turn, had its jaws fast +in the hind-quarters of a limp, yellow cub. + +"Oh, it's dead!" wailed Philippa, "I _did_ think I should have been in +time to save it!" + +"Well, if that doesn't beat all!" said Dr. Hickey. + + + + +VII + +A MISDEAL + +The wagonette slewed and slackened mysteriously on the top of the long +hill above Drumcurran. So many remarkable things had happened since we +had entrusted ourselves to the guidance of Mr. Bernard Shute that I +rose in my place and possessed myself of the brake, and in so doing saw +the horses with their heads hard in against their chests, and their +quarters jammed crookedly against the splashboard, being apparently +tied into knots by some inexplicable power. + +"Some one's pulling the reins out of my hand!" exclaimed Mr. Shute. + +The horses and pole were by this time making an acute angle with the +wagonette, and the groom plunged from the box to their heads. Miss +Sally Knox, who was sitting beside me, looked over the edge. + +"Put on the brake! the reins are twisted round the axle!" she cried, +and fell into a fit of laughter. + +We all--that is to say, Philippa, Miss Shute, Miss Knox, and I--got out +as speedily as might be; but, I think, without panic; Mr. Shute alone +stuck to the ship, with the horses struggling and rearing below him. +The groom and I contrived to back them, and by so doing caused the +reins to unwind themselves from the axle. + +"It was my fault," said Mr. Shute, hauling them in as fast as we could +give them to him; "I broke the reins yesterday, and these are the +phaeton ones, and about six fathoms long at that, and I forgot and let +the slack go overboard. It's all right, I won't do it again." + +With this reassurance we confided ourselves once more to the wagonette. + +As we neared the town of Drumcurran the fact that we were on our way to +a horse fair became alarmingly apparent. It is impossible to imagine +how we pursued an uninjured course through the companies of horsemen, +the crowded carts, the squealing colts, the irresponsible led horses, +and, most immutable of all obstacles, the groups of countrywomen, with +the hoods of their heavy blue cloaks over their heads. They looked +like nuns of some obscure order; they were deaf and blind as ramparts +of sandbags; nothing less callous to human life than a Parisian +cabdriver could have burst a way through them. Many times during that +drive I had cause to be thankful for the sterling qualities of Mr. +Shute's brake; with its aid he dragged his over-fed bays into a crawl +that finally, and not without injury to the varnish, took the wagonette +to the Royal Hotel. Every available stall in the yard was by that time +filled, and it was only by virtue of the fact that the kitchenmaid was +nearly related to my cook that the indignant groom was permitted to +stable the bays in a den known as the calf-house. + +That I should have lent myself to such an expedition was wholly due to +my wife. Since Philippa had taken up her residence in Ireland she had +discovered a taste for horses that was not to be extinguished, even by +an occasional afternoon on the Quaker, whose paces had become harder +than rock in his many journeys to Petty Sessions; she had also +discovered the Shutes, newcomers on the outer edge of our vast visiting +district, and between them this party to Drumcurran Horse Fair had been +devised. Philippa proposed to buy herself a hunter. Bernard Shute +wished to do the same, possibly two hunters, money being no difficulty +with this fortunate young man. Miss Sally Knox was of the company, and +I also had been kindly invited, as to a missionary meeting, to come, +and bring my cheque-book. The only saving clause in the affair was the +fact that Mr. Flurry Knox was to meet us at the scene of action. + +The fair was held in a couple of large fields outside the town, and on +the farther bank of the Curranhilty River. Across a wide and +glittering ford, horses of all sizes and sorts were splashing, and a +long row of stepping-stones was hopped, and staggered, and scrambled +over by a ceaseless variety of foot-passengers. A man with a cart +plied as a ferry boat, doing a heavy trade among the applewomen and +vendors of "crubeens," _alias_ pigs' feet, a grisly delicacy peculiar +to Irish open-air holiday-making, and the July sun blazed on a scene +that even Miss Cecilia Shute found to be almost repayment enough for +the alarms of the drive. + +"As a rule, I am so bored by driving that I find it reviving to be +frightened," she said to me, as we climbed to safety on a heathery +ridge above the fields dedicated to galloping the horses; "but when my +brother scraped all those people off one side of that car, and ran the +pole into the cart of lemonade-bottles, I began to wish for courage to +tell him I was going to get out and walk home." + +"Well, if you only knew it," said Bernard, who was spreading rugs over +the low furze bushes in the touching belief that the prickles would not +come through, "the time you came nearest to walking home was when the +lash of the whip got twisted round Nancy's tail. Miss Knox, you're an +authority on these things--don't you think it would be a good scheme to +have a light anchor in the trap, and when the horses began to play the +fool, you'd heave the anchor over the fence and bring them up all +standing?" + +"They wouldn't stand very long," remarked Miss Sally. + +"Oh, that's all right," returned the inventor; "I'd have a dodge to +cast them loose, with the pole and the splinter-bar." + +"You'd never see them again," responded Miss Knox demurely, "if you +thought that mattered." + +"It would be the brightest feature of the case," said Miss Shute. + +She was surveying Miss Sally through her pince-nez as she spoke, and +was, I have reason to believe, deciding that by the end of the day her +brother would be well on in the first stages of his fifteenth love +affair. + +It has possibly been suspected that Mr. Bernard Shute was a sailor, had +been a sailor rather, until within the last year, when he had tumbled +into a fortune and a property, and out of the navy, in the shortest +time on record. His enthusiasm for horses had been nourished by the +hirelings of Malta, and other resorts of her Majesty's ships, and his +knowledge of them was, so far, bounded by the fact that it was more +usual to come off over their heads than their tails. For the rest, he +was a clean-shaved and personable youth, with a laugh which I may, +without offensive intention, define as possessing a what-cheeriness +special to his profession, and a habit, engendered no doubt by long +sojourns at the Antipodes, of getting his clothes in large hideous +consignments from a naval outfitter. + +It was eleven o'clock, and the fair was in full swing. Its vortex was +in the centre of the field below us, where a low bank of sods and earth +had been erected as a trial jump, with a yelling crowd of men and boys +at either end, acting instead of the usual wings to prevent a swerve. +Strings of reluctant horses were scourged over the bank by dozens of +willing hands, while exhortation, cheers, and criticism were freely +showered upon each performance. + +"Give the knees to the saddle, boy, and leave the heels slack." +"That's a nice horse. He'd keep a jock on his back where another'd +throw him!" "Well jumped, begor! She fled that fairly!" as an +ungainly three-year-old flounced over the bank without putting a hoof +on it. Then her owner, unloosing his pride in simile after the manner +of his race, + +"Ah ha! when she give a lep, man, she's that free, she's like a hare +for it!" + +A giggling group of country girls elbowed their way past us out of the +crowd of spectators, one of the number inciting her fellows to hurry on +to the other field "until they'd see the lads galloping the horses," to +which another responding that she'd "be skinned alive for the horses," +the party sped on their way. We--_i.e._ my wife, Miss Knox, Bernard +Shute, and myself--followed in their wake, a matter by no means as easy +as it looked. Miss Shute had exhibited her wonted intelligence by +remaining on the hilltop with the "Spectator"; she had not reached the +happy point of possessing a mind ten years older than her age, and a +face ten years younger, without also developing the gift of scenting +boredom from afar. We squeezed past the noses and heels of fidgety +horses, and circumnavigated their attendant groups of critics, while +half-trained brutes in snaffles bolted to nowhere and back again, and +whinnying foals ran to and fro in search of their mothers. + +A moderate bank divided the upper from the lower fields, and as every +feasible spot in it was commanded by a refusing horse, the choice of a +place and moment for crossing it required judgment. I got Philippa +across it in safety; Miss Knox, though as capable as any young woman in +Ireland of getting over a bank, either on horseback or on her own legs, +had to submit to the assistance of Mr. Shute, and the laws of dynamics +decreed that a force sufficient to raise a bower anchor should hoist +her seven stone odd to the top of the bank with such speed that she +landed half on her knees and half in the arms of her pioneer. A group +of portentously quiet men stood near, their eyes on the ground, their +hands in their pockets; they were all dressed so much alike that I did +not at first notice that Flurry Knox was among them; when I did, I +perceived that his eyes, instead of being on the ground, were surveying +Mr. Shute with that measure of disapproval that he habitually bestowed +upon strange men. + +"You're later than I thought you'd be," he said. "I have a horse +half-bought for Mrs. Yeates. It's that old mare of Bobby Bennett's; +she makes a little noise, but she's a good mare, and you couldn't throw +her down if you tried. Bobby wants thirty pounds for her, but I think +you might get her for less. She's in the hotel stables, and you can +see her when you go to lunch." + +We moved on towards the rushy bank of the river, and Philippa and Sally +Knox seated themselves on a low rock, looking, in their white frocks, +as incongruous in that dingy preoccupied assemblage as the dreamy +meadow-sweet and purple spires of loosestrife that thronged the river +banks. Bernard Shute had been lost in the shifting maze of men and +horses, who were, for the most part, galloping with the blind fury of +charging bulls; but presently, among a party who seemed to be riding +the finish of a race, we descried our friend, and a second or two later +he hauled a brown mare to a standstill in front of us. + +"The fellow's asking forty-five pounds for her," he said to Miss Sally; +"she's a nailer to gallop. I don't think it's too much?" + +"Her grandsire was the Mountain Hare," said the owner of the mare, +hurrying up to continue her family history, "and he was the grandest +horse in the four baronies. He was forty-two years of age when he +died, and they waked him the same as ye'd wake a Christian. They had +whisky and porther--and bread--and a piper in it." + +"Thim Mountain Hare colts is no great things," interrupted Mr. Shute's +groom contemptuously. "I seen a colt once that was one of his stock, +and if there was forty men and their wives, and they after him with +sticks, he wouldn't lep a sod of turf." + +"Lep, is it!" ejaculated the owner in a voice shrill with outrage. +"You may lead that mare out through the counthry, and there isn't a +fence in it that she wouldn't go up to it as indepindent as if she was +going to her bed, and your honour's ladyship knows that dam well, Miss +Knox." + +"You want too much money for her, McCarthy," returned Miss Sally, with +her little air of preternatural wisdom. + +"God pardon you, Miss Knox! Sure a lady like you knows well that +forty-five pounds is no money for that mare. Forty-five pounds!" He +laughed. "It'd be as good for me to make her a present to the +gentleman all out as take three farthings less for her! She's too +grand entirely for a poor farmer like me, and if it wasn't for the long +weak family I have, I wouldn't part with her under twice the money." + +"Three fine lumps of daughters in America paying his rent for him," +commented Flurry in the background. "That's the long weak family!" + +Bernard dismounted and slapped the mare's ribs approvingly. + +"I haven't had such a gallop since I was at Rio," he said. "What do +you think of her, Miss Knox?" Then, without waiting for an answer, "I +like her. I think I may as well give him the forty-five and have done +with it!" + +At these ingenuous words I saw a spasm of anguish cross the countenance +of McCarthy, easily interpreted as the first pang of a life-long regret +that he had not asked twice the money. Flurry Knox put up an eyebrow +and winked at me; Mr. Shute's groom turned away for very shame. Sally +Knox laughed with the deplorable levity of nineteen. + +Thus, with a brevity absolutely scandalous in the eyes of all +beholders, the bargain was concluded. + +Flurry strolled up to Philippa, observing an elaborate remoteness from +Miss Sally and Mr. Shute. + +"I believe I'm selling a horse here myself to-day," he said; "would you +like to have a look at him, Mrs. Yeates?" + +"Oh, are you selling, Knox?" struck in Bernard, to whose brain the +glory of buying a horse had obviously mounted like new wine; "I want +another, and I know yours are the right sort." + +"Well, as you seem fond of galloping," said Flurry sardonically, "this +one might suit you." + +"You don't mean the Moonlighter?" said Miss Knox, looking fixedly at +him. + +"Supposing I did, have you anything to say against him?" replied Flurry. + +Decidedly he was in a very bad temper. Miss Sally shrugged her +shoulders, and gave a little shred of a laugh, but said no more. + +In a comparatively secluded corner of the field we came upon +Moonlighter, sidling and fussing, with flickering ears, his tail +tightly tucked in and his strong back humped in a manner that boded +little good. Even to my untutored eye, he appeared to be an uncommonly +good-looking animal, a well-bred grey, with shoulders that raked back +as far as the eye could wish, the true Irish jumping hindquarters, and +a showy head and neck; it was obvious that nothing except Michael +Hallahane's adroit chucks at his bridle kept him from displaying his +jumping powers free of charge. Bernard stared at him in silence; not +the pregnant and intimidating silence of the connoisseur, but the +tongue-tied muteness of helpless ignorance. His eye for horses had +most probably been formed on circus posters, and the advertisements of +a well-known embrocation, and Moonlighter approximated in colour and +conduct to these models. + +"I can see he's a ripping fine horse," he said at length; "I think I +should like to try him." + +Miss Knox changed countenance perceptibly, and gave a perturbed glance +at Flurry. Flurry remained impenetrably unamiable. + +"I don't pretend to be a judge of horses," went on Mr. Shute. "I dare +say I needn't tell you that!" with a very engaging smile at Miss Sally; +"but I like this one awfully." + +As even Philippa said afterwards, she would not have given herself away +like that over buying a reel of cotton. + +"Are you quite sure that he's really the sort of horse you want?" said +Miss Knox, with rather more colour in her face than usual; "he's only +four years old, and he's hardly a finished hunter." + +The object of her philanthropy looked rather puzzled. "What! can't he +jump?" he said. + +"Is it jump?" exclaimed Michael Hallahane, unable any longer to contain +himself; "is it the horse that jumped five foot of a clothes line in +Heffernan's yard, and not a one on his back but himself, and didn't +leave so much as the thrack of his hoof on the quilt that was hanging +on it!" + +"That's about good enough," said Mr. Shute, with his large friendly +laugh; "what's your price, Knox? I must have the horse that jumped the +quilt! I'd like to try him, if you don't mind. There are some +jolly-looking banks over there." + +"My price is a hundred sovereigns," said Flurry; "you can try him if +you like." + +"Oh, don't!" cried Sally impulsively; but Bernard's foot was already in +the stirrup. "I call it disgraceful!" I heard her say in a low voice +to her kinsman--"you know he can't ride." + +The kinsman permitted himself a malign smile. "That's his look-out," +he said. + +Perhaps the unexpected docility with which Moonlighter allowed himself +to be manoeuvred through the crowd was due to Bernard's thirteen stone; +at all events, his progress through a gate into the next field was +unexceptionable. Bernard, however, had no idea of encouraging this +tranquillity. He had come out to gallop, and without further ceremony +he drove his heels into Moonlighter's sides, and took the consequences +in the shape of a very fine and able buck. How he remained within even +visiting distance of the saddle it is impossible to explain; perhaps +his early experience in the rigging stood him in good stead in the +matter of hanging on by his hands; but, however preserved, he did +remain, and went away down the field at what he himself subsequently +described as "the rate of knots." + +Flurry flung away his cigarette and ran to a point of better +observation. We all ran, including Michael Hallahane and various +onlookers, and were in time to see Mr. Shute charging the least +advantageous spot in a hollow-faced furzy bank. Nothing but the grey +horse's extreme activity got the pair safely over; he jumped it on a +slant, changed feet in the heart of a furze-bush, and was lost to view. +In what relative positions Bernard and his steed alighted was to us a +matter of conjecture; when we caught sight of them again, Moonlighter +was running away, with his rider still on his back, while the slope of +the ground lent wings to his flight. + +"That young gentleman will be apt to be killed," said Michael Hallahane +with composure, not to say enjoyment. + +"He'll be into the long bog with him pretty soon," said Flurry, his +keen eye tracking the fugitive. + +"Oh!--I thought he was off that time!" exclaimed Miss Sally, with a +gasp in which consternation and amusement were blended. "There! He +_is_ into the bog!" + +It did not take us long to arrive at the scene of disaster, to which, +as to a dog-fight, other foot-runners were already hurrying, and on our +arrival we found things looking remarkably unpleasant for Mr. Shute and +Moonlighter. The latter was sunk to his withers in the sheet of black +slime into which he had stampeded; the former, submerged to the waist +three yards farther away in the bog, was trying to drag himself towards +firm ground by the aid of tussocks of wiry grass. + +"Hit him!" shouted Flurry. "Hit him! he'll sink if he stops there!" + +Mr. Shute turned on his adviser a face streaming with black mud, out of +which his brown eyes and white teeth gleamed with undaunted +cheerfulness. + +"All jolly fine," he called back; "if I let go this grass I'll sink +too!" + +A shout of laughter from the male portion of the spectators +sympathetically greeted this announcement, and a dozen equally futile +methods of escape were suggested. Among those who had joined us was, +fortunately, one of the many boys who pervaded the fair selling +halters, and, by means of several of these knotted together, a line of +communication was established. Moonlighter, who had fallen into the +state of inane stupor in which horses in his plight so often indulge, +was roused to activity by showers of stones and imprecations but +faintly chastened by the presence of ladies. Bernard, hanging on to +his tail, belaboured him with a cane, and, finally, the reins proving +good, the task of towing the victims ashore was achieved. + +"He's mine, Knox, you know," were Mr. Shute's first words as he +scrambled to his feet; "he's the best horse I ever got across--worth +twice the money!" + +"Faith, he's aisy plased!" remarked a bystander. + +"Oh, do go and borrow some dry clothes," interposed Philippa +practically; "surely there must be some one----" + +"There's a shop in the town where he can strip a peg for 13_s._ 9_d._," +said Flurry grimly; "I wouldn't care myself about the clothes you'd +borrow here!" + +The morning sun shone jovially upon Moonlighter and his rider, caking +momently the black bog stuff with which both were coated, and as the +group disintegrated, and we turned to go back, every man present was +pleasurably aware that the buttons of Mr. Shute's riding breeches had +burst at the knee, causing a large triangular hiatus above his gaiter. + +"Well," said Flurry conclusively to me as we retraced our steps, "I +always thought the fellow was a fool, but I never thought he was such a +damned fool." + +It seemed an interminable time since breakfast when our party, somewhat +shattered by the stirring events of the morning, found itself gathered +in an upstairs room at the Royal Hotel, waiting for a meal that had +been ordained some two hours before. The air was charged with the +mingled odours of boiling cabbage and frying mutton; we affected to +speak of them with disgust, but our souls yearned to them. Female +ministrants, with rustling skirts and pounding feet, raced along the +passages with trays that were never for us, and opening doors released +roaring gusts of conversation, blended with the clatter of knives and +forks, and still we starved. Even the ginger-coloured check suit, +lately labelled "The Sandringham. Wonderful value, 16_s._ 9_d._" in +the window of Drumcurran's leading mart, and now displayed upon Mr. +Shute's all too lengthy limbs, had lost its power to charm. + +"Oh, don't tear that bell quite out by the roots, Bernard," said his +sister, from the heart of a lamentable yawn. "I dare say it only +amuses them when we ring, but it may remind them that we are still +alive. Major Yeates, do you or do you not regret the pigs' feet?" + +"More than I can express," I said, turning from the window, where I had +been looking down at the endless succession of horses' backs and men's +hats, moving in two opposing currents in the street below. "I dare say +if we talk about them for a little we shall feel ill, and that will be +better than nothing." + +At this juncture, however, a heavy-laden tray thumped against the door, +and our repast was borne into the room by a hot young woman in creaking +boots, who hoarsely explained that what kept her was waiting on the +potatoes, and that the ould pan that was in it was playing Puck with +the beefsteaks. + +"Well," said Miss Shute, as she began to try conclusions between a +blunt knife and a bullet-proof mutton chop, "I have never lived in the +country before, but I have always been given to understand that the +village inn was one of its chief attractions." She delicately moved +the potato dish so as to cover the traces of a bygone egg, and her +glance lingered on the flies that dragged their way across a melting +mound of salt butter. "I like local colour, but I don't care about it +on the tablecloth." + +"Well, I'm feeling quite anxious about Irish country hotels now," said +Bernard; "they're getting so civilised and respectable. After all, +when you go back to England no one cares a pin to hear that you've been +done up to the knocker. That don't amuse them a bit. But all my +friends are as pleased as anything when I tell them of the pothouse +where I slept in my clothes rather than face the sheets, or how, when I +complained to the landlady next day, she said, 'Cock ye up! Wasn't it +his Reverence the Dean of Kilcoe had them last!'" + +We smiled wanly; what I chiefly felt was respect for any hungry man who +could jest in presence of such a meal. + +"All this time my hunter hasn't been bought," said Philippa presently, +leaning back in her chair, and abandoning the unequal contest with her +beefsteak. "Who is Bobby Bennett? Will his horse carry a lady?" + +Sally Knox looked at me and began to laugh. + +"You should ask Major Yeates about Bobby Bennett," she said. + +Confound Miss Sally! It had never seemed worth while to tell Philippa +all that story about my doing up Miss Bobby Bennett's hair, and I sank +my face in my tumbler of stagnant whisky-and-soda to conceal the colour +that suddenly adorned it. Any intelligent man will understand that it +was a situation calculated to amuse the ungodly, but without any real +fun in it. I explained Miss Bennett as briefly as possible, and at all +the more critical points Miss Sally's hazel-green eyes roamed slowly +and mercilessly towards me. + +"You haven't told Mrs. Yeates that she's one of the greatest +horse-copers in the country," she said, when I had got through somehow; +"she can sell you a very good horse sometimes, and a very bad one too, +if she gets the chance." + +"No one will ever explain to me," said Miss Shute, scanning us all with +her dark, half-amused, and wholly sophisticated eyes, "why horse-coping +is more respectable than cheating at cards. I rather respect people +who are able to cheat at cards; if every one did, it would make whist +so much more cheerful; but there is no forgiveness for dealing yourself +the right card, and there is no condemnation for dealing your neighbour +a very wrong horse!" + +"Your neighbour is supposed to be able to take care of himself," said +Bernard. + +"Well, why doesn't that apply to card-players?" returned his sister; +"are they all in a state of helpless innocence?" + +"I'm helplessly innocent," announced Philippa, "so I hope Miss Bennett +won't deal me a wrong horse." + +"Oh, her mare is one of the right ones," said Miss Sally; "she's a +lovely jumper, and her manners are the very best." + +The door opened, and Flurry Knox put in his head. "Bobby Bennett's +downstairs," he said to me mysteriously. + +I got up, not without consciousness of Miss Sally's eye, and prepared +to follow him. "You'd better come too, Mrs. Yeates, to keep an eye on +him. Don't let him give her more than thirty, and if he gives that she +should return him two sovereigns." This last injunction was bestowed +in a whisper as we descended the stairs. + +Miss Bennett was in the crowded yard of the hotel, looking handsome and +overdressed, and she greeted me with just that touch of Auld Lang Syne +in her manner that I could best have dispensed with. I turned to the +business in hand without delay. The brown mare was led forth from the +stable and paraded for our benefit; she was one of those inconspicuous, +meritorious animals about whom there seems nothing particular to say, +and I felt her legs and looked hard at her hocks, and was not much the +wiser. + +"It's no use my saying she doesn't make a noise," said Miss Bobby, +"because every one in the country will tell you she does. You can have +a vet. if you like, and that's the only fault he can find with her. +But if Mrs. Yeates hasn't hunted before now, I'll guarantee Cruiskeen +as just the thing for her. She's really safe and confidential. My +little brother Georgie has hunted her--_you_ remember Georgie, Major +Yeates?--the night of the ball, you know--and he's only eleven. Mr. +Knox can tell you what sort she is." + +"Oh, she's a grand mare," said Mr. Knox, thus appealed to; "you'd hear +her coming three fields off like a German band!" + +"And well for you if you could keep within three fields of her!" +retorted Miss Bennett. "At all events, she's not like the hunter you +sold Uncle, that used to kick the stars as soon as I put my foot in the +stirrup!" + +"'Twas the size of the foot frightened him," said Flurry. + +"Do you know how Uncle cured him?" said Miss Bennett, turning her back +on her adversary; "he had him tied head and tail across the yard gate, +and every man that came in had to get over his back!" + +"That's no bad one!" said Flurry. + +Philippa looked from one to the other in bewilderment, while the +badinage continued, swift and unsmiling, as became two hierarchs of +horse-dealing; it went on at intervals for the next ten minutes, and at +the end of that time I had bought the mare for thirty pounds. As Miss +Bennett said nothing about giving me back two of them, I had not the +nerve to suggest it. + +After this Flurry and Miss Bennett went away, and were swallowed up in +the fair; we returned to our friends upstairs, and began to arrange +about getting home. This, among other difficulties, involved the +tracking and capture of the Shutes' groom, and took so long that it +necessitated tea. Bernard and I had settled to ride our new purchases +home, and the groom was to drive the wagonette--an alteration ardently +furthered by Miss Shute. The afternoon was well advanced when Bernard +and I struggled through the turmoil of the hotel yard in search of our +horses, and, the hotel hostler being nowhere to be found, the Shutes' +man saddled our animals for us, and then withdrew, to grapple +single-handed with the bays in the calf-house. + +"Good business for me, that Knox is sending the grey horse home for +me," remarked Bernard, as his new mare followed him tractably out of +the stall. "He'd have been rather a handful in this hole of a place." + +He shoved his way out of the yard in front of me, seemingly quite +comfortable and at home upon the descendant of the Mountain Hare, and I +followed as closely as drunken carmen and shafts of erratic carts would +permit. Cruiskeen evinced a decided tendency to turn to the right on +leaving the yard, but she took my leftward tug in good part, and we +moved on through the streets of Drumcurran with a dignity that was only +impaired by the irrepressible determination of Mr. Shute's new trousers +to run up his leg. It was a trifle disappointing that Cruiskeen should +carry her nose in the air like a camel, but I set it down to my own bad +hands, and to that cause I also imputed her frequent desire to stop, a +desire that appeared to coincide with every fourth or fifth +public-house on the line of march. Indeed, at the last corner before +we left the town, Miss Bennett's mare and I had a serious difference of +opinion, in the course of which she mounted the pavement and remained +planted in front of a very disreputable public-house, whose owner had +been before me several times for various infringements of the Licensing +Acts. Bernard and the corner-boys were of course much pleased; I +inwardly resolved to let Miss Bennett know how her groom occupied his +time in Drumcurran. + +We got out into the calm of the country roads without further incident, +and I there discovered that Cruiskeen was possessed of a dromedary +swiftness in trotting, that the action was about as comfortable as the +dromedary's, and that it was extremely difficult to moderate the pace. + +"I say! This is something like going!" said Bernard, cantering hard +beside me with slack rein and every appearance of happiness. "Do you +mean to keep it up all the way?" + +"You'd better ask this devil," I replied, hauling on the futile ring +snaffle. "Miss Bennett must have an arm like a prize-fighter. If this +is what she calls confidential, I don't want her confidences." + +After another half-mile, during which I cursed Flurry Knox, and +registered a vow that Philippa should ride Cruiskeen in a cavalry bit, +we reached the cross-roads at which Bernard's way parted from mine. +Another difference of opinion between my wife's hunter and me here took +place, this time on the subject of parting from our companion, and I +experienced that peculiar inward sinking that accompanies the birth of +the conviction one has been stuck. There were still some eight miles +between me and home, but I had at least the consolation of knowing that +the brown mare would easily cover it in forty minutes. But in this +also disappointment awaited me. Dropping her head to about the level +of her knees, the mare subsided into a walk as slow as that of the +slowest cow, and very similar in general style. In this manner I +progressed for a further mile, breathing forth, like St. Paul, +threatenings and slaughters against Bobby Bennett and all her +confederates; and then the idea occurred to me that many really +first-class hunters were very poor hacks. I consoled myself with this +for a further period, and presently an opportunity for testing it +presented itself. The road made a long loop round the flank of a hill, +and it was possible to save half a mile or so by getting into the +fields. It was a short cut I had often taken on the Quaker, and it +involved nothing more serious than a couple of low stone "gaps" and an +infantine bank. I turned Cruiskeen at the first of these. She was +evidently surprised. Being in an excessively bad temper, I beat her in +a way that surprised her even more, and she jumped the stones +precipitately and with an ease that showed she knew quite well what she +was about. I vented some further emotion upon her by the convenient +medium of my cane, and galloped her across the field and over the bank, +which, as they say in these parts, she "fled" without putting an iron +on it. It was not the right way to jump it, but it was inspiriting, +and when she had disposed of the next gap without hesitation my waning +confidence in Miss Bennett began to revive. I cantered over the ridge +of the hill, and down it towards the cottage near which I was +accustomed to get out on to the road again. As I neared my wonted +opening in the fence, I saw that it had been filled by a stout pole, +well fixed into the bank at each end, but not more than three feet +high. Cruiskeen pricked her ears at it with intelligence; I trotted +her at it, and gave her a whack. + +Ages afterwards there was some one speaking on the blurred edge of a +dream that I was dreaming about nothing in particular. I went on +dreaming, and was impressed by the shape of a fat jug, mottled white +and blue, that intruded itself painfully, and I again heard voices, +very urgent and full of effort, but quite outside any concern of mine. + +I also made an effort of some kind; I was doing my very best to be good +and polite, but I was dreaming in a place that whirred, and was +engrossing, and daylight was cold and let in some unknown +unpleasantness. For that time the dream got the better of the +daylight, and then, _apropos_ of nothing, I was standing up in a house +with some one's arm round me; the mottled jug was there, so was the +unpleasantness, and I was talking with most careful, old-world +politeness. + +"Sit down now, you're all right," said Miss Bobby Bennett, who was +mopping my face with a handkerchief dipped in the jug. + +I perceived that I was asking what had happened. + +"She fell over the stick with you," said Miss Bennett; "the dirty +brute!" + +With another great effort I hooked myself on to the march of events, as +a truck is dragged out of a siding and hooked to a train. + +"Oh, the Lord save us!" said a grey-haired woman who held the jug, +"ye're desthroyed entirely, asthore! Oh, glory be to the merciful will +of God, me heart lepped across me shesht when I seen him undher the +horse!" + +"Go out and see if the trap's coming," said Miss Bennett; "he should +have found the doctor by this." She stared very closely at my face, +and seemed to find it easier to talk in short sentences. + +"We must get those cuts looking better before Mrs. Yeates comes." + +After an interval, during which unexpected places in my head ached from +the cold water, the desire to be polite and coherent again came upon me. + +"I am sure it was not your mare's fault," I said. + +Miss Bennett laughed a very little. I was glad to see her laugh; it +had struck me her face was strangely haggard and frightened. + +"Well, of course it wasn't poor Cruiskeen's fault," she said. "She's +nearly home with Mr. Shute by now. That's why I came after you!" + +"Mr. Shute!" I said; "wasn't he at the fair that day?" + +"He was," answered Miss Bobby, looking at me with very compassionate +eyes; "you and he got on each other's horses by mistake at the hotel, +and you got the worst of the exchange!" + +"Oh!" I said, without even trying to understand. + +"He's here within, your honour's ladyship, Mrs. Yeates, ma'am," shouted +the grey-haired woman at the door; "don't be unaisy, achudth; he's +doing grand. Sure, I'm telling Miss Binnitt if she was his wife +itself, she couldn't give him betther care!" + +The grey-haired woman laughed. + + + + +VIII + +THE HOLY ISLAND + +For three days of November a white fog stood motionless over the +country. All day and all night smothered booms and bangs away to the +south-west told that the Fastnet gun was hard at work, and the sirens +of the American liners uplifted their monstrous female voices as they +felt their way along the coast of Cork. On the third afternoon the +wind began to whine about the windows of Shreelane, and the barometer +fell like a stone. At 11 P.M. the storm rushed upon us with the roar +and the suddenness of a train; the chimneys bellowed, the tall old +house quivered, and the yelling wind drove against it, as a man puts +his shoulder against a door to burst it in. + +We none of us got much sleep, and if Mrs. Cadogan is to be +believed--which experience assures me she is not--she spent the night +in devotional exercises, and in ministering to the panic-stricken +kitchen-maid by the light of a Blessed candle. All that day the storm +screamed on, dry-eyed; at nightfall the rain began, and next morning, +which happened to be Sunday, every servant in the house was a messenger +of Job, laden with tales of leakages, floods, and fallen trees, and +inflated with the ill-concealed glory of their kind in evil tidings. +To Peter Cadogan, who had been to early Mass, was reserved the crowning +satisfaction of reporting that a big vessel had gone on the rocks at +Yokahn Point the evening before, and was breaking up fast; it was +rumoured that the crew had got ashore, but this feature, being +favourable and uninteresting, was kept as much as possible in the +background. Mrs. Cadogan, who had been to America in an ocean liner, +became at once the latest authority on shipwrecks, and was of opinion +that "whoever would be dhrownded, it wouldn't be thim lads o' sailors. +Sure wasn't there the greatest storm ever was in it the time meself was +on the say, and what'd thim fellows do but to put us below entirely in +the ship, and close down the doors on us, the way theirselves'd leg it +when we'd be dhrownding!" + +This view of the position was so startlingly novel that Philippa +withdrew suddenly from the task of ordering dinner, and fell up the +kitchen stairs in unsuitable laughter. Philippa has not the most +rudimentary capacity for keeping her countenance. + +That afternoon I was wrapped in the slumber, balmiest and most +profound, that follows on a wet Sunday luncheon, when Murray, our D.I. +of police, drove up in uniform, and came into the house on the top of a +gust that set every door banging and every picture dancing on the +walls. He looked as if his eyes had been blown out of his head, and he +wanted something to eat very badly. + +"I've been down at the wreck since ten o'clock this morning," he said, +"waiting for her to break up, and once she does there'll be trouble. +She's an American ship, and she's full up with rum, and bacon, and +butter, and all sorts. Bosanquet is there with all his coastguards, +and there are five hundred country people on the strand at this moment, +waiting for the fun to begin. I've got ten of my fellows there, and I +wish I had as many more. You'd better come back with me, Yeates, we +may want the Riot Act before all's done!" + +The heavy rain had ceased, but it seemed as if it had fed the wind +instead of calming it, and when Murray and I drove out of Shreelane, +the whole dirty sky was moving, full sailed, in from the south-west, +and the telegraph wires were hanging in a loop from the post outside +the gate. Nothing except a Skebawn car-horse would have faced the +whooping charges of the wind that came at us across Corran Lake; +stimulated mysteriously by whistles from the driver, Murray's yellow +hireling pounded woodenly along against the blast, till the smell of +the torn sea-weed was borne upon it, and we saw the Atlantic waves come +towering into the bay of Tralagough. + +The ship was, or had been, a three-masted barque; two of her masts were +gone, and her bows stood high out of water on the reef that forms one +of the shark-like jaws of the bay. The long strand was crowded with +black groups of people, from the bank of heavy shingle that had been +hurled over on to the road, down to the slope where the waves pitched +themselves and climbed and fought and tore the gravel back with them, +as though they had dug their fingers in. The people were nearly all +men, dressed solemnly and hideously in their Sunday clothes; most of +them had come straight from Mass without any dinner, true to that Irish +instinct that places its fun before its food. That the wreck was +regarded as a spree of the largest kind was sufficiently obvious. Our +car pulled up at a public-house that stood askew between the road and +the shingle; it was humming with those whom Irish publicans are pleased +to call "Bon feeds," and sundry of the same class were clustered round +the door. Under the wall on the lee-side was seated a bagpiper, +droning out "The Irish Washerwoman" with nodding head and tapping heel, +and a young man was cutting a few steps of a jig for the delectation of +a group of girls. + +So far Murray's constabulary had done nothing but exhibit their +imposing chest measurement and spotless uniforms to the Atlantic, and +Bosanquet's coastguards had only salvaged some spars, the debris of a +boat, and a dead sheep, but their time was coming. As we stumbled down +over the shingle, battered by the wind and pelted by clots of foam, +some one beside me shouted, "She's gone!" A hill of water had +smothered the wreck, and when it fell from her again nothing was left +but the bows, with the bowsprit hanging from them in a tangle of +rigging. The clouds, bronzed by an unseen sunset, hung low over her; +in that greedy pack of waves, with the remorseless rocks above and +below her, she seemed the most lonely and tormented of creatures. + +About half-an-hour afterwards the cargo began to come ashore on the top +of the rising tide. Barrels were plunging and diving in the trough of +the waves, like a school of porpoises; they were pitched up the beach +in waist-deep rushes of foam; they rolled down again, and were swung up +and shouldered by the next wave, playing a kind of Tom Tiddler's ground +with the coastguards. Some of the barrels were big and dangerous, some +were small and nimble like young pigs, and the bluejackets were up to +their middles as their prey dodged and ducked, and the police lined out +along the beach to keep back the people. Ten men of the R.I.C. can do +a great deal, but they cannot be in more than twenty or thirty places +at the same instant; therefore they could hardly cope with a scattered +and extremely active mob of four or five hundred, many of whom had +taken advantage of their privileges as "bon-fide travellers," and all +of whom were determined on getting at the rum. + +As the dusk fell the thing got more and more out of hand; the people +had found out that the big puncheons held the rum, and had succeeded in +capturing one. In the twinkling of an eye it was broached, and fifty +backs were shoving round it like a football scrummage. I have heard +many rows in my time: I have seen two Irish regiments--one of them +Militia--at each other's throats in Fermoy barracks; I have heard +Philippa's water spaniel and two fox-terriers hunting a strange cat +round the dairy; but never have I known such untrammelled bedlam as +that which yelled round the rum-casks on Tralagough strand. For it was +soon not a question of one broached cask, or even of two. The barrels +were coming in fast, so fast that it was impossible for the +representatives of law and order to keep on any sort of terms with +them. The people, shouting with laughter, stove in the casks, and +drank rum at 34 above proof, out of their hands, out of their hats, +out of their boots. Women came fluttering over the hillsides through +the twilight, carrying jugs, milk-pails, anything that would hold the +liquor; I saw one of them, roaring with laughter, tilt a filthy zinc +bucket to an old man's lips. + +With the darkness came anarchy. The rising tide brought more and yet +more booty: great spars came lunging in on the lap of the waves, mixed +up with cabin furniture, seamen's chests, and the black and slippery +barrels, and the country people continued to flock in, and the drinking +became more and more unbridled. Murray sent for more men and a doctor, +and we slaved on hopelessly in the dark, collaring half-drunken men, +shoving pig-headed casks up hills of shingle, hustling in among groups +of roaring drinkers--we rescued perhaps one barrel in half-a-dozen. I +began to know that there were men there who were not drunk and were not +idle; I was also aware, as the strenuous hours of darkness passed, of +an occasional rumble of cart wheels on the road. It was evident that +the casks which were broached were the least part of the looting, but +even they were beyond our control. The most that Bosanquet, Murray, +and I could do was to concentrate our forces on the casks that had been +secured, and to organise charges upon the swilling crowds in order to +upset the casks that they had broached. Already men and boys were +lying about, limp as leeches, motionless as the dead. + +"They'll kill themselves before morning, at this rate!" shouted Murray +to me. "They're drinking it by the quart! Here's another barrel; come +on!" + +We rallied our small forces, and after a brief but furious struggle +succeeded in capsizing it. It poured away in a flood over the stones, +over the prostrate figures that sprawled on them, and a howl of +reproach followed. + +"If ye pour away any more o' that, Major," said an unctuous voice in my +ear, "ye'll intoxicate the stones and they'll be getting up and +knocking us down!" + +I had been aware of a fat shoulder next to mine in the throng as we +heaved the puncheon over, and I now recognised the ponderous wit and +Falstaffian figure of Mr. James Canty, a noted member of the Skebawn +Board of Guardians, and the owner of a large farm near at hand. + +"I never saw worse work on this strand," he went on. "I considher +these debaucheries a disgrace to the counthry." + +Mr. Canty was famous as an orator, and I presume that it was from long +practice among his fellow P.L.G.'s that he was able, without apparent +exertion, to out-shout the storm. + +At this juncture the long-awaited reinforcements arrived, and along +with them came Dr. Jerome Hickey, armed with a black bag. Having +mentioned that the bag contained a pump--not one of the common or +garden variety--and that no pump on board a foundering ship had more +arduous labours to perform, I prefer to pass to other themes. The +wreck, which had at first appeared to be as inexhaustible and as +variously stocked as that in the "Swiss Family Robinson," was beginning +to fail in its supply. The crowd were by this time for the most part +incapable from drink, and the fresh contingent of police tackled their +work with some prospect of success by the light of a tar barrel, +contributed by the owner of the public-house. At about the same time I +began to be aware that I was aching with fatigue, that my clothes hung +heavy and soaked upon me, that my face was stiff with the salt spray +and the bitter wind, and that it was two hours past dinner-time. The +possibility of fried salt herrings and hot whisky and water at the +public-house rose dazzlingly before my mind, when Mr. Canty again +crossed my path. + +"In my opinion ye have the whole cargo under conthrol now, Major," he +said, "and the police and the sailors should be able to account for it +all now by the help of the light. Wasn't I the finished fool that I +didn't think to send up to my house for a tar barrel before now! +Well--we're all foolish sometimes! But indeed it's time for us to give +over, and that's what I'm after saying to the Captain and Mr. Murray. +You're exhausted now the three of ye, and if I might make so bold, I'd +suggest that ye'd come up to my little place and have what'd warm ye +before ye'd go home. It's only a few perches up the road." + +The tide had turned, the rain had begun again, and the tar barrel +illumined the fact that Dr. Hickey's dreadful duties alone were +pressing. We held a council and finally followed Mr. Canty, picking +our way through wreckage of all kinds, including the human variety. +Near the public-house I stumbled over something that was soft and had a +squeak in it; it was the piper, with his head and shoulders in an +overturned rum-barrel, and the bagpipes still under his arm. + +I knew the outward appearance of Mr. Canty's house very well. It was a +typical southern farm-house, with dirty whitewashed walls, a slated +roof, and small, hermetically-sealed windows staring at the morass of +manure which constituted the yard. We followed Mr. Canty up the filthy +lane that led to it, picked our way round vague and squelching spurs of +the manure heap, and were finally led through the kitchen into a +stifling best parlour. Mrs. Canty, a vast and slatternly matron, had +evidently made preparations for us; there was a newly-lighted fire +pouring flame up the chimney from layers of bogwood, there were whisky +and brandy on the table, and a plateful of biscuits sugared in white +and pink. Upon our hostess was a black silk dress which indifferently +concealed the fact that she was short of boot-laces, and that the boots +themselves had made many excursions to the yard and none to the +blacking-bottle. Her manners, however, were admirable, and while I +live I shall not forget her potato cakes. They came in hot and hot +from a pot-oven, they were speckled with caraway seeds, they swam in +salt butter, and we ate them shamelessly and greasily, and washed them +down with hot whisky and water; I knew to a nicety how ill I should be +next day, and heeded not. + +"Well, gentlemen," remarked Mr. Canty later on, in his best Board of +Guardians' manner, "I've seen many wrecks between this and the Mizen +Head, but I never witnessed a scene of more disgraceful ex-cess than +what was in it to-night." + +"Hear, hear!" murmured Bosanquet with unseemly levity. + +"I should say," went on Mr. Canty, "there was at one time to-night +upwards of one hundhred men dead dhrunk on the strand, or anyway so +dhrunk that if they'd attempt to spake they'd foam at the mouth." + +"The craytures!" interjected Mrs. Canty sympathetically. + +"But if they're dhrunk to-day," continued our host, "it's nothing at +all to what they'll be to-morrow and afther to-morrow, and it won't be +on the strand they'll be dhrinkin' it." + +"Why, where will it be?" said Bosanquet, with his disconcerting English +way of asking a point-blank question. + +Mr. Canty passed his hand over his red cheeks. + +"There'll be plenty asking that before all's said and done, Captain," +he said, with a compassionate smile, "and there'll be plenty that could +give the answer if they'll like, but by dam I don't think ye'll be apt +to get much out of the Yokahn boys!" + +"The Lord save us, 'twould be better to keep out from the likes o' +thim!" put in Mrs. Canty, sliding a fresh avalanche of potato cakes on +to the dish; "didn't they pull the clothes off the gauger and pour +potheen down his throath till he ran screeching through the streets o' +Skebawn!" + +James Canty chuckled. + +"I remember there was a wreck here one time, and the undherwriters put +me in charge of the cargo. Brandy it was--cases of the best Frinch +brandy. The people had a song about it, what's this the first verse +was-- + + "One night to the rocks of Yokahn + Came the barque _Isabella_ so dandy, + To pieces she went before dawn, + Herself and her cargo of brandy. + And all met a wathery grave + Excepting the vessel's car_pen_ther, + Poor fellow, so far from his home." + + +Mr. Canty chanted these touching lines in a tuneful if wheezy tenor. +"Well, gentlemen, we're all friends here," he continued, "and it's no +harm to mention that this man below at the public-house came askin' me +would I let him have some of it for a consideration. 'Sullivan,' says +I to him, 'if ye ran down gold in a cup in place of the brandy, I +wouldn't give it to you. Of coorse,' says I, 'I'm not sayin' but that +if a bottle was to get a crack of a stick, and it to be broken, and a +man to drink a glass out of it, that would be no more than an +accident.' 'That's no good to me,' says he, 'but if I had twelve +gallons of that brandy in Cork,' says he, 'by the Holy German!' says +he, saying an awful curse, 'I'd sell twenty-five out of it!' Well, +indeed, it was true for him; it was grand stuff. As the saying is, it +would make a horse out of a cow!" + +"It appears to be a handy sort of place for keeping a pub," said +Bosanquet. + +"Shut to the door, Margaret," said Mr. Canty with elaborate caution. +"It'd be a queer place that wouldn't be handy for Sullivan!" + +A further tale of great length was in progress when Dr. Hickey's +Mephistophelian nose was poked into the best parlour. + +"Hullo, Hickey! Pumped out? eh?" said Murray. + +"If I am, there's plenty more like me," replied the Doctor +enigmatically, "and some of them three times over! James, did these +gentlemen leave you a drop of anything that you'd offer me?" + +"Maybe ye'd like a glass of rum, Doctor?" said Mr. Canty with a wink at +his other guests. + +Dr. Hickey shuddered. + +I had next morning precisely the kind of mouth that I had anticipated, +and it being my duty to spend the better part of the day administering +justice in Skebawn, I received from Mr. Flurry Knox and other of my +brother magistrates precisely the class of condolences on my "Monday +head" that I found least amusing. It was unavailing to point out the +resemblance between hot potato cakes and molten lead, or to dilate on +their equal power of solidifying; the collective wisdom of the Bench +decided that I was suffering from contraband rum, and rejoiced over me +accordingly. + +During the next three weeks Murray and Bosanquet put in a time only to +be equalled by that of the heroes in detective romances. They began by +acting on the hint offered by Mr. Canty, and were rewarded by finding +eight barrels of bacon and three casks of rum in the heart of Mr. +Sullivan's turf rick, placed there, so Mr. Sullivan explained with much +detail, by enemies, with the object of getting his licence taken away. +They stabbed potato gardens with crowbars to find the buried barrels, +they explored the chimneys, they raided the cow-houses; and in every +possible and impossible place they found some of the cargo of the late +barque _John D. Williams_, and, as the sympathetic Mr. Canty said, "For +as much as they found, they left five times as much afther them!" + +It was a wet, lingering autumn, but towards the end of November the +rain dried up, the weather stiffened, and a week of light frosts and +blue skies was offered as a tardy apology. Philippa possesses, in +common with many of her sex, an inappeasable passion for picnics, and +her ingenuity for devising occasions for them is only equalled by her +gift for enduring their rigours. I have seen her tackle a moist +chicken pie with a splinter of slate and my stylograph pen. I have +known her to take the tea-basket to an auction, and make tea in a +four-wheeled inside car, regardless of the fact that it was coming +under the hammer in ten minutes, and that the kettle took twenty +minutes to boil. It will therefore be readily understood that the rare +occasions when I was free to go out with a gun were not allowed to pass +uncelebrated by the tea-basket. + +"You'd much better shoot Corran Lake to-morrow," my wife said to me one +brilliant afternoon. "We could send the punt over, and I could meet +you on Holy Island with----" + +The rest of the sentence was concerned with ways, means, and the +tea-basket, and need not be recorded. + +I had taken the shooting of a long snipe bog that trailed from Corran +Lake almost to the sea at Tralagough, and it was my custom to begin to +shoot from the seaward end of it, and finally to work round the lake +after duck. + +To-morrow proved a heavenly morning, touched with frost, gilt with sun. +I started early, and the mists were still smoking up from the calm, +all-reflecting lake, as the Quaker stepped out along the level road, +smashing the thin ice on the puddles with his big feet. Behind the +calves of my legs sat Maria, Philippa's brown Irish water-spaniel, +assiduously licking the barrels of my gun, as was her custom when the +ecstasy of going out shooting was hers. Maria had been given to +Philippa as a wedding-present, and since then it had been my wife's +ambition that she should conform to the Beth Gelert standard of being +"a lamb at home, a lion in the chase." Maria did pretty well as a +lion: she hunted all dogs unmistakably smaller than herself, and +whenever it was reasonably possible to do so she devoured the spoils of +the chase, notably jack snipe. It was as a lamb that she failed; +objectionable as I have no doubt a lamb would be as a domestic pet, it +at least would not snatch the cold beef from the luncheon-table, nor +yet, if banished for its crimes, would it spend the night in scratching +the paint off the hall door. Maria bit beggars (who valued their +disgusting limbs at five shillings the square inch), she bullied the +servants, she concealed ducks' claws and fishes' backbones behind the +sofa cushions, and yet, when she laid her brown snout upon my knee, and +rolled her blackguard amber eyes upon me, and smote me with her +feathered paw, it was impossible to remember her iniquities against +her. On shooting mornings Maria ceased to be a buccaneer, a glutton, +and a hypocrite. From the moment when I put my gun together her +breakfast stood untouched until it suffered the final degradation of +being eaten by the cats, and now in the trap she was shivering with +excitement, and agonising in her soul lest she should even yet be left +behind. + +Slipper met me at the cross roads from which I had sent back the trap; +Slipper, redder in the nose than anything I had ever seen off the +stage, very husky as to the voice, and going rather tender on both +feet. He informed me that I should have a grand day's shooting, the +head-poacher of the locality having, in a most gentlemanlike manner, +refrained from exercising his sporting rights the day before, on +hearing that I was coming. I understood that this was to be considered +as a mark of high personal esteem, and I set to work at the bog with +suitable gratitude. + +In spite of Mr. O'Driscoll's magnanimity, I had not a very good +morning. The snipe were there, but in the perfect stillness of the +weather it was impossible to get near them, and five times out of six +they were up, flickering and dodging, before I was within shot. Maria +became possessed of seven devils and broke away from heel the first +time I let off my gun, ranging far and wide in search of the bird I had +missed, and putting up every live thing for half a mile round, as she +went splashing and steeple-chasing through the bog. Slipper expressed +his opinion of her behaviour in language more appallingly picturesque +and resourceful than any I have heard, even in the Skebawn Courthouse; +I admit that at the time I thought he spoke very suitably. Before she +was recaptured every remaining snipe within earshot was lifted out of +it by Slipper's steam-engine whistles and my own infuriated bellows; it +was fortunate that the bog was spacious and that there was still a long +tract of it ahead, where beyond these voices there was peace. + +I worked my way on, jumping treacle-dark drains, floundering through +the rustling yellow rushes, circumnavigating the bog-holes, and taking +every possible and impossible chance of a shot; by the time I had +reached Corran Lake I had got two and a half brace, retrieved by Maria +with a perfection that showed what her powers were when the sinuous +adroitness of Slipper's woodbine stick was fresh in her mind. But with +Maria it was always the unexpected that happened. My last snipe, a +jack, fell in the lake, and Maria, bursting through the reeds with +kangaroo bounds, and cleaving the water like a torpedo-boat, was a +model of all the virtues of her kind. She picked up the bird with a +snake-like dart of her head, clambered with it on to a tussock, and +there, well out of reach of the arm of the law, before our indignant +eyes crunched it twice and bolted it. + +"Well," said Slipper complacently, some ten minutes afterwards, "divil +such a bating ever I gave a dog since the day Prince killed owld Mrs. +Knox's paycock! Prince was a lump of a brown tarrier I had one time, +and faith I kicked the toes out o' me owld boots on him before I had +the owld lady composed!" + +However composing Slipper's methods may have been to Mrs. Knox, they +had quite the contrary effect upon a family party of duck that had been +lying in the reeds. With horrified outcries they broke into flight, +and now were far away on the ethereal mirror of the lake, among strings +of their fellows that were floating and quacking in preoccupied +indifference to my presence. + +A promenade along the lake-shore demonstrated the fact that without a +boat there was no more shooting for me; I looked across to the island +where, some time ago, I had seen Philippa and her punt arrive. The +boat was tied to an overhanging tree, but my wife was nowhere to be +seen. I was opening my mouth to give a hail, when I saw her emerge +precipitately from among the trees and jump into the boat; Philippa had +not in vain spent many summers on the Thames, she was under way in a +twinkling, sculled a score of strokes at the rate of a finish, then +stopped and stared at the peaceful island. I called to her, and in a +minute or two the punt had crackled through the reeds, and shoved its +blunt nose ashore at the spot where I was standing. + +"Sinclair," said Philippa in awe-struck tones, "there's something on +the island!" + +"I hope there's something to eat there," said I. + +"I tell you there _is_ something there, alive," said my wife with her +eyes as large as saucers; "it's making an awful sound like snoring." + +"That's the fairies, ma'am," said Slipper with complete certainty; +"sure I known them that seen fairies in that island as thick as the +grass, and every one o' them with little caps on them." + +Philippa's wide gaze wandered to Slipper's hideous pug face and back to +me. + +"It was not a human being, Sinclair!" she said combatively, though I +had not uttered a word. + +Maria had already, after the manner of dogs, leaped, dripping, into the +boat: I prepared to follow her example. + +"Major," said Slipper, in a tragic whisper, "there was a man was a +night on that island one time, watching duck, and Thim People cot him, +and dhragged him through Hell and through Death, and threw him in the +tide----" + +"Shove off the boat," I said, too hungry for argument. + +Slipper obeyed, throwing his knee over the gunwale as he did so, and +tumbling into the bow; we could have done without him very comfortably, +but his devotion was touching. + +Holy Island was perhaps a hundred yards long, and about half as many +broad; it was covered with trees and a dense growth of rhododendrons; +somewhere in the jungle was a ruined fragment of a chapel, smothered in +ivy and briars, and in a little glade in the heart of the island there +was a holy well. We landed, and it was obviously a sore humiliation to +Philippa that not a sound was to be heard in the spell-bound silence of +the island, save the cough of a heron on a tree-top. + +"It _was_ there," she said, with an unconvinced glance at the +surrounding thickets. + +"Sure, I'll give a thrawl through the island, ma'am," volunteered +Slipper with unexpected gallantry, "an' if it's the divil himself is in +it, I'll rattle him into the lake!" + +He went swaggering on his search, shouting, "Hi, cock!" and whacking +the rhododendrons with his stick, and after an interval returned and +assured us that the island was uninhabited. Being provided with +refreshments he again withdrew, and Philippa and Maria and I fed +variously and at great length, and washed the plates with water from +the holy well. I was smoking a cigarette when we heard Slipper +addressing the solitudes at the farther end of the island, and ending +with one of his whisky-throated crows of laughter. + +He presently came lurching towards us through the bushes, and a glance +sufficed to show even Philippa--who was as incompetent a judge of such +matters as many of her sex--that he was undeniably screwed. + +"Major Yeates!" he began, "and Mrs. Major Yeates, with respex to ye, +I'm bastely dhrunk! Me head is light since the 'fluenzy, and the +docthor told me I should carry a little bottle-een o' sperrits----" + +"Look here," I said to Philippa, "I'll take him across, and bring the +boat back for you." + +"Sinclair," responded my wife with concentrated emotion, "I would +rather die than stay on this island alone!" + +Slipper was getting drunker every moment, but I managed to stow him on +his back in the bows of the punt, in which position he at once began to +uplift husky and wandering strains of melody. To this accompaniment +we, as Tennyson says, + + "moved from the brink like some full-breasted swan, + That, fluting a wild carol ere her death, + Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood + With swarthy web." + +Slipper would certainly have been none the worse for taking the flood, +and, as the burden of "Lannigan's Ball" strengthened and spread along +the tranquil lake, and the duck once more fled in justifiable +consternation, I felt much inclined to make him do so. + +We made for the end of the lake that was nearest Shreelane, and, as we +rounded the point of the island, another boat presented itself to our +view. It contained my late entertainer, Mrs. Canty, seated bulkily in +the stern, while a small boy bowed himself between the two heavy oars. + +"It's a lovely evening, Major Yeates," she called out. "I'm just going +to the island to get some water from the holy well for me daughter that +has an impression on her chest. Indeed, I thought 'twas yourself was +singing a song for Mrs. Yeates when I heard you coming, but sure +Slipper is a great warrant himself for singing." + +"May the divil crack the two legs undher ye!" bawled Slipper in +acknowledgment of the compliment. + +Mrs. Canty laughed genially, and her boat lumbered away. + +I shoved Slipper ashore at the nearest point; Philippa and I paddled to +the end of the lake, and abandoning the duck as a bad business, walked +home. + +A few days afterwards it happened that it was incumbent upon me to +attend the funeral of the Roman Catholic Bishop of the diocese. It was +what is called in France "_un bel enterrement_," with inky flocks of +tall-hatted priests, and countless yards of white scarves, and a repast +of monumental solidity at the Bishop's residence. The actual interment +was to take place in Cork, and we moved in long and imposing procession +to the railway station, where a special train awaited the cortge. My +friend Mr. James Canty was among the mourners: an important and active +personage, exchanging condolences with the priests, giving directions +to porters, and blowing his nose with a trumpeting mournfulness that +penetrated all the other noises of the platform. He was condescending +enough to notice my presence, and found time to tell me that he had +given Mr. Murray "a sure word" with regard to some of "_the +wreckage_"--this with deep significance, and a wink of an inflamed and +tearful eye. I saw him depart in a first-class carriage, and the odour +of sanctity; seeing that he was accompanied by seven priests, and that +both windows were shut, the latter must have been considerable. + +Afterwards, in the town, I met Murray, looking more pleased with +himself than I had seen him since he had taken up the unprofitable task +of smuggler-hunting. + +"Come along and have some lunch," he said, "I've got a real good thing +on this time! That chap Canty came to me late last night, and told me +that he knew for a fact that the island on Corran Lake was just stiff +with barrels of bacon and rum, and that I'd better send every man I +could spare to-day to get them into the town. I sent the men out at +eight o'clock this morning; I think I've gone one better than Bosanquet +this time!" + +I began to realise that Philippa was going to score heavily on the +subject of the fairies that she had heard snoring on the island, and I +imparted to Murray the leading features of our picnic there. + +"Oh, Slipper's been up to his chin in that rum from the first," said +Murray. "I'd like to know who his sleeping partner was!" + +It was beginning to get dark before the loaded carts of the salvage +party came lumbering past Murray's windows and into the yard of the +police-barrack. We followed them, and in so doing picked up Flurry +Knox, who was sauntering in the same direction. It was a good haul, +five big casks of rum, and at least a dozen smaller barrels of bacon +and butter, and Murray and his Chief Constable smiled seraphically on +one another as the spoil was unloaded and stowed in a shed. + +"Wouldn't it be as well to see how the butter is keeping?" remarked +Flurry, who had been looking on silently, with, as I had noticed, a +still and amused eye. "The rim of that small keg there looks as if it +had been shifted lately." + +The sergeant looked hard at Flurry; he knew as well as most people that +a hint from Mr. Knox was usually worth taking. He turned to Murray. + +"Will I open it, sir?" + +"Oh! open it if Mr. Knox wishes," said Murray, who was not famous for +appreciating other people's suggestions. + +The keg was opened. + +"Funny butter," said Flurry. + +The sergeant said nothing. The keg was full of black bog-mould. +Another was opened, and another, all with the same result. + +"Damnation!" said Murray, suddenly losing his temper. "What's the use +of going on with those? Try one of the rum casks." + +A few moments passed in total silence while a tap and a spigot were +sent for and applied to the barrel. The sergeant drew off a mugful and +put his nose to it with the deliberation of a connoisseur. + +"Water, sir," he pronounced, "dirty water, with a small indication of +sperrits." + +A junior constable tittered explosively, met the light blue glare of +Murray's eye, and withered away. + +"Perhaps it's holy water!" said I, with a wavering voice. + +Murray's glance pinned me like an assegai, and I also faded into the +background. + +"Well," said Flurry in dulcet tones, "if you want to know where the +stuff is that was in those barrels, I can tell you, for I was told it +myself half-an-hour ago. It's gone to Cork with the Bishop by special +train!" + + +Mr. Canty was undoubtedly a man of resource. Mrs. Canty had mistakenly +credited me with an intelligence equal to her own, and on receiving +from Slipper a highly coloured account of how audibly Mr. Canty had +slept off his potations, had regarded the secret of Holy Island as +having been given away. That night and the two succeeding ones were +spent in the transfer of the rum to bottles, and the bottles and the +butter to fish boxes; these were, by means of a slight lubrication of +the railway underlings, loaded into a truck as "Fresh Fish, Urgent," +and attached to the Bishop's funeral train, while the police, decoyed +far from the scene of action, were breaking their backs over barrels of +bog-water. "I suppose," continued Flurry pleasantly, "you don't know +the pub that Canty's brother has in Cork. Well, I do. I'm going to +buy some rum there next week, cheap." + +"I shall proceed against Canty," said Murray, with fateful calm. + +"You won't proceed far," said Flurry; "you'll not get as much evidence +out of the whole country as'd hang a cat." + +"Who was your informant?" demanded Murray. + +Flurry laughed. "Well, by the time the train was in Cork, yourself and +the Major were the only two men in the town that weren't talking about +it." + + + + +IX + +THE POLICY OF THE CLOSED DOOR + +The disasters and humiliations that befell me at Drumcurran Fair may +yet be remembered. They certainly have not been forgotten in the +regions about Skebawn, where the tale of how Bernard Shute and I stole +each other's horses has passed into history. The grand-daughter of the +Mountain Hare, bought by Mr. Shute with such light-hearted enthusiasm, +was restored to that position between the shafts of a cart that she was +so well fitted to grace; Moonlighter, his other purchase, spent the two +months following on the fair in "favouring" a leg with a strained +sinew, and in receiving visits from the local vet., who, however +uncertain in his diagnosis of Moonlighter's leg, had accurately +estimated the length of Bernard's foot. + +Miss Bennett's mare Cruiskeen, alone of the trio, was immediately and +thoroughly successful. She went in harness like a hero, she carried +Philippa like an elder sister, she was never sick or sorry; as Peter +Cadogan summed her up, "That one 'd live where another 'd die." In her +safe keeping Philippa made her dbut with hounds at an uneventful +morning's cubbing, with no particular result, except that Philippa +returned home so stiff that she had to go to bed for a day, and arose +more determined than ever to be a fox-hunter. + +The opening meet of Mr. Knox's foxhounds was on November 1, and on that +morning Philippa on Cruiskeen, accompanied by me on the Quaker, set out +for Ardmeen Cross, the time-honoured fixture for All Saints' Day. The +weather was grey and quiet, and full of all the moist sweetness of an +Irish autumn. There had been a great deal of rain during the past +month; it had turned the bracken to a purple brown, and had filled the +hollows with shining splashes of water. The dead leaves were slippery +under foot, and the branches above were thinly decked with yellow, +where the pallid survivors of summer still clung to their posts. As +Philippa and I sedately approached the meet the red coats of Flurry +Knox and his whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, were to be seen on the road at +the top of the hill; Cruiskeen put her head in the air, and stared at +them with eyes that understood all they portended. + +"Sinclair," said my wife hurriedly, as a straggling hound, flogged in +by Dr. Hickey, uttered a grievous and melodious howl, "remember, if +they find, it's no use to talk to me, for I shan't be able to speak." + +I was sufficiently acquainted with Philippa in moments of enthusiasm to +exhibit silently the corner of a clean pocket-handkerchief; I have seen +her cry when a police constable won a bicycle race in Skebawn; she has +wept at hearing Sir Valentine Knox's health drunk with musical honours +at a tenants' dinner. It is an amiable custom, but, as she herself +admits, it is unbecoming. + +An imposing throng, in point of numbers, was gathered at the +cross-roads, the riders being almost swamped in the crowd of traps, +outside cars, bicyclists, and people on foot. The field was an +eminently representative one. The Clan Knox was, as usual, there in +force, its more aristocratic members dingily respectable in black coats +and tall hats that went impartially to weddings, funerals, and hunts, +and, like a horse that is past mark of mouth, were no longer to be +identified with any special epoch; there was a humbler squireen element +in tweeds and flat-brimmed pot-hats, and a good muster of farmers, men +of the spare, black-muzzled, West of Ireland type, on horses that +ranged from the cart mare, clipped trace high, to shaggy and leggy +three-year-olds, none of them hunters, but all of them able to hunt. +Philippa and I worked our way to the heart of things, where was Flurry, +seated on his brown mare, in what appeared to be a somewhat moody +silence. As we exchanged greetings I was aware that his eye was +resting with extreme disfavour upon two approaching figures. I put up +my eye-glass, and perceived that one of them was Miss Sally Knox, on a +tall grey horse; the other was Mr. Bernard Shute, in all the flawless +beauty of his first pink coat, mounted on Stockbroker, a well-known, +hard-mouthed, big-jumping bay, recently purchased from Dr. Hickey. + +During the languors of a damp autumn the neighbourhood had been much +nourished and sustained by the privilege of observing and diagnosing +the progress of Mr. Shute's flirtation with Miss Sally Knox. What made +it all the more enjoyable for the lookers-on--or most of them--was, +that although Bernard's courtship was of the nature of a proclamation +from the housetops, Miss Knox's attitude left everything to the +imagination. To Flurry Knox the romantic but despicable position of +slighted rival was comfortably allotted; his sole sympathisers were +Philippa and old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas, but no one knew if he needed +sympathisers. Flurry was a man of mystery. + +Mr. Shute and Miss Knox approached us rapidly, the latter's mount +pulling hard. + +"Flurry," I said, "isn't that grey the horse Shute bought from you last +July at the fair?" + +Flurry did not answer me. His face was as black as thunder. He