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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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..917d7d1 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #54900 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/54900) diff --git a/old/54900-0.txt b/old/54900-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index da8215c..0000000 --- a/old/54900-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,9572 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Return of The O'Mahony, by Harold Frederic - -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'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: The Return of The O'Mahony - A Novel - -Author: Harold Frederic - -Illustrator: Warren B. Davis - -Release Date: June 13, 2017 [EBook #54900] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - - - - - - - - -THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY - -_A Novel_ - -By Harold Frederic - -Author Of “The Lawton Girl” “Seth’s Brother’s Wife” Etc. - -With Illustrations By Warren B. Davis. - -New York: G. W. Dillingham Co., Publishers, - -1892 - - -[Illustration: 0010] - -[Illustration: 0011] - - - - -THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY - - - - -CHAPTER I.--THE FATHER OF COMPANY F. - -ZEKE TISDALE was the father of Company F. Not that this title had -ever been formally conferred upon him, or even recognized in terms, but -everybody understood about it. Sometimes Company F was for whole days -together exceedingly proud of the relation--but alas! more often it -viewed its parent with impatient levity, not to say contempt. In either -case, it seemed all the same to Zeke. - -He was by no means the oldest man in the company, at least as -appearances went. Some there were gathered about the camp-fire, this -last night in March of ‘65, who looked almost old enough to be _his_ -father--gray, gaunt, stiff-jointed old fighters, whose hard service -stretched back across four years of warfare to Lincoln’s first call for -troops, and who laughed now grimly over the joke that they had come -out to suppress the Rebellion within ninety days, and had the job still -unfinished on their hands at the end of fourteen hundred. - -But Zeke, though his mud-colored hair and beard bore scarcely a trace -of gray, and neither his placid, unwrinkled face nor his lithe, elastic -form suggested age, somehow produced an impression of seniority upon all -his comrades, young and old alike. He had been in the company from the -beginning, for one thing; but that was not all. It was certain that -he had been out in Utah at the time of Albert Sidney Johnston’s -expedition--perhaps had fought under him. It seemed pretty well -established that before this Mormon episode he had been with Walker in -Nicaragua. Over the mellowing canteen he had given stray hints of even -other campaigns which his skill had illumined and his valor adorned. -Nobody ever felt quite sure how much of this was true--for Zeke had a -child’s disregard for any mere veracity which might mar the immediate -effects of his narratives--but enough passed undoubted to make him the -veteran of the company. And _that_ was not all. - -For cold-blooded intrepidity in battle, for calm, clear-headed rashness -on the skirmish-line, Zeke had a fame extending beyond even his regiment -and the division to which it belonged. Men in regiments from distant -States, who met with no closer bond than that they all wore the badge -of the same army corps, talked on occasion of the fellow in the --th -New York, who had done this, that or the other dare-devil feat, and yet -never got his shoulder-straps. It was when Company F men heard this talk -that they were most proud of Zeke--proud sometimes even to the point of -keeping silence about his failure to win promotion. - -But among themselves there was no secret about this failure. Once the -experiment had been made of lifting Zeke to the grade of corporal--and -the less said about its outcome the better. Still, the truth may as -well be told. Brave as any lion, or whatever beast should best typify -absolute fearlessness in the teeth of deadly peril, Zeke in times of -even temporary peace left a deal to be desired. His personal habits, -or better, perhaps, the absence of them, made even the roughest of his -fellows unwilling to be his tent-mate. As they saw him lounging about -the idle camp, he was shiftless, insubordinate, taciturn and unsociable -when sober, wearisomely garrulous when drunk--the last man out of -four-score whom the company liked to think of as its father. - -And Company F had had nothing to do, now, for a good while. Through the -winter it had lain in its place on the great, steel-clad intrenched -line which waited, jaws open, for the fall of Petersburg. The ready-made -railroad from City Point was at its back, and food was plenty. But now, -as spring came on--the wet, warm Virginian spring, with every meadow -a swamp, every road a morass, every piece of bright-green woodland an -impassable tangle--the strategy of the closing act in the dread drama -sent Company F away to the South and West, into the desolate backwoods -country where no roads existed, and no foraging, be it never so -vigilant, promised food. The movement really reflected Grant’s fear -lest, before the final blow was struck, Lee should retreat into the -interior. But Company F did not know what it meant, and disliked it -accordingly, and, by the end of the third day in its quarters, was both -hungry and quarrelsome. - -Evening fell upon a gloomy, rain-soaked day, which the men had miserably -spent in efforts to avoid getting drenched to the skin, and in devices -to preserve dry spots upon which to sleep at night. Permission to build -a fire, which had been withheld ever since their arrival, had only come -from division headquarters an hour ago; and as they warmed themselves -now over the blaze, biting the savorless hard-tack, and sipping the -greasy fluid of beans and chicory from their tin cups, they still looked -sulkily upon the line of lights which began to dot the ridge on which -they lay, and noted the fact that their division had grown into an army -corps, almost as if it had been a grievance. Distant firing had been -heard all day, but it seemed a part of their evil luck that it _should_ -be distant. - -They stared, too, with a sullen indifference at the spectacle of a -sergeant who entered their camp escorting a half-dozen recruits, and, -with stiff salutation, turned them over to the captain at the door of -his tent. The men of Company F might have studied these bounty-men, -as they stood in file waiting for the company’s clerk to fill out -his receipt, with more interest, had it been realized that they were -probably the very last men to be enrolled by the Republic for the Civil -War. But nobody knew that, and the arrival of recruits was an old -story in the --th New York, which had been thrust into every available -hellpit, it seemed to the men, since that first cruel corner at Bull -Run. So they scowled at the newcomers in their fresh, clean uniforms, -as these straggled doubtfully toward the fire, and gave them no welcome -whatever. - -Hours passed under the black sky, into which the hissing, spluttering -fire of green wood was too despondent to hurl a single spark. The men -stood or squatted about the smoke-ringed pile on rails and fence-boards -which they had laid to save them from the soft mud--in silence broken -only by fitful words. From time to time the monotonous call of the -sentries out in the darkness came to them like the hooting of an owl. -Sharp shadows on the canvas walls of the captain’s tent and the sound of -voices from within told them that the officers were playing poker. -Once or twice some moody suggestion of a “game” fell upon the smoky -air outside, but died away unanswered. It was too wet and muddy and -generally depressing. The low west wind which had risen since nightfall -carried the threat of more rain. - -“Grant ain’t no good, nor any other dry-land general, in this dripping -old swamp of a country,” growled a grizzled corporal, whose mud-laden -heels had slipped off his rail. “The man we want here is Noah. This is -his job, and nobody else’s.” - -“There’d be one comfort in that, anyway,” said another, well read in -the Bible. “When the rain was all over, he set up drinks.” - -“Don’t you make any mistake,” put in a third. “He shut himself up in his -tent, and played his booze solitaire. He didn’t even ask in the officers -of the ark and propose a game.” - -“I--I ‘ve got a small flask with me,” one of the recruits diffidently -began. “I was able to get it to-day at Dinwiddie Court House. Paid more -for it I suppose, than--” - -In the friendly excitement created by the recruit’s announcement, and -his production of a flat, brown bottle, further explanation was lost. -Nobody cared how much he had paid. Two dozen of his neighbors took a -lively interest in what he had bought. The flask made its tour of only -a segment of the circle, amid a chorus of admonitions to drink fair, -and came back flatter than ever and wholly empty. But its ameliorating -effect became visible at once. One of the recruits was emboldened to -tell a story he had heard at City Point, and the veterans consented to -laugh at it. Conversation sprang up as the fire began to crackle under -a shift of wind, and the newcomers disclosed that they all had clean -blankets, and that several had an excess of chewing tobacco. At this -last, all reserve was cleared away. Veterans and recruits spat into the -fire now from a common ground of liking, and there was even some rivalry -to secure such thoughtful strangers as tent-mates. - -Only one of the newcomers stood alone in the muddiest spot of the -circle, before a part of the fire which would not burn. He seemed to -have no share in the confidences of his fellow-recruits. None of their -stories or reminiscences referred to him, and neither they nor any -veteran had offered him a word during the evening. - -He was obviously an Irishman, and it was equally apparent that he had -just landed. There was an indefinable something in the way he stood, in -his manner of looking at people, in the very awkwardness with which -his ill-fitting uniform hung upon him, which spoke loudly of recent -importation. This in itself would have gone some way toward prejudicing -Company F against him, for Castle Garden recruits were rarely popular, -even in the newest regiments. But there was a much stronger reason for -the cold shoulder turned upon him. - -This young man who stood alone in the mud--he could hardly have got half -through the twenties--had a repellent, low-browed face, covered with -freckles and an irregular stubble of reddish beard, and a furtive -squint in his pale, greenish-blue eyes. The whites of these eyes showed -bloodshot, even in the false light of the fire, and the swollen lines -about them spoke plainly of a prolonged carouse. They were not Puritans, -these men of Company F, but with one accord they left Andrew Linsky--the -name the roster gave him--to himself. - -Time came, after the change of guard, when those who were entitled to -sleep must think of bed. The orderly-sergeant strolled up to the fire, -and dropped a saturnine hint to the effect that it would be best to -sleep with one eye open; signs pointed to a battle next day, and the -long roll might come before morning broke. Their brigade was on the -right of a line into which two corps had been dumped during the day, and -apparently this portended the hottest kind of a fight; moreover, it was -said Sheridan was on the other side of the ridge. Everybody knew what -that meant. - -“We ought to be used to hot corners by this time,” said the grizzled -corporal, in comment, “but it’s the deuce to go into ’em on empty -stomachs. We’ve been on half-rations two days.” - -“There’ll be the more to go round among them that’s left,” said the -sergeant, grimly, and turned on his heel. - -The Irishman, pulling his feet with difficulty out of the ooze into -which they had settled, suddenly left his place and walked over to the -corporal, lifting his hand in a sidelong, clumsy salute. - -“Wud ye moind tellin me, sur, where I’m to sleep?” he asked, saluting -again. - -The corporal looked at his questioner, spat meditatively into the -embers, then looked again, and answered, briefly: - -“On the ground.” - -Linsky cast a glance of pained bewilderment, first down at the mud -into which he was again sinking, then across the fire into the black, -wind-swept night. - -“God forgive me for a fool,” he groaned aloud, “to lave a counthry where -even the pigs have straw to drame on.” - -“Where did you expect to sleep--in a balloon?” asked the corporal, with -curt sarcasm. Then the look of utter hopelessness on the other’s -ugly face prompted him to add, in a softer tone; “You must hunt up a -tent-mate for yourself--make friends with some fellow who’ll take you -in.” - -“Sorra a wan’ll be friends wid me,” said the despondent recruit. “I’m -waitin’ yet, the furst dacent wurrud from anny of ’em.” - -The corporal’s face showed that he did not specially blame them for -their exclusiveness, but his words were kindly enough. - -“Perhaps I can fix you out,” he said, and sent a comprehensive glance -round the group which still huddled over the waning fire, on the other -side. - -“Hughie, here’s a countryman of yours,” he called out to a lean, tall, -gray-bearded private who, seated on a rail, had taken off his wet boots -and was scraping the mud from them with a bayonet; “can you take him -in?” - -“I have some one already,” the other growled, not even troubling to lift -his eyes from his task. - -It happened that this was a lie, and that the corporal knew it to be -one. He hesitated for a moment, dallying with the impulse to speak -sharply. Then, reflecting that Hugh O’Mahony was a quarrelsome and -unsociable creature with whom a dispute was always a vexation to the -spirit, he decided to say nothing. - -How curiously inscrutable a thing is chance! Upon that one decision -turned every human interest in this tale, and most of all, the destiny -of the sulky man who sat scraping his boots. The Wheel of Fortune, in -this little moment of silence, held him poised within the hair’s breadth -of a discovery which would have altered his career in an amazing way, -and changed the story of a dozen lives. But the corporal bit his lip and -said nothing. O’Mahony bent doggedly over his work--and the wheel rolled -on. - -The corporal’s eye, roaming about the circle, fell upon the figure of a -man who had just approached the fire and stood in the full glare of -the red light, thrusting one foot close to the blaze, while he balanced -himself on the other. His ragged hair and unkempt beard were of the -color of the miry clay at his feet. His shoulders, rounded at best, were -unnaturally drawn forward by the exertion of keeping his hands in his -pockets, the while he maintained his balance. His face, of which snub -nose and grey eyes alone were visible in the frame of straggling hair -and under the shadow of the battered foragecap visor, wore a pleased, -almost merry, look in the flickering, ruddy light. He was humming a -droning sort of tune to himself as he watched the steam rise from the -wet leather. - -“Zeke’s happy to-night; that means fight tomorrow, sure as God made -little fishes,” said the corporal to nobody in particular. Then he -lifted his voice: - -“Have you got a place in your diggin’s for a recruit, Zeke--say just for -to-night?” he asked. - -Zeke looked up, and sauntered forward to where they stood, hands still -in pockets. - -“Well--I don’t know,” he drawled. “Guess so--if he don’t snore too bad.” - -He glanced Linsky over with indolent gravity. It was plain that he -didn’t think much of him. - -“Got a blanket?” he asked, abruptly. - -“I have that,” the Irishman replied. - -“Anything to drink?” - -Linsky produced from his jacket pocket a flat, brown bottle, twin -brother to that which had been passed about the camp-fire circle earlier -in the evening, and held it up to the light. - -“They called it whiskey,” he said, in apology; “an’ be the price I paid -fur it, it moight a’ been doimonds dissolved in angel’s tears; but the -furst sup I tuk of it, faith, I thought it ’ud tear th’ t’roat from -me!” - -Zeke had already linked Linsky’s arm within his own, and he reached -forth now and took the bottle. - -“It’s p’zen to a man that ain’t used to it,” he said, with a grave wink -to the corporal. “Come along with me, Irish; mebbe if you watch me close -you can pick up points about gittin’ the stuff down without injurin’ -your throat.” - -And, with another wink, Zeke led his new-found friend away from the -fire, picking his steps through the soft mud, past dozens of little -tents propped up with rails and boughs, walking unconsciously toward a -strange, new, dazzling future. - - - - -CHAPTER II--THE VIDETTE POST. - -Zeke’s tent--a low and lop-sided patchwork of old blankets, strips of -wagon-covering and stray pieces of cast-off clothing--was pitched on the -high ground nearest to the regimental sentry line. At its back one could -discern, by the dim light of the camp-fires, the lowering shadows of -a forest. To the west a broad open slope descended gradually, its -perspective marked to the vision this night by red points of light, -diminishing in size as they receded toward the opposite hill’s dead wall -of blackness. Upon the crown of this wall, nearly two miles distant, -Zeke’s sharp eyes now discovered still other lights which had not been -visible before. - -“Caught sight of any Rebs yet since you been here, Irish?” he asked, as -the two stood halted before his tent. - -“I saw some prisoners at what they call City Point, th’ day before -yesterday--the most starved and miserable divils ever I laid eyes on. -That’s what I thought thin, but I know betther now. Sure they were -princes compared wid me this noight.” - -“Well, it’s dollars to doughnuts them are their lights over yonder on -the ridge,” said Zeke. - -“You’ll see enough of ’em to-morrow to last a lifetime.” - -Linksy looked with interest upon the row of dim sparks which now crowned -the whole long crest. He had brought his blanket, knapsack and rifle -from the stacks outside company headquarters, and stood holding them as -he gazed. - -“Faith,” he said at last, “if they’re no more desirous of seeing me than -I am thim, there’s been a dale of throuble wasted in coming so far for -both of us.” - -Zeke, for answer, chuckled audibly, and the sound of this was succeeded -by a low, soft gurgling noise, as he lifted the flask to his mouth and -threw back his head. Then, after a satisfied “A-h!” he said: - -“Well, we’d better be turning in now,” and kicked aside the door-flap of -his tent. - -“And is it here we’re to sleep?” asked Linsky, making out with -difficulty the outlines of the little hut-like tent. - -“I guess there won’t be much sleep about it, but this is our shebang. -Wait a minute.” He disappeared momentarily within the tent, entering it -on all-fours, and emerged with an armful of sticks and paper. “Now you -can dump your things inside there. I’ll have a fire out here in the jerk -of a lamb’s tail.” - -The Irishman crawled in in turn, and presently, by the light of the -blaze his companion had started outside, was able to spread out his -blanket in some sort, and even to roll himself up in it, without -tumbling the whole edifice down. There was a scant scattering of straw -upon which to lie, but underneath this he could feel the chill of the -damp earth. He managed to drag his knapsack under his head to serve as a -pillow, and then, shivering, resigned himself to fate. - -The fire at his feet burned so briskly that soon he began to be -pleasantly conscious of its warmth stealing through the soles of his -thick, wet soles. - -“I’m thinkin’ I’ll take off me boots,” he called out. “Me feet are just -perished wid the cold.” - -“No. You couldn’t get ’em on again, p’r’aps, when we’re called, and I -don’t want any such foolishness as that. When we get out, it’ll have to -be at the drop of the hat--double quick. How many rounds of cartridges -you got?” - -“This bag of mine they gave me is that filled wid ’em the weight of it -would tip an outside car.” - -“Can you shoot?” - -“I don’t know if I can. I haven’t tried that same yet.” - -A long silence ensued, Zeke squatting on a cracker-box beside the fire, -flask in hand, Linsky concentrating his attention upon the warmth at the -soles of his feet, and drowsily mixing up the Galtee Mountains with the -fire-crowned hills of a strange, new world, upon one of which he lay. -Then all at once he was conscious that Zeke had crept into the tent, and -was lying curled close beside him, and that the fire outside had sunk -to a mass of sparkless embers. He half rose from his recumbent posture -before these things displaced his dreams; then, as he sank back again, -and closed his eyes to settle once more into sleep, Zeke spoke: - -“Don’t do that again! You got to lie still here, or you’ll bust the -hull combination. If you want to turn over, tell me, and we’ll flop -together--otherwise you’ll have the thing down on our heads.” There came -another pause, and Linsky almost believed himself to be asleep again. -But Zeke was wakeful. - -“Say, Irish,” he began, “that country of yourn must be a pretty tough -place, if this kind of thing strikes you fellows as an improvement on -it.” - -“Sur,” said Linsky, with sleepy dignity, “ther’s no other counthry on -earth fit to buckle Ireland’s shoe’s--no offence to you.” - -“Yes, you always give us that; but if it’s so fine a place, why in ------- don’t you stay there? What do you all pile over here for?” - -“I came to America on business,” replied Linsky, stiffly. - -“Business of luggin’ bricks up a ladder!” - -“Sur, I’m a solicitor’s clark.” - -“How do you mean--‘Clark?’ Thought your name was Linsky?” - -“It’s what you call ‘clurk’--a lawyer’s clurk--and I’ll be a lawyer -mesilf, in toime.” - -“That’s worse still. There’s seven hundred times as many lawyers here -already as anybody wants.” - -“I had no intintion of stoppin’. My business was to foind a certain -man, the heir to a great estate in Ireland, and thin to returrun; but -I didn’t foind my man--and--sure, it’s plain enough I didn’t returrun, -ayether; and I’ll go to sleep now, I’m thinkin’.” Zeke paid no attention -to the hint. - -“Go on,” he said. “Why didn’t you go back, Irish?” - -“It’s aisy enough,” Linsky replied, with a sigh. “Tin long weeks was -I scurryin’ from wan ind of the land to the other, lukkin’ for this -invisible divil of a Hugh O’Mahony”--Zeke stretched out his feet here -with a sudden movement, unnoted by the other--“makin’ inquiries here, -foindin’ traces there, gettin’ laughed at somewhere else, till me heart -was broke entoirely. ‘He’s in the army,’ says they. ‘Whereabouts?’ says -I. Here, there, everwhere they sint me on a fool’s errand. Plintv of -places I came upon where he had been, but divil a wan where he was; and -thin I gave it up and wint to New York to sail, and there I made some -fri’nds, and wint out wid ’em and they spoke fair, and I drank wid -’em, and, faith, whin I woke I was a soldier, wid brass buttons on -me and a gun; and that’s the truth of it--worse luck! And _now_ I’ll -sleep!” - -“And this Hugh What-d’ye-call-him--the fellow you was huntin’ -after--where did he live before the war?” - -“’Twas up in New York State--a place they call Tecumsy--he’d been a -shoemaker there for years. I have here among me papers all they know -about him and his family there. It wan’t much, but it makes his identity -plain, and that’s the great thing.” - -“And what d’ye reckon has become of him?” - -“If ye ask me in me capacity as solicitor’s clark, I’d say that, for -purposes of law, he’d be aloive till midsummer day next, and thin doy be -process of statutory neglict, and niver know it as long as he lives; but -if you ask me proivate opinion, he’s as dead as a mackerel; and, if he -isn’t, he will be in good toime, and divil a ha’porth of shoe-leather -will I waste more on him. And now good-noight to ye, sur!” - -Linsky fell to snoring before any reply came. Zeke had meant to tell -him that they were to rise at three and set out upon a venturesome -vidette-post expedition together. He wondered now what it was that had -prompted him to select this raw and undrilled Irishman as his comrade in -the enterprise which lay before him. Without finding an answer, his mind -wandered drowsily to another question--Ought O’Mahony to be told of the -search for him or not? That vindictive and sullen Hughie should be heir -to anything seemed an injustice to all good fellows; but heir to what -Linsky called a great estate!--that was ridiculous! What would an -ignorant cobbler like him do with an estate? - -Zeke was not quite clear in his mind as to what an “estate” was, but -obviously it must be something much too good for O’Mahony. And why, sure -enough! Only a fortnight before, while they were still at Fort Davis, -this O’Mahony had refused to mend his boot for him, even though his -frost-bitten toes had pushed their way to the daylight between the sole -and upper. Zeke could feel the toes ache perceptibly as he thought on -this affront. Sleepy as he was, it grew apparent to him that O’Mahony -would probably never hear of that inheritance; and then he went off -bodily into dream-land, and was the heir himself, and violently resisted -O’Mahony’s attempts to dispossess him, and--and then it was three -o’clock, and the sentry was rolling him to and fro on the ground with -his foot to wake him. - -“Sh-h! Keep as still as you can,” Zeke admonished the bewildered Linsky, -when he, too, had been roused to consciousness. “We mustn’t stir up the -camp.” - -“Is it desertin’ ye are?” asked the Irishman, rubbing his eyes and -sitting upright. - -“Sh-h! you fool--no! Feel around for your gun and knapsack and cap, and -bring ’em out,” whispered Zeke from the door of the tent. - -Linsky obeyed mechanically, groping in the utter darkness for what -seemed to him an age, and then crawling awkwardly forth. As he rose to -his feet, he could hardly distinguish his companion standing beside him. -Only faint, dusky pillars of smoke, reddish at the base, gray above, -rising like slenderest palms to fade in the obscurity overhead, showed -where the fires in camp had been. The clouded sky was black as ink. - -“Fill your pockets with cartridges,” he heard Zeke whisper. “We’ll -prob’ly have to scoot for our lives. We don’t want no extra load of -knapsacks.” - -It strained Linsky’s other perceptions even more than it did his sight -to follow his comrade in the tramp which now began. He stumbled over -roots and bushes, sank knee-deep in swampy holes, ran full tilt into -trees and fences, until it seemed to him they must have traveled miles, -and he could hardly drag one foot after the other. The first shadowy -glimmer of dawn fell upon them after they had accomplished a short but -difficult descent from the ridge and stood at its foot, on the edge of -a tiny, alder-fringed brook. The Irishman sat down on a fallen log for a -minute to rest; the while Zeke, as fresh and cool as the morning itself, -glanced critically about him. - -“Yes, here we are,” he said as last. “We can strike through here, get up -the side hill, and sneak across by the hedge into the house afore it’s -square daylight. Come on, and no noise now!” - -Linsky took up his gun and followed once more in the other’s footsteps -as well as might be. The growing light from the dull-gray east made it -a simpler matter now to get along, but he still stumbled so often that -Zeke cast warning looks backward upon him more than once. At last they -reached the top of the low hill which had confronted them. - -It was near enough to daylight for Linsky to see, at the distance of an -eighth of a mile, a small, red farm-house, flanked by a larger barn. -A tolerably straight line of thick hedge ran from close by where they -stood, to within a stone’s throw of the house. All else was open pasture -and meadow land. - -“Now bend your back,” said Zeke. “We’ve got to crawl along up this -side of the fence till we git opposite that house, and then, somehow or -other, work across to it without bein’ seen.” - -“Who is it that would see us?” - -“Why, you blamed fool, them woods there”--pointing to a long strip of -undergrowth woodland beyond the house--“are as thick with Johnnies as a -dog is with fleas.” - -“Thin that house is no place for any dacent man to be in,” said Linsky; -but despite this conviction he crouched down close behind Zeke -and followed him in the stealthy advance along the hedge. It was -back-breaking work, but Linsky had stalked partridges behind the -ditch-walls of his native land, and was able to keep up with his guide -without losing breath. - -“Faith, it’s loike walking down burrds,” he whispered ahead; “only that -it’s two-legged partridges we’re after this toime.” - -“How many legs have they got in Ireland?” Zeke muttered back over his -shoulder. - -“Arrah, it’s milking-stools I had in moind,” returned Linsky, readily, -with a smile. - -“Sh-h! Don’t talk. We’re close now.” - -Sure enough, the low roof and the top of the big square chimney of stone -built outside the red clapboard end of the farmhouse were visible near -at hand, across the hedge. Zeke bade Linsky sit down, and opening the -big blade of a huge jackknife, began to cut a hole through the thorns. -Before this aperture had grown large enough to permit the passage of a -man’s body, full daylight came. It was not a very brilliant affair, this -full daylight, for the morning was overcast and gloomy, and the woods -beyond the house, distant some two hundred yards, were half lost in -mist. But there was light enough for Linsky, idly peering through the -bushes, to discern a grey-coated sentry pacing slowly along the edge of -the woodland. He nudged Zeke, and indicated the discovery by a gesture. - -Zeke nodded, after barely lifting his eyes, and then pursued his -whittling. - -“I saw him when we first come,” he said, calmly. - -“And is it through this hole we’re goin’ out to be kilt?” - -“You ask too many questions, Irish,” responded Zeke. He had finished -his work and put away the knife. He rolled over now to a half-recumbent -posture, folded his hands under his head, and asked: - -“How much bounty did you git?” - -“Is it me? Faith, I was merely a disbursing agent in the thransaction. -They gave me a roll of paper notes, they said, but divil a wan could I -foind when I come to mesilf and found mesilf a soldier. It’s thim new -fri’nds o’ moine that got the bounty.” - -“So you didn’t enlist to git the money?” - -“Sorra a word did I know about enlistin’, or bounty, or anything else, -for four-and-twenty hours afther the mischief was done. Is it money that -’ud recompinse a man for sittin’ here in the mud, waitin’ to be blown -to bits by a whole plantation full of soldiers, as I am here, God help -me? Is it money you say? Faith, I’ve enough to take me back to Cork -twice over. What more do I want? And I offered the half of it to the -captain, or gineral, or whatever he was, to lave me go, when I found -what I’d done; but he wouldn’t hearken to me.” - -Zeke rolled over to take a glance through the hedge. - -“Tell me some more about that fellow you were tryin’ to find,” he said, -with his gaze fixed on the distant sentry. “What’ll happen now that you -haven’t found him?” - -“If he remains unknown until midsummer-day next, the estate goes to some -distant cousins who live convanient to it.” - -“And he can’t touch it after that, s’posin’ he should turn up?” - -“The law of adverse possession is twinty years, and only five of ’em -have passed. No; he’d have a claim these fifteen years yet. But rest -aisy. He’ll never be heard of.” - -“And you wrote and told ’em in Ireland that he couldn’t be found?” - -“That I did--or--Wait now! What I wrote was that he was in the army, and -I was afther searching for him there. Sure, whin I got to New York, what -with the fri’nds and the drink and--and this foine soldiering of moine, -I niver wrote at all. It’s God’s mercy I didn’t lose me papers on top of -it all, or it would be if I was likely ever to git out of this aloive.” - -Zeke lay silent and motionless for a time, watching the prospect through -this hole in the hedge. - -“Hungry, Irish?” he asked at last, with laconic abruptness. - -“I’ve a twist on me like the County Kerry in a famine year.” - -“Well, then, double yourself up and follow me when I give the word. I’ll -bet there’s something to eat in that house. Give me your gun. We’ll put -them through first. That’s it. Now, then, when that fellow’s on t’other -side of the house. _Now!_” - -With lizard-like swiftness, Zeke made his way through the aperture, and, -bending almost double, darted across the wet sward toward the house. - -Linsky followed him, doubting not that the adventure led to certain -death, but hoping that there would be breakfast first. - - - - -CHAPTER III--LINSKY’S BRIEF MILITARY CAREER. - -Zeke, though gliding over the slippery ground with all the speed at -his command, had kept a watch on the further corner of the house. -He straightened himself now against the angle of the projecting, -weather-beaten chimney, and drew a long breath. - -“He didn’t see us,” he whispered reassuringly to Linsky, who had also -drawn up as flatly as possible against the side of the house. - -“Glory be to God!” the recruit ejaculated. - -After a brief breathing spell, Zeke ventured out a few feet, and looked -the house over. There was a single window on his side, opening upon -the ground floor. Beckoning to Linsky to follow, lie stole over to the -window, and standing his gun against the clapboards, cautiously tested -the sash. It moved, and Zeke with infinite pains lifted it to the top, -and stuck his knife in to hold it up. Then, with a bound, he raised -himself on his arms, and crawled in over the sill. - -It was at this moment, as Linsky for the first time stood alone, that -a clamorous outburst of artillery-fire made the earth quiver under his -feet. The crash of noises reverberated with so many echoes from hill -to hill that he had no notion whence they had proceeded, or from what -distance. The whole broad vailey before him, with its sodden meadows and -wet, mist-wrapped forests showed no sign of life or motion. But from -the crest of the ridge which they had quitted before daybreak there rose -now, and whitened the gray of the overhanging clouds, a faint film -of smoke--while suddenly the air above him was filled with a strange -confusion of unfamiliar sounds, like nothing so much as the hoarse -screams of a flock of giant wild-fowl; and then this affrighting babel -ceased as swiftly as it had arisen, and he heard the thud and swish of -splintered tree-tops and trunks falling in the woodland at the back of -the house. The Irishman reasoned it out that they were firing from the -hill he had left, over at the hill upon which he now stood, and was not -comforted by the discovery. - -While he stared at the ascending smoke and listened to the din of the -cannonade, he felt himself sharply poked on the shoulder, and started -nervously, turning swiftly, gun in hand. It was Zeke, who stood at the -window, and had playfully attracted his attention with one of the long -sides of bacon which the army knew as “sow-bellies.” He had secured two -of these, which he now handed out to Linsky; then came a ham and a bag -of meal; and lastly, a twelve-quart pan of sorghum molasses. When the -Irishman had lifted down the last of these spoils, Zeke vaulted lightly -out. - -“Guess we’ll have a whack at the ham,” he said cheerfully. “It’s good -raw.” - -The two gnawed greedily at the smoked slices cut from the thick of the -ham, as became men who had been on short rations. Zeke listened to the -firing, and was visibly interested in noting all that was to be seen -and guessed of its effects and purpose, meanwhile, but the ham was an -effectual bar to conversation. - -Suddenly the men paused, their mouths full, their senses alert. The -sound of voices rose distinctly, and close by, from the other side -of the house. Zeke took up his gun, cocked it, and crept noiselessly -forward to the corner. After a moment’s attentive listening here, and -one swift, cautious peep, he tiptoed back again. - -“Take half the things,” he whispered, pointing to the provisions, “and -we’ll get back again to the fence. There’s too many of ’em for us to -try and hold the house. They’d burn us alive in there!” - -The pan of sorghum fell to Linsky’s care, and Zeke, with both guns and -all the rest in some mysterious manner bestowed about him, made his way, -crouching and with long strides, toward the hedge. He got through the -hole undiscovered, dragging his burden after him. Then he took the -pan over the hedge, while Linsky should in turn crawl through. But the -burlier Irishman caught in the thorns, slipped, and clutched Zeke’s arm, -with the result that the whole contents of the pan were emptied upon -Linsky’s head. - -Then Zeke did an unwise thing. He cast a single glance at the spectacle -his comrade presented--with the thick, dark molasses covering his -cap like an oilskin, soaking into his hair, and streaming down his -bewildered face in streaks like an Indian’s war-paint--and then burst -forth in a resounding peal of laughter. - -On the instant two men in gray, with battered slouch hats and guns, -appeared at the corner of the house, looking eagerly up and down the -hedge for some sign of a hostile presence. Zeke had dropped to his knees -in time to prevent discovery. It seemed to be with a part of the same -swift movement that he lifted his gun, sighted it as it ran through the -thorns, and fired. While the smoke still curled among the branches and -spiked twigs, he had snatched up Linsky’s gun and fire a second shot. -The two men in gray lay sprawling and clutching at the wet grass, one on -top of the other. - -[Illustration: 0039] - -“Quick, Irish! We must make a break!” Zeke hissed at Linsky. “Grab what -you can and run!” - -Linsky, his eyes and mouth full of molasses, and understanding nothing -at all of what had happened, found himself a moment later careering -blindly and in hot haste down the open slope, the ham and the bag of -meal under one arm, his gun in the other hand. A dozen minie-bullets -sang through the damp air about him as he tore along after Zeke, and he -heard vague volleys of cheering arise from the meadow to his right; but -neither stopped his course. - -It was barely three minutes--though to Linsky, at least, it seemed an -interminable while--before the two came to a halt by a clump of trees -on the edge of the ravine. In the shelter of these broad hemlock trunks -they stood still, panting for breath. Then Zeke looked at Linsky again, -and