turned +his horse round, cursing two country boys who got in his way, with low +and concentrated venom, and began to move forward, followed by the +hounds. If his wish was to avoid speaking to Miss Sally it was not to +be gratified. + +"Good-morning, Flurry," she began, sitting close down to Moonlighter's +ramping jog as she rode up beside her cousin. "What a hurry you're in! +We passed no end of people on the road who won't be here for another +ten minutes." + +"No more will I," was Mr. Knox's cryptic reply, as he spurred the brown +mare into a trot. + +Moonlighter made a vigorous but frustrated effort to buck, and +indemnified himself by a successful kick at a hound. + +"Bother you, Flurry! Can't you walk for a minute?" exclaimed Miss +Sally, who looked about as large, in relation to her horse, as the +conventional tomtit on a round of beef. "You might have more sense +than to crack your whip under this horse's nose! I don't believe you +know what horse it is even!" + +I was not near enough to catch Flurry's reply. + +"Well, if you didn't want him to be lent to me you shouldn't have sold +him to Mr. Shute!" retorted Miss Knox, in her clear, provoking little +voice. + +"I suppose he's afraid to ride him himself," said Flurry, turning his +horse in at a gate. "Get ahead there, Jerome, can't you? It's better +to put them in at this end than to have every one riding on top of +them!" + +Miss Sally's cheeks were still very pink when I came up and began to +talk to her, and her grey-green eyes had a look in them like those of +an angry kitten. + +The riders moved slowly down a rough pasture-field, and took up their +position along the brow of Ardmeen covert, into which the hounds had +already hurled themselves with their customary contempt for the +convenances. Flurry's hounds, true to their nationality, were in the +habit of doing the right thing in the wrong way. + +Untouched by autumn, the furze bushes of Ardmeen covert were darkly +green, save for a golden fleck of blossom here and there, and the +glistening grey cobwebs that stretched from spike to spike. The look +of the ordinary gorse covert is familiar to most people as a tidy +enclosure of an acre or so, filled with low plants of well-educated +gorse; not so many will be found who have experience of it as a rocky, +sedgy wilderness, half a mile square, garrisoned with brigades of furze +bushes, some of them higher than a horse's head, lean, strong, and +cunning, like the foxes that breed in them, impenetrable, with their +bristling spikes, as a hedge of bayonets. By dint of infinite leisure +and obstinate greed, the cattle had made paths for themselves through +the bushes to the patches of grass that they hemmed in; their +hoofprints were guides to the explorer, down muddy staircases of rock, +and across black intervals of unplumbed bog. The whole covert slanted +gradually down to a small river that raced round three sides of it, and +beyond the stream, in agreeable contrast, lay a clean and wholesome +country of grass fields and banks. + +The hounds drew slowly along and down the hill towards the river, and +the riders hung about outside the covert, and tried--I can answer for +at least one of them--to decide which was the least odious of the ways +through it, in the event of the fox breaking at the far side. Miss +Sally took up a position not very far from me, and it was easy to see +that she had her hands full with her borrowed mount, on whose temper +the delay and suspense were visibly telling. His iron-grey neck was +white from the chafing of the reins; had the ground under his feet been +red-hot he could hardly have sidled and hopped more uncontrollably; +nothing but the most impassioned conjugation of the verb to condemn +could have supplied any human equivalent for the manner in which he +tore holes in the sedgy grass with a furious forefoot. Those who were +even superficial judges of character gave his heels a liberal allowance +of sea-room, and Mr. Shute, who could not be numbered among such, and +had, as usual, taken up a position as near Miss Sally as possible, was +rewarded by a double knock on his horse's ribs that was a cause of +heartless mirth to the lady of his affections. + +Not a hound had as yet spoken, but they were forcing their way through +the gorse forest and shoving each other jealously aside with growing +excitement, and Flurry could be seen at intervals, moving forward in +the direction they were indicating. It was at this juncture that the +ubiquitous Slipper presented himself at my horse's shoulder. + +"'Tis for the river he's making, Major," he said, with an upward roll +of his squinting eyes, that nearly made me sea-sick. "He's a Castle +Knox fox that came in this morning, and ye should get ahead down to the +ford!" + +A tip from Slipper was not to be neglected, and Philippa and I began a +cautious progress through the gorse, followed by Miss Knox as quietly +as Moonlighter's nerves would permit. + +"Wishful has it!" she exclaimed, as a hound came out into view, uttered +a sharp yelp, and drove forward. + +"Hark! hark!" roared Flurry with at least three r's reverberating in +each "hark"; at the same instant came a holloa from the farther side of +the river, and Dr. Hickey's renowned and blood-curdling screech was +uplifted at the bottom of the covert. Then babel broke forth, as the +hounds, converging from every quarter, flung themselves shrieking on +the line. Moonlighter went straight up on his hind-legs, and dropped +again with a bound that sent him crushing past Philippa and Cruiskeen; +he did it a second time, and was almost on to the tail of the Quaker, +whose bulky person was not to be hurried in any emergency. + +"Get on if you can, Major Yeates!" called out Sally, steadying the grey +as well as she could in the narrow pathway between the great gorse +bushes. + +Other horses were thundering behind us, men were shouting to each other +in similar passages right and left of us, the cry of the hounds filled +the air with a kind of delirium. A low wall with a stick laid along it +barred the passage in front of me, and the Quaker firmly and +immediately decided not to have it until some one else had dislodged +the pole. + +"Go ahead!" I shouted, squeezing to one side with heroic disregard of +the furze bushes and my new tops. + +The words were hardly out of my mouth when Moonlighter, mad with +thwarted excitement, shot by me, hurtled over the obstacle with +extravagant fury, landed twelve feet beyond it on clattering slippery +rock, saved himself from falling with an eel-like forward buck on to +sedgy ground, and bolted at full speed down the muddy cattle track. +There are corners--rocky, most of them--in that cattle track, that +Sally has told me she will remember to her dying day; boggy holes of +any depth, ranging between two feet and half-way to Australia, that she +says she does not fail to mention in the General Thanksgiving; but at +the time they occupied mere fractions of the strenuous seconds in which +it was hopeless for her to do anything but try to steer, trust to luck, +sit hard down into the saddle and try to stay there. (For my part, I +would as soon try to adhere to the horns of a charging bull as to the +crutches of a side-saddle, but happily the necessity is not likely to +arise.) I saw Flurry Knox a little ahead of her on the same track, +jamming his mare into the furze bushes to get out of her way; he +shouted something after her about the ford, and started to gallop for +it himself by a breakneck short cut. + +The hounds were already across the river, and it was obvious that, ford +or no ford, Moonlighter's intentions might be simply expressed in the +formula "Be with them I will." It was all down-hill to the river, and +among the furze bushes and rocks there was neither time nor place to +turn him. He rushed at it with a shattering slip upon a streak of +rock, with a heavy plunge in the deep ground by the brink; it was as +bad a take-off for twenty feet of water as could well be found. The +grey horse rose out of the boggy stuff with all the impetus that pace +and temper could give, but it was not enough. For one instant the +twisting, sliding current was under Sally, the next a veil of water +sprang up all round her, and Moonlighter was rolling and lurching in +the desperate effort to find foothold in the rocky bed of the stream. + +I was following at the best pace I could kick out of the Quaker, and +saw the water swirl into her lap as her horse rolled to the near-side. +She caught the mane to save herself, but he struggled on to his legs +again, and came floundering broadside on to the farther bank. In three +seconds she had got out of the saddle and flung herself at the bank, +grasping the rushes, and trying, in spite of the sodden weight of her +habit, to drag herself out of the water. + +At the same instant I saw Flurry and the brown mare dashing through the +ford, twenty yards higher up. He was off his horse and beside her with +that uncanny quickness that Flurry reserved for moments of emergency, +and, catching her by the arms, swung her on to the bank as easily as if +she had been the kennel terrier. + +"Catch the horse!" she called out, scrambling to her feet. + +"Damn the horse!" returned Flurry, in the rage that is so often the +reaction from a bad scare. + +I turned along the bank and made for the ford; by this time it was full +of hustling, splashing riders, through whom Bernard Shute, furiously +picking up a bad start, drove a devastating way. He tried to turn his +horse down the bank towards Miss Knox, but the hounds were running +hard, and, to my intense amusement, Stockbroker refused to abandon the +chase, and swept his rider away in the wake of his stable companion, +Dr. Hickey's young chestnut. By this time two country boys had, as is +usual in such cases, risen from the earth, and fished Moonlighter out +of the stream. Miss Sally wound up an acrimonious argument with her +cousin by observing that she didn't care what he said, and placing her +water-logged boot in his obviously unwilling hand, in a second was +again in the saddle, gathering up the wet reins with the trembling, +clumsy fingers of a person who is thoroughly chilled and in a violent +hurry. She set Moonlighter going, and was away in a moment, galloping +him at the first fence at a pace that suited his steeple-chasing ideas. + +"Mr. Knox!" panted Philippa, who had by this time joined us, "make her +go home!" + +"She can go where she likes as far as I'm concerned," responded Mr. +Knox, pitching himself on his mare's back and digging in the spurs. + +Moonlighter had already glided over the bank in front of us, with a +perfunctory flick at it with his heels; Flurry's mare and Cruiskeen +jumped it side by side with equal precision. It was a bank of some +five feet high; the Quaker charged it enthusiastically, refused it +abruptly, and, according to his infuriating custom at such moments, +proceeded to tear hurried mouthfuls of grass. + +"Will I give him a couple o' belts, your Honour?" shouted one of the +running accompaniment of country boys. + +"You will!" said I, with some further remarks to the Quaker that I need +not commit to paper. + +Swish! Whack! The sound was music in my ears, as the good, +remorseless ash sapling bent round the Quaker's dappled hind-quarters. +At the third stripe he launched both his heels in the operator's face; +at the fourth he reared undecidedly; at the fifth he bundled over the +bank in a manner purged of hesitation. + +"Ha!" yelled my assistants, "that'll put the fear o' God in him!" as +the Quaker fled headlong after the hunt. "He'll be the betther o' that +while he lives!" + +Without going quite as far as this, I must admit that for the next +half-hour he was astonishingly the better of it. + +The Castle Knox fox was making a very pretty line of it over the seven +miles that separated him from his home. He headed through a grassy +country of Ireland's mild and brilliant green, fenced with sound and +buxom banks, enlivened by stone walls, uncompromised by the presence of +gates, and yet comfortably laced with lanes for the furtherance of +those who had laid to heart Wolsey's valuable advice: "Fling away +ambition: by that sin fell the angels." The flotsam and jetsam of the +hunt pervaded the landscape: standing on one long bank, three +dismounted farmers flogged away at the refusing steeds below them, like +anglers trying to rise a sulky fish; half-a-dozen hats, bobbing in a +string, showed where the road riders followed the delusive windings of +a bohereen. It was obvious that in the matter of ambition they would +not have caused Cardinal Wolsey a moment's uneasiness; whether angels +or otherwise, they were not going to run any risk of falling. + +Flurry's red coat was like a beacon two fields ahead of me, with +Philippa following in his tracks; it was the first run worthy of the +name that Philippa had ridden, and I blessed Miss Bobby Bennett as I +saw Cruiskeen's undefeated fencing. An encouraging twang of the +Doctor's horn notified that the hounds were giving us a chance; even +the Quaker pricked his blunt ears and swerved in his stride to the +sound. A stone wall, a rough patch of heather, a boggy field, dinted +deep and black with hoof marks, and the stern chase was at an end. The +hounds had checked on the outskirts of a small wood, and the field, +thinned down to a panting dozen or so, viewed us with the disfavour +shown by the first flight towards those who unexpectedly add to their +select number. In the depths of the wood Dr. Hickey might be heard +uttering those singular little yelps of encouragement that to the +irreverent suggest a milkman in his dotage. Bernard Shute, who neither +knew nor cared what the hounds were doing, was expatiating at great +length to an uninterested squireen upon the virtues and perfections of +his new mount. + +"I did all I knew to come and help you at the river," he said, riding +up to the splashed and still dripping Sally, "but Stockbroker wouldn't +hear of it. I pulled his ugly head round till his nose was on my boot, +but he galloped away just the same!" + +"He was quite right," said Miss Sally; "I didn't want you in the least." + +As Miss Sally's red gold coil of hair was turned towards me during this +speech, I could only infer the glance with which it was delivered, from +the fact that Mr. Shute responded to it with one of those firm gazes of +adoration in which the neighbourhood took such an interest, and +crumbled away into incoherency. + +A shout from the top of a hill interrupted the amenities of the check; +Flurry was out of the wood in half-a-dozen seconds, blowing shattering +blasts upon his horn, and the hounds rushed to him, knowing the "gone +away" note that was never blown in vain. The brown mare came out +through the trees and the undergrowth like a woodcock down the wind, +and jumped across a stream on to a more than questionable bank; the +hounds splashed and struggled after him, and, as they landed, the first +ecstatic whimpers broke forth. In a moment it was full cry, +discordant, beautiful, and soul-stirring, as the pack spread and sped, +and settled to the line. I saw the absurd dazzle of tears in +Philippa's eyes, and found time for the insulting proffer of the clean +pocket-handkerchief, as we all galloped hard to get away on good terms +with the hounds. + +It was one of those elect moments in fox-hunting when the fittest alone +have survived; even the Quaker's sluggish blood was stirred by good +company, and possibly by the remembrance of the singing ash-plant, and +he lumbered up tall stone-faced banks and down heavy drops, and across +wide ditches, in astounding adherence to the line cut out by Flurry. +Cruiskeen went like a book--a story for girls, very pleasant and safe, +but rather slow. Moonlighter was pulling Miss Sally on to the sterns +of the hounds, flying his banks, rocketing like a pheasant over +three-foot walls--committing, in fact, all the crimes induced by youth +and over-feeding; he would have done very comfortably with another six +or seven stone on his back. + +Why Bernard Shute did not come off at every fence and generally die a +thousand deaths I cannot explain. Occasionally I rather wished he +would, as, from my secure position in the rear, I saw him charging his +fences at whatever pace and place seemed good to the thoroughly +demoralised Stockbroker, and in so doing cannon heavily against Dr. +Hickey on landing over a rotten ditch, jump a wall with his spur +rowelling Charlie Knox's boot, and cut in at top speed in front of +Flurry, who was scientifically cramming his mare up a very awkward +scramble. In so far as I could think of anything beyond Philippa and +myself and the next fence, I thought there would be trouble for Mr. +Shute in consequence of this last feat. It was a half-hour long to be +remembered, in spite of the Quaker's ponderous and unalterable gallop, +in spite of the thump with which he came down off his banks, in spite +of the confiding manner in which he hung upon my hand. + +We were nearing Castle Knox, and the riders began to edge away from the +hounds towards a gate that broke the long barrier of the demesne wall. +Steaming horses and purple-faced riders clattered and crushed in at the +gate; there was a moment of pulling up and listening, in which +quivering tails and pumping sides told their own story. Cruiskeen's +breathing suggested a cross between a grampus and a gramophone; +Philippa's hair had come down, and she had a stitch in her side. +Moonlighter, fresher than ever, stamped and dragged at his bit; I +thought little Miss Sally looked very white. The bewildering clamour +of the hounds was all through the wide laurel plantations. At a word +from Flurry, Dr. Hickey shoved his horse ahead and turned down a ride, +followed by most of the field. + +"Philippa," I said severely, "you've had enough, and you know it." + +"Do go up to the house and make them give you something to eat," struck +in Miss Sally, twisting Moonlighter round to keep his mind occupied. + +"And as for you, Miss Sally," I went on, in the manner of Mr. +Fairchild, "the sooner you get off that horse and out of those wet +things the better." + +Flurry, who was just in front of us, said nothing, but gave a short and +most disagreeable laugh. Philippa accepted my suggestion with the +meekness of exhaustion, but under the circumstances it did not surprise +me that Miss Sally did not follow her example. + +Then ensued an hour of woodland hunting at its worst and most +bewildering. I galloped after Flurry and Miss Sally up and down long +glittering lanes of laurel, at every other moment burying my face in +the Quaker's coarse white mane to avoid the slash of the branches, and +receiving down the back of my neck showers of drops stored up from the +rain of the day before; playing an endless game of hide-and-seek with +the hounds, and never getting any nearer to them, as they turned and +doubled through the thickets of evergreens. Even to my limited +understanding of the situation it became clear at length that two foxes +were on foot; most of the hounds were hard at work a quarter of a mile +away, but Flurry, with a grim face and a faithful three couple, stuck +to the failing line of the hunted fox. + +There came a moment when Miss Sally and I--who through many +vicissitudes had clung to each other--found ourselves at a spot where +two rides crossed. Flurry was waiting there, and a little way up one +of the rides a couple of hounds were hustling to and fro, with the +thwarted whimpers half breaking from them; he held up his hand to stop +us, and at that identical moment Bernard Shute, like a bolt from the +blue, burst upon our vision. It need scarcely be mentioned that he was +going at full gallop--I have rarely seen him ride at any other +pace--and as he bore down upon Flurry and the hounds, ducking and +dodging to avoid the branches, he shouted something about a fox having +gone away at the other side of the covert. + +"Hold hard!" roared Flurry; "don't you see the hounds, you fool?" + +Mr. Shute, to do him justice, held hard with all the strength of his +body, but it was of no avail. The bay horse had got his head down and +his tail up, there was a piercing yell from a hound as it was ridden +over, and Flurry's brown mare will not soon forget the moment when +Stockbroker's shoulder took her on the point of the hip and sent her +staggering into the laurel branches. As she swung round, Flurry's whip +went up, and with a swift backhander the cane and the looped thong +caught Bernard across his broad shoulders. + +"O Mr. Shute!" shrieked Miss Sally, as I stared dumfoundered; "did that +branch hurt you?" + +"All right! Nothing to signify!" he called out as he bucketed past, +tugging at his horse's head. "Thought some one had hit me at first! +Come on, we'll catch 'em up this way!" + +He swung perilously into the main ride and was gone, totally unaware of +the position that Miss Sally's quickness had saved. + +Flurry rode straight up to his cousin, with a pale, dangerous face. + +"I suppose you think I'm to stand being ridden over and having my +hounds killed to please you," he said; "but you're mistaken. You were +very smart, and you may think you've saved him his licking, but you +needn't think he won't get it. He'll have it in spite of you, before +he goes to his bed this night!" + +A man who loses his temper badly because he is badly in love is +inevitably ridiculous, far though he may be from thinking himself so. +He is also a highly unpleasant person to argue with, and Miss Sally and +I held our peace respectfully. He turned his horse and rode away. + +Almost instantly the three couple of hounds opened in the underwood +near us with a deafening crash, and not twenty yards ahead the hunted +fox, dark with wet and mud, slunk across the ride. The hounds were +almost on his brush; Moonlighter reared and chafed; the din was +redoubled, passed away to a little distance, and suddenly seemed +stationary in the middle of the laurels. + +"Could he have got into the old ice-house?" exclaimed Miss Sally, with +reviving excitement. She pushed ahead, and turned down the narrowest +of all the rides that had that day been my portion. At the end of the +green tunnel there was a comparatively open space; Flurry's mare was +standing in it, riderless, and Flurry himself was hammering with a +stone at the padlock of a door that seemed to lead into the heart of a +laurel clump. The hounds were baying furiously somewhere back of the +entrance, among the laurel stems. + +"He's got in by the old ice drain," said Flurry, addressing himself +sulkily to me, and ignoring Miss Sally. He had not the least idea of +how absurd was his scowling face, draped by the luxuriant +hart's-tongues that overhung the doorway. + +The padlock yielded, and the opening door revealed a low, dark passage, +into which Flurry disappeared, lugging a couple of hounds with him by +the scruff of the neck; the remaining two couple bayed implacably at +the mouth of the drain. The croak of a rusty bolt told of a second +door at the inner end of the passage. + +"Look out for the steps, Flurry, they're all broken," called out Miss +Sally in tones of honey. + +There was no answer. Miss Sally looked at me; her face was serious, +but her mischievous eyes made a confederate of me. + +"He's in an _awful_ rage!" she said. "I'm afraid there will certainly +be a row." + +A row there certainly was, but it was in the cavern of the ice-house, +where the fox had evidently been discovered. Miss Sally suddenly flung +Moonlighter's reins to me and slipped off his back. + +"Hold him!" she said, and dived into the doorway under the overhanging +branches. + +Things happened after that with astonishing simultaneousness. There +was a shrill exclamation from Miss Sally, the inner door was slammed +and bolted, and at one and the same moment the fox darted from the +entry, and was away into the wood before one could wink. + +"What's happened?" I called out, playing the refractory Moonlighter +like a salmon. + +Miss Sally appeared at the doorway, looking half scared and half +delighted. + +"I've bolted him in, and I won't let him out till he promises to be +good! I was only just in time to slam the door after the fox bolted +out!" + +"Great Scott!" I said helplessly. + +Miss Sally vanished again into the passage, and the imprisoned hounds +continued to express their emotions in the echoing vault of the +ice-house. Their master remained mute as the dead, and I trembled. + +"Flurry!" I heard Miss Sally say. "Flurry, I--I've locked you in!" + +This self-evident piece of information met with no response. + +"Shall I tell you why?" + +A keener note seemed to indicate that a hound had been kicked. + +"I don't care whether you answer me or not, I'm going to tell you!" + +There was a pause; apparently telling him was not as simple as had been +expected. + +"I won't let you out till you promise me something. Ah, Flurry, don't +be so cross! What do you say?---- Oh, that's a ridiculous thing to +say. You know quite well it's not on his account!" + +There was another considerable pause. + +"Flurry!" said Miss Sally again, in tones that would have wiled a +badger from his earth. "Dear Flurry--" + +At this point I hurriedly flung Moonlighter's bridle over a branch and +withdrew. + +My own subsequent adventures are quite immaterial, until the moment +when I encountered Miss Sally on the steps of the hall door at Castle +Knox. + +"I'm just going in to take off these wet things," she said airily. + +This was no way to treat a confederate. + +"Well?" I said, barring her progress. + +"Oh--he--he promised. It's all right," she replied, rather +breathlessly. + +There was no one about; I waited resolutely for further information. +It did not come. + +"Did he try to make his own terms?" said I, looking hard at her. + +"Yes, he did." She tried to pass me. + +"And what did you do?" + +"I refused them!" she said, with the sudden stagger of a sob in her +voice, as she escaped into the house. + +Now what on earth was Sally Knox crying about? + + + + +X + +THE HOUSE OF FAHY + +Nothing could shake the conviction of Maria that she was by nature and +by practice a house dog. Every one of Shreelane's many doors had, at +one time or another, slammed upon her expulsion, and each one of them +had seen her stealthy, irrepressible return to the sphere that she felt +herself so eminently qualified to grace. For her the bone, thriftily +interred by Tim Connor's terrier, was a mere diversion; even the +fruitage of the ashpit had little charm for an accomplished _habitu_ +of the kitchen. She knew to a nicety which of the doors could be burst +open by assault, at which it was necessary to whine sycophantically; +and the clinical thermometer alone could furnish a parallel for her +perception of mood in those in authority. In the case of Mrs. Cadogan +she knew that there were seasons when instant and complete +self-effacement was the only course to pursue; therefore when, on a +certain morning in July, on my way through the downstairs regions to my +office, I saw her approach the kitchen door with her usual +circumspection, and, on hearing her name enunciated indignantly by my +cook, withdraw swiftly to a city of refuge at the back of the hayrick, +I drew my own conclusions. + +Had she remained, as I did, she would have heard the disclosure of a +crime that lay more heavily on her digestion than her conscience. + +"I can't put a thing out o' me hand but he's watching me to whip it +away!" declaimed Mrs. Cadogan, with all the disregard of her kind for +the accident of sex in the brute creation. "'Twas only last night I +was back in the scullery when I heard Bridget let a screech, and there +was me brave dog up on the table eating the roast beef that was after +coming out from the dinner!" + +"Brute!" interjected Philippa, with what I well knew to be a simulated +wrath. + +"And I had planned that bit of beef for the luncheon," continued Mrs. +Cadogan in impassioned lamentation, "the way we wouldn't have to +inthrude on the cold turkey! Sure he has it that dhragged, that all we +can do with it now is run it through the mincing machine for the +Major's sandwiches." + +At this appetising suggestion I thought fit to intervene in the +deliberations. + +"One thing," I said to Philippa afterwards, as I wrapped up a bottle of +Yanatas in a Cardigan jacket and rammed it into an already apoplectic +Gladstone bag, "that I do draw the line at, is taking that dog with us. +The whole business is black enough as it is." + +"Dear," said my wife, looking at me with almost clairvoyant +abstraction, "I could manage a second evening dress if you didn't mind +putting my tea-jacket in your portmanteau." + +Little, thank Heaven! as I know about yachting, I knew enough to make +pertinent remarks on the incongruity of an ancient 60-ton hireling and +a fleet of smart evening dresses; but none the less I left a pair of +indispensable boots behind, and the tea-jacket went into my portmanteau. + +It is doing no more than the barest justice to the officers of the +Royal Navy to say that, so far as I know them, they cherish no mistaken +enthusiasm for a home on the rolling deep when a home anywhere else +presents itself. Bernard Shute had unfortunately proved an exception +to this rule. During the winter, the invitation to go for a cruise in +the yacht that was in process of building for him hung over me like a +cloud; a timely strike in the builder's yard brought a respite, and, in +fact, placed the completion of the yacht at so safe a distance that I +was betrayed into specious regrets, echoed with an atrocious sincerity +by Philippa. Into a life pastorally compounded of Petty Sessions and +lawn-tennis parties, retribution fell when it was least expected. +Bernard Shute hired a yacht in Queenstown, and one short week +afterwards the worst had happened, and we were packing our things for a +cruise in her, the only alleviation being the knowledge that, whether +by sea or land, I was bound to return to my work in four days. + +We left Shreelane at twelve o'clock, a specially depressing hour for a +start, when breakfast has died in you, and lunch is still remote. My +last act before mounting the dogcart was to put her collar and chain on +Maria and immure her in the potato-house, whence, as we drove down the +avenue, her wails rent the heart of Philippa and rejoiced mine. It was +a very hot day, with a cloudless sky; the dust lay thick on the white +road, and on us also, as, during two baking hours, we drove up and down +the long hills and remembered things that had been left behind, and +grew hungry enough to eat sandwiches that tasted suspiciously of roast +beef. + +The yacht was moored in Clountiss Harbour; we drove through the village +street, a narrow and unlovely thoroughfare, studded with public-houses, +swarming with children and poultry, down through an ever-growing smell +of fish, to the quay. + +Thence we first viewed our fate, a dingy-looking schooner, and the hope +I had secretly been nourishing that there was not wind enough for her +to start, was dispelled by the sight of her topsail going up. More +than ever at that radiant moment--as the reflection of the white sail +quivered on the tranquil blue, and the still water flattered all it +reproduced, like a fashionable photographer--did I agree with George +Herbert's advice, "Praise the sea, but stay on shore." + +"We must hail her, I suppose," I said drearily. I assailed the _Eileen +Oge_, such being her inappropriate name, with desolate cries, but +achieved no immediate result beyond the assembling of some village +children round us and our luggage. + +"Mr. Shute and the two ladies was after screeching here for the boat +awhile ago," volunteered a horrid little girl, whom I had already twice +frustrated in the attempt to seat an infant relative on our bundle of +rugs. "Timsy Hallahane says 'twould be as good for them to stay +ashore, for there isn't as much wind outside as'd out a candle." + +With this encouraging statement the little girl devoted herself to the +alternate consumption of gooseberries and cockles. + +All things come to those who wait, and to us arrived at length the gig +of the _Eileen Oge_, and such, by this time, were the temperature and +the smells of the quay that I actually welcomed the moment that found +us leaving it for the yacht. + +"Now, Sinclair, aren't you glad we came?" remarked Philippa, as the +clear green water deepened under us, and a light briny air came coolly +round us with the motion of the boat. + +As she spoke, there was an outburst of screams from the children on the +quay, followed by a heavy splash. + +"Oh stop!" cried Philippa in an agony; "one of them has fallen in! I +can see its poor little brown head!" + +"'Tis a dog, ma'am," said briefly the man who was rowing stroke. + +"One might have wished it had been that little girl," said I, as I +steered to the best of my ability for the yacht. + +We had traversed another twenty yards or so, when Philippa, in a voice +in which horror and triumph were strangely blended, exclaimed, "She's +following us!" + +"Who? The little girl?" I asked callously. + +"No," returned Philippa; "worse." + +I looked round, not without a prevision of what I was to see, and +beheld the faithful Maria swimming steadily after us, with her brown +muzzle thrust out in front of her, ripping through the reflections like +a plough. + +"Go home!" I roared, standing up and gesticulating in fury that I well +know to be impotent. "Go home, you brute!" + +Maria redoubled her efforts, and Philippa murmured uncontrollably-- + +"Well, she _is_ a dear!" + +Had I had a sword in my hand I should undoubtedly have slain Philippa; +but before I could express my sentiments in any way, a violent shock +flung me endways on top of the man who was pulling stroke. Thanks to +Maria, we had reached our destination all unawares; the two men, +respectfully awaiting my instructions, had rowed on with disciplined +steadiness, and, as a result, we had rammed the _Eileen Oge_ amidships, +with a vigour that brought Mr. Shute tumbling up the companion to see +what had happened. + +"Oh, it's you, is it?" he said, with his mouth full. "Come in; don't +knock! Delighted to see you, Mrs. Yeates; don't apologise. There's +nothing like a hired ship after all--it's quite jolly to see the +splinters fly--shows you're getting your money's worth. Hullo! who's +this?" + +This was Maria, feigning exhaustion, and noisily treading water at the +boat's side. + +"What, poor old Maria? Wanted to send her ashore, did he? Heartless +ruffian!" + +Thus was Maria installed on board the _Eileen Oge_, and the element of +fatality had already begun to work. + +There was just enough wind to take us out of Clountiss Harbour, and +with the last of the out-running tide we crept away to the west. The +party on board consisted of our host's sister, Miss Cecilia Shute, Miss +Sally Knox, and ourselves; we sat about in conventional attitudes in +deck chairs and on adamantine deck bosses, and I talked to Miss Shute +with feverish brilliancy, and wished the patience-cards were not in the +cabin; I knew the supreme importance of keeping one's mind occupied, +but I dared not face the cabin. There was a long, almost imperceptible +swell, with little queer seabirds that I have never seen before--and +trust I never shall again--dotted about on its glassy slopes. The +coast-line looked low and grey and dull, as, I think, coast-lines +always do when viewed from the deep. The breeze that Bernard had +promised us we should find outside was barely enough to keep us moving. +The burning sun of four o'clock focussed its heat on the deck; Bernard +stood up among us, engaged in what he was pleased to call "handling the +stick," and beamed almost as offensively as the sun. + +"Oh, we're slipping along," he said, his odiously healthy face glowing +like copper against the blazing blue sky. "You're going a great deal +faster than you think, and the men say we'll pick up a breeze once +we're round the Mizen." + +I made no reply; I was not feeling ill, merely thoroughly disinclined +for conversation. Miss Sally smiled wanly, and closing her eyes, laid +her head on Philippa's knee. Instructed by a dread freemasonry, I knew +that for her the moment had come when she could no longer bear to see +the rail rise slowly above the horizon, and with an equal rhythmic +slowness sink below it. Maria moved restlessly to and fro, panting and +yawning, and occasionally rearing herself on her hind-legs against the +side, and staring forth with wild eyes at the headachy sliding of the +swell. Perhaps she was meditating suicide; if so I sympathised with +her, and since she was obviously going to be sick I trusted that she +would bring off the suicide with as little delay as possible. Philippa +and Miss Shute sat in unaffected serenity in deck chairs, and stitched +at white things--teacloths for the _Eileen Oge_, I believe, things in +themselves a mockery--and talked untiringly, with that singular +indifference to their marine surroundings that I have often observed in +ladies who are not sea-sick. It always stirs me afresh to wonder why +they have not remained ashore; nevertheless, I prefer their tranquil +and total lack of interest in seafaring matters to the blatant +Vikingism of the average male who is similarly placed. + +Somehow, I know not how, we crawled onwards, and by about five o'clock +we had rounded the Mizen, a gaunt spike of a headland that starts up +like a boar's tusk above the ragged lip of the Irish coast, and the +_Eileen Oge_ was beginning to swing and wallop in the long sluggish +rollers that the American liners know and despise. I was very far from +despising them. Down in the west, resting on the sea's rim, a purple +bank of clouds lay awaiting the descent of the sun, as seductively and +as malevolently as a damp bed at a hotel awaits a traveller. + +The end, so far as I was concerned, came at tea-time. The meal had +been prepared in the saloon, and thither it became incumbent on me to +accompany my hostess and my wife. Miss Sally, long past speech, +opened, at the suggestion of tea, one eye, and disclosed a look of +horror. As I tottered down the companion I respected her good sense. +The _Eileen Oge_ had been built early in the sixties, and headroom was +not her strong point; neither, apparently, was ventilation. I began by +dashing my forehead against the frame of the cabin door, and then, +shattered morally and physically, entered into the atmosphere of the +pit. After which things, and the sight of a plate of rich cake, I +retired in good order to my cabin, and began upon the Yanatas. + +I pass over some painful intermediate details and resume at the moment +when Bernard Shute woke me from a drugged slumber to announce that +dinner was over. + +"It's been raining pretty hard," he said, swaying easily with the swing +of the yacht; "but we've got a clinking breeze, and we ought to make +Lurriga Harbour to-night. There's good anchorage there, the men say. +They're rather a lot of swabs, but they know this coast, and I don't. +I took 'em over with the ship all standing." + +"Where are we now?" I asked, something heartened by the blessed word +"anchorage." + +"You're running up Sheepskin Bay--it's a thundering big bay; Lurriga's +up at the far end of it, and the night's as black as the inside of a +cow. Dig out and get something to eat, and come on deck---- What! no +dinner?"--I had spoken morosely, with closed eyes--"Oh, rot! you're on +an even keel now. I promised Mrs. Yeates I'd make you dig out. You're +as bad as a soldier officer that we were ferrying to Malta one time in +the old Tamar. He got one leg out of his berth when we were going down +the Channel, and he was too sick to pull it in again till we got to +Gib!" + +I compromised on a drink and some biscuits. The ship was certainly +steadier, and I felt sufficiently restored to climb weakly on deck. It +was by this time past ten o'clock, and heavy clouds blotted out the +last of the afterglow, and smothered the stars at their birth. A wet +warm wind was lashing the _Eileen Oge_ up a wide estuary; the waves +were hunting her, hissing under her stern, racing up to her, crested +with the white glow of phosphorus, as she fled before them. I dimly +discerned in the greyness the more solid greyness of the shore. The +mainsail loomed out into the darkness, nearly at right angles to the +yacht, with the boom creaking as the following wind gave us an +additional shove. I know nothing of yacht sailing, but I can +appreciate the grand fact that in running before a wind the boom is +removed from its usual sphere of devastation. + +I sat down beside a bundle of rugs that I had discovered to be my wife, +and thought of my whitewashed office at Shreelane and its bare but +stationary floor, with a yearning that was little short of passion. +Miss Sally had long since succumbed; Miss Shute was tired, and had +turned in soon after dinner. + +"I suppose she's overdone by the delirious gaiety of the afternoon," +said I acridly, in reply to this information. + +Philippa cautiously poked forth her head from the rugs, like a tortoise +from under its shell, to see that Bernard, who was standing near the +steersman, was out of hearing. + +"In all your life, Sinclair," she said impressively, "you never knew +such a time as Cecilia and I have had down there! We've had to wash +_everything_ in the cabins, and remake the beds, and _hurl_ the sheets +away--they were covered with black finger-marks--and while we were +doing that, in came the creature that calls himself the steward, to ask +if he might get something of his that he had left in Miss Shute's +'birthplace'! and he rooted out from under Cecilia's mattress a pair of +socks and half a loaf of bread!" + +"Consolation to Miss Shute to know her berth has been well aired," I +said, with the nearest approach to enjoyment I had known since I came +on board; "and has Sally made any equally interesting discoveries?" + +"She said she didn't care what her bed was like; she just dropped into +it. I must say I am sorry for her," went on Philippa; "she hated +coming. Her mother made her accept." + +"I wonder if Lady Knox will make her accept _him_!" I said. "How often +has Sally refused him, does any one know?" + +"Oh, about once a week," replied Philippa; "just the way I kept on +refusing you, you know!" + +Something cold and wet was thrust into my hand, and the aroma of damp +dog arose upon the night air; Maria had issued from some lair at the +sound of our voices, and was now, with palsied tremblings, slowly +trying to drag herself on to my lap. + +"Poor thing, she's been so dreadfully ill," said Philippa. "Don't send +her away, Sinclair. Mr. Shute found her lying on his berth not able to +move; didn't you, Mr. Shute?" + +"She found out that she was able to move," said Bernard, who had +crossed to our side of the deck; "it was somehow borne in upon her when +I got at her with a boot-tree. I wouldn't advise you to keep her in +your lap, Yeates. She stole half a ham after dinner, and she might +take a notion to make the only reparation in her power." + +I stood up and stretched myself stiffly. The wind was freshening, and +though the growing smoothness of the water told that we were making +shelter of some kind, for all that I could see of land we might as well +have been in mid-ocean. The heaving lift of the deck under my feet, +and the lurching swing when a stronger gust filled the ghostly sails, +were more disquieting to me in suggestion than in reality, and, to my +surprise, I found something almost enjoyable in rushing through +darkness at the pace at which we were going. + +"We're a small bit short of the mouth of Lurriga Harbour yet, sir," +said the man who was steering, in reply to a question from Bernard. "I +can see the shore well enough; sure I know every yard of wather in the +bay----" + +As he spoke he sat down abruptly and violently; so did Bernard, so did +I. The bundle that contained Philippa collapsed upon Maria. + +"Main sheet!" bellowed Bernard, on his feet in an instant, as the boom +swung in and out again with a terrific jerk. "We're ashore!" + +In response to this order three men in succession fell over me while I +was still struggling on the deck, and something that was either +Philippa's elbow, or the acutest angle of Maria's skull, hit me in the +face. As I found my feet the cabin skylight was suddenly illuminated +by a wavering glare. I got across the slanting deck somehow, through +the confusion of shouting men and the flapping thunder of the sails, +and saw through the skylight a gush of flame rising from a pool of +fire, around an overturned lamp on the swing-table. I avalanched down +the companion and was squandered like an avalanche on the floor at the +foot of it. Even as I fell, McCarthy the steward dragged the strip of +carpet from the cabin floor and threw it on the blaze; I found myself, +in some unexplained way, snatching a railway rug from Miss Shute and +applying it to the same purpose, and in half-a-dozen seconds we had +smothered the flame and were left in total darkness. The most striking +feature of the situation was the immovability of the yacht. + +"Great Ned!" said McCarthy, invoking I know not what heathen deity, "it +is on the bottom of the say we are? Well, whether or no, thank God we +have the fire quinched!" + +We were not, so far, at the bottom of the sea, but during the next ten +minutes the chances seemed in favour of our getting there. The yacht +had run her bows upon a sunken ridge of rock, and after a period of +feminine indecision as to whether she were going to slide off again, or +roll over into deep water, she elected to stay where she was, and the +gig was lowered with all speed, in order to tow her off before the tide +left her. + +My recollection of this interval is but hazy, but I can certify that in +ten minutes I had swept together an assortment of necessaries and +knotted them into my counterpane, had broken the string of my +eye-glass, and lost my silver matchbox; had found Philippa's +curling-tongs and put them in my pocket; had carted all the luggage on +deck; had then applied myself to the manly duty of reassuring the +ladies, and had found Miss Shute merely bored, Philippa +enthusiastically anxious to be allowed to help to pull the gig, and +Miss Sally radiantly restored to health and spirits by the cessation of +movement and the probability of an early escape from the yacht. + +The rain had, with its usual opportuneness, begun again; we stood in it +under umbrellas, and watched the gig jumping on its tow-rope like a dog +on a string, as the crew plied the labouring oar in futile endeavour to +move the _Eileen Oge_. We had run on the rock at half-tide, and the +increasing slant of the deck as the tide fell brought home to us the +pleasing probability that at low water--viz. about 2 A.M.--we should +roll off the rock and go to the bottom. Had Bernard Shute wished to +show himself in the most advantageous light to Miss Sally he could +scarcely have bettered the situation. I looked on in helpless respect +while he whom I had known as the scourge of the hunting field, the +terror of the shooting party, rose to the top of a difficult position +and kept there, and my respect was, if possible, increased by the +presence of mind with which he availed himself of all critical moments +to place a protecting arm round Miss Knox. + +By about 1 A.M. the two gaffs with which Bernard had contrived to shore +up the slowly heeling yacht began to show signs of yielding, and, in +approved shipwreck fashion, we took to the boats, the yacht's crew in +the gig remaining in attendance on what seemed likely to be the last +moments of the _Eileen Oge_, while we, in the dinghy, sought for the +harbour. Owing to the tilt of the yacht's deck, and the roughness of +the broken water round her, getting into the boat was no mean feat of +gymnastics. Miss Sally did it like a bird, alighting in the inevitable +arms of Bernard; Miss Shute followed very badly, but, by innate force +of character, successfully; Philippa, who was enjoying every moment of +her shipwreck, came last, launching herself into the dinghy with my +silver shoe-horn clutched in one hand, and in the other the tea-basket. +I heard the hollow clank of its tin cups as she sprang, and appreciated +the heroism with which Bernard received one of its corners in his +waist. How or when Maria left the yacht I know not, but when I applied +myself to the bow oar I led off with three crabs, owing to the devotion +with which she thrust her head into my lap. + +I am no judge of these matters, but in my opinion we ought to have been +swamped several times during that row. There was nothing but the +phosphorus of breaking waves to tell us where the rocks were, and +nothing to show where the harbour was except a solitary light, a +masthead light, as we supposed. The skipper had assured us that we +could not go wrong if we kept "a westerly course with a little northing +in it;" but it seemed simpler to steer for the light, and we did so. +The dinghy climbed along over the waves with an agility that was safer +than it felt; the rain fell without haste and without rest, the oars +were as inflexible as crowbars, and somewhat resembled them in shape +and weight; nevertheless, it was Elysium when compared with the +afternoon leisure of the deck of the _Eileen Oge_. + +At last we came, unexplainably, into smooth water, and it was at about +this time that we were first aware that the darkness was less dense +than it had been, and that the rain had ceased. By imperceptible +degrees a greyness touched the back of the waves, more a dreariness +than a dawn, but more welcome than thousands of gold and silver. I +looked over my shoulder and discerned vague bulky things ahead; as I +did so, my oar was suddenly wrapped in seaweed. We crept on; Maria +stood up with her paws on the gunwale, and whined in high agitation. +The dark objects ahead resolved themselves into rocks, and without more +ado Maria pitched herself into the water. In half a minute we heard +her shaking herself on shore. We slid on; the water swelled under the +dinghy, and lifted her keel on to grating gravel. + +"We couldn't have done it better if we'd been the Hydrographer Royal," +said Bernard, wading knee-deep in a light wash of foam, with the +painter in his hand; "but all the same, that masthead light is some +one's bedroom candle!" + +We landed, hauled up the boat, and then feebly sat down on our +belongings to review the situation, and Maria came and shook herself +over each of us in turn. We had run into a little cove, guided by the +philanthropic beam of a candle in the upper window of a house about a +hundred yards away. The candle still burned on, and the anmic +daylight exhibited to us our surroundings, and we debated as to whether +we could at 2.45 A.M. present ourselves as objects of compassion to the +owner of the candle. I need hardly say that it was the ladies who +decided on making the attempt, having, like most of their sex, a +courage incomparably superior to ours in such matters; Bernard and I +had not a grain of genuine compunction in our souls, but we failed in +nerve. + +We trailed up from the cove, laden with emigrants' bundles, stumbling +on wet rocks in the half-light, and succeeded in making our way to the +house. + +It was a small two-storied building, of that hideous breed of +architecture usually dedicated to the rectories of the Irish Church; we +felt that there was something friendly in the presence of a pair of +carpet slippers in the porch, but there was a hint of exclusiveness in +the fact that there was no knocker and that the bell was broken. The +light still burned in the upper window, and with a faltering hand I +flung gravel at the glass. This summons was appallingly responded to +by a shriek; there was a flutter of white at the panes, and the candle +was extinguished. + +"Come away!" exclaimed Miss Shute, "it's a lunatic asylum!" + +We stood our ground, however, and presently heard a footstep within, a +blind was poked aside in another window, and we were inspected by an +unseen inmate; then some one came downstairs, and the hall-door was +opened by a small man with a bald head and a long sandy beard. He was +attired in a brief dressing-gown, and on his shoulder sat, like an +angry ghost, a large white cockatoo. Its crest was up on end, its beak +was a good two inches long and curved like a Malay kris; its claws +gripped the little man's shoulder. Maria uttered in the background a +low and thunderous growl. + +"Don't take any notice of the bird, please," said the little man +nervously, seeing our united gaze fixed upon this apparition; "he's +extremely fierce if annoyed." + +The majority of our party here melted away to either side of the +hall-door, and I was left to do the explaining. The tale of our +misfortunes had its due effect, and we were ushered into a small +drawing-room, our host holding open the door for us, like a nightmare +footman with bare shins, a gnome-like bald head, and an unclean spirit +swaying on his shoulder. He opened the shutters, and we sat decorously +round the room, as at an afternoon party, while the situation was +further expounded on both sides. Our entertainer, indeed, favoured us +with the leading items of his family history, amongst them the facts +that he was a Dr. Fahy from Cork, who had taken somebody's rectory for +the summer, and had been prevailed on by some of his patients to permit +them to join him as paying guests. + +"I said it was a lunatic asylum," murmured Miss Shute to me. + +"In point of fact," went on our host, "there isn't an empty room in the +house, which is why I can only offer your party the use of this room +and the kitchen fire, which I make a point of keeping burning all +night." + +He leaned back complacently in his chair, and crossed his legs; then, +obviously remembering his costume, sat bolt upright again. We owed the +guiding beams of the candle to the owner of the cockatoo, an old Mrs. +Buck, who was, we gathered, the most paying of all the patients, and +also, obviously, the one most feared and cherished by Dr. Fahy. "She +has a candle burning all night for the bird, and her door open to let +him walk about the house when he likes," said Dr. Fahy; "indeed, I may +say her passion for him amounts to dementia. He's very fond of me, and +Mrs. Fahy's always telling me I should be thankful, as whatever he did +we'd be bound to put up with it!" + +Dr. Fahy had evidently a turn for conversation that was unaffected by +circumstance; the first beams of the early sun were lighting up the rep +chair covers before the door closed upon his brown dressing-gown, and +upon the stately white back of the cockatoo, and the demoniac +possession of laughter that had wrought in us during the interview +burst forth unchecked. It was most painful and exhausting, as such +laughter always is; but by far the most serious part of it was that +Miss Sally, who was sitting in the window, somehow drove her elbow +through a pane of glass, and Bernard, in pulling down the blind to +conceal the damage, tore it off the roller. + +There followed on this catastrophe a period during which reason +tottered and Maria barked furiously. Philippa was the first to pull +herself together, and to suggest an adjournment to the kitchen fire +that, in honour of the paying guests, was never quenched, and, +respecting the repose of the household, we proceeded thither with a +stealth that convinced Maria we were engaged in a rat hunt. The boots +of paying guests littered the floor, the debris of their last repast +covered the table; a cat in some unseen fastness crooned a war song to +Maria, who feigned unconsciousness and fell to scientific research in +the scullery. + +We roasted our boots at the range, and Bernard, with all a sailor's +gift for exploration and theft, prowled in noisome purlieus and emerged +with a jug of milk and a lump of salt butter. No one who has not been +a burglar can at all realise what it was to roam through Dr. Fahy's +basement storey, with the rookery of paying guests asleep above, and to +feel that, so far, we had repaid his confidence by breaking a pane of +glass and a blind, and putting the scullery tap out of order. I have +always maintained that there was something wrong with it before I +touched it, but the fact remains that when I had filled Philippa's +kettle, no human power could prevail upon it to stop flowing. For all +I know to the contrary it is running still. + +It was in the course of our furtive return to the drawing-room that we +were again confronted by Mrs. Buck's cockatoo. It was standing in +malign meditation on the stairs, and on seeing us it rose, without a +word of warning, upon the wing, and with a long screech flung itself at +Miss Sally's golden-red head, which a ray of sunlight had chanced to +illumine. There was a moment of stampede, as the selected victim, +pursued by the cockatoo, fled into the drawing-room; two chairs were +upset (one, I think, broken), Miss Sally enveloped herself in a window +curtain, Philippa and Miss Shute effaced themselves beneath a table; +the cockatoo, foiled of its prey, skimmed, still screeching, round the +ceiling. It was Bernard who, with a well-directed sofa-cushion, drove +the enemy from the room. There was only a chink of the door open, but +the cockatoo turned on his side as he flew, and swung through it like a +woodcock. + +We slammed the door behind him, and at the same instant there came a +thumping on the floor overhead, muffled, yet peremptory. + +"That's Mrs. Buck!" said Miss Shute, crawling from under the table; +"the room over this is the one that had the candle in it." + +We sat for a time in awful stillness, but nothing further happened, +save a distant shriek overhead, that told the cockatoo had sought and +found sanctuary in his owner's room. We had tea _sotto voce_, and +then, one by one, despite the amazing discomfort of the drawing-room +chairs, we dozed off to sleep. + +It was at about five o'clock that I woke with a stiff neck and an +uneasy remembrance that I had last seen Maria in the kitchen. The +others, looking, each of them, about twenty years older than their age, +slept in various attitudes of exhaustion. Bernard opened his eyes as I +stole forth to look for Maria, but none of the ladies awoke. I went +down the evil-smelling passage that led to the kitchen stairs, and, +there on a mat, regarding me with intelligent affection, was Maria; but +what--oh what was the white thing that lay between her forepaws? + +The situation was too serious to be coped with alone. I fled +noiselessly back to the drawing-room and put my head in; Bernard's +eyes--blessed be the light sleep of sailors!--opened again, and there +was that in mine that summoned him forth. (Blessed also be the light +step of sailors!) + +We took the corpse from Maria, withholding perforce the language and +the slaughtering that our hearts ached to bestow. For a minute or two +our eyes communed. + +"I'll get the kitchen shovel," breathed Bernard; "you open the +hall-door!" + +A moment later we passed like spirits into the open air, and on into a +little garden at the end of the house. Maria followed us, licking her +lips. There were beds of nasturtiums, and of purple stocks, and of +marigolds. We chose a bed of stocks, a plump bed, that looked like +easy digging. The windows were all tightly shut and shuttered, and I +took the cockatoo from under my coat and hid it, temporarily, behind a +box border. Bernard had brought a shovel and a coal scoop. We dug +like badgers. At eighteen inches we got down into shale and stones, +and the coal scoop struck work. + +"Never mind," said Bernard; "we'll plant the stocks on top of him." + +It was a lovely morning, with a new-born blue sky and a light northerly +breeze. As we returned to the house, we looked across the wavelets of +the little cove and saw, above the rocky point round which we had +groped last night, a triangular white patch moving slowly along. + +"The tide's lifted her!" said Bernard, standing stock-still. He looked +at Mrs. Buck's window and at me. "Yeates!" he whispered, "let's quit!" + +It was now barely six o'clock, and not a soul was stirring. We woke +the ladies and convinced them of the high importance of catching the +tide. Bernard left a note on the hall table for Dr. Fahy, a beautiful +note of leave-taking and gratitude, and apology for the broken window +(for which he begged to enclose half-a-crown). No allusion was made to +the other casualties. As we neared the strand he found an occasion to +say to me: + +"I put in a postscript that I thought it best to mention that I had +seen the cockatoo in the garden, and hoped it would get back all right. +That's quite true, you know! But look here, whatever you do, you must +keep it all dark from the ladies----" + +At this juncture Maria overtook us with the cockatoo in her mouth. + + + + +XI + +OCCASIONAL LICENSES + +"It's out of the question," I said, looking forbiddingly at Mrs. +Moloney through the spokes of the bicycle that I was pumping up outside +the grocer's in Skebawn. + +"Well, indeed, Major Yeates," said Mrs. Moloney, advancing excitedly, +and placing on the nickel plating a hand that I had good and recent +cause to know was warm, "sure I know well that if th' angel Gabriel +came down from heaven looking for a license for the races, your honour +wouldn't give it to him without a charackther, but as for Michael! +Sure, the world knows what Michael is!" + +I had been waiting for Philippa for already nearly half-an-hour, and my +temper was not at its best. + +"Character or no character, Mrs. Moloney," said I with asperity, "the +magistrates have settled to give no occasional licenses, and if Michael +were as sober as----" + +"Is it sober! God help us!" exclaimed Mrs. Moloney with an upward +rolling of her eye to the Recording Angel; "I'll tell your honour the +truth. I'm his wife, now, fifteen years, and I never seen the sign of +dhrink on Michael only once, and that was when he went out o' +good-nature helping Timsy Ryan to whitewash his house, and Timsy and +himself had a couple o' pots o' porther, and look, he was as little +used to it that his head got light, and he walked away out to dhrive in +the cows and it no more than eleven o'clock in the day! And the cows, +the craytures, as much surprised, goin' hither and over the four +corners of the road from him! Faith, ye'd have to laugh. 'Michael,' +says I to him, 'ye're dhrunk!' 'I am,' says he, and the tears rained +from his eyes. I turned the cows from him. 'Go home,' I says, 'and +lie down on Willy Tom's bed----'" + +At this affecting point my wife came out of the grocer's with a large +parcel to be strapped to my handlebar, and the history of Mr. Moloney's +solitary lapse from sobriety got no further than Willy Tom's bed. + +"You see," I said to Philippa, as we bicycled quietly home through the +hot June afternoon, "we've settled we'll give no licenses for the +sports. Why even young Sheehy, who owns three pubs in Skebawn, came to +me and said he hoped the magistrates would be firm about it, as these +one-day licenses were quite unnecessary, and only led to drunkenness +and fighting, and every man on the Bench has joined in promising not to +grant any." + +"How nice, dear!" said Philippa absently. "Do you know Mrs. McDonnell +can only let me have three dozen cups and saucers; I wonder if that +will be enough?" + +"Do you mean to say you expect three dozen people?" said I. + +"Oh, it's always well to be prepared," replied my wife evasively. + +During the next few days I realised the true inwardness of what it was +to be prepared for an entertainment of this kind. Games were not at a +high level in my district. Football, of a wild, guerilla species, was +waged intermittently, blended in some inextricable way with Home Rule +and a brass band, and on Sundays gatherings of young men rolled a heavy +round stone along the roads, a rudimentary form of sport, whose +fascination lay primarily in the fact that it was illegal, and, in +lesser degree, in betting on the length of each roll. I had had a +period of enthusiasm, during which I thought I was going to be the +apostle of cricket in the neighbourhood, but my mission dwindled to +single wicket with Peter Cadogan, who was indulgent but bored, and I +swiped the ball through the dining-room window, and some one took one +of the stumps to poke the laundry fire. Once a year, however, on that +festival of the Roman Catholic Church which is familiarly known as +"Pether and Paul's day," the district was wont to make a spasmodic +effort at athletic sports, which were duly patronised by the gentry and +promoted by the publicans, and this year the honour of a steward's +green rosette was conferred upon me. Philippa's genius for hospitality +here saw its chance, and broke forth into unbridled tea-party in +connection with the sports, even involving me in the hire of a tent, +the conveyance of chairs and tables, and other large operations. + +It chanced that Flurry Knox had on this occasion lent the fields for +the sports, with the proviso that horse-races and a tug-of-war were to +be added to the usual programme; Flurry's participation in events of +this kind seldom failed to be of an inflaming character. As he and I +planted larch spars for the high jump, and stuck furze-bushes into +hurdles (locally known as "hurrls"), and skirmished hourly with people +who wanted to sell drink on the course, I thought that my next summer +leave would singularly coincide with the festival consecrated to St. +Peter and St. Paul. We made a grand stand of quite four feet high, out +of old fish-boxes, which smelt worse and worse as the day wore on, but +was, none the less, as sought after by those for whom it was not +intended, as is the Royal enclosure at Ascot; we broke gaps in all the +fences to allow carriages on to the ground, we armed a gang of the +worst blackguards in Skebawn with cart-whips, to keep the course, and +felt that organisation could go no further. + +The momentous day of Pether and Paul opened badly, with heavy clouds +and every indication of rain, but after a few thunder showers things +brightened, and it seemed within the bounds of possibility that the +weather might hold up. When I got down to the course on the day of the +sports the first thing I saw was a tent of that peculiar filthy grey +that usually enshrines the sale of porter, with an array of barrels in +a crate beside it; I bore down upon it in all the indignant majesty of +the law, and in so doing came upon Flurry Knox, who was engaged in +flogging boys off the Grand Stand. + +"Sheehy's gone one better than you!" he said, without taking any +trouble to conceal the fact that he was amused. + +"Sheehy!" I said; "why, Sheehy was the man who went to every magistrate +in the country to ask them to refuse a license for the sports." + +"Yes, he took some trouble to prevent any one else having a look in," +replied Flurry; "he asked every magistrate but one, and that was the +one that gave him the license." + +"You don't mean to say that it was you?" I demanded in high wrath and +suspicion, remembering that Sheehy bred horses, and that my friend Mr. +Knox was a person of infinite resource in the matter of a deal. + +"Well, well," said Flurry, rearranging a disordered fish-box, "and me +that's a church-warden, and sprained my ankle a month ago with running +downstairs at my grandmother's to be in time for prayers! Where's the +use of a good character in this country?" + +"Not much when you keep it eating its head off for want of exercise," I +retorted; "but if it wasn't you, who was it?" + +"Do you remember old Moriarty out at Castle Ire?" + +I remembered him extremely well as one of those representatives of the +people with whom a paternal Government had leavened the effete ranks of +the Irish magistracy. + +"Well," resumed Flurry, "that license was as good as a five-pound note +in his pocket." + +I permitted myself a comment on Mr. Moriarty suitable to the occasion. + +"Oh, that's nothing," said Flurry easily; "he told me one day when he +was half screwed that his Commission of the Peace was worth a hundred +and fifty a year to him in turkeys and whisky, and he was telling the +truth for once." + +At this point Flurry's eye wandered, and following its direction I saw +Lady Knox's smart 'bus cleaving its way through the throng of country +people, lurching over the ups and downs of the field like a ship in a +sea. I was too blind to make out the component parts of the white +froth that crowned it on top, and seethed forth from it when it had +taken up a position near the tent in which Philippa was even now +propping the legs of the tea-table, but from the fact that Flurry +addressed himself to the door, I argued that Miss Sally had gone inside. + +Lady Knox's manner had something more than its usual bleakness. She +had brought, as she promised, a large contingent, but from the way that +the strangers within her gates melted impalpably and left me to deal +with her single-handed, I drew the further deduction that all was not +well. + +"Did you ever in your life see such a gang of women as I have brought +with me?" she began with her wonted directness, as I piloted her to the +Grand Stand, and placed her on the stoutest looking of the fish-boxes. +"I have no patience with men who yacht! Bernard Shute has gone off to +the Clyde, and I had counted on his being a man at my dance next week. +I suppose you'll tell me you're going away too." + +I assured Lady Knox that I would be a man to the best of my ability. + +"This is the last dance I shall give," went on her ladyship, +unappeased; "the men in this country consist of children and cads." + +I admitted that we were but a poor lot, "but," I said, "Miss Sally told +me----" + +"Sally's a fool!" said Lady Knox, with a falcon eye at her daughter, +who happened to be talking to her distant kinsman, Mr. Flurry of that +ilk. + +The races had by this time begun with a competition known as the "Hop, +Step, and Lep"; this, judging by the yells, was a highly interesting +display, but as it was conducted between two impervious rows of +onlookers, the aristocracy on the fish-boxes saw nothing save the +occasional purple face of a competitor, starting into view above the +wall of backs like a jack-in-the-box. For me, however, the odorous +sanctuary of the fish-boxes was not to be. I left it guarded by +Slipper with a cart-whip of flail-like dimensions, as disreputable an +object as could be seen out of low comedy, with some one's old white +cords on his bandy legs, butcher-boots three sizes too big for him, and +a black eye. The small boys fled before him; in the glory of his +office he would have flailed his own mother off the fish-boxes had +occasion served. + +I had an afternoon of decidedly mixed enjoyment. My stewardship +blossomed forth like Aaron's rod, and added to itself the duties of +starter, handicapper, general referee, and chucker-out, besides which I +from time to time strove with emissaries who came from Philippa with +messages about water and kettles. Flurry and I had to deal +single-handed with the foot-races (our brothers in office being +otherwise engaged at Mr. Sheehy's), a task of many difficulties, +chiefest being that the spectators all swept forward at the word "Go!" +and ran the race with the competitors, yelling curses, blessings, and +advice upon them, taking short cuts over anything and everybody, and +mingling inextricably with the finish. By fervent applications of the +whips, the course was to some extent purged for the quarter-mile, and +it would, I believe, have been a triumph of handicapping had not an +unforeseen disaster overtaken the favourite--old Mrs. Knox's bath-chair +boy. Whether, as was alleged, his braces had or had not been tampered +with by a rival was a matter that the referee had subsequently to deal +with in the thick of a free fight; but the painful fact remained that +in the course of the first lap what were described as "his galluses" +abruptly severed their connection with the garments for whose safety +they were responsible, and the favourite was obliged to seek seclusion +in the crowd. + +The tug-of-war followed close on this _contre-temps_, and had the +excellent effect of drawing away, like a blister, the inflammation set +up by the grievances of the bath-chair boy. I cannot at this moment +remember of how many men each team consisted; my sole aim was to keep +the numbers even, and to baffle the volunteers who, in an ecstasy of +sympathy, attached themselves to the tail of the rope at moments when +their champions weakened. The rival forces dug their heels in and +tugged, in an uproar that drew forth the innermost line of customers +from Mr. Sheehy's porter tent, and even attracted "the quality" from +the haven of the fish-boxes, Slipper, in the capacity of Squire of +Dames, pioneering Lady Knox through the crowd with the cart-whip, and +with language whose nature was providentially veiled, for the most +part, by the din. The tug-of-war continued unabated. One team was +getting the worst of it, but hung doggedly on, sinking lower and lower +till they gradually sat down; nothing short of the trump of judgment +could have conveyed to them that they were breaking rules, and both +teams settled down by slow degrees on to their sides, with the rope +under them, and their heels still planted in the ground, bringing about +complete deadlock. I do not know the record duration for a tug-of-war, +but I can certify that the Cullinagh and Knockranny teams lay on the +ground at full tension for half-an-hour, like men in apoplectic fits, +each man with his respective adherents howling over him, blessing him, +and adjuring him to continue. + +With my own nauseated eyes I saw a bearded countryman, obviously one of +Mr. Sheehy's best customers, fling himself on his knees beside one of +the combatants, and kiss his crimson and streaming face in a rapture of +encouragement. As he shoved unsteadily past me on his return journey +to Mr. Sheehy's, I heard him informing a friend that "he cried a +handful over Danny Mulloy, when he seen the poor brave boy so +shtubborn, and, indeed, he couldn't say why he cried." + +"For good-nature ye'd cry," suggested the friend. + +"Well, just that, I suppose," returned Danny Mulloy's admirer +resignedly; "indeed, if it was only two cocks ye seen fightin' on the +road, yer heart'd take part with one o' them!" + +I had begun to realise that I might as well abandon the tug-of-war and +occupy myself elsewhere, when my wife's much harassed messenger brought +me the portentous tidings that Mrs. Yeates wanted me at the tent at +once. When I arrived I found the tent literally bulging with +Philippa's guests; Lady Knox, seated on a hamper, was taking off her +gloves, and loudly announcing her desire for tea, and Philippa, with a +flushed face and a crooked hat, breathed into my ear the awful news +that both the cream and the milk had been forgotten. + +"But Flurry Knox says he can get me some," she went on; "he's gone to +send people to milk a cow that lives near here. Go out and see if he's +coming." + +I went out and found, in the first instance, Mrs. Cadogan, who greeted +me with the prayer that the divil might roast Julia McCarthy, that +legged it away to the races like a wild goose, and left the cream +afther her on the servants' hall table. "Sure, Misther Flurry's gone +looking for a cow, and what cow would there be in a backwards place +like this? And look at me shtriving to keep the kettle simpering on +the fire, and not as much coals undher it as'd redden a pipe!" + +"Where's Mr. Knox?" I asked. + +"Himself and Slipper's galloping the counthry like the deer. I believe +it's to the house above they went, sir." + +I followed up a rocky hill to the house above, and there found Flurry +and Slipper engaged in the patriarchal task of driving two brace of +coupled and spancelled goats into a shed. + +"It's the best we can do," said Flurry briefly; "there isn't a cow to +be found, and the people are all down at the sports. Be d----d to you, +Slipper, don't let them go from you!" as the goats charged and doubled +like football players. + +"But goats' milk!" I said, paralysed by horrible memories of what tea +used to taste like at Gib. + +"They'll never know it!" said Flurry, cornering a venerable nanny; +"here, hold this divil, and hold her tight!" + +I have no time to dwell upon the pastoral scene that followed. Suffice +it to say, that at the end of ten minutes of scorching profanity from +Slipper, and incessant warfare with the goats, the latter had +reluctantly yielded two small jugfuls, and the dairymaids had exhibited +a nerve and skill in their trade that won my lasting respect. + +"I knew I could trust _you_, Mr. Knox!" said Philippa, with shining +eyes, as we presented her with the two foaming beakers. I suppose a +man is never a hero to his wife, but if she could have realised the +bruises on my legs, I think she would have reserved a blessing for me +also. + +What was thought of the goats' milk I gathered symptomatically from a +certain fixity of expression that accompanied the first sip of the tea, +and from observing that comparatively few ventured on second cups. I +also noted that after a brief conversation with Flurry, Miss Sally +poured hers secretly on to the grass. Lady Knox had throughout the day +preserved an aspect so threatening that no change was perceptible in +her demeanour. In the throng of hungry guests I did not for some time +notice that Mr. Knox had withdrawn until something in Miss Sally's eye +summoned me to her, and she told me she had a message from him for me. + +"Couldn't we come outside?" she said. + +Outside the tent, within less than six yards of her mother, Miss Sally +confided to me a scheme that made my hair stand on end. Summarised, it +amounted to this: That, first, she was in the primary stage of a deal +with Sheehy for a four-year-old chestnut colt, for which Sheehy was +asking double its value on the assumption that it had no rival in the +country; that, secondly, they had just heard it was going to run in the +first race; and, thirdly and lastly, that as there was no other horse +available, Flurry was going to take old Sultan out of the 'bus and ride +him in the race; and that Mrs. Yeates had promised to keep mamma safe +in the tent, while the race was going on, and "you know, Major Yeates, +it would be delightful to beat Sheehy after his getting the better of +you all about the license!" + +With this base appeal to my professional feelings, Miss Knox paused, +and looked at me insinuatingly. Her eyes were greeny-grey, and very +beguiling. + +"Come on," she said; "they want you to start them!" + +Pursued by visions of the just wrath of Lady Knox, I weakly followed +Miss Sally to the farther end of the second field, from which point the +race was to start. The course was not a serious one: two or three +natural banks, a stone wall, and a couple of "hurrls." There were but +four riders, including Flurry, who was seated composedly on Sultan, +smoking a cigarette and talking confidentially to Slipper. Sultan, +although something stricken in years and touched in the wind, was a +brown horse who in his day had been a hunter of no mean repute; even +now he occasionally carried Lady Knox in a sedate and gentlemanly +manner, but it struck me that it was trying him rather high to take him +from the pole of the 'bus after twelve miles on a hilly road, and +hustle him over a country against a four-year-old. My acutest anxiety, +however, was to start the race as quickly as possible, and to get back +to the tent in time to establish an alibi; therefore I repressed my +private sentiments, and, tying my handkerchief to a stick, determined +that no time should be fashionably frittered away in false starts. + +They got away somehow; I believe Sheehy's colt was facing the wrong way +at the moment when I dropped the flag, but a friend turned him with a +stick, and, with a cordial and timely whack, speeded him on his way on +sufficiently level terms, and then somehow, instead of returning to the +tent, I found myself with Miss Sally on the top of a tall narrow bank, +in a precarious line of other spectators, with whom we toppled and +swayed, and, in moments of acuter emotion, held on to each other in +unaffected comradeship. + +Flurry started well, and from our commanding position we could see him +methodically riding at the first fence at a smart hunting canter, +closely attended by James Canty's brother on a young black mare, and by +an unknown youth on a big white horse. The hope of Sheehy's stable, a +leggy chestnut, ridden by a cadet of the house of Sheehy, went away +from the friend's stick like a rocket, and had already refused the +first bank twice before old Sultan decorously changed feet on it and +dropped down into the next field with tranquil precision. The white +horse scrambled over it on his stomach, but landed safely, despite the +fact that his rider clasped him round the neck during the process; the +black mare and the chestnut shouldered one another over at the hole the +white horse had left, and the whole party went away in a bunch and +jumped the ensuing hurdle without disaster. Flurry continued to ride +at the same steady hunting pace, accompanied respectfully by the white +horse and by Jerry Canty on the black mare. Sheehy's colt had clearly +the legs of the party, and did some showy galloping between the jumps, +but as he refused to face the banks without a lead, the end of the +first round found the field still a sociable party personally conducted +by Mr. Knox. + +"That's a dam nice horse," said one of my hangers-on, looking +approvingly at Sultan as he passed us at the beginning of the second +round, making a good deal of noise but apparently going at his ease; +"you might depind your life on him, and he have the crabbedest jock in +the globe of Ireland on him this minute." + +"Canty's mare's very sour," said another; "look at her now, baulking +the bank! she's as cross as a bag of weasels." + +"Begob, I wouldn't say but she's a little sign lame," resumed the +first; "she was going light on one leg on the road a while ago." + +"I tell you what it is," said Miss Sally, very seriously, in my ear, +"that chestnut of Sheehy's is settling down. I'm afraid he'll gallop +away from Sultan at the finish, and the wall won't stop him. Flurry +can't get another inch out of Sultan. He's riding him well," she ended +in a critical voice, which yet was not quite like her own. Perhaps I +should not have noticed it but for the fact that the hand that held my +arm was trembling. As for me, I thought of Lady Knox, and trembled too. + +There now remained but one bank, the trampled remnant of the furze +hurdle, and the stone wall. The pace was beginning to improve, and the +other horses drew away from Sultan; they charged the bank at full +gallop, the black mare and the chestnut flying it perilously, with a +windmill flourish of legs and arms from their riders, the white horse +racing up to it with a gallantry that deserted him at the critical +moment, with the result that his rider turned a somersault over his +head and landed, amidst the roars of the onlookers, sitting on the +fence facing his horse's nose. With creditable presence of mind he +remained on the bank, towed the horse over, scrambled on to his back +again and started afresh. Sultan, thirty yards to the bad, pounded +doggedly on, and Flurry's cane and heels remained idle; the old horse, +obviously blown, slowed cautiously coming in at the jump. Sally's grip +tightened on my arm, and the crowd yelled as Sultan, answering to a +hint from the spurs and a touch at his mouth, heaved himself on to the +bank. Nothing but sheer riding on Flurry's part got him safe off it, +and saved him from the consequences of a bad peck on landing; none the +less, he pulled himself together and went away down the hill for the +stone wall as stoutly as ever. The high-road skirted the last two +fields, and there was a gate in the roadside fence beside the place +where the stone wall met it at right angles. I had noticed this gate, +because during the first round Slipper had been sitting on it, +demonstrating with his usual fervour. Sheeny's colt was leading, with +his nose in the air, his rider's hands going like a circular saw, and +his temper, as a bystander remarked, "up on end"; the black mare, half +mad from spurring, was going hard at his heels, completely out of hand; +the white horse was steering steadily for the wrong side of the flag, +and Flurry, by dint of cutting corners and of saving every yard of +ground, was close enough to keep his antagonists' heads over their +shoulders, while their right arms rose and fell in unceasing +flagellation. + +"There'll be a smash when they come to the wall! If one falls they'll +all go!" panted Sally. "Oh!