roared with laughter till he choked and went into a fit of coughing. - -The Irishman had thrown down his provisions and gun, and seated himself -on the roots of his tree. He ruefully combed the sticky fluid from his -hair and stubble beard with his fingers now, and strove to clean his -face on his sleeve. Between the native temptation to join in the other’s -merriment and the strain of the last few minutes’ deadly peril, he could -only blink at Zeke, and gasp for breath. - -“Tight squeak--eh, Irish?” said Zeke at last, between dying-away -chuckles. - -“And tell me, now,” Linsky began, still panting heavily, his besmeared -face red with the heat of the chase, “fwat the divil were we doin’ up -there, anny-way? No Linsky or Lynch--’tis the same name--was ever -called coward yet--but goin’ out and defoyin’ whole armies single-handed -is no fit worrk for solicitors’ clarks. Spacheless and sinseless though -I was with the dhrink, sure, if they told me I was to putt down the -Rebellion be meself, I’d a’ had the wit to decloine.” - -“That was a vidette post we were on,” explained Zeke. - -“There’s a shorter name for it--God save us both from goin’ there. But -fwat was the intintion? ’Tis that that bothers me entoirely.” - -“Look there!” was Zeke’s response. He waved his hand comprehensively -over the field they had just quitted, and the Irishman rose to his feet -and stepped aside from his tree to see. - -The little red farm-house was half hidden in a vail of smoke. Dim -shadows of men could be seen flitting about its sides, and from these -shadows shot forth tongues of momentary flame. The upper end of the -meadow was covered thick with smoke, and through this were visible dark -masses of men and the same spark-like flashing of fiery streaks. Along -the line of the hedge, closer to the house, still another wall of smoke -arose, and Linsky could discern a fringe of blue-coated men lying -flat under the cover of the thorn-bushes, whom he guessed to be -sharp-shooters. - -“That’s what we went up there for--to start that thing a-goin’,” said -Zeke, not without pride. “See the guide--that little flag there by the -bushes? That’s our regiment. They was comin’ up as we skedaddled out. -Didn’t yeh hear ’em cheer? They was cheerin’ for us, Irish--that is, -some for us and a good deal for the sow-bellies and ham.” - -No answer came, and Zeke stood for a moment longer, taking in with his -practiced gaze the details of the fight that was raging before him. -Half-spent bullets were singing all about him, but he seemed to give -them no more thought than in his old Adirondack home he had wasted -on mosquitoes. The din and deafening rattle of this musketry war had -kindled a sparkle in his gray eyes. - -“There they go, Irish! Gad! we’ve got ’em on the run! We kin scoot -across now and jine our men.” - -Still no answer. Zeke turned, and, to his amazement, saw no Linsky -at his side. Puzzled, he looked vaguely about among the trees for an -instant. Then his wandering glance fell, and the gleam of battle died -out of his eyes as he saw the Irishman lying prone at his very feet, his -face flat in the wet moss and rotting leaves, an arm and leg bent -under the prostrate body. So wrapt had Zeke’s senses been in the noisy -struggle outside, he had not heard his comrade’s fall. - -The veteran knelt, and gently turned Linsky over on his back. A -wandering ball had struck him in the throat. The lips were already -colorless, and from their corners a thin line of bright blood had oozed -to mingle grotesquely with the molasses on the unshaven jaw. To -Zeke’s skilled glance it was apparent that the man was mortally -wounded--perhaps already dead, for no trace of pulse or heartbeat -could be found. He softly closed the Irishman’s eyes, and put the -sorghum-stained cap over his face. - -Zeke rose and looked forth again upon the scene of battle. His regiment -had crossed the fence and gained possession of the farm-house, from -which they were firing into the woods beyond. Further to the left, -through the mist of smoke which hung upon the meadow, he could see that -large masses of troops in blue were being pushed forward. He thought he -would go and join his company. He would tell the fellows how well Linsky -had behaved. Perhaps, after the fight was all over, he would lick Hugh -O’Mahony for having spoken so churlishly to him. - -He turned at this and looked down again upon the insensible Linsky. - -“Well, Irish, you had sand in your gizzard, anyway,” he said, aloud. -“I’ll whale the head off ’m O’Mahony, jest on your account.” - -Then, musing upon some new ideas which these words seem to have -suggested, he knelt once more, and, unbuttoning Linsky’s jacket, felt -through his pockets. - -He drew forth a leather wallet and a long linen-lined envelope -containing many papers. The wallet had in it a comfortable looking -roll of green, backs, but Zeke’s attention was bestowed rather upon the -papers. - -“So these would give O’Mahony an estate, eh?” he pondered, half aloud, -turning them over. “It ’ud be a tolerable good bet that he never lays -eyes on ’em. We’ll fix that right now, for fear of accidents.” - -He began to kick about in the leaves, as he rose a second time, thinking -hard upon the problem of what to do with the papers. He had no matches. -He might cut down a cartridge, and get a fire by percussion--but that -would take time. So, for that matter, would digging a hole to bury the -papers. - -All at once his abstracted face lost its lines of labor, and brightened -radiantly. He thrust wallet and envelope into his own pocket, and -smilingly stepped forward once more to see what the field of battle was -like. The farm-house had become the headquarters of a general and -his staff, and the noise of fighting had passed away to the furthest -confines of the woods. - -“This darned old campaign won’t last up’ard of another week,” he said, -in satisfied reverie. “I reckon I’ve done my share in it, and somethin’ -to lap over on the next. Nobody ’ll be a cent the wuss off if I turn -up missin’ now.” - -Gathering up the provisions and his gun, Zeke turned abruptly, and -made his way down the steep side-hill into the forest, each long stride -bearing him further from Company F’s headquarters. - - - - -CHAPTER IV.--THE O’MAHONY ON ERIN’S SOIL. - -It became known among the passengers on the _Moldavian_, an hour or so -before bedtime on Sunday evening, April 23, 1865, that the lights to -be seen in the larboard distance were really on the Irish coast. The -intelligence ran swiftly through all quarters of the vessel. Its truth -could not be doubted; the man on the bridge said that it truly was -Ireland; and if he had not said so, the ship’s barber had. - -Excitement over the news reached its highest point in the steerage, -two-thirds of the inmates of which hung now lovingly upon the port rail -of the forward deck, to gaze with eager eyes at the far-off points of -radiance glowing through the soft northern spring night. - -Farther down the rail, from the obscurity of the jostling throng, a -stout male voice sent up the opening bars of the dear familiar song, -“The Cove of Cork.” The ballad trembled upon the air as it progressed, -then broke into something like sobs, and ceased. - -“Ah, Barney,” a sympathetic voice cried out, “’tis no longer the Cove; -’tis Queenstown they’re after calling it now. Small wandher the song -won’t listen to itself be sung!” - -“But they haven’t taken the Cove away--God bless it!” the other -rejoined, bitterly. “’Tis there, beyant the lights, waitin’ for its -honest name to come back to it when--when things are set right once -more.” - -“Is it the Cove you think you see yonder?” queried another, captiously. -“Thim’s the Fastnet and Cape Clear lights. We’re fifty miles and more -from Cork.” - -“Thin if ’twas daylight,” croaked an old man between coughs, “we’d -be in sight of The O’Mahony’s castles, or what bloody Cromwell left of -them.” - -“It’s mad ye are, Martin,” remonstrated a female voice. “The’re laygues -beyant on Dunmanus Bay. Wasn’t I born mesilf at Durrus?” - -“The O’Mahony of Murrisk is on board,” whispered some one else, -“returnin’ to his estates. I had it this day from the cook’s helper. The -quantity of mate that same O’Mahony’s been ’atin’! An’ dhrink, is it? -Faith, there’s no English nobleman could touch him!” - -On the saloon deck, aft, the interest excited by these distant lights -was less volubly eager, but it had sufficed to break up the card-games -in the smoking-room, and even to tempt some malingering passengers from -the cabins below. Such talk as passed among the group lounging along -the rail, here in the politer quarter, bore, for the most part, upon the -record of the _Moldavian_ on this and past voyages, as contrasted with -the achievements of other steamships. No one confessed to reverential -sensations in looking at the lights, and no one lamented the change -of name which sixteen years before, had befallen the Cove of Cork; -but there was the liveliest speculation upon the probabilities of the -_Bahama_, which had sailed from New York the same day, having beaten -them into the south harbor of Cape Clear, where, in those exciting war -times, before the cable was laid, every ocean steamer halted long enough -to hurl overboard its rubber-encased budget of American news, to be -scuffled for in the swell by the rival oarsmen of the cape, and borne by -the successful boat to the island, where relays of telegraph clerks -then waited day and night to serve Europe with tidings of the republic’s -fight for life. - -This concentration of thought upon steamer runs and records, to the -exclusion of interest in mere Europe, has descended like a mantle upon -the first-cabin passengers of our own later generation. But the voyagers -in the _Moldavian_ had a peculiar warrant for their concern. They had -left America on Saturday, April 15, bearing with them the terrible news -of Lincoln’s assassination in Ford’s Theatre, the previous evening, and -it meant life-long distinction--in one’s own eyes at least--to be the -first to deliver these tidings to an astounded Old World. Eight days’ -musing on this chance of greatness had brought them to a point where -they were prepared to learn with equanimity that the rival _Bahama_ -had struck a rock outside, somewhere. One of their number, a little -Jew diamond merchant, now made himself quite popular by relating his -personal recollections of the calamity which befel her sister ship, the -_Anglia_, eighteen months ago, when she ran upon Blackrock in Galway -harbor. - -One of these first-cabin passengers, standing for a time irresolutely -upon the outskirts of this gossiping group, turned abruptly when the -under-sized Hebrew addressed a part of his narrative to him, and walked -off alone into the shadows of the stern. He went to the very end, and -leaned over the taff-rail, looking down upon the boiling, phosphorescent -foam of the vessel’s wake. He did not care a button about being able to -tell Europe of the murder of Lincoln and Seward--for when they left -the secretary was supposed, also, to have been mortally wounded. His -anxieties were of a wholly different sort. - -He, The O’Mahony of Muirisc, was plainly but warmly clad, with a new, -shaggy black overcoat buttoned to the chin, and a black slouch hat drawn -over his eyes. His face was clean shaven, and remarkably free from lines -of care and age about the mouth and nostrils, though the eyes were -set in wrinkles. The upper part of the face was darker and more -weather-beaten, too, than the lower, from which a shrewd observer might -have guessed that until very recently he had always worn a beard. - -There were half a dozen shrewd observers on board the _Moldavian_ among -its cabin passengers--men of obvious Irish nationality, whose manner -with one another had a certain effect of furtiveness, and who were -described on the ship’s list by distinctively English names, like -Potter, Cooper and Smith; and they had watched the O’Mahony of Muirisc -very closely during the whole voyage, but none of them had had doubts -about the beard, much less about the man’s identity. In truth, they -looked from day to day for him to give some sign, be it never so -slight, that his errand to Ireland was a political one. They were all -Fenians--among the advance guard of that host of Irishmen who returned -from exile at the close of the American War--and they took it for -granted that the solitary and silent O’Mahony was a member of the -Brotherhood. The more taciturn he grew, the more he held aloof, the -firmer became their conviction that his rank in the society was exalted -and his mission important. The very fact that he would not be drawn into -conversation and avoided their company was proof conclusive. They left -him alone, but watched him with lynx-like scrutiny. - -The O’Mahony had been conscious of this ceaseless observation, and he -mused upon it now as he watched the white whirl of churned waters below. -The time was close at hand when he should know whether it had meant -anything or not; there was comfort in that, at all events. He was less -a coward than any other man he knew, but, all the same, this unending -espionage had worn upon his nerve. Doubtless, that was in part because -sea-voyaging was a novelty to him. He had not been ill for a moment. -In fact, he could not remember to have ever eaten and drunk more in -any eight days of his life. If it had not been for the confounded -watchfulness of the Irishmen, he would have enjoyed the whole experience -immensely. But it was evident that they were all in collusion--“in -cahoots,” he phrased it in his mind--and had a common interest in noting -all his movements. What could it mean? Strange as it may seem, The -O’Mahony had never so much as heard of the Fenian Brotherhood. - -He rose from his lounging meditation presently, and sauntered forward -again along the port deck. The lights from the coast were growing more -distinct in the distance, and, as he paused to look, he fancied he could -discern a dark line of shore below them. - -“I suppose your ancistral estates are lyin’ further west, sir,” spoke -a voice at his side. The O’Mahony cast a swift half-glance around, and -recognized one of the suspected spies. - -“Yes, a good deal west,” he growled, curtly. - -The other took no offense. - -“Sure,” he went on, pleasantly, “the O’Mahonys and the O’Driscolls, not -to mintion the McCarthys, chased each other around that counthry yonder -at such a divil of a pace it’s hard tellin’ now which belonged to who.” - -“Yes, we did hustle round considerable,” assented The O’Mahony, with -frigidity. - -“You’re manny years away from Ireland, sir?” pursued the man. - -“Why?” - -“I notice you say ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ It takes a long absence to tache an -Irishman that.” - -“I’ve been away nearly all my life,” said The O’Mahony, sharply--“ever -since I was a little boy and turning on his heel, he walked to the -companionway and disappeared down the stairs. - -“Faith, I’m bettin’ it’s the gineral himself!” said the other, looking -after him. - -***** - -To have one’s waking vision greeted, on a soft, warm April morning, by -the sight of the Head of Kinsale in the sunlight--with the dark rocks -capped in tenderest verdure and washed below by milkwhite breakers; -with the smooth water mirroring the blue of the sky upon its bosom, yet -revealing as well the marbled greens of its own crystalline depths; -with the balmy scents of fresh blossoms meeting and mingling in the -languorous air of the Gulf Stream’s bringing--can there be a fairer -finish to any voyage over the waters of the whole terrestrial ball! - -The O’Mahony had been up on deck before any of his fellow-passengers, -scanning the novel details of the scene before him. The vessel barely -kept itself in motion through the calm waters. The soft land breeze just -availed to turn the black column of smoke rising from the funnel into -a sort of carboniferous leaning tower. The pilot had been taken on -the previous evening. They waited now for the tug, which could be seen -passing Roche’s Point with a prodigious spluttering and splashing of -side-paddles. Before its arrival, the _Moldavian_ lay at rest within -full view of the wonderful harbor--her deck thronged with passengers -dressed now in fine shore apparel and bearing bags and rugs, who bade -each other good-bye with an enthusiasm which nobody believed in, and -edged along as near as possible where the gang-plank would be. - -The O’Mahony walked alone down the plank, rebuffing the porters who -sought to relieve him of his heavy bags. He stood alone at the prow -of the tug, as it waddled and puffed on its rolling way back again, -watching the superb amphitheatre of terraced stone houses, walls, groves -and gardens toward which he had voyaged these nine long days, with an -anxious, almost gloomy face. The Fenians, still closely observing him, -grew nervous with fear that this depression forboded a discovery of -contra-brand arms in his baggage. - -But no scandal arose. The custom officers searched fruitlessly through -the long platforms covered with luggage, with a half perfunctory and -wholly whimsical air, as if they knew perfectly well that the revolvers -they pretended to be looking for were really in the pockets of the -passengers. Then other good-byes, distinctly less enthusiastic, -were exchanged, and the last bonds of comradeship which life on the -_Moldavian_ had enforced snapped lightly as the gates were opened. - -Everybody else seemed to know where to go. The O’Mahony stood for so -long a time just outside the gates, with his two big valises at his feet -and helpless hesitation written all over his face, that even some of -the swarm of beggars surrounding him could not wait any longer, and went -away giving him up. To the importunities of the others, who buzzed about -him like blue-bottles on a sunny window-pane, he paid no heed; but he -finally beckoned to the driver of the solitary remaining outside car, -who had been flicking his broker, whip invitingly at him, and who now -turned his vehicle abruptly round and drove it, with wild shouts -of factitious warning, straight through the group of mendicants, -overbearing their loud cries of remonstrance with his superior voice, -and cracking his whip like mad. He drew up in front of the bags with -the air of a lord mayor’s coachman, and took off his shapeless hat in -salutation. - -“I want to go to the law office of White & Carmody,” The O’Mahony said, -brusquely. - -[Illustration: 0055] - -“Right, your honor,” the carman answered, dismounting and lifting the -luggage to the well of the car, and then officiously helping his patron -to mount to his sidelong seat. He sprang up on the other side, screamed -“Now thin, Maggie!” to his poor old horse, flipped his whip derisively -at the beggars, and started off at a little dog-trot, clucking loudly as -he went. - -He drove through all the long ascending streets of Queenstown at this -shambling pace, traversing each time the whole length of the town, until -finally they gained the terraced pleasure-road at the top. Here the -driver drew rein, and waved his whip to indicate the splendid scope -of the view below--the gray roof of the houses embowered in trees, the -river’s crowded shipping, the castellated shore opposite, the broad, -island-dotted harbor beyond. - -“L’uk there, now!” he said, proudly. “Have yez annything like that in -Ameriky?” - -The O’Mahony cast only an indifferent glance upon the prospect, - -“Yes--but where’s White & Carmody’s office?” he asked. “That’s what I -want.” - -“Right, your honor,” was the reply; and with renewed clucking and -cracking of the dismantled whip, the journey was resumed. That is to -say, they wound their way back again down the hill, through all the -streets, until at last the car stopped in front of the Queen’s Hotel. - -“Is it thrue what they tell me, sir, that the Prisidint is murdhered?” - the jarvey asked, as they came to a halt. - -“Yes--but where the devil is that law-office?” - -“Sure, your honor, there’s no such names here at all,” the carman -replied, pleasantly. “Here’s the hotel where gintleman stop, an’ I’ve -shown ye the view from the top, an’ it’s plased I am ye had such a clear -day for it--and wud ye like to see Smith-Barry’s place, after lunch?” - -The stranger turned round on his seat to the better comment upon this -amazing impudence, beginning a question harsh of purpose and profane in -form. - -Then the spectacle of the ragged driver’s placidly amiable face and -roguish eye; of the funny old horse, like nothing so much in all the -world as an ancient hair-trunk with legs at the corners, yet which -was driven with the noise and ostentation of a six-horse team; of the -harness tied up with ropes; the tumble-down car; the broken whip; the -beggars--all this, by a happy chance, suddenly struck The O’Mahony in a -humorous light. Even as his angered words were on the air he smiled in -spite of himself. It was a gaunt, reluctant smile, the merest curling -of the lips at their corners; but it sufficed in a twinkling to surround -him with beaming faces. He laughed aloud at this, and on the instant -driver and beggars were convulsed with merriment. - -The O’Mahony jumped off the car. - -“I’ll run into the hotel and find out where I want to go,” he said. -“Wait here.” - -Two minutes passed. - -“These lawyers live in Cork,” he explained on his return. “It seems this -is only Queenstown. I want you to go to Cork with me.” - -“Right, your honor,” said the driver, snapping his whip in preparation. - -“But I don’t want to drive; it’s too much like a funeral. We ain’t -a-buryin’ anybody.” - -“Is it Maggie your honor manes? Sure, there’s no finer quality of a mare -in County Cork, if she only gets dacent encouragement.” - -“Yes; but we ain’t got time to encourage her. Go and put her out, and -hustle back here as quick as you can. I’ll pay you a good day’s wages. -Hurry, now; we’ll go by train.” - -The O’Mahony distributed small silver among the beggars the while he -waited in front of the hotel. - -“That laugh was worth a hundred dollars to me,” he said, more to himself -than to the beggars. “I hain’t laughed before since Linsky spilt the -molasses over his head.” - - - - -CHAPTER V.