---- Now! Flurry! Flurry!----" + +What had happened was that the chestnut colt had suddenly perceived +that the gate at right angles to the wall was standing wide open, and, +swinging away from the jump, he had bolted headlong out on to the road, +and along it at top speed for his home. After him fled Canty's black +mare, and with her, carried away by the spirit of stampede, went the +white horse. + +Flurry stood up in his stirrups and gave a view-halloa as he cantered +down to the wall. Sultan came at it with the send of the hill behind +him, and jumped it with a skill that intensified, if that were +possible, the volume of laughter and yells around us. By the time the +black mare and the white horse had returned and ignominiously bundled +over the wall to finish as best they might, Flurry was leading Sultan +towards us. + +"That blackguard, Slipper!" he said, grinning; "every one'll say I told +him to open the gate! But look here, I'm afraid we're in for trouble. +Sultan's given himself a bad over-reach; you could never drive him home +to-night. And I've just seen Norris lying blind drunk under a wall!" + +Now Norris was Lady Knox's coachman. We stood aghast at this "horror +on horror's head," the blood trickled down Sultan's heel, and the +lather lay in flecks on his dripping, heaving sides, in irrefutable +witness to the iniquity of Lady Knox's only daughter. Then Flurry said: + +"Thank the Lord, here's the rain!" + +At the moment I admit that I failed to see any cause for gratitude in +this occurrence, but later on I appreciated Flurry's grasp of +circumstances. + +That appreciation was, I think, at its highest development about +half-an-hour afterwards, when I, an unwilling conspirator (a part with +which my acquaintance with Mr. Knox had rendered me but too familiar) +unfurled Mrs. Cadogan's umbrella over Lady Knox's head, and hurried her +through the rain from the tent to the 'bus, keeping it and my own +person well between her and the horses. I got her in, with the rest of +her bedraggled and exhausted party, and slammed the door. + +"Remember, Major Yeates," she said through the window, "you are the +_only_ person here in whom I have any confidence. I don't wish _any_ +one else to touch the reins!" this with a glance towards Flurry, who +was standing near. + +"I'm afraid I'm only a moderate whip," I said. + +"My dear man," replied Lady Knox testily, "those horses could drive +themselves!" + +I slunk round to the front of the 'bus. Two horses, carefully rugged, +were in it, with the inevitable Slipper at their heads. + +"Slipper's going with you," whispered Flurry, stepping up to me; "she +won't have me at any price. He'll throw the rugs over them when you +get to the house, and if you hold the umbrella well over her she'll +never see. I'll manage to get Sultan over somehow, when Norris is +sober. That will be all right." + +I climbed to the box without answering, my soul being bitter within me, +as is the soul of a man who has been persuaded by womankind against his +judgment. + +"Never again!" I said to myself, picking up the reins; "let her marry +him or Bernard Shute, or both of them if she likes, but I won't be +roped into this kind of business again!" + +Slipper drew the rugs from the horses, revealing on the near side Lady +Knox's majestic carriage horse, and on the off, a thick-set brown mare +of about fifteen hands. + +"What brute is this?" said I to Slipper, as he swarmed up beside me. + +"I don't rightly know where Misther Flurry got her," said Slipper, with +one of his hiccoughing crows of laughter; "give her the whip, Major, +and"--here he broke into song: + + "Howld to the shteel, + Honamaundhiaoul; she'll run off like an eel!" + + +"If you don't shut your mouth," said I, with pent-up ferocity, "I'll +chuck you off the 'bus." + +Slipper was but slightly drunk, and, taking this delicate rebuke in +good part, he relapsed into silence. + +Wherever the brown mare came from, I can certify that it was not out of +double harness. Though humble and anxious to oblige, she pulled away +from the pole as if it were red hot, and at critical moments had a +tendency to sit down. However, we squeezed without misadventure among +the donkey carts and between the groups of people, and bumped at length +in safety out on to the high-road. + +Here I thought it no harm to take Slipper's advice, and I applied the +whip to the brown mare, who seemed inclined to turn round. She +immediately fell into an uncertain canter that no effort of mine could +frustrate; I could only hope that Miss Sally would foster conversation +inside the 'bus and create a distraction; but judging from my last view +of the party, and of Lady Knox in particular, I thought she was not +likely to be successful. Fortunately the rain was heavy and thick, and +a rising west wind gave every promise of its continuance. I had little +doubt but that I should catch cold, but I took it to my bosom with +gratitude as I reflected how it was drumming on the roof of the 'bus +and blurring the windows. + +We had reached the foot of a hill, about a quarter of a mile from the +racecourse; the Castle Knox horse addressed himself to it with +dignified determination, but the mare showed a sudden and alarming +tendency to jib. + +"Belt her, Major!" vociferated Slipper, as she hung back from the pole +chain, with the collar half-way up her ewe neck, "and give it to the +horse, too! He'll dhrag her!" + +I was in the act of "belting," when a squealing whinny struck upon my +ear, accompanied by a light pattering gallop on the road behind us; +there was an answering roar from the brown mare, a roar, as I realised +with a sudden drop of the heart, of outraged maternal feeling, and in +another instant a pale, yellow foal sprinted up beside us, with shrill +whickerings of joy. Had there at this moment been a boghole handy, I +should have turned the 'bus into it without hesitation; as there was no +accommodation of the kind, I laid the whip severely into everything I +could reach, including the foal. The result was that we topped the +hill at a gallop, three abreast, like a Russian troitska; it was like +my usual luck that at this identical moment we should meet the police +patrol, who saluted respectfully. + +"That the divil may blisther Michael Moloney!" ejaculated Slipper, +holding on to the rail; "didn't I give him the foaleen and a halther on +him to keep him! I'll howld you a pint 'twas the wife let him go, for +she being vexed about the license! Sure that one's a March foal, an' +he'd run from here to Cork!" + +There was no sign from my inside passengers, and I held on at a round +pace, the mother and child galloping absurdly, the carriage horse +pulling hard, but behaving like a gentleman. I wildly revolved plans +of how I would make Slipper turn the foal in at the first gate we came +to, of what I should say to Lady Knox supposing the worst happened and +the foal accompanied us to her hall door, and of how I would have +Flurry's blood at the earliest possible opportunity, and here the +fateful sound of galloping behind us was again heard. + +"It's impossible!" I said to myself; "she can't have twins!" + +The galloping came nearer, and Slipper looked back. + +"Murdher alive!" he said in a stage whisper; "Tom Sheehy's afther us on +the butcher's pony!" + +"What's that to me?" I said, dragging my team aside to let him pass; "I +suppose he's drunk, like every one else!" + +Then the voice of Tom Sheehy made itself heard. + +"Shtop! Shtop thief!" he was bawling; "give up my mare! How will I +get me porther home!" + + +That was the closest shave I have ever had, and nothing could have +saved the position but the torrential nature of the rain and the fact +that Lady Knox had on a new bonnet. I explained to her at the door of +the 'bus that Sheehy was drunk (which was the one unassailable feature +of the case), and had come after his foal, which, with the fatuity of +its kind, had escaped from a field and followed us. I did not mention +to Lady Knox that when Mr. Sheehy retreated, apologetically, dragging +the foal after him in a halter belonging to one of her own carriage +horses, he had a sovereign of mine in his pocket, and during the +narration I avoided Miss Sally's eye as carefully as she avoided mine. + +The only comments on the day's events that are worthy of record were +that Philippa said to me that she had not been able to understand what +the curious taste in the tea had been till Sally told her it was +turf-smoke, and that Mrs. Cadogan said to Philippa that night that "the +Major was that dhrinched that if he had a shirt between his skin and +himself he could have wrung it," and that Lady Knox said to a mutual +friend that though Major Yeates had been extremely kind and obliging, +he was an uncommonly bad whip. + + + + +XII + +"OH LOVE! OH FIRE!" + +It was on one of the hottest days of a hot August that I walked over to +Tory Lodge to inform Mr. Flurry Knox, M.F.H., that the limits of human +endurance had been reached, and that either Venus and her family, or I +and mine, must quit Shreelane. In a moment of impulse I had accepted +her and her numerous progeny as guests in my stable-yard, since when +Mrs. Cadogan had given warning once or twice a week, and Maria, lawful +autocrat of the ashpit, had had--I quote the kitchen-maid--"tin battles +for every male she'd ate." + +The walk over the hills was not of a nature to lower the temperature, +moral or otherwise. The grassy path was as slippery as glass, the +rocks radiated heat, the bracken radiated horseflies. There was no +need to nurse my wrath to keep it warm. + +I found Flurry seated in the kennel-yard in a long and unclean white +linen coat, engaged in clipping hieroglyphics on the ears of a young +outgoing draft, an occupation in itself unfavourable to argument. The +young draft had already monopolised all possible forms of remonstrance, +from snarling in the obscurity behind the meal sack in the +boiler-house, to hysterical yelling as they were dragged forth by the +tail; but through these alarms and excursions I denounced Venus and all +her works, from slaughtered Wyandottes to broken dishes. Even as I did +so I was conscious of something chastened in Mr. Knox's demeanour, some +touch of remoteness and melancholy with which I was quite unfamiliar; +my indictment weakened and my grievances became trivial when laid +before this grave and almost religiously gentle young man. + +"I'm sorry you and Mrs. Yeates should be vexed by her. Send her back +when you like. I'll keep her. Maybe it'll not be for so long after +all." + +When pressed to expound this dark saying, Flurry smiled wanly and +snipped a second line in the hair of the puppy that was pinned between +his legs. I was almost relieved when a hard try to bite on the part of +the puppy imparted to Flurry's language a transient warmth; but the +reaction was only temporary. + +"It'd be as good for me to make a present of this lot to old Welby as +to take the price he's offering me," he went on, as he got up and took +off his highly-scented kennel-coat; "but I couldn't be bothered +fighting him. Come on in and have something. I drink tea myself at +this hour." + +If he had said toast and water it would have seemed no more than was +suitable to such a frame of mind. As I followed him to the house I +thought that when the day came that Flurry Knox could not be bothered +with fighting old Welby things were becoming serious, but I kept this +opinion to myself and merely offered an admiring comment on the roses +that were blooming on the front of the house. + +"I put up every stick of that trellis myself with my own hands," said +Flurry, still gloomily; "the roses were trailing all over the place for +the want of it. Would you like to have a look at the garden while +they're getting tea? I settled it up a bit since you saw it last." + +I acceded to this almost alarmingly ladylike suggestion, marvelling +greatly. + +Flurry certainly was a changed man, and his garden was a changed +garden. It was a very old garden, with unexpected arbours madly +overgrown with flowering climbers, and a flight of grey steps leading +to a terrace, where a moss-grown sundial and ancient herbaceous plants +strove with nettles and briars; but I chiefly remembered it as a place +where washing was wont to hang on black-currant bushes, and the kennel +terrier matured his bones and hunted chickens. There was now rabbit +wire on the gate, the walks were cleaned, the beds weeded. There was +even a bed of mignonette, a row of sweet pea, and a blazing party of +sunflowers, and Michael, once second in command in many a filibustering +expedition, was now on his knees, ingloriously tying carnations to +little pieces of cane. + +We walked up the steps to the terrace. Down below us the rich and +southern blue of the sea filled the gaps between scattered fir-trees; +the hillside above was purple with heather; a bay mare and her foal +were moving lazily through the bracken, with the sun glistening on it +and them. I looked back at the house, nestling in the hollow of the +hill, I smelled the smell of the mignonette in the air, I regarded +Michael's labouring back among the carnations, and without any +connection of ideas I seemed to see Miss Sally Knox, with her +golden-red hair and slight figure, standing on the terrace beside her +kinsman. + +"Michael! Do ye know where's Misther Flurry?" squalled a voice from +the garden gate, the untrammelled voice of the female domestic at large +among her fellows. "The tay's wet, and there's a man over with a +message from Aussolas. He was tellin' me the owld hairo beyant is +givin' out invitations----" + +A stricken silence fell, induced, no doubt, by hasty danger signals +from Michael. + +"Who's 'the old hero beyant'?" I asked, as we turned toward the house. + +"My grandmother," said Flurry, permitting himself a smile that had +about as much sociability in it as skim milk; "she's giving a tenants' +dance at Aussolas. She gave one about five years ago, and I declare +you might as well get the influenza into the country, or a mission at +the chapel. There won't be a servant in the place will be able to +answer their name for a week after it, what with toothache and +headache, and blathering in the kitchen!" + +We had tea in the drawing-room, a solemnity which I could not but be +aware was due to the presence of a new carpet, a new wall-paper, and a +new piano. Flurry made no comment on these things, but something told +me that I was expected to do so, and I did. + +"I'd sell you the lot to-morrow for half what I gave for them," said my +host, eyeing them with morose respect as he poured out his third cup of +tea. + +I have all my life been handicapped by not having the courage of my +curiosity. Those who have the nerve to ask direct questions on matters +that do not concern them seldom fail to extract direct answers, but in +my lack of this enviable gift I went home in the dark as to what had +befallen my landlord, and fully aware of how my wife would despise me +for my shortcomings. Philippa always says that she never asks +questions, but she seems none the less to get a lot of answers. + +On my own avenue I met Miss Sally Knox riding away from the house on +her white cob; she had found no one at home, and she would not turn +back with me, but she did not seem to be in any hurry to ride away. I +told her that I had just been over to see her relative, Mr. Knox, who +had informed me that he meant to give up the hounds, a fact in which +she seemed only conventionally interested. She looked pale, and her +eyelids were slightly pink; I checked myself on the verge of asking her +if she had hay-fever, and inquired instead if she had heard of the +tenants' dance at Aussolas. She did not answer at first, but rubbed +her cane up and down the cob's clipped toothbrush of a mane. Then she +said: + +"Major Yeates--look here--there's a most awful row at home!" + +I expressed incoherent regret, and wished to my heart that Philippa had +been there to cope with the situation. + +"It began when mamma found out about Flurry's racing Sultan, and then +came our dance----" + +Miss Sally stopped; I nodded, remembering certain episodes of Lady +Knox's dance. + +"And--mamma says--she says----" + +I waited respectfully to hear what mamma had said; the cob fidgeted +under the attentions of the horseflies, and nearly trod on my toe. + +"Well, the end of it is," she said with a gulp, "she said such things +to Flurry that he can't come near the house again, and I'm to go over +to England to Aunt Dora, next week. Will you tell Philippa I came to +say good-bye to her? I don't think I can get over here again." + +Miss Sally was a sufficiently old friend of mine for me to take her +hand and press it in a fatherly manner, but for the life of me I could +not think of anything to say, unless I expressed my sympathy with her +mother's point of view about detrimentals, which was obviously not the +thing to do. + +Philippa accorded to my news the rare tribute of speechless attention, +and then was despicable enough to say that she had foreseen the whole +affair from the beginning. + +"From the day that she refused him in the ice-house, I suppose," said I +sarcastically. + +"That _was_ the beginning," replied Philippa. + +"Well," I went on judicially, "whenever it began, it was high time for +it to end. She can do a good deal better than Flurry." + +Philippa became rather red in the face. + +"I call that a thoroughly commonplace thing to say," she said. "I dare +say he has not many ideas beyond horses, but no more has she, and he +really does come and borrow books from me----" + +"Whitaker's Almanack," I murmured. + +"Well, I don't care, I like him very much, and I know what you're going +to say, and you're wrong, and I'll tell you why----" + +Here Mrs. Cadogan came into the room, her cap at rather more than its +usual warlike angle over her scarlet forehead, and in her hand a +kitchen plate, on which a note was ceremoniously laid forth. + +"But this is for you, Mrs. Cadogan," said Philippa, as she looked at it. + +"Ma'am," returned Mrs. Cadogan with immense dignity, "I have no +learning, and from what the young man's afther telling me that brought +it from Aussolas, I'd sooner yerself read it for me than thim gerrls." + +My wife opened the envelope, and drew forth a gilt-edged sheet of pink +paper. + +"Miss Margaret Nolan presents her compliments to Mrs. Cadogan," she +read, "and I have the pleasure of telling you that the servants of +Aussolas is inviting you and Mr. Peter Cadogan, Miss Mulrooney, and +Miss Gallagher"--Philippa's voice quavered perilously--"to a dance on +next Wednesday. Dancing to begin at seven o'clock, and to go on till +five.--Yours affectionately, MAGGIE NOLAN." + +"How affectionate she is!" snorted Mrs. Cadogan; "them's Dublin +manners, I dare say!" + +"P.S.," continued Philippa; "steward, Mr. Denis O'Loughlin; stewardess, +Mrs. Mahony." + +"Thoughtful provision," I remarked; "I suppose Mrs. Mahony's duties +will begin after supper." + +"Well, Mrs. Cadogan," said Philippa, quelling me with a glance, "I +suppose you'd all like to go?" + +"As for dancin'," said Mrs. Cadogan, with her eyes fixed on a level +with the curtain-pole, "I thank God I'm a widow, and the only dancin' +I'll do is to dance to my grave." + +"Well, perhaps Julia, and Annie, and Peter----" suggested Philippa, +considerably overawed. + +"I'm not one of them that holds with loud mockery and harangues," +continued Mrs. Cadogan, "but if I had any wish for dhrawing down talk I +could tell you, ma'am, that the like o' them has their share of dances +without going to Aussolas! Wasn't it only last Sunday week I wint +follyin' the turkey that's layin' out in the plantation, and the whole +o' thim hysted their sails and back with them to their lovers at the +gate-house, and the kitchen-maid having a Jew-harp to be playing for +them!" + +"That was very wrong," said the truckling Philippa. "I hope you spoke +to the kitchen-maid about it." + +"Is it spake to thim?" rejoined Mrs. Cadogan. "No, but what I done was +to dhrag the kitchenmaid round the passages by the hair o' the head!" + +"Well, after that, I think you might let her go to Aussolas," said I +venturously. + +The end of it was that every one in and about the house went to +Aussolas on the following Wednesday, including Mrs. Cadogan. Philippa +had gone over to stay at the Shutes, ostensibly to arrange about a +jumble sale, the real object being (as a matter of history) to inspect +the Scotch young lady before whom Bernard Shute had dumped his +affections in his customary manner. Being alone, with every prospect +of a bad dinner, I accepted with gratitude an invitation to dine and +sleep at Aussolas and see the dance; it is only on very special +occasions that I have the heart to remind Philippa that she had neither +part nor lot in what occurred--it is too serious a matter for trivial +gloryings. + +Mrs. Knox had asked me to dine at six o'clock, which meant that I +arrived, in blazing sunlight and evening clothes, punctually at that +hour, and that at seven o'clock I was still sitting in the library, +reading heavily-bound classics, while my hostess held loud +conversations down staircases with Denis O'Loughlin, the red-bearded +Robinson Crusoe who combined in himself the offices of coachman, +butler, and, to the best of my belief, valet to the lady of the house. +The door opened at last, and Denis, looking as furtive as his prototype +after he had sighted the footprint, put in his head and beckoned to me. + +"The misthress says will ye go to dinner without her," he said very +confidentially; "sure she's greatly vexed ye should be waitin' on her. +'Twas the kitchen chimney cot fire, and faith she's afther giving Biddy +Mahony the sack, on the head of it! Though, indeed, 'tis little we'd +regard a chimney on fire here any other day." + +Mrs. Knox's woolly dog was the sole occupant of the dining-room when I +entered it; he was sitting on his mistress's chair, with all the air of +outrage peculiar to a small and self-important dog when routine has +been interfered with. It was difficult to discover what had caused the +delay, the meal, not excepting the soup, being a cold collation; it was +heavily flavoured with soot, and was hurled on to the table by Crusoe +in spasmodic bursts, contemporaneous, no doubt, with Biddy Mahony's +fits of hysterics in the kitchen. Its most memorable feature was a +noble lake trout, which appeared in two jagged pieces, a matter lightly +alluded to by Denis as the result of "a little argument" between +himself and Biddy as to the dish on which it was to be served. Further +conversation elicited the interesting fact that the combatants had +pulled the trout in two before the matter was settled. A brief glance +at my attendant's hands decided me to let the woolly dog justify his +existence by consuming my portion for me, when Crusoe left the room. + +Old Mrs. Knox remained invisible till the end of dinner, when she +appeared in the purple velvet bonnet that she was reputed to have worn +since the famine, and a dun-coloured woollen shawl fastened by a +splendid diamond brooch, that flashed rainbow fire against the last +shafts of sunset. There was a fire in the old lady's eye, too, the +light that I had sometimes seen in Flurry's in moments of crisis. + +"I have no apologies to offer that are worth hearing," she said, "but I +have come to drink a glass of port wine with you, if you will so far +honour me, and then we must go out and see the ball. My grandson is +late, as usual." + +She crumbled a biscuit with a brown and preoccupied hand; her claw-like +fingers carried a crowded sparkle of diamonds upwards as she raised her +glass to her lips. + +The twilight was falling when we left the room and made our way +downstairs. I followed the little figure in the purple bonnet through +dark regions of passages and doorways, where strange lumber lay about; +there was a rusty suit of armour, an upturned punt, mouldering +pictures, and finally, by a door that opened into the yard, a lady's +bicycle, white with the dust of travel. I supposed this latter to have +been imported from Dublin by the fashionable Miss Maggie Nolan, but on +the other hand it was well within the bounds of possibility that it +belonged to old Mrs. Knox. The coach-house at Aussolas was on a par +with the rest of the establishment, being vast, dilapidated, and of +unknown age. Its three double doors were wide open, and the guests +overflowed through them into the cobble-stoned yard; above their heads +the tin reflectors of paraffin lamps glared at us from among the +Christmas decorations of holly and ivy that festooned the walls. The +voices of a fiddle and a concertina, combined, were uttering a polka +with shrill and hideous fluency, to which the scraping and stamping of +hobnailed boots made a ponderous bass accompaniment. + +Mrs. Knox's donkey-chair had been placed in a commanding position at +the top of the room, and she made her way slowly to it, shaking hands +with all varieties of tenants and saying right things without showing +any symptom of that flustered boredom that I have myself exhibited when +I went round the men's messes on Christmas Day. She took her seat in +the donkey-chair, with the white dog in her lap, and looked with her +hawk's eyes round the array of faces that hemmed in the space where the +dancers were solemnly bobbing and hopping. + +"Will you tell me who that tomfool is, Denis?" she said, pointing to a +young lady in a ball dress who was circling in conscious magnificence +and somewhat painful incongruity in the arms of Mr. Peter Cadogan. + +"That's the lady's-maid from Castle Knox, yer honour, ma'am," replied +Denis, with something remarkably like a wink at Mrs. Knox. + +"When did the Castle Knox servants come?" asked the old lady, very +sharply. + +"The same time yer honour left the table, and----Pillilew! What's +this?" + +There was a clatter of galloping hoofs in the courtyard, as of a troop +of cavalry, and out of the heart of it Flurry's voice shouting to Denis +to drive out the colts and shut the gates before they had the people +killed. I noticed that the colour had risen to Mrs. Knox's face, and I +put it down to anxiety about her young horses. I may admit that when I +heard Flurry's voice, and saw him collaring his grandmother's guests +and pushing them out of the way as he came into the coach-house, I +rather feared that he was in the condition so often defined to me at +Petty Sessions as "not dhrunk, but having dhrink taken." His face was +white, his eyes glittered, there was a general air of exaltation about +him that suggested the solace of the pangs of love according to the +most ancient convention. + +"Hullo!" he said, swaggering up to the orchestra, "what's this +humbugging thing they're playing? A polka, is it? Drop that, John +Casey, and play a jig." + +John Casey ceased abjectly. + +"What'll I play, Masther Flurry?" + +"What the devil do I care? Here, Yeates, put a name on it! You're a +sort of musicianer yourself!" + +I know the names of three or four Irish jigs; but on this occasion my +memory clung exclusively to one, I suppose because it was the one I +felt to be peculiarly inappropriate. + +"Oh, well, 'Haste to the Wedding,'" I said, looking away. + +Flurry gave a shout of laughter. + +"That's it!" he exclaimed. "Play it up, John! Give us 'Haste to the +Wedding.' That's Major Yeates's fancy!" + +Decidedly Flurry was drunk. + +"What's wrong with you all that you aren't dancing?" he continued, +striding up the middle of the room. "Maybe you don't know how. Here, +I'll soon get one that'll show you!" + +He advanced upon his grandmother, snatched her out of the donkey-chair, +and, amid roars of applause, led her out, while the fiddle squealed its +way through the inimitable twists of the tune, and the concertina +surged and panted after it. Whatever Mrs. Knox may have thought of her +grandson's behaviour, she was evidently going to make the best of it. +She took her station opposite to him, in the purple bonnet, the +dun-coloured shawl, and the diamonds, she picked up her skirt at each +side, affording a view of narrow feet in elastic-sided cloth boots, and +for three repeats of the tune she stood up to her grandson, and footed +it on the coach-house floor. What the cloth boots did I could not +exactly follow; they were, as well as I could see, extremely +scientific, while there was hardly so much as a nod from the plumes of +the bonnet. Flurry was also scientific, but his dancing did not alter +my opinion that he was drunk; in fact, I thought he was making rather +an exhibition of himself. They say that that jig was twenty pounds in +Mrs. Knox's pocket at the next rent day; but though this statement is +open to doubt, I believe that if she and Flurry had taken the hat round +there and then she would have got in the best part of her arrears. + +After this the company settled down to business. The dances lasted a +sweltering half-hour, old women and young dancing with equal and +tireless zest. At the end of each the gentlemen abandoned their +partners without ceremony or comment, and went out to smoke, while the +ladies retired to the laundry, where families of teapots stewed on the +long bars of the fire, and Mrs. Mahony cut up mighty "barm-bracks," and +the tea-drinking was illimitable. + +At ten o'clock Mrs. Knox withdrew from the revel; she said that she was +tired, but I have seldom seen any one look more wide awake. I thought +that I might unobtrusively follow her example, but I was intercepted by +Flurry. + +"Yeates," he said seriously, "I'll take it as a kindness if you'll see +this thing out with me. We must keep them pretty sober, and get them +out of this by daylight. I--I have to get home early." + +I at once took back my opinion that Flurry was drunk; I almost wished +he had been, as I could then have deserted him without a pang. As it +was, I addressed myself heavily to the night's enjoyment. Wan with +heat, but conscientiously cheerful, I danced with Miss Maggie Nolan, +with the Castle Knox lady's-maid, with my own kitchenmaid, who fell +into wild giggles of terror whenever I spoke to her, with Mrs. Cadogan, +who had apparently postponed the interesting feat of dancing to her +grave, and did what she could to dance me into mine. I am bound to +admit that though an ex-soldier and a major, and therefore equipped +with a ready-made character for gallantry, Mrs. Cadogan was the only +one of my partners with whom I conversed with any comfort. + +At intervals I smoked cigarettes in the yard, seated on the old +mounting-block by the gate, and overheard such conversation about the +price of pigs in Skebawn; at intervals I plunged again into the +coach-house, and led forth a perspiring wallflower into the scrimmage +of a polka, or shuffled meaninglessly opposite to her in the long +double line of dancers who were engaged with serious faces in executing +a jig or a reel, I neither knew nor cared which. Flurry remained as +undefeated as ever; I could only suppose it was his method of showing +that his broken heart had mended. + +"It's time to be making the punch, Masther Flurry," said Denis, as the +harness-room clock struck twelve; "sure the night's warm, and the men's +all gaping for it, the craytures!" + +"What'll we make it in?" said Flurry, as we followed him into the +laundry. + +"The boiler, to be sure," said Crusoe, taking up a stone of sugar, and +preparing to shoot it into the laundry copper. + +"Stop, you fool, it's full of cockroaches!" shouted Flurry, amid +sympathetic squalls from the throng of countrywomen. "Go get a bath!" + +"Sure yerself knows there's but one bath in it," retorted Denis, "and +that's within in the Major's room. Faith, the tinker got his own share +yestherday with the same bath, sthriving to quinch the holes, and they +as thick in it as the stars in the sky, and 'tis weeping still, afther +all he done!" + +"Well, then, here goes for the cockroaches!" said Flurry. "What +doesn't sicken will fatten! Give me the kettle, and come on, you Kitty +Collins, and be skimming them off!" + +There were no complaints of the punch when the brew was completed, and +the dance thundered on with a heavier stamping and a louder hilarity +than before. The night wore on; I squeezed through the unyielding pack +of frieze coats and shawls in the doorway, and with feet that momently +swelled in my pumps I limped over the cobble-stones to smoke my eighth +cigarette on the mounting-block. It was a dark, hot night. The old +castle loomed above me in piled-up roofs and gables, and high up in it +somewhere a window sent a shaft of light into the sleeping leaves of a +walnut-tree that overhung the gateway. At the bars of the gate two +young horses peered in at the medley of noise and people; away in an +outhouse a cock crew hoarsely. The gaiety in the coach-house increased +momently, till, amid shrieks and bursts of laughter, Miss Maggie Nolan +fed coquettishly from it with a long yell, like a train coming out of a +tunnel, pursued by the fascinating Peter Cadogan brandishing a twig of +mountain ash, in imitation of mistletoe. The young horses stampeded in +horror, and immediately a voice proceeded from the lighted window +above, Mrs. Knox's voice, demanding what the noise was, and announcing +that if she heard any more of it she would have the place cleared. + +An awful silence fell, to which the young horses' fleeing hoofs lent +the final touch of consternation. Then I heard the irrepressible +Maggie Nolan say: "Oh God! Merry-come-sad!" which I take to be a +reflection on the mutability of all earthly happiness. + +Mrs. Knox remained for a moment at the window, and it struck me as +remarkable that at 2.30 A.M. she should still have on her bonnet. I +thought I heard her speak to some one in the room, and there followed a +laugh, a laugh that was not a servant's, and was puzzlingly familiar. +I gave it up, and presently dropped into a cheerless doze. + +With the dawn there came a period when even Flurry showed signs of +failing. He came and sat down beside me with a yawn; it struck me that +there was more impatience and nervousness than fatigue in the yawn. + +"I think I'll turn them all out of this after the next dance is over," +he said; "I've a lot to do, and I can't stay here." + +I grunted in drowsy approval. It must have been a few minutes later +that I felt Flurry grip my shoulder. + +"Yeates!" he said, "look up at the roof. Do you see anything up there +by the kitchen chimney?" + +He was pointing at a heavy stack of chimneys in a tower that stood up +against the grey and pink of the morning sky. At the angle where one +of them joined the roof smoke was oozing busily out, and, as I stared, +a little wisp of flame stole through. + +The next thing that I distinctly remember is being in the van of a rush +through the kitchen passages, every one shouting "Water! Water!" and +not knowing where to find it, then up several flights of the narrowest +and darkest stairs it has ever been my fate to ascend, with a bucket of +water that I snatched from a woman, spilling as I ran. At the top of +the stairs came a ladder leading to a trap-door, and up in the dark +loft above was the roar and the wavering glare of flames. + +"My God! That's sthrong fire!" shouted Denis, tumbling down the ladder +with a brace of empty buckets; "we'll never save it! The lake won't +quinch it!" + +The flames were squirting out through the bricks of the chimney, +through the timbers, through the slates; it was barely possible to get +through the trap-door, and the booming and crackling strengthened every +instant. + +"A chain to the lake!" gasped Flurry, coughing in the stifling heat as +he slashed the water at the blazing rafters; "the well's no good! Go +on, Yeates!" + +The organising of a double chain out of the mob that thronged and +shouted and jammed in the passages and yard was no mean feat of +generalship; but it got done somehow. Mrs. Cadogan and Biddy Mahony +rose magnificently to the occasion, cursing, thumping, shoving; and +stable buckets, coal buckets, milk pails, and kettles were unearthed +and sent swinging down the grass slope to the lake that lay in +glittering unconcern in the morning sunshine. Men, women, and children +worked in a way that only Irish people can work on an emergency. All +their cleverness, all their good-heartedness, and all their love of a +ruction came to the front; the screaming and the exhortations were +incessant, but so were also the buckets that flew from hand to hand up +to the loft. I hardly know how long we were at it, but there came a +time when I looked up from the yard and saw that the billows of +reddened smoke from the top of the tower were dying down, and I +bethought me of old Mrs. Knox. + +I found her at the door of her room, engaged in tying up a bundle of +old clothes in a sheet; she looked as white as a corpse, but she was +not in any way quelled by the situation. + +"I'd be obliged to you all the same, Major Yeates, to throw this over +the balusters," she said, as I advanced with the news that the fire had +been got under. "'Pon my honour, I don't know when I've been as vexed +as I've been this night, what with one thing and another! 'Tis a +monstrous thing to use a guest as we've used you, but what could we do? +I threw all the silver out of the dining-room window myself, and the +poor peahen that had her nest there was hurt by an entre dish, and +half her eggs were----" + +There was a curious sound not unlike a titter in Mrs. Knox's room. + +"However, we can't make omelettes without breaking eggs--as they say--" +she went on rather hurriedly; "I declare I don't know what I'm saying! +My old head is confused----" + +Here Mrs. Knox went abruptly into her room and shut the door. +Obviously there was nothing further to do for my hostess, and I fought +my way up the dripping back staircase to the loft. The flames had +ceased, the supply of buckets had been stopped, and Flurry, standing on +a ponderous crossbeam, was poking his head and shoulders out into the +sunlight through the hole that had been burned in the roof. Denis and +others were pouring water over charred beams, the atmosphere was still +stifling, everything was black, everything dripped with inky water. +Flurry descended from his beam and stretched himself, looking like a +drowned chimney-sweep. + +"We've made a night of it, Yeates, haven't we?" he said, "but we've +bested it anyhow. We were done for only for you!" There was more +emotion about him than the occasion seemed to warrant, and his eyes had +a Christy Minstrel brightness, not wholly to be attributed to the dirt +on his face. "What's the time?--I must get home." + +The time, incredible as it seemed, was half-past six. I could almost +have sworn that Flurry changed colour when I said so. + +"I must be off," he said; "I had no idea it was so late." + +"Why, what's the hurry?" I asked. + +He stared at me, laughed foolishly, and fell to giving directions to +Denis. Five minutes afterwards he drove out of the yard and away at a +canter down the long stretch of avenue that skirted the lake, with a +troop of young horses flying on either hand. He whirled his whip round +his head and shouted at them, and was lost to sight in a clump of +trees. It is a vision of him that remains with me, and it always +carried with it the bitter smell of wet charred wood. + +Reaction had begun to set in among the volunteers. The chain took to +sitting in the kitchen, cups of tea began mysteriously to circulate, +and personal narratives of the fire were already foreshadowing the +amazing legends that have since gathered round the night's adventure. +I left to Denis the task of clearing the house, and went up to change +my wet clothes, with a feeling that I had not been to bed for a year. +The ghost of a waiter who had drowned himself in a boghole would have +presented a cheerier aspect than I, as I surveyed myself in the +prehistoric mirror in my room, with the sunshine falling on my unshorn +face and begrimed shirt-front. + +I made my toilet at considerable length, and, it being now nearly eight +o'clock, went downstairs to look for something to eat. I had left the +house humming with people; I found it silent as Pompeii. The sheeted +bundles containing Mrs. Knox's wardrobe were lying about the hall; a +couple of ancestors who in the first alarm had been dragged from the +walls were leaning drunkenly against the bundles; last night's dessert +was still on the dining-room table. I went out on to the hall-door +steps, and saw the entre-dishes in a glittering heap in a nasturtium +bed, and realised that there was no breakfast for me this side of lunch +at Shreelane. + +There was a sound of wheels on the avenue, and a brougham came into +view, driving fast up the long open stretch by the lake. It was the +Castle Knox brougham, driven by Norris, whom I had last seen drunk at +the athletic sports, and as it drew up at the door I saw Lady Knox +inside. + +"It's all right, the fire's out," I said, advancing genially and full +of reassurance. + +"What fire?" said Lady Knox, regarding me with an iron countenance. + +I explained. + +"Well, as the house isn't burned down," said Lady Knox, cutting short +my details, "perhaps you would kindly find out if I could see Mrs. +Knox." + +Lady Knox's face was many shades redder than usual. I began to +understand that something awful had happened, or would happen, and I +wished myself safe at Shreelane, with the bedclothes over my head. + +"If 'tis for the misthress you're looking, me lady," said Denis's voice +behind me, in tones of the utmost respect, "she went out to the kitchen +garden a while ago to get a blasht o' the fresh air afther the night. +Maybe your ladyship would sit inside in the library till I call her?" + +Lady Knox eyed Crusoe suspiciously. + +"Thank you, I'll fetch her myself," she said. + +"Oh, sure, that's too throuble----" began Denis. + +"Stay where you are!" said Lady Knox, in a voice like the slam of a +door. + +"Bedad, I'm best plased she went," whispered Denis, as Lady Knox set +forth alone down the shrubbery walk. + +"But is Mrs. Knox in the garden?" said I. + +"The Lord preserve your innocence, sir!" replied Denis, with seeming +irrelevance. + +At this moment I became aware of the incredible fact that Sally Knox +was silently descending the stairs; she stopped short as she got into +the hall, and looked almost wildly at me and Denis. Was I looking at +her wraith? There was again a sound of wheels on the gravel; she went +to the hall door, outside which was now drawn up Mrs. Knox's +donkey-carriage, as well as Lady Knox's brougham, and, as if overcome +by this imposing spectacle, she turned back and put her hands over her +face. + +"She's gone round to the garden, asthore," said Denis in a hoarse +whisper; "go in the donkey-carriage. 'Twill be all right!" He seized +her by the arm, pushed her down the steps and into the little carriage, +pulled up the hood over her to its furthest stretch, snatched the whip +out of the hand of the broadly-grinning Norris, and with terrific +objurgations lashed the donkey into a gallop. The donkey-boy grasped +the position, whatever it might be; he took up the running on the other +side, and the donkey-carriage swung away down the avenue, with all its +incongruous air of hooded and rowdy invalidism. + +I have never disguised the fact that I am a coward, and therefore when, +at this dynamitical moment, I caught a glimpse of Lady Knox's hat over +a laurustinus, as she returned at high speed from the garden, I slunk +into the house and faded away round the dining-room door. "This minute +I seen the misthress going down through the plantation beyond," said +the voice of Crusoe outside the window, "and I'm afther sending Johnny +Regan to her with the little carriage, not to put any more delay on yer +ladyship. Sure you can see him making all the haste he can. Maybe +you'd sit inside in the library till she comes." + +Silence followed. I peered cautiously round the window curtain. Lady +Knox was looking defiantly at the donkey-carriage as it reeled at top +speed into the shades of the plantation, strenuously pursued by the +woolly dog. Norris was regarding his horses' ears in expressionless +respectability. Denis was picking up the entre-dishes with decorous +solicitude. Lady Knox turned and came into the house; she passed the +dining-room door with an ominous step, and went on into the library. + +It seemed to me that now or never was the moment to retire quietly to +my room, put my things into my portmanteau, and---- + +Denis rushed into the room with the entre-dishes piled up to his chin. + +"She's diddled!" he whispered, crashing them down on the table. He +came at me with his hand out. "Three cheers for Masther Flurry and +Miss Sally," he hissed, wringing my hand up and down, "and 'twas +yerself called for 'Haste to the Weddin'' last night, long life to ye! +The Lord save us! There's the misthress going into the library!" + +Through the half-open door I saw old Mrs. Knox approach the library +from the staircase with a dignified slowness; she had on a wedding +garment, a long white burnous, in which she might easily have been +mistaken for a small, stout clergyman. She waved back Crusoe, the door +closed upon her, and the battle of giants was entered upon. I sat +down--it was all I was able for--and remained for a full minute in +stupefied contemplation of the entre-dishes. + + +Perhaps of all conclusions to a situation so portentous, that which +occurred was the least possible. Twenty minutes after Mrs. Knox met +her antagonist I was summoned from strapping my portmanteau to face the +appalling duty of escorting the combatants, in Lady Knox's brougham, to +the church outside the back gate, to which Miss Sally had preceded them +in the donkey-carriage. I pulled myself together, went down stairs, +and found that the millennium had suddenly set in. It had apparently +dawned with the news that Aussolas and all things therein were +bequeathed to Flurry by his grandmother, and had established itself +finally upon the considerations that the marriage was past praying for, +and that the diamonds were intended for Miss Sally. + +We fetched the bride and bridegroom from the church; we fetched old +Eustace Hamilton, who married them; we dug out the champagne from the +cellar; we even found rice and threw it. + +The hired carriage that had been ordered to take the runaways across +country to a distant station was driven by Slipper. He was shaved; he +wore an old livery coat and a new pot hat; he was wondrous sober. On +the following morning he was found asleep on a heap of stones ten miles +away; somewhere in the neighbourhood one of the horses was grazing in a +field with a certain amount of harness hanging about it. The carriage +and the remaining horse were discovered in a roadside ditch, two miles +farther on; one of the carriage doors had been torn off, and in the +interior the hens of the vicinity were conducting an exhaustive search +after the rice that lurked in the cushions. + + + + + PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT + THE PRESS OF THE PUBLISHERS. + + + + +THE NEW NELSON CLASSICS + + +_Over 300 volumes. Cloth gilt. Each 1s. 6d. net._ + + +This famous series, which is now more attractive than ever, contains +many notable modern books, the classics of to-morrow, besides +"classics" in the accepted sense. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Some Experiences of an Irish R.M. + +Author: E. OE. Somerville + Martin Ross + +Release Date: January 15, 2011 [EBook #34630] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + +SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. + + +by + +E. OE. SOMERVILLE + +and + +MARTIN ROSS + + + + +THOMAS NELSON & SONS LTD + +LONDON EDINBURGH PARIS MELBOURNE + +TORONTO AND NEW YORK + + + + + Reprinted by permission of + Messrs. Longmans Green & Co., Ltd. + + + + +CONTENTS + + I. GREAT-UNCLE MCCARTHY + II. IN THE CURRANHILTY COUNTRY + III. TRINKET'S COLT + IV. THE WATERS OF STRIFE + V. LISHEEN RACES, SECOND-HAND + VI. PHILIPPA'S FOX-HUNT + VII. A MISDEAL + VIII. THE HOLY ISLAND + IX. THE POLICY OF THE CLOSED DOOR + X. THE HOUSE OF FAHY + XI. OCCASIONAL LICENSES + XII. "OH LOVE! OH FIRE!" + + + + +SOME EXPERIENCES OF AN IRISH R.M. + + + +I + +GREAT-UNCLE McCARTHY + +A Resident Magistracy in Ireland is not an easy thing to come by +nowadays; neither is it a very attractive job; yet on the evening when +I first propounded the idea to the young lady who had recently +consented to become Mrs. Sinclair Yeates, it seemed glittering with +possibilities. There was, on that occasion, a sunset, and a string +band playing "The Gondoliers," and there was also an ingenuous belief +in the omnipotence of a godfather of Philippa's--(Philippa was the +young lady)--who had once been a member of the Government. + +I was then climbing the steep ascent of the Captains towards my +Majority. I have no fault to find with Philippa's godfather; he did +all and more than even Philippa had expected; nevertheless, I had +attained to the dignity of mud major, and had spent a good deal on +postage stamps, and on railway fares to interview people of influence, +before I found myself in the hotel at Skebawn, opening long envelopes +addressed to "Major Yeates, R.M." + +My most immediate concern, as any one who has spent nine weeks at Mrs. +Raverty's hotel will readily believe, was to leave it at the earliest +opportunity; but in those nine weeks I had learned, amongst other +painful things, a little, a very little, of the methods of the artisan +in the West of Ireland. Finding a house had been easy enough. I had +had my choice of several, each with some hundreds of acres of shooting, +thoroughly poached, and a considerable portion of the roof intact. I +had selected one; the one that had the largest extent of roof in +proportion to the shooting, and had been assured by my landlord that in +a fortnight or so it would be fit for occupation. + +"There's a few little odd things to be done," he said easily; "a lick +of paint here and there, and a slap of plaster----" + +I am short-sighted; I am also of Irish extraction; both facts that make +for toleration--but even I thought he was understating the case. So +did the contractor. + +At the end of three weeks the latter reported progress, which mainly +consisted of the facts that the plumber had accused the carpenter of +stealing sixteen feet of his inch-pipe to run a bell wire through, and +that the carpenter had replied that he wished the divil might run the +plumber through a wran's quill. The plumber having reflected upon the +carpenter's parentage, the work of renovation had merged in battle, and +at the next Petty Sessions I was reluctantly compelled to allot to each +combatant seven days, without the option of a fine. + +These and kindred difficulties extended in an unbroken chain through +the summer months, until a certain wet and windy day in October, when, +with my baggage, I drove over to establish myself at Shreelane. It was +a tall, ugly house of three storeys high, its walls faced with +weather-beaten slates, its windows staring, narrow, and vacant. Round +the house ran an area, in which grew some laurustinus and holly bushes +among ash heaps, and nettles, and broken bottles. I stood on the +steps, waiting for the door to be opened, while the rain sluiced upon +me from a broken eaveshoot that had, amongst many other things, escaped +the notice of my landlord. I thought of Philippa, and of her plan, +broached in to-day's letter, of having the hall done up as a +sitting-room. + +The door opened, and revealed the hall. It struck me that I had +perhaps overestimated its possibilities. Among them I had certainly +not included a flagged floor, sweating with damp, and a reek of cabbage +from the adjacent kitchen stairs. A large elderly woman, with a red +face, and a cap worn helmet-wise on her forehead, swept me a +magnificent curtsey as I crossed the threshold. + +"Your honour's welcome----" she began, and then every door in the house +slammed in obedience to the gust that drove through it. With something +that sounded like "Mend ye for a back door!" Mrs. Cadogan abandoned her +opening speech and made for the kitchen stairs. (Improbable as it may +appear, my housekeeper was called Cadogan, a name made locally possible +by being pronounced Caydogawn.) + +Only those who have been through a similar experience can know what +manner of afternoon I spent. I am a martyr to colds in the head, and I +felt one coming on. I made a laager in front of the dining-room fire, +with a tattered leather screen and the dinner table, and gradually, +with cigarettes and strong tea, baffled the smell of must and cats, and +fervently trusted that the rain might avert a threatened visit from my +landlord. I was then but superficially acquainted with Mr. Florence +McCarthy Knox and his habits. + +At about 4.30, when the room had warmed up, and my cold was yielding to +treatment, Mrs. Cadogan entered and informed me that "Mr. Flurry" was +in the yard, and would be thankful if I'd go out to him, for he +couldn't come in. Many are the privileges of the female sex; had I +been a woman I should unhesitatingly have said that I had a cold in my +head. Being a man, I huddled on a mackintosh, and went out into the +yard. + +My landlord was there on horseback, and with him there was a man +standing at the head of a stout grey animal. I recognised with despair +that I was about to be compelled to buy a horse. + +"Good afternoon, Major," said Mr. Knox in his slow, sing-song brogue; +"it's rather soon to be paying you a visit, but I thought you might be +in a hurry to see the horse I was telling you of." + +I could have laughed. As if I were ever in a hurry to see a horse! I +thanked him, and suggested that it was rather wet for horse-dealing. + +"Oh, it's nothing when you're used to it," replied Mr. Knox. His +gloveless hands were red and wet, the rain ran down his nose, and his +covert coat was soaked to a sodden brown. I thought that I did not +want to become used to it. My relations with horses have been of a +purely military character, I have endured the Sandhurst riding-school, +I have galloped for an impetuous general, I have been steward at +regimental races, but none of these feats have altered my opinion that +the horse, as a means of locomotion, is obsolete. Nevertheless, the +man who accepts a resident magistracy in the south-west of Ireland +voluntarily retires into the prehistoric age; to institute a stable +became inevitable. + +"You ought to throw a leg over him," said Mr. Knox, "and you're welcome +to take him over a fence or two if you like. He's a nice flippant +jumper." + +Even to my unexacting eye the grey horse did not seem to promise +flippancy, nor did I at all desire to find that quality in him. I +explained that I wanted something to drive, and not to ride. + +"Well, that's a fine raking horse in harness," said Mr. Knox, looking +at me with his serious grey eyes, "and you'd drive him with a sop of +hay in his mouth. Bring him up here, Michael." + +Michael abandoned his efforts to kick the grey horse's forelegs into a +becoming position, and led him up to me. + +I regarded him from under my umbrella with a quite unreasonable +disfavour. He had the dreadful beauty of a horse in a toy-shop, as +chubby, as wooden, and as conscientiously dappled, but it was +unreasonable to urge this as an objection, and I was incapable of +finding any more technical drawback. Yielding to circumstance, I +"threw my leg" over the brute, and after pacing gravely round the +quadrangle that formed the yard, and jolting to my entrance gate and +back, I decided that as he had neither fallen down nor kicked me off, +it was worth paying twenty-five pounds for him, if only to get in out +of the rain. + +Mr. Knox accompanied me into the house and had a drink. He was a fair, +spare young man, who looked like a stable boy among gentlemen, and a +gentleman among stable boys. He belonged to a clan that cropped up in +every grade of society in the county, from Sir Valentine Knox of Castle +Knox down to the auctioneer Knox, who bore the attractive title of +Larry the Liar. So far as I could judge, Florence McCarthy of that ilk +occupied a shifting position about midway in the tribe. I had met him +at dinner at Sir Valentine's, I had heard of him at an illicit auction, +held by Larry the Liar, of brandy stolen from a wreck. They were +"Black Protestants," all of them, in virtue of their descent from a +godly soldier of Cromwell, and all were prepared at any moment of the +day or night to sell a horse. + +"You'll be apt to find this place a bit lonesome after the hotel," +remarked Mr. Flurry, sympathetically, as he placed his foot in its +steaming boot on the hob, "but it's a fine sound house anyway, and lots +of rooms in it, though indeed, to tell you the truth, I never was +through the whole of them since the time my great-uncle, Denis +McCarthy, died here. The dear knows I had enough of it that time." He +paused, and lit a cigarette--one of my best, and quite thrown away upon +him. "Those top floors, now," he resumed, "I wouldn't make too free +with them. There's some of them would jump under you like a spring +bed. Many's the night I was in and out of those attics, following my +poor uncle when he had a bad turn on him--the horrors, y' know--there +were nights he never stopped walking through the house. Good Lord! +will I ever forget the morning he said he saw the devil coming up the +avenue! 'Look at the two horns on him,' says he, and he out with his +gun and shot him, and, begad, it was his own donkey!" + +Mr. Knox gave a couple of short laughs. He seldom laughed, having in +unusual perfection, the gravity of manner that is bred by +horse-dealing, probably from the habitual repression of all emotion +save disparagement. + +The autumn evening, grey with rain, was darkening in the tall windows, +and the wind was beginning to make bullying rushes among the shrubs in +the area; a shower of soot rattled down the chimney and fell on the +hearthrug. + +"More rain coming," said Mr. Knox, rising composedly; "you'll have to +put a goose down these chimneys some day soon, it's the only way in the +world to clean them. Well, I'm for the road. You'll come out on the +grey next week, I hope; the hounds'll be meeting here. Give a roar at +him coming in at his jumps." He threw his cigarette into the fire and +extended a hand to me. "Good-bye, Major, you'll see plenty of me and +my hounds before you're done. There's a power of foxes in the +plantations here." + +This was scarcely reassuring for a man who hoped to shoot woodcock, and +I hinted as much. + +"Oh, is it the cock?" said Mr. Flurry; "b'leeve me, there never was a +woodcock yet that minded hounds, now, no more than they'd mind rabbits! +The best shoots ever I had here, the hounds were in it the day before." + +When Mr. Knox had gone, I began to picture myself going across country +roaring, like a man on a fire-engine, while Philippa put the goose down +the chimney; but when I sat down to write to her I did not feel equal +to being humorous about it. I dilated ponderously on my cold, my hard +work, and my loneliness, and eventually went to bed at ten o'clock full +of cold shivers and hot whisky-and-water. + +After a couple of hours of feverish dozing, I began to understand what +had driven Great-Uncle McCarthy to perambulate the house by night. +Mrs. Cadogan had assured me that the Pope of Rome hadn't a betther bed +undher him than myself; wasn't I down on the new flog mattherass the +old masther bought in Father Scanlan's auction? By the smell I +recognised that "flog" meant flock, otherwise I should have said my +couch was stuffed with old boots. I have seldom spent a more wretched +night. The rain drummed with soft fingers on my window panes; the +house was full of noises. I seemed to see Great-Uncle McCarthy ranging +the passages with Flurry at his heels; several times I thought I heard +him. Whisperings seemed borne on the wind through my keyhole, boards +creaked in the room overhead, and once I could have sworn that a hand +passed, groping, over the panels of my door. I am, I may admit, a +believer in ghosts; I even take in a paper that deals with their +culture, but I cannot pretend that on that night I looked forward to a +manifestation of Great-Uncle McCarthy with any enthusiasm. + +The morning broke stormily, and I woke to find Mrs. Cadogan's +understudy, a grimy nephew of about eighteen, standing by my bedside, +with a black bottle in his hand. + +"There's no bath in the house, sir," was his reply to my command; "but +me A'nt said, would ye like a taggeen?" + +This alternative proved to be a glass of raw whisky. I declined it. + +I look back to that first week of housekeeping at Shreelane as to a +comedy excessively badly staged, and striped with lurid melodrama. +Towards its close I was positively home-sick for Mrs. Raverty's, and I +had not a single clean pair of boots. I am not one of those who hold +the convention that in Ireland the rain never ceases, day or night, but +I must say that my first November at Shreelane was composed of weather +of which my friend Flurry Knox remarked that you wouldn't meet a +Christian out of doors, unless it was a snipe or a dispensary doctor. +To this lamentable category might be added a resident magistrate. +Daily, shrouded in mackintosh, I set forth for the Petty Sessions +Courts of my wide district; daily, in the inevitable atmosphere of wet +frieze and perjury, I listened to indictments of old women who plucked +geese alive, of publicans whose hospitality to their friends broke +forth uncontrollably on Sunday afternoons, of "parties" who, in the +language of the police sergeant, were subtly defined as "not to say +dhrunk, but in good fighting thrim." + +I got used to it all in time--I suppose one can get used to anything--I +even became callous to the surprises of Mrs. Cadogan's cooking. As the +weather hardened and the woodcock came in, and one by one I discovered +and nailed up the rat holes, I began to find life endurable, and even +to feel some remote sensation of home-coming when the grey horse turned +in at the gate of Shreelane. + +The one feature of my establishment to which I could not become inured +was the pervading sub-presence of some thing or things which, for my +own convenience, I summarised as Great-Uncle McCarthy. There were +nights on which I was certain that I heard the inebriate shuffle of his +foot overhead, the touch of his fumbling hand against the walls. There +were dark times before the dawn when sounds went to and fro, the moving +of weights, the creaking of doors, a far-away rapping in which was a +workmanlike suggestion of the undertaker, a rumble of wheels on the +avenue. Once I was impelled to the perhaps imprudent measure of +cross-examining Mrs. Cadogan. Mrs. Cadogan, taking the preliminary +precaution of crossing herself, asked me fatefully what day of the week +it was. + +"Friday!" she repeated after me. "Friday! The Lord save us! 'Twas a +Friday the old masther was buried!" + +At this point a saucepan opportunely boiled over, and Mrs. Cadogan fled +with it to the scullery, and was seen no more. + +In the process of time I brought Great-Uncle McCarthy down to a fine +point. On Friday nights he made coffins and drove hearses; during the +rest of the week he rarely did more than patter and shuffle in the +attics over my head. + +One night, about the middle of December, I awoke, suddenly aware that +some noise had fallen like a heavy stone into my dreams. As I felt for +the matches it came again, the long, grudging groan and the +uncompromising bang of the cross door at the head of the kitchen +stairs. I told myself that it was a draught that had done it, but it +was a perfectly still night. Even as I listened, a sound of wheels on +the avenue shook the stillness. The thing was getting past a joke. In +a few minutes I was stealthily groping my way down my own staircase, +with a box of matches in my hand, enforced by scientific curiosity, but +none the less armed with a stick. I stood in the dark at the top of +the back stairs and listened; the snores of Mrs. Cadogan and her nephew +Peter rose tranquilly from their respective lairs. I descended to the +kitchen and lit a candle; there was nothing unusual there, except a +great portion of the Cadogan wearing apparel, which was arranged at the +fire, and was being serenaded by two crickets. Whatever had opened the +door, my household was blameless. The kitchen was not attractive, yet +I felt indisposed to leave it. None the less, it appeared to be my +duty to inspect the yard. I put the candle on the table and went forth +into the outer darkness. Not a sound was to be heard. The night was +very cold, and so dark, that I could scarcely distinguish the roofs of +the stables against the sky; the house loomed tall and oppressive above +me; I was conscious of how lonely it stood in the dumb and barren +country. Spirits were certainly futile creatures, childish in their +manifestations, stupidly content with the old machinery of raps and +rumbles. I thought how fine a scene might be played on a stage like +this; if I were a ghost, how bluely I would glimmer at the windows, how +whimperingly chatter in the wind. Something whirled out of the +darkness above me, and fell with a flop on the ground, just at my feet. +I jumped backwards, in point of fact I made for the kitchen door, and, +with my hand on the latch, stood still and waited. Nothing further +happened; the thing that lay there did not stir. I struck a match. +The moment of tension turned to bathos as the light flickered on +nothing more fateful than a dead crow. + +Dead it certainly was. I could have told that without looking at it; +but why should it, at some considerable period after its death, fall +from the clouds at my feet. But did it fall from the clouds? I struck +another match, and stared up at the impenetrable face of the house. +There was no hint of solution in the dark windows, but I determined to +go up and search the rooms that gave upon the yard. + +How cold it was! I can feel now the frozen musty air of those attics, +with their rat-eaten floors and wall-papers furred with damp. I went +softly from one to another, feeling like a burglar in my own house, and +found nothing in elucidation of the mystery. The windows were +hermetically shut, and sealed with cobwebs. There was no furniture, +except in the end room, where a wardrobe without doors stood in a +corner, empty save for the solemn presence of a monstrous tall hat. I +went back to bed, cursing those powers of darkness that had got me out +of it, and heard no more. + +My landlord had not failed of his promise to visit my coverts with his +hounds; in fact, he fulfilled it rather more conscientiously than +seemed to me quite wholesome for the cock-shooting. I maintained a +silence which I felt to be magnanimous on the part of a man who cared +nothing for hunting and a great deal for shooting, and wished the +hounds more success in the slaughter of my foxes than seemed to be +granted to them. I met them all, one red frosty evening, as I drove +down the long hill to my demesne gates, Flurry at their head, in his +shabby pink coat and dingy breeches, the hounds trailing dejectedly +behind him and his half-dozen companions. + +"What luck?" I called out, drawing rein as I met them. + +"None," said Mr. Flurry briefly. He did not stop, neither did he +remove his pipe from the down-twisted corner of his mouth; his eye at +me was cold and sour. The other members of the hunt passed me with +equal hauteur; I thought they took their ill luck very badly. + +On foot, among the last of the straggling hounds, cracking a carman's +whip, and swearing comprehensively at them all, slouched my friend +Slipper. Our friendship had begun in Court, the relative positions of +the dock and the judgment-seat forming no obstacle to its progress, and +had been cemented during several days' tramping after snipe. He was, +as usual, a little drunk, and he hailed me as though I were a ship. + +"Ahoy, Major Yeates!" he shouted, bringing himself up with a lurch +against my cart; "it's hunting you should be, in place of sending poor +divils to gaol!" + +"But I hear you had no hunting," I said. + +"Ye heard that, did ye?" Slipper rolled upon me an eye like that of a +profligate pug. "Well, begor, ye heard no more than the thruth." + +"But where are all the foxes?" said I. + +"Begor, I don't know no more than your honour. And Shreelane--that +there used to be as many foxes in it as there's crosses in a yard of +check! Well, well, I'll say nothin' for it, only that it's quare! +Here, Vaynus! Naygress!" Slipper uttered a yell, hoarse with whisky, +in adjuration of two elderly ladies of the pack who had profited by our +conversation to stray away into an adjacent cottage. "Well, +good-night, Major. Mr. Flurry's as cross as briars, and he'll have me +ate!" + +He set off at a surprisingly steady run, cracking his whip, and +whooping like a madman. I hope that when I also am fifty I shall be +able to run like Slipper. + +That frosty evening was followed by three others like unto it, and a +flight of woodcock came in. I calculated that I could do with five +guns, and I despatched invitations to shoot and dine on the following +day to four of the local sportsmen, among whom was, of course, my +landlord. I remember that in my letter to the latter I expressed a +facetious hope that my bag of cock would be more successful than his of +foxes had been. + +The answers to my invitations were not what I expected. All, without +so much as a conventional regret, declined my invitation; Mr. Knox +added that he hoped the bag of cock would be to my liking, and that I +need not be "affraid" that the hounds would trouble my coverts any +more. Here was war! I gazed in stupefaction at the crooked scrawl in +which my landlord had declared it. It was wholly and entirely +inexplicable, and instead of going to sleep comfortably over the fire +and my newspaper as a gentleman should, I spent the evening in +irritated ponderings over this bewildering and exasperating change of +front on the part of my friendly squireens. + +My shoot the next day was scarcely a success. I shot the woods in +company with my gamekeeper, Tim Connor, a gentleman whose duties mainly +consisted in limiting the poaching privileges to his personal friends, +and whatever my offence might have been, Mr. Knox could have wished me +no bitterer punishment than hearing the unavailing shouts of "Mark +cock!" and seeing my birds winging their way from the coverts, far out +of shot. Tim Connor and I got ten couple between us; it might have +been thirty if my neighbours had not boycotted me, for what I could +only suppose was the slackness of their hounds. + +I was dog-tired that night, having walked enough for three men, and I +slept the deep, insatiable sleep that I had earned. It was somewhere +about 3 A.M. that I was gradually awakened by a continuous knocking, +interspersed with muffled calls. Great-Uncle McCarthy had never before +given tongue, and I freed one ear from blankets to listen. Then I +remembered that Peter had told me the sweep had promised to arrive that +morning, and to arrive early. Blind with sleep and fury I went to the +passage window, and thence desired the sweep to go to the devil. It +availed me little. For the remainder of the night I could hear him +pacing round the house, trying the windows, banging at the doors, and +calling upon Peter Cadogan as the priests of Baal called upon their +god. At six o'clock I had fallen into a troubled doze, when Mrs. +Cadogan knocked at my door and imparted the information that the sweep +had arrived. My answer need not be recorded, but in spite of it the +door opened, and my housekeeper, in a weird _deshabille_, effectively +lighted by the orange beams of her candle, entered my room. + +"God forgive me, I never seen one I'd hate as much as that sweep!" she +began; "he's these three hours--arrah, what, three hours!--no, but all +night, raising tallywack and tandem round the house to get at the +chimbleys." + +"Well, for Heaven's sake let him get at the chimneys and let me go to +sleep," I answered, goaded to desperation, "and you may tell him from +me that if I hear his voice again I'll shoot him!" + +Mrs. Cadogan silently left my bedside, and as she closed the door she +said to herself, "The Lord save us!" + +Subsequent events may be briefly summarised. At 7.30 I was awakened +anew by a thunderous sound in the chimney, and a brick crashed into the +fireplace, followed at a short interval by two dead jackdaws and their +nests. At eight, I was informed by Peter that there was no hot water, +and that he wished the divil would roast the same sweep. At 9.30, when +I came down to breakfast, there was no fire anywhere, and my coffee, +made in the coachhouse, tasted of soot. I put on an overcoat and +opened my letters. About fourth or fifth in the uninteresting heap +came one in an egregiously disguised hand. + +"Sir," it began, "this is to inform you your unsportsmanlike conduct +has been discovered. You have been suspected this good while of +shooting the Shreelane foxes, it is known now you do worse. Parties +have seen your gamekeeper going regular to meet the Saturday early +train at Salters Hill Station, with your grey horse under a cart, and +your labels on the boxes, and we know as well as _your agent in Cork_ +what it is you have in those boxes. Be warned in time.--Your +Wellwisher." + +I read this through twice before its drift became apparent, and I +realised that I was accused of improving my shooting and my finances by +the simple expedient of selling my foxes. That is to say, I was in a +worse position than if I had stolen a horse, or murdered Mrs. Cadogan, +or got drunk three times a week in Skebawn. + +For a few moments I fell into wild laughter, and then, aware that it +was rather a bad business to let a lie of this kind get a start, I sat +down to demolish the preposterous charge in a letter to Flurry Knox. +Somehow, as I selected my sentences, it was borne in upon me that, if +the letter spoke the truth, circumstantial evidence was rather against +me. Mere lofty repudiation would be unavailing, and by my infernal +facetiousness about the woodcock I had effectively filled in the case +against myself. At all events, the first thing to do was to establish +a basis, and have it out with Tim Connor. I rang the bell. + +"Peter, is Tim Connor about the place?" + +"He is not, sir. I heard him say he was going west the hill to mend +the bounds fence." Peter's face was covered with soot, his eyes were +red, and he coughed ostentatiously. "The sweep's after breaking one of +his brushes within in yer bedroom chimney, sir," he went on, with all +the satisfaction of his class in announcing domestic calamity; "he's +above on the roof now, and he'd be thankful to you to go up to him." + +I followed him upstairs in that state of simmering patience that any +employer of Irish labour must know and sympathise with. I climbed the +rickety ladder and squeezed through the dirty trapdoor involved in the +ascent to the roof, and was confronted by the hideous face of the +sweep, black against the frosty blue sky. He had encamped with all his +paraphernalia on the flat top of the roof, and was good enough to rise +and put his pipe in his pocket on my arrival. + +"Good morning, Major. That's a grand view you have up here," said the +sweep. He was evidently far too well bred to talk shop. "I thravelled +every roof in this counthry, and there isn't one where you'd get as +handsome a prospect!" + +Theoretically he was right, but I had not come up to the roof to +discuss scenery, and demanded brutally why he had sent for me. The +explanation involved a recital of the special genius required to sweep +the Shreelane chimneys; of the fact that the sweep had in infancy been +sent up and down every one of them by Great-Uncle McCarthy; of the +three ass-loads of soot that by his peculiar skill he had this morning +taken from the kitchen chimney; of its present purity, the draught +being such that it would "dhraw up a young cat with it." +Finally--realising that I could endure no more--he explained that my +bedroom chimney had got what he called "a wynd" in it, and he proposed +to climb down a little way in the stack to try "would he get to come at +the brush." The sweep was very small, the chimney very large. I +stipulated that he should have a rope round his waist, and despite the +illegality, I let him go. He went down like a monkey, digging his toes +and fingers into the niches made for the purpose in the old chimney; +Peter held the rope. I lit a cigarette and waited. + +Certainly the view from the roof was worth coming up to look at. It +was rough, heathery country on one side, with a string of little blue +lakes running like a turquoise necklet round the base of a firry hill, +and patches of pale green pasture were set amidst the rocks and +heather. A silvery flash behind the undulations of the hills told +where the Atlantic lay in immense plains of sunlight. I turned to +survey with an owner's eye my own grey woods and straggling plantations +of larch, and espied a man coming out of the western wood. He had +something on his back, and he was walking very fast; a rabbit poacher +no doubt. As he passed out of sight into the back avenue he was +beginning to run. At the same instant I saw on the hill beyond my +western boundaries half-a-dozen horsemen scrambling by zigzag ways down +towards the wood. There was one red coat among them; it came first at +the gap in the fence that Tim Connor had gone out to mend, and with the +others was lost to sight in the covert, from which, in another instant, +came clearly through the frosty air a shout of "Gone to ground!" +Tremendous horn blowings followed, then, all in the same moment, I saw +the hounds break in full cry from the wood, and come stringing over the +grass and up the back avenue towards the yard gate. Were they running +a fresh fox into the stables? + +I do not profess to be a hunting-man, but I am an Irishman, and so, it +is perhaps superfluous to state, is Peter. We forgot the sweep as if +he had never existed, and precipitated ourselves down the ladder, down +the stairs, and out into the yard. One side of the yard is formed by +the coach-house and a long stable, with a range of lofts above them, +planned on the heroic scale in such matters that obtained in Ireland +formerly. These join the house at the corner by the back door. A long +flight of stone steps leads to the lofts, and up these, as Peter and I +emerged from the back door, the hounds were struggling helter-skelter. +Almost simultaneously there was a confused clatter of hoofs in the back +avenue, and Flurry Knox came stooping at a gallop under the archway +followed by three or four other riders. They flung themselves from +their horses and made for the steps of the loft; more hounds pressed, +yelling, on their heels, the din was indescribable, and justified Mrs. +Cadogan's subsequent remark that "when she heard the noise she thought +'twas the end of the world and the divil collecting his own!" + +I jostled in the wake of the party, and found myself in the loft, +wading in hay, and nearly deafened by the clamour that was bandied +about the high roof and walls. At the farther end of the loft the +hounds were raging in the hay, encouraged thereto by the whoops and +screeches of Flurry and his friends. High up in the gable of the loft, +where it joined the main wall of the house, there was a small door, and +I noted with a transient surprise that there was a long ladder leading +up to it. Even as it caught my eye a hound fought his way out of a +drift of hay and began to jump at the ladder, throwing his tongue +vociferously, and even clambering up a few rungs in his excitement. + +"There's the way he's gone!" roared Flurry, striving through hounds and +hay towards the ladder, "Trumpeter has him! What's up there, back of +the door, Major? I don't remember it at all." + +My crimes had evidently been forgotten in the supremacy of the moment. +While I was futilely asserting that had the fox gone up the ladder he +could not possibly have opened the door and shut it after him, even if +the door led anywhere, which, to the best of my belief, it did not, the +door in question opened, and to my amazement the sweep appeared at it. +He gesticulated violently, and over the tumult was heard to asseverate +that there was nothing above there, only a way into the flue, and any +one would be destroyed with the soot---- + +"Ah, go to blazes with your soot!" interrupted Flurry, already half-way +up the ladder. + +I followed him, the other men pressing up behind me. That Trumpeter +had made no mistake was instantly brought home to our noses by the reek +of fox that met us at the door. Instead of a chimney, we found +ourselves in a dilapidated bedroom full of people. Tim Connor was +there, the sweep was there, and a squalid elderly man and woman on whom +I had never set eyes before. There was a large open fireplace, black +with the soot the sweep had brought down with him, and on the table +stood a bottle of my own special Scotch whisky. In one corner of the +room was a pile of broken packing-cases, and beside these on the floor +lay a bag in which something kicked. + +Flurry, looking more uncomfortable and nonplussed than I could have +believed possible, listened in silence to the ceaseless harangue of the +elderly woman. The hounds were yelling like lost spirits in the loft +below, but her voice pierced the uproar like a bagpipe. It was an +unspeakably vulgar voice, yet it was not the voice of a countrywoman, +and there were frowzy remnants of respectability about her general +aspect. + +"And is it you, Flurry Knox, that's calling me a disgrace! Disgrace, +indeed, am I? Me that was your poor mother's own uncle's daughter, and +as good a McCarthy as ever stood in Shreelane!" + +What followed I could not comprehend, owing to the fact that the sweep +kept up a perpetual undercurrent of explanation to me as to how he had +got down the wrong chimney. I noticed that his breath stank of +whisky--Scotch, not the native variety. + + * * * * * + +Never, as long as Flurry Knox lives to blow a horn, will he hear the +last of the day that he ran his mother's first cousin to ground in the +attic. Never, while Mrs. Cadogan can hold a basting spoon, will she +cease to recount how, on the same occasion, she plucked and roasted ten +couple of woodcock in one torrid hour to provide luncheon for the hunt. +In the glory of this achievement her confederacy with the stowaways in +the attic is wholly slurred over, in much the same manner as the +startling outburst of summons for trespass, brought by Tim Connor +during the remainder of the shooting season, obscured the unfortunate +episode of the bagged fox. It was, of course, zeal for my shooting +that induced him to assist Mr. Knox's disreputable relations in the +deportation of my foxes; and I have allowed it to remain at that. + +In fact, the only things not allowed to remain were Mr. and Mrs. +McCarthy Gannon. They, as my landlord informed me, in the midst of +vast apologies, had been permitted to squat at Shreelane until my +tenancy began, and having then ostentatiously and abusively left the +house, they had, with the connivance of the Cadogans, secretly returned +to roost in the corner attic, to sell foxes under the aegis of my name, +and to make inroads on my belongings. They retained connection with +the outer world by means of the ladder and the loft, and with the house +in general, and my whisky in particular, by a door into the other +attics--a door concealed by the wardrobe in which reposed Great-Uncle +McCarthy's tall hat. + +It is with the greatest regret that I relinquish the prospect of +writing a monograph on Great-Uncle McCarthy for a Spiritualistic +Journal, but with the departure of his relations he ceased to manifest +himself, and neither the nailing up of packing-cases, nor the rumble of +the cart that took them to the station, disturbed my sleep for the +future. + +I understand that the task of clearing out the McCarthy Gannon's +effects was of a nature that necessitated two glasses of whisky per +man; and if the remnants of rabbit and jackdaw disinterred in the +process were anything like the crow that was thrown out of the window +at my feet, I do not grudge the restorative. + +As Mrs. Cadogan remarked to the sweep, "A Turk couldn't stand it." + + + + +II + +IN THE CURRANHILTY COUNTRY + +It is hardly credible that I should have been induced to depart from my +usual walk of life by a creature so uninspiring as the grey horse that +I bought from Flurry Knox for L25. + +Perhaps it was the monotony of being questioned by every other person +with whom I had five minutes' conversation, as to when I was coming out +with the hounds, and being further informed that in the days when +Captain Browne, the late Coastguard officer, had owned the grey, there +was not a fence between this and Mallow big enough to please them. At +all events, there came an epoch-making day when I mounted the Quaker +and presented myself at a meet of Mr. Knox's hounds. It is my belief +that six out of every dozen people who go out hunting are disagreeably +conscious of a nervous system, and two out of the six are in what is +brutally called "a blue funk." I was not in a blue funk, but I was +conscious not only of a nervous system, but of the anatomical fact that +I possessed large, round legs, handsome in their way, even admirable in +their proper sphere, but singularly ill adapted for adhering to the +slippery surfaces of a saddle. By a fatal intervention of Providence, +the sport, on this my first day in the hunting-field, was such as I +could have enjoyed from a bath-chair. The hunting-field was, on this +occasion, a relative term, implying long stretches of unfenced moorland +and bog, anything, in fact, save a field, the hunt itself might also +have been termed a relative one, being mainly composed of Mr. Knox's +relations in all degrees of cousinhood. It was a day when frost and +sunshine combined went to one's head like iced champagne; the distant +sea looked like the Mediterranean, and for four sunny hours the Knox +relatives and I followed nine couple of hounds at a tranquil footpace +along the hills, our progress mildly enlivened by one or two scrambles +in the shape of jumps. At three o'clock I jogged home, and felt within +me the newborn desire to brag to Peter Cadogan of the Quaker's doings, +as I dismounted rather stiffly in my own yard. + +I little thought that the result would be that three weeks later I +should find myself in a railway carriage at an early hour of a December +morning, in company with Flurry Knox and four or five of his clan, +journeying towards an unknown town, named Drumcurran, with an +appropriate number of horses in boxes behind us and a van full of +hounds in front. Mr. Knox's hounds were on their way, by invitation, +to have a day in the country of their neighbours, the Curranhilty +Harriers, and with amazing fatuity I had allowed myself to be cajoled +into joining the party. A northerly shower was striking in long spikes +on the glass of the window, the atmosphere of the carriage was blue +with tobacco smoke, and my feet, in a pair of new blucher boots, had +sunk into a species of Arctic sleep. + +"Well, you got my letter about the dance at the hotel to-night?" said +Flurry Knox, breaking off a whispered conversation with his amateur +whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, and sitting down beside me. "And we're to go +out with the Harriers to-day, and they've a sure fox for our hounds +to-morrow. I tell you you'll have the best fun ever you had. It's a +great country to ride. Fine honest banks, that you can come racing at +anywhere you like." + +Dr. Hickey, a saturnine young man, with a long nose and a black torpedo +beard, returned to his pocket the lancet with which he had been +trimming his nails. + +"They're like the Tipperary banks," he said; "you climb down nine feet +and you fall the rest." + +It occurred to me that the Quaker and I would most probably fall all +the way, but I said nothing. + +"I hear Tomsy Flood has a good horse this season," resumed Flurry. + +"Then it's not the one you sold him," said the Doctor. + +"I'll take my oath it's not," said Flurry with a grin. "I believe he +has it in for me still over that one." + +Dr. Jerome's moustache went up under his nose and showed his white +teeth. + +"Small blame to him! when you sold him a mare that was wrong of both +her hind-legs. Do you know what he did, Major Yeates? The mare was +lame going into the fair, and he took the two hind-shoes off her and +told poor Flood she kicked them off in the box, and that was why she +was going tender, and he was so drunk he believed him." + +The conversation here deepened into trackless obscurities of +horse-dealing. I took out my stylograph pen, and finished a letter to +Philippa, with a feeling that it would probably be my last. + +The next step in the day's enjoyment consisted in trotting in cavalcade +through the streets of Drumcurran, with another northerly shower +descending upon us, the mud splashing in my face, and my feet coming +torturingly to life. Every man and boy in the town ran with us; the +Harriers were somewhere in the tumult ahead, and the Quaker began to +pull and hump his back ominously. I arrived at the meet considerably +heated, and found myself one of some thirty or forty riders, who, with +traps and bicycles and footpeople, were jammed in a narrow, muddy road. +We were late, and a move was immediately made across a series of grass +fields, all considerately furnished with gates. There was a glacial +gleam of sunshine and people began to turn down the collars of their +coats. As they spread over the field I observed that Mr. Knox was no +longer riding with old Captain Handcock, the Master of the Harriers, +but had attached himself to a square-shouldered young lady with +effective coils of dark hair and a grey habit. She was riding a +fidgety black mare with great decision and a not disagreeable swagger. + +It was at about this moment that the hounds began to run, fast and +silently, and every one began to canter. + +"This is nothing at all," said Dr. Hickey, thundering alongside of me +on a huge young chestnut; "there might have been a hare here last week, +or a red herring this morning. I wouldn't care if we only got what'd +warm us. For the matter of that, I'd as soon hunt a cat as a hare." + +I was already getting quite enough to warm me. The Quaker's +respectable grey head had twice disappeared between his forelegs in a +brace of most unsettling bucks, and all my experiences at the +riding-school at Sandhurst did not prepare me for the sensation of +jumping a briary wall with a heavy drop into a lane so narrow that each +horse had to turn at right angles as he landed. I did not so turn, but +saved myself from entire disgrace by a timely clutch at the mane. We +scrambled out of the lane over a pile of stones and furze bushes, and +at the end of the next field were confronted by a tall, stone-faced +bank. Everyone, always excepting myself, was riding with that furious +valour which is so conspicuous when neighbouring hunts meet, and the +leading half-dozen charged the obstacle at steeplechase speed. I +caught a glimpse of the young lady in the grey habit, sitting square +and strong as her mare topped the bank, with Flurry and the redoubtable +Mr. Tomsy Flood riding on either hand; I followed in their wake, with a +blind confidence in the Quaker, and none at all in myself. He refused +it. I suppose it was in token of affection and gratitude that I fell +upon his neck; at all events, I had reason to respect his judgment, as, +before I had recovered myself, the hounds were straggling back into the +field by a gap lower down. + +It finally appeared that the hounds could do no more with the line they +had been hunting, and we proceeded to jog interminably, I knew not +whither. During this unpleasant process Flurry Knox bestowed on me +many items of information, chiefly as to the pangs of jealousy he was +inflicting on Mr. Flood by his attentions to the lady in the grey +habit, Miss "Bobbie" Bennett. + +"She'll have all old Handcock's money one of these days--she's his +niece, y' know--and she's a good girl to ride, but she's not as young +as she was ten years ago. You'd be looking at a chicken a long time +before you thought of her! She might take Tomsy some day if she can't +do any better." He stopped and looked at me with a gleam in his eye. +"Come on, and I'll introduce you to her!" + +Before, however, this privilege could be mine, the whole cavalcade was +stopped by a series of distant yells, which apparently conveyed +information to the hunt, though to me they only suggested a Red Indian +scalping his enemy. The yells travelled rapidly nearer, and a young +man with a scarlet face and a long stick sprang upon the fence, and +explained that he and Patsy Lorry were after chasing a hare two miles +down out of the hill above, and ne'er a dog nor a one with them but +themselves, and she was lying, beat out, under a bush, and Patsy Lorry +was minding her until the hounds would come. I had a vision of the +humane Patsy Lorry fanning the hare with his hat, but apparently nobody +else found the fact unusual. The hounds were hurried into the fields, +the hare was again spurred into action, and I was again confronted with +the responsibilities of the chase. After the first five minutes I had +discovered several facts about the Quaker. If the bank was above a +certain height he refused it irrevocably, if it accorded with his ideas +he got his forelegs over and ploughed through the rest of it on his +stifle-joints, or, if a gripe made this inexpedient, he remained poised +on top till the fabric crumbled under his weight. In the case of walls +he butted them down with his knees, or squandered them with his +hind-legs. These operations took time, and the leaders of the hunt +streamed farther and farther away over the crest of a hill, while the +Quaker pursued at the equable gallop of a horse in the Bayeux Tapestry. + +I began to perceive that I had been adopted as a pioneer by a small +band of followers, who, as one of their number candidly explained +"liked to have some one ahead of them to soften the banks," and +accordingly waited respectfully till the Quaker had made the rough +places smooth, and taken the raw edge off the walls. They, in their +turn, showed me alternative routes when the obstacle proved above the +Quaker's limit; thus, in ignoble confederacy, I and the offscourings of +the Curranhilty hunt pursued our way across some four miles of country. +When at length we parted it was with extreme regret on both sides. A +river crossed our course, with boggy banks pitted deep with the +hoof-marks of our forerunners; I suggested it to the Quaker, and +discovered that Nature had not in vain endued him with the hindquarters +of the hippopotamus. I presume the others had jumped it; the Quaker, +with abysmal flounderings, walked through and heaved himself to safety +on the farther bank. It was the dividing of the ways. My friendly +company turned aside as one man, and I was left with the world before +me, and no guide save the hoof-marks in the grass. These presently led +me to a road, on the other side of which was a bank, that was at once +added to the Quaker's black list. The rain had again begun to fall +heavily, and was soaking in about my elbows; I suddenly asked myself +why, in Heaven's name, I should go any farther. No adequate reason +occurred to me, and I turned in what I believed to be the direction of +Drumcurran. + +I rode on for possibly two or three miles without seeing a human being, +until, from the top of a hill I descried a solitary lady rider. I +started in pursuit. The rain kept blurring my eye-glass, but it seemed +to me that the rider was a schoolgirl with hair hanging down her back, +and that her horse was a trifle lame. I pressed on to ask my way, and +discovered that I had been privileged to overtake no less a person than +Miss Bobbie Bennett. + +My question as to the route led to information of a varied character. +Miss Bennett was going that way herself; her mare had given her what +she called "a toss and a half," whereby she had strained her arm and +the mare her shoulder, her habit had been torn, and she had lost all +her hairpins. + +"I'm an awful object," she concluded; "my hair's the plague of my life +out hunting! I declare I wish to goodness I was bald!" + +I struggled to the level of the occasion with an appropriate protest. +She had really very brilliant grey eyes, and her complexion was +undeniable. Philippa has since explained to me that it is a mere male +fallacy that any woman can look well with her hair down her back, but I +have always maintained that Miss Bobbie Bennett, with the rain +glistening on her dark tresses, looked uncommonly well. + +"I shall never get it dry for the dance to-night," she complained. + +"I wish I could help you," said I. + +"Perhaps you've got a hairpin or two about you!" said she, with a +glance that had certainly done great execution before now. + +I disclaimed the possession of any such tokens, but volunteered to go +and look for some at a neighbouring cottage. + +The cottage door was shut, and my knockings were answered by a +stupefied-looking elderly man. Conscious of my own absurdity, I asked +him if he had any hairpins. + +"I didn't see a hare this week!" he responded in a slow bellow. + +"Hairpins!" I roared; "has your wife any hairpins?" + +"She has not." Then, as an after-thought, "She's dead these ten years." + +At this point a young woman emerged from the cottage, and, with many +coy grins, plucked from her own head some half-dozen hairpins, crooked, +and grey with age, but still hairpins, and as such well worth my +shilling. I returned with my spoil to Miss Bennett, only to be +confronted with a fresh difficulty. The arm that she had strained was +too stiff to raise to her head. + +Miss Bobbie turned her handsome eyes upon me. "It's no use," she said +plaintively, "I can't do it!" + +I looked up and down the road; there was no one in sight. I offered to +do it for her. + +Miss Bennett's hair was long, thick, and soft; it was also slippery +with rain. I twisted it conscientiously, as if it were a hay rope, +until Miss Bennett, with an irrepressible shriek, told me it would +break off. I coiled the rope with some success, and proceeded to nail +it to her head with the hairpins. At all the most critical points one, +if not both, of the horses moved; hairpins were driven home into Miss +Bennett's skull, and were with difficulty plucked forth again; in fact, +a more harrowing performance can hardly be imagined, but Miss Bennett +bore it with the heroism of a pin-cushion. + +I was putting the finishing touches to the coiffure when some sound +made me look round, and I beheld at a distance of some fifty yards the +entire hunt approaching us at a foot-pace. I lost my head, and, +instead of continuing my task, I dropped the last hairpin as if it were +red-hot, and kicked the Quaker away to the far side of the road, thus, +if it were possible, giving the position away a shade more generously. + +There were fifteen riders in the group that overtook us, and fourteen +of them, including the Whip, were grinning from ear to ear; the +fifteenth was Mr. Tomsy Flood, and he showed no sign of appreciation. +He shoved his horse past me and up to Miss Bennett, his red moustache +bristling, truculence in every outline of his heavy shoulders. His +green coat was muddy, and his hat had a cave in it. Things had +apparently gone ill with him. + +Flurry's witticisms held out for about two miles and a half; I do not +give them, because they were not amusing, but they all dealt ultimately +with the animosity that I, in common with himself, should henceforth +have to fear from Mr. Flood. + +"Oh, he's a holy terror!" he said conclusively; "he was riding the +tails off the hounds to-day to best me. He was near killing me twice. +We had some words about it, I can tell you. I very near took my whip +to him. Such a bull-rider of a fellow I never saw! He wouldn't so +much as stop to catch Bobbie Bennett's horse when I picked her up, he +was riding so jealous. His own girl, mind you! And such a crumpler as +she got too! I declare she knocked a groan out of the road when she +struck it!" + +"She doesn't seem so much hurt?" I said. + +"Hurt!" said Flurry, flicking casually at a hound. "You couldn't hurt +that one unless you took a hatchet to her!" + +The rain had reached a pitch that put further hunting out of the +question, and we bumped home at that intolerable pace known as a +"hound's jog." I spent the remainder of the afternoon over a fire in +my bedroom in the Royal Hotel, Drumcurran, official letters to write +having mercifully provided me with an excuse for seclusion, while the +bar and the billiard-room hummed below, and the Quaker's three-cornered +gallop wreaked its inevitable revenge upon my person. As this process +continued, and I became proportionately embittered, I asked myself, not +for the first time, what Philippa would say when introduced to my +present circle of acquaintances. + +I have already mentioned that a dance was to take place at the hotel, +given, as far as I could gather, by the leading lights of the +Curranhilty Hunt. A less jocund guest than the wreck who at the +pastoral hour of nine crept stiffly down to "chase the glowing hours +with flying feet" could hardly have been encountered. The dance was +held in the coffee-room, and a conspicuous object outside the door was +a saucer bath full of something that looked like flour. + +"Rub your feet in that," said Flurry; "that's French chalk! They +hadn't time to do the floor, so they hit on this dodge." + +I complied with this encouraging direction, and followed him into the +room. Dancing had already begun, and the first sight that met my eyes +was Miss Bennett, in a yellow dress, waltzing with Mr. Tomsy Flood. +She looked very handsome, and, in spite of her accident, she was +getting round the sticky floor and her still more sticky partner with +the swing of a racing cutter. Her eye caught mine immediately, and +with confidence. Clearly our acquaintance that, in the space of twenty +minutes, had blossomed tropically into hair-dressing, was not to be +allowed to wither. Nor was I myself allowed to wither. Men, known and +unknown, plied me with partners, till my shirt cuff was black with +names, and the number of dances stretched away into the blue distance +of to-morrow morning. The music was supplied by the organist of the +church, who played with religious unction and at the pace of a +processional hymn. I put forth into the melee with a junior Bennett, +inferior in calibre to Miss Bobbie, but a strong goer, and, I fear, +made but a sorry debut in the eyes of Drumcurran. At every other +moment I bumped into the unforeseen orbits of those who reversed, and +of those who walked their partners backwards down the room with faces +of ineffable supremacy. Being unskilled in these intricacies of an +elder civilisation, the younger Miss Bennett fared but ingloriously at +my hands; the music pounded interminably on, until the heel of Mr. +Flood put a period to our sufferings. + +"The nasty dirty filthy brute!" shrieked the younger Miss Bennett in a +single breath; "he's torn the gown off my back!" + +She whirled me to the cloak-room; we parted, mutually unregretted, at +its door, and by, I fear, common consent, evaded our second dance +together. + +Many, many times during the evening I asked myself why I did not go to +bed. Perhaps it was the remembrance that my bed was situated some ten +feet above the piano in a direct line; but, whatever was the reason, +the night wore on and found me still working my way down my shirt cuff. +I sat out as much as possible, and found my partners to be, as a body, +pretty, talkative, and ill dressed, and during the evening I had many +and varied opportunities of observing the rapid progress of Mr. Knox's +flirtation with Miss Bobbie Bennett. From No. 4 to No. 8 they were +invisible; that they were behind a screen in the commercial-room might +be inferred from Mr. Flood's thundercloud presence in the passage +outside. + +At No. 9 the young lady emerged for one of her dances with me; it was a +barn dance, and particularly trying to my momently stiffening muscles; +but Miss Bobbie, whether in dancing or sitting out, went in for "the +rigour of the game." She was in as hard condition as one of her +uncle's hounds, and for a full fifteen minutes I capered and swooped +beside her, larding the lean earth as I went, and replying but +spasmodically to her even flow of conversation. + +"That'll take the stiffness out of you!" she exclaimed, as the organist +slowed down reverentially to a conclusion. "I had a bet with Flurry +Knox over that dance. He said you weren't up to my weight at the pace!" + +I led her forth to the refreshment table, and was watching with awe her +fearless consumption of claret cup that I would not have touched for a +sovereign, when Flurry, with a partner on his arm, strolled past us. + +"Well, you won the gloves, Miss Bobbie!" he said. "Don't you wish you +may get them!" + +"Gloves without the _g_, Mr. Knox!" replied Miss Bennett, in a voice +loud enough to reach the end of the passage, where Mr. Thomas Flood was +burying his nose in a very brown whisky-and-soda. + +"Your hair's coming down!" retorted Flurry. "Ask Major Yeates if he +can spare you a few hairpins!" + +Swifter than lightning Miss Bennett hurled a macaroon at her retreating +foe, missed him, and subsided laughing on to a sofa. I mopped my brow +and took my seat beside her, wondering how much longer I could live up +to the social exigencies of Drumcurran. + +Miss Bennett, however, proved excellent company. She told me artfully, +and inch by inch, all that Mr. Flood had said to her on the subject of +my hair-dressing; she admitted that she had, as a punishment, cut him +out of three dances and given them to Flurry Knox. When I remarked +that in fairness they should have been given to me, she darted a very +attractive glance at me, and pertinently observed that I had not asked +for them. + + As steals the dawn into a fevered room, + And says "Be of good cheer, the day is born!" + +so did the rumour of supper pass among the chaperons, male and female. +It was obviously due to a sense of the fitness of things that Mrs. +Bennett was apportioned to me, and I found myself in the gratifying +position of heading with her the procession to supper. My impressions +of Mrs. Bennett are few but salient. She wore an apple-green satin +dress and filled it tightly; wisely mistrusting the hotel supper, she +had imported sandwiches and cake in a pocket-handkerchief, and, warmed +by two glasses of sherry, she made me the recipient of the remarkable +confidence that she had but two back teeth in her head, but, thank God, +they met. When, with the other starving men, I fell upon the remains +of the feast, I regretted that I had declined her offer of a sandwich. + +Of the remainder of the evening I am unable to give a detailed account. +Let it not for one instant be imagined that I had looked upon the wine +of the Royal Hotel when it was red, or, indeed, any other colour; as a +matter of fact, I had espied an inconspicuous corner in the entrance +hall, and there I first smoked a cigarette, and subsequently sank into +uneasy sleep. Through my dreams I was aware of the measured pounding +of the piano, of the clatter of glasses at the bar, of wheels in the +street, and then, more clearly, of Flurry's voice assuring Miss Bennett +that if she'd only wait for another dance he'd get the R.M. out of bed +to do her hair for her--then again oblivion. + +At some later period I was dropping down a chasm on the Quaker's back, +and landing with a shock; I was twisting his mane into a chignon, when +he turned round his head and caught my arm in his teeth. I awoke with +the dew of terror on my forehead, to find Miss Bennett leaning over me +in a scarlet cloak with a hood over her head, and shaking me by my coat +sleeve. + +"Major Yeates," she began at once in a hurried whisper, "I want you to +find Flurry Knox, and tell him there's a plan to feed his hounds at six +o'clock this morning so as to spoil their hunting!" + +"How do you know?" I asked, jumping up. + +"My little brother told me. He came in with us to-night to see the +dance, and he was hanging round in the stables, and he heard one of the +men telling another there was a dead mule in an outhouse in Bride's +Alley, all cut up ready to give to Mr. Knox's hounds." + +"But why shouldn't they get it?" I asked in sleepy stupidity. + +"Is it fill them up with an old mule just before they're going out +hunting?" flashed Miss Bennett. "Hurry and tell Mr. Knox; don't let +Tomsy Flood see you telling him--or any one else." + +"Oh, then it's Mr. Flood's game?" I said, grasping the situation at +length. + +"It is," said Miss Bennett, suddenly turning scarlet; "he's a disgrace! +I'm ashamed of him! I'm done with him!" + +I resisted a strong disposition to shake Miss Bennett by the hand. + +"I can't wait," she continued. "I made my mother drive back a +mile--she doesn't know a thing about it--I said I'd left my purse in +the cloak-room. Good-night! Don't tell a soul but Flurry!" + +She was off, and upon my incapable shoulders rested the responsibility +of the enterprise. + +It was past four o'clock, and the last bars of the last waltz were +being played. At the bar a knot of men, with Flurry in their midst, +were tossing "Odd man out" for a bottle of champagne. Flurry was not +in the least drunk, a circumstance worthy of remark in his present +company, and I got him out into the hall and unfolded my tidings. The +light of battle lit in his eye as he listened. + +"I knew by Tomsy he was shaping for mischief," he said coolly; "he's +taken as much liquor as'd stiffen a tinker, and he's only half-drunk +this minute. Hold on till I get Jerome Hickey and Charlie +Knox--they're sober; I'll be back in a minute." + +I was not present at the council of war thus hurriedly convened; I was +merely informed when they returned that we were all to "hurry on." My +best evening pumps have never recovered the subsequent proceedings. +They, with my swelled and aching feet inside them, were raced down one +filthy lane after another, until, somewhere on the outskirts of +Drumcurran, Flurry pushed open the gate of a yard and went in. It was +nearly five o'clock on that raw December morning; low down in the sky a +hazy moon shed a diffused light; all the surrounding houses were still +and dark. At our footsteps an angry bark or two came from inside the +stable. + +"Whisht!" said Flurry, "I'll say a word to them before I open the door." + +At his voice a chorus of hysterical welcome arose; without more delay +he flung open the stable door, and instantly we were all knee-deep in a +rush of hounds. There was not a moment lost. Flurry started at a +quick run out of the yard with the whole pack pattering at his heels. +Charley Knox vanished; Dr. Hickey and I followed the hounds, splashing +into puddles and hobbling over patches of broken stones, till we left +the town behind and hedges arose on either hand. + +"Here's the house!" said Flurry, stopping short at a low entrance gate; +"many's the time I've been here when his father had it; it'll be a +queer thing if I can't find a window I can manage, and the old cook he +has is as deaf as the dead." + +He and Doctor Hickey went in at the gate with the hounds; I hesitated +ignobly in the mud. + +"This isn't an R.M.'s job," said Flurry in a whisper, closing the gate +in my face; "you'd best keep clear of house-breaking." + +I accepted his advice, but I may admit that before I turned for home a +sash was gently raised, a light had sprung up in one of the lower +windows, and I heard Flurry's voice saying, "Over, over, over!" to his +hounds. + +There seemed to me to be no interval at all between these events and +the moment when I woke in bright sunlight to find Dr. Hickey standing +by my bedside in a red coat with a tall glass in his hand. + +"It's nine o'clock," he said. "I'm just after waking Flurry Knox. +There wasn't one stirring in the hotel till I went down and pulled the +'boots' from under the kitchen table! It's well for us the meet's in +the town; and, by-the-bye, your grey horse has four legs on him the +size of bolsters this morning; he won't be fit to go out, I'm afraid. +Drink this anyway, you're in the want of it." + +Dr. Hickey's eyelids were rather pink, but his hand was as steady as a +rock. The whisky-and-soda was singularly untempting. + +"What happened last night?" I asked eagerly as I gulped it. + +"Oh, it all went off very nicely, thank you," said Hickey, twisting his +black beard to a point. "We benched as many of the hounds in Flood's +bed as'd fit, and we shut the lot into the room. We had them just +comfortable when we heard his latchkey below at the door." He broke +off and began to snigger. + +"Well?" I said, sitting bolt upright. + +"Well, he got in at last, and he lit a candle then. That took him five +minutes. He was pretty tight. We were looking at him over the +banisters until he started to come up, and according as he came up, we +went on up the top flight. He stood admiring his candle for a while on +the landing, and we wondered he didn't hear the hounds snuffing under +the door. He opened it then, and, on the minute, three of them bolted +out between his legs." Dr. Hickey again paused to indulge in +Mephistophelian laughter. "Well, you know," he went on, "when a man in +poor Tomsy's condition sees six dogs jumping out of his bed he's apt to +make a wrong diagnosis. He gave a roar, and pitched the candlestick at +them, and ran for his life downstairs, and all the hounds after him. +'Gone away!' screeches that devil Flurry, pelting downstairs on top of +them in the dark. I believe I screeched too." + +"Good heavens!" I gasped, "I was well out of that!" + +"Well, you were," admitted the Doctor. "However, Tomsy bested them in +the dark, and he got to ground in the pantry. I heard the cups and +saucers go as he slammed the door on the hounds' noses, and the minute +he was in Flurry turned the key on him. 'They're real dogs, Tomsy, my +buck!' says Flurry, just to quiet him; and there we left him." + +"Was he hurt?" I asked, conscious of the triviality of the question. + +"Well, he lost his brush," replied Dr. Hickey. "Old Merrylegs tore the +coat-tails off him; we got them on the floor when we struck a light; +Flurry has them to nail on his kennel door. Charley Knox had a +pleasant time too," he went on, "with the man that brought the +barrow-load of meat to the stable. We picked out the tastiest bits and +arranged them round Flood's breakfast table for him. They smelt very +nice. Well, I'm delaying you with my talking----" + +Flurry's hounds had the run of the season that day. I saw it admirably +throughout--from Miss Bennett's pony cart. She drove extremely well, +in spite of her strained arm. + + + + +III + +TRINKET'S COLT + +It was Petty Sessions day in Skebawn, a cold, grey day of February. A +case of trespass had dragged its burden of cross summonses and cross +swearing far into the afternoon, and when I left the bench my head was +singing from the bellowings of the attorneys, and the smell of their +clients was heavy upon my palate. + +The streets still testified to the fact that it was market day, and I +evaded with difficulty the sinuous course of carts full of soddenly +screwed people, and steered an equally devious one for myself among the +groups anchored round the doors of the public-houses. Skebawn +possesses, among its legion of public-houses, one establishment which +timorously, and almost imperceptibly, proffers tea to the thirsty. I +turned in there, as was my custom on court days, and found the little +dingy den, known as the Ladies' Coffee-Room, in the occupancy of my +friend Mr. Florence McCarthy Knox, who was drinking strong tea and +eating buns with serious simplicity. It was a first and quite +unexpected glimpse of that domesticity that has now become a marked +feature in his character. + +"You're the very man I wanted to see," I said as I sat down beside him +at the oilcloth-covered table; "a man I know in England who is not much +of a judge of character has asked me to buy him a four-year-old down +here, and as I should rather be stuck by a friend than a dealer, I wish +you'd take over the job." + +Flurry poured himself out another cup of tea, and dropped three lumps +of sugar into it in silence. + +Finally he said, "There isn't a four-year-old in this country that I'd +be seen dead with at a pig fair." + +This was discouraging, from the premier authority on horse-flesh in the +district. + +"But it isn't six weeks since you told me you had the finest filly in +your stables that was ever foaled in the County Cork," I protested: +"what's wrong with her?" + +"Oh, is it that filly?" said Mr. Knox with a lenient smile; "she's gone +these three weeks from me. I swapped her and L6 for a three-year-old +Ironmonger colt, and after that I swapped the colt and L19 for that +Bandon horse I rode last week at your place, and after that again I +sold the Bandon horse for L75 to old Welply, and I had to give him back +a couple of sovereigns luck-money. You see I did pretty well with the +filly after all." + +"Yes, yes--oh rather," I assented, as one dizzily accepts the +propositions of a bimetallist; "and you don't know of anything +else----?" + +The room in which we were seated was closely screened from the shop by +a door with a muslin-curtained window in it; several of the panes were +broken, and at this juncture two voices that had for some time carried +on a discussion forced themselves upon our attention. + +"Begging your pardon for contradicting you, ma'am," said the voice of +Mrs. McDonald, proprietress of the tea-shop, and a leading light in +Skebawn Dissenting circles, shrilly tremulous with indignation, "if the +servants I recommend you won't stop with you, it's no fault of mine. +If respectable young girls are set picking grass out of your gravel, in +place of their proper work, certainly they will give warning!" + +The voice that replied struck me as being a notable one, well-bred and +imperious. + +"When I take a barefooted slut out of a cabin, I don't expect her to +dictate to me what her duties are!" + +Flurry jerked up his chin in a noiseless laugh. "It's my grandmother!" +he whispered. "I bet you Mrs. McDonald don't get much change out of +her!" + +"If I set her to clean the pig-sty I expect her to obey me," continued +the voice in accents that would have made me clean forty pig-sties had +she desired me to do so. + +"Very well, ma'am," retorted Mrs. McDonald, "if that's the way you +treat your servants, you needn't come here again looking for them. I +consider your conduct is neither that of a lady nor a Christian!" + +"Don't you, indeed?" replied Flurry's grandmother. "Well, your opinion +doesn't greatly distress me, for, to tell you the truth, I don't think +you're much of a judge." + +"Didn't I tell you she'd score?" murmured Flurry, who was by this time +applying his eye to a hole in the muslin curtain. "She's off," he went +on, returning to his tea. "She's a great character! She's +eighty-three if she's a day, and she's as sound on her legs as a +three-year-old! Did you see that old shandrydan of hers in the street +a while ago, and a fellow on the box with a red beard on him like +Robinson Crusoe? That old mare that was on the near side--Trinket her +name is--is mighty near clean bred. I can tell you her foals are worth +a bit of money." + +I had heard of old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas; indeed, I had seldom dined +out in the neighbourhood without hearing some new story of her and her +remarkable menage, but it had not yet been my privilege to meet her. + +"Well, now," went on Flurry in his slow voice, "I'll tell you a thing +that's just come into my head. My grandmother promised me a foal of +Trinket's the day I was one-and-twenty, and that's five years ago, and +deuce a one I've got from her yet. You never were at Aussolas? No, +you were not. Well, I tell you the place there is like a circus with +horses. She has a couple of score of them running wild in the woods, +like deer." + +"Oh, come," I said, "I'm a bit of a liar myself--" + +"Well, she has a dozen of them anyhow, rattling good colts too, some of +them, but they might as well be donkeys for all the good they are to me +or any one. It's not once in three years she sells one, and there she +has them walking after her for bits of sugar, like a lot of dirty +lapdogs," ended Flurry with disgust. + +"Well, what's your plan? Do you want me to make her a bid for one of +the lapdogs?" + +"I was thinking," replied Flurry, with great deliberation, "that my +birthday's this week, and maybe I could work a four-year-old colt of +Trinket's she has out of her in honour of the occasion." + +"And sell your grandmother's birthday present to me?" + +"Just that, I suppose," answered Flurry with a slow wink. + +A few days afterwards a letter from Mr. Knox informed me that he had +"squared the old lady, and it would be all right about the colt." He +further told me that Mrs. Knox had been good enough to offer me, with +him, a day's snipe shooting on the celebrated Aussolas bogs, and he +proposed to drive me there the following Monday, if convenient. Most +people found it convenient to shoot the Aussolas snipe bog when they +got the chance. Eight o'clock on the following Monday morning saw +Flurry, myself, and a groom packed into a dogcart, with portmanteaus, +gun-cases, and two rampant red setters. + +It was a long drive, twelve miles at least, and a very cold one. We +passed through long tracts of pasture country, fraught, for Flurry, +with memories of runs, which were recorded for me, fence by fence, in +every one of which the biggest dog-fox in the country had gone to +ground, with not two feet--measured accurately on the handle of the +whip--between him and the leading hound; through bogs that +imperceptibly melted into lakes, and finally down and down into a +valley, where the fir-trees of Aussolas clustered darkly round a +glittering lake, and all but hid the grey roofs and pointed gables of +Aussolas Castle. + +"There's a nice stretch of a demesne for you," remarked Flurry, +pointing downwards with the whip, "and one little old woman holding it +all in the heel of her fist. Well able to hold it she is, too, and +always was, and she'll live twenty years yet, if it's only to spite the +whole lot of us, and when all's said and done goodness knows how she'll +leave it!" + +"It strikes me you were lucky to keep her up to her promise about the +colt," I said. + +Flurry administered a composing kick to the ceaseless strivings of the +red setters under the seat. + +"I used to be rather a pet with her," he said, after a pause; "but mind +you, I haven't got him yet, and if she gets any notion I want to sell +him I'll never get him, so say nothing about the business to her." + +The tall gates of Aussolas shrieked on their hinges as they admitted +us, and shut with a clang behind us, in the faces of an old mare and a +couple of young horses, who, foiled in their break for the excitements +of the outer world, turned and galloped defiantly on either side of us. +Flurry's admirable cob hammered on, regardless of all things save his +duty. + +"He's the only one I have that I'd trust myself here with," said his +master, flicking him approvingly with the whip; "there are plenty of +people afraid to come here at all, and when my grandmother goes out +driving she has a boy on the box with a basket full of stones to peg at +them. Talk of the dickens, here she is herself!" + +A short, upright old woman was approaching, preceded by a white woolly +dog with sore eyes and a bark like a tin trumpet; we both got out of +the trap and advanced to meet the lady of the manor. + +I may summarise her attire by saying that she looked as if she had +robbed a scarecrow; her face was small and incongruously refined, the +skinny hand that she extended to me had the grubby tan that bespoke the +professional gardener, and was decorated with a magnificent diamond +ring. On her head was a massive purple velvet bonnet. + +"I am very glad to meet you, Major Yeates," she said with an +old-fashioned precision of utterance; "your grandfather was a dancing +partner of mine in old days at the Castle, when he was a handsome young +aide-de-camp there, and I was----you may judge for yourself what I was." + +She ended with a startling little hoot of laughter, and I was aware +that she quite realised the world's opinion of her, and was indifferent +to it. + +Our way to the bogs took us across Mrs. Knox's home farm, and through a +large field in which several young horses were grazing. + +"There now, that's my fellow," said Flurry, pointing to a fine-looking +colt, "the chestnut with the white diamond on his forehead. He'll run +into three figures before he's done, but we'll not tell that to the old +lady!" + +The famous Aussolas bogs were as full of snipe as usual, and a good +deal fuller of water than any bogs I had ever shot before. I was on my +day, and Flurry was not, and as he is ordinarily an infinitely better +snipe shot than I, I felt at peace with the world and all men as we +walked back, wet through, at five o'clock. + +The sunset had waned, and a big white moon was making the eastern tower +of Aussolas look like a thing in a fairy tale or a play when we arrived +at the hall door. An individual, whom I recognised as the Robinson +Crusoe coachman, admitted us to a hall, the like of which one does not +often see. The walls were panelled with dark oak up to the gallery +that ran round three sides of it, the balusters of the wide staircase +were heavily carved, and blackened portraits of Flurry's ancestors on +the spindle side stared sourly down on their descendant as he tramped +upstairs with the bog mould on his hobnailed boots. + +We had just changed into dry clothes when Robinson Crusoe shoved his +red beard round the corner of the door, with the information that the +mistress said we were to stay for dinner. My heart sank. It was then +barely half-past five. I said something about having no evening +clothes and having to get home early. + +"Sure the dinner'll be in another half-hour," said Robinson Crusoe, +joining hospitably in the conversation; "and as for evening clothes---- +God bless ye!" + +The door closed behind him. + +"Never mind," said Flurry, "I dare say you'll be glad enough to eat +another dinner by the time you get home." He laughed. "Poor Slipper!" +he added inconsequently, and only laughed again when I asked for an +explanation. + +Old Mrs. Knox received us in the library, where she was seated by a +roaring turf fire, which lit the room a good deal more effectively than +the pair of candles that stood beside her in tall silver candlesticks. +Ceaseless and implacable growls from under her chair indicated the +presence of the woolly dog. She talked with confounding culture of the +books that rose all round her to the ceiling; her evening dress was +accomplished by means of an additional white shawl, rather dirtier than +its congeners; as I took her in to dinner she quoted Virgil to me, and +in the same breath screeched an objurgation at a being whose matted +head rose suddenly into view from behind an ancient Chinese screen, as +I have seen the head of a Zulu woman peer over a bush. + +Dinner was as incongruous as everything else. Detestable soup in a +splendid old silver tureen that was nearly as dark in hue as Robinson +Crusoe's thumb; a perfect salmon, perfectly cooked, on a chipped +kitchen dish; such cut glass as is not easy to find nowadays; sherry +that, as Flurry subsequently remarked, would burn the shell off an egg; +and a bottle of port, draped in immemorial cobwebs, wan with age, and +probably priceless. Throughout the vicissitudes of the meal Mrs. +Knox's conversation flowed on undismayed, directed sometimes at me--she +had installed me in the position of friend of her youth, and talked to +me as if I were my own grandfather--sometimes at Crusoe, with whom she +had several heated arguments, and sometimes she would make a statement +of remarkable frankness on the subject of her horse-farming affairs to +Flurry, who, very much on his best behaviour, agreed with all she said, +and risked no original remark. As I listened to them both, I +remembered with infinite amusement how he had told me once that "a pet +name she had for him was 'Tony Lumpkin,' and no one but herself knew +what she meant by it." It seemed strange that she made no allusion to +Trinket's colt or to Flurry's birthday, but, mindful of my +instructions, I held my peace. + +As, at about half-past eight, we drove away in the moonlight, Flurry +congratulated me solemnly on my success with his grandmother. He was +good enough to tell me that she would marry me to-morrow if I asked +her, and he wished I would, even if it was only to see what a nice +grandson he'd be for me. A sympathetic giggle behind me told me that +Michael, on the back seat, had heard and relished the jest. + +We had left the gates of Aussolas about half a mile behind when, at the +corner of a by-road, Flurry pulled up. A short squat figure arose from +the black shadow of a furze bush and came out into the moonlight, +swinging its arms like a cabman and cursing audibly. + +"Oh murdher, oh murdher, Misther Flurry! What kept ye at all? 'Twould +perish the crows to be waiting here the way I am these two hours----" + +"Ah, shut your mouth, Slipper!" said Flurry, who, to my surprise, had +turned back the rug and was taking off his driving coat, "I couldn't +help it. Come on, Yeates, we've got to get out here." + +"What for?" I asked, in not unnatural bewilderment. + +"It's all right. I'll tell you as we go along," replied my companion, +who was already turning to follow Slipper up the by-road. "Take the +trap on, Michael, and wait at the River's Cross." He waited for me to +come up with him, and then put his hand on my arm. "You see, Major, +this is the way it is. My grandmother's given me that colt right +enough, but if I waited for her to send him over to me I'd never see a +hair of his tail. So I just thought that as we were over here we might +as well take him back with us, and maybe you'll give us a help with +him; he'll not be altogether too handy for a first go off." + +I was staggered. An infant in arms could scarcely have failed to +discern the fishiness of the transaction, and I begged Mr. Knox not to +put himself to this trouble on my account, as I had no doubt I could +find a horse for my friend elsewhere. Mr. Knox assured me that it was +no trouble at all, quite the contrary, and that, since his grandmother +had given him the colt, he saw no reason why he should not take him +when he wanted him; also, that if I didn't want him he'd be glad enough +to keep him himself; and finally, that I wasn't the chap to go back on +a friend, but I was welcome to drive back to Shreelane with Michael +this minute if I liked. + +Of course I yielded in the end. I told Flurry I should lose my job +over the business, and he said I could then marry his grandmother, and +the discussion was abruptly closed by the necessity of following +Slipper over a locked five-barred gate. + +Our pioneer took us over about half a mile of country, knocking down +stone gaps where practicable and scrambling over tall banks in the +deceptive moonlight. We found ourselves at length in a field with a +shed in one corner of it; in a dim group of farm buildings a little way +off a light was shining. + +"Wait here," said Flurry to me in a whisper; "the less noise the +better. It's an open shed, and we'll just slip in and coax him out." + +Slipper unwound from his waist a halter, and my colleagues glided like +spectres into the shadow of the shed, leaving me to meditate on my +duties as Resident Magistrate, and on the questions that would be asked +in the House by our local member when Slipper had given away the +adventure in his cups. + +In less than a minute three shadows emerged from the shed, where two +had gone in. They had got the colt. + +"He came out as quiet as a calf when he winded the sugar," said Flurry; +"it was well for me I filled my pockets from grandmamma's sugar basin." + +He and Slipper had a rope from each side of the colt's head; they took +him quickly across a field towards a gate. The colt stepped daintily +between them over the moonlit grass; he snorted occasionally, but +appeared on the whole amenable. + +The trouble began later, and was due, as trouble often is, to the +beguilements of a short cut. Against the maturer judgment of Slipper, +Flurry insisted on following a route that he assured us he knew as well +as his own pocket, and the consequence was that in about five minutes I +found myself standing on top of a bank hanging on to a rope, on the +other end of which the colt dangled and danced, while Flurry, with the +other rope, lay prone in the ditch, and Slipper administered to the +bewildered colt's hindquarters such chastisement as could be ventured +on. + +I have no space to narrate in detail the atrocious difficulties and +disasters of the short cut. How the colt set to work to buck, and went +away across a field, dragging the faithful Slipper, literally +_ventre-a-terre_, after him, while I picked myself in ignominy out of a +briar patch, and Flurry cursed himself black in the face. How we were +attacked by ferocious cur dogs, and I lost my eyeglass; and how, as we +neared the River's Cross, Flurry espied the police patrol on the road, +and we all hid behind a rick of turf, while I realised in fulness what +an exceptional ass I was, to have been beguiled into an enterprise that +involved hiding with Slipper from the Royal Irish Constabulary. + +Let it suffice to say that Trinket's infernal offspring was finally +handed over on the high-road to Michael and Slipper, and Flurry drove +me home in a state of mental and physical overthrow. + +I saw nothing of my friend Mr. Knox for the next couple of days, by the +end of which time I had worked up a high polish on my misgivings, and +had determined to tell him that under no circumstances would I have +anything to say to his grandmother's birthday present. It was like my +usual luck that, instead of writing a note to this effect, I thought it +would be good for my liver to walk across the hills to Tory Cottage and +tell Flurry so in person. + +It was a bright, blustery morning, after a muggy day. The feeling of +spring was in the air, the daffodils were already in bud, and crocuses +showed purple in the grass on either side of the avenue. It was only a +couple of miles to Tory Cottage by the way across the hills; I walked +fast, and it was barely twelve o'clock when I saw its pink walls and +clumps of evergreens below me. As I looked down at it the chiming of +Flurry's hounds in the kennels came to me on the wind; I stood still to +listen, and could almost have sworn that I was hearing again the clash +of Magdalen bells, hard at work on May morning. + +The path that I was following led downwards through a larch plantation +to Flurry's back gate. Hot wafts from some hideous caldron at the +other side of a wall apprised me of the vicinity of the kennels and +their cuisine, and the fir-trees round were hung with gruesome and +unknown joints. I thanked Heaven that I was not a master of hounds, +and passed on as quickly as might be to the hall door. + +I rang two or three times without response; then the door opened a +couple of inches and was instantly slammed in my face. I heard the +hurried paddling of bare feet on oilcloth, and a voice, "Hurry, +Bridgie, hurry! There's quality at the door!" + +Bridgie, holding a dirty cap on with one hand, presently arrived and +informed me that she believed Mr. Knox was out about the place. She +seemed perturbed, and she cast scared glances down the drive while +speaking to me. + +I knew enough of Flurry's habits to shape a tolerably direct course for +his whereabouts. He was, as I had expected, in the training paddock, a +field behind the stable-yard, in which he had put up practice jumps for +his horses. It was a good-sized field with clumps of furze in it, and +Flurry was standing near one of these with his hands in his pockets, +singularly unoccupied. I supposed that he was prospecting for a place +to put up another jump. He did not see me coming, and turned with a +start as I spoke to him. There was a queer expression of mingled guilt +and what I can only describe as divilment in his grey eyes as he +greeted me. In my dealings with Flurry Knox, I have since formed the +habit of sitting tight, in a general way, when I see that expression. + +"Well, who's coming next, I wonder!" he said, as he shook hands with +me; "it's not ten minutes since I had two of your d--d peelers here +searching the whole place for my grandmother's colt!" + +"What!" I exclaimed, feeling cold all down my back; "do you mean the +police have got hold of it?" + +"They haven't got hold of the colt anyway," said Flurry, looking +sideways at me from under the peak of his cap, with the glint of the +sun in his eye. "I got word in time before they came." + +"What do you mean?" I demanded; "where is he? For Heaven's sake don't +tell me you've sent the brute over to my place!" + +"It's a good job for you I didn't," replied Flurry, "as the police are +on their way to Shreelane this minute to consult you about it. _You_!" +He gave utterance to one of his short diabolical fits of laughter. +"He's where they'll not find him, anyhow. Ho! ho! It's the funniest +hand I ever played!" + +"Oh yes, it's devilish funny, I've no doubt," I retorted, beginning to +lose my temper, as is the manner of many people when they are +frightened; "but I give you fair warning that if Mrs. Knox asks me any +questions about it, I shall tell her the whole story." + +"All right," responded Flurry; "and when you do, don't forget to tell +her how you flogged the colt out on to the road over her own bounds +ditch." + +"Very well," I said hotly, "I may as well go home and send in my +papers. They'll break me over this----" + +"Ah, hold on, Major," said Flurry soothingly, "it'll be all right. No +one knows anything. It's only on spec the old lady sent the bobbies +here. It you'll keep quiet it'll all blow over." + +"I don't care," I said, struggling hopelessly in the toils; "if I meet +your grandmother, and she asks me about it, I shall tell her all I +know." + +"Please God you'll not meet her! After all, it's not once in a blue +moon that she--" began Flurry. Even as he said the words his face +changed. "Holy fly!" he ejaculated, "isn't that her dog coming into +the field? Look at her bonnet over the wall! Hide, hide for your +life!" He caught me by the shoulder and shoved me down among the furze +bushes before I realised what had happened. + +"Get in there! I'll talk to her." + +I may as well confess that at the mere sight of Mrs. Knox's purple +bonnet my heart had turned to water. In that moment I knew what it +would be like to tell her how I, having eaten her salmon, and capped +her quotations, and drunk her best port, had gone forth and helped to +steal her horse. I abandoned my dignity, my sense of honour; I took +the furze prickles to my breast and wallowed in them. + +Mrs. Knox had advanced with vengeful speed; already she was in high +altercation with Flurry at no great distance from where I lay; varying +sounds of battle reached me, and I gathered that Flurry was not--to put +it mildly--shrinking from that economy of truth that the situation +required. + +"Is it that curby, long-backed brute? You promised him to me long ago, +but I wouldn't be bothered with him!" + +The old lady uttered a laugh of shrill derision. "Is it likely I'd +promise you my best colt? And still more, is it likely that you'd +refuse him if I did?" + +"Very well, ma'am." Flurry's voice was admirably indignant. "Then I +suppose I'm a liar and a thief." + +"I'd be more obliged to you for the information if I hadn't known it +before," responded his grandmother with lightning speed; "if you swore +to me on a stack of Bibles you knew nothing about my colt I wouldn't +believe you! I shall go straight to Major Yeates and ask his advice. +I believe _him_ to be a gentleman, in spite of the company he keeps!" + +I writhed deeper into the furze bushes, and thereby discovered a sandy +rabbit run, along which I crawled, with my cap well over my eyes, and +the furze needles stabbing me through my stockings. The ground shelved +a little, promising profounder concealment, but the bushes were very +thick, and I laid hold of the bare stem of one to help my progress. It +lifted out of the ground in my hand, revealing a freshly-cut stump. +Something snorted, not a yard away; I glared through the opening, and +was confronted by the long, horrified face of Mrs. Knox's colt, +mysteriously on a level with my own. + +Even without the white diamond on his forehead I should have divined +the truth; but how in the name of wonder had Flurry persuaded him to +couch like a woodcock in the heart of a furze brake? For a full minute +I lay as still as death for fear of frightening him, while the voices +of Flurry and his grandmother raged on alarmingly close to me. The +colt snorted, and blew long breaths through his wide nostrils, but he +did not move. I crawled an inch or two nearer, and after a few seconds +of cautious peering I grasped the position. They had buried him. + +A small sandpit among the furze had been utilised as a grave; they had +filled him in up to his withers with sand, and a few furze bushes, +artistically disposed round the pit, had done the rest. As the depth +of Flurry's guile was revealed, laughter came upon me like a flood; I +gurgled and shook apoplectically, and the colt gazed at me with serious +surprise, until a sudden outburst of barking close to my elbow +administered a fresh shock to my tottering nerves. + +Mrs. Knox's woolly dog had tracked me into the furze, and was now +baying the colt and me with mingled terror and indignation. I +addressed him in a whisper, with perfidious endearments, advancing a +crafty hand towards him the while, made a snatch for the back of his +neck, missed it badly, and got him by the ragged fleece of his +hind-quarters as he tried to flee. If I had flayed him alive he could +hardly have uttered a more deafening series of yells, but, like a fool, +instead of letting him go, I dragged him towards me, and tried to +stifle the noise by holding his muzzle. The tussle lasted engrossingly +for a few seconds, and then the climax of the nightmare arrived. + +Mrs. Knox's voice, close behind me, said, "Let go my dog this instant, +sir! Who are you----" + +Her voice faded away, and I knew that she also had seen the colt's head. + +I positively felt sorry for her. At her age there was no knowing what +effect the shock might have on her. I scrambled to my feet and +confronted her. + +"Major Yeates!" she said. There was a deathly pause. "Will you kindly +tell me," said Mrs. Knox slowly, "am I in Bedlam, or are you? And +_what is that_?" + +She pointed to the colt, and that unfortunate animal, recognising the +voice of his mistress, uttered a hoarse and lamentable whinny. Mrs. +Knox felt around her for support, found only furze prickles, gazed +speechlessly at me, and then, to her eternal honour, fell into wild +cackles of laughter. + +So, I may say, did Flurry and I. I embarked on my explanation and +broke down; Flurry followed suit and broke down too. Overwhelming +laughter held us all three, disintegrating our very souls. Mrs. Knox +pulled herself together first. + +"I acquit you, Major Yeates, I acquit you, though appearances are +against you. It's clear enough to me you've fallen among thieves." +She stopped and glowered at Flurry. Her purple bonnet was over one +eye. "I'll thank you, sir," she said, "to dig out that horse before I +leave this place. And when you've dug him out you may keep him. I'll +be no receiver of stolen goods!" + +She broke off and shook her fist at him. "Upon my conscience, Tony, +I'd give a guinea to have thought of it myself!" + + + + +IV + +THE WATERS OF STRIFE + +I knew Bat Callaghan's face long before I was able to put a name to it. +There was seldom a court day in Skebawn that I was not aware of his +level brows and superfluously intense expression somewhere among the +knot of corner-boys who patronised the weekly sittings of the bench of +magistrates. His social position appeared to fluctuate: I have seen +him driving a car; he sometimes held my horse for me--that is to say, +he sat on the counter of a public-house while the Quaker slumbered in +the gutter; and, on one occasion, he retired, at my bidding, to Cork +gaol, there to meditate upon the inadvisability of defending a friend +from the attentions of the police with the tailboard of a cart. + +He next obtained prominence in my regard at a regatta held under the +auspices of "The Sons of Liberty," a local football club that justified +its title by the patriot green of its jerseys and its free +interpretation of the rules of the game. The announcement of my name +on the posters as a patron--a privilege acquired at the cost of a +reluctant half-sovereign--made it incumbent on me to put in an +appearance, even though the festival coincided with my Petty Sessions +day at Skebawn; and at some five of the clock on a brilliant September +afternoon I found myself driving down the stony road that dropped in +zigzags to the borders of the lake on which the races were to come off. + +I believe that the selection of Lough Lonen as the scene of the regatta +was not unconnected with the fact that the secretary of the club owned +a public-house at the cross roads at one end of it; none the less, the +president of the Royal Academy could scarcely have chosen more +picturesque surroundings. A mountain towered steeply up from the +lake's edge, dark with the sad green of beech-trees in September; fir +woods followed the curve of the shore, and leaned far over the +answering darkness of the water; and above the trees rose the toppling +steepnesses of the hill, painted with a purple glow of heather. The +lake was about a mile long, and, tumbling from its farther end, a +fierce and narrow river fled away west to the sea, some four or five +miles off. + +I had not seen a boat race since I was at Oxford, and the words