--THE INSTALLATION OF JERRY. - -The visit to White & Carmody’s law-office had weighed heavily upon the -mind of The O’Mahony during the whole voyage across the Atlantic, and -it still was the burden of his thoughts as he sat beside Jerry -Higgins--this he learned to be the car-driver’s name--in the train which -rushed up the side of the Lea toward Cork. The first-class compartment -to which Jerry had led the way was crowded with people who had arrived -by the _Moldavian_, and who scowled at their late fellow-passenger -for having imposed upon them the unsavory presence of the carman. The -O’Mahony was too deeply occupied with his own business to observe this. -Jerry smiled blandly into the hostile faces, and hummed a “come-all-ye” - to himself. - -When, an hour or so after their arrival, The O’Mahony emerged from the -lawyers’ office the waiting Jerry scarcely knew him for the same man. -The black felt hat, which had been pulled down over his brows, rested -with easy confidence now well back on his head; his gray eyes twinkled -with a pleasant light; the long face had lost its drawn lines and -saturnine expression, and reflected content instead. - -“Come along somewhere where we can get a drink,” he said to Jerry; but -stopped before they had taken a dozen steps, attracted by the sign and -street-show of a second-hand clothing shop. “Or no,” he said, “come -in here first, and I’ll kind o’ spruce you up a bit so’t you can pass -muster in society.” - -When they came upon the street again, it was Jerry who was even more -strikingly metamorphosed. The captious eye of one whose soul is in -clothes might have discerned that the garments he now wore had not been -originally designed for Jerry. The sleeves of the coat were a trifle -long; the legs of the trousers just a suspicion short. But the smile -with which he surveyed the passing reflections of his improved image in -the shop-windows was all his own. He strode along jauntily, carrying the -heavy bags as if they had been mere featherweight parcels. - -The two made their way to a small tavern near the quays, which Jerry -knew of, and where The O’Mahony ordered a room, with a fire in it, and a -comfortable meal to be laid therein at once. - -“Sure, it’s not becomin’ that I should ate along wid your honor,” Jerry -remonstrated, when they had been left alone in the dingy little chamber, -overlooking the street and the docks beyond. - -At this protest The O’Mahony lifted his brows in unaffected surprise. - -“What’s the matter with _you?_” he asked, half-derisively; and no more -was said on the subject. - -No more was said on any subject, for that matter, until fish had -succeeded soup, and the waiter was making ready for a third course. Then -the founder of the feast said to this menial: - -“See here, you, don’t play this on me! Jest tote in whatever more you’ve -got, an’ put er down, an’ git out. We don’t want you bobbin’ in here -every second minute, all the afternoon.” - -The waiter, with an aggrieved air, brought in presently a tray loaded -with dishes, which he plumped down all over The O’Mahony’s half of the -table. - -“That’s somethin’ like it,” said that gentleman, approvingly; “you’ll -get the hang of your business in time, young man,” as the servant left -the room. Then he heaped up Jerry’s plate and his own, ruminated over a -mouthful or two, with his eyes searching the other’s face--and began to -speak. - -“Do you know what made me take a shine to you?” he asked, and then made -answer: “’Twas on account of your dodrotted infernal cheek. It made me -laugh--an’ I’d got so it seemed as if I wasn’t never goin’ to laugh any -more. That’s why I cottoned to you--an’ got a notion you was jest the -kind o’ fellow I wanted. D’ye know who I am?” - -Jerry’s quizzical eyes studied his companion’s face in turn, first -doubtingly, then with an air of reassurance. - -“I do not, your honor,” he said at last, visibly restraining the -impulse to say a great deal more. - -“I’m the O’Mahony of Murrisk, an’ I’m returnin’ to my estates.” - -Jerry did prolonged but successful battle once more with his sense of -humor and loquacious instincts. - -“All right, your honor,” he said, with humility. - -“Maybe I don’t look like an Irishman or talk like one,” the other went -on, “but that’s because I was taken to America when I was a little -shaver, knee-high to a grasshopper, an’ my folks didn’t keep up no -connection with Irishmen. That’s how I lost my grip on the hull Ireland -business, don’t you see?” - -“Sure, your honor, it’s as clear as Spike Island in the sunshine.” - -“Well, that’s how it was. And now my relations over here have died -off--that is, all that stood in front of me--and so the estates come to -me, and I’m The O’Mahony.” - -“An’ it’s proud ivery mother’s son of your tin-ints ‘ll be at that same, -your honor.” - -“At first, of course, I didn’t know but the lawyers ’ud make a kick -when I turned up and claimed the thing. Generally you have to go to -law, an’ take your oath, an’ fight everybody. But, pshaw! why they jest -swallered me slick’n clean, as if I’d had my ears pinned back an’ be’n -greased all over. Never asked ‘ah,’ ‘yes,’ or ‘no.’ Didn’t raise a -single question. I guess there ain’t no White in the business now. I -didn’t see him or hear anything about him. But Carmody’s a reg’lar old -brick. They wasn’t nothin’ too good for me after he learnt who I was. -But what fetched him most was that I’d seen Abe Lincoln, close -to, dozens o’ times. He was crazy to know all about him, an’ the -assassination, an’ what I thought ’ud be the next move; so’t we hardly -talked about The O’Mahony business at all. An’ it seems ther’s been a -lot o’ shenanigan about it, too. The fellow that came out to America -to--to find me--Linsky his name was--why, darn my buttons, if he hadn’t -run away from Cork, an’ stole my papers along with a lot of others, -countin’ on peddlin’ ’em over there an’ collarin’ the money.” - -“Ah, the thief of the earth!” said Jerry. - -“Well, he got killed there, in about the last battle there was in the -war; an’ ’twas by the finding of the papers on him that--that I came -by my rights.” - -“Glory be to God!” commented Jerry, as he buried his jowl afresh in the -tankard of stout. - -A term of silence ensued, during which what remained of the food was -disposed of. Then The O’Mahony spoke again: - -“Are you a man of family?” - -“Well, your honor, I’ve never rightly, come by the truth of it, -but there are thim that says I’m descinded from the O’Higginses of -Westmeath. I’d not venture to take me Bible oath on it, but--” - -“No, I don’t mean that. Have you got a wife an’ children?” - -“Is it me, your honor? Arrah, what girl that wasn’t blind an’ crippled -an’ deminted wid fits wud take up wid the likes of me?” - -“Well, what is your job down at Queenstown like? Can you leave it right -off, not to go back any more?” - -“It’s no job at all. Sure, I jist take out Mikey Doolan’s car, wid that -thund’rin’ old Maggie, givin’ warnin’ to fall to pieces on the road in -front of me, for friendship--to exercise ’em like. It’s not till every -other horse and ass in Queenstown’s ingaged that anny mortial sow ’ll -ride on my car. An’ whin I gets a fare, why, I do be after that long -waitin’ that--” - -“That you drive ’em up on top of the hill whether they want to go or -not, eh?” asked The O’Mahony, with a grin. - -Jerry took the liberty of winking at his patron in response. - -“Egor! that’s the way of it, your honor,” he said, pleasantly. - -“So you don’t have to go back there at all?” pursued the other. - -“Divila rayson have I for ever settin’ fut in the Cove ag’in, if your -honor has work for me elsewhere.” - -“I guess I can fix that,” said The O’Mahony, speaking more slowly, and -studying his man as he spoke. “You see, I ain’t got a man in this hull -Ireland that I can call a friend. I don’t know nothin’ about your ways, -no more’n a babe unborn. It took me jest about two minutes, after I got -out through the Custom House, to figger out that I was goin’ to need -some one to sort o’ steer me--and need him powerful bad, too. Why, I -can’t even reckon in your blamed money, over here. You call a shillin’ -what we’d call two shillin’s, an’ there ain’t no such thing as a dollar. -Now, I’m goin’ out to my estates, where I don’t know a livin’ soul, an’ -prob’ly they’d jest rob me out o’ my eye-teeth, if I hadn’t got some one -to look after me--some one that knew his way around. D’ye see?” - -The car-driver’s eyes sparkled, but he shook his curly red head with -doubt, upon reflection. - -“You’ve been fair wid me, sir,” he said, after a pause, “an’ I’ll not -be behind you in honesty. You don’t know me at all. What the divil, -man!--why, I might be the most rebellious rogue in all County Cork.” - He scratched his head with added dubiety, as he went on; “An’, for the -matter of that, faith, if you did know me, it’s some one else you’d -take. There’s no one in the Cove that ’ud give me a character.” - -“You’re right,” observed The O’Mahony. “I don’t know you from a side o’ -soleleather. But that’s my style. I like a fellow, or I don’t like him, -and I do it on my own hook, follerin’ my own notions, and just to suit -myself. I’ve been siz’in’ you up, all around, an’ I like the cut o’ your -gib. You might be washed up a trifle more, p’r’aps, and have your hair -cropped; but them’s details. The main point is, that I believe you’ll -act fair and square with me, an see to it that I git a straight deal!” - -“Sir, I’ll go to the end of the earth for you,” said Jerry. He rose, and -by an instinctive movement, the two men shook hands across the table. - -“That’s right,” said The O’Mahony, referring more to the clasping of -hands than to the vow of fealty. “That’s the way I want ’er to stand. -Don’t call me ‘yer honor,’ or any o’ that sort o’ palaver. I’ve been a -poor man all my life. I ain’t used to bossin’ niggers around, or playin’ -off that I’m better’n other folks. Now that I’m returnin’ to my estates, -prob’ly I’ll have to stomach more or less of that sort o’ nonsense. -That’s one of the things I’ll want you to steer me in.” - -“An’ might I be askin’, where are these estates, sir?” - -“So far’s I can make out, they’re near where we come in sight of Ireland -first; it can’t be very far from here. They’re on the seashore--I -know that much. We go to Dunmanway, wherever that is, by the railroad -to-morrow, and there the lawyers have telegraphed to have the agent meet -us. From there on, we’ve got to stage it. The place itself is Murrisk, -beyond Skull--nice, comfortable, soothin’ sort o’ names you Irish have -for your towns, eh?” - -“And what time’ll we be startin’ to-morrow?” - -“The train leaves at noon--that is, for Dunmanway.” - -“Thank God for that,” said Jerry, with a sigh of relief. - -The O’Mahony turned upon him with such an obviously questioning glance -that he made haste to explain: - -“I’ll be bound your honor hasn’t been to mass since--since ye were like -that grasshopper ye spoke about.” - -“Mass--no--how d’ye mean? What is it?” - -“Luk at that, now!” exclaimed Jerry, triumphantly. “See what ’d ’a’ -come to ye if ye’d gone to your estates without knowing the first word -of your Christian obligations! We’ll rise early to-morrow, and I’ll get -ye through all the masses there are in Cork, betune thin an’ midday.” - -“Gad! I’d clean forgotten that,” said The O’Mahony. “An’ now let’s git -out an’ see the town.” - - - - -CHAPTER VI--THE HEREDITARY BARD. - -Two hours and more of the afternoon were spent before The O’Mahony and -his new companion next day reached Dunmanway. - -The morning had been devoted, for the most part, to church-going, and -The O’Mahony’s mind was still confused with a bewildering jumble of -candles, bells and embroidered gowns; of boys in frocks swinging little -kettles of smoke by long chains; of books printed on one side in English -and on the other in an unknown tongue; of strange necessities for -standing, kneeling, sitting all together, at different times, for no -apparent reason which he could discover, and at no word of command -whatever. He meditated upon it all now, as the slow train bumped its -wandering way into the west, as upon some novel kind of drill, which -it was obviously going to take him a long time to master. He had his -moments of despondency at the prospect, until he reflected that if the -poorest, least intelligent, hod-carrying Irishman alive knew it all, -he ought surely to be able to learn it. This hopeful view gaining -predominance at last in his thoughts, he had leisure to look out of the -window. - -The country through which they passed was for a long distance fairly -level, with broad stretches of fair grass-fields and strips of ploughed -land, the soil of which seemed richness, itself. The O’Mahony noted -this, but was still more interested in the fact that stone was the only -building material anywhere in sight. The few large houses, the multitude -of cabins, the high fences surrounding residences, the low fences -limiting farm lands, even the very gateposts--all were of gray stone, -and all as identical in color and aspect as if Ireland contained but a -single quarry. - -The stone had come to be a very prominent feature in the natural -landscape as well, before their journey by rail ended--a cold, wild, -hard-featured landscape, with scant brown grass barely masking the black -of the bog lands, and dying of! at the fringes of gaunt layers of -rock which thrust their heads everywhere upon the vision. The O’Mahony -observed with curiosity that as the land grew poorer, the population, -housed all in wretched hovels, seemed to increase, and the burning -fire-yellow of the furze blossoms all about made lurid mockery of the -absence of crops. - -Dunmanway was then the terminus of the line, which has since been pushed -onward to Bantry. The two travellers got out here and stood almost alone -on the stone platform with their luggage. They were, indeed, the only -first-class passengers in the train. - -As they glanced about them, they were approached by a diminutive man, -past middle age, dressed in a costume which The O’Mahony had seen once -or twice on the stage, but never before in every-day life. He was a -clean-shaven, swarthy-faced little man, lean as a withered bean-pod, and -clad in a long-tailed coat with brass buttons, a long waist-coat, drab -corduroy knee-breeches and gray worsted stockings. On his head he wore a -high silk hat of antique pattern, dulled and rusty with extreme age. He -took this off as he advanced, and looked from one to the other of the -twain doubtingly. - -“Is it The O’Mahony of Muirisc that I have the honor to see before me?” - he asked, his little ferret eyes dividing their glances in hesitation -between the two. - -“I’m your huckleberry,” said The O’Mahony, and held out his hand. - -The small man bent his shriveled form double in salutation, and took the -proffered hand with ceremonious formality. - -“Sir, you’re kindly welcome back to your ancesthral domain,” he said, -with an emotional quaver in his thin, high voice. “All your people are -waitin’ with anxiety and pleasure for the sight of your face.” - -“I hope they’ve got us somethin’ to eat,” said The O’Mahony. “We had -breakfast at daybreak this morning, so’s to work the churches, and -I’m--” - -“His honor,” hastily interposed Jerry, “is that pious he can’t sleep of -a mornin’ for pinin’ to hear mass.” - -The little man’s dark face softened at the information. He guessed -Jerry’s status by it, as well, and nodded at him while he bowed once -more before The O’Mahony. - -“I took the liberty to order some slight refresh-mints at the hotel, -sir, against your coming,” he said. “If you’ll do me the condescinsion -to follow me, I will conduct you thither without delay.” - -They followed their guide, as he, bearing himself very proudly and -swinging his shoulders in rhythm with his gait, picked his way across the -square, through the mud of the pig-market, and down a narrow street of -ancient, evil-smelling rookeries, to the chief tavern of the town--a -cramped and dismal little hostelry, with unwashed children playing with -a dog in the doorway, and a shock-headed stable-boy standing over them -to do with low bows the honors of the house. - -The room into which they were shown, though no whit cleaner than the -rest, had a comfortable fire upon the grate, and a plentiful meal, of -cold meat and steaming potatoes boiled in their jackets, laid on the -table. Jerry put down the bags here, and disappeared before The O’Mahony -could speak. The O’Mahony promptly sent the waiter after him, and upon -his return spoke with some sharpness: - -“Jerry, don’t give me any more of this,” he said. “You can chore it -around, and make yourself useful to me, as you’ve always done; but you -git your meals with me, d’ ye hear? Right alongside of me, every time.” - -Thus the table was laid for three, and the O’Mahony made his companions -acquainted with each other. - -“This is Jerry Higgins,” he explained to the wondering, swart-visaged -little man. “He’s sort o’ chief cook and bottle-washer to the -establishment, but he’s so bashful afore strangers, I have to talk sharp -to him now an’ then. And let’s see--I don’t think the lawyer told me -your name.” - -“I am Cormac O’Daly,” said the other, bowing with proud humility. “An -O’Mahony has had an O’Daly to chronicle his deeds of valor and daring, -to sing his praises of person and prowess, since ages before Kian fought -at Clontarf and married the daughter of the great Brian Boru. Oppression -and poverty, sir, have diminished the position of the bard in most parts -of Ireland, I’m informed. All the O’Dalys that informer times were -bards to The O’Neill in Ulster, The O’Reilly of Brefny, The MacCarthy in -Desmond and The O’Farrell of Annaly--faith, they’ve disappeared from -the face of the earth. But in Muirisc--glory be to the Lord!