still +called up before my eyes a vision of smart parasols, of gorgeous +barges, of snowy-clad youths, and of low slim outriggers, winged with +the level flight of oars, slitting the water to the sway of the line of +flat backs. Certainly undreamed-of possibilities in aquatics were +revealed to me as I reined in the Quaker on the outskirts of the crowd, +and saw below me the festival of the Sons of Liberty in full swing. +Boats of all shapes and sizes, outrageously overladen, moved about the +lake, with oars flourishing to the strains of concertinas. Black +swarms of people seethed along the water's edge, congesting here and +there round the dingy tents and stalls of green apples; and the club's +celebrated brass band, enthroned in a wagonette, and stimulated by the +presence of a barrel of porter on the box-seat, was belching forth "The +Boys of Wexford," under the guidance of a disreputable ex-militia +drummer, in a series of crashing discords. + +Almost as I arrived a pistol-shot set the echoes clattering round the +lake, and three boats burst out abreast from the throng into the open +water. Two of the crews were in shirt-sleeves, the third wore the +green jerseys of the football club; the boats were of the heavy +sea-going build, and pulled six oars apiece, oars of which the looms +were scarcely narrower than the blades, and were, of the two, but a +shade heavier. None the less the rowers started dauntlessly at +thirty-five strokes a minute, quickening up, incredible as it may seem, +as they rounded the mark boat in the first lap of the two-mile course. +The rowing was, in general style, more akin to the action of beating up +eggs with a fork than to any other form of athletic exercise; but in +its unorthodox way it kicked the heavy boats along at a surprising +pace. The oars squeaked and grunted against the thole-pins, the +coxswains kept up an unceasing flow of oratory, and superfluous little +boys in punts contrived to intervene at all the more critical +turning-points of the race, only evading the flail of the oncoming oars +by performing prodigies of "waggling" with a single oar at the stern. +I took out my watch and counted the strokes when they were passing the +mark boat for the second time; they were pulling a fraction over forty; +one of the shirt-sleeved crews was obviously in trouble, the other, +with humped backs and jerking oars, was holding its own against the +green jerseys amid the blended yells of friends and foes. When for the +last time they rounded the green flag there were but two boats in the +race, and the foul that had been imminent throughout was at length +achieved with a rattle of oars and a storm of curses. They were clear +again in a moment, the shirt-sleeved crew getting away with a distinct +lead, and it was at about this juncture that I became aware that the +coxswains had abandoned their long-handled tillers, and were standing +over their respective "strokes," shoving frantically at their oars, and +maintaining the while a ceaseless bawl of encouragement and defiance. +It looked like a foregone conclusion for the leaders, and the war of +cheers rose to frenzy. The word "cheering," indeed, is but an +euphuism, and in no way expresses the serrated yell, composed of +epithets, advice, and imprecations, that was flung like a live thing at +the oncoming boats. The green jerseys answered to this stimulant with +a wild spurt that drove the bow of their boat within a measurable +distance of their opponents' stroke oar. In another second a +thoroughly successful foul would have been effected, but the cox of the +leading boat proved himself equal to the emergency by unshipping his +tiller, and with it dealing "bow" of the green jerseys such a blow over +the head as effectually dismissed him from the sphere of practical +politics. + +A great roar of laughter greeted this feat of arms, and a voice at my +dogcart's wheel pierced the clamour-- + +"More power to ye, Larry, me owld darlin'!" + +I looked down and saw Bat Callaghan, with shining eyes, and a face +white with excitement, poising himself on one foot on the box of my +wheel in order to get a better view of the race. Almost before I had +time to recognise him, a man in a green jersey caught him round the +legs and jerked him down. Callaghan fell into the throng, recovered +himself in an instant, and rushed, white and dangerous, at his +assailant. The Son of Liberty was no less ready for the fray, and what +is known in Ireland as "the father and mother of a row" was imminent. +Already, however, one of those unequalled judges of the moral +temperature of a crowd, a sergeant of the R.I.C., had quietly +interposed his bulky person between the combatants, and the coming +trouble was averted. + +Elsewhere battle was raging. The race was over, and the committee boat +was hemmed in by the rival crews, supplemented by craft of all kinds. +The "objection" was being lodged, and in its turn objected to, and I +can only liken the process to the screaming warfare of seagulls round a +piece of carrion. The tumult was still at its height when out of its +very heart two four-oared boats broke forth, and a pistol shot +proclaimed that another race had begun, the public interest in which +was specially keen, owing to the fact that the rowers were stalwart +country girls, who made up in energy what they lacked in skill. It was +a short race, once round the mark boat only, and, like a successful +farce, it "went with a roar" from start to finish. Foul after foul, +each followed by a healing interval of calm, during which the crews, +who had all caught crabs, were recovering themselves and their oars, +marked its progress; and when the two boats, locked in an inextricable +embrace, at length passed the winning flag, and the crews, oblivious of +judges and public, fell to untrammelled personal abuse and to doing up +their hair, I decided that I had seen the best of the fun, and prepared +to go home. + +It was, as it happened, the last race of the day, and nothing remained +in the way of excitement save the greased pole with the pig slung in a +bag at the end of it. My final impression of the Lough Lonen Regatta +was of Callaghan's lithe figure, sleek and dripping, against the yellow +sky, as he poised on the swaying pole with the broken gold of the water +beneath him. + +Limited as was my experience of the Southwest of Ireland, I was in no +way surprised to hear on the following afternoon from Peter Cadogan +that there had been "sthrokes" the night before, when the boys were +going home from the regatta, and that the police were searching for one +Jimmy Foley. + +"What do they want him for?" I asked. + +"Sure it's according as a man that was bringing a car of bogwood was +tellin' me, sir," answered Peter, pursuing his occupation of washing +the dogcart with unabated industry; "they say Jimmy's wife went roaring +to the police, saying she could get no account of her husband." + +"I suppose he's beaten some fellow and is hiding," I suggested. + +"Well, that might be, sir," asserted Peter respectfully. He plied his +mop vigorously in intricate places about the springs, which would, I +knew, have never been explored save for my presence. + +"It's what John Hennessy was saying, that he was hard set to get his +horse past Cluin Cross, the way the blood was sthrewn about the road," +resumed Peter; "sure they were fighting like wasps in it half the +night." + +"Who were fighting?" + +"I couldn't say, indeed, sir. Some o' thim low rakish lads from the +town, I suppose," replied Peter with virtuous respectability. + +When Peter Cadogan was quietly and intelligently candid, to pursue an +inquiry was seldom of much avail. + +Next day in Skebawn I met little Murray, the district inspector, very +alert and smart in his rifle-green uniform, going forth to collect +evidence about the fight. He told me that the police were pretty +certain that one of the Sons of Liberty, named Foley, had been +murdered, but, as usual, the difficulty was to get any one to give +information; all that was known was that he was gone, and that his wife +had identified his cap, which had been found, drenched with blood, by +the roadside. Murray gave it as his opinion that the whole business +had arisen out of the row over the disputed race, and that there must +have been a dozen people looking on when the murder was done; but so +far no evidence was forthcoming, and after a day and a night of search +the police had not been able to find the body. + +"No," said Flurry Knox, who had joined us, "and if it was any of those +mountainy men did away with him you might scrape Ireland with a +small-tooth comb and you'll not get him!" + +That evening I smoked an after-dinner cigarette out of doors in the +mild starlight, strolling about the rudimentary paths of what would, I +hoped, some day be Philippa's garden. The bats came stooping at the +red end of my cigarette, and from the covert behind the house I heard +once or twice the delicate bark of a fox. Civilisation seemed a +thousand miles off, as far away as the falling star that had just drawn +a line of pale fire half-way down the northern sky. I had been nearly +a year at Shreelane House by myself now, and the time seemed very long +to me. It was slow work putting by money, even under the austerities +of Mrs. Cadogan's _regime_, and though I had warned Philippa I meant to +marry her after Christmas, there were moments, and this was one of +them, when it seemed an idle threat. + +"Pether!" the strident voice of Mrs. Cadogan intruded upon my +meditations. "Go tell the Major his coffee is waitin' on him!" + +I went gloomily into the house, and, with a resignation born of +adversity, swallowed the mixture of chicory and liquorice which my +housekeeper possessed the secret of distilling from the best and most +expensive coffee. My theory about it was that it added to the illusion +that I had dined, and moreover, that it kept me awake, and I generally +had a good deal of writing to do after dinner. + +Having swallowed it I went downstairs and out past the kitchen regions +to my office, a hideous whitewashed room, in which I interviewed +policemen, and took affidavits, and did most of my official writing. +It had a door that opened into the yard, and a window that looked out +in the other direction, among lanky laurels and scrubby hollies, where +lay the cats' main thoroughfare from the scullery window to the rabbit +holes in the wood. I had a good deal of work to do, and the time +passed quickly. It was Friday night, and from the kitchen at the end +of the passage came the gabbling murmur, in two alternate keys, that I +had learned to recognise as the recital of a litany by my housekeeper +and her nephew Peter. This performance was followed by some of those +dreary and heart-rending yawns that are, I think, peculiar to Irish +kitchens, then such of the cats as had returned from the chase were +loudly shepherded into the back scullery, the kitchen door shut with a +slam, and my retainers retired to repose. + +It was nearly half-an-hour afterwards when I finished the notes I had +been making on an adjourned case of "stroke-hauling" salmon in the +Lonen River. I leaned back in my chair and lighted a cigarette +preparatory to turning in; my thoughts had again wandered on a +sentimental journey across the Irish Channel, when I heard a slight +stir of some kind outside the open window. In the wilds of Ireland no +one troubles themselves about burglars; "more cats," I thought, "I must +shut the window before I go to bed." + +Almost immediately there followed a faint tap on the window, and then a +voice said in a hoarse and hurried whisper, "Them that wants Jim Foley, +let them look in the river!" + +If I had kept my head I should have sat still and encouraged a further +confidence, but unfortunately I acted on the impulse of the natural +man, and was at the window in a jump, knocking down my chair, and +making noise enough to scare a far less shy bird than an Irish +informer. Of course there was no one there. I listened, with every +nerve as taut as a violin string. It was quite dark; there was just +breeze enough to make a rustling in the evergreens, so that a man might +brush through them without being heard; and while I debated on a plan +of action there came from beyond the shrubbery the jar and twang of a +loose strand of wire in the paling by the wood. My informant, whoever +he might be, had vanished into the darkness from which he had come as +irrecoverably as had the falling star that had written its brief +message across the sky, and gone out again into infinity. + +I got up very early next morning and drove to Skebawn to see Murray, +and offer him my mysterious information for what it was worth. +Personally I did not think it worth much, and was disposed to regard it +as a red herring drawn across the trail. Murray, however, was not in a +mood to despise anything that had a suggestion to make, having been out +till nine o'clock the night before without being able to find any clue +to the hiding-place of James Foley. + +"The river's a good mile from the place where the fight was," he said, +straddling his compasses over the Ordnance Survey map, "and there's no +sort of a road they could have taken him along, but a tip like this is +always worth trying. I remember in the Land League time how a man came +one Saturday night to my window and told me there were holes drilled in +the chapel door to shoot a boycotted man through while he was at mass. +The holes were there right enough, and you may be quite sure that chap +found excellent reasons for having family prayers at home next day!" + +I had sessions to attend on the extreme outskirts of my district, and +could not wait, as Murray suggested, to see the thing out. I did not +get home till the following day, and when I arrived I found a letter +from Murray awaiting me. + +"Your pal was right. We found Foley's body in the river, knocking +about against the posts of the weir. The head was wrapped in his own +green jersey, and had been smashed in by a stone. We suspect a fellow +named Bat Callaghan, who has bolted, but there were a lot of them in +it. Possibly it was Callaghan himself who gave you the tip; you never +can tell how superstition is going to take them next. The inquest will +be held to-morrow." + +The coroner's jury took a cautious view of the cause of the +catastrophe, and brought in a verdict of "death by misadventure," and I +presently found it to be my duty to call a magisterial inquiry to +further investigate the matter. A few days before this was to take +place, I was engaged in the delicate task of displaying to my landlord, +Mr. Flurry Knox, the defects of the pantry sink, when Mrs. Cadogan +advanced upon us with the information that the Widow Callaghan from +Cluin would be thankful to speak to me, and had brought me a present of +"a fine young goose." + +"Is she come over here looking for Bat?" said Flurry, withdrawing his +arm and the longest kitchen-ladle from the pipe that he had been +probing; "she knows you're handy at hiding your friends, Mary; maybe +it's he that's stopping the drain!" + +Mrs. Cadogan turned her large red face upon her late employer. + +"God knows I wish yerself was stuck in it, Master Flurry, the way ye'd +hear Pether cursin' the full o' the house when he's striving to wash +the things in that unnatural little trough." + +"Are you sure it's Peter does all the cursing?" retorted Flurry. "I +hear Father Scanlan has it in for you this long time for not going to +confession." + +"And how can I walk two miles to the chapel with God's burden on me +feet?" demanded Mrs. Cadogan in purple indignation; "the Blessed Virgin +and Docthor Hickey knows well the hardship I gets from them. If it +wasn't for a pair of the Major's boots he gave me, I'd be hard set to +thravel the house itself!" + +The contest might have been continued indefinitely, had I not struck up +the swords with a request that Mrs. Callaghan might be sent round to +the hall door. There we found a tall, grey-haired countrywoman waiting +for us at the foot of the steps, in the hooded blue cloak that is +peculiar to the south of Ireland; from the fact that she clutched a +pocket-handkerchief in her right hand I augured a stormy interview, but +nothing could have been more self-restrained and even imposing than the +reverence with which she greeted Flurry and me. + +"Good-morning to your honours," she began, with a dignified and +extremely imminent snuffle. "I ask your pardon for troubling you, +Major Yeates, but I haven't a one in the counthry to give me an adwice, +and I have no confidence only in your honour's experiments." + +"Experience, she means," prompted Flurry. "Didn't you get advice +enough out of Mr. Murray yesterday?" he went on aloud. "I heard he was +at Cluin to see you." + +"And if he was itself, it's little adwantage any one'd get out of that +little whipper-shnapper of a shnap-dhragon!" responded Mrs. Callaghan +tartly; "he was with me for a half-hour giving me every big rock of +English till I had a reel in me head. I declare to ye, Mr. Flurry, +after he had gone out o' the house, ye wouldn't throw three farthings +for me!" + +The pocket-handkerchief was here utilised, after which, with a heavy +groan, Mrs. Callaghan again took up her parable. + +"I towld him first and last I'd lose me life if I had to go into the +coort, and if I did itself sure th' attorneys could rip no more out o' +me than what he did himself." + +"Did you tell him where was Bat?" inquired Flurry casually. + +At this Mrs. Callaghan immediately dissolved into tears. + +"Is it Bat?" she howled. "If the twelve Apostles came down from heaven +asking me where was Bat, I could give them no satisfaction. The divil +a know I know what's happened him. He came home with me sober and +good-natured from the rogatta, and the next morning he axed a fresh egg +for his breakfast, and God forgive me, I wouldn't break the score I was +taking to the hotel, and with that he slapped the cup o' tay into the +fire and went out the door, and I never got a word of him since, good +nor bad. God knows 'tis I got throuble with that poor boy, and he the +only one I have to look to in the world!" + +I cut the matter short by asking her what she wanted me to do for her, +and sifted out from amongst much extraneous detail the fact that she +relied upon my renowned wisdom and clemency to preserve her from being +called as a witness at the coming inquiry. The gift of the goose +served its intended purpose of embarrassing my position, but in spite +of it I broke to the Widow Callaghan my inability to help her. She did +not, of course, believe me, but she was too well-bred to say so. In +Ireland one becomes accustomed to this attitude. + +As it turned out, however, Bat Callaghan's mother had nothing to fear +from the inquiry. She was by turns deaf, imbecile, garrulously candid, +and furiously abusive of Murray's principal witness, a frightened lad +of seventeen, who had sworn to having seen Bat Callaghan and Jimmy +Foley "shaping at one another to fight," at an hour when, according to +Mrs. Callaghan, Bat was "lying sthretched on the beddeen with a sick +shtomach" in consequence of the malignant character of the porter +supplied by the last witness's father. It all ended, as such cases so +often do in Ireland, in complete moral certainty in the minds of all +concerned as to the guilt of the accused, and entire impotence on the +part of the law to prove it. A warrant was issued for the arrest of +Bartholomew Callaghan; and the clans of Callaghan and Foley fought +rather more bloodily than usual, as occasion served; and at intervals +during the next few months Murray used to ask me if my friend the +murderer had dropped in lately, to which I was wont to reply with +condolences on the failure of the R.I.C. to find the Widow Callaghan's +only son for her; and that was about all that came of it. + +Events with which the present story has no concern took me to England +towards the end of the following March. It so happened that my old +regiment, the ----th Fusiliers, was quartered at Whincastle, within a +couple of hours by rail of Philippa's home, where I was staying, and, +since my wedding was now within measurable distance, my former +brothers-in-arms invited me over to dine and sleep, and to receive a +valedictory silver claret jug that they were magnanimous enough to +bestow upon a backslider. I enjoyed the dinner as much as any man can +enjoy his dinner when he knows he has to make a speech at the end of +it; through much and varied conversation I strove, like a nervous +mother who cannot trust her offspring out of her sight, to keep before +my mind's eye the opening sentences that I had composed in the train; I +felt that if I could only "get away" satisfactorily I might trust the +Ayala ('89) to do the rest, and of that fount of inspiration there was +no lack. As it turned out, I got away all right, though the sight of +the double line of expectant faces and red mess jackets nearly +scattered those precious opening sentences, and I am afraid that so far +as the various subsequent points went that I had intended to make, I +stayed away; however, neither Demosthenes, nor a Nationalist member at +a Cork election, could have been listened to with more gratifying +attention, and I sat down, hot and happy, to be confronted with my own +flushed visage, hideously reflected in the glittering paunch of the +claret jug. + +Once safely over the presentation, the evening mellowed into frivolity, +and it was pretty late before I found myself settled down to whist, at +sixpenny points, in the ancient familiar way, while most of the others +fell to playing pool in the billiard-room next door. I have played +whist from my youth up; with the preternatural seriousness of a +subaltern, with the self-assurance of a senior captain, with the +privileged irascibility of a major; and my eighteen months of +abstinence at Shreelane had only whetted my appetite for what I +consider the best of games. After the long lonely evenings there, with +rats for company, and, for relaxation, a "deck" of that specially +demoniacal American variety of patience known as "Fooly Ann," it was +wondrous agreeable to sit again among my fellows, and "lay the longs" +on a severely scientific rubber of whist, as though Mrs. Cadogan and +the Skebawn Bench of Magistrates had never existed. + +We were in the first game of the second rubber, and I was holding a +very nice playing hand; I had early in the game moved forth my trumps +to battle, and I was now in the ineffable position of scoring with the +small cards of my long suit. The cards fell and fell in silence, and +Ballantyne, my partner, raked in the tricks like a machine. The +concentrated quiet of the game was suddenly arrested by a sharp, +unmistakable sound from the barrack yard outside, the snap of a +Lee-Metford rifle. + +"What was that?" exclaimed Moffat, the senior major. + +Before he had finished speaking there was a second shot. + +"By Jove, those were rifle-shots! Perhaps I'd better go and see what's +up," said Ballantyne, who was captain of the week, throwing down his +cards and making a bolt for the door. + +He had hardly got out of the room when the first long high note of the +"assembly" sang out, sudden and clear. We all sprang to our feet, and +as the bugle-call went shrilly on, the other men came pouring in from +the billiard-room, and stampeded to their quarters to get their swords. +At the same moment the mess sergeant appeared at the outer door with a +face as white as his shirt-front. + +"The sentry on the magazine guard has been shot, sir!" he said +excitedly to Moffat. "They say he's dead!" + +We were all out in the barrack square in an instant; it was clear +moonlight, and the square was already alive with hurrying figures +cramming on clothes and caps as they ran to fall in. I was a free +agent these times, and I followed the mess sergeant across the square +towards the distant corner where the magazine stands. As we doubled +round the end of the men's quarters, we nearly ran into a small party +of men who were advancing slowly and heavily in our direction. + +"'Ere he is, sir!" said the mess sergeant, stopping himself abruptly. + +They were carrying the sentry to the hospital. His busby had fallen +off; the moon shone mildly on his pale, convulsed face, and foam and +strange inhuman sounds came from his lips. His head was rolling from +side to side on the arm of one of the men who was carrying him; as it +turned towards me I was struck by something disturbingly familiar in +the face, and I wondered if he had been in my old company. + +"What's his name, sergeant?" I said to the mess sergeant. + +"Private Harris, sir," replied the sergeant; "he's only lately come up +from the depot, and this was his first time on sentry by himself." + +I went back to the mess, and in process of time the others straggled +in, thirsting for whiskies-and-sodas, and full of such information as +there was to give. Private Harris was not wounded; both the shots had +been fired by him, as was testified by the state of his rifle and the +fact that two of the cartridges were missing from the packet in his +pouch. + +"I hear he was a queer, sulky sort of chap always," said Tomkinson, the +subaltern of the day, "but if he was having a try at suicide he made a +bally bad fist of it." + +"He made as good a fist of it as you did of putting on your sword, +Tommy," remarked Ballantyne, indicating a dangling white strap of +webbing, that hung down like a tail below Mr. Tomkinson's mess jacket. +"Nerves, obviously, in both cases!" + +The exquisite satisfaction afforded by this discovery to Mr. +Tomkinson's brother officers found its natural outlet in a bear fight +that threatened to become more or less general, and in the course of +which I slid away unostentatiously to bed in Ballantyne's quarters, and +took the precaution of barricading my door. + +Next morning, when I got down to breakfast, I found Ballantyne and two +or three others in the mess room, and my first inquiry was for Private +Harris. + +"Oh, the poor chap's dead," said Ballantyne; "it's a very queer +business altogether. I think he must have been wrong in the top +storey. The doctor was with him when he came to out of the fit, or +whatever it was, and O'Reilly--that's the doctor y' know, Irish of +course, and, by the way, poor Harris was an Irishman too--says that he +could only jibber at first, but then he got better, and he got out of +him that when he had been on sentry-go for about half-an-hour, he +happened to look up at the angle of the barrack wall near where it +joins the magazine tower, and saw a face looking at him over it. He +challenged and got no answer, but the face just stuck there staring at +him; he challenged again, and then, as O'Reilly said, he 'just oop with +his royfle and blazed at it.'" Ballantyne was not above the common +English delusion that he could imitate an Irish brogue. + +"Well, what happened then?" + +"Well, according to the poor devil's own story, the face just kept on +looking at him and he had another shot at it, and 'My God Almighty,' he +said to O'Reilly, 'it was there always!' While he was saying that to +O'Reilly he began to chuck another fit, and apparently went on chucking +them till he died a couple of hours ago." + +"One result of it is," said another man, "that they couldn't get a man +to go on sentry there alone last night. I expect we shall have to +double the sentries there every night as long as we're here." + +"Silly asses!" remarked Tomkinson, but he said it without conviction. + +After breakfast we went out to look at the wall by the magazine. It +was about eleven feet high, with a coped top, and they told me there +was a deep and wide dry ditch on the outside. A ladder was brought, +and we examined the angle of the wall at which Harris said the face had +appeared. He had made a beautiful shot, one of his bullets having +flicked a piece off the ridge of the coping exactly at the corner. + +"It's not the kind of shot a man would make if he had been drinking," +said Moffat, regretfully abandoning his first simple hypothesis; "he +must have been mad." + +"I wish I could find out who his people are," said Brownlow, the +adjutant, who had joined us; "they found in his box a letter to him +from his mother, but we can't make out the name of the place. By Jove, +Yeates, you're an Irishman, perhaps you can help us." + +He handed me a letter in a dirty envelope. There was no address given, +the contents were very short, and I may be forgiven if I transcribe +them:-- + + +"My dear Son, I hope you are well as this leaves me at present, thanks +be to God for it. I am very much unaisy about the cow. She swelled up +this morning, she ran in and was frauding and I did not do but to run +up for torn sweeney in the minute. We are thinking it is too much +lairels or an eirub she took. I do not know what I will do with her. +God help one that's alone with himself I had not a days luck since ye +went away. I am thinkin' them that wants ye is tired lookin' for ye. +And so I remain, + +"YOUR FOND MOTHER." + + +"Well, you don't get much of a lead from the cow, do you? And what the +deuce is an eirub?" said Brownlow. + +"It's another way of spelling herb," I said, turning over the envelope +abstractedly. The postmark was almost obliterated, but it struck me it +might be construed into the word Skebawn. + +"Look here," I said suddenly, "let me see Harris. It's just possible I +may know something about him." + +The sentry's body had been laid in the dead-house near the hospital, +and Brownlow fetched the key. It was a grim little whitewashed +building, without windows, save a small one of lancet shape, high up in +one gable, through which a streak of April sunlight fell sharp and +slender on the whitewashed wall. The long figure of the sentry lay +sheeted on a stone slab, and Brownlow, with his cap in his hand, gently +uncovered the face. + +I leaned over and looked at it--at the heavy brows, the short nose, the +small moustache lying black above the pale mouth, the deep-set eyes +sealed in appalling peacefulness. There rose before me the wild dark +face of the young man who had hung on my wheel and yelled encouragement +to the winning coxswain at the Lough Lonen Regatta. + +"I know him," I said, "his name is Callaghan." + + + + +V + +LISHEEN RACES, SECOND-HAND + +It may or may not be agreeable to have attained the age of +thirty-eight, but, judging from old photographs, the privilege of being +nineteen has also its drawbacks. I turned over page after page of an +ancient book in which were enshrined portraits of the friends of my +youth, singly, in David and Jonathan couples, and in groups in which I, +as it seemed to my mature and possibly jaundiced perception, always +contrived to look the most immeasurable young bounder of the lot. Our +faces were fat, and yet I cannot remember ever having been considered +fat in my life; we indulged in low-necked shirts, in "Jemima" ties with +diagonal stripes; we wore coats that seemed three sizes too small, and +trousers that were three sizes too big; we also wore small whiskers. + +I stopped at last at one of the David and Jonathan memorial portraits. +Yes, here was the object of my researches; this stout and earnestly +romantic youth was Leigh Kelway, and that fatuous and chubby young +person seated on the arm of his chair was myself. Leigh Kelway was a +young man ardently believed in by a large circle of admirers, headed by +himself and seconded by me, and for some time after I had left Magdalen +for Sandhurst, I maintained a correspondence with him on large and +abstract subjects. This phase of our friendship did not survive; I +went soldiering to India, and Leigh Kelway took honours and moved +suitably on into politics, as is the duty of an earnest young Radical +with useful family connections and an independent income. Since then I +had at intervals seen in the papers the name of the Honourable Basil +Leigh Kelway mentioned as a speaker at elections, as a writer of +thoughtful articles in the reviews, but we had never met, and nothing +could have been less expected by me than the letter, written from Mrs. +Raverty's Hotel, Skebawn, in which he told me he was making a tour in +Ireland with Lord Waterbury, to whom he was private secretary. Lord +Waterbury was at present having a few days' fishing near Killarney, and +he himself, not being a fisherman, was collecting statistics for his +chief on various points connected with the Liquor Question in Ireland. +He had heard that I was in the neighbourhood, and was kind enough to +add that it would give him much pleasure to meet me again. + +With a stir of the old enthusiasm I wrote begging him to be my guest +for as long as it suited him, and the following afternoon he arrived at +Shreelane. The stout young friend of my youth had changed +considerably. His important nose and slightly prominent teeth +remained, but his wavy hair had withdrawn intellectually from his +temples; his eyes had acquired a statesmanlike absence of expression, +and his neck had grown long and bird-like. It was his first visit to +Ireland, as he lost no time in telling me, and he and his chief had +already collected much valuable information on the subject to which +they had dedicated the Easter recess. He further informed me that he +thought of popularising the subject in a novel, and therefore intended +to, as he put it, "master the brogue" before his return. + +During the next few days I did my best for Leigh Kelway. I turned him +loose on Father Scanlan; I showed him Mohona, our champion village, +that boasts fifteen public-houses out of twenty buildings of sorts and +a railway station; I took him to hear the prosecution of a publican for +selling drink on a Sunday, which gave him an opportunity of studying +perjury as a fine art, and of hearing a lady, on whom police suspicion +justly rested, profoundly summed up by the sergeant as "a woman who had +th' appairance of having knocked at a back door." + +The net result of these experiences has not yet been given to the world +by Leigh Kelway. For my own part, I had at the end of three days +arrived at the conclusion that his society, when combined with a +note-book and a thirst for statistics, was not what I used to find it +at Oxford. I therefore welcomed a suggestion from Mr. Flurry Knox that +we should accompany him to some typical country races, got up by the +farmers at a place called Lisheen, some twelve miles away. It was the +worst road in the district, the races of the most grossly unorthodox +character; in fact, it was the very place for Leigh Kelway to collect +impressions of Irish life, and in any case it was a blessed opportunity +of disposing of him for the day. + +In my guest's attire next morning I discerned an unbending from the +role of cabinet minister towards that of sportsman; the outlines of the +note-book might be traced in his breast pocket, but traversing it was +the strap of a pair of field-glasses, and his light grey suit was smart +enough for Goodwood. + +Flurry was to drive us to the races at one o'clock, and we walked to +Tory Cottage by the short cut over the hill, in the sunny beauty of an +April morning. Up to the present the weather had kept me in a more or +less apologetic condition; any one who has entertained a guest in the +country knows the unjust weight of responsibility that rests on the +shoulders of the host in the matter of climate, and Leigh Kelway, after +two drenchings, had become sarcastically resigned to what I felt he +regarded as my mismanagement. + +Flurry took us into the house for a drink and a biscuit, to keep us +going, as he said, till "we lifted some luncheon out of the Castle Knox +people at the races," and it was while we were thus engaged that the +first disaster of the day occurred. The dining-room door was open, so +also was the window of the little staircase just outside it, and +through the window travelled sounds that told of the close proximity of +the stable-yard; the clattering of hoofs on cobble stones, and voices +uplifted in loud conversation. Suddenly from this region there arose a +screech of the laughter peculiar to kitchen flirtation, followed by the +clank of a bucket, the plunging of a horse, and then an uproar of +wheels and galloping hoofs. An instant afterwards Flurry's chestnut +cob, in a dogcart, dashed at full gallop into view, with the reins +streaming behind him, and two men in hot pursuit. Almost before I had +time to realise what had happened, Flurry jumped through the +half-opened window of the dining-room like a clown at a pantomime, and +joined in the chase; but the cob was resolved to make the most of his +chance, and went away down the drive and out of sight at a pace that +distanced every one save the kennel terrier, who sped in shrieking +ecstasy beside him. + +"Oh merciful hour!" exclaimed a female voice behind me. Leigh Kelway +and I were by this time watching the progress of events from the +gravel, in company with the remainder of Flurry's household. "The +horse is desthroyed! Wasn't that the quare start he took! And all in +the world I done was to slap a bucket of wather at Michael out the +windy, and 'twas himself got it in place of Michael!" + +"Ye'll never ate another bit, Bridgie Dunnigan," replied the cook, with +the exulting pessimism of her kind. "The Master'll have your life!" + +Both speakers shouted at the top of their voices, probably because in +spirit they still followed afar the flight of the cob. + +Leigh Kelway looked serious as we walked on down the drive. I almost +dared to hope that a note on the degrading oppression of Irish +retainers was shaping itself. Before we reached the bend of the drive +the rescue party was returning with the fugitive, all, with the +exception of the kennel terrier, looking extremely gloomy. The cob had +been confronted by a wooden gate, which he had unhesitatingly taken in +his stride, landing on his head on the farther side with the gate and +the cart on top of him, and had arisen with a lame foreleg, a cut on +his nose, and several other minor wounds. + +"You'd think the brute had been fighting the cats, with all the +scratches and scrapes he has on him!" said Flurry, casting a vengeful +eye at Michael, "and one shaft's broken and so is the dashboard. I +haven't another horse in the place; they're all out at grass, and so +there's an end of the races!" + +We all three stood blankly on the hall-door steps and watched the wreck +of the trap being trundled up the avenue. + +"I'm very sorry you're done out of your sport," said Flurry to Leigh +Kelway, in tones of deplorable sincerity; "perhaps, as there's nothing +else to do, you'd like to see the hounds----?" + +I felt for Flurry, but of the two I felt more for Leigh Kelway as he +accepted this alleviation. He disliked dogs, and held the newest views +on sanitation, and I knew what Flurry's kennels could smell like. I +was lighting a precautionary cigarette, when we caught sight of an old +man riding up the drive. Flurry stopped short. + +"Hold on a minute," he said; "here's an old chap that often brings me +horses for the kennels; I must see what he wants." + +The man dismounted and approached Mr. Knox, hat in hand, towing after +him a gaunt and ancient black mare with a big knee. + +"Well, Barrett," began Flurry, surveying the mare with his hands in his +pockets, "I'm not giving the hounds meat this month, or only very +little." + +"Ah, Master Flurry," answered Barrett, "it's you that's pleasant! Is +it give the like o' this one for the dogs to ate! She's a vallyble +strong young mare, no more than shixteen years of age, and ye'd sooner +be lookin' at her goin' under a side-car than eatin' your dinner." + +"There isn't as much meat on her as 'd fatten a jackdaw," said Flurry, +clinking the silver in his pockets as he searched for a matchbox. +"What are you asking for her?" + +The old man drew cautiously up to him. + +"Master Flurry," he said solemnly, "I'll sell her to your honour for +five pounds, and she'll be worth ten after you give her a month's +grass." + +Flurry lit his cigarette; then he said imperturbably, "I'll give you +seven shillings for her." + +Old Barrett put on his hat in silence, and in silence buttoned his coat +and took hold of the stirrup leather. Flurry remained immovable. +"Master Flurry," said old Barrett suddenly, with tears in his voice, +"you must make it eight, sir!" + +"Michael!" called out Flurry with apparent irrelevance, "run up to your +father's and ask him would he lend me a loan of his side-car." + +Half-an-hour later we were, improbable as it may seem, on our way to +Lisheen races. We were seated upon an outside-car of immemorial age, +whose joints seemed to open and close again as it swung in and out of +the ruts, whose tattered cushions stank of rats and mildew, whose +wheels staggered and rocked like the legs of a drunken man. Between +the shafts jogged the latest addition to the kennel larder, the +eight-shilling mare. Flurry sat on one side, and kept her going at a +rate of not less than four miles an hour; Leigh Kelway and I held on to +the other. + +"She'll get us as far as Lynch's anyway," said Flurry, abandoning his +first contention that she could do the whole distance, as he pulled her +on to her legs after her fifteenth stumble, "and he'll lend us some +sort of a horse, if it was only a mule." + +"Do you notice that these cushions are very damp?" said Leigh Kelway to +me, in a hollow undertone. + +"Small blame to them if they are!" replied Flurry. "I've no doubt but +they were out under the rain all day yesterday at Mrs. Hurly's funeral." + +Leigh Kelway made no reply, but he took his note-book out of his pocket +and sat on it. + +We arrived at Lynch's at a little past three, and were there confronted +by the next disappointment of this disastrous day. The door of Lynch's +farmhouse was locked, and nothing replied to our knocking except a +puppy, who barked hysterically from within. + +"All gone to the races," said Flurry philosophically, picking his way +round the manure heap. "No matter, here's the filly in the shed here. +I know he's had her under a car." + +An agitating ten minutes ensued, during which Leigh Kelway and I got +the eight-shilling mare out of the shafts and the harness, and Flurry, +with our inefficient help, crammed the young mare into them. As Flurry +had stated that she had been driven before, I was bound to believe him, +but the difficulty of getting the bit into her mouth was remarkable, +and so also was the crab-like manner in which she sidled out of the +yard, with Flurry and myself at her head, and Leigh Kelway hanging on +to the back of the car to keep it from jamming in the gateway. + +"Sit up on the car now," said Flurry when we got out on to the road; +"I'll lead her on a bit. She's been ploughed anyway; one side of her +mouth's as tough as a gad!" + +Leigh Kelway threw away the wisp of grass with which he had been +cleaning his hands, and mopped his intellectual forehead; he was very +silent. We both mounted the car, and Flurry, with the reins in his +hand, walked beside the filly, who, with her tail clasped in, moved +onward in a succession of short jerks. + +"Oh, she's all right!" said Flurry, beginning to run, and dragging the +filly into a trot; "once she gets started--" Here the filly spied a +pig in a neighbouring field, and despite the fact that she had probably +eaten out of the same trough with it, she gave a violent side spring, +and broke into a gallop. + +"Now we're off!" shouted Flurry, making a jump at the car and +clambering on; "if the traces hold we'll do!" + +The English language is powerless to suggest the view-halloo with which +Mr. Knox ended his speech, or to do more than indicate the rigid +anxiety of Leigh Kelway's face as he regained his balance after the +preliminary jerk, and clutched the back rail. It must be said for +Lynch's filly that she did not kick; she merely fled, like a dog with a +kettle tied to its tail, from the pursuing rattle and jingle behind +her, with the shafts buffeting her dusty sides as the car swung to and +fro. Whenever she showed any signs of slackening, Flurry loosed +another yell at her that renewed her panic, and thus we precariously +covered another two or three miles of our journey. + +Had it not been for a large stone lying on the road, and had the filly +not chosen to swerve so as to bring the wheel on top of it, I dare say +we might have got to the races; but by an unfortunate coincidence both +these things occurred, and when we recovered from the consequent shock, +the tire of one of the wheels had come off, and was trundling with +cumbrous gaiety into the ditch. Flurry stopped the filly and began to +laugh; Leigh Kelway said something startlingly unparliamentary under +his breath. + +"Well, it might be worse," Flurry said consolingly as he lifted the +tire on to the car; "we're not half a mile from a forge." + +We walked that half-mile in funereal procession behind the car; the +glory had departed from the weather, and an ugly wall of cloud was +rising up out of the west to meet the sun; the hills had darkened and +lost colour, and the white bog cotton shivered in a cold wind that +smelt of rain. + +By a miracle the smith was not at the races, owing, as he explained, to +his having "the toothaches," the two facts combined producing in him a +morosity only equalled by that of Leigh Kelway. The smith's sole +comment on the situation was to unharness the filly, and drag her into +the forge, where he tied her up. He then proceeded to whistle +viciously on his fingers in the direction of a cottage, and to command, +in tones of thunder, some unseen creature to bring over a couple of +baskets of turf. The turf arrived in process of time, on a woman's +back, and was arranged in a circle in a yard at the back of the forge. +The tire was bedded in it, and the turf was with difficulty kindled at +different points. + +"Ye'll not get to the races this day," said the smith, yielding to a +sardonic satisfaction; "the turf's wet, and I haven't one to do a +hand's turn for me." He laid the wheel on the ground and lit his pipe. + +Leigh Kelway looked pallidly about him over the spacious empty +landscape of brown mountain slopes patched with golden furze and seamed +with grey walls; I wondered if he were as hungry as I. We sat on +stones opposite the smouldering ring of turf and smoked, and Flurry +beguiled the smith into grim and calumnious confidences about every +horse in the country. After about an hour, during which the turf went +out three times, and the weather became more and more threatening, a +girl with a red petticoat over her head appeared at the gate of the +yard, and said to the smith: + +"The horse is gone away from ye." + +"Where?" exclaimed Flurry, springing to his feet. + +"I met him walking wesht the road there below, and when I thought to +turn him he commenced to gallop." + +"Pulled her head out of the headstall," said Flurry, after a rapid +survey of the forge. "She's near home by now." + +It was at this moment that the rain began; the situation could scarcely +have been better stage-managed. After reviewing the position, Flurry +and I decided that the only thing to do was to walk to a public-house a +couple of miles farther on, feed there if possible, hire a car, and go +home. + +It was an uphill walk, with mild generous raindrops striking thicker +and thicker on our faces; no one talked, and the grey clouds crowded up +from behind the hills like billows of steam. Leigh Kelway bore it all +with egregious resignation. I cannot pretend that I was at heart +sympathetic, but by virtue of being his host I felt responsible for the +breakdown, for his light suit, for everything, and divined his +sentiment of horror at the first sight of the public-house. + +It was a long, low cottage, with a line of dripping elm-trees +overshadowing it; empty cars and carts round its door, and a babel from +within made it evident that the race-goers were pursuing a gradual +homeward route. The shop was crammed with steaming countrymen, whose +loud brawling voices, all talking together, roused my English friend to +his first remark since we had left the forge. + +"Surely, Yeates, we are not going into that place?" he said severely; +"those men are all drunk." + +"Ah, nothing to signify!" said Flurry, plunging in and driving his way +through the throng like a plough. "Here, Mary Kate!" he called to the +girl behind the counter, "tell your mother we want some tea and bread +and butter in the room inside." + +The smell of bad tobacco and spilt porter was choking; we worked our +way through it after him towards the end of the shop, intersecting at +every hand discussions about the races. + +"Tom was very nice. He spared his horse all along, and then he put +into him--" "Well, at Goggin's corner the third horse was before the +second, but he was goin' wake in himself." "I tell ye the mare had the +hind leg fasht in the fore." "Clancy was dipping in the saddle." +"'Twas a dam nice race whatever----" + +We gained the inner room at last, a cheerless apartment, adorned with +sacred pictures, a sewing-machine, and an array of supplementary +tumblers and wineglasses; but, at all events, we had it so far to +ourselves. At intervals during the next half-hour Mary Kate burst in +with cups and plates, cast them on the table and disappeared, but of +food there was no sign. After a further period of starvation and of +listening to the noise in the shop, Flurry made a sortie, and, after +lengthy and unknown adventures, reappeared carrying a huge brown +teapot, and driving before him Mary Kate with the remainder of the +repast. The bread tasted of mice, the butter of turf-smoke, the tea of +brown paper, but we had got past the critical stage. I had entered +upon my third round of bread and butter when the door was flung open, +and my valued acquaintance, Slipper, slightly advanced in liquor, +presented himself to our gaze. His bandy legs sprawled +consequentially, his nose was redder than a coal of fire, his prominent +eyes rolled crookedly upon us, and his left hand swept behind him the +attempt of Mary Kate to frustrate his entrance. + +"Good-evening to my vinerable friend, Mr. Flurry Knox!" he began, in +the voice of a town crier, "and to the Honourable Major Yeates, and the +English gintleman!" + +This impressive opening immediately attracted an audience from the +shop, and the doorway filled with grinning faces as Slipper advanced +farther into the room. + +"Why weren't ye at the races, Mr. Flurry?" he went on, his roving eye +taking a grip of us all at the same time; "sure the Miss Bennetts and +all the ladies was asking where were ye." + +"It'd take some time to tell them that," said Flurry, with his mouth +full; "but what about the races, Slipper? Had you good sport?" + +"Sport is it? Divil so pleasant an afternoon ever you seen," replied +Slipper. He leaned against a side table, and all the glasses on it +jingled. "Does your honour know O'Driscoll?" he went on irrelevantly. +"Sure you do. He was in your honour's stable. It's what we were all +sayin'; it was a great pity your honour was not there, for the likin' +you had to Driscoll." + +"That's thrue," said a voice at the door. + +"There wasn't one in the Barony but was gethered in it, through and +fro," continued Slipper, with a quelling glance at the interrupter; +"and there was tints for sellin' porther, and whisky as pliable as new +milk, and boys gain' round the tints outside, feeling for heads with +the big ends of their blackthorns, and all kinds of recreations, and +the Sons of Liberty's piffler and dhrum band from Skebawn; though +faith! there was more of thim runnin' to look at the races than what +was playin' in it; not to mintion different occasions that the +bandmasther was atin' his lunch within in the whisky tint." + +"But what about Driscoll?" said Flurry. + +"Sure it's about him I'm tellin' ye," replied Slipper, with the +practised orator's watchful eye on his growing audience. "'Twas within +in the same whisky tint meself was, with the bandmasther and a few of +the lads, an' we buyin' a ha'porth o' crackers, when I seen me brave +Driscoll landin' into the tint, and a pair o' thim long boots on him; +him that hadn't a shoe nor a stocking to his foot when your honour had +him picking grass out o' the stones behind in your yard. 'Well,' says +I to meself, 'we'll knock some spoort out of Driscoll!' + +"'Come here to me, acushla!' says I to him; 'I suppose it's some way +wake in the legs y'are,' says I, 'an' the docthor put them on ye the +way the people wouldn't thrample ye!' + +"'May the divil choke ye!' says he, pleasant enough, but I knew by the +blush he had he was vexed. + +"'Then I suppose 'tis a left-tenant colonel y'are,' says I; 'yer mother +must be proud out o' ye!' says I, 'an' maybe ye'll lend her a loan o' +thim waders when she's rinsin' yer bauneen in the river!' says I. + +"'There'll be work out o' this!' says he, lookin' at me both sour and +bitther. + +"'Well indeed, I was thinkin' you were blue moulded for want of a +batin',' says I. He was for fightin' us then, but afther we had him +pacificated with about a quarther of a naggin o' sperrits, he told us +he was goin' ridin' in a race. + +"'An' what'll ye ride?' says I. + +"'Owld Bocock's mare,' says he. + +"'Knipes!' says I, sayin' a great curse; 'is it that little staggeen +from the mountains; sure she's somethin' about the one age with +meself,' says I. 'Many's the time Jamesy Geoghegan and meself used to +be dhrivin' her to Macroom with pigs an' all soorts,' says I; 'an' is +it leppin' stone walls ye want her to go now?' + +"'Faith, there's walls and every vari'ty of obstackle in it,' says he. + +"'It'll be the best o' your play, so,' says I, 'to leg it away home out +o' this.' + +"'An' who'll ride her, so?' says he. + +"'Let the divil ride her,' says I." + +Leigh Kelway, who had been leaning back seemingly half asleep, obeyed +the hypnotism of Slipper's gaze, and opened his eyes. + +"That was now all the conversation that passed between himself and +meself," resumed Slipper, "and there was no great delay afther that +till they said there was a race startin' and the dickens a one at all +was goin' to ride only two, Driscoll, and one Clancy. With that then I +seen Mr. Kinahane, the Petty Sessions clerk, goin' round clearin' the +coorse, an' I gethered a few o' the neighbours, an' we walked the +fields hither and over till we seen the most of th' obstackles. + +"'Stand aisy now by the plantation,' says I; 'if they get to come as +far as this, believe me ye'll see spoort,' says I, 'an' 'twill be a +convanient spot to encourage the mare if she's anyway wake in herself,' +says I, cuttin' somethin' about five foot of an ash sapling out o' the +plantation. + +"'That's yer sort!' says owld Bocock, that was thravellin' the +racecoorse, peggin' a bit o' paper down with a thorn in front of every +lep, the way Driscoll 'd know the handiest place to face her at it. + +"Well, I hadn't barely thrimmed the ash plant----" + +"Have you any jam, Mary Kate?" interrupted Flurry, whose meal had been +in no way interfered with by either the story or the highly-scented +crowd who had come to listen to it. + +"We have no jam, only thraycle, sir," replied the invisible Mary Kate. + +"I hadn't the switch barely thrimmed," repeated Slipper firmly, "when I +heard the people screechin', an' I seen Driscoll an' Clancy comin' on, +leppin' all before them, an' owld Bocock's mare bellusin' an' +powdherin' along, an' bedad! whatever obstackle wouldn't throw _her_ +down, faith, she'd throw _it_ down, an' there's the thraffic they had +in it. + +"'I declare to me sowl,' says I, 'if they continue on this way there's +a great chance some one o' thim 'll win," says I. + +"'Ye lie!' says the bandmasther, bein' a thrifle fulsome after his +luncheon. + +"'I do not,' says I, 'in regard of seein' how soople them two boys is. +Ye might observe,' says I, 'that if they have no convanient way to sit +on the saddle, they'll ride the neck o' the horse till such time as +they gets an occasion to lave it,' says I. + +"'Arrah, shut yer mouth!' says the bandmasther; 'they're puckin' out +this way now, an' may the divil admire me!' says he, 'but Clancy has +the other bet out, and the divil such leatherin' and beltin' of owld +Bocock's mare ever you seen as what's in it!' says he. + +"Well, when I seen them comin' to me, and Driscoll about the length of +the plantation behind Clancy, I let a couple of bawls. + +"'Skelp her, ye big brute!' says I. 'What good's in ye that ye aren't +able to skelp her?'" + +The yell and the histrionic flourish of his stick with which Slipper +delivered this incident brought down the house. Leigh Kelway was +sufficiently moved to ask me in an undertone if "skelp" was a local +term. + +"Well, Mr. Flurry, and gintlemen," recommenced Slipper, "I declare to +ye when owld Bocock's mare heard thim roars she sthretched out her neck +like a gandher, and when she passed me out she give a couple of grunts, +and looked at me as ugly as a Christian. + +"'Hah!' says I, givin' her a couple o' dhraws o' th' ash plant across +the butt o' the tail, the way I wouldn't blind her; 'I'll make ye +grunt!' says I, 'I'll nourish ye!' + +"I knew well she was very frightful of th' ash plant since the winter +Tommeen Sullivan had her under a sidecar. But now, in place of havin' +any obligations to me, ye'd be surprised if ye heard the blaspheemious +expressions of that young boy that was ridin' her; and whether it was +over-anxious he was, turnin' around the way I'd hear him cursin', or +whether it was some slither or slide came to owld Bocock's mare, I +dunno, but she was bet up agin the last obstackle but two, and before +ye could say 'Schnipes,' she was standin' on her two ears beyond in th' +other field! I declare to ye, on the vartue of me oath, she stood that +way till she reconnoithered what side would Driscoll fall, an' she +turned about then and rolled on him as cosy as if he was meadow grass!" + +Slipper stopped short; the people in the doorway groaned +appreciatively; Mary Kate murmured "The Lord save us!" + +"The blood was dhruv out through his nose and ears," continued Slipper, +with a voice that indicated the cream of the narration, "and you'd hear +his bones crackin' on the ground! You'd have pitied the poor boy." + +"Good heavens!" said Leigh Kelway, sitting up very straight in his +chair. + +"Was he hurt, Slipper?" asked Flurry casually. + +"Hurt is it?" echoed Slipper in high scorn; "killed on the spot!" He +paused to relish the effect of the _denouement_ on Leigh Kelway. "Oh, +divil so pleasant an afthernoon ever you seen; and indeed, Mr. Flurry, +it's what we were all sayin', it was a great pity your honour was not +there for the likin' you had for Driscoll." + +As he spoke the last word there was an outburst of singing and cheering +from a carload of people who had just pulled up at the door. Flurry +listened, leaned back in his chair, and began to laugh. + +"It scarcely strikes one as a comic incident," said Leigh Kelway, very +coldly to me; "in fact, it seems to me that the police ought----" + +"Show me Slipper!" bawled a voice in the shop; "show me that dirty +little undherlooper till I have his blood! Hadn't I the race won only +for he souring the mare on me! What's that you say? I tell ye he did! +He left seven slaps on her with the handle of a hay-rake----" + +There was in the room in which we were sitting a second door, leading +to the back yard, a door consecrated to the unobtrusive visits of +so-called "Sunday travellers." Through it Slipper faded away like a +dream, and, simultaneously, a tall young man, with a face like a +red-hot potato tied up in a bandage, squeezed his way from the shop +into the room. + +"Well, Driscoll," said Flurry, "since it wasn't the teeth of the rake +he left on the mare, you needn't be talking!" + +Leigh Kelway looked from one to the other with a wilder expression in +his eye than I had thought it capable of. I read in it a resolve to +abandon Ireland to her fate. + +At eight o'clock we were still waiting for the car that we had been +assured should be ours directly it returned from the races. At +half-past eight we had adopted the only possible course that remained, +and had accepted the offers of lifts on the laden cars that were +returning to Skebawn, and I presently was gratified by the spectacle of +my friend Leigh Kelway wedged between a roulette table and its +proprietor on one side of a car, with Driscoll and Slipper, +mysteriously reconciled and excessively drunk, seated, locked in each +other's arms, on the other. Flurry and I, somewhat similarly placed, +followed on two other cars. I was scarcely surprised when I was +informed that the melancholy white animal in the shafts of the leading +car was Owld Bocock's much-enduring steeplechaser. + +The night was very dark and stormy, and it is almost superfluous to say +that no one carried lamps; the rain poured upon us, and through wind +and wet Owld Bocock's mare set the pace at a rate that showed she knew +from bitter experience what was expected from her by gentlemen who had +spent the evening in a public-house; behind her the other two tired +horses followed closely, incited to emulation by shouting, singing, and +a liberal allowance of whip. We were a good ten miles from Skebawn, +and never had the road seemed so long. For mile after mile the +half-seen low walls slid past us, with occasional plunges into caverns +of darkness under trees. Sometimes from a wayside cabin a dog would +dash out to bark at us as we rattled by; sometimes our cavalcade swung +aside to pass, with yells and counter-yells, crawling carts filled with +other belated race-goers. + +I was nearly wet through, even though I received considerable shelter +from a Skebawn publican, who slept heavily and irrepressibly on my +shoulder. Driscoll, on the leading car, had struck up an approximation +to the "Wearing of the Green," when a wavering star appeared on the +road ahead of us. It grew momently larger; it came towards us apace. +Flurry, on the car behind me, shouted suddenly-- + +"That's the mail car, with one of the lamps out! Tell those fellows +ahead to look out!" + +But the warning fell on deaf ears. + + "When laws can change the blades of grass + From growing as they grow----" + +howled five discordant voices, oblivious of the towering proximity of +the star. + +A Bianconi mail car is nearly three times the size of an ordinary +outside car, and when on a dark night it advances, Cyclops-like, with +but one eye, it is difficult for even a sober driver to calculate its +bulk. Above the sounds of melody there arose the thunder of heavy +wheels, the splashing trample of three big horses, then a crash and a +turmoil of shouts. Our cars pulled up just in time, and I tore myself +from the embrace of my publican to go to Leigh Kelway's assistance. + +The wing of the Bianconi had caught the wing of the smaller car, +flinging Owld Bocock's mare on her side and throwing her freight +headlong on top of her, the heap being surmounted by the roulette +table. The driver of the mail car unshipped his solitary lamp and +turned it on the disaster. I saw that Flurry had already got hold of +Leigh Kelway by the heels, and was dragging him from under the others. +He struggled up hatless, muddy, and gasping, with Driscoll hanging on +by his neck, still singing the "Wearing of the Green." + +A voice from the mail car said incredulously, "_Leigh Kelway!_" A +spectacled face glared down upon him from under the dripping spikes of +an umbrella. + +It was the Right Honourable the Earl of Waterbury, Leigh Kelway's +chief, returning from his fishing excursion. + +Meanwhile Slipper, in the ditch, did not cease to announce that "Divil +so pleasant an afthernoon ever ye seen as what was in it!" + + + + +VI + +PHILIPPA'S FOX-HUNT + +No one can accuse Philippa and me of having married in haste. As a +matter of fact, it was but little under five years from that autumn +evening on the river when I had said what is called in Ireland "the +hard word," to the day in August when I was led to the altar by my best +man, and was subsequently led away from it by Mrs. Sinclair Yeates. +About two years out of the five had been spent by me at Shreelane in +ceaseless warfare with drains, eaveshoots, chimneys, pumps; all those +fundamentals, in short, that the ingenuous and improving tenant expects +to find established as a basis from which to rise to higher things. As +far as rising to higher things went, frequent ascents to the roof to +search for leaks summed up my achievements; in fact, I suffered so +general a shrinkage of my ideals that the triumph of making the +hall-door bell ring blinded me to the fact that the rat-holes in the +hall floor were nailed up with pieces of tin biscuit boxes, and that +the casual visitor could, instead of leaving a card, have easily +written his name in the damp on the walls. + +Philippa, however, proved adorably callous to these and similar +shortcomings. She regarded Shreelane and its floundering, foundering +menage of incapables in the light of a gigantic picnic in a foreign +land; she held long conversations daily with Mrs. Cadogan, in order, as +she informed me, to acquire the language; without any ulterior domestic +intention she engaged kitchen-maids because of the beauty of their +eyes, and housemaids because they had such delightfully picturesque old +mothers, and she declined to correct the phraseology of the +parlour-maid, whose painful habit it was to whisper "Do ye choose +cherry or clarry?" when proffering the wine. Fast-days, perhaps, +afforded my wife her first insight into the sterner realities of Irish +housekeeping. Philippa had what are known as High Church proclivities, +and took the matter seriously. + +"I don't know how we are to manage for the servants' dinner to-morrow, +Sinclair," she said, coming in to my office one Thursday morning; +"Julia says she 'promised God this long time that she wouldn't eat an +egg on a fast-day,' and the kitchen-maid says she won't eat herrings +'without they're fried with onions,' and Mrs. Cadogan says she will +'not go to them extremes for servants.'" + +"I should let Mrs. Cadogan settle the menu herself," I suggested. + +"I asked her to do that," replied Philippa, "and she only said she +'thanked God she had no appetite!'" + +The lady of the house here fell away into unseasonable laughter. + +I made the demoralising suggestion that, as we were going away for a +couple of nights, we might safely leave them to fight it out, and the +problem was abandoned. + +Philippa had been much called on by the neighbourhood in all its shades +and grades, and daily she and her trousseau frocks presented themselves +at hall-doors of varying dimensions in due acknowledgment of +civilities. In Ireland, it may be noted, the process known in England +as "summering and wintering" a newcomer does not obtain; sociability +and curiosity alike forbid delay. The visit to which we owed our +escape from the intricacies of the fast-day was to the Knoxes of Castle +Knox, relations in some remote and tribal way of my landlord, Mr. +Flurry of that ilk. It involved a short journey by train, and my +wife's longest basket-trunk; it also, which was more serious, involved +my being lent a horse to go out cubbing the following morning. + +At Castle Knox we sank into an almost forgotten environment of +draught-proof windows and doors, of deep carpets, of silent servants +instead of clattering belligerents. Philippa told me afterwards that +it had only been by an effort that she had restrained herself from +snatching up the train of her wedding-gown as she paced across the wide +hall on little Sir Valentine's arm. After three weeks at Shreelane she +found it difficult to remember that the floor was neither damp nor +dusty. + +I had the good fortune to be of the limited number of those who got on +with Lady Knox, chiefly, I imagine, because I was as a worm before her, +and thankfully permitted her to do all the talking. + +"Your wife is extremely pretty," she pronounced autocratically, +surveying Philippa between the candle-shades; "does she ride?" + +Lady Knox was a short square lady, with a weather-beaten face, and an +eye decisive from long habit of taking her own line across country and +elsewhere. She would have made a very imposing little coachman, and +would have caused her stable helpers to rue the day they had the +presumption to be born; it struck me that Sir Valentine sometimes did +so. + +"I'm glad you like her looks," I replied, "as I fear you will find her +thoroughly despicable otherwise; for one thing, she not only can't +ride, but she believes that I can!" + +"Oh come, you're not as bad as all that!" my hostess was good enough to +say; "I'm going to put you up on Sorcerer to-morrow, and we'll see you +at the top of the hunt--if there is one. That young Knox hasn't a +notion how to draw these woods." + +"Well, the best run we had last year out of this place was with +Flurry's hounds," struck in Miss Sally, sole daughter of Sir +Valentine's house and home, from her place half-way down the table. It +was not difficult to see that she and her mother held different views +on the subject of Mr. Flurry Knox. + +"I call it a criminal thing in any one's great-great-grandfather to +rear up a preposterous troop of sons and plant them all out in his own +country," Lady Knox said to me with apparent irrelevance. "I detest +collaterals. Blood may be thicker than water, but it is also a great +deal nastier. In this country I find that fifteenth cousins consider +themselves near relations if they live within twenty miles of one!" + +Having before now taken in the position with regard to Flurry Knox, I +took care to accept these remarks as generalities, and turned the +conversation to other themes. + +"I see Mrs. Yeates is doing wonders with Mr. Hamilton," said Lady Knox +presently, following the direction of my eyes, which had strayed away +to where Philippa was beaming upon her left-hand neighbour, a +mildewed-looking old clergyman, who was delivering a long dissertation, +the purport of which we were happily unable to catch. + +"She has always had a gift for the Church," I said. + +"Not curates?" said Lady Knox, in her deep voice. + +I made haste to reply that it was the elders of the Church who were +venerated by my wife. + +"Well, she has her fancy in old Eustace Hamilton; he's elderly enough!" +said Lady Knox. "I wonder if she'd venerate him as much if she knew +that he had fought with his sister-in-law, and they haven't spoken for +thirty years! though for the matter of that," she added, "I think it +shows his good sense!" + +"Mrs. Knox is rather a friend of mine," I ventured. + +"Is she? H'm! Well, she's not one of mine!" replied my hostess, with +her usual definiteness. "I'll say one thing for her, I believe she's +always been a sportswoman. She's very rich, you know, and they say she +only married old Badger Knox to save his hounds from being sold to pay +his debts, and then she took the horn from him and hunted them herself. +Has she been rude to your wife yet? No? Oh, well, she will. It's a +mere question of time. She hates all English people. You know the +story they tell of her? She was coming home from London, and when she +was getting her ticket the man asked if she had said a ticket for York. +'No, thank God, Cork!' says Mrs. Knox." + +"Well, I rather agree with her!" said I; "but why did she fight with +Mr. Hamilton?" + +"Oh, nobody knows. I don't believe they know themselves! Whatever it +was, the old lady drives five miles to Fortwilliam every Sunday, rather +than go to his church, just outside her own back gates," Lady Knox said +with a laugh like a terrier's bark. "I wish I'd fought with him +myself," she said; "he gives us forty minutes every Sunday." + +As I struggled into my boots the following morning, I felt that Sir +Valentine's acid confidences on cub-hunting, bestowed on me at +midnight, did credit to his judgment. "A very moderate amusement, my +dear Major," he had said, in his dry little voice; "you should stick to +shooting. No one expects you to shoot before daybreak." + +It was six o'clock as I crept downstairs, and found Lady Knox and Miss +Sally at breakfast, with two lamps on the table, and a foggy daylight +oozing in from under the half-raised blinds. Philippa was already in +the hall, pumping up her bicycle, in a state of excitement at the +prospect of her first experience of hunting that would have been more +comprehensible to me had she been going to ride a strange horse, as I +was. As I bolted my food I saw the horses being led past the windows, +and a faint twang of a horn told that Flurry Knox and his hounds were +not far off. + +Miss Sally jumped up. + +"If I'm not on the Cockatoo before the hounds come up, I shall never +get there!" she said, hobbling out of the room in the toils of her +safety habit. Her small, alert face looked very childish under her +riding-hat; the lamp-light struck sparks out of her thick coil of +golden-red hair: I wondered how I had ever thought her like her prim +little father. + +She was already on her white cob when I got to the hall-door, and +Flurry Knox was riding over the glistening wet grass with his hounds, +while his whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, was having a stirring time with the +young entry and the rabbit-holes. They moved on without stopping, up a +back avenue, under tall and dripping trees, to a thick laurel covert, +at some little distance from the house. Into this the hounds were +thrown, and the usual period of fidgety inaction set in for the riders, +of whom, all told, there were about half-a-dozen. Lady Knox, square +and solid, on her big, confidential iron-grey, was near me, and her +eyes were on me and my mount; with her rubicund face and white collar +she was more than ever like a coachman. + +"Sorcerer looks as if he suited you well," she said, after a few +minutes of silence, during which the hounds rustled and crackled +steadily through the laurels; "he's a little high on the leg, and so +are you, you know, so you show each other off." + +Sorcerer was standing like a rock, with his good-looking head in the +air and his eyes fastened on the covert. His manners, so far, had been +those of a perfect gentleman, and were in marked contrast to those of +Miss Sally's cob, who was sidling, hopping, and snatching unappeasably +at his bit. Philippa had disappeared from view down the avenue ahead. +The fog was melting, and the sun threw long blades of light through the +trees; everything was quiet, and in the distance the curtained windows +of the house marked the warm repose of Sir Valentine, and those of the +party who shared his opinion of cubbing. + +"Hark! hark to cry there!" + +It was Flurry's voice, away at the other side of the covert. The +rustling and brushing through the laurels became more vehement, then +passed out of hearing. + +"He never will leave his hounds alone," said Lady Knox disapprovingly. + +Miss Sally and the Cockatoo moved away in a series of heraldic capers +towards the end of the laurel plantation, and at the same moment I saw +Philippa on her bicycle shoot into view on the drive ahead of us. + +"I've seen a fox!" she screamed, white with what I believe to have been +personal terror, though she says it was excitement; "it passed quite +close to me!" + +"What way did he go?" bellowed a voice which I recognised as Dr. +Hickey's, somewhere in the deep of the laurels. + +"Down the drive!" returned Philippa, with a pea-hen quality in her +tones with which I was quite unacquainted. + +An electrifying screech of "Gone away!" was projected from the laurels +by Dr. Hickey. + +"Gone away!" chanted Flurry's horn at the top of the covert. + +"This is what he calls cubbing!" said Lady Knox, "a mere farce!" but +none the less she loosed her sedate monster into a canter. + +Sorcerer got his hind-legs under him, and hardened his crest against +the bit, as we all hustled along the drive after the flying figure of +my wife. I knew very little about horses, but I realised that even +with the hounds tumbling hysterically out of the covert, and the +Cockatoo kicking the gravel into his face, Sorcerer comported himself +with the manners of the best society. Up a side road I saw Flurry Knox +opening half of a gate and cramming through it; in a moment we also had +crammed through, and the turf of a pasture field was under our feet. +Dr. Hickey leaned forward and took hold of his horse; I did likewise, +with the trifling difference that my horse took hold of me, and I +steered for Flurry Knox with single-hearted purpose, the hounds, +already a field ahead, being merely an exciting and noisy accompaniment +of this endeavour. A heavy stone wall was the first occurrence of +note. Flurry chose a place where the top was loose, and his +clumsy-looking brown mare changed feet on the rattling stones like a +fairy. Sorcerer came at it, tense and collected as a bow at full +stretch, and sailed steeply into the air; I saw the wall far beneath +me, with an unsuspected ditch on the far side, and I felt my hat +following me at the full stretch of its guard as we swept over it, +then, with a long slant, we descended to earth some sixteen feet from +where we had left it, and I was possessor of the gratifying fact that I +had achieved a good-sized "fly," and had not perceptibly moved in my +saddle. Subsequent disillusioning experience has taught me that but +few horses jump like Sorcerer, so gallantly, so sympathetically, and +with such supreme mastery of the subject; but none the less the +enthusiasm that he imparted to me has never been extinguished, and that +October morning ride revealed to me the unsuspected intoxication of +fox-hunting. + +Behind me I heard the scrabbling of the Cockatoo's little hoofs among +the loose stones, and Lady Knox, galloping on my left, jerked a +maternal chin over her shoulder to mark her daughter's progress. For +my part, had there been an entire circus behind me, I was far too much +occupied with ramming on my hat and trying to hold Sorcerer, to have +looked round, and all my spare faculties were devoted to steering for +Flurry, who had taken a right-handed turn, and was at that moment +surmounting a bank of uncertain and briary aspect. I surmounted it +also, with the swiftness and simplicity for which the Quaker's methods +of bank jumping had not prepared me, and two or three fields, traversed +at the same steeplechase pace, brought us to a road and to an abrupt +check. There, suddenly, were the hounds, scrambling in baffled silence +down into the road from the opposite bank, to look for the line they +had overrun, and there, amazingly, was Philippa, engaged in excited +converse with several men with spades over their shoulders. + +"Did ye see the fox, boys?" shouted Flurry, addressing the group. + +"We did! we did!" cried my wife and her friends in chorus; "he ran up +the road!" + +"We'd be badly off without Mrs. Yeates!" said Flurry, as he whirled his +mare round and clattered up the road with a hustle of hounds after him. + +It occurred to me as forcibly as any mere earthly thing can occur to +those who are wrapped in the sublimities of a run, that, for a young +woman who had never before seen a fox out of a cage at the Zoo, +Philippa was taking to hunting very kindly. Her cheeks were a most +brilliant pink, her blue eyes shone. + +"Oh, Sinclair!" she exclaimed, "they say he's going for Aussolas, and +there's a road I can ride all the way!" + +"Ye can, Miss! Sure we'll show you!" chorussed her cortege. + +Her foot was on the pedal ready to mount. Decidedly my wife was in no +need of assistance from me. + +Up the road a hound gave a yelp of discovery, and flung himself over a +stile into the fields; the rest of the pack went squealing and jostling +after him, and I followed Flurry over one of those infinitely varied +erections, pleasantly termed "gaps" in Ireland. On this occasion the +gap was made of three razor-edged slabs of slate leaning against an +iron bar, and Sorcerer conveyed to me his thorough knowledge of the +matter by a lift of his hind-quarters that made me feel as if I were +being skilfully kicked downstairs. To what extent I looked it, I +cannot say, nor providentially can Philippa, as she had already +started. I only know that undeserved good luck restored to me my +stirrup before Sorcerer got away with me in the next field. + +What followed was, I am told, a very fast fifteen minutes; for me time +was not; the empty fields rushed past uncounted, fences came and went +in a flash, while the wind sang in my ears, and the dazzle of the early +sun was in my eyes. I saw the hounds occasionally, sometimes pouring +over a green bank, as the charging breaker lifts and flings itself, +sometimes driving across a field, as the white tongues of foam slide +racing over the sand; and always ahead of me was Flurry Knox, going as +a man goes who knows his country, who knows his horse, and whose heart +is wholly and absolutely in the right place. + +Do what I would, Sorcerer's implacable stride carried me closer and +closer to the brown mare, till, as I thundered down the slope of a long +field, I was not twenty yards behind Flurry. Sorcerer had stiffened +his neck to iron, and to slow him down was beyond me; but I fought his +head away to the right, and found myself coming hard and steady at a +stonefaced bank with broken ground in front of it. Flurry bore away to +the left, shouting something that I did not understand. That Sorcerer +shortened his stride at the right moment was entirely due to his own +judgment; standing well away from the jump, he rose like a stag out of +the tussocky ground, and as he swung my twelve stone six into the air +the obstacle revealed itself to him and me as consisting not of one +bank but of two, and between the two lay a deep grassy lane, half +choked with furze. I have often been asked to state the width of the +bohereen, and can only reply that in my opinion it was at least +eighteen feet; Flurry Knox and Dr. Hickey, who did not jump it, say +that it is not more than five. What Sorcerer did with it I cannot say; +the sensation was of a towering flight with a kick back in it, a +biggish drop, and a landing on cee-springs, still on the downhill +grade. That was how one of the best horses in Ireland took one of +Ireland's most ignorant riders over a very nasty place. + +A sombre line of fir-wood lay ahead, rimmed with a grey wall, and in +another couple of minutes we had pulled up on the Aussolas road, and +were watching the hounds struggling over the wall into Aussolas demesne. + +"No hurry now," said Flurry, turning in his saddle to watch the +Cockatoo jump into the road, "he's to ground in the big earth inside. +Well, Major, it's well for you that's a big-jumped horse. I thought +you were a dead man a while ago when you faced him at the bohereen!" + +I was disclaiming intention in the matter when Lady Knox and the others +joined us. + +"I thought you told me your wife was no sportswoman," she said to me, +critically scanning Sorcerer's legs for cuts the while, "but when I saw +her a minute ago she had abandoned her bicycle and was running across +country like----" + +"Look at her now!" interrupted Miss Sally. "Oh!--oh!" In the interval +between these exclamations my incredulous eyes beheld my wife in +mid-air, hand in hand with a couple of stalwart country boys, with whom +she was leaping in unison from the top of a bank on to the road. + +Every one, even the saturnine Dr. Hickey, began to laugh; I rode back +to Philippa, who was exchanging compliments and congratulations with +her escort. + +"Oh, Sinclair!" she cried, "wasn't it splendid? I saw you jumping, and +everything! Where are they going now?" + +"My dear girl," I said, with marital disapproval, "you're killing +yourself. Where's your bicycle?" + +"Oh, it's punctured in a sort of lane, back there. It's all right; and +then they"--she breathlessly waved her hand at her attendants--"they +showed me the way." + +"Begor! you proved very good, Miss!" said a grinning cavalier. + +"Faith she did!" said another, polishing his shining brow with his +white flannel coat-sleeve, "she lepped like a haarse!" + +"And may I ask how you propose to go home?" said I. + +"I don't know and I don't care! I'm not going home!" She cast an +entirely disobedient eye at me. "And your eye-glass is hanging down +your back and your tie is bulging out over your waistcoat!" + +The little group of riders had begun to move away. + +"We're going on into Aussolas," called out Flurry; "come on, and make +my grandmother give you some breakfast, Mrs. Yeates; she always has it +at eight o'clock." + +The front gates were close at hand, and we turned in under the tall +beech-trees, with the unswept leaves rustling round the horses' feet, +and the lovely blue of the October morning sky filling the spaces +between smooth grey branches and golden leaves. The woods rang with +the voices of the hounds, enjoying an untrammelled rabbit hunt, while +the Master and the Whip, both on foot, strolled along unconcernedly +with their bridles over their arms, making themselves agreeable to my +wife, an occasional touch of Flurry's horn, or a crack of Dr. Rickey's +whip, just indicating to the pack that the authorities still took a +friendly interest in their doings. + +Down a grassy glade in the wood a party of old Mrs. Knox's young horses +suddenly swept into view, headed by an old mare, who, with her tail +over her back, stampeded ponderously past our cavalcade, shaking and +swinging her handsome old head, while her youthful friends bucked and +kicked and snapped at each other round her with the ferocious humour of +their kind. + +"Here, Jerome, take the horn," said Flurry to Dr. Hickey; "I'm going to +see Mrs. Yeates up to the house, the way these tomfools won't gallop on +top of her." + +From this point it seems to me that Philippa's adventures are more +worthy of record than mine, and as she has favoured me with a full +account of them, I venture to think my version may be relied on. + +Mrs. Knox was already at breakfast when Philippa was led, quaking, into +her formidable presence. My wife's acquaintance with Mrs. Knox was, so +far, limited to a state visit on either side, and she found but little +comfort in Flurry's assurances that his grandmother wouldn't mind if he +brought all the hounds in to breakfast, coupled with the statement that +she would put her eyes on sticks for the Major. + +Whatever the truth of this may have been, Mrs. Knox received her guest +with an equanimity quite unshaken by the fact that her boots were in +the fender instead of on her feet, and that a couple of shawls of +varying dimensions and degrees of age did not conceal the inner +presence of a magenta flannel dressing-jacket. She installed Philippa +at the table and plied her with food, oblivious as to whether the +needful implements with which to eat it were forthcoming or no. She +told Flurry where a vixen had reared her family, and she watched him +ride away, with some biting comments on his mare's hocks screamed after +him from the window. + +The dining-room at Aussolas Castle is one of the many rooms in Ireland +in which Cromwell is said to have stabled his horse (and probably no +one would have objected less than Mrs. Knox had she been consulted in +the matter). Philippa questions if the room had ever been tidied up +since, and she endorses Flurry's observation that "there wasn't a day +in the year you wouldn't get feeding for a hen and chickens on the +floor." Opposite to Philippa, on a Louis Quinze chair, sat Mrs. Knox's +woolly dog, its suspicious little eyes peering at her out of their +setting of pink lids and dirty white wool. A couple of young horses +outside the windows tore at the matted creepers on the walls, or thrust +faces that were half-shy, half-impudent, into the room. Portly pigeons +waddled to and fro on the broad window-sill, sometimes flying in to +perch on the picture-frames, while they kept up incessantly a hoarse +and pompous cooing. + +Animals and children are, as a rule, alike destructive to conversation; +but Mrs. Knox, when she chose, _bien entendu_, could have made herself +agreeable in a Noah's ark, and Philippa has a gift of sympathetic +attention that personal experience has taught me to regard with +distrust as well as respect, while it has often made me realise the +worldly wisdom of Kingsley's injunction: + + "Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever." + + +Family prayers, declaimed by Mrs. Knox with alarming austerity, +followed close on breakfast, Philippa and a vinegar-faced henchwoman +forming the family. The prayers were long, and through the open window +as they progressed came distantly a whoop or two; the declamatory tones +staggered a little, and then continued at a distinctly higher rate of +speed. + +"Ma'am! Ma'am!" whispered a small voice at the window. + +Mrs. Knox made a repressive gesture and held on her way. A sudden +outcry of hounds followed, and the owner of the whisper, a small boy +with a face freckled like a turkey's egg, darted from the window and +dragged a donkey and bath-chair into view. Philippa admits to having +lost the thread of the discourse, but she thinks that the "Amen" that +immediately ensued can hardly have come in its usual place. Mrs. Knox +shut the book abruptly, scrambled up from her knees, and said, "They've +found!" + +In a surprisingly short space of time she had added to her attire her +boots, a fur cape, and a garden hat, and was in the bath-chair, the +small boy stimulating the donkey with the success peculiar to his +class, while Philippa hung on behind. + +The woods of Aussolas are hilly and extensive, and on that particular +morning it seemed that they held as many foxes as hounds. In vain was +the horn blown, and the whips cracked, small rejoicing parties of +hounds, each with a fox of its own, scoured to and fro: every labourer +in the vicinity had left his work, and was sedulously heading every fox +with yells that would have befitted a tiger hunt, and sticks and stones +when occasion served. + +"Will I pull out as far as the big rosy-dandhrum, ma'am?" inquired the +small boy; "I seen three of the dogs go in it, and they yowling." + +"You will," said Mrs. Knox, thumping the donkey on the back with her +umbrella; "here! Jeremiah Regan! Come down out of that with that +pitchfork! Do you want to kill the fox, you fool?" + +"I do not, your honour, ma'am," responded Jeremiah Regan, a tall young +countryman, emerging from a bramble brake. + +"Did you see him?" said Mrs. Knox eagerly. + +"I seen himself and his ten pups drinking below at the lake ere +yestherday, your honour, ma'am, and he as big as a chestnut horse!" +said Jeremiah. + +"Faugh! Yesterday!" snorted Mrs. Knox; "go on to the rhododendrons, +Johnny!" + +The party, reinforced by Jeremiah and the pitchfork, progressed at a +high rate of speed along the shrubbery path, encountering _en route_ +Lady Knox, stooping on to her horse's neck under the sweeping branches +of the laurels. + +"Your horse is too high for my coverts, Lady Knox," said the Lady of +the Manor, with a malicious eye at Lady Knox's flushed face and dinged +hat; "I'm afraid you will be left behind like Absalom when the hounds +go away!" + +"As they never do anything here but hunt rabbits," retorted her +ladyship, "I don't think that's likely." + +Mrs. Knox gave her donkey another whack, and passed on. + +"Rabbits, my dear!" she said scornfully to Philippa. "That's all she +knows about it. I declare it disgusts me to see a woman of that age +making such a Judy of herself! Rabbits indeed!" + +Down in the thicket of rhododendron everything was very quiet for a +time. Philippa strained her eyes in vain to see any of the riders; the +horn blowing and the whip cracking passed on almost out of hearing. +Once or twice a hound worked through the rhododendrons, glanced at the +party, and hurried on, immersed in business. All at once Johnny, the +donkey-boy, whispered excitedly: + +"Look at he! Look at he!" and pointed to a boulder of grey rock that +stood out among the dark evergreens. A big yellow cub was crouching on +it; he instantly slid into the shelter of the bushes, and the +irrepressible Jeremiah, uttering a rending shriek, plunged into the +thicket after him. Two or three hounds came rushing at the sound, and +after this Philippa says she finds some difficulty in recalling the +proper order of events; chiefly, she confesses, because of the wholly +ridiculous tears of excitement that blurred her eyes. + +"We ran," she said, "we simply tore, and the donkey galloped, and as +for that old Mrs. Knox, she was giving cracked screams to the hounds +all the time, and they were screaming too; and then somehow we were all +out on the road!" + +What seems to have occurred was that three couple of hounds, Jeremiah +Regan, and Mrs. Knox's equipage, amongst them somehow hustled the cub +out of Aussolas demesne and up on to a hill on the farther side of the +road. Jeremiah was sent back by his mistress to fetch Flurry, and the +rest of the party pursued a thrilling course along the road, parallel +with that of the hounds, who were hunting slowly through the gorse on +the hillside. + +"Upon my honour and word, Mrs. Yeates, my dear, we have the hunt to +ourselves!" said Mrs. Knox to the panting Philippa, as they pounded +along the road. "Johnny, d'ye see the fox?" + +"I do, ma'am!" shrieked Johnny, who possessed the usual field-glass +vision bestowed upon his kind. "Look at him over-right us on the hill +above! Hi! The spotty dog have him! No, he's gone from him! _Gwan +out o' that_!" This to the donkey, with blows that sounded like the +beating of carpets, and produced rather more dust. + +They had left Aussolas some half a mile behind, when, from a strip of +wood on their right, the fox suddenly slipped over the bank on to the +road just ahead of them, ran up it for a few yards and whisked in at a +small entrance gate, with the three couple of hounds yelling on a +red-hot scent, not thirty yards behind. The bath-chair party whirled +in at their heels, Philippa and the donkey considerably blown, Johnny +scarlet through his freckles, but as fresh as paint, the old lady blind +and deaf to all things save the chase. The hounds went raging through +the shrubs beside the drive, and away down a grassy slope towards a +shallow glen, in the bottom of which ran a little stream, and after +them over the grass bumped the bath-chair. At the stream they turned +sharply and ran up the glen towards the avenue, which crossed it by +means of a rough stone viaduct. + +"'Pon me conscience, he's into the old culvert!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox; +"there was one of my hounds choked there once, long ago! Beat on the +donkey, Johnny!" + +At this juncture Philippa's narrative again becomes incoherent, not to +say breathless. She is, however, positive that it was somewhere about +here that the upset of the bath-chair occurred, but she cannot be clear +as to whether she picked up the donkey or Mrs. Knox, or whether she +herself was picked up by Johnny while Mrs. Knox picked up the donkey. +From my knowledge of Mrs. Knox I should say she picked up herself and +no one else. At all events, the next salient point is the palpitating +moment when Mrs. Knox, Johnny, and Philippa successively applying an +eye to the opening of the culvert by which the stream trickled under +the viaduct, while five dripping hounds bayed and leaped around them, +discovered by more senses than that of sight that the fox was in it, +and furthermore that one of the hounds was in it too. + +"There's a sthrong grating before him at the far end," said Johnny, his +head in at the mouth of the hole, his voice sounding as if he were +talking into a jug, "the two of them's fighting in it; they'll be +choked surely!" + +"Then don't stand gabbling there, you little fool, but get in and pull +the hound out!" exclaimed Mrs. Knox, who was balancing herself on a +stone in the stream. + +"I'd be in dread, ma'am," whined Johnny. + +"Balderdash!" said the implacable Mrs. Knox. "In with you!" + +I understand that Philippa assisted Johnny into the culvert, and +presume that it was in so doing that she acquired the two Robinson +Crusoe bare footprints which decorated her jacket when I next met her. + +"Have you got hold of him yet, Johnny?" cried Mrs. Knox up the culvert. + +"I have, ma'am, by the tail," responded Johnny's voice, sepulchral in +the depths. + +"Can you stir him, Johnny?" + +"I cannot, ma'am, and the wather is rising in it." + +"Well, please God, they'll not open the mill dam!" remarked Mrs. Knox +philosophically to Philippa, as she caught hold of Johnny's dirty +ankles. "Hold on to the tail, Johnny!" + +She hauled, with, as might be expected, no appreciable result. "Run, +my dear, and look for somebody, and we'll have that fox yet!" + +Philippa ran, whither she knew not, pursued by fearful visions of +bursting mill-dams, and maddened foxes at bay. As she sped up the +avenue she heard voices, robust male voices, in a shrubbery, and made +for them. Advancing along an embowered walk towards her was what she +took for one wild instant to be a funeral; a second glance showed her +that it was a party of clergymen of all ages, walking by twos and +threes in the dappled shade of the over-arching trees. Obviously she +had intruded her sacrilegious presence into a Clerical Meeting. She +acknowledges that at this awe-inspiring spectacle she faltered, but the +thought of Johnny, the hound, and the fox, suffocating, possibly +drowning together in the culvert, nerved her. She does not remember +what she said or how she said it, but I fancy she must have conveyed to +them the impression that old Mrs. Knox was being drowned, as she +immediately found herself heading a charge of the Irish Church towards +the scene of disaster. + +Fate has not always used me well, but on this occasion it was +mercifully decreed that I and the other members of the hunt should be +privileged to arrive in time to see my wife and her rescue party +precipitating themselves down the glen. + +"Holy Biddy!" ejaculated Flurry, "is she running a paper-chase with all +the parsons? But look! For pity's sake will you look at my +grandmother and my Uncle Eustace?" + +Mrs. Knox and her sworn enemy the old clergyman, whom I had met at +dinner the night before, were standing, apparently in the stream, +tugging at two bare legs that projected from a hole in the viaduct, and +arguing at the top of their voices. The bath-chair lay on its side +with the donkey grazing beside it, on the bank a stout Archdeacon was +tendering advice, and the hounds danced and howled round the entire +group. + +"I tell you, Eliza, you had better let the Archdeacon try," thundered +Mr. Hamilton. + +"Then I tell you I will not!" vociferated Mrs. Knox, with a tug at the +end of the sentence that elicited a subterranean lament from Johnny. +"Now who was right about the second grating? I told you so twenty +years ago!" + +Exactly as Philippa and her rescue party arrived, the efforts of Mrs. +Knox and her brother-in-law triumphed. The struggling, sopping form of +Johnny was slowly drawn from the hole, drenched, speechless, but +clinging to the stern of a hound, who, in its turn, had its jaws fast +in the hind-quarters of a limp, yellow cub. + +"Oh, it's dead!" wailed Philippa, "I _did_ think I should have been in +time to save it!" + +"Well, if that doesn't beat all!" said Dr. Hickey. + + + + +VII + +A MISDEAL + +The wagonette slewed and slackened mysteriously on the top of the long +hill above Drumcurran. So many remarkable things had happened since we +had entrusted ourselves to the guidance of Mr. Bernard Shute that I +rose in my place and possessed myself of the brake, and in so doing saw +the horses with their heads hard in against their chests, and their +quarters jammed crookedly against the splashboard, being apparently +tied into knots by some inexplicable power. + +"Some one's pulling the reins out of my hand!" exclaimed Mr. Shute. + +The horses and pole were by this time making an acute angle with the +wagonette, and the groom plunged from the box to their heads. Miss +Sally Knox, who was sitting beside me, looked over the edge. + +"Put on the brake! the reins are twisted round the axle!" she cried, +and fell into a fit of laughter. + +We all--that is to say, Philippa, Miss Shute, Miss Knox, and I--got out +as speedily as might be; but, I think, without panic; Mr. Shute alone +stuck to the ship, with the horses struggling and rearing below him. +The groom and I contrived to back them, and by so doing caused the +reins to unwind themselves from the axle. + +"It was my fault," said Mr. Shute, hauling them in as fast as we could +give them to him; "I broke the reins yesterday, and these are the +phaeton ones, and about six fathoms long at that, and I forgot and let +the slack go overboard. It's all right, I won't do it again." + +With this reassurance we confided ourselves once more to the wagonette. + +As we neared the town of Drumcurran the fact that we were on our way to +a horse fair became alarmingly apparent. It is impossible to imagine +how we pursued an uninjured course through the companies of horsemen, +the crowded carts, the squealing colts, the irresponsible led horses, +and, most immutable of all obstacles, the groups of countrywomen, with +the hoods of their heavy blue cloaks over their heads. They looked +like nuns of some obscure order; they were deaf and blind as ramparts +of sandbags; nothing less callous to human life than a Parisian +cabdriver could have burst a way through them. Many times during that +drive I had cause to be thankful for the sterling qualities of Mr. +Shute's brake; with its aid he dragged his over-fed bays into a crawl +that finally, and not without injury to the varnish, took the wagonette +to the Royal Hotel. Every available stall in the yard was by that time +filled, and it was only by virtue of the fact that the kitchenmaid was +nearly related to my cook that the indignant groom was permitted to +stable the bays in a den known as the calf-house. + +That I should have lent myself to such an expedition was wholly due to +my wife. Since Philippa had taken up her residence in Ireland she had +discovered a taste for horses that was not to be extinguished, even by +an occasional afternoon on the Quaker, whose paces had become harder +than rock in his many journeys to Petty Sessions; she had also +discovered the Shutes, newcomers on the outer edge of our vast visiting +district, and between them this party to Drumcurran Horse Fair had been +devised. Philippa proposed to buy herself a hunter. Bernard Shute +wished to do the same, possibly two hunters, money being no difficulty +with this fortunate young man. Miss Sally Knox was of the company, and +I also had been kindly invited, as to a missionary meeting, to come, +and bring my cheque-book. The only saving clause in the affair was the +fact that Mr. Flurry Knox was to meet us at the scene of action. + +The fair was held in a couple of large fields outside the town, and on +the farther bank of the Curranhilty River. Across a wide and +glittering ford, horses of all sizes and sorts were splashing, and a +long row of stepping-stones was hopped, and staggered, and scrambled +over by a ceaseless variety of foot-passengers. A man with a cart +plied as a ferry boat, doing a heavy trade among the applewomen and +vendors of "crubeens," _alias_ pigs' feet, a grisly delicacy peculiar +to Irish open-air holiday-making, and the July sun blazed on a scene +that even Miss Cecilia Shute found to be almost repayment enough for +the alarms of the drive. + +"As a rule, I am so bored by driving that I find it reviving to be +frightened," she said to me, as we climbed to safety on a heathery +ridge above the fields dedicated to galloping the horses; "but when my +brother scraped all those people off one side of that car, and ran the +pole into the cart of lemonade-bottles, I began to wish for courage to +tell him I was going to get out and walk home." + +"Well, if you only knew it," said Bernard, who was spreading rugs over +the low furze bushes in the touching belief that the prickles would not +come through, "the time you came nearest to walking home was when the +lash of the whip got twisted round Nancy's tail. Miss Knox, you're an +authority on these things--don't you think it would be a good scheme to +have a light anchor in the trap, and when the horses began to play the +fool, you'd heave the anchor over the fence and bring them up all +standing?" + +"They wouldn't stand very long," remarked Miss Sally. + +"Oh, that's all right," returned the inventor; "I'd have a dodge to +cast them loose, with the pole and the splinter-bar." + +"You'd never see them again," responded Miss Knox demurely, "if you +thought that mattered." + +"It would be the brightest feature of the case," said Miss Shute. + +She was surveying Miss Sally through her pince-nez as she spoke, and +was, I have reason to believe, deciding that by the end of the day her +brother would be well on in the first stages of his fifteenth love +affair. + +It has possibly been suspected that Mr. Bernard Shute was a sailor, had +been a sailor rather, until within the last year, when he had tumbled +into a fortune and a property, and out of the navy, in the shortest +time on record. His enthusiasm for horses had been nourished by the +hirelings of Malta, and other resorts of her Majesty's ships, and his +knowledge of them was, so far, bounded by the fact that it was more +usual to come off over their heads than their tails. For the rest, he +was a clean-shaved and personable youth, with a laugh which I may, +without offensive intention, define as possessing a what-cheeriness +special to his profession, and a habit, engendered no doubt by long +sojourns at the Antipodes, of getting his clothes in large hideous +consignments from a naval outfitter. + +It was eleven o'clock, and the fair was in full swing. Its vortex was +in the centre of the field below us, where a low bank of sods and earth +had been erected as a trial jump, with a yelling crowd of men and boys +at either end, acting instead of the usual wings to prevent a swerve. +Strings of reluctant horses were scourged over the bank by dozens of +willing hands, while exhortation, cheers, and criticism were freely +showered upon each performance. + +"Give the knees to the saddle, boy, and leave the heels slack." +"That's a nice horse. He'd keep a jock on his back where another'd +throw him!" "Well jumped, begor! She fled that fairly!" as an +ungainly three-year-old flounced over the bank without putting a hoof +on it. Then her owner, unloosing his pride in simile after the manner +of his race, + +"Ah ha! when she give a lep, man, she's that free, she's like a hare +for it!" + +A giggling group of country girls elbowed their way past us out of the +crowd of spectators, one of the number inciting her fellows to hurry on +to the other field "until they'd see the lads galloping the horses," to +which another responding that she'd "be skinned alive for the horses," +the party sped on their way. We--_i.e._ my wife, Miss Knox, Bernard +Shute, and myself--followed in their wake, a matter by no means as easy +as it looked. Miss Shute had exhibited her wonted intelligence by +remaining on the hilltop with the "Spectator"; she had not reached the +happy point of possessing a mind ten years older than her age, and a +face ten years younger, without also developing the gift of scenting +boredom from afar. We squeezed past the noses and heels of fidgety +horses, and circumnavigated their attendant groups of critics, while +half-trained brutes in snaffles bolted to nowhere and back again, and +whinnying foals ran to and fro in search of their mothers. + +A moderate bank divided the upper from the lower fields, and as every +feasible spot in it was commanded by a refusing horse, the choice of a +place and moment for crossing it required judgment. I got Philippa +across it in safety; Miss Knox, though as capable as any young woman in +Ireland of getting over a bank, either on horseback or on her own legs, +had to submit to the assistance of Mr. Shute, and the laws of dynamics +decreed that a force sufficient to raise a bower anchor should hoist +her seven stone odd to the top of the bank with such speed that she +landed half on her knees and half in the arms of her pioneer. A group +of portentously quiet men stood near, their eyes on the ground, their +hands in their pockets; they were all dressed so much alike that I did +not at first notice that Flurry Knox was among them; when I did, I +perceived that his eyes, instead of being on the ground, were surveying +Mr. Shute with that measure of disapproval that he habitually bestowed +upon strange men. + +"You're later than I thought you'd be," he said. "I have a horse +half-bought for Mrs. Yeates. It's that old mare of Bobby Bennett's; +she makes a little noise, but she's a good mare, and you couldn't throw +her down if you tried. Bobby wants thirty pounds for her, but I think +you might get her for less. She's in the hotel stables, and you can +see her when you go to lunch." + +We moved on towards the rushy bank of the river, and Philippa and Sally +Knox seated themselves on a low rock, looking, in their white frocks, +as incongruous in that dingy preoccupied assemblage as the dreamy +meadow-sweet and purple spires of loosestrife that thronged the river +banks. Bernard Shute had been lost in the shifting maze of men and +horses, who were, for the most part, galloping with the blind fury of +charging bulls; but presently, among a party who seemed to be riding +the finish of a race, we descried our friend, and a second or two later +he hauled a brown mare to a standstill in front of us. + +"The fellow's asking forty-five pounds for her," he said to Miss Sally; +"she's a nailer to gallop. I don't think it's too much?" + +"Her grandsire was the Mountain Hare," said the owner of the mare, +hurrying up to continue her family history, "and he was the grandest +horse in the four baronies. He was forty-two years of age when he +died, and they waked him the same as ye'd wake a Christian. They had +whisky and porther--and bread--and a piper in it." + +"Thim Mountain Hare colts is no great things," interrupted Mr. Shute's +groom contemptuously. "I seen a colt once that was one of his stock, +and if there was forty men and their wives, and they after him with +sticks, he wouldn't lep a sod of turf." + +"Lep, is it!" ejaculated the owner in a voice shrill with outrage. +"You may lead that mare out through the counthry, and there isn't a +fence in it that she wouldn't go up to it as indepindent as if she was +going to her bed, and your honour's ladyship knows that dam well, Miss +Knox." + +"You want too much money for her, McCarthy," returned Miss Sally, with +her little air of preternatural wisdom. + +"God pardon you, Miss Knox! Sure a lady like you knows well that +forty-five pounds is no money for that mare. Forty-five pounds!" He +laughed. "It'd be as good for me to make her a present to the +gentleman all out as take three farthings less for her! She's too +grand entirely for a poor farmer like me, and if it wasn't for the long +weak family I have, I wouldn't part with her under twice the money." + +"Three fine lumps of daughters in America paying his rent for him," +commented Flurry in the background. "That's the long weak family!" + +Bernard dismounted and slapped the mare's ribs approvingly. + +"I haven't had such a gallop since I was at Rio," he said. "What do +you think of her, Miss Knox?" Then, without waiting for an answer, "I +like her. I think I may as well give him the forty-five and have done +with it!" + +At these ingenuous words I saw a spasm of anguish cross the countenance +of McCarthy, easily interpreted as the first pang of a life-long regret +that he had not asked twice the money. Flurry Knox put up an eyebrow +and winked at me; Mr. Shute's groom turned away for very shame. Sally +Knox laughed with the deplorable levity of nineteen. + +Thus, with a brevity absolutely scandalous in the eyes of all +beholders, the bargain was concluded. + +Flurry strolled up to Philippa, observing an elaborate remoteness from +Miss Sally and Mr. Shute. + +"I believe I'm selling a horse here myself to-day," he said; "would you +like to have a look at him, Mrs. Yeates?" + +"Oh, are you selling, Knox?" struck in Bernard, to whose brain the +glory of buying a horse had obviously mounted like new wine; "I want +another, and I know yours are the right sort." + +"Well, as you seem fond of galloping," said Flurry sardonically, "this +one might suit you." + +"You don't mean the Moonlighter?" said Miss Knox, looking fixedly at +him. + +"Supposing I did, have you anything to say against him?" replied Flurry. + +Decidedly he was in a very bad temper. Miss Sally shrugged her +shoulders, and gave a little shred of a laugh, but said no more. + +In a comparatively secluded corner of the field we came upon +Moonlighter, sidling and fussing, with flickering ears, his tail +tightly tucked in and his strong back humped in a manner that boded +little good. Even to my untutored eye, he appeared to be an uncommonly +good-looking animal, a well-bred grey, with shoulders that raked back +as far as the eye could wish, the true Irish jumping hindquarters, and +a showy head and neck; it was obvious that nothing except Michael +Hallahane's adroit chucks at his bridle kept him from displaying his +jumping powers free of charge. Bernard stared at him in silence; not +the pregnant and intimidating silence of the connoisseur, but the +tongue-tied muteness of helpless ignorance. His eye for horses had +most probably been formed on circus posters, and the advertisements of +a well-known embrocation, and Moonlighter approximated in colour and +conduct to these models. + +"I can see he's a ripping fine horse," he said at length; "I think I +should like to try him." + +Miss Knox changed countenance perceptibly, and gave a perturbed glance +at Flurry. Flurry remained impenetrably unamiable. + +"I don't pretend to be a judge of horses," went on Mr. Shute. "I dare +say I needn't tell you that!" with a very engaging smile at Miss Sally; +"but I like this one awfully." + +As even Philippa said afterwards, she would not have given herself away +like that over buying a reel of cotton. + +"Are you quite sure that he's really the sort of horse you want?" said +Miss Knox, with rather more colour in her face than usual; "he's only +four years old, and he's hardly a finished hunter." + +The object of her philanthropy looked rather puzzled. "What! can't he +jump?" he said. + +"Is it jump?" exclaimed Michael Hallahane, unable any longer to contain +himself; "is it the horse that jumped five foot of a clothes line in +Heffernan's yard, and not a one on his back but himself, and didn't +leave so much as the thrack of his hoof on the quilt that was hanging +on it!" + +"That's about good enough," said Mr. Shute, with his large friendly +laugh; "what's your price, Knox? I must have the horse that jumped the +quilt! I'd like to try him, if you don't mind. There are some +jolly-looking banks over there." + +"My price is a hundred sovereigns," said Flurry; "you can try him if +you like." + +"Oh, don't!" cried Sally impulsively; but Bernard's foot was already in +the stirrup. "I call it disgraceful!" I heard her say in a low voice +to her kinsman--"you know he can't ride." + +The kinsman permitted himself a malign smile. "That's his look-out," +he said. + +Perhaps the unexpected docility with which Moonlighter allowed himself +to be manoeuvred through the crowd was due to Bernard's thirteen stone; +at all events, his progress through a gate into the next field was +unexceptionable. Bernard, however, had no idea of encouraging this +tranquillity. He had come out to gallop, and without further ceremony +he drove his heels into Moonlighter's sides, and took the consequences +in the shape of a very fine and able buck. How he remained within even +visiting distance of the saddle it is impossible to explain; perhaps +his early experience in the rigging stood him in good stead in the +matter of hanging on by his hands; but, however preserved, he did +remain, and went away down the field at what he himself subsequently +described as "the rate of knots." + +Flurry flung away his cigarette and ran to a point of better +observation. We all ran, including Michael Hallahane and various +onlookers, and were in time to see Mr. Shute charging the least +advantageous spot in a hollow-faced furzy bank. Nothing but the grey +horse's extreme activity got the pair safely over; he jumped it on a +slant, changed feet in the heart of a furze-bush, and was lost to view. +In what relative positions Bernard and his steed alighted was to us a +matter of conjecture; when we caught sight of them again, Moonlighter +was running away, with his rider still on his back, while the slope of +the ground lent wings to his flight. + +"That young gentleman will be apt to be killed," said Michael Hallahane +with composure, not to say enjoyment. + +"He'll be into the long bog with him pretty soon," said Flurry, his +keen eye tracking the fugitive. + +"Oh!--I thought he was off that time!" exclaimed Miss Sally, with a +gasp in which consternation and amusement were blended. "There! He +_is_ into the bog!" + +It did not take us long to arrive at the scene of disaster, to which, +as to a dog-fight, other foot-runners were already hurrying, and on our +arrival we found things looking remarkably unpleasant for Mr. Shute and +Moonlighter. The latter was sunk to his withers in the sheet of black +slime into which he had stampeded; the former, submerged to the waist +three yards farther away in the bog, was trying to drag himself towards +firm ground by the aid of tussocks of wiry grass. + +"Hit him!" shouted Flurry. "Hit him! he'll sink if he stops there!" + +Mr. Shute turned on his adviser a face streaming with black mud, out of +which his brown eyes and white teeth gleamed with undaunted +cheerfulness. + +"All jolly fine," he called back; "if I let go this grass I'll sink +too!" + +A shout of laughter from the male portion of the spectators +sympathetically greeted this announcement, and a dozen equally futile +methods of escape were suggested. Among those who had joined us was, +fortunately, one of the many boys who pervaded the fair selling +halters, and, by means of several of these knotted together, a line of +communication was established. Moonlighter, who had fallen into the +state of inane stupor in which horses in his plight so often indulge, +was roused to activity by showers of stones and imprecations but +faintly chastened by the presence of ladies. Bernard, hanging on to +his tail, belaboured him with a cane, and, finally, the reins proving +good, the task of towing the victims ashore was achieved. + +"He's mine, Knox, you know," were Mr. Shute's first words as he +scrambled to his feet; "he's the best horse I ever got across--worth +twice the money!" + +"Faith, he's aisy plased!" remarked a bystander. + +"Oh, do go and borrow some dry clothes," interposed Philippa +practically; "surely there must be some one----" + +"There's a shop in the town where he can strip a peg for 13_s._ 9_d._," +said Flurry grimly; "I wouldn't care myself about the clothes you'd +borrow here!" + +The morning sun shone jovially upon Moonlighter and his rider, caking +momently the black bog stuff with which both were coated, and as the +group disintegrated, and we turned to go back, every man present was +pleasurably aware that the buttons of Mr. Shute's riding breeches had +burst at the knee, causing a large triangular hiatus above his gaiter. + +"Well," said Flurry conclusively to me as we retraced our steps, "I +always thought the fellow was a fool, but I never thought he was such a +damned fool." + +It seemed an interminable time since breakfast when our party, somewhat +shattered by the stirring events of the morning, found itself gathered +in an upstairs room at the Royal Hotel, waiting for a meal that had +been ordained some two hours before. The air was charged with the +mingled odours of boiling cabbage and frying mutton; we affected to +speak of them with disgust, but our souls yearned to them. Female +ministrants, with rustling skirts and pounding feet, raced along the +passages with trays that were never for us, and opening doors released +roaring gusts of conversation, blended with the clatter of knives and +forks, and still we starved. Even the ginger-coloured check suit, +lately labelled "The Sandringham. Wonderful value, 16_s._ 9_d._" in +the window of Drumcurran's leading mart, and now displayed upon Mr. +Shute's all too lengthy limbs, had lost its power to charm. + +"Oh, don't tear that bell quite out by the roots, Bernard," said his +sister, from the heart of a lamentable yawn. "I dare say it only +amuses them when we ring, but it may remind them that we are still +alive. Major Yeates, do you or do you not regret the pigs' feet?" + +"More than I can express," I said, turning from the window, where I had +been looking down at the endless succession of horses' backs and men's +hats, moving in two opposing currents in the street below. "I dare say +if we talk about them for a little we shall feel ill, and that will be +better than nothing." + +At this juncture, however, a heavy-laden tray thumped against the door, +and our repast was borne into the room by a hot young woman in creaking +boots, who hoarsely explained that what kept her was waiting on the +potatoes, and that the ould pan that was in it was playing Puck with +the beefsteaks. + +"Well," said Miss Shute, as she began to try conclusions between a +blunt knife and a bullet-proof mutton chop, "I have never lived in the +country before, but I have always been given to understand that the +village inn was one of its chief attractions." She delicately moved +the potato dish so as to cover the traces of a bygone egg, and her +glance lingered on the flies that dragged their way across a melting +mound of salt butter. "I like local colour, but I don't care about it +on the tablecloth." + +"Well, I'm feeling quite anxious about Irish country hotels now," said +Bernard; "they're getting so civilised and respectable. After all, +when you go back to England no one cares a pin to hear that you've been +done up to the knocker. That don't amuse them a bit. But all my +friends are as pleased as anything when I tell them of the pothouse +where I slept in my clothes rather than face the sheets, or how, when I +complained to the landlady next day, she said, 'Cock ye up! Wasn't it +his Reverence the Dean of Kilcoe had them last!'" + +We smiled wanly; what I chiefly felt was respect for any hungry man who +could jest in presence of such a meal. + +"All this time my hunter hasn't been bought," said Philippa presently, +leaning back in her chair, and abandoning the unequal contest with her +beefsteak. "Who is Bobby Bennett? Will his horse carry a lady?" + +Sally Knox looked at me and began to laugh. + +"You should ask Major Yeates about Bobby Bennett," she said. + +Confound Miss Sally! It had never seemed worth while to tell Philippa +all that story about my doing up Miss Bobby Bennett's hair, and I sank +my face in my tumbler of stagnant whisky-and-soda to conceal the colour +that suddenly adorned it. Any intelligent man will understand that it +was a situation calculated to amuse the ungodly, but without any real +fun in it. I explained Miss Bennett as briefly as possible, and at all +the more critical points Miss Sally's hazel-green eyes roamed slowly +and mercilessly towards me. + +"You haven't told Mrs. Yeates that she's one of the greatest +horse-copers in the country," she said, when I had got through somehow; +"she can sell you a very good horse sometimes, and a very bad one too, +if she gets the chance." + +"No one will ever explain to me," said Miss Shute, scanning us all with +her dark, half-amused, and wholly sophisticated eyes, "why horse-coping +is more respectable than cheating at cards. I rather respect people +who are able to cheat at cards; if every one did, it would make whist +so much more cheerful; but there is no forgiveness for dealing yourself +the right card, and there is no condemnation for dealing your neighbour +a very wrong horse!" + +"Your neighbour is supposed to be able to take care of himself," said +Bernard. + +"Well, why doesn't that apply to card-players?" returned his sister; +"are they all in a state of helpless innocence?" + +"I'm helplessly innocent," announced Philippa, "so I hope Miss Bennett +won't deal me a wrong horse." + +"Oh, her mare is one of the right ones," said Miss Sally; "she's a +lovely jumper, and her manners are the very best." + +The door opened, and Flurry Knox put in his head. "Bobby Bennett's +downstairs," he said to me mysteriously. + +I got up, not without consciousness of Miss Sally's eye, and prepared +to follow him. "You'd better come too, Mrs. Yeates, to keep an eye on +him. Don't let him give her more than thirty, and if he gives that she +should return him two sovereigns." This last injunction was bestowed +in a whisper as we descended the stairs. + +Miss Bennett was in the crowded yard of the hotel, looking handsome and +overdressed, and she greeted me with just that touch of Auld Lang Syne +in her manner that I could best have dispensed with. I turned to the +business in hand without delay. The brown mare was led forth from the +stable and paraded for our benefit; she was one of those inconspicuous, +meritorious animals about whom there seems nothing particular to say, +and I felt her legs and looked hard at her hocks, and was not much the +wiser. + +"It's no use my saying she doesn't make a noise," said Miss Bobby, +"because every one in the country will tell you she does. You can have +a vet. if you like, and that's the only fault he can find with her. +But if Mrs. Yeates hasn't hunted before now, I'll guarantee Cruiskeen +as just the thing for her. She's really safe and confidential. My +little brother Georgie has hunted her--_you_ remember Georgie, Major +Yeates?--the night of the ball, you know--and he's only eleven. Mr. +Knox can tell you what sort she is." + +"Oh, she's a grand mare," said Mr. Knox, thus appealed to; "you'd hear +her coming three fields off like a German band!" + +"And well for you if you could keep within three fields of her!" +retorted Miss Bennett. "At all events, she's not like the hunter you +sold Uncle, that used to kick the stars as soon as I put my foot in the +stirrup!" + +"'Twas the size of the foot frightened him," said Flurry. + +"Do you know how Uncle cured him?" said Miss Bennett, turning her back +on her adversary; "he had him tied head and tail across the yard gate, +and every man that came in had to get over his back!" + +"That's no bad one!" said Flurry. + +Philippa looked from one to the other in bewilderment, while the +badinage continued, swift and unsmiling, as became two hierarchs of +horse-dealing; it went on at intervals for the next ten minutes, and at +the end of that time I had bought the mare for thirty pounds. As Miss +Bennett said nothing about giving me back two of them, I had not the +nerve to suggest it. + +After this Flurry and Miss Bennett went away, and were swallowed up in +the fair; we returned to our friends upstairs, and began to arrange +about getting home. This, among other difficulties, involved the +tracking and capture of the Shutes' groom, and took so long that it +necessitated tea. Bernard and I had settled to ride our new purchases +home, and the groom was to drive the wagonette--an alteration ardently +furthered by Miss Shute. The afternoon was well advanced when Bernard +and I struggled through the turmoil of the hotel yard in search of our +horses, and, the hotel hostler being nowhere to be found, the Shutes' +man saddled our animals for us, and then withdrew, to grapple +single-handed with the bays in the calf-house. + +"Good business for me, that Knox is sending the grey horse home for +me," remarked Bernard, as his new mare followed him tractably out of +the stall. "He'd have been rather a handful in this hole of a place." + +He shoved his way out of the yard in front of me, seemingly quite +comfortable and at home upon the descendant of the Mountain Hare, and I +followed as closely as drunken carmen and shafts of erratic carts would +permit. Cruiskeen evinced a decided tendency to turn to the right on +leaving the yard, but she took my leftward tug in good part, and we +moved on through the streets of Drumcurran with a dignity that was only +impaired by the irrepressible determination of Mr. Shute's new trousers +to run up his leg. It was a trifle disappointing that Cruiskeen should +carry her nose in the air like a camel, but I set it down to my own bad +hands, and to that cause I also imputed her frequent desire to stop, a +desire that appeared to coincide with every fourth or fifth +public-house on the line of march. Indeed, at the last corner before +we left the town, Miss Bennett's mare and I had a serious difference of +opinion, in the course of which she mounted the pavement and remained +planted in front of a very disreputable public-house, whose owner had +been before me several times for various infringements of the Licensing +Acts. Bernard and the corner-boys were of course much pleased; I +inwardly resolved to let Miss Bennett know how her groom occupied his +time in Drumcurran. + +We got out into the calm of the country roads without further incident, +and I there discovered that Cruiskeen was possessed of a dromedary +swiftness in trotting, that the action was about as comfortable as the +dromedary's, and that it was extremely difficult to moderate the pace. + +"I say! This is something like going!" said Bernard, cantering hard +beside me with slack rein and every appearance of happiness. "Do you +mean to keep it up all the way?" + +"You'd better ask this devil," I replied, hauling on the futile ring +snaffle. "Miss Bennett must have an arm like a prize-fighter. If this +is what she calls confidential, I don't want her confidences." + +After another half-mile, during which I cursed Flurry Knox, and +registered a vow that Philippa should ride Cruiskeen in a cavalry bit, +we reached the cross-roads at which Bernard's way parted from mine. +Another difference of opinion between my wife's hunter and me here took +place, this time on the subject of parting from our companion, and I +experienced that peculiar inward sinking that accompanies the birth of +the conviction one has been stuck. There were still some eight miles +between me and home, but I had at least the consolation of knowing that +the brown mare would easily cover it in forty minutes. But in this +also disappointment awaited me. Dropping her head to about the level +of her knees, the mare subsided into a walk as slow as that of the +slowest cow, and very similar in general style. In this manner I +progressed for a further mile, breathing forth, like St. Paul, +threatenings and slaughters against Bobby Bennett and all her +confederates; and then the idea occurred to me that many really +first-class hunters were very poor hacks. I consoled myself with this +for a further period, and presently an opportunity for testing it +presented itself. The road made a long loop round the flank of a hill, +and it was possible to save half a mile or so by getting into the +fields. It was a short cut I had often taken on the Quaker, and it +involved nothing more serious than a couple of low stone "gaps" and an +infantine bank. I turned Cruiskeen at the first of these. She was +evidently surprised. Being in an excessively bad temper, I beat her in +a way that surprised her even more, and she jumped the stones +precipitately and with an ease that showed she knew quite well what she +was about. I vented some further emotion upon her by the convenient +medium of my cane, and galloped her across the field and over the bank, +which, as they say in these parts, she "fled" without putting an iron +on it. It was not the right way to jump it, but it was inspiriting, +and when she had disposed of the next gap without hesitation my waning +confidence in Miss Bennett began to revive. I cantered over the ridge +of the hill, and down it towards the cottage near which I was +accustomed to get out on to the road again. As I neared my wonted +opening in the fence, I saw that it had been filled by a stout pole, +well fixed into the bank at each end, but not more than three feet +high. Cruiskeen pricked her ears at it with intelligence; I trotted +her at it, and gave her a whack. + +Ages afterwards there was some one speaking on the blurred edge of a +dream that I was dreaming about nothing in particular. I went on +dreaming, and was impressed by the shape of a fat jug, mottled white +and blue, that intruded itself painfully, and I again heard voices, +very urgent and full of effort, but quite outside any concern of mine. + +I also made an effort of some kind; I was doing my very best to be good +and polite, but I was dreaming in a place that whirred, and was +engrossing, and daylight was cold and let in some unknown +unpleasantness. For that time the dream got the better of the +daylight, and then, _apropos_ of nothing, I was standing up in a house +with some one's arm round me; the mottled jug was there, so was the +unpleasantness, and I was talking with most careful, old-world +politeness. + +"Sit down now, you're all right," said Miss Bobby Bennett, who was +mopping my face with a handkerchief dipped in the jug. + +I perceived that I was asking what had happened. + +"She fell over the stick with you," said Miss Bennett; "the dirty +brute!" + +With another great effort I hooked myself on to the march of events, as +a truck is dragged out of a siding and hooked to a train. + +"Oh, the Lord save us!" said a grey-haired woman who held the jug, +"ye're desthroyed entirely, asthore! Oh, glory be to the merciful will +of God, me heart lepped across me shesht when I seen him undher the +horse!" + +"Go out and see if the trap's coming," said Miss Bennett; "he should +have found the doctor by this." She stared very closely at my face, +and seemed to find it easier to talk in short sentences. + +"We must get those cuts looking better before Mrs. Yeates comes." + +After an interval, during which unexpected places in my head ached from +the cold water, the desire to be polite and coherent again came upon me. + +"I am sure it was not your mare's fault," I said. + +Miss Bennett laughed a very little. I was glad to see her laugh; it +had struck me her face was strangely haggard and frightened. + +"Well, of course it wasn't poor Cruiskeen's fault," she said. "She's +nearly home with Mr. Shute by now. That's why I came after you!" + +"Mr. Shute!" I said; "wasn't he at the fair that day?" + +"He was," answered Miss Bobby, looking at me with very compassionate +eyes; "you and he got on each other's horses by mistake at the hotel, +and you got the worst of the exchange!" + +"Oh!" I said, without even trying to understand. + +"He's here within, your honour's ladyship, Mrs. Yeates, ma'am," shouted +the grey-haired woman at the door; "don't be unaisy, achudth; he's +doing grand. Sure, I'm telling Miss Binnitt if she was his wife +itself, she couldn't give him betther care!" + +The grey-haired woman laughed. + + + + +VIII + +THE HOLY ISLAND + +For three days of November a white fog stood motionless over the +country. All day and all night smothered booms and bangs away to the +south-west told that the Fastnet gun was hard at work, and the sirens +of the American liners uplifted their monstrous female voices as they +felt their way along the coast of Cork. On the third afternoon the +wind began to whine about the windows of Shreelane, and the barometer +fell like a stone. At 11 P.M. the storm rushed upon us with the roar +and the suddenness of a train; the chimneys bellowed, the tall old +house quivered, and the yelling wind drove against it, as a man puts +his shoulder against a door to burst it in. + +We none of us got much sleep, and if Mrs. Cadogan is to be +believed--which experience assures me she is not--she spent the night +in devotional exercises, and in ministering to the panic-stricken +kitchen-maid by the light of a Blessed candle. All that day the storm +screamed on, dry-eyed; at nightfall the rain began, and next morning, +which happened to be Sunday, every servant in the house was a messenger +of Job, laden with tales of leakages, floods, and fallen trees, and +inflated with the ill-concealed glory of their kind in evil tidings. +To Peter Cadogan, who had been to early Mass, was reserved the crowning +satisfaction of reporting that a big vessel had gone on the rocks at +Yokahn Point the evening before, and was breaking up fast; it was +rumoured that the crew had got ashore, but this feature, being +favourable and uninteresting, was kept as much as possible in the +background. Mrs. Cadogan, who had been to America in an ocean liner, +became at once the latest authority on shipwrecks, and was of opinion +that "whoever would be dhrownded, it wouldn't be thim lads o' sailors. +Sure wasn't there the greatest storm ever was in it the time meself was +on the say, and what'd thim fellows do but to put us below entirely in +the ship, and close down the doors on us, the way theirselves'd leg it +when we'd be dhrownding!" + +This view of the position was so startlingly novel that Philippa +withdrew suddenly from the task of ordering dinner, and fell up the +kitchen stairs in unsuitable laughter. Philippa has not the most +rudimentary capacity for keeping her countenance. + +That afternoon I was wrapped in the slumber, balmiest and most +profound, that follows on a wet Sunday luncheon, when Murray, our D.I. +of police, drove up in uniform, and came into the house on the top of a +gust that set every door banging and every picture dancing on the +walls. He looked as if his eyes had been blown out of his head, and he +wanted something to eat very badly. + +"I've been down at the wreck since ten o'clock this morning," he said, +"waiting for her to break up, and once she does there'll be trouble. +She's an American ship, and she's full up with rum, and bacon, and +butter, and all sorts. Bosanquet is there with all his coastguards, +and there are five hundred country people on the strand at this moment, +waiting for the fun to begin. I've got ten of my fellows there, and I +wish I had as many more. You'd better come back with me, Yeates, we +may want the Riot Act before all's done!" + +The heavy rain had ceased, but it seemed as if it had fed the wind +instead of calming it, and when Murray and I drove out of Shreelane, +the whole dirty sky was moving, full sailed, in from the south-west, +and the telegraph wires were hanging in a loop from the post outside +the gate. Nothing except a Skebawn car-horse would have faced the +whooping charges of the wind that came at us across Corran Lake; +stimulated mysteriously by whistles from the driver, Murray's yellow +hireling pounded woodenly along against the blast, till the smell of +the torn sea-weed was borne upon it, and we saw the Atlantic waves come +towering into the bay of Tralagough. + +The ship was, or had been, a three-masted barque; two of her masts were +gone, and her bows stood high out of water on the reef that forms one +of the shark-like jaws of the bay. The long strand was crowded with +black groups of people, from the bank of heavy shingle that had been +hurled over on to the road, down to the slope where the waves pitched +themselves and climbed and fought and tore the gravel back with them, +as though they had dug their fingers in. The people were nearly all +men, dressed solemnly and hideously in their Sunday clothes; most of +them had come straight from Mass without any dinner, true to that Irish +instinct that places its fun before its food. That the wreck was +regarded as a spree of the largest kind was sufficiently obvious. Our +car pulled up at a public-house that stood askew between the road and +the shingle; it was humming with those whom Irish publicans are pleased +to call "Bona feeds," and sundry of the same class were clustered round +the door. Under the wall on the lee-side was seated a bagpiper, +droning out "The Irish Washerwoman" with nodding head and tapping heel, +and a young man was cutting a few steps of a jig for the delectation of +a group of girls. + +So far Murray's constabulary had done nothing but exhibit their +imposing chest measurement and spotless uniforms to the Atlantic, and +Bosanquet's coastguards had only salvaged some spars, the debris of a +boat, and a dead sheep, but their time was coming. As we stumbled down +over the shingle, battered by the wind and pelted by clots of foam, +some one beside me shouted, "She's gone!" A hill of water had +smothered the wreck, and when it fell from her again nothing was left +but the bows, with the bowsprit hanging from them in a tangle of +rigging. The clouds, bronzed by an unseen sunset, hung low over her; +in that greedy pack of waves, with the remorseless rocks above and +below her, she seemed the most lonely and tormented of creatures. + +About half-an-hour afterwards the cargo began to come ashore on the top +of the rising tide. Barrels were plunging and diving in the trough of +the waves, like a school of porpoises; they were pitched up the beach +in waist-deep rushes of foam; they rolled down again, and were swung up +and shouldered by the next wave, playing a kind of Tom Tiddler's ground +with the coastguards. Some of the barrels were big and dangerous, some +were small and nimble like young pigs, and the bluejackets were up to +their middles as their prey dodged and ducked, and the police lined out +along the beach to keep back the people. Ten men of the R.I.C. can do +a great deal, but they cannot be in more than twenty or thirty places +at the same instant; therefore they could hardly cope with a scattered +and extremely active mob of four or five hundred, many of whom had +taken advantage of their privileges as "bona-fide travellers," and all +of whom were determined on getting at the rum. + +As the dusk fell the thing got more and more out of hand; the people +had found out that the big puncheons held the rum, and had succeeded in +capturing one. In the twinkling of an eye it was broached, and fifty +backs were shoving round it like a football scrummage. I have heard +many rows in my time: I have seen two Irish regiments--one of them +Militia--at each other's throats in Fermoy barracks; I have heard +Philippa's water spaniel and two fox-terriers hunting a strange cat +round the dairy; but never have I known such untrammelled bedlam as +that which yelled round the rum-casks on Tralagough strand. For it was +soon not a question of one broached cask, or even of two. The barrels +were coming in fast, so fast that it was impossible for the +representatives of law and order to keep on any sort of terms with +them. The people, shouting with laughter, stove in the casks, and +drank rum at 34 deg. above proof, out of their hands, out of their hats, +out of their boots. Women came fluttering over the hillsides through +the twilight, carrying jugs, milk-pails, anything that would hold the +liquor; I saw one of them, roaring with laughter, tilt a filthy zinc +bucket to an old man's lips. + +With the darkness came anarchy. The rising tide brought more and yet +more booty: great spars came lunging in on the lap of the waves, mixed +up with cabin furniture, seamen's chests, and the black and slippery +barrels, and the country people continued to flock in, and the drinking +became more and more unbridled. Murray sent for more men and a doctor, +and we slaved on hopelessly in the dark, collaring half-drunken men, +shoving pig-headed casks up hills of shingle, hustling in among groups +of roaring drinkers--we rescued perhaps one barrel in half-a-dozen. I +began to know that there were men there who were not drunk and were not +idle; I was also aware, as the strenuous hours of darkness passed, of +an occasional rumble of cart wheels on the road. It was evident that +the casks which were broached were the least part of the looting, but +even they were beyond our control. The most that Bosanquet, Murray, +and I could do was to concentrate our forces on the casks that had been +secured, and to organise charges upon the swilling crowds in order to +upset the casks that they had broached. Already men and boys were +lying about, limp as leeches, motionless as the dead. + +"They'll kill themselves before morning, at this rate!" shouted Murray +to me. "They're drinking it by the quart! Here's another barrel; come +on!" + +We rallied our small forces, and after a brief but furious struggle +succeeded in capsizing it. It poured away in a flood over the stones, +over the prostrate figures that sprawled on them, and a howl of +reproach followed. + +"If ye pour away any more o' that, Major," said an unctuous voice in my +ear, "ye'll intoxicate the stones and they'll be getting up and +knocking us down!" + +I had been aware of a fat shoulder next to mine in the throng as we +heaved the puncheon over, and I now recognised the ponderous wit and +Falstaffian figure of Mr. James Canty, a noted member of the Skebawn +Board of Guardians, and the owner of a large farm near at hand. + +"I never saw worse work on this strand," he went on. "I considher +these debaucheries a disgrace to the counthry." + +Mr. Canty was famous as an orator, and I presume that it was from long +practice among his fellow P.L.G.'s that he was able, without apparent +exertion, to out-shout the storm. + +At this juncture the long-awaited reinforcements arrived, and along +with them came Dr. Jerome Hickey, armed with a black bag. Having +mentioned that the bag contained a pump--not one of the common or +garden variety--and that no pump on board a foundering ship had more +arduous labours to perform, I prefer to pass to other themes. The +wreck, which had at first appeared to be as inexhaustible and as +variously stocked as that in the "Swiss Family Robinson," was beginning +to fail in its supply. The crowd were by this time for the most part +incapable from drink, and the fresh contingent of police tackled their +work with some prospect of success by the light of a tar barrel, +contributed by the owner of the public-house. At about the same time I +began to be aware that I was aching with fatigue, that my clothes hung +heavy and soaked upon me, that my face was stiff with the salt spray +and the bitter wind, and that it was two hours past dinner-time. The +possibility of fried salt herrings and hot whisky and water at the +public-house rose dazzlingly before my mind, when Mr. Canty again +crossed my path. + +"In my opinion ye have the whole cargo under conthrol now, Major," he +said, "and the police and the sailors should be able to account for it +all now by the help of the light. Wasn't I the finished fool that I +didn't think to send up to my house for a tar barrel before now! +Well--we're all foolish sometimes! But indeed it's time for us to give +over, and that's what I'm after saying to the Captain and Mr. Murray. +You're exhausted now the three of ye, and if I might make so bold, I'd +suggest that ye'd come up to my little place and have what'd warm ye +before ye'd go home. It's only a few perches up the road." + +The tide had turned, the rain had begun again, and the tar barrel +illumined the fact that Dr. Hickey's dreadful duties alone were +pressing. We held a council and finally followed Mr. Canty, picking +our way through wreckage of all kinds, including the human variety. +Near the public-house I stumbled over something that was soft and had a +squeak in it; it was the piper, with his head and shoulders in an +overturned rum-barrel, and the bagpipes still under his arm. + +I knew the outward appearance of Mr. Canty's house very well. It was a +typical southern farm-house, with dirty whitewashed walls, a slated +roof, and small, hermetically-sealed windows staring at the morass of +manure which constituted the yard. We followed Mr. Canty up the filthy +lane that led to it, picked our way round vague and squelching spurs of +the manure heap, and were finally led through the kitchen into a +stifling best parlour. Mrs. Canty, a vast and slatternly matron, had +evidently made preparations for us; there was a newly-lighted fire +pouring flame up the chimney from layers of bogwood, there were whisky +and brandy on the table, and a plateful of biscuits sugared in white +and pink. Upon our hostess was a black silk dress which indifferently +concealed the fact that she was short of boot-laces, and that the boots +themselves had made many excursions to the yard and none to the +blacking-bottle. Her manners, however, were admirable, and while I +live I shall not forget her potato cakes. They came in hot and hot +from a pot-oven, they were speckled with caraway seeds, they swam in +salt butter, and we ate them shamelessly and greasily, and washed them +down with hot whisky and water; I knew to a nicety how ill I should be +next day, and heeded not. + +"Well, gentlemen," remarked Mr. Canty later on, in his best Board of +Guardians' manner, "I've seen many wrecks between this and the Mizen +Head, but I never witnessed a scene of more disgraceful ex-cess than +what was in it to-night." + +"Hear, hear!" murmured Bosanquet with unseemly levity. + +"I should say," went on Mr. Canty, "there was at one time to-night +upwards of one hundhred men dead dhrunk on the strand, or anyway so +dhrunk that if they'd attempt to spake they'd foam at the mouth." + +"The craytures!" interjected Mrs. Canty sympathetically. + +"But if they're dhrunk to-day," continued our host, "it's nothing at +all to what they'll be to-morrow and afther to-morrow, and it won't be +on the strand they'll be dhrinkin' it." + +"Why, where will it be?" said Bosanquet, with his disconcerting English +way of asking a point-blank question. + +Mr. Canty passed his hand over his red cheeks. + +"There'll be plenty asking that before all's said and done, Captain," +he said, with a compassionate smile, "and there'll be plenty that could +give the answer if they'll like, but by dam I don't think ye'll be apt +to get much out of the Yokahn boys!" + +"The Lord save us, 'twould be better to keep out from the likes o' +thim!" put in Mrs. Canty, sliding a fresh avalanche of potato cakes on +to the dish; "didn't they pull the clothes off the gauger and pour +potheen down his throath till he ran screeching through the streets o' +Skebawn!" + +James Canty chuckled. + +"I remember there was a wreck here one time, and the undherwriters put +me in charge of the cargo. Brandy it was--cases of the best Frinch +brandy. The people had a song about it, what's this the first verse +was-- + + "One night to the rocks of Yokahn + Came the barque _Isabella_ so dandy, + To pieces she went before dawn, + Herself and her cargo of brandy. + And all met a wathery grave + Excepting the vessel's car_pen_ther, + Poor fellow, so far from his home." + + +Mr. Canty chanted these touching lines in a tuneful if wheezy tenor. +"Well, gentlemen, we're all friends here," he continued, "and it's no +harm to mention that this man below at the public-house came askin' me +would I let him have some of it for a consideration. 'Sullivan,' says +I to him, 'if ye ran down gold in a cup in place of the brandy, I +wouldn't give it to you. Of coorse,' says I, 'I'm not sayin' but that +if a bottle was to get a crack of a stick, and it to be broken, and a +man to drink a glass out of it, that would be no more than an +accident.' 