--. there’s -still an O’Daly to welcome the O’Mahony back and sing the celebration of -his achievements.” - -“Sort o’ song-and-dance man, then, eh?” said The O’Mahony. “Well, after -dinner we’ll push the table back an’ give you a show. But let’s eat -first.” - -The little man for the moment turned upon the speaker a glance of -surprise, which seemed to have in it the elements of pain. Then he -spoke, as if reassured: - -“Ah, sir, in America, where I’m told the Irish are once more a rich and -powerful people, our ancient nobility would have their bards, with -rale harps and voices for singing. But in this poor country it’s only a -mettyphorical existence a bard can have. Whin I spoke the word ‘song,’ -my intintion was allegorical. Sure, ’tis drivin’ you from the house -I’d be after doing, were I to sing in the ginuine maning of the word. -But I have here some small verses which I composed this day, while I was -waitin’ in the pig-market, that you might not be indisposed to listen -to, and to accept.” - -O’Daly drew from his waistcoat pocket a sheet of soiled and crumpled -paper forthwith, on which some lines had been scrawled in pencil. -Smoothing this out upon the table, he donned a pair of big, hornrimmed -spectacles, and proceeded to decipher and slowly read out the following, -the while the others ate and, marveling much, listened: - - -I. - - - “What do the gulls scream as they wheel - - Along Dunmanus’ broken shore? - - What do the west winds, keening shrill, - - Call to each othir for evermore? - - From Muirisc’s reeds, from Goleen’s weeds, - - From Gabriel’s summit, Skull’s low lawn, - - The echoes answer, through their tears, - - ‘O’Mahony’s gone! O’Mahony’s gone!’ - - -II. - - “But now the sunburst brightens all, - - The clouds are lifted, waters gleam, - - Long pain forgotten, glad tears fall, - - At waking from this evil dream. - - The cawing rooks, the singing brooks, - - The zephyr’s sighs, the bee’s soft hum, - - All tell the tale of our delight-- - - O’Mahony’s come! O’Mahony’s come! - - -III. - - - “O’Mahony of the white-foamed coast, - - Of Kinalmeaky’s nut-brown plains, - - Lord of Rosbrin, proud Raithlean’s boast, - - Who over the waves and the sea-mist reigns. - - Let Clancy quake! O’Driscoll shake! - - The O’Casey hide his head in fear! - - While Saxons flee across the sea-- - - O’Mahony’s here! O’Mahony’s here!” - - -The bard finished his reading with a trembling voice, and looked at his -auditors earnestly through moistened eyes. The excitement had brought a -dim flush of color upon his leathery cheeks where the blue-black line of -close shaving ended. - -“It’s to be sung to the chune of ‘The West’s Awake!’” he said at last, -with diffidence. - -“You did that all with your own jack-knife, eh?” remarked the The -O’Mahony, nodding in approbation. “Well, sir, it’s darned good!” - -“Then you’re plased with it, sir?” asked the poet. - -“‘Pleased!’ Why, man, if I’d known they felt that way about it, I’d have -come years ago. ‘Pleased?’ Why it’s downright po’try.” - -“Ah, that it is, sir,” put in Jerry, sympathetically. “And to think of -it that he did it all in the pig-market whiles he waited for us! Egor! -’twould take me the best part of a week to conthrive as much!” - -O’Daly glanced at him with severity. - -“Maybe more yet,” he said, tersely, and resumed his long-interrupted -meal. - -“And you’re goin’ to be around all the while, eh, ready to turn these -poems out on short notice?” the O’Mahony asked. - -“Sir, an O’Daly’s poor talents are day and night at the command of the -O’Mahony of Muirisc,” the bard replied. Then, scanning Jerry, he put a -question: - -“Is Mr. Higgins long with you, sir?” - -“Oh, yes; a long while,” answered The O’Mahony, without a moment’s -hesitation. “Yes--I wouldn’t know how to get along without him--he’s -been one of the family so long, now.” - -The near-sighted poet failed to observe the wink which was exchanged -across the table. - -“The name Higgins,” he remarked, “is properly MacEgan. It is a very -honorable name. They were hereditary Brehons or judges, in both Desmond -and Ormond, and, later, in Connaught, too. The name is also called -O’Higgins and O’Hagan. If you would permit me to suggest, sir,” he went -on, “it would be betther at Muirisc if Mr. Higgins were to resume his -ancestral appellation, and consint to be known as MacEgan. The children -there are that well grounded in Irish history, the name would secure -for him additional respect in their eyes. And moreover, sir, saving Mr. -Higgins’s feelings, I observed that you called him ‘Jerry.’ Now ‘Jerry’ -is appropriate when among intimate friends or relations, or bechune -master and man--and its more ceremonious form, Jeremiah, is greatly -used in the less educated parts of this country. But, sir, Jeremiah is, -strictly speaking, no name for an Irishman at all, but only the cognomen -of a Hebrew bard who followed the Israelites into captivity, like Owen -Ward did the O’Neils into exile. It’s a base and vulgar invintion of the -Saxons--this new Irish Jeremiah--for why? because their thick tongues -could not pronounce the beautiful old Irish name Diarmid or Dermot. -Manny poor people for want of understanding, forgets this now. But in -Muirisc the laste intelligent child knows betther. Therefore, I would -suggest that when we arrive at your ancesthral abode, sir, Mr. Higgins’s -name be given as Diarmid MacEgan.” - -“An’ a foine bould name it is, too!” said Jerry. “Egor! if I’m called -that, and called rigular to me males as well, I’ll put whole inches to -my stature.” - -“Well, O’Daly,” said The O’Mahony, “you just run that part of the show -to suit yourself. If you hear of anything that wants changin’ any time, -or whittlin’ down or bein’ spelt different, you can interfere right then -an’ there without sayin’ anything to me. What I want is to have things -done correct, even if we’re out o’ pocket by it. You’re the agent of the -estate, ain’t you?” - -“I am that, sir; and likewise the postmaster, the physician, the -precepthor, the tax-collector, the clerk of the parish, the poor law -guardian and the attorney; not to mintion the proud hereditary post to -which I’ve already adverted, that of bard and historian to The O’Mahony. -But, sir, I see that your family carriage is at the dure. We’ll be -startin’ now, if it’s your pleazure. It’s a long journey we’ve before -us.” - -When the bill had been called for and paid by O’Daly, and they had -reached the street, The O’Mahony surveyed with a lively interest the -strange vehicle drawn up at the curb before him. In principle it was -like the outside cars he had yesterday seen for the first time, but much -lower, narrower and longer. The seats upon which occupants were expected -to place themselves back to back, were close together, and cushioned -only with worn old pieces of cow-skin. Between the shafts was a shaggy -and unkempt little beast, which was engaged in showing its teeth -viciously at the children and the dog. The whole equipage looked a -century old at the least. - -At the end of four hours the rough-coated pony was still scurrying along -the stony road at a rattling pace. It had galloped up the hills and -raced down into the valleys with no break of speed from the beginning. -The O’Mahony, grown accustomed now to maintaining his seat, thought -he had never seen such a horse before, and said so to O’Daly, who sat -beside him, Jerry and the bag being disposed on the opposite side, and -the driver, a silent, round-shouldered, undersized young man sitting in -front with his feet on the shafts. - -“Ah, sir, our bastes are like our people hereabouts,” replied the -bard--“not much to look at, but with hearts of goold. They’ll run till -they fall. But, sir--halt, now, Malachy!--yonder you can see Muirisc.” - -The jaunting-car stopped. The April twilight was gathering in the clear -sky above them, and shadows were rising from the brown bases of the -mountains to their right. The whole journey had been through a bleak and -desolate moor and bog land, broken here and there by a lonely glen, -in the shelter of which a score of stone hovels were clustered, and to -which all attempts at tillage were confined. - -Now, as The O’Mahony looked, he saw stretched before him, some hundred -feet below, a great, level plain, from which, in the distance, a -solitary mountain ridge rose abruptly. This plain was wedgeshaped, and -its outlines were sharply defined by the glow of evening light upon the -waters surrounding it--waters which dashed in white-breakers against the -rocky coast nearest by, but seemed to lie in placid quiescence on the -remote farther shore. - -It was toward this latter dark line of coast, half-obscured now as -they gazed by rising sea-mists, that O’Daly pointed; and The O’Mahony, -scanning the broad, dusky landscape, made out at last some flickering -sparks of reddish light close to where the waters met the land. - -“See, O’Mahoney, see!” the little man cried, his claw-like hand -trembling as he pointed. “Those lights burned there for Kian when he -never returned from Clontarf, eight hundred years ago; they are burning -there now for you!” - - - - -CHAPTER VII--THE O’MAHONY’S HOME-WELCOME. - -The road from the brow of the hill down to the plain wound in such -devious courses through rock-lined defiles and bog-paths shrouded with -stunted tangles of scrub-trees, that an hour elapsed before The O’Mahony -again saw the fires which had been lighted to greet his return. This -hour’s drive went in silence, for the way was too rough for talk. -Darkness fell, and then the full moon rose and wrapped the wild -landscape in strange, misty lights and weird shadows. - -All at once the car emerged from the obscurity of overhanging trees and -bowlders, and the travellers found themselves in the very heart of the -hamlet of Muirisc. The road they had been traversing seemed to have -come suddenly to an end in a great barn-yard, in the center of which -a bonfire was blazing, and around which, in the reddish flickering -half-lights, a lot of curiously shaped stone buildings, little and big, -old and new, were jumbled in sprawling picturesqueness. - -About the fire a considerable crowd of persons were gathered--thin, -little men in long coats and knee-breeches; old, white-capped women with -large, black hooded cloaks; younger women with crimson petticoats and -bare feet and ankles, children of all sizes and ages clustering about -their skirts--perhaps a hundred souls in all. Though The O’Mahony -had very little poetic imagination or pictorial sensibility, he was -conscious that the spectacle was a curious one. - -As the car came to a stop, O’Daly leaped lightly to the ground, and ran -over to the throng by the bonfire. - -“Now thin!” he called out, with vehemence, “have ye swallowed ye’re -tongues? Follow me now! Cheers for The O’Mahony! Now thin! One--two--” - -The little man waved his arms, and at the signal, led by his piping -voice, the assembled villagers sent up a concerted shout, which filled -the shadowed rookeries round about with rival echoes of “hurrahs” and -“hurroos,” and then broke, like an exploding rocket, into a shower of -high pitched, unintelligible ejaculations. - -Amidst this welcoming chorus of remarks, which he could not understand, -The O’Mahony alighted, and walked toward the fire, closely followed by -Jerry, and by Malachy, the driver, bearing the bags. - -For a moment he almost feared to be overthrown by the spontaneous rush -which the black-cloaked old women made upon him, clutching at his arms -and shoulders and deafening his ears with a babel of outlandish sounds. -But O’Daly came instantly to his rescue, pushing back the eager crones -with vigorous roughness, and scolding them in two languages in sharp -peremptory tones. - -“Back there wid ye, Biddy Quinn! Now thin, ould deludherer, will ye -hould yer pace! Come along out o’ that, Pether’s Mag! Lave his honor a -free path, will ye!” Thus, with stern remonstrance, backed by cuffs -and pushes, O’Daly cleared the way, and The O’Mahony found himself -half-forced, half-guided away from the fire and toward a tall and -sculptured archway, which stood, alone, quite independent of any -adjoining wall, upon the nearest edge of what he took to be the -barnyard. - -Passing under this impressive mediæval gateway, he confronted a strange -pile of buildings, gray and hoar in the moonlight where their surface -was not covered thick with ivy. There were high pinnacles thrusting -their jagged points into the sky line, which might be either chimneys -or watch-towers; there were lofty gabled walls, from which the roofs -had fallen; there were arched window-holes, through which vines twisted -their umbrageous growth unmolested; and side by side with these signs of -bygone ruin, there were puzzling tokens of present occupation. - -A stout, elderly woman, in the white, frilled cap of her district, with -a shawl about her shoulders and a bright-red skirt, stood upon the steps -of what seemed the doorway of a church, bowing to the new-comer. Behind -her, in the hall, glowed the light of a hospitable, homelike fire. - -“It is his honor come back to his own, Mrs. Sullivan,” the stranger -heard O’Daly’s voice call out. - -“And it’s kindly welcome ye are, sir,” said the woman, bowing again. -“Yer honor doen’t remimber me, perhaps. I was Nora O’Mara, thin, in the -day whin ye were a wee bit of a lad, before your father and mother--God -rest their sowls!--crossed the say.” - -“I’m afraid I doen’t jest place you,” said The O’Mahony. “I’m the worst -hand in the world at rememberin’ faces.” - -The woman smiled. - -“Molare! It’s not be me face that anny boy of thirty years back ’ud -recognize me now,” she said, as she led the way for the party into the -house. “There were thim that had a dale of soft-sawderin’ words to spake -about it thin; but they’ve left off this manny years ago.” - -“It’s your cooking and your fine housekeeping that we do be praising now -with every breath, Mrs. Sullivan; and sure that’s far more complimintary -to you than mere eulojums on skin-deep beauty, that’s here to-day -and gone to-morrow, and that was none o’ your choosing at best,” said -O’Daly, as they entered the room at the end of the passage. - -“Thrue for you, Cormac O’Daly,” the housekeeper responded, with -twinkling eyes; “and I’m thinkin’, if we’d all of us the choosin’ of new -faces, what an altered appearance you’d presint, without delay.” - -A bright, glowing bank of peat on the hearth filled the room with cozy -comfort. - -It was a small, square chamber, roofed with blackened oak beams, and -having arched doors and windows. Its walls, partly of stone, partly of -plaster roughly scratched, were whitewashed. The sanded floor was -bare, save for a cowskin mat spread before the fire. A high, -black-wood sideboard at one end of the room, a half-dozen stiffbacked, -uncompromising looking chairs, and a table in the center, heaped with -food, but without a cloth, completed the inventory of visible furniture. - -Mrs. O’Sullivan bustled out of the room, leaving the men together. The -O’Mahony sent a final inquisitive glance from ceiling to uncarpeted -floor. - -“So this is my ranch, eh?” he said, taking off his hat. - -“Sir, you’re welcome to the ancesthral abode of the O’Mahony’s of -Muirisc,” answered O’Daly, gravely. “The room we stand in often enough -sheltered stout Conagher O’Mahony, before confiscation dhrove him forth, -and the ruffian Boyle came in. ’Tis far oldher, sir, than Ballydesmond -or even Dunmanus.” - -“So old, the paper seems to have all come off’n the walls,” said The -O’Mahony. “Well, we’ll git in a rocking-chair or so and a rag-carpet and -new paper, an’ spruce her up generally. I s’pose there’s lots o’ more -room in the house.” - -“Well, sir, rightly spakin’, there is a dale more, but it’s mostly not -used, by rayson of there being no roof overhead. There’s this part -of the castle that’s inhabitable, and there’s a part of the convent -forninst the porch where the nuns live, but there’s more of both, not to -mintion the church, that’s ruined entirely. Whatever your taste in ruins -may plase to be, there’ll be something here to delight you. We have thim -that’s a thousand years old, and thim that’s fallen into disuse -since only last winter. Anny kind you like: Early Irish, pray-Norman, -posht-Norman, Elizabethan, Georgian, or very late Victorian--here -the ruins are for you, the natest and most complate and convanient -altogether to be found in Munster.” - -The eyes of the antiquarian bard sparkled with enthusiasm as he -recounted the architectural glories of Muirisc. There was no answering -glow in the glance of The O’Mahony. - -“I’ll have a look round first thing in the morning,” he said, after the -men had seated themselves at the table. - -A bright-faced, neatly clad girl divided with Mrs. O’Sullivan the task -of bringing the supper from the kitchen beyond into the room; but it was -Malachy, wearing now a curiously shapeless long black coat, instead of -his driver’s jacket, who placed the dishes on the table, and for the -rest stood in silence behind his new master’s chair. - -The O’Mahony grew speedily restless under the consciousness of Malachy’s -presence close at his back. - -“We can git along without him, can’t we?” he asked O’Daly, with a curt -backward nod. - -“Ah, no, sir,” pleaded the other. “The boy ’ud be heart-broken if -ye sint him away. ’Twas his grandfather waited on your great-uncle’s -cousin, The O’Mahony of the Double Teeth; and his father always served -your cousins four times removed, who aich in his turn held the title; -and the old man sorrowed himsilf to death whin the last of ’em -desaysed, and your honor couldn’t be found, and there was no more an -O’Mahony to wait upon. The grief of that good man wud ’a’ brought -tears to your eyes. There was no keeping him from the dhrink day or -night, sir, till he made an ind to him-silf. And young Malachy, sir, -he’s composed of the same determined matarial.” - -“Well, of course, if he’s so much sot on it as all that,” said The -O’Mahony, relenting. “But I wanted to feel free to talk over affairs -with you--money matters and so on; and--” - -“Ah, sir, no fear about Malachy. Not a