'That's no good to me,' says he, 'but if I had twelve +gallons of that brandy in Cork,' says he, 'by the Holy German!' says +he, saying an awful curse, 'I'd sell twenty-five out of it!' Well, +indeed, it was true for him; it was grand stuff. As the saying is, it +would make a horse out of a cow!" + +"It appears to be a handy sort of place for keeping a pub," said +Bosanquet. + +"Shut to the door, Margaret," said Mr. Canty with elaborate caution. +"It'd be a queer place that wouldn't be handy for Sullivan!" + +A further tale of great length was in progress when Dr. Hickey's +Mephistophelian nose was poked into the best parlour. + +"Hullo, Hickey! Pumped out? eh?" said Murray. + +"If I am, there's plenty more like me," replied the Doctor +enigmatically, "and some of them three times over! James, did these +gentlemen leave you a drop of anything that you'd offer me?" + +"Maybe ye'd like a glass of rum, Doctor?" said Mr. Canty with a wink at +his other guests. + +Dr. Hickey shuddered. + +I had next morning precisely the kind of mouth that I had anticipated, +and it being my duty to spend the better part of the day administering +justice in Skebawn, I received from Mr. Flurry Knox and other of my +brother magistrates precisely the class of condolences on my "Monday +head" that I found least amusing. It was unavailing to point out the +resemblance between hot potato cakes and molten lead, or to dilate on +their equal power of solidifying; the collective wisdom of the Bench +decided that I was suffering from contraband rum, and rejoiced over me +accordingly. + +During the next three weeks Murray and Bosanquet put in a time only to +be equalled by that of the heroes in detective romances. They began by +acting on the hint offered by Mr. Canty, and were rewarded by finding +eight barrels of bacon and three casks of rum in the heart of Mr. +Sullivan's turf rick, placed there, so Mr. Sullivan explained with much +detail, by enemies, with the object of getting his licence taken away. +They stabbed potato gardens with crowbars to find the buried barrels, +they explored the chimneys, they raided the cow-houses; and in every +possible and impossible place they found some of the cargo of the late +barque _John D. Williams_, and, as the sympathetic Mr. Canty said, "For +as much as they found, they left five times as much afther them!" + +It was a wet, lingering autumn, but towards the end of November the +rain dried up, the weather stiffened, and a week of light frosts and +blue skies was offered as a tardy apology. Philippa possesses, in +common with many of her sex, an inappeasable passion for picnics, and +her ingenuity for devising occasions for them is only equalled by her +gift for enduring their rigours. I have seen her tackle a moist +chicken pie with a splinter of slate and my stylograph pen. I have +known her to take the tea-basket to an auction, and make tea in a +four-wheeled inside car, regardless of the fact that it was coming +under the hammer in ten minutes, and that the kettle took twenty +minutes to boil. It will therefore be readily understood that the rare +occasions when I was free to go out with a gun were not allowed to pass +uncelebrated by the tea-basket. + +"You'd much better shoot Corran Lake to-morrow," my wife said to me one +brilliant afternoon. "We could send the punt over, and I could meet +you on Holy Island with----" + +The rest of the sentence was concerned with ways, means, and the +tea-basket, and need not be recorded. + +I had taken the shooting of a long snipe bog that trailed from Corran +Lake almost to the sea at Tralagough, and it was my custom to begin to +shoot from the seaward end of it, and finally to work round the lake +after duck. + +To-morrow proved a heavenly morning, touched with frost, gilt with sun. +I started early, and the mists were still smoking up from the calm, +all-reflecting lake, as the Quaker stepped out along the level road, +smashing the thin ice on the puddles with his big feet. Behind the +calves of my legs sat Maria, Philippa's brown Irish water-spaniel, +assiduously licking the barrels of my gun, as was her custom when the +ecstasy of going out shooting was hers. Maria had been given to +Philippa as a wedding-present, and since then it had been my wife's +ambition that she should conform to the Beth Gelert standard of being +"a lamb at home, a lion in the chase." Maria did pretty well as a +lion: she hunted all dogs unmistakably smaller than herself, and +whenever it was reasonably possible to do so she devoured the spoils of +the chase, notably jack snipe. It was as a lamb that she failed; +objectionable as I have no doubt a lamb would be as a domestic pet, it +at least would not snatch the cold beef from the luncheon-table, nor +yet, if banished for its crimes, would it spend the night in scratching +the paint off the hall door. Maria bit beggars (who valued their +disgusting limbs at five shillings the square inch), she bullied the +servants, she concealed ducks' claws and fishes' backbones behind the +sofa cushions, and yet, when she laid her brown snout upon my knee, and +rolled her blackguard amber eyes upon me, and smote me with her +feathered paw, it was impossible to remember her iniquities against +her. On shooting mornings Maria ceased to be a buccaneer, a glutton, +and a hypocrite. From the moment when I put my gun together her +breakfast stood untouched until it suffered the final degradation of +being eaten by the cats, and now in the trap she was shivering with +excitement, and agonising in her soul lest she should even yet be left +behind. + +Slipper met me at the cross roads from which I had sent back the trap; +Slipper, redder in the nose than anything I had ever seen off the +stage, very husky as to the voice, and going rather tender on both +feet. He informed me that I should have a grand day's shooting, the +head-poacher of the locality having, in a most gentlemanlike manner, +refrained from exercising his sporting rights the day before, on +hearing that I was coming. I understood that this was to be considered +as a mark of high personal esteem, and I set to work at the bog with +suitable gratitude. + +In spite of Mr. O'Driscoll's magnanimity, I had not a very good +morning. The snipe were there, but in the perfect stillness of the +weather it was impossible to get near them, and five times out of six +they were up, flickering and dodging, before I was within shot. Maria +became possessed of seven devils and broke away from heel the first +time I let off my gun, ranging far and wide in search of the bird I had +missed, and putting up every live thing for half a mile round, as she +went splashing and steeple-chasing through the bog. Slipper expressed +his opinion of her behaviour in language more appallingly picturesque +and resourceful than any I have heard, even in the Skebawn Courthouse; +I admit that at the time I thought he spoke very suitably. Before she +was recaptured every remaining snipe within earshot was lifted out of +it by Slipper's steam-engine whistles and my own infuriated bellows; it +was fortunate that the bog was spacious and that there was still a long +tract of it ahead, where beyond these voices there was peace. + +I worked my way on, jumping treacle-dark drains, floundering through +the rustling yellow rushes, circumnavigating the bog-holes, and taking +every possible and impossible chance of a shot; by the time I had +reached Corran Lake I had got two and a half brace, retrieved by Maria +with a perfection that showed what her powers were when the sinuous +adroitness of Slipper's woodbine stick was fresh in her mind. But with +Maria it was always the unexpected that happened. My last snipe, a +jack, fell in the lake, and Maria, bursting through the reeds with +kangaroo bounds, and cleaving the water like a torpedo-boat, was a +model of all the virtues of her kind. She picked up the bird with a +snake-like dart of her head, clambered with it on to a tussock, and +there, well out of reach of the arm of the law, before our indignant +eyes crunched it twice and bolted it. + +"Well," said Slipper complacently, some ten minutes afterwards, "divil +such a bating ever I gave a dog since the day Prince killed owld Mrs. +Knox's paycock! Prince was a lump of a brown tarrier I had one time, +and faith I kicked the toes out o' me owld boots on him before I had +the owld lady composed!" + +However composing Slipper's methods may have been to Mrs. Knox, they +had quite the contrary effect upon a family party of duck that had been +lying in the reeds. With horrified outcries they broke into flight, +and now were far away on the ethereal mirror of the lake, among strings +of their fellows that were floating and quacking in preoccupied +indifference to my presence. + +A promenade along the lake-shore demonstrated the fact that without a +boat there was no more shooting for me; I looked across to the island +where, some time ago, I had seen Philippa and her punt arrive. The +boat was tied to an overhanging tree, but my wife was nowhere to be +seen. I was opening my mouth to give a hail, when I saw her emerge +precipitately from among the trees and jump into the boat; Philippa had +not in vain spent many summers on the Thames, she was under way in a +twinkling, sculled a score of strokes at the rate of a finish, then +stopped and stared at the peaceful island. I called to her, and in a +minute or two the punt had crackled through the reeds, and shoved its +blunt nose ashore at the spot where I was standing. + +"Sinclair," said Philippa in awe-struck tones, "there's something on +the island!" + +"I hope there's something to eat there," said I. + +"I tell you there _is_ something there, alive," said my wife with her +eyes as large as saucers; "it's making an awful sound like snoring." + +"That's the fairies, ma'am," said Slipper with complete certainty; +"sure I known them that seen fairies in that island as thick as the +grass, and every one o' them with little caps on them." + +Philippa's wide gaze wandered to Slipper's hideous pug face and back to +me. + +"It was not a human being, Sinclair!" she said combatively, though I +had not uttered a word. + +Maria had already, after the manner of dogs, leaped, dripping, into the +boat: I prepared to follow her example. + +"Major," said Slipper, in a tragic whisper, "there was a man was a +night on that island one time, watching duck, and Thim People cot him, +and dhragged him through Hell and through Death, and threw him in the +tide----" + +"Shove off the boat," I said, too hungry for argument. + +Slipper obeyed, throwing his knee over the gunwale as he did so, and +tumbling into the bow; we could have done without him very comfortably, +but his devotion was touching. + +Holy Island was perhaps a hundred yards long, and about half as many +broad; it was covered with trees and a dense growth of rhododendrons; +somewhere in the jungle was a ruined fragment of a chapel, smothered in +ivy and briars, and in a little glade in the heart of the island there +was a holy well. We landed, and it was obviously a sore humiliation to +Philippa that not a sound was to be heard in the spell-bound silence of +the island, save the cough of a heron on a tree-top. + +"It _was_ there," she said, with an unconvinced glance at the +surrounding thickets. + +"Sure, I'll give a thrawl through the island, ma'am," volunteered +Slipper with unexpected gallantry, "an' if it's the divil himself is in +it, I'll rattle him into the lake!" + +He went swaggering on his search, shouting, "Hi, cock!" and whacking +the rhododendrons with his stick, and after an interval returned and +assured us that the island was uninhabited. Being provided with +refreshments he again withdrew, and Philippa and Maria and I fed +variously and at great length, and washed the plates with water from +the holy well. I was smoking a cigarette when we heard Slipper +addressing the solitudes at the farther end of the island, and ending +with one of his whisky-throated crows of laughter. + +He presently came lurching towards us through the bushes, and a glance +sufficed to show even Philippa--who was as incompetent a judge of such +matters as many of her sex--that he was undeniably screwed. + +"Major Yeates!" he began, "and Mrs. Major Yeates, with respex to ye, +I'm bastely dhrunk! Me head is light since the 'fluenzy, and the +docthor told me I should carry a little bottle-een o' sperrits----" + +"Look here," I said to Philippa, "I'll take him across, and bring the +boat back for you." + +"Sinclair," responded my wife with concentrated emotion, "I would +rather die than stay on this island alone!" + +Slipper was getting drunker every moment, but I managed to stow him on +his back in the bows of the punt, in which position he at once began to +uplift husky and wandering strains of melody. To this accompaniment +we, as Tennyson says, + + "moved from the brink like some full-breasted swan, + That, fluting a wild carol ere her death, + Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood + With swarthy web." + +Slipper would certainly have been none the worse for taking the flood, +and, as the burden of "Lannigan's Ball" strengthened and spread along +the tranquil lake, and the duck once more fled in justifiable +consternation, I felt much inclined to make him do so. + +We made for the end of the lake that was nearest Shreelane, and, as we +rounded the point of the island, another boat presented itself to our +view. It contained my late entertainer, Mrs. Canty, seated bulkily in +the stern, while a small boy bowed himself between the two heavy oars. + +"It's a lovely evening, Major Yeates," she called out. "I'm just going +to the island to get some water from the holy well for me daughter that +has an impression on her chest. Indeed, I thought 'twas yourself was +singing a song for Mrs. Yeates when I heard you coming, but sure +Slipper is a great warrant himself for singing." + +"May the divil crack the two legs undher ye!" bawled Slipper in +acknowledgment of the compliment. + +Mrs. Canty laughed genially, and her boat lumbered away. + +I shoved Slipper ashore at the nearest point; Philippa and I paddled to +the end of the lake, and abandoning the duck as a bad business, walked +home. + +A few days afterwards it happened that it was incumbent upon me to +attend the funeral of the Roman Catholic Bishop of the diocese. It was +what is called in France "_un bel enterrement_," with inky flocks of +tall-hatted priests, and countless yards of white scarves, and a repast +of monumental solidity at the Bishop's residence. The actual interment +was to take place in Cork, and we moved in long and imposing procession +to the railway station, where a special train awaited the cortege. My +friend Mr. James Canty was among the mourners: an important and active +personage, exchanging condolences with the priests, giving directions +to porters, and blowing his nose with a trumpeting mournfulness that +penetrated all the other noises of the platform. He was condescending +enough to notice my presence, and found time to tell me that he had +given Mr. Murray "a sure word" with regard to some of "_the +wreckage_"--this with deep significance, and a wink of an inflamed and +tearful eye. I saw him depart in a first-class carriage, and the odour +of sanctity; seeing that he was accompanied by seven priests, and that +both windows were shut, the latter must have been considerable. + +Afterwards, in the town, I met Murray, looking more pleased with +himself than I had seen him since he had taken up the unprofitable task +of smuggler-hunting. + +"Come along and have some lunch," he said, "I've got a real good thing +on this time! That chap Canty came to me late last night, and told me +that he knew for a fact that the island on Corran Lake was just stiff +with barrels of bacon and rum, and that I'd better send every man I +could spare to-day to get them into the town. I sent the men out at +eight o'clock this morning; I think I've gone one better than Bosanquet +this time!" + +I began to realise that Philippa was going to score heavily on the +subject of the fairies that she had heard snoring on the island, and I +imparted to Murray the leading features of our picnic there. + +"Oh, Slipper's been up to his chin in that rum from the first," said +Murray. "I'd like to know who his sleeping partner was!" + +It was beginning to get dark before the loaded carts of the salvage +party came lumbering past Murray's windows and into the yard of the +police-barrack. We followed them, and in so doing picked up Flurry +Knox, who was sauntering in the same direction. It was a good haul, +five big casks of rum, and at least a dozen smaller barrels of bacon +and butter, and Murray and his Chief Constable smiled seraphically on +one another as the spoil was unloaded and stowed in a shed. + +"Wouldn't it be as well to see how the butter is keeping?" remarked +Flurry, who had been looking on silently, with, as I had noticed, a +still and amused eye. "The rim of that small keg there looks as if it +had been shifted lately." + +The sergeant looked hard at Flurry; he knew as well as most people that +a hint from Mr. Knox was usually worth taking. He turned to Murray. + +"Will I open it, sir?" + +"Oh! open it if Mr. Knox wishes," said Murray, who was not famous for +appreciating other people's suggestions. + +The keg was opened. + +"Funny butter," said Flurry. + +The sergeant said nothing. The keg was full of black bog-mould. +Another was opened, and another, all with the same result. + +"Damnation!" said Murray, suddenly losing his temper. "What's the use +of going on with those? Try one of the rum casks." + +A few moments passed in total silence while a tap and a spigot were +sent for and applied to the barrel. The sergeant drew off a mugful and +put his nose to it with the deliberation of a connoisseur. + +"Water, sir," he pronounced, "dirty water, with a small indication of +sperrits." + +A junior constable tittered explosively, met the light blue glare of +Murray's eye, and withered away. + +"Perhaps it's holy water!" said I, with a wavering voice. + +Murray's glance pinned me like an assegai, and I also faded into the +background. + +"Well," said Flurry in dulcet tones, "if you want to know where the +stuff is that was in those barrels, I can tell you, for I was told it +myself half-an-hour ago. It's gone to Cork with the Bishop by special +train!" + + +Mr. Canty was undoubtedly a man of resource. Mrs. Canty had mistakenly +credited me with an intelligence equal to her own, and on receiving +from Slipper a highly coloured account of how audibly Mr. Canty had +slept off his potations, had regarded the secret of Holy Island as +having been given away. That night and the two succeeding ones were +spent in the transfer of the rum to bottles, and the bottles and the +butter to fish boxes; these were, by means of a slight lubrication of +the railway underlings, loaded into a truck as "Fresh Fish, Urgent," +and attached to the Bishop's funeral train, while the police, decoyed +far from the scene of action, were breaking their backs over barrels of +bog-water. "I suppose," continued Flurry pleasantly, "you don't know +the pub that Canty's brother has in Cork. Well, I do. I'm going to +buy some rum there next week, cheap." + +"I shall proceed against Canty," said Murray, with fateful calm. + +"You won't proceed far," said Flurry; "you'll not get as much evidence +out of the whole country as'd hang a cat." + +"Who was your informant?" demanded Murray. + +Flurry laughed. "Well, by the time the train was in Cork, yourself and +the Major were the only two men in the town that weren't talking about +it." + + + + +IX + +THE POLICY OF THE CLOSED DOOR + +The disasters and humiliations that befell me at Drumcurran Fair may +yet be remembered. They certainly have not been forgotten in the +regions about Skebawn, where the tale of how Bernard Shute and I stole +each other's horses has passed into history. The grand-daughter of the +Mountain Hare, bought by Mr. Shute with such light-hearted enthusiasm, +was restored to that position between the shafts of a cart that she was +so well fitted to grace; Moonlighter, his other purchase, spent the two +months following on the fair in "favouring" a leg with a strained +sinew, and in receiving visits from the local vet., who, however +uncertain in his diagnosis of Moonlighter's leg, had accurately +estimated the length of Bernard's foot. + +Miss Bennett's mare Cruiskeen, alone of the trio, was immediately and +thoroughly successful. She went in harness like a hero, she carried +Philippa like an elder sister, she was never sick or sorry; as Peter +Cadogan summed her up, "That one 'd live where another 'd die." In her +safe keeping Philippa made her debut with hounds at an uneventful +morning's cubbing, with no particular result, except that Philippa +returned home so stiff that she had to go to bed for a day, and arose +more determined than ever to be a fox-hunter. + +The opening meet of Mr. Knox's foxhounds was on November 1, and on that +morning Philippa on Cruiskeen, accompanied by me on the Quaker, set out +for Ardmeen Cross, the time-honoured fixture for All Saints' Day. The +weather was grey and quiet, and full of all the moist sweetness of an +Irish autumn. There had been a great deal of rain during the past +month; it had turned the bracken to a purple brown, and had filled the +hollows with shining splashes of water. The dead leaves were slippery +under foot, and the branches above were thinly decked with yellow, +where the pallid survivors of summer still clung to their posts. As +Philippa and I sedately approached the meet the red coats of Flurry +Knox and his whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey, were to be seen on the road at +the top of the hill; Cruiskeen put her head in the air, and stared at +them with eyes that understood all they portended. + +"Sinclair," said my wife hurriedly, as a straggling hound, flogged in +by Dr. Hickey, uttered a grievous and melodious howl, "remember, if +they find, it's no use to talk to me, for I shan't be able to speak." + +I was sufficiently acquainted with Philippa in moments of enthusiasm to +exhibit silently the corner of a clean pocket-handkerchief; I have seen +her cry when a police constable won a bicycle race in Skebawn; she has +wept at hearing Sir Valentine Knox's health drunk with musical honours +at a tenants' dinner. It is an amiable custom, but, as she herself +admits, it is unbecoming. + +An imposing throng, in point of numbers, was gathered at the +cross-roads, the riders being almost swamped in the crowd of traps, +outside cars, bicyclists, and people on foot. The field was an +eminently representative one. The Clan Knox was, as usual, there in +force, its more aristocratic members dingily respectable in black coats +and tall hats that went impartially to weddings, funerals, and hunts, +and, like a horse that is past mark of mouth, were no longer to be +identified with any special epoch; there was a humbler squireen element +in tweeds and flat-brimmed pot-hats, and a good muster of farmers, men +of the spare, black-muzzled, West of Ireland type, on horses that +ranged from the cart mare, clipped trace high, to shaggy and leggy +three-year-olds, none of them hunters, but all of them able to hunt. +Philippa and I worked our way to the heart of things, where was Flurry, +seated on his brown mare, in what appeared to be a somewhat moody +silence. As we exchanged greetings I was aware that his eye was +resting with extreme disfavour upon two approaching figures. I put up +my eye-glass, and perceived that one of them was Miss Sally Knox, on a +tall grey horse; the other was Mr. Bernard Shute, in all the flawless +beauty of his first pink coat, mounted on Stockbroker, a well-known, +hard-mouthed, big-jumping bay, recently purchased from Dr. Hickey. + +During the languors of a damp autumn the neighbourhood had been much +nourished and sustained by the privilege of observing and diagnosing +the progress of Mr. Shute's flirtation with Miss Sally Knox. What made +it all the more enjoyable for the lookers-on--or most of them--was, +that although Bernard's courtship was of the nature of a proclamation +from the housetops, Miss Knox's attitude left everything to the +imagination. To Flurry Knox the romantic but despicable position of +slighted rival was comfortably allotted; his sole sympathisers were +Philippa and old Mrs. Knox of Aussolas, but no one knew if he needed +sympathisers. Flurry was a man of mystery. + +Mr. Shute and Miss Knox approached us rapidly, the latter's mount +pulling hard. + +"Flurry," I said, "isn't that grey the horse Shute bought from you last +July at the fair?" + +Flurry did not answer me. His face was as black as thunder. He turned +his horse round, cursing two country boys who got in his way, with low +and concentrated venom, and began to move forward, followed by the +hounds. If his wish was to avoid speaking to Miss Sally it was not to +be gratified. + +"Good-morning, Flurry," she began, sitting close down to Moonlighter's +ramping jog as she rode up beside her cousin. "What a hurry you're in! +We passed no end of people on the road who won't be here for another +ten minutes." + +"No more will I," was Mr. Knox's cryptic reply, as he spurred the brown +mare into a trot. + +Moonlighter made a vigorous but frustrated effort to buck, and +indemnified himself by a successful kick at a hound. + +"Bother you, Flurry! Can't you walk for a minute?" exclaimed Miss +Sally, who looked about as large, in relation to her horse, as the +conventional tomtit on a round of beef. "You might have more sense +than to crack your whip under this horse's nose! I don't believe you +know what horse it is even!" + +I was not near enough to catch Flurry's reply. + +"Well, if you didn't want him to be lent to me you shouldn't have sold +him to Mr. Shute!" retorted Miss Knox, in her clear, provoking little +voice. + +"I suppose he's afraid to ride him himself," said Flurry, turning his +horse in at a gate. "Get ahead there, Jerome, can't you? It's better +to put them in at this end than to have every one riding on top of +them!" + +Miss Sally's cheeks were still very pink when I came up and began to +talk to her, and her grey-green eyes had a look in them like those of +an angry kitten. + +The riders moved slowly down a rough pasture-field, and took up their +position along the brow of Ardmeen covert, into which the hounds had +already hurled themselves with their customary contempt for the +convenances. Flurry's hounds, true to their nationality, were in the +habit of doing the right thing in the wrong way. + +Untouched by autumn, the furze bushes of Ardmeen covert were darkly +green, save for a golden fleck of blossom here and there, and the +glistening grey cobwebs that stretched from spike to spike. The look +of the ordinary gorse covert is familiar to most people as a tidy +enclosure of an acre or so, filled with low plants of well-educated +gorse; not so many will be found who have experience of it as a rocky, +sedgy wilderness, half a mile square, garrisoned with brigades of furze +bushes, some of them higher than a horse's head, lean, strong, and +cunning, like the foxes that breed in them, impenetrable, with their +bristling spikes, as a hedge of bayonets. By dint of infinite leisure +and obstinate greed, the cattle had made paths for themselves through +the bushes to the patches of grass that they hemmed in; their +hoofprints were guides to the explorer, down muddy staircases of rock, +and across black intervals of unplumbed bog. The whole covert slanted +gradually down to a small river that raced round three sides of it, and +beyond the stream, in agreeable contrast, lay a clean and wholesome +country of grass fields and banks. + +The hounds drew slowly along and down the hill towards the river, and +the riders hung about outside the covert, and tried--I can answer for +at least one of them--to decide which was the least odious of the ways +through it, in the event of the fox breaking at the far side. Miss +Sally took up a position not very far from me, and it was easy to see +that she had her hands full with her borrowed mount, on whose temper +the delay and suspense were visibly telling. His iron-grey neck was +white from the chafing of the reins; had the ground under his feet been +red-hot he could hardly have sidled and hopped more uncontrollably; +nothing but the most impassioned conjugation of the verb to condemn +could have supplied any human equivalent for the manner in which he +tore holes in the sedgy grass with a furious forefoot. Those who were +even superficial judges of character gave his heels a liberal allowance +of sea-room, and Mr. Shute, who could not be numbered among such, and +had, as usual, taken up a position as near Miss Sally as possible, was +rewarded by a double knock on his horse's ribs that was a cause of +heartless mirth to the lady of his affections. + +Not a hound had as yet spoken, but they were forcing their way through +the gorse forest and shoving each other jealously aside with growing +excitement, and Flurry could be seen at intervals, moving forward in +the direction they were indicating. It was at this juncture that the +ubiquitous Slipper presented himself at my horse's shoulder. + +"'Tis for the river he's making, Major," he said, with an upward roll +of his squinting eyes, that nearly made me sea-sick. "He's a Castle +Knox fox that came in this morning, and ye should get ahead down to the +ford!" + +A tip from Slipper was not to be neglected, and Philippa and I began a +cautious progress through the gorse, followed by Miss Knox as quietly +as Moonlighter's nerves would permit. + +"Wishful has it!" she exclaimed, as a hound came out into view, uttered +a sharp yelp, and drove forward. + +"Hark! hark!" roared Flurry with at least three r's reverberating in +each "hark"; at the same instant came a holloa from the farther side of +the river, and Dr. Hickey's renowned and blood-curdling screech was +uplifted at the bottom of the covert. Then babel broke forth, as the +hounds, converging from every quarter, flung themselves shrieking on +the line. Moonlighter went straight up on his hind-legs, and dropped +again with a bound that sent him crushing past Philippa and Cruiskeen; +he did it a second time, and was almost on to the tail of the Quaker, +whose bulky person was not to be hurried in any emergency. + +"Get on if you can, Major Yeates!" called out Sally, steadying the grey +as well as she could in the narrow pathway between the great gorse +bushes. + +Other horses were thundering behind us, men were shouting to each other +in similar passages right and left of us, the cry of the hounds filled +the air with a kind of delirium. A low wall with a stick laid along it +barred the passage in front of me, and the Quaker firmly and +immediately decided not to have it until some one else had dislodged +the pole. + +"Go ahead!" I shouted, squeezing to one side with heroic disregard of +the furze bushes and my new tops. + +The words were hardly out of my mouth when Moonlighter, mad with +thwarted excitement, shot by me, hurtled over the obstacle with +extravagant fury, landed twelve feet beyond it on clattering slippery +rock, saved himself from falling with an eel-like forward buck on to +sedgy ground, and bolted at full speed down the muddy cattle track. +There are corners--rocky, most of them--in that cattle track, that +Sally has told me she will remember to her dying day; boggy holes of +any depth, ranging between two feet and half-way to Australia, that she +says she does not fail to mention in the General Thanksgiving; but at +the time they occupied mere fractions of the strenuous seconds in which +it was hopeless for her to do anything but try to steer, trust to luck, +sit hard down into the saddle and try to stay there. (For my part, I +would as soon try to adhere to the horns of a charging bull as to the +crutches of a side-saddle, but happily the necessity is not likely to +arise.) I saw Flurry Knox a little ahead of her on the same track, +jamming his mare into the furze bushes to get out of her way; he +shouted something after her about the ford, and started to gallop for +it himself by a breakneck short cut. + +The hounds were already across the river, and it was obvious that, ford +or no ford, Moonlighter's intentions might be simply expressed in the +formula "Be with them I will." It was all down-hill to the river, and +among the furze bushes and rocks there was neither time nor place to +turn him. He rushed at it with a shattering slip upon a streak of +rock, with a heavy plunge in the deep ground by the brink; it was as +bad a take-off for twenty feet of water as could well be found. The +grey horse rose out of the boggy stuff with all the impetus that pace +and temper could give, but it was not enough. For one instant the +twisting, sliding current was under Sally, the next a veil of water +sprang up all round her, and Moonlighter was rolling and lurching in +the desperate effort to find foothold in the rocky bed of the stream. + +I was following at the best pace I could kick out of the Quaker, and +saw the water swirl into her lap as her horse rolled to the near-side. +She caught the mane to save herself, but he struggled on to his legs +again, and came floundering broadside on to the farther bank. In three +seconds she had got out of the saddle and flung herself at the bank, +grasping the rushes, and trying, in spite of the sodden weight of her +habit, to drag herself out of the water. + +At the same instant I saw Flurry and the brown mare dashing through the +ford, twenty yards higher up. He was off his horse and beside her with +that uncanny quickness that Flurry reserved for moments of emergency, +and, catching her by the arms, swung her on to the bank as easily as if +she had been the kennel terrier. + +"Catch the horse!" she called out, scrambling to her feet. + +"Damn the horse!" returned Flurry, in the rage that is so often the +reaction from a bad scare. + +I turned along the bank and made for the ford; by this time it was full +of hustling, splashing riders, through whom Bernard Shute, furiously +picking up a bad start, drove a devastating way. He tried to turn his +horse down the bank towards Miss Knox, but the hounds were running +hard, and, to my intense amusement, Stockbroker refused to abandon the +chase, and swept his rider away in the wake of his stable companion, +Dr. Hickey's young chestnut. By this time two country boys had, as is +usual in such cases, risen from the earth, and fished Moonlighter out +of the stream. Miss Sally wound up an acrimonious argument with her +cousin by observing that she didn't care what he said, and placing her +water-logged boot in his obviously unwilling hand, in a second was +again in the saddle, gathering up the wet reins with the trembling, +clumsy fingers of a person who is thoroughly chilled and in a violent +hurry. She set Moonlighter going, and was away in a moment, galloping +him at the first fence at a pace that suited his steeple-chasing ideas. + +"Mr. Knox!" panted Philippa, who had by this time joined us, "make her +go home!" + +"She can go where she likes as far as I'm concerned," responded Mr. +Knox, pitching himself on his mare's back and digging in the spurs. + +Moonlighter had already glided over the bank in front of us, with a +perfunctory flick at it with his heels; Flurry's mare and Cruiskeen +jumped it side by side with equal precision. It was a bank of some +five feet high; the Quaker charged it enthusiastically, refused it +abruptly, and, according to his infuriating custom at such moments, +proceeded to tear hurried mouthfuls of grass. + +"Will I give him a couple o' belts, your Honour?" shouted one of the +running accompaniment of country boys. + +"You will!" said I, with some further remarks to the Quaker that I need +not commit to paper. + +Swish! Whack! The sound was music in my ears, as the good, +remorseless ash sapling bent round the Quaker's dappled hind-quarters. +At the third stripe he launched both his heels in the operator's face; +at the fourth he reared undecidedly; at the fifth he bundled over the +bank in a manner purged of hesitation. + +"Ha!" yelled my assistants, "that'll put the fear o' God in him!" as +the Quaker fled headlong after the hunt. "He'll be the betther o' that +while he lives!" + +Without going quite as far as this, I must admit that for the next +half-hour he was astonishingly the better of it. + +The Castle Knox fox was making a very pretty line of it over the seven +miles that separated him from his home. He headed through a grassy +country of Ireland's mild and brilliant green, fenced with sound and +buxom banks, enlivened by stone walls, uncompromised by the presence of +gates, and yet comfortably laced with lanes for the furtherance of +those who had laid to heart Wolsey's valuable advice: "Fling away +ambition: by that sin fell the angels." The flotsam and jetsam of the +hunt pervaded the landscape: standing on one long bank, three +dismounted farmers flogged away at the refusing steeds below them, like +anglers trying to rise a sulky fish; half-a-dozen hats, bobbing in a +string, showed where the road riders followed the delusive windings of +a bohereen. It was obvious that in the matter of ambition they would +not have caused Cardinal Wolsey a moment's uneasiness; whether angels +or otherwise, they were not going to run any risk of falling. + +Flurry's red coat was like a beacon two fields ahead of me, with +Philippa following in his tracks; it was the first run worthy of the +name that Philippa had ridden, and I blessed Miss Bobby Bennett as I +saw Cruiskeen's undefeated fencing. An encouraging twang of the +Doctor's horn notified that the hounds were giving us a chance; even +the Quaker pricked his blunt ears and swerved in his stride to the +sound. A stone wall, a rough patch of heather, a boggy field, dinted +deep and black with hoof marks, and the stern chase was at an end. The +hounds had checked on the outskirts of a small wood, and the field, +thinned down to a panting dozen or so, viewed us with the disfavour +shown by the first flight towards those who unexpectedly add to their +select number. In the depths of the wood Dr. Hickey might be heard +uttering those singular little yelps of encouragement that to the +irreverent suggest a milkman in his dotage. Bernard Shute, who neither +knew nor cared what the hounds were doing, was expatiating at great +length to an uninterested squireen upon the virtues and perfections of +his new mount. + +"I did all I knew to come and help you at the river," he said, riding +up to the splashed and still dripping Sally, "but Stockbroker wouldn't +hear of it. I pulled his ugly head round till his nose was on my boot, +but he galloped away just the same!" + +"He was quite right," said Miss Sally; "I didn't want you in the least." + +As Miss Sally's red gold coil of hair was turned towards me during this +speech, I could only infer the glance with which it was delivered, from +the fact that Mr. Shute responded to it with one of those firm gazes of +adoration in which the neighbourhood took such an interest, and +crumbled away into incoherency. + +A shout from the top of a hill interrupted the amenities of the check; +Flurry was out of the wood in half-a-dozen seconds, blowing shattering +blasts upon his horn, and the hounds rushed to him, knowing the "gone +away" note that was never blown in vain. The brown mare came out +through the trees and the undergrowth like a woodcock down the wind, +and jumped across a stream on to a more than questionable bank; the +hounds splashed and struggled after him, and, as they landed, the first +ecstatic whimpers broke forth. In a moment it was full cry, +discordant, beautiful, and soul-stirring, as the pack spread and sped, +and settled to the line. I saw the absurd dazzle of tears in +Philippa's eyes, and found time for the insulting proffer of the clean +pocket-handkerchief, as we all galloped hard to get away on good terms +with the hounds. + +It was one of those elect moments in fox-hunting when the fittest alone +have survived; even the Quaker's sluggish blood was stirred by good +company, and possibly by the remembrance of the singing ash-plant, and +he lumbered up tall stone-faced banks and down heavy drops, and across +wide ditches, in astounding adherence to the line cut out by Flurry. +Cruiskeen went like a book--a story for girls, very pleasant and safe, +but rather slow. Moonlighter was pulling Miss Sally on to the sterns +of the hounds, flying his banks, rocketing like a pheasant over +three-foot walls--committing, in fact, all the crimes induced by youth +and over-feeding; he would have done very comfortably with another six +or seven stone on his back. + +Why Bernard Shute did not come off at every fence and generally die a +thousand deaths I cannot explain. Occasionally I rather wished he +would, as, from my secure position in the rear, I saw him charging his +fences at whatever pace and place seemed good to the thoroughly +demoralised Stockbroker, and in so doing cannon heavily against Dr. +Hickey on landing over a rotten ditch, jump a wall with his spur +rowelling Charlie Knox's boot, and cut in at top speed in front of +Flurry, who was scientifically cramming his mare up a very awkward +scramble. In so far as I could think of anything beyond Philippa and +myself and the next fence, I thought there would be trouble for Mr. +Shute in consequence of this last feat. It was a half-hour long to be +remembered, in spite of the Quaker's ponderous and unalterable gallop, +in spite of the thump with which he came down off his banks, in spite +of the confiding manner in which he hung upon my hand. + +We were nearing Castle Knox, and the riders began to edge away from the +hounds towards a gate that broke the long barrier of the demesne wall. +Steaming horses and purple-faced riders clattered and crushed in at the +gate; there was a moment of pulling up and listening, in which +quivering tails and pumping sides told their own story. Cruiskeen's +breathing suggested a cross between a grampus and a gramophone; +Philippa's hair had come down, and she had a stitch in her side. +Moonlighter, fresher than ever, stamped and dragged at his bit; I +thought little Miss Sally looked very white. The bewildering clamour +of the hounds was all through the wide laurel plantations. At a word +from Flurry, Dr. Hickey shoved his horse ahead and turned down a ride, +followed by most of the field. + +"Philippa," I said severely, "you've had enough, and you know it." + +"Do go up to the house and make them give you something to eat," struck +in Miss Sally, twisting Moonlighter round to keep his mind occupied. + +"And as for you, Miss Sally," I went on, in the manner of Mr. +Fairchild, "the sooner you get off that horse and out of those wet +things the better." + +Flurry, who was just in front of us, said nothing, but gave a short and +most disagreeable laugh. Philippa accepted my suggestion with the +meekness of exhaustion, but under the circumstances it did not surprise +me that Miss Sally did not follow her example. + +Then ensued an hour of woodland hunting at its worst and most +bewildering. I galloped after Flurry and Miss Sally up and down long +glittering lanes of laurel, at every other moment burying my face in +the Quaker's coarse white mane to avoid the slash of the branches, and +receiving down the back of my neck showers of drops stored up from the +rain of the day before; playing an endless game of hide-and-seek with +the hounds, and never getting any nearer to them, as they turned and +doubled through the thickets of evergreens. Even to my limited +understanding of the situation it became clear at length that two foxes +were on foot; most of the hounds were hard at work a quarter of a mile +away, but Flurry, with a grim face and a faithful three couple, stuck +to the failing line of the hunted fox. + +There came a moment when Miss Sally and I--who through many +vicissitudes had clung to each other--found ourselves at a spot where +two rides crossed. Flurry was waiting there, and a little way up one +of the rides a couple of hounds were hustling to and fro, with the +thwarted whimpers half breaking from them; he held up his hand to stop +us, and at that identical moment Bernard Shute, like a bolt from the +blue, burst upon our vision. It need scarcely be mentioned that he was +going at full gallop--I have rarely seen him ride at any other +pace--and as he bore down upon Flurry and the hounds, ducking and +dodging to avoid the branches, he shouted something about a fox having +gone away at the other side of the covert. + +"Hold hard!" roared Flurry; "don't you see the hounds, you fool?" + +Mr. Shute, to do him justice, held hard with all the strength of his +body, but it was of no avail. The bay horse had got his head down and +his tail up, there was a piercing yell from a hound as it was ridden +over, and Flurry's brown mare will not soon forget the moment when +Stockbroker's shoulder took her on the point of the hip and sent her +staggering into the laurel branches. As she swung round, Flurry's whip +went up, and with a swift backhander the cane and the looped thong +caught Bernard across his broad shoulders. + +"O Mr. Shute!" shrieked Miss Sally, as I stared dumfoundered; "did that +branch hurt you?" + +"All right! Nothing to signify!" he called out as he bucketed past, +tugging at his horse's head. "Thought some one had hit me at first! +Come on, we'll catch 'em up this way!" + +He swung perilously into the main ride and was gone, totally unaware of +the position that Miss Sally's quickness had saved. + +Flurry rode straight up to his cousin, with a pale, dangerous face. + +"I suppose you think I'm to stand being ridden over and having my +hounds killed to please you," he said; "but you're mistaken. You were +very smart, and you may think you've saved him his licking, but you +needn't think he won't get it. He'll have it in spite of you, before +he goes to his bed this night!" + +A man who loses his temper badly because he is badly in love is +inevitably ridiculous, far though he may be from thinking himself so. +He is also a highly unpleasant person to argue with, and Miss Sally and +I held our peace respectfully. He turned his horse and rode away. + +Almost instantly the three couple of hounds opened in the underwood +near us with a deafening crash, and not twenty yards ahead the hunted +fox, dark with wet and mud, slunk across the ride. The hounds were +almost on his brush; Moonlighter reared and chafed; the din was +redoubled, passed away to a little distance, and suddenly seemed +stationary in the middle of the laurels. + +"Could he have got into the old ice-house?" exclaimed Miss Sally, with +reviving excitement. She pushed ahead, and turned down the narrowest +of all the rides that had that day been my portion. At the end of the +green tunnel there was a comparatively open space; Flurry's mare was +standing in it, riderless, and Flurry himself was hammering with a +stone at the padlock of a door that seemed to lead into the heart of a +laurel clump. The hounds were baying furiously somewhere back of the +entrance, among the laurel stems. + +"He's got in by the old ice drain," said Flurry, addressing himself +sulkily to me, and ignoring Miss Sally. He had not the least idea of +how absurd was his scowling face, draped by the luxuriant +hart's-tongues that overhung the doorway. + +The padlock yielded, and the opening door revealed a low, dark passage, +into which Flurry disappeared, lugging a couple of hounds with him by +the scruff of the neck; the remaining two couple bayed implacably at +the mouth of the drain. The croak of a rusty bolt told of a second +door at the inner end of the passage. + +"Look out for the steps, Flurry, they're all broken," called out Miss +Sally in tones of honey. + +There was no answer. Miss Sally looked at me; her face was serious, +but her mischievous eyes made a confederate of me. + +"He's in an _awful_ rage!" she said. "I'm afraid there will certainly +be a row." + +A row there certainly was, but it was in the cavern of the ice-house, +where the fox had evidently been discovered. Miss Sally suddenly flung +Moonlighter's reins to me and slipped off his back. + +"Hold him!" she said, and dived into the doorway under the overhanging +branches. + +Things happened after that with astonishing simultaneousness. There +was a shrill exclamation from Miss Sally, the inner door was slammed +and bolted, and at one and the same moment the fox darted from the +entry, and was away into the wood before one could wink. + +"What's happened?" I called out, playing the refractory Moonlighter +like a salmon. + +Miss Sally appeared at the doorway, looking half scared and half +delighted. + +"I've bolted him in, and I won't let him out till he promises to be +good! I was only just in time to slam the door after the fox bolted +out!" + +"Great Scott!" I said helplessly. + +Miss Sally vanished again into the passage, and the imprisoned hounds +continued to express their emotions in the echoing vault of the +ice-house. Their master remained mute as the dead, and I trembled. + +"Flurry!" I heard Miss Sally say. "Flurry, I--I've locked you in!" + +This self-evident piece of information met with no response. + +"Shall I tell you why?" + +A keener note seemed to indicate that a hound had been kicked. + +"I don't care whether you answer me or not, I'm going to tell you!" + +There was a pause; apparently telling him was not as simple as had been +expected. + +"I won't let you out till you promise me something. Ah, Flurry, don't +be so cross! What do you say?---- Oh, that's a ridiculous thing to +say. You know quite well it's not on his account!" + +There was another considerable pause. + +"Flurry!" said Miss Sally again, in tones that would have wiled a +badger from his earth. "Dear Flurry--" + +At this point I hurriedly flung Moonlighter's bridle over a branch and +withdrew. + +My own subsequent adventures are quite immaterial, until the moment +when I encountered Miss Sally on the steps of the hall door at Castle +Knox. + +"I'm just going in to take off these wet things," she said airily. + +This was no way to treat a confederate. + +"Well?" I said, barring her progress. + +"Oh--he--he promised. It's all right," she replied, rather +breathlessly. + +There was no one about; I waited resolutely for further information. +It did not come. + +"Did he try to make his own terms?" said I, looking hard at her. + +"Yes, he did." She tried to pass me. + +"And what did you do?" + +"I refused them!" she said, with the sudden stagger of a sob in her +voice, as she escaped into the house. + +Now what on earth was Sally Knox crying about? + + + + +X + +THE HOUSE OF FAHY + +Nothing could shake the conviction of Maria that she was by nature and +by practice a house dog. Every one of Shreelane's many doors had, at +one time or another, slammed upon her expulsion, and each one of them +had seen her stealthy, irrepressible return to the sphere that she felt +herself so eminently qualified to grace. For her the bone, thriftily +interred by Tim Connor's terrier, was a mere diversion; even the +fruitage of the ashpit had little charm for an accomplished _habitue_ +of the kitchen. She knew to a nicety which of the doors could be burst +open by assault, at which it was necessary to whine sycophantically; +and the clinical thermometer alone could furnish a parallel for her +perception of mood in those in authority. In the case of Mrs. Cadogan +she knew that there were seasons when instant and complete +self-effacement was the only course to pursue; therefore when, on a +certain morning in July, on my way through the downstairs regions to my +office, I saw her approach the kitchen door with her usual +circumspection, and, on hearing her name enunciated indignantly by my +cook, withdraw swiftly to a city of refuge at the back of the hayrick, +I drew my own conclusions. + +Had she remained, as I did, she would have heard the disclosure of a +crime that lay more heavily on her digestion than her conscience. + +"I can't put a thing out o' me hand but he's watching me to whip it +away!" declaimed Mrs. Cadogan, with all the disregard of her kind for +the accident of sex in the brute creation. "'Twas only last night I +was back in the scullery when I heard Bridget let a screech, and there +was me brave dog up on the table eating the roast beef that was after +coming out from the dinner!" + +"Brute!" interjected Philippa, with what I well knew to be a simulated +wrath. + +"And I had planned that bit of beef for the luncheon," continued Mrs. +Cadogan in impassioned lamentation, "the way we wouldn't have to +inthrude on the cold turkey! Sure he has it that dhragged, that all we +can do with it now is run it through the mincing machine for the +Major's sandwiches." + +At this appetising suggestion I thought fit to intervene in the +deliberations. + +"One thing," I said to Philippa afterwards, as I wrapped up a bottle of +Yanatas in a Cardigan jacket and rammed it into an already apoplectic +Gladstone bag, "that I do draw the line at, is taking that dog with us. +The whole business is black enough as it is." + +"Dear," said my wife, looking at me with almost clairvoyant +abstraction, "I could manage a second evening dress if you didn't mind +putting my tea-jacket in your portmanteau." + +Little, thank Heaven! as I know about yachting, I knew enough to make +pertinent remarks on the incongruity of an ancient 60-ton hireling and +a fleet of smart evening dresses; but none the less I left a pair of +indispensable boots behind, and the tea-jacket went into my portmanteau. + +It is doing no more than the barest justice to the officers of the +Royal Navy to say that, so far as I know them, they cherish no mistaken +enthusiasm for a home on the rolling deep when a home anywhere else +presents itself. Bernard Shute had unfortunately proved an exception +to this rule. During the winter, the invitation to go for a cruise in +the yacht that was in process of building for him hung over me like a +cloud; a timely strike in the builder's yard brought a respite, and, in +fact, placed the completion of the yacht at so safe a distance that I +was betrayed into specious regrets, echoed with an atrocious sincerity +by Philippa. Into a life pastorally compounded of Petty Sessions and +lawn-tennis parties, retribution fell when it was least expected. +Bernard Shute hired a yacht in Queenstown, and one short week +afterwards the worst had happened, and we were packing our things for a +cruise in her, the only alleviation being the knowledge that, whether +by sea or land, I was bound to return to my work in four days. + +We left Shreelane at twelve o'clock, a specially depressing hour for a +start, when breakfast has died in you, and lunch is still remote. My +last act before mounting the dogcart was to put her collar and chain on +Maria and immure her in the potato-house, whence, as we drove down the +avenue, her wails rent the heart of Philippa and rejoiced mine. It was +a very hot day, with a cloudless sky; the dust lay thick on the white +road, and on us also, as, during two baking hours, we drove up and down +the long hills and remembered things that had been left behind, and +grew hungry enough to eat sandwiches that tasted suspiciously of roast +beef. + +The yacht was moored in Clountiss Harbour; we drove through the village +street, a narrow and unlovely thoroughfare, studded with public-houses, +swarming with children and poultry, down through an ever-growing smell +of fish, to the quay. + +Thence we first viewed our fate, a dingy-looking schooner, and the hope +I had secretly been nourishing that there was not wind enough for her +to start, was dispelled by the sight of her topsail going up. More +than ever at that radiant moment--as the reflection of the white sail +quivered on the tranquil blue, and the still water flattered all it +reproduced, like a fashionable photographer--did I agree with George +Herbert's advice, "Praise the sea, but stay on shore." + +"We must hail her, I suppose," I said drearily. I assailed the _Eileen +Oge_, such being her inappropriate name, with desolate cries, but +achieved no immediate result beyond the assembling of some village +children round us and our luggage. + +"Mr. Shute and the two ladies was after screeching here for the boat +awhile ago," volunteered a horrid little girl, whom I had already twice +frustrated in the attempt to seat an infant relative on our bundle of +rugs. "Timsy Hallahane says 'twould be as good for them to stay +ashore, for there isn't as much wind outside as'd out a candle." + +With this encouraging statement the little girl devoted herself to the +alternate consumption of gooseberries and cockles. + +All things come to those who wait, and to us arrived at length the gig +of the _Eileen Oge_, and such, by this time, were the temperature and +the smells of the quay that I actually welcomed the moment that found +us leaving it for the yacht. + +"Now, Sinclair, aren't you glad we came?" remarked Philippa, as the +clear green water deepened under us, and a light briny air came coolly +round us with the motion of the boat. + +As she spoke, there was an outburst of screams from the children on the +quay, followed by a heavy splash. + +"Oh stop!" cried Philippa in an agony; "one of them has fallen in! I +can see its poor little brown head!" + +"'Tis a dog, ma'am," said briefly the man who was rowing stroke. + +"One might have wished it had been that little girl," said I, as I +steered to the best of my ability for the yacht. + +We had traversed another twenty yards or so, when Philippa, in a voice +in which horror and triumph were strangely blended, exclaimed, "She's +following us!" + +"Who? The little girl?" I asked callously. + +"No," returned Philippa; "worse." + +I looked round, not without a prevision of what I was to see, and +beheld the faithful Maria swimming steadily after us, with her brown +muzzle thrust out in front of her, ripping through the reflections like +a plough. + +"Go home!" I roared, standing up and gesticulating in fury that I well +know to be impotent. "Go home, you brute!" + +Maria redoubled her efforts, and Philippa murmured uncontrollably-- + +"Well, she _is_ a dear!" + +Had I had a sword in my hand I should undoubtedly have slain Philippa; +but before I could express my sentiments in any way, a violent shock +flung me endways on top of the man who was pulling stroke. Thanks to +Maria, we had reached our destination all unawares; the two men, +respectfully awaiting my instructions, had rowed on with disciplined +steadiness, and, as a result, we had rammed the _Eileen Oge_ amidships, +with a vigour that brought Mr. Shute tumbling up the companion to see +what had happened. + +"Oh, it's you, is it?" he said, with his mouth full. "Come in; don't +knock! Delighted to see you, Mrs. Yeates; don't apologise. There's +nothing like a hired ship after all--it's quite jolly to see the +splinters fly--shows you're getting your money's worth. Hullo! who's +this?" + +This was Maria, feigning exhaustion, and noisily treading water at the +boat's side. + +"What, poor old Maria? Wanted to send her ashore, did he? Heartless +ruffian!" + +Thus was Maria installed on board the _Eileen Oge_, and the element of +fatality had already begun to work. + +There was just enough wind to take us out of Clountiss Harbour, and +with the last of the out-running tide we crept away to the west. The +party on board consisted of our host's sister, Miss Cecilia Shute, Miss +Sally Knox, and ourselves; we sat about in conventional attitudes in +deck chairs and on adamantine deck bosses, and I talked to Miss Shute +with feverish brilliancy, and wished the patience-cards were not in the +cabin; I knew the supreme importance of keeping one's mind occupied, +but I dared not face the cabin. There was a long, almost imperceptible +swell, with little queer seabirds that I have never seen before--and +trust I never shall again--dotted about on its glassy slopes. The +coast-line looked low and grey and dull, as, I think, coast-lines +always do when viewed from the deep. The breeze that Bernard had +promised us we should find outside was barely enough to keep us moving. +The burning sun of four o'clock focussed its heat on the deck; Bernard +stood up among us, engaged in what he was pleased to call "handling the +stick," and beamed almost as offensively as the sun. + +"Oh, we're slipping along," he said, his odiously healthy face glowing +like copper against the blazing blue sky. "You're going a great deal +faster than you think, and the men say we'll pick up a breeze once +we're round the Mizen." + +I made no reply; I was not feeling ill, merely thoroughly disinclined +for conversation. Miss Sally smiled wanly, and closing her eyes, laid +her head on Philippa's knee. Instructed by a dread freemasonry, I knew +that for her the moment had come when she could no longer bear to see +the rail rise slowly above the horizon, and with an equal rhythmic +slowness sink below it. Maria moved restlessly to and fro, panting and +yawning, and occasionally rearing herself on her hind-legs against the +side, and staring forth with wild eyes at the headachy sliding of the +swell. Perhaps she was meditating suicide; if so I sympathised with +her, and since she was obviously going to be sick I trusted that she +would bring off the suicide with as little delay as possible. Philippa +and Miss Shute sat in unaffected serenity in deck chairs, and stitched +at white things--teacloths for the _Eileen Oge_, I believe, things in +themselves a mockery--and talked untiringly, with that singular +indifference to their marine surroundings that I have often observed in +ladies who are not sea-sick. It always stirs me afresh to wonder why +they have not remained ashore; nevertheless, I prefer their tranquil +and total lack of interest in seafaring matters to the blatant +Vikingism of the average male who is similarly placed. + +Somehow, I know not how, we crawled onwards, and by about five o'clock +we had rounded the Mizen, a gaunt spike of a headland that starts up +like a boar's tusk above the ragged lip of the Irish coast, and the +_Eileen Oge_ was beginning to swing and wallop in the long sluggish +rollers that the American liners know and despise. I was very far from +despising them. Down in the west, resting on the sea's rim, a purple +bank of clouds lay awaiting the descent of the sun, as seductively and +as malevolently as a damp bed at a hotel awaits a traveller. + +The end, so far as I was concerned, came at tea-time. The meal had +been prepared in the saloon, and thither it became incumbent on me to +accompany my hostess and my wife. Miss Sally, long past speech, +opened, at the suggestion of tea, one eye, and disclosed a look of +horror. As I tottered down the companion I respected her good sense. +The _Eileen Oge_ had been built early in the sixties, and headroom was +not her strong point; neither, apparently, was ventilation. I began by +dashing my forehead against the frame of the cabin door, and then, +shattered morally and physically, entered into the atmosphere of the +pit. After which things, and the sight of a plate of rich cake, I +retired in good order to my cabin, and began upon the Yanatas. + +I pass over some painful intermediate details and resume at the moment +when Bernard Shute woke me from a drugged slumber to announce that +dinner was over. + +"It's been raining pretty hard," he said, swaying easily with the swing +of the yacht; "but we've got a clinking breeze, and we ought to make +Lurriga Harbour to-night. There's good anchorage there, the men say. +They're rather a lot of swabs, but they know this coast, and I don't. +I took 'em over with the ship all standing." + +"Where are we now?" I asked, something heartened by the blessed word +"anchorage." + +"You're running up Sheepskin Bay--it's a thundering big bay; Lurriga's +up at the far end of it, and the night's as black as the inside of a +cow. Dig out and get something to eat, and come on deck---- What! no +dinner?"--I had spoken morosely, with closed eyes--"Oh, rot! you're on +an even keel now. I promised Mrs. Yeates I'd make you dig out. You're +as bad as a soldier officer that we were ferrying to Malta one time in +the old Tamar. He got one leg out of his berth when we were going down +the Channel, and he was too sick to pull it in again till we got to +Gib!" + +I compromised on a drink and some biscuits. The ship was certainly +steadier, and I felt sufficiently restored to climb weakly on deck. It +was by this time past ten o'clock, and heavy clouds blotted out the +last of the afterglow, and smothered the stars at their birth. A wet +warm wind was lashing the _Eileen Oge_ up a wide estuary; the waves +were hunting her, hissing under her stern, racing up to her, crested +with the white glow of phosphorus, as she fled before them. I dimly +discerned in the greyness the more solid greyness of the shore. The +mainsail loomed out into the darkness, nearly at right angles to the +yacht, with the boom creaking as the following wind gave us an +additional shove. I know nothing of yacht sailing, but I can +appreciate the grand fact that in running before a wind the boom is +removed from its usual sphere of devastation. + +I sat down beside a bundle of rugs that I had discovered to be my wife, +and thought of my whitewashed office at Shreelane and its bare but +stationary floor, with a yearning that was little short of passion. +Miss Sally had long since succumbed; Miss Shute was tired, and had +turned in soon after dinner. + +"I suppose she's overdone by the delirious gaiety of the afternoon," +said I acridly, in reply to this information. + +Philippa cautiously poked forth her head from the rugs, like a tortoise +from under its shell, to see that Bernard, who was standing near the +steersman, was out of hearing. + +"In all your life, Sinclair," she said impressively, "you never knew +such a time as Cecilia and I have had down there! We've had to wash +_everything_ in the cabins, and remake the beds, and _hurl_ the sheets +away--they were covered with black finger-marks--and while we were +doing that, in came the creature that calls himself the steward, to ask +if he might get something of his that he had left in Miss Shute's +'birthplace'! and he rooted out from under Cecilia's mattress a pair of +socks and half a loaf of bread!" + +"Consolation to Miss Shute to know her berth has been well aired," I +said, with the nearest approach to enjoyment I had known since I came +on board; "and has Sally made any equally interesting discoveries?" + +"She said she didn't care what her bed was like; she just dropped into +it. I must say I am sorry for her," went on Philippa; "she hated +coming. Her mother made her accept." + +"I wonder if Lady Knox will make her accept _him_!" I said. "How often +has Sally refused him, does any one know?" + +"Oh, about once a week," replied Philippa; "just the way I kept on +refusing you, you know!" + +Something cold and wet was thrust into my hand, and the aroma of damp +dog arose upon the night air; Maria had issued from some lair at the +sound of our voices, and was now, with palsied tremblings, slowly +trying to drag herself on to my lap. + +"Poor thing, she's been so dreadfully ill," said Philippa. "Don't send +her away, Sinclair. Mr. Shute found her lying on his berth not able to +move; didn't you, Mr. Shute?" + +"She found out that she was able to move," said Bernard, who had +crossed to our side of the deck; "it was somehow borne in upon her when +I got at her with a boot-tree. I wouldn't advise you to keep her in +your lap, Yeates. She stole half a ham after dinner, and she might +take a notion to make the only reparation in her power." + +I stood up and stretched myself stiffly. The wind was freshening, and +though the growing smoothness of the water told that we were making +shelter of some kind, for all that I could see of land we might as well +have been in mid-ocean. The heaving lift of the deck under my feet, +and the lurching swing when a stronger gust filled the ghostly sails, +were more disquieting to me in suggestion than in reality, and, to my +surprise, I found something almost enjoyable in rushing through +darkness at the pace at which we were going. + +"We're a small bit short of the mouth of Lurriga Harbour yet, sir," +said the man who was steering, in reply to a question from Bernard. "I +can see the shore well enough; sure I know every yard of wather in the +bay----" + +As he spoke he sat down abruptly and violently; so did Bernard, so did +I. The bundle that contained Philippa collapsed upon Maria. + +"Main sheet!" bellowed Bernard, on his feet in an instant, as the boom +swung in and out again with a terrific jerk. "We're ashore!" + +In response to this order three men in succession fell over me while I +was still struggling on the deck, and something that was either +Philippa's elbow, or the acutest angle of Maria's skull, hit me in the +face. As I found my feet the cabin skylight was suddenly illuminated +by a wavering glare. I got across the slanting deck somehow, through +the confusion of shouting men and the flapping thunder of the sails, +and saw through the skylight a gush of flame rising from a pool of +fire, around an overturned lamp on the swing-table. I avalanched down +the companion and was squandered like an avalanche on the floor at the +foot of it. Even as I fell, McCarthy the steward dragged the strip of +carpet from the cabin floor and threw it on the blaze; I found myself, +in some unexplained way, snatching a railway rug from Miss Shute and +applying it to the same purpose, and in half-a-dozen seconds we had +smothered the flame and were left in total darkness. The most striking +feature of the situation was the immovability of the yacht. + +"Great Ned!" said McCarthy, invoking I know not what heathen deity, "it +is on the bottom of the say we are? Well, whether or no, thank God we +have the fire quinched!" + +We were not, so far, at the bottom of the sea, but during the next ten +minutes the chances seemed in favour of our getting there. The yacht +had run her bows upon a sunken ridge of rock, and after a period of +feminine indecision as to whether she were going to slide off again, or +roll over into deep water, she elected to stay where she was, and the +gig was lowered with all speed, in order to tow her off before the tide +left her. + +My recollection of this interval is but hazy, but I can certify that in +ten minutes I had swept together an assortment of necessaries and +knotted them into my counterpane, had broken the string of my +eye-glass, and lost my silver matchbox; had found Philippa's +curling-tongs and put them in my pocket; had carted all the luggage on +deck; had then applied myself to the manly duty of reassuring the +ladies, and had found Miss Shute merely bored, Philippa +enthusiastically anxious to be allowed to help to pull the gig, and +Miss Sally radiantly restored to health and spirits by the cessation of +movement and the probability of an early escape from the yacht. + +The rain had, with its usual opportuneness, begun again; we stood in it +under umbrellas, and watched the gig jumping on its tow-rope like a dog +on a string, as the crew plied the labouring oar in futile endeavour to +move the _Eileen Oge_. We had run on the rock at half-tide, and the +increasing slant of the deck as the tide fell brought home to us the +pleasing probability that at low water--viz. about 2 A.M.--we should +roll off the rock and go to the bottom. Had Bernard Shute wished to +show himself in the most advantageous light to Miss Sally he could +scarcely have bettered the situation. I looked on in helpless respect +while he whom I had known as the scourge of the hunting field, the +terror of the shooting party, rose to the top of a difficult position +and kept there, and my respect was, if possible, increased by the +presence of mind with which he availed himself of all critical moments +to place a protecting arm round Miss Knox. + +By about 1 A.M. the two gaffs with which Bernard had contrived to shore +up the slowly heeling yacht began to show signs of yielding, and, in +approved shipwreck fashion, we took to the boats, the yacht's crew in +the gig remaining in attendance on what seemed likely to be the last +moments of the _Eileen Oge_, while we, in the dinghy, sought for the +harbour. Owing to the tilt of the yacht's deck, and the roughness of +the broken water round her, getting into the boat was no mean feat of +gymnastics. Miss Sally did it like a bird, alighting in the inevitable +arms of Bernard; Miss Shute followed very badly, but, by innate force +of character, successfully; Philippa, who was enjoying every moment of +her shipwreck, came last, launching herself into the dinghy with my +silver shoe-horn clutched in one hand, and in the other the tea-basket. +I heard the hollow clank of its tin cups as she sprang, and appreciated +the heroism with which Bernard received one of its corners in his +waist. How or when Maria left the yacht I know not, but when I applied +myself to the bow oar I led off with three crabs, owing to the devotion +with which she thrust her head into my lap. + +I am no judge of these matters, but in my opinion we ought to have been +swamped several times during that row. There was nothing but the +phosphorus of breaking waves to tell us where the rocks were, and +nothing to show where the harbour was except a solitary light, a +masthead light, as we supposed. The skipper had assured us that we +could not go wrong if we kept "a westerly course with a little northing +in it;" but it seemed simpler to steer for the light, and we did so. +The dinghy climbed along over the waves with an agility that was safer +than it felt; the rain fell without haste and without rest, the oars +were as inflexible as crowbars, and somewhat resembled them in shape +and weight; nevertheless, it was Elysium when compared with the +afternoon leisure of the deck of the _Eileen Oge_. + +At last we came, unexplainably, into smooth water, and it was at about +this time that we were first aware that the darkness was less dense +than it had been, and that the rain had ceased. By imperceptible +degrees a greyness touched the back of the waves, more a dreariness +than a dawn, but more welcome than thousands of gold and silver. I +looked over my shoulder and discerned vague bulky things ahead; as I +did so, my oar was suddenly wrapped in seaweed. We crept on; Maria +stood up with her paws on the gunwale, and whined in high agitation. +The dark objects ahead resolved themselves into rocks, and without more +ado Maria pitched herself into the water. In half a minute we heard +her shaking herself on shore. We slid on; the water swelled under the +dinghy, and lifted her keel on to grating gravel. + +"We couldn't have done it better if we'd been the Hydrographer Royal," +said Bernard, wading knee-deep in a light wash of foam, with the +painter in his hand; "but all the same, that masthead light is some +one's bedroom candle!" + +We landed, hauled up the boat, and then feebly sat down on our +belongings to review the situation, and Maria came and shook herself +over each of us in turn. We had run into a little cove, guided by the +philanthropic beam of a candle in the upper window of a house about a +hundred yards away. The candle still burned on, and the anaemic +daylight exhibited to us our surroundings, and we debated as to whether +we could at 2.45 A.M. present ourselves as objects of compassion to the +owner of the candle. I need hardly say that it was the ladies who +decided on making the attempt, having, like most of their sex, a +courage incomparably superior to ours in such matters; Bernard and I +had not a grain of genuine compunction in our souls, but we failed in +nerve. + +We trailed up from the cove, laden with emigrants' bundles, stumbling +on wet rocks in the half-light, and succeeded in making our way to the +house. + +It was a small two-storied building, of that hideous breed of +architecture usually dedicated to the rectories of the Irish Church; we +felt that there was something friendly in the presence of a pair of +carpet slippers in the porch, but there was a hint of exclusiveness in +the fact that there was no knocker and that the bell was broken. The +light still burned in the upper window, and with a faltering hand I +flung gravel at the glass. This summons was appallingly responded to +by a shriek; there was a flutter of white at the panes, and the candle +was extinguished. + +"Come away!" exclaimed Miss Shute, "it's a lunatic asylum!" + +We stood our ground, however, and presently heard a footstep within, a +blind was poked aside in another window, and we were inspected by an +unseen inmate; then some one came downstairs, and the hall-door was +opened by a small man with a bald head and a long sandy beard. He was +attired in a brief dressing-gown, and on his shoulder sat, like an +angry ghost, a large white cockatoo. Its crest was up on end, its beak +was a good two inches long and curved like a Malay kris; its claws +gripped the little man's shoulder. Maria uttered in the background a +low and thunderous growl. + +"Don't take any notice of the bird, please," said the little man +nervously, seeing our united gaze fixed upon this apparition; "he's +extremely fierce if annoyed." + +The majority of our party here melted away to either side of the +hall-door, and I was left to do the explaining. The tale of our +misfortunes had its due effect, and we were ushered into a small +drawing-room, our host holding open the door for us, like a nightmare +footman with bare shins, a gnome-like bald head, and an unclean spirit +swaying on his shoulder. He opened the shutters, and we sat decorously +round the room, as at an afternoon party, while the situation was +further expounded on both sides. Our entertainer, indeed, favoured us +with the leading items of his family history, amongst them the facts +that he was a Dr. Fahy from Cork, who had taken somebody's rectory for +the summer, and had been prevailed on by some of his patients to permit +them to join him as paying guests. + +"I said it was a lunatic asylum," murmured Miss Shute to me. + +"In point of fact," went on our host, "there isn't an empty room in the +house, which is why I can only offer your party the use of this room +and the kitchen fire, which I make a point of keeping burning all +night." + +He leaned back complacently in his chair, and crossed his legs; then, +obviously remembering his costume, sat bolt upright again. We owed the +guiding beams of the candle to the owner of the cockatoo, an old Mrs. +Buck, who was, we gathered, the most paying of all the patients, and +also, obviously, the one most feared and cherished by Dr. Fahy. "She +has a candle burning all night for the bird, and her door open to let +him walk about the house when he likes," said Dr. Fahy; "indeed, I may +say her passion for him amounts to dementia. He's very fond of me, and +Mrs. Fahy's always telling me I should be thankful, as whatever he did +we'd be bound to put up with it!" + +Dr. Fahy had evidently a turn for conversation that was unaffected by +circumstance; the first beams of the early sun were lighting up the rep +chair covers before the door closed upon his brown dressing-gown, and +upon the stately white back of the cockatoo, and the demoniac +possession of laughter that had wrought in us during the interview +burst forth unchecked. It was most painful and exhausting, as such +laughter always is; but by far the most serious part of it was that +Miss Sally, who was sitting in the window, somehow drove her elbow +through a pane of glass, and Bernard, in pulling down the blind to +conceal the damage, tore it off the roller. + +There followed on this catastrophe a period during which reason +tottered and Maria barked furiously. Philippa was the first to pull +herself together, and to suggest an adjournment to the kitchen fire +that, in honour of the paying guests, was never quenched, and, +respecting the repose of the household, we proceeded thither with a +stealth that convinced Maria we were engaged in a rat hunt. The boots +of paying guests littered the floor, the debris of their last repast +covered the table; a cat in some unseen fastness crooned a war song to +Maria, who feigned unconsciousness and fell to scientific research in +the scullery. + +We roasted our boots at the range, and Bernard, with all a sailor's +gift for exploration and theft, prowled in noisome purlieus and emerged +with a jug of milk and a lump of salt butter. No one who has not been +a burglar can at all realise what it was to roam through Dr. Fahy's +basement storey, with the rookery of paying guests asleep above, and to +feel that, so far, we had repaid his confidence by breaking a pane of +glass and a blind, and putting the scullery tap out of order. I have +always maintained that there was something wrong with it before I +touched it, but the fact remains that when I had filled Philippa's +kettle, no human power could prevail upon it to stop flowing. For all +I know to the contrary it is running still. + +It was in the course of our furtive return to the drawing-room that we +were again confronted by Mrs. Buck's cockatoo. It was standing in +malign meditation on the stairs, and on seeing us it rose, without a +word of warning, upon the wing, and with a long screech flung itself at +Miss Sally's golden-red head, which a ray of sunlight had chanced to +illumine. There was a moment of stampede, as the selected victim, +pursued by the cockatoo, fled into the drawing-room; two chairs were +upset (one, I think, broken), Miss Sally enveloped herself in a window +curtain, Philippa and Miss Shute effaced themselves beneath a table; +the cockatoo, foiled of its prey, skimmed, still screeching, round the +ceiling. It was Bernard who, with a well-directed sofa-cushion, drove +the enemy from the room. There was only a chink of the door open, but +the cockatoo turned on his side as he flew, and swung through it like a +woodcock. + +We slammed the door behind him, and at the same instant there came a +thumping on the floor overhead, muffled, yet peremptory. + +"That's Mrs. Buck!" said Miss Shute, crawling from under the table; +"the room over this is the one that had the candle in it." + +We sat for a time in awful stillness, but nothing further happened, +save a distant shriek overhead, that told the cockatoo had sought and +found sanctuary in his owner's room. We had tea _sotto voce_, and +then, one by one, despite the amazing discomfort of the drawing-room +chairs, we dozed off to sleep. + +It was at about five o'clock that I woke with a stiff neck and an +uneasy remembrance that I had last seen Maria in the kitchen. The +others, looking, each of them, about twenty years older than their age, +slept in various attitudes of exhaustion. Bernard opened his eyes as I +stole forth to look for Maria, but none of the ladies awoke. I went +down the evil-smelling passage that led to the kitchen stairs, and, +there on a mat, regarding me with intelligent affection, was Maria; but +what--oh what was the white thing that lay between her forepaws? + +The situation was too serious to be coped with alone. I fled +noiselessly back to the drawing-room and put my head in; Bernard's +eyes--blessed be the light sleep of sailors!--opened again, and there +was that in mine that summoned him forth. (Blessed also be the light +step of sailors!) + +We took the corpse from Maria, withholding perforce the language and +the slaughtering that our hearts ached to bestow. For a minute or two +our eyes communed. + +"I'll get the kitchen shovel," breathed Bernard; "you open the +hall-door!" + +A moment later we passed like spirits into the open air, and on into a +little garden at the end of the house. Maria followed us, licking her +lips. There were beds of nasturtiums, and of purple stocks, and of +marigolds. We chose a bed of stocks, a plump bed, that looked like +easy digging. The windows were all tightly shut and shuttered, and I +took the cockatoo from under my coat and hid it, temporarily, behind a +box border. Bernard had brought a shovel and a coal scoop. We dug +like badgers. At eighteen inches we got down into shale and stones, +and the coal scoop struck work. + +"Never mind," said Bernard; "we'll plant the stocks on top of him." + +It was a lovely morning, with a new-born blue sky and a light northerly +breeze. As we returned to the house, we looked across the wavelets of +the little cove and saw, above the rocky point round which we had +groped last night, a triangular white patch moving slowly along. + +"The tide's lifted her!" said Bernard, standing stock-still. He looked +at Mrs. Buck's window and at me. "Yeates!" he whispered, "let's quit!" + +It was now barely six o'clock, and not a soul was stirring. We woke +the ladies and convinced them of the high importance of catching the +tide. Bernard left a note on the hall table for Dr. Fahy, a beautiful +note of leave-taking and gratitude, and apology for the broken window +(for which he begged to enclose half-a-crown). No allusion was made to +the other casualties. As we neared the strand he found an occasion to +say to me: + +"I put in a postscript that I thought it best to mention that I had +seen the cockatoo in the garden, and hoped it would get back all right. +That's quite true, you know! But look here, whatever you do, you must +keep it all dark from the ladies----" + +At this juncture Maria overtook us with the cockatoo in her mouth. + + + + +XI + +OCCASIONAL LICENSES + +"It's out of the question," I said, looking forbiddingly at Mrs. +Moloney through the spokes of the bicycle that I was pumping up outside +the grocer's in Skebawn. + +"Well, indeed, Major Yeates," said Mrs. Moloney, advancing excitedly, +and placing on the nickel plating a hand that I had good and recent +cause to know was warm, "sure I know well that if th' angel Gabriel +came down from heaven looking for a license for the races, your honour +wouldn't give it to him without a charackther, but as for Michael! +Sure, the world knows what Michael is!" + +I had been waiting for Philippa for already nearly half-an-hour, and my +temper was not at its best. + +"Character or no character, Mrs. Moloney," said I with asperity, "the +magistrates have settled to give no occasional licenses, and if Michael +were as sober as----" + +"Is it sober! God help us!" exclaimed Mrs. Moloney with an upward +rolling of her eye to the Recording Angel; "I'll tell your honour the +truth. I'm his wife, now, fifteen years, and I never seen the sign of +dhrink on Michael only once, and that was when he went out o' +good-nature helping Timsy Ryan to whitewash his house, and Timsy and +himself had a couple o' pots o' porther, and look, he was as little +used to it that his head got light, and he walked away out to dhrive in +the cows and it no more than eleven o'clock in the day! And the cows, +the craytures, as much surprised, goin' hither and over the four +corners of the road from him! Faith, ye'd have to laugh. 'Michael,' +says I to him, 'ye're dhrunk!' 'I am,' says he, and the tears rained +from his eyes. I turned the cows from him. 'Go home,' I says, 'and +lie down on Willy Tom's bed----'" + +At this affecting point my wife came out of the grocer's with a large +parcel to be strapped to my handlebar, and the history of Mr. Moloney's +solitary lapse from sobriety got no further than Willy Tom's bed. + +"You see," I said to Philippa, as we bicycled quietly home through the +hot June afternoon, "we've settled we'll give no licenses for the +sports. Why even young Sheehy, who owns three pubs in Skebawn, came to +me and said he hoped the magistrates would be firm about it, as these +one-day licenses were quite unnecessary, and only led to drunkenness +and fighting, and every man on the Bench has joined in promising not to +grant any." + +"How nice, dear!" said Philippa absently. "Do you know Mrs. McDonnell +can only let me have three dozen cups and saucers; I wonder if that +will be enough?" + +"Do you mean to say you expect three dozen people?" said I. + +"Oh, it's always well to be prepared," replied my wife evasively. + +During the next few days I realised the true inwardness of what it was +to be prepared for an entertainment of this kind. Games were not at a +high level in my district. Football, of a wild, guerilla species, was +waged intermittently, blended in some inextricable way with Home Rule +and a brass band, and on Sundays gatherings of young men rolled a heavy +round stone along the roads, a rudimentary form of sport, whose +fascination lay primarily in the fact that it was illegal, and, in +lesser degree, in betting on the length of each roll. I had had a +period of enthusiasm, during which I thought I was going to be the +apostle of cricket in the neighbourhood, but my mission dwindled to +single wicket with Peter Cadogan, who was indulgent but bored, and I +swiped the ball through the dining-room window, and some one took one +of the stumps to poke the laundry fire. Once a year, however, on that +festival of the Roman Catholic Church which is familiarly known as +"Pether and Paul's day," the district was wont to make a spasmodic +effort at athletic sports, which were duly patronised by the gentry and +promoted by the publicans, and this year the honour of a steward's +green rosette was conferred upon me. Philippa's genius for hospitality +here saw its chance, and broke forth into unbridled tea-party in +connection with the sports, even involving me in the hire of a tent, +the conveyance of chairs and tables, and other large operations. + +It chanced that Flurry Knox had on this occasion lent the fields for +the sports, with the proviso that horse-races and a tug-of-war were to +be added to the usual programme; Flurry's participation in events of +this kind seldom failed to be of an inflaming character. As he and I +planted larch spars for the high jump, and stuck furze-bushes into +hurdles (locally known as "hurrls"), and skirmished hourly with people +who wanted to sell drink on the course, I thought that my next summer +leave would singularly coincide with the festival consecrated to St. +Peter and St. Paul. We made a grand stand of quite four feet high, out +of old fish-boxes, which smelt worse and worse as the day wore on, but +was, none the less, as sought after by those for whom it was not +intended, as is the Royal enclosure at Ascot; we broke gaps in all the +fences to allow carriages on to the ground, we armed a gang of the +worst blackguards in Skebawn with cart-whips, to keep the course, and +felt that organisation could go no further. + +The momentous day of Pether and Paul opened badly, with heavy clouds +and every indication of rain, but after a few thunder showers things +brightened, and it seemed within the bounds of possibility that the +weather might hold up. When I got down to the course on the day of the +sports the first thing I saw was a tent of that peculiar filthy grey +that usually enshrines the sale of porter, with an array of barrels in +a crate beside it; I bore down upon it in all the indignant majesty of +the law, and in so doing came upon Flurry Knox, who was engaged in +flogging boys off the Grand Stand. + +"Sheehy's gone one better than you!" he said, without taking any +trouble to conceal the fact that he was amused. + +"Sheehy!" I said; "why, Sheehy was the man who went to every magistrate +in the country to ask them to refuse a license for the sports." + +"Yes, he took some trouble to prevent any one else having a look in," +replied Flurry; "he asked every magistrate but one, and that was the +one that gave him the license." + +"You don't mean to say that it was you?" I demanded in high wrath and +suspicion, remembering that Sheehy bred horses, and that my friend Mr. +Knox was a person of infinite resource in the matter of a deal. + +"Well, well," said Flurry, rearranging a disordered fish-box, "and me +that's a church-warden, and sprained my ankle a month ago with running +downstairs at my grandmother's to be in time for prayers! Where's the +use of a good character in this country?" + +"Not much when you keep it eating its head off for want of exercise," I +retorted; "but if it wasn't you, who was it?" + +"Do you remember old Moriarty out at Castle Ire?" + +I remembered him extremely well as one of those representatives of the +people with whom a paternal Government had leavened the effete ranks of +the Irish magistracy. + +"Well," resumed Flurry, "that license was as good as a five-pound note +in his pocket." + +I permitted myself a comment on Mr. Moriarty suitable to the occasion. + +"Oh, that's nothing," said Flurry easily; "he told me one day when he +was half screwed that his Commission of the Peace was worth a hundred +and fifty a year to him in turkeys and whisky, and he was telling the +truth for once." + +At this point Flurry's eye wandered, and following its direction I saw +Lady Knox's smart 'bus cleaving its way through the throng of country +people, lurching over the ups and downs of the field like a ship in a +sea. I was too blind to make out the component parts of the white +froth that crowned it on top, and seethed forth from it when it had +taken up a position near the tent in which Philippa was even now +propping the legs of the tea-table, but from the fact that Flurry +addressed himself to the door, I argued that Miss Sally had gone inside. + +Lady Knox's manner had something more than its usual bleakness. She +had brought, as she promised, a large contingent, but from the way that +the strangers within her gates melted impalpably and left me to deal +with her single-handed, I drew the further deduction that all was not +well. + +"Did you ever in your life see such a gang of women as I have brought +with me?" she began with her wonted directness, as I piloted her to the +Grand Stand, and placed her on the stoutest looking of the fish-boxes. +"I have no patience with men who yacht! Bernard Shute has gone off to +the Clyde, and I had counted on his being a man at my dance next week. +I suppose you'll tell me you're going away too." + +I assured Lady Knox that I would be a man to the best of my ability. + +"This is the last dance I shall give," went on her ladyship, +unappeased; "the men in this country consist of children and cads." + +I admitted that we were but a poor lot, "but," I said, "Miss Sally told +me----" + +"Sally's a fool!" said Lady Knox, with a falcon eye at her daughter, +who happened to be talking to her distant kinsman, Mr. Flurry of that +ilk. + +The races had by this time begun with a competition known as the "Hop, +Step, and Lep"; this, judging by the yells, was a highly interesting +display, but as it was conducted between two impervious rows of +onlookers, the aristocracy on the fish-boxes saw nothing save the +occasional purple face of a competitor, starting into view above the +wall of backs like a jack-in-the-box. For me, however, the odorous +sanctuary of the fish-boxes was not to be. I left it guarded by +Slipper with a cart-whip of flail-like dimensions, as disreputable an +object as could be seen out of low comedy, with some one's old white +cords on his bandy legs, butcher-boots three sizes too big for him, and +a black eye. The small boys fled before him; in the glory of his +office he would have flailed his own mother off the fish-boxes had +occasion served. + +I had an afternoon of decidedly mixed enjoyment. My stewardship +blossomed forth like Aaron's rod, and added to itself the duties of +starter, handicapper, general referee, and chucker-out, besides which I +from time to time strove with emissaries who came from Philippa with +messages about water and kettles. Flurry and I had to deal +single-handed with the foot-races (our brothers in office being +otherwise engaged at Mr. Sheehy's), a task of many difficulties, +chiefest being that the spectators all swept forward at the word "Go!" +and ran the race with the competitors, yelling curses, blessings, and +advice upon them, taking short cuts over anything and everybody, and +mingling inextricably with the finish. By fervent applications of the +whips, the course was to some extent purged for the quarter-mile, and +it would, I believe, have been a triumph of handicapping had not an +unforeseen disaster overtaken the favourite--old Mrs. Knox's bath-chair +boy. Whether, as was alleged, his braces had or had not been tampered +with by a rival was a matter that the referee had subsequently to deal +with in the thick of a free fight; but the painful fact remained that +in the course of the first lap what were described as "his galluses" +abruptly severed their connection with the garments for whose safety +they were responsible, and the favourite was obliged to seek seclusion +in the crowd. + +The tug-of-war followed close on this _contre-temps_, and had the +excellent effect of drawing away, like a blister, the inflammation set +up by the grievances of the bath-chair boy. I cannot at this moment +remember of how many men each team consisted; my sole aim was to keep +the numbers even, and to baffle the volunteers who, in an ecstasy of +sympathy, attached themselves to the tail of the rope at moments when +their champions weakened. The rival forces dug their heels in and +tugged, in an uproar that drew forth the innermost line of customers +from Mr. Sheehy's porter tent, and even attracted "the quality" from +the haven of the fish-boxes, Slipper, in the capacity of Squire of +Dames, pioneering Lady Knox through the crowd with the cart-whip, and +with language whose nature was providentially veiled, for the most +part, by the din. The tug-of-war continued unabated. One team was +getting the worst of it, but hung doggedly on, sinking lower and lower +till they gradually sat down; nothing short of the trump of judgment +could have conveyed to them that they were breaking rules, and both +teams settled down by slow degrees on to their sides, with the rope +under them, and their heels still planted in the ground, bringing about +complete deadlock. I do not know the record duration for a tug-of-war, +but I can certify that the Cullinagh and Knockranny teams lay on the +ground at full tension for half-an-hour, like men in apoplectic fits, +each man with his respective adherents howling over him, blessing him, +and adjuring him to continue. + +With my own nauseated eyes I saw a bearded countryman, obviously one of +Mr. Sheehy's best customers, fling himself on his knees beside one of +the combatants, and kiss his crimson and streaming face in a rapture of +encouragement. As he shoved unsteadily past me on his return journey +to Mr. Sheehy's, I heard him informing a friend that "he cried a +handful over Danny Mulloy, when he seen the poor brave boy so +shtubborn, and, indeed, he couldn't say why he cried." + +"For good-nature ye'd cry," suggested the friend. + +"Well, just that, I suppose," returned Danny Mulloy's admirer +resignedly; "indeed, if it was only two cocks ye seen fightin' on the +road, yer heart'd take part with one o' them!" + +I had begun to realise that I might as well abandon the tug-of-war and +occupy myself elsewhere, when my wife's much harassed messenger brought +me the portentous tidings that Mrs. Yeates wanted me at the tent at +once. When I arrived I found the tent literally bulging with +Philippa's guests; Lady Knox, seated on a hamper, was taking off her +gloves, and loudly announcing her desire for tea, and Philippa, with a +flushed face and a crooked hat, breathed into my ear the awful news +that both the cream and the milk had been forgotten. + +"But Flurry Knox says he can get me some," she went on; "he's gone to +send people to milk a cow that lives near here. Go out and see if he's +coming." + +I went out and found, in the first instance, Mrs. Cadogan, who greeted +me with the prayer that the divil might roast Julia McCarthy, that +legged it away to the races like a wild goose, and left the cream +afther her on the servants' hall table. "Sure, Misther Flurry's gone +looking for a cow, and what cow would there be in a backwards place +like this? And look at me shtriving to keep the kettle simpering on +the fire, and not as much coals undher it as'd redden a pipe!" + +"Where's Mr. Knox?" I asked. + +"Himself and Slipper's galloping the counthry like the deer. I believe +it's to the house above they went, sir." + +I followed up a rocky hill to the house above, and there found Flurry +and Slipper engaged in the patriarchal task of driving two brace of +coupled and spancelled goats into a shed. + +"It's the best we can do," said Flurry briefly; "there isn't a cow to +be found, and the people are all down at the sports. Be d----d to you, +Slipper, don't let them go from you!" as the goats charged and doubled +like football players. + +"But goats' milk!" I said, paralysed by horrible memories of what tea +used to taste like at Gib. + +"They'll never know it!" said Flurry, cornering a venerable nanny; +"here, hold this divil, and hold her tight!" + +I have no time to dwell upon the pastoral scene that followed. Suffice +it to say, that at the end of ten minutes of scorching profanity from +Slipper, and incessant warfare with the goats, the latter had +reluctantly yielded two small jugfuls, and the dairymaids had exhibited +a nerve and skill in their trade that won my lasting respect. + +"I knew I could trust _you_, Mr. Knox!" said Philippa, with shining +eyes, as we presented her with the two foaming beakers. I suppose a +man is never a hero to his wife, but if she could have realised the +bruises on my legs, I think she would have reserved a blessing for me +also. + +What was thought of the goats' milk I gathered symptomatically from a +certain fixity of expression that accompanied the first sip of the tea, +and from observing that comparatively few ventured on second cups. I +also noted that after a brief conversation with Flurry, Miss Sally +poured hers secretly on to the grass. Lady Knox had throughout the day +preserved an aspect so threatening that no change was perceptible in +her demeanour. In the throng of hungry guests I did not for some time +notice that Mr. Knox had withdrawn until something in Miss Sally's eye +summoned me to her, and she told me she had a message from him for me. + +"Couldn't we come outside?" she said. + +Outside the tent, within less than six yards of her mother, Miss Sally +confided to me a scheme that made my hair stand on end. Summarised, it +amounted to this: That, first, she was in the primary stage of a deal +with Sheehy for a four-year-old chestnut colt, for which Sheehy was +asking double its value on the assumption that it had no rival in the +country; that, secondly, they had just heard it was going to run in the +first race; and, thirdly and lastly, that as there was no other horse +available, Flurry was going to take old Sultan out of the 'bus and ride +him in the race; and that Mrs. Yeates had promised to keep mamma safe +in the tent, while the race was going on, and "you know, Major Yeates, +it would be delightful to beat Sheehy after his getting the better of +you all about the license!" + +With this base appeal to my professional feelings, Miss Knox paused, +and looked at me insinuatingly. Her eyes were greeny-grey, and very +beguiling. + +"Come on," she said; "they want you to start them!" + +Pursued by visions of the just wrath of Lady Knox, I weakly followed +Miss Sally to the farther end of the second field, from which point the +race was to start. The course was not a serious one: two or three +natural banks, a stone wall, and a couple of "hurrls." There were but +four riders, including Flurry, who was seated composedly on Sultan, +smoking a cigarette and talking confidentially to Slipper. Sultan, +although something stricken in years and touched in the wind, was a +brown horse who in his day had been a hunter of no mean repute; even +now he occasionally carried Lady Knox in a sedate and gentlemanly +manner, but it struck me that it was trying him rather high to take him +from the pole of the 'bus after twelve miles on a hilly road, and +hustle him over a country against a four-year-old. My acutest anxiety, +however, was to start the race as quickly as possible, and to get back +to the tent in time to establish an alibi; therefore I repressed my +private sentiments, and, tying my handkerchief to a stick, determined +that no time should be fashionably frittered away in false starts. + +They got away somehow; I believe Sheehy's colt was facing the wrong way +at the moment when I dropped the flag, but a friend turned him with a +stick, and, with a cordial and timely whack, speeded him on his way on +sufficiently level terms, and then somehow, instead of returning to the +tent, I found myself with Miss Sally on the top of a tall narrow bank, +in a precarious line of other spectators, with whom we toppled and +swayed, and, in moments of acuter emotion, held on to each other in +unaffected comradeship. + +Flurry started well, and from our commanding position we could see him +methodically riding at the first fence at a smart hunting canter, +closely attended by James Canty's brother on a young black mare, and by +an unknown youth on a big white horse. The hope of Sheehy's stable, a +leggy chestnut, ridden by a cadet of the house of Sheehy, went away +from the friend's stick like a rocket, and had already refused the +first bank twice before old Sultan decorously changed feet on it and +dropped down into the next field with tranquil precision. The white +horse scrambled over it on his stomach, but landed safely, despite the +fact that his rider clasped him round the neck during the process; the +black mare and the chestnut shouldered one another over at the hole the +white horse had left, and the whole party went away in a bunch and +jumped the ensuing hurdle without disaster. Flurry continued to ride +at the same steady hunting pace, accompanied respectfully by the white +horse and by Jerry Canty on the black mare. Sheehy's colt had clearly +the legs of the party, and did some showy galloping between the jumps, +but as he refused to face the banks without a lead, the end of the +first round found the field still a sociable party personally conducted +by Mr. Knox. + +"That's a dam nice horse," said one of my hangers-on, looking +approvingly at Sultan as he passed us at the beginning of the second +round, making a good deal of noise but apparently going at his ease; +"you might depind your life on him, and he have the crabbedest jock in +the globe of Ireland on him this minute." + +"Canty's mare's very sour," said another; "look at her now, baulking +the bank! she's as cross as a bag of weasels." + +"Begob, I wouldn't say but she's a little sign lame," resumed the +first; "she was going light on one leg on the road a while ago." + +"I tell you what it is," said Miss Sally, very seriously, in my ear, +"that chestnut of Sheehy's is settling down. I'm afraid he'll gallop +away from Sultan at the finish, and the wall won't stop him. Flurry +can't get another inch out of Sultan. He's riding him well," she ended +in a critical voice, which yet was not quite like her own. Perhaps I +should not have noticed it but for the fact that the hand that held my +arm was trembling. As for me, I thought of Lady Knox, and trembled too. + +There now remained but one bank, the trampled remnant of the furze +hurdle, and the stone wall. The pace was beginning to improve, and the +other horses drew away from Sultan; they charged the bank at full +gallop, the black mare and the chestnut flying it perilously, with a +windmill flourish of legs and arms from their riders, the white horse +racing up to it with a gallantry that deserted him at the critical +moment, with the result that his rider turned a somersault over his +head and landed, amidst the roars of the onlookers, sitting on the +fence facing his horse's nose. With creditable presence of mind he +remained on the bank, towed the horse over, scrambled on to his back +again and started afresh. Sultan, thirty yards to the bad, pounded +doggedly on, and Flurry's cane and heels remained idle; the old horse, +obviously blown, slowed cautiously coming in at the jump. Sally's grip +tightened on my arm, and the crowd yelled as Sultan, answering to a +hint from the spurs and a touch at his mouth, heaved himself on to the +bank. Nothing but sheer riding on Flurry's part got him safe off it, +and saved him from the consequences of a bad peck on landing; none the +less, he pulled himself together and went away down the hill for the +stone wall as stoutly as ever. The high-road skirted the last two +fields, and there was a gate in the roadside fence beside the place +where the stone wall met it at right angles. I had noticed this gate, +because during the first round Slipper had been sitting on it, +demonstrating with his usual fervour. Sheeny's colt was leading, with +his nose in the air, his rider's hands going like a circular saw, and +his temper, as a bystander remarked, "up on end"; the black mare, half +mad from spurring, was going hard at his heels, completely out of hand; +the white horse was steering steadily for the wrong side of the flag, +and Flurry, by dint of cutting corners and of saving every yard of +ground, was close enough to keep his antagonists' heads over their +shoulders, while their right arms rose and fell in unceasing +flagellation. + +"There'll be a smash when they come to the wall! If one falls they'll +all go!" panted Sally. "Oh!---- Now! Flurry! Flurry!----" + +What had happened was that the chestnut colt had suddenly perceived +that the gate at right angles to the wall was standing wide open, and, +swinging away from the jump, he had bolted headlong out on to the road, +and along it at top speed for his home. After him fled Canty's black +mare, and with her, carried away by the spirit of stampede, went the +white horse. + +Flurry stood up in his stirrups and gave a view-halloa as he cantered +down to the wall. Sultan came at it with the send of the hill behind +him, and jumped it with a skill that intensified, if that were +possible, the volume of laughter and yells around us. By the time the +black mare and the white horse had returned and ignominiously bundled +over the wall to finish as best they might, Flurry was leading Sultan +towards us. + +"That blackguard, Slipper!" he said, grinning; "every one'll say I told +him to open the gate! But look here, I'm afraid we're in for trouble. +Sultan's given himself a bad over-reach; you could never drive him home +to-night. And I've just seen Norris lying blind drunk under a wall!" + +Now Norris was Lady Knox's coachman. We stood aghast at this "horror +on horror's head," the blood trickled down Sultan's heel, and the +lather lay in flecks on his dripping, heaving sides, in irrefutable +witness to the iniquity of Lady Knox's only daughter. Then Flurry said: + +"Thank the Lord, here's the rain!" + +At the moment I admit that I failed to see any cause for gratitude in +this occurrence, but later on I appreciated Flurry's grasp of +circumstances. + +That appreciation was, I think, at its highest development about +half-an-hour afterwards, when I, an unwilling conspirator (a part with +which my acquaintance with Mr. Knox had rendered me but too familiar) +unfurled Mrs. Cadogan's umbrella over Lady Knox's head, and hurried her +through the rain from the tent to the 'bus, keeping it and my own +person well between her and the horses. I got her in, with the rest of +her bedraggled and exhausted party, and slammed the door. + +"Remember, Major Yeates," she said through the window, "you are the +_only_ person here in whom I have any confidence. I don't wish _any_ +one else to touch the reins!" this with a glance towards Flurry, who +was standing near. + +"I'm afraid I'm only a moderate whip," I said. + +"My dear man," replied Lady Knox testily, "those horses could drive +themselves!" + +I slunk round to the front of the 'bus. Two horses, carefully rugged, +were in it, with the inevitable Slipper at their heads. + +"Slipper's going with you," whispered Flurry, stepping up to me; "she +won't have me at any price. He'll throw the rugs over them when you +get to the house, and if you hold the umbrella well over her she'll +never see. I'll manage to get Sultan over somehow, when Norris is +sober. That will be all right." + +I climbed to the box without answering, my soul being bitter within me, +as is the soul of a man who has been persuaded by womankind against his +judgment. + +"Never again!" I said to myself, picking up the reins; "let her marry +him or Bernard Shute, or both of them if she likes, but I won't be +roped into this kind of business again!" + +Slipper drew the rugs from the horses, revealing on the near side Lady +Knox's majestic carriage horse, and on the off, a thick-set brown mare +of about fifteen hands. + +"What brute is this?" said I to Slipper, as he swarmed up beside me. + +"I don't rightly know where Misther Flurry got her," said Slipper, with +one of his hiccoughing crows of laughter; "give her the whip, Major, +and"--here he broke into song: + + "Howld to the shteel, + Honamaundhiaoul; she'll run off like an eel!" + + +"If you don't shut your mouth," said I, with pent-up ferocity, "I'll +chuck you off the 'bus." + +Slipper was but slightly drunk, and, taking this delicate rebuke in +good part, he relapsed into silence. + +Wherever the brown mare came from, I can certify that it was not out of +double harness. Though humble and anxious to oblige, she pulled away +from the pole as if it were red hot, and at critical moments had a +tendency to sit down. However, we squeezed without misadventure among +the donkey carts and between the groups of people, and bumped at length +in safety out on to the high-road. + +Here I thought it no harm to take Slipper's advice, and I applied the +whip to the brown mare, who seemed inclined to turn round. She +immediately fell into an uncertain canter that no effort of mine could +frustrate; I could only hope that Miss Sally would foster conversation +inside the 'bus and create a distraction; but judging from my last view +of the party, and of Lady Knox in particular, I thought she was not +likely to be successful. Fortunately the rain was heavy and thick, and +a rising west wind gave every promise of its continuance. I had little +doubt but that I should catch cold, but I took it to my bosom with +gratitude as I reflected how it was drumming on the roof of the 'bus +and blurring the windows. + +We had reached the foot of a hill, about a quarter of a mile from the +racecourse; the Castle Knox horse addressed himself to it with +dignified determination, but the mare showed a sudden and alarming +tendency to jib. + +"Belt her, Major!" vociferated Slipper, as she hung back from the pole +chain, with the collar half-way up her ewe neck, "and give it to the +horse, too! He'll dhrag her!" + +I was in the act of "belting," when a squealing whinny struck upon my +ear, accompanied by a light pattering gallop on the road behind us; +there was an answering roar from the brown mare, a roar, as I realised +with a sudden drop of the heart, of outraged maternal feeling, and in +another instant a pale, yellow foal sprinted up beside us, with shrill +whickerings of joy. Had there at this moment been a boghole handy, I +should have turned the 'bus into it without hesitation; as there was no +accommodation of the kind, I laid the whip severely into everything I +could reach, including the foal. The result was that we topped the +hill at a gallop, three abreast, like a Russian troitska; it was like +my usual luck that at this identical moment we should meet the police +patrol, who saluted respectfully. + +"That the divil may blisther Michael Moloney!" ejaculated Slipper, +holding on to the rail; "didn't I give him the foaleen and a halther on +him to keep him! I'll howld you a pint 'twas the wife let him go, for +she being vexed about the license! Sure that one's a March foal, an' +he'd run from here to Cork!" + +There was no sign from my inside passengers, and I held on at a round +pace, the mother and child galloping absurdly, the carriage horse +pulling hard, but behaving like a gentleman. I wildly revolved plans +of how I would make Slipper turn the foal in at the first gate we came +to, of what I should say to Lady Knox supposing the worst happened and +the foal accompanied us to her hall door, and of how I would have +Flurry's blood at the earliest possible opportunity, and here the +fateful sound of galloping behind us was again heard. + +"It's impossible!" I said to myself; "she can't have twins!" + +The galloping came nearer, and Slipper looked back. + +"Murdher alive!" he said in a stage whisper; "Tom Sheehy's afther us on +the butcher's pony!" + +"What's that to me?" I said, dragging my team aside to let him pass; "I +suppose he's drunk, like every one else!" + +Then the voice of Tom Sheehy made itself heard. + +"Shtop! Shtop thief!" he was bawling; "give up my mare! How will I +get me porther home!" + + +That was the closest shave I have ever had, and nothing could have +saved the position but the torrential nature of the rain and the fact +that Lady Knox had on a new bonnet. I explained to her at the door of +the 'bus that Sheehy was drunk (which was the one unassailable feature +of the case), and had come after his foal, which, with the fatuity of +its kind, had escaped from a field and followed us. I did not mention +to Lady Knox that when Mr. Sheehy retreated, apologetically, dragging +the foal after him in a halter belonging to one of her own carriage +horses, he had a sovereign of mine in his pocket, and during the +narration I avoided Miss Sally's eye as carefully as she avoided mine. + +The only comments on the day's events that are worthy of record were +that Philippa said to me that she had not been able to understand what +the curious taste in the tea had been till Sally told her it was +turf-smoke, and that Mrs. Cadogan said to Philippa that night that "the +Major was that dhrinched that if he had a shirt between his skin and +himself he could have wrung it," and that Lady Knox said to a mutual +friend that though Major Yeates had been extremely kind and obliging, +he was an uncommonly bad whip. + + + + +XII + +"OH LOVE! OH FIRE!" + +It was on one of the hottest days of a hot August that I walked over to +Tory Lodge to inform Mr. Flurry Knox, M.F.H., that the limits of human +endurance had been reached, and that either Venus and her family, or I +and mine, must quit Shreelane. In a moment of impulse I had accepted +her and her numerous progeny as guests in my stable-yard, since when +Mrs. Cadogan had given warning once or twice a week, and Maria, lawful +autocrat of the ashpit, had had--I quote the kitchen-maid--"tin battles +for every male she'd ate." + +The walk over the hills was not of a nature to lower the temperature, +moral or otherwise. The grassy path was as slippery as glass, the +rocks radiated heat, the bracken radiated horseflies. There was no +need to nurse my wrath to keep it warm. + +I found Flurry seated in the kennel-yard in a long and unclean white +linen coat, engaged in clipping hieroglyphics on the ears of a young +outgoing draft, an occupation in itself unfavourable to argument. The +young draft had already monopolised all possible forms of remonstrance, +from snarling in the obscurity behind the meal sack in the +boiler-house, to hysterical yelling as they were dragged forth by the +tail; but through these alarms and excursions I denounced Venus and all +her works, from slaughtered Wyandottes to broken dishes. Even as I did +so I was conscious of something chastened in Mr. Knox's demeanour, some +touch of remoteness and melancholy with which I was quite unfamiliar; +my indictment weakened and my grievances became trivial when laid +before this grave and almost religiously gentle young man. + +"I'm sorry you and Mrs. Yeates should be vexed by her. Send her back +when you like. I'll keep her. Maybe it'll not be for so long after +all." + +When pressed to expound this dark saying, Flurry smiled wanly and +snipped a second line in the hair of the puppy that was pinned between +his legs. I was almost relieved when a hard try to bite on the part of +the puppy imparted to Flurry's language a transient warmth; but the +reaction was only temporary. + +"It'd be as good for me to make a present of this lot to old Welby as +to take the price he's offering me," he went on, as he got up and took +off his highly-scented kennel-coat; "but I couldn't be bothered +fighting him. Come on in and have something. I drink tea myself at +this hour." + +If he had said toast and water it would have seemed no more than was +suitable to such a frame of mind. As I followed him to the house I +thought that when the day came that Flurry Knox could not be bothered +with fighting old Welby things were becoming serious, but I kept this +opinion to myself and merely offered an admiring comment on the roses +that were blooming on the front of the house. + +"I put up every stick of that trellis myself with my own hands," said +Flurry, still gloomily; "the roses were trailing all over the place for +the want of it. Would you like to have a look at the garden while +they're getting tea? I settled it up a bit since you saw it last." + +I acceded to this almost alarmingly ladylike suggestion, marvelling +greatly. + +Flurry certainly was a changed man, and his garden was a changed +garden. It was a very old garden, with unexpected arbours madly +overgrown with flowering climbers, and a flight of grey steps leading +to a terrace, where a moss-grown sundial and ancient herbaceous plants +strove with nettles and briars; but I chiefly remembered it as a place +where washing was wont to hang on black-currant bushes, and the kennel +terrier matured his bones and hunted chickens. There was now rabbit +wire on the gate, the walks were cleaned, the beds weeded. There was +even a bed of mignonette, a row of sweet pea, and a blazing party of +sunflowers, and Michael, once second in command in many a filibustering +expedition, was now on his knees, ingloriously tying carnations to +little pieces of cane. + +We walked up the steps to the terrace. Down below us the rich and +southern blue of the sea filled the gaps between scattered fir-trees; +the hillside above was purple with heather; a bay mare and her foal +were moving lazily through the bracken, with the sun glistening on it +and them. I looked back at the house, nestling in the hollow of the +hill, I smelled the smell of the mignonette in the air, I regarded +Michael's labouring back among the carnations, and without any +connection of ideas I seemed to see Miss Sally Knox, with her +golden-red hair and slight figure, standing on the terrace beside her +kinsman. + +"Michael! Do ye know where's Misther Flurry?" squalled a voice from +the garden gate, the untrammelled voice of the female domestic at large +among her fellows. "The tay's wet, and there's a man over with a +message from Aussolas. He was tellin' me the owld hairo beyant is +givin' out invitations----" + +A stricken silence fell, induced, no doubt, by hasty danger signals +from Michael. + +"Who's 'the old hero beyant'?" I asked, as we turned toward the house. + +"My grandmother," said Flurry, permitting himself a smile that had +about as much sociability in it as skim milk; "she's giving a tenants' +dance at Aussolas. She gave one about five years ago, and I declare +you might as well get the influenza into the country, or a mission at +the chapel. There won't be a servant in the place will be able to +answer their name for a week after it, what with toothache and +headache, and blathering in the kitchen!" + +We had tea in the drawing-room, a solemnity which I could not but be +aware was due to the presence of a new carpet, a new wall-paper, and a +new piano. Flurry made no comment on these things, but something told +me that I was expected to do so, and I did. + +"I'd sell you the lot to-morrow for half what I gave for them," said my +host, eyeing them with morose respect as he poured out his third cup of +tea. + +I have all my life been handicapped by not having the courage of my +curiosity. Those who have the nerve to ask direct questions on matters +that do not concern them seldom fail to extract direct answers, but in +my lack of this enviable gift I went home in the dark as to what had +befallen my landlord, and fully aware of how my wife would despise me +for my shortcomings. Philippa always says that she never asks +questions, but she seems none the less to get a lot of answers. + +On my own avenue I met Miss Sally Knox riding away from the house on +her white cob; she had found no one at home, and she would not turn +back with me, but she did not seem to be in any hurry to ride away. I +told her that I had just been over to see her relative, Mr. Knox, who +had informed me that he meant to give up the hounds, a fact in which +she seemed only conventionally interested. She looked pale, and her +eyelids were slightly pink; I checked myself on the verge of asking her +if she had hay-fever, and inquired instead if she had heard of the +tenants' dance at Aussolas. She did not answer at first, but rubbed +her cane up and down the cob's clipped toothbrush of a mane. Then she +said: + +"Major Yeates--look here--there's a most awful row at home!" + +I expressed incoherent regret, and wished to my heart that Philippa had +been there to cope with the situation. + +"It began when mamma found out about Flurry's racing Sultan, and then +came our dance----" + +Miss Sally stopped; I nodded, remembering certain episodes of Lady +Knox's dance. + +"And--mamma says--she says----" + +I waited respectfully to hear what mamma had said; the cob fidgeted +under the attentions of the horseflies, and nearly trod on my toe. + +"Well, the end of it is," she said with a gulp, "she said such things +to Flurry that he can't come near the house again, and I'm to go over +to England to Aunt Dora, next week. Will you tell Philippa I came to +say good-bye to her? I don't think I can get over here again." + +Miss Sally was a sufficiently old friend of mine for me to take her +hand and press it in a fatherly manner, but for the life of me I could +not think of anything to say, unless I expressed my sympathy with her +mother's point of view about detrimentals, which was obviously not the +thing to do. + +Philippa accorded to my news the rare tribute of speechless attention, +and then was despicable enough to say that she had foreseen the whole +affair from the beginning. + +"From the day that she refused him in the ice-house, I suppose," said I +sarcastically. + +"That _was_ the beginning," replied Philippa. + +"Well," I went on judicially, "whenever it began, it was high time for +it to end. She can do a good deal better than Flurry." + +Philippa became rather red in the face. + +"I call that a thoroughly commonplace thing to say," she said. "I dare +say he has not many ideas beyond horses, but no more has she, and he +really does come and borrow books from me----" + +"Whitaker's Almanack," I murmured. + +"Well, I don't care, I like him very much, and I know what you're going +to say, and you're wrong, and I'll tell you why----" + +Here Mrs. Cadogan came into the room, her cap at rather more than its +usual warlike angle over her scarlet forehead, and in her hand a +kitchen plate, on which a note was ceremoniously laid forth. + +"But this is for you, Mrs. Cadogan," said Philippa, as she looked at it. + +"Ma'am," returned Mrs. Cadogan with immense dignity, "I have no +learning, and from what the young man's afther telling me that brought +it from Aussolas, I'd sooner yerself read it for me than thim gerrls." + +My wife opened the envelope, and drew forth a gilt-edged sheet of pink +paper. + +"Miss Margaret Nolan presents her compliments to Mrs. Cadogan," she +read, "and I have the pleasure of telling you that the servants of +Aussolas is inviting you and Mr. Peter Cadogan, Miss Mulrooney, and +Miss Gallagher"--Philippa's voice quavered perilously--"to a dance on +next Wednesday. Dancing to begin at seven o'clock, and to go on till +five.--Yours affectionately, MAGGIE NOLAN." + +"How affectionate she is!" snorted Mrs. Cadogan; "them's Dublin +manners, I dare say!" + +"P.S.," continued Philippa; "steward, Mr. Denis O'Loughlin; stewardess, +Mrs. Mahony." + +"Thoughtful provision," I remarked; "I suppose Mrs. Mahony's duties +will begin after supper." + +"Well, Mrs. Cadogan," said Philippa, quelling me with a glance, "I +suppose you'd all like to go?" + +"As for dancin'," said Mrs. Cadogan, with her eyes fixed on a level +with the curtain-pole, "I thank God I'm a widow, and the only dancin' +I'll do is to dance to my grave." + +"Well, perhaps Julia, and Annie, and Peter----" suggested Philippa, +considerably overawed. + +"I'm not one of them that holds with loud mockery and harangues," +continued Mrs. Cadogan, "but if I had any wish for dhrawing down talk I +could tell you, ma'am, that the like o' them has their share of dances +without going to Aussolas! Wasn't it only last Sunday week I wint +follyin' the turkey that's layin' out in the plantation, and the whole +o' thim hysted their sails and back with them to their lovers at the +gate-house, and the kitchen-maid having a Jew-harp to be playing for +them!" + +"That was very wrong," said the truckling Philippa. "I hope you spoke +to the kitchen-maid about it." + +"Is it spake to thim?" rejoined Mrs. Cadogan. "No, but what I done was +to dhrag the kitchenmaid round the passages by the hair o' the head!" + +"Well, after that, I think you might let her go to Aussolas," said I +venturously. + +The end of it was that every one in and about the house went to +Aussolas on the following Wednesday, including Mrs. Cadogan. Philippa +had gone over to stay at the Shutes, ostensibly to arrange about a +jumble sale, the real object being (as a matter of history) to inspect +the Scotch young lady before whom Bernard Shute had dumped his +affections in his customary manner. Being alone, with every prospect +of a bad dinner, I accepted with gratitude an invitation to dine and +sleep at Aussolas and see the dance; it is only on very special +occasions that I have the heart to remind Philippa that she had neither +part nor lot in what occurred--it is too serious a matter for trivial +gloryings. + +Mrs. Knox had asked me to dine at six o'clock, which meant that I +arrived, in blazing sunlight and evening clothes, punctually at that +hour, and that at seven o'clock I was still sitting in the library, +reading heavily-bound classics, while my hostess held loud +conversations down staircases with Denis O'Loughlin, the red-bearded +Robinson Crusoe who combined in himself the offices of coachman, +butler, and, to the best of my belief, valet to the lady of the house. +The door opened at last, and Denis, looking as furtive as his prototype +after he had sighted the footprint, put in his head and beckoned to me. + +"The misthress says will ye go to dinner without her," he said very +confidentially; "sure she's greatly vexed ye should be waitin' on her. +'Twas the kitchen chimney cot fire, and faith she's afther giving Biddy +Mahony the sack, on the head of it! Though, indeed, 'tis little we'd +regard a chimney on fire here any other day." + +Mrs. Knox's woolly dog was the sole occupant of the dining-room when I +entered it; he was sitting on his mistress's chair, with all the air of +outrage peculiar to a small and self-important dog when routine has +been interfered with. It was difficult to discover what had caused the +delay, the meal, not excepting the soup, being a cold collation; it was +heavily flavoured with soot, and was hurled on to the table by Crusoe +in spasmodic bursts, contemporaneous, no doubt, with Biddy Mahony's +fits of hysterics in the kitchen. Its most memorable feature was a +noble lake trout, which appeared in two jagged pieces, a matter lightly +alluded to by Denis as the result of "a little argument" between +himself and Biddy as to the dish on which it was to be served. Further +conversation elicited the interesting fact that the combatants had +pulled the trout in two before the matter was settled. A brief glance +at my attendant's hands decided me to let the woolly dog justify his +existence by consuming my portion for me, when Crusoe left the room. + +Old Mrs. Knox remained invisible till the end of dinner, when she +appeared in the purple velvet bonnet that she was reputed to have worn +since the famine, and a dun-coloured woollen shawl fastened by a +splendid diamond brooch, that flashed rainbow fire against the last +shafts of sunset. There was a fire in the old lady's eye, too, the +light that I had sometimes seen in Flurry's in moments of crisis. + +"I have no apologies to offer that are worth hearing," she said, "but I +have come to drink a glass of port wine with you, if you will so far +honour me, and then we must go out and see the ball. My grandson is +late, as usual." + +She crumbled a biscuit with a brown and preoccupied hand; her claw-like +fingers carried a crowded sparkle of diamonds upwards as she raised her +glass to her lips. + +The twilight was falling when we left the room and made our way +downstairs. I followed the little figure in the purple bonnet through +dark regions of passages and doorways, where strange lumber lay about; +there was a rusty suit of armour, an upturned punt, mouldering +pictures, and finally, by a door that opened into the yard, a lady's +bicycle, white with the dust of travel. I supposed this latter to have +been imported from Dublin by the fashionable Miss Maggie Nolan, but on +the other hand it was well within the bounds of possibility that it +belonged to old Mrs. Knox. The coach-house at Aussolas was on a par +with the rest of the establishment, being vast, dilapidated, and of +unknown age. Its three double doors were wide open, and the guests +overflowed through them into the cobble-stoned yard; above their heads +the tin reflectors of paraffin lamps glared at us from among the +Christmas decorations of holly and ivy that festooned the walls. The +voices of a fiddle and a concertina, combined, were uttering a polka +with shrill and hideous fluency, to which the scraping and stamping of +hobnailed boots made a ponderous bass accompaniment. + +Mrs. Knox's donkey-chair had been placed in a commanding position at +the top of the room, and she made her way slowly to it, shaking hands +with all varieties of tenants and saying right things without showing +any symptom of that flustered boredom that I have myself exhibited when +I went round the men's messes on Christmas Day. She took her seat in +the donkey-chair, with the white dog in her lap, and looked with her +hawk's eyes round the array of faces that hemmed in the space where the +dancers were solemnly bobbing and hopping. + +"Will you tell me who that tomfool is, Denis?" she said, pointing to a +young lady in a ball dress who was circling in conscious magnificence +and somewhat painful incongruity in the arms of Mr. Peter Cadogan. + +"That's the lady's-maid from Castle Knox, yer honour, ma'am," replied +Denis, with something remarkably like a wink at Mrs. Knox. + +"When did the Castle Knox servants come?" asked the old lady, very +sharply. + +"The same time yer honour left the table, and----Pillilew! What's +this?" + +There was a clatter of galloping hoofs in the courtyard, as of a troop +of cavalry, and out of the heart of it Flurry's voice shouting to Denis +to drive out the colts and shut the gates before they had the people +killed. I noticed that the colour had risen to Mrs. Knox's face, and I +put it down to anxiety about her young horses. I may admit that when I +heard Flurry's voice, and saw him collaring his grandmother's guests +and pushing them out of the way as he came into the coach-house, I +rather feared that he was in the condition so often defined to me at +Petty Sessions as "not dhrunk, but having dhrink taken." His face was +white, his eyes glittered, there was a general air of exaltation about +him that suggested the solace of the pangs of love according to the +most ancient convention. + +"Hullo!" he said, swaggering up to the orchestra, "what's this +humbugging thing they're playing? A polka, is it? Drop that, John +Casey, and play a jig." + +John Casey ceased abjectly. + +"What'll I play, Masther Flurry?" + +"What the devil do I care? Here, Yeates, put a name on it! You're a +sort of musicianer yourself!" + +I know the names of three or four Irish jigs; but on this occasion my +memory clung exclusively to one, I suppose because it was the one I +felt to be peculiarly inappropriate. + +"Oh, well, 'Haste to the Wedding,'" I said, looking away. + +Flurry gave a shout of laughter. + +"That's it!" he exclaimed. "Play it up, John! Give us 'Haste to the +Wedding.' That's Major Yeates's fancy!" + +Decidedly Flurry was drunk. + +"What's wrong with you all that you aren't dancing?" he continued, +striding up the middle of the room. "Maybe you don't know how. Here, +I'll soon get one that'll show you!" + +He advanced upon his grandmother, snatched her out of the donkey-chair, +and, amid roars of applause, led her out, while the fiddle squealed its +way through the inimitable twists of the tune, and the concertina +surged and panted after it. Whatever Mrs. Knox may have thought of her +grandson's behaviour, she was evidently going to make the best of it. +She took her station opposite to him, in the purple bonnet, the +dun-coloured shawl, and the diamonds, she picked up her skirt at each +side, affording a view of narrow feet in elastic-sided cloth boots, and +for three repeats of the tune she stood up to her grandson, and footed +it on the coach-house floor. What the cloth boots did I could not +exactly follow; they were, as well as I could see, extremely +scientific, while there was hardly so much as a nod from the plumes of +the bonnet. Flurry was also scientific, but his dancing did not alter +my opinion that he was drunk; in fact, I thought he was making rather +an exhibition of himself. They say that that jig was twenty pounds in +Mrs. Knox's pocket at the next rent day; but though this statement is +open to doubt, I believe that if she and Flurry had taken the hat round +there and then she would have got in the best part of her arrears. + +After this the company settled down to business. The dances lasted a +sweltering half-hour, old women and young dancing with equal and +tireless zest. At the end of each the gentlemen abandoned their +partners without ceremony or comment, and went out to smoke, while the +ladies retired to the laundry, where families of teapots stewed on the +long bars of the fire, and Mrs. Mahony cut up mighty "barm-bracks," and +the tea-drinking was illimitable. + +At ten o'clock Mrs. Knox withdrew from the revel; she said that she was +tired, but I have seldom seen any one look more wide awake. I thought +that I might unobtrusively follow her example, but I was intercepted by +Flurry. + +"Yeates," he said seriously, "I'll take it as a kindness if you'll see +this thing out with me. We must keep them pretty sober, and get them +out of this by daylight. I--I have to get home early." + +I at once took back my opinion that Flurry was drunk; I almost wished +he had been, as I could then have deserted him without a pang. As it +was, I addressed myself heavily to the night's enjoyment. Wan with +heat, but conscientiously cheerful, I danced with Miss Maggie Nolan, +with the Castle Knox lady's-maid, with my own kitchenmaid, who fell +into wild giggles of terror whenever I spoke to her, with Mrs. Cadogan, +who had apparently postponed the interesting feat of dancing to her +grave, and did what she could to dance me into mine. I am bound to +admit that though an ex-soldier and a major, and therefore equipped +with a ready-made character for gallantry, Mrs. Cadogan was the only +one of my partners with whom I conversed with any comfort. + +At intervals I smoked cigarettes in the yard, seated on the old +mounting-block by the gate, and overheard such conversation about the +price of pigs in Skebawn; at intervals I plunged again into the +coach-house, and led forth a perspiring wallflower into the scrimmage +of a polka, or shuffled meaninglessly opposite to her in the long +double line of dancers who were engaged with serious faces in executing +a jig or a reel, I neither knew nor cared which. Flurry remained as +undefeated as ever; I could only suppose it was his method of showing +that his broken heart had mended. + +"It's time to be making the punch, Masther Flurry," said Denis, as the +harness-room clock struck twelve; "sure the night's warm, and the men's +all gaping for it, the craytures!" + +"What'll we make it in?" said Flurry, as we followed him into the +laundry. + +"The boiler, to be sure," said Crusoe, taking up a stone of sugar, and +preparing to shoot it into the laundry copper. + +"Stop, you fool, it's full of cockroaches!" shouted Flurry, amid +sympathetic squalls from the throng of countrywomen. "Go get a bath!" + +"Sure yerself knows there's but one bath in it," retorted Denis, "and +that's within in the Major's room. Faith, the tinker got his own share +yestherday with the same bath, sthriving to quinch the holes, and they +as thick in it as the stars in the sky, and 'tis weeping still, afther +all he done!" + +"Well, then, here goes for the cockroaches!" said Flurry. "What +doesn't sicken will fatten! Give me the kettle, and come on, you Kitty +Collins, and be skimming them off!" + +There were no complaints of the punch when the brew was completed, and +the dance thundered on with a heavier stamping and a louder hilarity +than before. The night wore on; I squeezed through the unyielding pack +of frieze coats and shawls in the doorway, and with feet that momently +swelled in my pumps I limped over the cobble-stones to smoke my eighth +cigarette on the mounting-block. It was a dark, hot night. The old +castle loomed above me in piled-up roofs and gables, and high up in it +somewhere a window sent a shaft of light into the sleeping leaves of a +walnut-tree that overhung the gateway. At the bars of the gate two +young horses peered in at the medley of noise and people; away in an +outhouse a cock crew hoarsely. The gaiety in the coach-house increased +momently, till, amid shrieks and bursts of laughter, Miss Maggie Nolan +fed coquettishly from it with a long yell, like a train coming out of a +tunnel, pursued by the fascinating Peter Cadogan brandishing a twig of +mountain ash, in imitation of mistletoe. The young horses stampeded in +horror, and immediately a voice proceeded from the lighted window +above, Mrs. Knox's voice, demanding what the noise was, and announcing +that if she heard any more of it she would have the place cleared. + +An awful silence fell, to which the young horses' fleeing hoofs lent +the final touch of consternation. Then I heard the irrepressible +Maggie Nolan say: "Oh God! Merry-come-sad!" which I take to be a +reflection on the mutability of all earthly happiness. + +Mrs. Knox remained for a moment at the window, and it struck me as +remarkable that at 2.30 A.M. she should still have on her bonnet. I +thought I heard her speak to some one in the room, and there followed a +laugh, a laugh that was not a servant's, and was puzzlingly familiar. +I gave it up, and presently dropped into a cheerless doze. + +With the dawn there came a period when even Flurry showed signs of +failing. He came and sat down beside me with a yawn; it struck me that +there was more impatience and nervousness than fatigue in the yawn. + +"I think I'll turn them all out of this after the next dance is over," +he said; "I've a lot to do, and I can't stay here." + +I grunted in drowsy approval. It must have been a few minutes later +that I felt Flurry grip my shoulder. + +"Yeates!" he said, "look up at the roof. Do you see anything up there +by the kitchen chimney?" + +He was pointing at a heavy stack of chimneys in a tower that stood up +against the grey and pink of the morning sky. At the angle where one +of them joined the roof smoke was oozing busily out, and, as I stared, +a little wisp of flame stole through. + +The next thing that I distinctly remember is being in the van of a rush +through the kitchen passages, every one shouting "Water! Water!" and +not knowing where to find it, then up several flights of the narrowest +and darkest stairs it has ever been my fate to ascend, with a bucket of +water that I snatched from a woman, spilling as I ran. At the top of +the stairs came a ladder leading to a trap-door, and up in the dark +loft above was the roar and the wavering glare of flames. + +"My God! That's sthrong fire!" shouted Denis, tumbling down the ladder +with a brace of empty buckets; "we'll never save it! The lake won't +quinch it!" + +The flames were squirting out through the bricks of the chimney, +through the timbers, through the slates; it was barely possible to get +through the trap-door, and the booming and crackling strengthened every +instant. + +"A chain to the lake!" gasped Flurry, coughing in the stifling heat as +he slashed the water at the blazing rafters; "the well's no good! Go +on, Yeates!" + +The organising of a double chain out of the mob that thronged and +shouted and jammed in the passages and yard was no mean feat of +generalship; but it got done somehow. Mrs. Cadogan and Biddy Mahony +rose magnificently to the occasion, cursing, thumping, shoving; and +stable buckets, coal buckets, milk pails, and kettles were unearthed +and sent swinging down the grass slope to the lake that lay in +glittering unconcern in the morning sunshine. Men, women, and children +worked in a way that only Irish people can work on an emergency. All +their cleverness, all their good-heartedness, and all their love of a +ruction came to the front; the screaming and the exhortations were +incessant, but so were also the buckets that flew from hand to hand up +to the loft. I hardly know how long we were at it, but there came a +time when I looked up from the yard and saw that the billows of +reddened smoke from the top of the tower were dying down, and I +bethought me of old Mrs. Knox. + +I found her at the door of her room, engaged in tying up a bundle of +old clothes in a sheet; she looked as white as a corpse, but she was +not in any way quelled by the situation. + +"I'd be obliged to you all the same, Major Yeates, to throw this over +the balusters," she said, as I advanced with the news that the fire had +been got under. "'Pon my honour, I don't know when I've been as vexed +as I've been this night, what with one thing and another! 'Tis a +monstrous thing to use a guest as we've used you, but what could we do? +I threw all the silver out of the dining-room window myself, and the +poor peahen that had her nest there was hurt by an entree dish, and +half her eggs were----" + +There was a curious sound not unlike a titter in Mrs. Knox's room. + +"However, we can't make omelettes without breaking eggs--as they say--" +she went on rather hurriedly; "I declare I don't know what I'm saying! +My old head is confused----" + +Here Mrs. Knox went abruptly into her room and shut the door. +Obviously there was nothing further to do for my hostess, and I fought +my way up the dripping back staircase to the loft. The flames had +ceased, the supply of buckets had been stopped, and Flurry, standing on +a ponderous crossbeam, was poking his head and shoulders out into the +sunlight through the hole that had been burned in the roof. Denis and +others were pouring water over charred beams, the atmosphere was still +stifling, everything was black, everything dripped with inky water. +Flurry descended from his beam and stretched himself, looking like a +drowned chimney-sweep. + +"We've made a night of it, Yeates, haven't we?" he said, "but we've +bested it anyhow. We were done for only for you!" There was more +emotion about him than the occasion seemed to warrant, and his eyes had +a Christy Minstrel brightness, not wholly to be attributed to the dirt +on his face. "What's the time?--I must get home." + +The time, incredible as it seemed, was half-past six. I could almost +have sworn that Flurry changed colour when I said so. + +"I must be off," he said; "I had no idea it was so late." + +"Why, what's the hurry?" I asked. + +He stared at me, laughed foolishly, and fell to giving directions to +Denis. Five minutes afterwards he drove out of the yard and away at a +canter down the long stretch of avenue that skirted the lake, with a +troop of young horses flying on either hand. He whirled his whip round +his head and shouted at them, and was lost to sight in a clump of +trees. It is a vision of him that remains with me, and it always +carried with it the bitter smell of wet charred wood. + +Reaction had begun to set in among the volunteers. The chain took to +sitting in the kitchen, cups of tea began mysteriously to circulate, +and personal narratives of the fire were already foreshadowing the +amazing legends that have since gathered round the night's adventure. +I left to Denis the task of clearing the house, and went up to change +my wet clothes, with a feeling that I had not been to bed for a year. +The ghost of a waiter who had drowned himself in a boghole would have +presented a cheerier aspect than I, as I surveyed myself in the +prehistoric mirror in my room, with the sunshine falling on my unshorn +face and begrimed shirt-front. + +I made my toilet at considerable length, and, it being now nearly eight +o'clock, went downstairs to look for something to eat. I had left the +house humming with people; I found it silent as Pompeii. The sheeted +bundles containing Mrs. Knox's wardrobe were lying about the hall; a +couple of ancestors who in the first alarm had been dragged from the +walls were leaning drunkenly against the bundles; last night's dessert +was still on the dining-room table. I went out on to the hall-door +steps, and saw the entree-dishes in a glittering heap in a nasturtium +bed, and realised that there was no breakfast for me this side of lunch +at Shreelane. + +There was a sound of wheels on the avenue, and a brougham came into +view, driving fast up the long open stretch by the lake. It was the +Castle Knox brougham, driven by Norris, whom I had last seen drunk at +the athletic sports, and as it drew up at the door I saw Lady Knox +inside. + +"It's all right, the fire's out," I said, advancing genially and full +of reassurance. + +"What fire?" said Lady Knox, regarding me with an iron countenance. + +I explained. + +"Well, as the house isn't burned down," said Lady Knox, cutting short +my details, "perhaps you would kindly find out if I could see Mrs. +Knox." + +Lady Knox's face was many shades redder than usual. I began to +understand that something awful had happened, or would happen, and I +wished myself safe at Shreelane, with the bedclothes over my head. + +"If 'tis for the misthress you're looking, me lady," said Denis's voice +behind me, in tones of the utmost respect, "she went out to the kitchen +garden a while ago to get a blasht o' the fresh air afther the night. +Maybe your ladyship would sit inside in the library till I call her?" + +Lady Knox eyed Crusoe suspiciously. + +"Thank you, I'll fetch her myself," she said. + +"Oh, sure, that's too throuble----" began Denis. + +"Stay where you are!" said Lady Knox, in a voice like the slam of a +door. + +"Bedad, I'm best plased she went," whispered Denis, as Lady Knox set +forth alone down the shrubbery walk. + +"But is Mrs. Knox in the garden?" said I. + +"The Lord preserve your innocence, sir!" replied Denis, with seeming +irrelevance. + +At this moment I became aware of the incredible fact that Sally Knox +was silently descending the stairs; she stopped short as she got into +the hall, and looked almost wildly at me and Denis. Was I looking at +her wraith? There was again a sound of wheels on the gravel; she went +to the hall door, outside which was now drawn up Mrs. Knox's +donkey-carriage, as well as Lady Knox's brougham, and, as if overcome +by this imposing spectacle, she turned back and put her hands over her +face. + +"She's gone round to the garden, asthore," said Denis in a hoarse +whisper; "go in the donkey-carriage. 'Twill be all right!" He seized +her by the arm, pushed her down the steps and into the little carriage, +pulled up the hood over her to its furthest stretch, snatched the whip +out of the hand of the broadly-grinning Norris, and with terrific +objurgations lashed the donkey into a gallop. The donkey-boy grasped +the position, whatever it might be; he took up the running on the other +side, and the donkey-carriage swung away down the avenue, with all its +incongruous air of hooded and rowdy invalidism. + +I have never disguised the fact that I am a coward, and therefore when, +at this dynamitical moment, I caught a glimpse of Lady Knox's hat over +a laurustinus, as she returned at high speed from the garden, I slunk +into the house and faded away round the dining-room door. "This minute +I seen the misthress going down through the plantation beyond," said +the voice of Crusoe outside the window, "and I'm afther sending Johnny +Regan to her with the little carriage, not to put any more delay on yer +ladyship. Sure you can see him making all the haste he can. Maybe +you'd sit inside in the library till she comes." + +Silence followed. I peered cautiously round the window curtain. Lady +Knox was looking defiantly at the donkey-carriage as it reeled at top +speed into the shades of the plantation, strenuously pursued by the +woolly dog. Norris was regarding his horses' ears in expressionless +respectability. Denis was picking up the entree-dishes with decorous +solicitude. Lady Knox turned and came into the house; she passed the +dining-room door with an ominous step, and went on into the library. + +It seemed to me that now or never was the moment to retire quietly to +my room, put my things into my portmanteau, and---- + +Denis rushed into the room with the entree-dishes piled up to his chin. + +"She's diddled!" he whispered, crashing them down on the table. He +came at me with his hand out. "Three cheers for Masther Flurry and +Miss Sally," he hissed, wringing my hand up and down, "and 'twas +yerself called for 'Haste to the Weddin'' last night, long life to ye! +The Lord save us! There's the misthress going into the library!" + +Through the half-open door I saw old Mrs. Knox approach the library +from the staircase with a dignified slowness; she had on a wedding +garment, a long white burnous, in which she might easily have been +mistaken for a small, stout clergyman. She waved back Crusoe, the door +closed upon her, and the battle of giants was entered upon. I sat +down--it was all I was able for--and remained for a full minute in +stupefied contemplation of the entree-dishes. + + +Perhaps of all conclusions to a situation so portentous, that which +occurred was the least possible. Twenty minutes after Mrs. Knox met +her antagonist I was summoned from strapping my portmanteau to face the +appalling duty of escorting the combatants, in Lady Knox's brougham, to +the church outside the back gate, to which Miss Sally had preceded them +in the donkey-carriage. I pulled myself together, went down stairs, +and found that the millennium had suddenly set in. It had apparently +dawned with the news that Aussolas and all things therein were +bequeathed to Flurry by his grandmother, and had established itself +finally upon the considerations that the marriage was past praying for, +and that the diamonds were intended for Miss Sally. + +We fetched the bride and bridegroom from the church; we fetched old +Eustace Hamilton, who married them; we dug out the champagne from the +cellar; we even found rice and threw it. + +The hired carriage that had been ordered to take the runaways across +country to a distant station was driven by Slipper. He was shaved; he +wore an old livery coat and a new pot hat; he was wondrous sober. On +the following morning he was found asleep on a heap of stones ten miles +away; somewhere in the neighbourhood one of the horses was grazing in a +field with a certain amount of harness hanging about it. The carriage +and the remaining horse were discovered in a roadside ditch, two miles +farther on; one of the carriage doors had been torn off, and in the +interior the hens of the vicinity were conducting an exhaustive search +after the rice that lurked in the cushions. + + + + + PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN AT + THE PRESS OF THE PUBLISHERS. + + + + +THE NEW NELSON CLASSICS + + +_Over 300 volumes. Cloth gilt. Each 1s. 6d. net._ + + +This famous series, which is now more attractive than ever, contains +many notable modern books, the classics of to-morrow, besides +"classics" in the accepted sense. 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