word of what we do be saying does -he comprehind.” - -“Deef and dumb, eh?” - -“Not at all; but he has only the Irish.” In answer to O’Mahony’s puzzled -look, O’Daly added in explanation: “It’s the glory of Muirisc, sir, that -we hould fast be our ancient thraditions and tongue. In all the place -there’s not rising a dozen that could spake to you in English. And--I -suppose your honor forgets the Irish entoirely? Or perhaps your parents -neglected to tache it to you?” - -“Yes,” said The O’Mahony; “they never taught me any Irish at all; -leastways, not that I remember.” - -“Luk at that now!” exclaimed O’Daly, sadly, as he took more fish upon -his plate. - -“It’s goin’ to be pritty rough sleddin’ for me to git around if nobody -understands what I say, ain’t it?” asked The O’Mahony, doubtfully. - -“Oh, not at all,” O’Daly made brisk reply. “It’s part of my hereditary -duty to accompany you on all your travels and explorations and -incursions, to keep a record of the same, and properly celebrate thim in -song and history. The last two O’Mahonys betwixt ourselves, did nothing -but dhrink at the pig-market at Dunmanway once a week, and dhrink at -Mike Leary’s shebeen over at Ballydivlin the remainding days of the -week, and dhrink here at home on Sundays. To say the laste, this -provided only indifferent opportunities for a bard. But plase the Lord -bether times have come, now.” - -Malachy had cleared the dishes from the board, and now brought forward -a big square decanter, a sugar-bowl, a lemon fresh cut in slices, three -large glasses and one small one. O’Daly at this lifted a steaming copper -kettle from the crane over the fire, and began in a formally ceremonious -and deliberate manner the brewing of the punch. The O’Mahony watched the -operation with vigilance. Then clay pipes and tobacco were produced, and -Malachy left the room. - -“What I wanted to ask about,” said The O’Mahony, after a pause, and -between sips from his fragrant glass, “was this: That lawyer, Carmody, -didn’t seem to know much about what the estate was worth, or how the -money came in, or anything else. All he had to do, he said, was to snoop -around and find out where I was. All the rest was in your hands. What I -want to know is jest where I stand.” - -“Well, sir, that’s not hard to demonsthrate. You’re The O’Mahony of -Muirisc. You own in freehold the best part of this barony--some nine -thousand acres. You have eight-and-thirty tinants by lasehold, at a -total rintal of close upon four hundred pounds; turbary rights bring in -rising twinty pounds; the royalty on the carrigeens bring ten pounds; -your own farms, with the pigs, the barley, the grazing and the butter, -produce annually two hundred pounds--a total of six hundred and thirty -pounds, if I’m not mistaken.” - -“How much is that in dollars?” - -“About three thousand one hundred and fifty dollars, sir.” - -“And that comes in each year?” said The O’Mahony, straightening himself -in his chair. - -“It does that,” said O’Daly; then, after a pause, he added dryly: “and -goes out again.” - -“How d’ye mean?” - -“Sir, the O’Mahonys are a proud and high-minded race, and must live -accordingly. And aich of your ancestors, to keep up his dignity, -borrowed as much money on the blessed land as ever he could raise, till -the inthrest now ates up the greater half of the income. If you net -two hundred pounds a year--that is to say, one thousand dollars--you’re -doing very well indeed. In the mornin’ I’ll be happy to show you all me -books and Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony.” - -“Who’s she?” - -“The sister of the last of The O’Mahonys before you, sir, who married -another of the name only distantly related, and has been a widow these -five years, and would be owner of the estate if her brother had broken -the entail as he always intinded, and never did by rayson that there was -so much dhrinking and sleeping and playing ‘forty-five’ at Mike Leary’s -to be done, he’d no time for lawyers. Mrs. Fergus has been having the -use of the property since his death, sir, being the nearest visible -heir.” - -“And so my comin’ threw her out, eh? Did she take it pritty hard?” - -“Sir, loyalty to The O’Mahony is so imbedded in the brest of every sowl -in Muirisc, that if she made a sign to resist your pretinsions, her own -frinds would have hooted her. She may have some riservations deep down -in her heart, but she’s too thrue an O’Mahony to revale thim.” - -More punch was mixed, and The O’Mahony was about to ask further -questions concerning the widow he had dispossessed, when the door opened -and a novel procession entered the room. - -Three venerable women, all of about the same height, and all clad in a -strange costume of black gowns and sweeping black vails, their foreheads -and chins covered with stiff bands of white linen, and long chains of -beads ending in a big silver-gilt cross swinging from their girdles, -advanced in single file toward the table--then halted, and bowed -slightly. - -O’Daly and Jerry had risen to their feet upon the instant of this -curious apparition, but the The O’Mahony kept his seat, and nodded with -amiability. - -“How d’ do?” he said, lightly. “It’s mighty neighborly of you to run -in like this, without knockin’, or standin’ on ceremony. Won’t you sit -down, ladies? I guess you can find chairs.” - -“These are the Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears, your honor,” O’Daly -hastened to explain, at the same time energetically winking and -motioning to him to stand. - -But The O’Mahony did not budge. - -“I’m glad to see you,” he assured the nuns once more. “Take a seat, -won’t you? O’Daly here’ll mix you up one o’ these drinks o’ his’n, I’m -sure, if you’ll give the word.” - -“We thank you, O’Mahony,” said the foremost of the aged women, in a -deep, solemn voice, but paying no heed to the chairs which O’Daly and -Jerry had dragged forward. “We come solely to do obeisance to you as the -heir and successor of our pious founder, Diarmid of the Fine Steeds, and -to presint to you your kinswoman--our present pupil, and the solitary -hope of our once renowned order.” - -The O’Mahony gathered nothing of her meaning from this lugubrious wail -of words, and glanced over the speaker’s equally aged companions in vain -for any sign of hopefulness, solitary or otherwise. Then he saw that -the hindmost of the nuns had produced, as if from the huge folds of her -black gown, a little girl of six or seven, clad in the same gloomy tint, -whom she was pushing forward. - -The child advanced timidly under pressure, gazing wonderingly at The -O’Mahony, out of big, heavily fringed hazel eyes. Her pale face was made -almost chalk-like by contrast with a thick tangle of black hair, and -wore an expression of apprehensive shyness almost painful to behold. - -The O’Mahony stretched out his hands and smiled, but the child hung -back, and looked not in the least reassured. He asked her name with an -effort at jovialty. - -[Illustration: 0089] - -“Kate O’Mahony, sir,” she said, in a low voice, bending her little knees -in a formal bob of courtesy. - -“And are you goin’ to rig yourself out in those long gowns and vails, -too, when you grow up, eh, siss?” he asked. - -“The daughters of The O’Mahonys of Muirisc, with only here and there a -thrifling exception, have been Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears since the -order was founded here in the year of Our Lord 1191,” said the foremost -nun, stiffly. “After long years, in which it seemed as if the order must -perish, our prayers were answered, and this child of The O’Mahonys was -sent to us, to continue the vows and obligations of the convent, and -restore it, if it be the saints’ will, to its former glory.” - -“Middlin’ big job they’ve cut out for you, eh, siss?” commented The -O’Mahony, smilingly. - -The pleasant twinkle in his eye seemed to attract the child. Her face -lost something of its scared look, and she of her own volition moved a -step nearer to his outstretched hands. Then he caught her up and seated -her on his knee. - -“So you’re goin’ to sail in, eh, an’ jest make the old convent hum -again? Strikes me that’s a pritty chilly kind o’ look-out for a little -gal like you. Wouldn’t you now, honest Injun, rather be whoopin’ round -barefoot, with a nanny-goat, say, an’ some rag dolls, an’--an’--climbin’ -trees an’ huntin’ after eggs in the hay-mow--than go into partnership -with grandma, here, in the nun business?” - -The O’Mahony had trotted the child gently up and down, the while he -propounded his query. Perhaps it was its obscure phraseology which -prompted her to hang her head, and obstinately refuse to lift it even -when he playfully put his finger under her chin. She continued to gaze -in silence at the floor; but if the nuns could have seen her face they -would have noted that presently its expression lightened and its big -eyes flashed, as The O’Mahony whispered something into her ear. The good -women would have been shocked indeed could they also have heard that -something. - -“Now don’t you fret your gizzard, siss,” he had whispered--“you needn’t -be a nun for one solitary darned minute, if you don’t want to be.” - - - - -CHAPTER VIII--TWO MEN IN A BOAT. - -A fishing-boat lay at anchor in a cove of Dun-manus Bay, a hundred rods -from shore, softly rising and sinking with the swell of the tide which -stirred the blue waters with all gentleness on this peaceful June -morning. Two men sat in lounging attitudes at opposite ends of the -little craft, yawning lazily in the sunshine. They held lines in their -hands, but their listless and wandering glances made it evident that -nothing was further from their thoughts than the catching of fish. - -The warm summer air was so clear that the hamlet of Muirisc, whose gray -walls, embroidered with glossy vines, and tiny cottages white with -lime-wash were crowded together on the very edge of the shore, seemed -close beside them, and every grunt and squawk from sty or barn-yard came -over the lapping waters to them as from a sounding-board. The village, -engirdled by steep, sheltering cliffs, and glistening in the sunlight, -made a picture which artists would have blessed their stars for. The two -men in the boat looked at it wearily. - -“Egor, it’s my belafe,” said the fisher at the bow, after what seemed -an age of idle silence, “that the fishes have all follied the byes an’ -gerrels, an’ betaken thimselves to Ameriky.” He pulled in his line, and -gazed with disgust at the intact bait. “Luk at that, now!” he continued. -“There’s a male fit for the holy Salmon of Knowledge himsilf, that -taught Fin MacCool the spache of animals, and divil a bite has the -manest shiner condiscinded to make at it.” - -“Oh, darn the fish!” replied the other, with a long sigh. “I don’t care -whether we catch’ any or not. It’s worth while to come out here even if -we never get a nibble and baked ourselves into bricks, jest to get rid -of that infernal O’Daly.” - -It was The O’Mahony who spake, and he invested the concluding portion -of his remark with an almost tearful earnestness. During the pause which -ensued he chewed vigorously upon the tobacco in his mouth, and spat into -the sea with a stern expression of countenance. - -“I tell you what, Jerry,” he broke out with at last--“I can’t stand much -more of that fellow. He’s jest breakin’ me up piecemeal. I begin to feel -like Jeff Davis--that it ’ud have bin ten dollars in my pocket if I’d -never bin born.” - -“Ah, sure, your honor,” said Jerry, “ye’ll git used to it in time. He -manes for the best.” - -“That’s jest what makes me tired,” rejoined The O’Mahony; “that’s what -they always said about a fellow when he makes a confounded nuisance of -himself. I hate fellows that mean for the best. I’d much rather he -meant as bad as he knew how. P’raps then he’d shut up and mind his own -business, and leave me alone part of the time. It’s bad enough to have -your estate mortgaged up to the eyebrows, but to have a bard piled on -top o’ the mortgages--egad, it’s more’n flesh and blood can stand! I -don’t wonder them other O’Mahonys took to drink.” - -“There’s a dale to be said for the dhrink, your honor,” commented the -other, tentatively. - -“There can be as much said as you like,” said The O’Mahony, with -firmness, “but _doin_’ is a hoss of another color. I’m goin’ to stick to -the four drinks a day an’ two at night; an’ what’s good enough for me’s -good enough for you. That bat of ours the first week we come settled -the thing. I said to myself: ‘There’s goin’ to be one O’Mahony that dies -sober, or I’ll know the reason why!’” - -“Egor, Saint Pether won’t recognize ye, thin,” chuckled Jerry; and the -other grinned grimly in spite of himself. - -“Do you know I’ve bin fig’rin’ to myself on that convent business,” The -O’Mahony mused aloud, after a time, “an’ I guess I’ve pritty well sized -it up. The O’Mahonys started that thing, accordin’ to my notion, jest to -coop up their sisters in, where board and lodgin’ ’ud come cheap, an’ -one suit o’ clothes ’ud last a lifetime, in order to leave more money -for themselves for whisky. I ain’t sayin’ the scheme ain’t got some -points about it. You bar out all that nonsense about bonnets an’ silk -dresses an’ beads an’ fixin’s right from the word go, and you’ve got -’em safe under lock an’ key, so ’t they can’t go gallivantin’ round -an’ gittin’ into scrapes. But I’ll be dodrotted if I’m goin’ to set -still an’ see ’em capture that little gal Katie agin her will. You -hear _me!_ An’ another thing, I’m goin’ to put my foot down about goin’ -to church every mornin’. Once a week’s goin’ to be my ticket right from -now. An’ you needn’t show up any oftener yourself if you don’t want to. -It’s high time we had it out whether it’s me or O’Daly that’s runnin’ -this show.” - -“Sure, rightly spakin’, your honor’s own sowl wouldn’t want no more than -a mass aich Sunday,” expounded Jerry, concentrating his thoughts upon -the whole vast problem of dogmatic theology. “But this is the throuble -of it, you see, sir: there’s the sowls of all thim other O’Mahonys -that’s gone before, that the nuns do be prayin’ for to git out of -purgatory, an’--” - -“That’s all right,” broke in The O’Mahony, “but my motto is: let every -fellow hustle for himself. They’re on the spot, wherever it is, an’ -they’re the best judges of what they want; an’ if they ain’t got sand -enough to sail in an’ git it, I don’t see why I should be routed up out -of bed every mornin’ at seven o’clock to help ’em. To tell the truth, -Jerry, I’m gittin’ all-fired sick of these O’Mahonys. This havin’ dead -men slung at you from mornin’ to night, day in an’ day out, rain or -shine, would have busted up Job himself.” - -“I’m thinking, sir,” said Jerry, with a merry twinkle in his eyes, -“there’s no havin’ annything in this worruld without payin’ for that -same. ’Tis the pinalty of belongin’ to a great family. Egor, since -O’Daly thranslated me into a MacEgan I’ve had no pace of me life, by -rayson of the necessity to demane mesilf accordin’.” - -“Why, darn it all, man,” pursued the other, “I can’t do a solitary -thing, any time of day, without O’Daly luggin’ up what some old rooster -did a thousand years ago. He follows me round like my shadow, blatherin’ -about what Dermid of the Bucking Horses did, an’ what Conn of the Army -Mules thought of doin’ and didn’t, and what Finn of the Wall-eyed Pikes -would have done if he could, till I git sick at my stomach. He won’t let -me lift my ‘finger to do anything, because The O’Mahony mustn’t sile his -hands with work, and I have to stand round and watch a lot of bungling -cusses pretend to do it, when they don’t know any more about the work -than a yellow dog.” - -“Faith, ye’ll not get much sympathy from the gintry of Ireland on _that_ -score,” said Jerry. - -“An’ then that Malachy--he gives me a cramp! he ain’t got a grin in his -whole carcass, an’ he can’t understand a word that I say, so that O’Daly -has that for another excuse to hang around all the while. Take my steer, -Jerry; if anybody leaves you an estate, you jest inquire if there’s a -bard and a hereditary dumb waiter that go with it; an’ if there is, you -jest sashay off somewhere else.” - -“Ah, sir, but an estate’s a great thing.” - -“Yes--to tell about. But now jest look at the thing as she stands. I’m -the O’Mahony an’ all that, an’ I own more land than you can shake a -stick at; but what does it all come to? Why, when the int’rest is paid, -I am left so poor that if churches was sellin’ at two cents apiece, I -couldn’t buy the hinge on a contribution box. An’ then it’s downright -mortifyin’ to me to have to git a livin’ by takin’ things away from -these poverty-stricken devils here. I’m ashamed to look ’em in the -face, knowin’ as I do how O’Daly makes ’em whack up pigs, an’ geese, -an’ chickens, an’ vegetables, an’ fish, not to mention all the money -they can scrape together, just to keep me in idleness. It ain’t fair. -Every time one of ’em comes in, to bring me a peck o’ peas, or a pail -o’ butter, or a shillin’ that he’s managed to earn somewhere, I say to -myself: ‘Ole hoss, if you was that fellow, and he was loafin’ round as -The O’Mahony, you’d jest lay for him and kick the whole top of his head -off, and serve him darned well right, too.’” - -Jerry looked at his master now with a prolonged and serious scrutiny, -greatly differing from his customary quizzical glance. - -“Throo for your honor,” he said at last, in a hesitating way, as if his -remark disclosed only half his thought. - -“Yes, sirree, I’m sourin’ fast on the hull thing,” The O’Mahony -exclaimed. “To do nothin’ all day long but to listen to O’Daly’s yarns, -an’ make signs at Malachy, an’ think how long it is between drinks--that -ain’t no sort o’ life for a white man. Egad! if there was any fightin’ -goin’ on anywhere in the world, darn me if I would not pull up stakes -an’ light out for it. Another six months o’ this, an’ my blood’ll all be -turned to butter-milk.” - -The distant apparition of a sailing-vessel hung upon the outer horizon, -the noon sun causing the white squares of canvas to glow like jewels -upon the satin sheen of the sea. Jerry stole a swift glance at his -companion, and then bent a tong meditative gaze upon the passing -vessel, humming softly to himself as he looked. At last he turned to his -companion with an air of decision. - -“O’Mahony,” he said, using the name thus for the first time, “I’m -resolved in me mind to disclose something to ye. It’s a sacret I’m goin’ -to tell you.” - -He spoke with impressive solemnity, and the other looked up with -interest awakened. - -“Go ahead,” he said. - -“Well, sir, your remarks this day, and what I’ve seen wid me own eyes -of your demaynor, makes it plane that you’re a frind of Ireland. -Now there’s just wan way in the worruld for a frind of Ireland to -demonsthrate his affection--and that’s be enrollin’ himsilf among thim -that’ll fight for her rights. Sir, I’ll thrust ye wid me sacret. I’m a -Fenian.” - -The O’Mahony’s attentive face showed no light of comprehension. The word -which Jerry had uttered with such mystery conveyed no meaning to him at -all at first; then he vaguely recalled it as a sort of slang description -of Irishmen in general, akin to “Mick” and “bogtrotter.” - -“Well, what of it?” he asked, wonderingly. - -Jerry’s quick perception sounded at once the depth of his ignorance. - -“The Fenians, sir,” he explained, “are a great and sacret society, wid -tins of thousands of min enlisted here, an’ in Ameriky, an’ among the -Irish in England, wid intint to rise up as wan man whin the time comes, -an’ free Ireland. It’s a regular army, sir, that we’re raisin’, to -conquer back our liberties, and dhrive the bloody Saxon foriver away -from Erin’s green shores.” - -The O’Mahony let his puzzled gaze wander along the beetling coast-line -of naked rocks. - -“So far’s I can see, they ain’t green,” he said; “they’re black and -drab. An’ who’s this fellow you call Saxon? I notice O’Daly lugs him -into about every other piece o’ po’try he nails me with, evenin’s.” - -“Sir, it’s our term for the Englishman, who oppreases us, an’ dhrives us -to despair, an’ prevints our holdin’ our hieads up amongst the nations -of the earth. Sure, sir, wasn’t all this counthry roundabout for a three -days’ journey belongin’ to your ancesthors, till the English stole it -and sold it to Boyle, that thief of the earth--and his tomb, be the same -token, I’ve seen many a time at Youghal, where I was born. But--awh, -sir, what’s the use o’ talkin’? Sure, the blood o’ the O’Mahonys ought -to stir in your veins at the mere suspicion of an opporchunity to -sthrike a blow for your counthry.” The O’Mahony yawned and stretched his -long arms lazily in the sunshine. - -“Nary a stir,” he said, with an idle half-grin. “But what the deuce is -it you’re drivin’ at anyway?” - -“Sir, I’ve towld ye we’re raisin’ an army--a great, thund’rin’ secret -army--and whin it’s raised an’ our min all dhrilled an’ our guns an’ -pikes all handy--sure, thin we’ll rise and fight. An’ it’s much mistaken -I am in you, O’Mahony, if you’d be contint to lave this fun go on undher -your nose, an’ you to have no hand in it.” - -“Of course I want to be in it,” said The O’Mahony, evincing more -interest. “Only I couldn’t make head or tail of what you was talkin’ -about. An’ I don’t know as I see yet jest what the scheme is. But you -can count me in on anything that’s got gunpowder in it, an’ that’ll give -me somethin’ to do besides list’nin’ to O’Daly’s yawp.” - -“We’ll go to Cork to-morrow, thin, if it’s convanient to you,” said -Jerry, eagerly. “I’ll spake to my ‘B,’ or captain, that is, an’ -inthroduce ye, through him, to the chief organizer of Munster, and sure, -they’ll mak’ ye an’ ‘A,’ the same as a colonel, an’ I’ll get promotion -undher ye--an’, Egor! we’ll raise a rigiment to oursilves entirely--an’ -Muirisc’s the very darlin’ of a place to land guns an’ pikes an’ powdher -for all Ireland--an’ ’tis we’ll get the credit of it, an’ get more -promotion still, till, faith, there’ll be nothin’ too fine for our -askin’, an’ we’ll carry the whole blessed Irish republic around in our -waistcoat pocket. What the divil, man! We’ll make ye presidint, an’ I’ll -have a place in the poliss.” - -“All right,” said The O’Mahony, “we’ll git all the fun there is out of -it; but there’s one thing, mind, that I’m jest dead set about.” .. - -“Ye’ve only to name it, sir, an’ they’ll be de-loighted to plase ye.” - -“Well, it’s this: O’Daly’s got to be ruled out o’ the thing. I’m goin’ -to have one deal without any hereditary bard in it, or I don’t play.” - - - - -CHAPTER IX--THE VOICE OF THE HOSTAGE. - -We turn over now a score of those fateful pages on which Father Time -keeps his monthly accounts with mankind, passing from sunlit June, with -its hazy radiance lying softly upon smooth waters, to bleak and shrill -February--the memorable February of 1867. - -A gale had been blowing outside beyond the headlands all day, and by -nightfall the minor waters of Dunmanus Bay had suffered such prolonged -pulling and hauling and buffeting from their big Atlantic neighbors that -they were up in full revolt, hurling themselves with thunderous roars of -rage against the cliffs of their coast line, and drenching the darkness -with scattered spray. The little hamlet of Muirisc, which hung to its -low, nestling nook under the rocks in the very teeth of this blast, -shivered, soaked to the skin, and crossed itself prayerfully as the wind -shrieked like a banshee about its roofless gables and tower-walls and -tore at the thatches of its clustered cabins. - -The three nuns of the Hostage’s Tears, listening to the storm without, -felt that it afforded an additional justification for the infraction of -their rules which they were for this evening, by no means for the first -time, permitting themselves. Religion itself rebelled against solitude -on such a night. - -Time had been when this convent, enlarged though it was by the piety of -successive generations of early lords of Muirisc, still needed more -room than it had to accommodate in comfort its host of inmates. But that -time, alas! was now a musty tradition of bygone ages. Even before the -great sectarian upheaval of the mid-Tudor period, the ancient family -order of the Hostage’s Tears had begun to decline. I can’t pretend to -give the reason. Perhaps the supply of The O’Mahony’s daughters fell -off; possibly some obscure shift of fashion rendered marriage more -attractive in their eyes. Only this I know, that when the Commissioners -of Elizabeth, gleaning in the monastic stubble which the scythe of Henry -had laid bare, came upon the nuns at Muirisc, whom the first sweep of -the blade had missed, they found them no longer so numerous as they -once had been. Ever since then the order had dwindled visibly. The three -remaining ladies had, in their own extended cloistral career, seen the -last habitable section of the convent fall into disuse and decay, until -now only their own gaunt, stone-walled trio of cells, the school-room, -the tiny chapel, and a chamber still known by the dignified title of the -“reception hall,” were available for use. - -Here it was that a great mound of peat sparkled and glowed on the -hearth, under a capricious draught which now sucked upward with a -whistling swoop whole clods of blazing turf--now, by a contradictory -freak, half-filled the room with choking bog-smoke. Still, even when -eyes were tingling and nostrils aflame, it was better to be here than -outside, and better to have company than be alone. - -Both propositions were shiningly clear to the mind of Corinac O’Daly, -as he mixed a second round of punch, and, peering through the steam from -his glass at the audience gathered by the hearth, began talking again. -The three aged nuns, who had heard him talk ever since he was born, -sat decorously together on a bench and watched him, and listened as -attentively as if his presence were a complete novelty. Their chaplain, -a snuffy, half-palsied little old man, Father Harrington to wit, -dozed and blinked and coughed at the smoke in his chair by the fire as -harmlessly as a house-cat on the rug. Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, a plump and -buxom widow in the late twenties, with a comely, stupid face, framed -in little waves of black, crimped hair pasted flat to the skin, sat -opposite the priest, glass in hand. Whenever the temptation to yawn -became too strong, she repressed it by sipping at the punch. - -“Anny student of the ancient Irish, or I might say Milesian charachter,” - said O’Daly, with high, disputatious voice, “might discern in our -present chief a remarkable proof of what the learned call a reversion -of toypes. It’s thrue what you say, Mother Agnes, that he’s unlike -and teetotally different from anny other O’Mahony of our knowledge -in modhern times. But thin I ask mesilf, what’s the maning of this? -Clearly, that he harks back on the ancesthral tree, and resimbles -some O’Mahony we _don’t_ know about! And this I’ve been to the labor -of thracing out. Now attind to me! ’Tis in your riccords, that four -ginerations afther your foundher, Diarmid of the Fine Steeds, there came -an O’Mahony of Muirisc called Teige, a turbulent and timpistuous man, -as his name in the chronicles, Teige Goarbh, would indicate. ’Tis well -known that he viewed holy things with contimpt. ’Twas he that wint on -to the very althar at Rosscarbery, in the chapel of St. Fachnau Mougah, -or the hairy, and cudgeled wan of the daycons out of the place for the -rayson that he stammered in his spache. ’Twas he that hung his bard, -my ancestor of that period, up by the heels on a willow-tree, merely -because he fell asleep over his punch, afther dinner, and let the -rival O’Dugan bard stale his new harp from him, and lave a broken and -disthressful old insthrumint in its place. Now there’s the rale ancestor -of our O’Mahony. ’Tis as plain as the nose on your face. And--now -I remimber--sure ’twas this same divil of a Teige Goarbh who was -possessed to marry his own cousin wance removed, who’d taken vows here -in this blessed house. ‘Marry me now,’ says he. ‘I’m wedded to the -Lord,’ says she. ‘Come along out o’ that now,’ says he. ‘Not a step,’ -says she. And thin, faith, what did the rebellious ruffian do but -gather all the straw and weeds and wet turf round about, and pile ’em -undernayth, and smoke the nuns out like a swarm o’ bees. Sure, that’s as -like our O’Mahony now as two pays in a pod.” - -As the little man finished, a shifty gust blew down the flue, and sent a -darkling wave of smoke over the good people seated before the fire. They -were too used to the sensation to do more than cough and rub their eyes. -The mother-superior even smiled sternly through the smoke. - -“Is your maning that O’Mahony is at present on the roof, striving to -smoke us out?” she asked, with iron clad sarcasm. - -“Awh, get along wid ye, Mother Agnes,” wheezed the little priest, from -his carboniferous corner. - -“Who would he be afther demanding in marriage here?” - -O’Daly and the nuns looked at their aged and shaky spiritual director -with dulled apprehension. He spoke so rarely, and had a mind so -far removed from the mere vanities and trickeries of decorative. -conversation, that his remark puzzled them. Then, as if through a single -pair of eyes, they saw that Mrs. Fergus had straightened herself in her -chair, and was simpering and preening her head weakly, like a conceited -parrot. - -The mother-superior spoke sharply. - -“And do you flatther yoursilf, Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, that the head of -our house is blowing smoke down through the chimney for _you?_” she -asked. “Sure, if he was, thin, ’twould be a lamint-able waste of -breath. Wan puff from a short poipe would serve to captivate _you!_” - -Cormac O’Daly made haste to bury his nose in his glass. Long -acquaintance with the attitude of the convent toward the marital -tendencies of Mrs. Fergus had taught him wisdom. It was safe to -sympathize with either side of the long-standing dispute when the other -side was unrepresented. But when the nuns and Mrs. Fergus discussed it -together, he sagaciously held his peace. - -“Is it sour grapes you’re tasting, Agnes O’Mahony?” put in Mrs. Fergus, -briskly. In new matters, hers could not be described as an alert mind. -But in this venerable quarrel she knew by heart every retort, innuendo -and affront which could be used as weapons, and every weak point in the -other’s armor. - -“Sour grapes! _me!_” exclaimed the mother-superior, with as lively an -effect of indignation as if this rejoinder had not been flung in her -face every month or so for the past dozen years. “D’ye harken to that, -Sister Blanaid and Sister Ann! It’s _me_, after me wan-and-fifty years -of life in religion, that has this ojus imputation put on me! Whisht -now! don’t demane yourselves by replyin’! We’ll lave her to the -condimnation of her own conscience.” - -The two nuns had made no sign of breaking their silence before this -admonition came, and they gazed now at the peat fire placidly. But the -angered mother-superior ostentatiously took up her beads, and began -whispering to herself, as if her thoughts were already millions of miles -away from her antagonist with the crimped hair and the vacuous smile. - -“It’s persecuting me she’s been these long years back,” Mrs. Fergus -said to the company at large, but never taking her eyes from the -mother-superior’s flushed face; “and all because I married me poor -desaysed husband, instead of taking me vows under her.” - -“Ah, that poor desaysed husband!” Mother Agnes put in, with an ironical -drawl in the words. “Sure, whin he was aloive, me ears were just worn -out with listening to complaints about him! Ah, thin! ’Tis whin we’re -dead that we’re appreciated!” - -“All because I married,” pursued Mrs. Fergus, doggedly, “and wouldn’t -come and lock mesilf up here, like a toad in the turf, and lave me -brothers free to spind the money in riot and luxurious livin’. May be, -if God’s will had putt a squint on me, or given me shoulders a twist -like Danny at the fair, or otherwise disfigured me faytures, I’d have -been glad to take vows. Mortial plainness is a great injucement to -religion.” - -The two nuns scuffled their feet on the stone floor and scowled at the -fire. Mother Agnes put down her beads, and threw a martyr-like glance -upward at the blackened oak roof. - -“Praise be to the saints,” she said, solemnly, “that denied us the -snare of mere beauty without sinse, or piety, or respect for old age, or -humility, or politeness, or gratitude, or--” - -“Very well, thin, Agnes O’Mahony,” broke in Mrs. Fergus, promptly. -“If ye’ve that opinion of me, it’s not becomin’ that I should lave -me daughter wid ye anny longer. I’ll take her meself to Kenmare next -week--the ride over the mountains will do me nervous system a power o’ -good--and _there_ she’ll learn to be a lady.” - -Cormac O’Daly lifted his head and set down his glass. He knew perfectly -well that with this familiar threat the dispute always came to an end. -Indeed, all the parties to the recent contention now of their own accord -looked at him, and resettled themselves in their seats, as if to notify -him that his turn had come round again. - -“I’m far from denying,” he said, as if there had been no interruption at -all, “that our O’Mahony is possessed of qualities which commind him to -the vulgar multichude. It’s thrue that he rejewced rints all over the -estate, and made turbary rights and the carrigeens as free as wather, -and yet more than recouped himself by opening the copper mines beyant -Ardmahon, and laysing thim to a company for a foine royalty. It’s thrue -he’s the first O’Mahony for manny a gineration who’s paid expinses, let -alone putting money by in the bank.” - -“And what more would ye ask?” said Mrs. Fergus. “Sure, whin he’s -done all this, and made fast frinds with every man, women and child -roundabout into the bargain, what more would ye want?” - -“Ah, what’s money, Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony,” remonstrated O’Daly, “and -what’s popularity wid the mere thoughtless peasanthry, if ye’ve no -ancesthral proide, no love and reverence for ancient family thraditions, -no devout desoire to walk in the paths your forefathers trod?” - -“Faith, thim same forefathers trod thim with a highly unsteady step, -thin, bechune oursilves,” commented Mrs. Fergus. - -“But their souls were filled with blessid piety,” said Mother Agnes, -gravely. “If they gave small thought to the matter of money, and loike -carnal disthractions, they had open hands always for the needs of the -church, and of the convint here, and they made holy indings, every soul -of ’em.” - -“And they respected the hereditary functions of their bards,” put in -O’Daly, with a conclusive air. - -At the moment, as there came a sudden lull in the tumult of the storm -outside, those within the reception-room heard a distinct noise of -knocking, which proceeded from beneath the stone-flags at their feet. -Three blows were struck, with a deadened thud as upon wet wood, and then -the astounded listeners heard a low, muffled sound, strangely like a -human voice, from the same depths. - -The tempest’s furious screaming rose again without, even as they -listened. All six crossed themselves mechanically, and gazed at one -another with blanched faces. - -“It is the Hostage,” whispered the mother-superior, glancing -impressively around, and striving to dissemble the tremor which forced -itself upon her lips. “For wan-and-fifty years I’ve been waiting to hear -the sound of him. My praydecessor, Mother Ellen, rest her sowl, heard -him wance, and nixt day the roof of the church fell in. Be the same -token, some new disasther is on fut for us, now.” - -Cormac O’Daly was as frightened as the rest, but, as an antiquarian, he -could not combat the temptation to talk. - -“’Tis now just six hundred and seventy years,” he began, in a husky -voice, “since Diarmid of the Fine Steeds founded this convint, in -expiation of his wrong to young Donal, Prince of Connaught. ’Twas the -custom thin for the kings and great princes in Ireland to sind their -sons as hostages to the palaces of their rivals, to live there as -security, so to spake, for their fathers’ good behavior and peaceable -intintions. ’Twas in this capacity that young Donal O’Connor came -here, but Diarmid thrated him badly--not like his father’s son at -all--and immured him in a dungeon convanient in the rocks. His mother’s -milk was in the lad, and he wept for being parted from her till his -tears filled the earth, and a living well sprung from thim the day he -died. So thin Diarmid repinted and built a convint; and the well bubbled -forth healing wathers so that all the people roundabout made pilgrimages -to it, and with their offerings the O’Mahonys built new edifices till -’twas wan of the grandest convints in Desmond; and none but fay-males -of the O’Mahony blood saying prayers for the sowl of the Hostage.” - -The nuns were busy with their beads, and even Mrs. Fergus bent her head. -At last it was Mother Agnes who spoke, letting her rosary drop. - -“’Twas whin they allowed the holy well to be choked up and lost sight -of among fallen stones that throuble first come to the O’Mahonys,” she -said solemnly. “’Tis mesilf will beg The O’Mahony, on binded knees, to -dig it open again. Worse luck, he’s away to Cork or Waterford with his -boat, and this storm’ll keep him from returning, till, perhaps, the -final disasther falls on us and our house, and he still absinting -himsilf. Wirra! What’s that?” - -The mother-superior had been forced to lift her voice, in concluding, to -make it distinct above the hoarse roar of the elements outside. Even -as she spoke, a loud crackling noise was heard, followed by a crash of -masonry which deafened the listeners’ ears and shook the walls of the -room they sat in. - -With a despairing groan, the three nuns fell to their knees and bowed -their vailed heads over their beads. - - - - -CHAPTER X--HOW THE “HEN HAWK” WAS BROUGHT IN. - -The good people of Muirisc had shut themselves up in their cabins, -on this inclement evening of which I have spoken, almost before the -twilight faded from the storm-wrapt outlines of the opposite coast. If -any adventurous spirit of them all had braved the blast, and stood -out on the cliff to see night fall in earnest upon the scene, perhaps -between wild sweeps of drenching and blinding spray, he might have -caught sight of a little vessel, with only its jib set, plunging and -laboring in the trough of the Atlantic outside. And if the spectacle -had met his eyes, unquestionably his first instinct would have been to -mutter a prayer for the souls of the doomed men upon this fated craft. - -On board the _Hen Hawk_ a good many prayers had already been said. The -small coaster seemed, to its terrified crew, to have shrunk to the size -of a walnut shell, so wholly was it the plaything of the giant waters -which heaved and tumbled about it, and shook the air with the riotous -tumult of their sport. There were moments when the vessel hung poised -and quivering upon the very ridge of a huge mountain of sea, like an -Alpine climber who shudders to find himself balanced upon a crumbling -foot of rock between two awful depths of precipice; then would come the -breathless downward swoop into howling space and the fierce buffeting -of ton-weight blows as the boat staggered blindly at the bottom of the -abyss; then again the helpless upward sweep, borne upon the shoulders -of titan waves which reared their vast bulk into the sky, the dizzy -trembling upon the summit, and the hideous plunge--a veritable nightmare -of torture and despair. - -Five men lay or knelt on deck huddled about the mainmast, clinging -to its hoops and ropes for safety. Now and again, when the vessel -was lifted to the top of the green walls of water, they caught vague -glimpses of the distant rocks, darkling through the night mists, which -sheltered Muirisc, their home--and knew in their souls that they were -never to reach that home alive. The time for praying was past. Drenched -to the skin, choked with the salt spray, nearly frozen in the bitter -winter cold, they clung numbly to their hold, and awaited the end. - -One of them strove to gild the calamity with cheerfulness, by humming -and groaning the air of a “come-all-ye” ditty, the croon of which rose -with quaint persistency after the crash of each engulfing wave had -passed. The others were, perhaps, silently grateful to him--but they -felt that if Jerry had been a born Muirisc man, he could not have done -it. - -At the helm, soaked and gaunt as a water-rat, with his feet braced -against the waist-rails, and the rudder-bar jammed under his arm and -shoulder, was a sixth man--the master and owner of the _Hen Hawk_. The -strain upon his physical strength, in thus by main force holding the -tiller right, had for hours been unceasing--and one could see by his -dripping face that he was deeply wearied. But sign of fear there was -none. - -Only a man brought up in the interior of a country, and who had come to -the sea late in life, would have dared bring this tiny cockle-shell of a -coaster into such waters upon such a coast. The O’Ma-hony might himself -have been frightened had he known enough about navigation to understand -his present danger. As it was, all his weariness could nor destroy -the keen sense of pleasurable excitement he had in the tremendous -experience. He forgot crew and cargo and vessel itself in the splendid -zest of this mad fight with the sea and the storm. He clung to the -tiller determinedly, bowing his head to the rush of the broken waves -when they fell, and bending knees and body this way and that to answer -the wild tossings and sidelong plung-ings of the craft--always with a -light as of battle in his gray eyes. It was ever so much better than -fighting with mere men. - -The gloom of twilight ripened into pitchy darkness, broken only by -momentary gleams of that strange, weird half-light which the rushing -waves generate in their own crests of foam. The wind rose in violence -when the night closed in, and the vessel’s timbers creaked in added -travail as huge seas lifted and hurled her onward through the black -chaos toward the rocks. The men by the mast could every few minutes -discern the red lights from the cottage windows of Muirisc, and -shuddered anew as the glimmering sparks grew nearer. - -Four of these five unhappy men were Muirisc born, and knew the sea as -they knew their own mothers. The marvel was that they had not revolted -against this wanton sacrifice of their lives to the whim or perverse -obstinacy of an ignorant landsman, who a year ago had scarcely known -a rudder from a jib-boom. They themselves dimly wondered at it now, as -they strained their eyes for a glimpse of the fatal crags ahead. They -had indeed ventured upon some mild remonstrance, earlier in the day, -while it had still been possible to set the mainsail, and by long tacks -turn the vessel’s course. But The O’Mahony had received their suggestion -with such short temper and so stern a refusal, that there had been -nothing more to be said--bound to him as Muirisc men to their chief, and -as Fenians to their leader, as they were. And soon thereafter it became -too late to do aught but scud bare-poled before the gale; and now there -was nothing left but to die. - -They could hear at last, above the shrill clamor of wind and rolling -waves, the sullen roar of breakers smashing against the cliffs. They -braced themselves for the great final crash, and muttered fragments of -the Litany of the Saints between clenched teeth. - -A prodigious sea grasped the vessel and lifted it to a towering height, -where for an instant it hung trembling. Then with a leap it made a -sickening dive down, down, till it was fairly engulfed in the whirling -floods which caught it and swept wildly over its decks. A sinister -thrill ran through the stout craft’s timbers, and upon the instant came -the harsh grinding sound of its keel against the rocks. The men shut -their eyes. - -A dreadful second--and lo! the _Hen Hawk_, shaking herself buoyantly -like a fisher-fowl emerging after a plunge, floated upon gently rocking -waters--with the hoarse tumult of storm and breakers comfortably behind -her, and at her sides only the sighing-harp music of the wind in the -sea-reeds. - -“Hustle now, an’ git out your anchor!” called out the cheerful voice of -The O’Mahony, from the tiller. - -The men scrambled from their knees as in a dream. They ran out the -chain, reefed the jib, and then made their way over the flush deck aft, -slapping their arms for warmth, still only vaguely realizing that they -were actually moored in safety, inside the sheltered salt-water marsh, -or _muirisc_, which gave their home its name. - -This so-called swamp was at high tide, in truth, a very respectable -inlet, which lay between the tongue of arable land on which the hamlet -was built and the high jutting cliffs of the coast to the south. Its -entrance, a stretch of water some forty yards in width, was over a bar -of rock which at low tide could only be passed by row-boats. At its -greatest daily depth, there was not much water to spare under the -forty-five tons of the Hen Hawk. She had been steered now in utter -darkness, with only the scattered and confusing lights of the houses -to the left for guidance, unerringly upon the bar, and then literally -lifted and tossed over it by the great rolling wall of breakers. She lay -now tossing languidly on the choppy waters of the marsh, as if breathing -hard after undue exertion--secure at last behind the cliffs. - -The O’Mahony slapped _his_ arms in turn, and looked about him. He -was not in the least conscious of having performed a feat which any -yachtsman in British waters would regard as incredible. - -“Now, Jerry,” he said, calmly, “you git ashore and bring out the boat. -You other fellows open the hatchway, an’ be gittin’ the things out. Be -careful about your candle down-stairs. You know why. It won’t do to -have a light up here on deck. Some of the women might happen to come -out-doors an see us.” - -Without a word, the crew, even yet dazed at their miraculous escape, -proceeded to carry out his orders. The O’Mahony bit from his plug a -fresh mouthful of tobacco, and munched it meditatively, walking up and -down the deck in the darkness, and listening to the high wind howling -overhead. - -The _Hen Hawk_ had really been built at Barnstable, a dozen years -before, for the Devon fisheries, but she did not look unlike those -unwieldy Dutch boats which curious summer visitors watch with unfailing -interest from the soft sands of Scheveningen. - -Her full-flushed deck had been an afterthought, dating back to the -time when her activities were diverted from the fishing to the carrying -industry. The O’Mahony had bought her at Cork, ostensibly for use in -the lobster-canning enterprise which he had founded at Muirisc. -Duck-breasted, squat and thick-lined, she looked the part to perfection. - -The men were busy now getting out from the hold below a score of small -kegs, each wrapped in oil skin swathings, and, after these, more than -a score of long, narrow wooden cases, which, as they were passed up the -little gangway from the glow of candlelight into the darkness, bore -a gloomy resemblance to coffins. An hour passed before the empty boat -returned from shore, having landed its finishing load, and the six men, -stiff and chilled, clumsily swung themselves over the side of the vessel -into it. - -“Sure, it’s a new layse of life, I’m beginnin’,” murmured one of them, -Dominic by name, as he clambered out upon the stone landing-place. “It’s -dead I was intoirely--an’ restricted agin, glory be to the Lord!” - -“Sh-h! You shall have some whisky to make a fresh start on when we’re -through,” said The O’Mahony. “Jerry, you run ahead an’ open the side -door. Don’t make any noise. Mrs. Sullivan’s got ears that can hear grass -growin’. We’ll follow on with the things.” - -The carrying of the kegs and boxes across the village common to the -castle, in which the master bore his full share of work, consumed nearly -another hour. Some of the cottage lights ceased to burn. Not a soul -stirred out of doors. - -The entrance opened by Jerry was a little postern door, access to which -was gained through the deserted and weed-grown church-yard, and the -possible use of which was entirely unsuspected by even the housekeeper, -let alone the villagers at large. The men bore their burdens through -this, traversing a long, low-arched passage-way, built entirely of -stone and smelling like an ancient tomb. Thence their course was down -a precipitous, narrow stairway, winding like the corkscrew stairs of a -tower, until, at a depth of thirty feet or more, they reached a small -square chamber, the air of which was mustiness itself. Here a candle was -fastened in a bracket, and the men put down their loads. Here, too, it -was that Jerry, when the last journey had been made, produced a bottle -and glasses and dispensed his master’s hospitality in raw spirits, which -the men gulped down without a whisper about water. - -“Mind!--day after to-morrow; five o’clock in the morning, sharp!” said -The O’Mahony, in admonitory tones. Then he added, more softly: “Jest -take it easy to-morrow; loaf around to suit yourselves, so long’s you -keep sober. You’ve had a pritty tough day of it Good-night. Jerry’n -me’ll do the rest. Jest pull the door to when you go out.” - -With answering “Good nights,” and a formal hand-shake all around, the -four villagers left the room. Their tired footsteps were heard with -diminishing distinctness as they went up the stairs. - -Jerry turned and surveyed his master from head to foot by the light of -the candle on the wall. - -“O’Mahony,” he said, impressively, “you’re a divil, an’ no mistake!” - -The other put the bottle to his mouth first. Then he licked his lips and -chuckled grimly. - -“Them fellows was scared out of their boots, wasn’t they? An’ you, too, -eh?” he asked. - -“Well, sir, you know it as well as I, the lives of the lot of us would -have been high-priced at a thruppenny-bit.” - -“Pshaw, man! You fellows don’t know what fun is. Why, she was safe as a -house every minute. An’ here I was, goin’ to compliment you on gittin’ -through the hull voyage without bein’ sick once--thought, at last, I was -really goin’ to make a sailor of you.” - -“Egor, afther to-day I’ll believe I’ve the makin’ of annything under -the sun in me--or on top of it, ayther. But, sure, sir, you’ll not deny -’twas timptin’ providence saints’ good-will to come in head over heels -under wather, the way we did?” - -“We _had_ to be here--that’s all,” said The O’Mahony, briefly. “I’ve got -to meet a man tomorrow, at a place some distance from here, sure pop; -and then there’s the big job on next day.” Jerry said no more, and The -O’Mahony took the candle down from the iron ring in the wall. - -“D’ye know, I noticed somethin’ cur’ous in the wall out on the staircase -here as we come down?” he said, bearing the light before him as he moved -to the door. “It’s about a dozen steps up. Here it is! What d’ye guess -that might a-been?” - -The O’Mahony held the candle close to the curved wall, and indicated -with his free hand a couple of regular and vertical seams in the -masonry, about two feet apart, and nearly a man’s height in length. - -“There’s a door there, or I’m a Dutchman,” he said, lifting and lowering -the light in his scrutiny. - -The mediæval builders could have imagined no sight more weird than that -of the high, fantastic shadows thrown upon the winding, well-like walls -by this drenched and saturnine figure, clad in oilskins instead of -armor, and peering into their handiwork with the curiosity of a man -nurtured in a log-cabin. - -“Egor, would it be a dure?” exclaimed the wondering Jerry. - -His companion handed the candle to him, and took from his pocket a big -jack-knife--larger, if anything, than the weapon which had been left -under the window of the little farm-house at Five Forks. He ran the -large blade up and down the two long, straight cracks, tapping the -stonework here and there with the butt of the handle afterward. Finally, -after numerous experiments, he found the trick--a bolt to be pushed down -by a blade inserted not straight but obliquely--and a thick, iron-bound -door, faced with masonry, but with an oaken lining, swung open, heavily -and unevenly, upon some concealed pivots. - -The O’Mahony took the light once more, thrust it forward to make sure of -his footing, and then stepped over the newly-discovered threshold, -Jerry close at his heels. They pushed their way along a narrow and -evil-smelling passage, so low that they were forced to bend almost -double. Suddenly, after traversing this for a long distance, their path -was blocked by another door, somewhat smaller than the other. This gave -forth a hollow sound when tested by blows. - -“It ain’t very thick,” said The O’Mahony. “I’ll put my shoulder against -it. I guess I can bust her open.” - -The resistance was even less than he had anticipated. One energetic -shove sufficed; the door flew back with a swift splintering of rotten -wood. The O’Mahony went stumbling sidelong into the darkness as the -door gave way. At the moment a strange, rumbling sound was heard at -some remote height above them, and then a crash nearer at hand, the -thundering reverberation of which rang with loud echoes through the -vault-like passage. The concussion almost put out the candle, and Jerry -noted that the hand which he instinctively put out to shield the flame -was trembling. - -“Show a light in here, can’t ye?” called out The O’Mahony from the black -obscurity beyond the broken door. “Sounds as if the hull darned castle -’d been blown down over our heads.” - -Jerry timorously advanced, candle well out in front of him. Its small -radiance served dimly to disclose what seemed to be a large chamber, -or even hall, high-roofed and spacious. Its floor of stone flags was -covered with dry mold. The walls were smoothed over with a gray coat of -plastering, whole patches of which had here and there fallen, and more -of which tumbled even now as they looked. They saw that this plastering -had been decorated by zigzag, saw-toothed lines in three or four colors, -now dulled and in places scarcely discernible. The room was irregularly -shaped. At its narrower end was a big, roughly built fireplace, on the -hearth of which lay ashes and some charred bits of wood, covered, like -the stone itself, by a dry film of mold. The O’Mahony held the candle -under the flue. The way in which the flame swayed and pointed itself -showed that the chimney was open. - -Cooking utensils, some of metal, some of pottery, but all alike of -strange form, were bestowed on the floor on either side of the hearth. -There was a single wooden chair, with a high, pointed back, standing -against the wall, and in front of this lay a rug of cowskin, the reddish -hair of which came off at the touch. Beside this chair was a low, -oblong wooden chest, with a lifting-lid curiously carved, and apparently -containing nothing but rolls of parchment and leather-bound volumes. - -At the other and wider end of the room was an archway built in the -stone, and curtained by hangings of thick, mildewed cloth. The O’Mahony -drew these aside, and Jerry advanced with the light. - -In a little recess, and reaching from side to side of the arched walls, -was built a bed of oaken beams, its top the height of a man’s middle. -Withered and faded straw lay piled on the wood, and above this both -thick cloth similar to the curtains and finer fabrics which looked like -silk. The candle shook in Jerry’s hand, and came near to falling, at the -discovery which followed. - -On the bed lay stretched the body of a bearded and tonsured man, clad -in a long, heavy, dark woolen gown, girt at the waist with a leathern -thong--as strangely dried and mummified as are the dead preserved in St. -Michan’s vaults at Dublin or in the Bleikeller of the Dom at Bremen. -The shriveled, tan-colored face bore a weird resemblance to that of the -hereditary bard. - -The O’Mahony looked wonderingly down upon this grim spectacle, the while -Jerry crossed himself. - -“Guess there won’t be much use of callin’ a doctor for _him_,” said the -master, at last. - -Then he backed away, to let the curtains fall, and yawned. - -“I’m about tuckered out,” he said, stretching his arms. “Let’s go up -now an’ take somethin’ warm, and git to bed. We’ll keep mum about this -place. P’rhaps--I shouldn’t wonder--it might come in handy for O’Daly.” - - - - -CHAPTER XI--A FACE FROM OUT THE WINDING-SHEET. - -The sun was shining brightly in a clear sky next morning, when the -people of Muirisc finally got up out of bed, and, still rubbing their -eyes, strolled forth to note the ravages of last night’s storm, and talk -with one another about it. - -There was much to marvel at and discuss at length in garrulous groups -before the cottage doors. One whole wing of the ancient convent -structure--that which tradition ascribed to the pious building fervor of -Cathal _an Diomuis_, or “the Haughty”--had been thrown down during the -night, and lay now a tumbled mass of stones and timber piled in wild -disorder upon the _débris_ of previous ruins. But inasmuch as the fallen -building had long been roofless and disused, and its collapse meant only -another added layer of chaos in the deserted convent-yard, Muirisc did -not worry its head much about it, and even yawned in Cormac O’Daly’s -face as he wandered from one knot of gossips to another, relating -legends about Cathal the Proud. - -What interested them considerably more was the report, confirmed now -by O’Daly himself, that just before the crash came, six people in the -reception hall of the convent had distinctly heard the voice of the -Hostage from the depths below the cloistral building. Everybody in -Muirisc knew all about the Hostage. They had been, so to speak, brought -up with him. Prolonged familiarity with the pathetic story of his -death in exile, here at Muirisc, and constant contact with his name as -perpetuated in the title of their unique convent, made him a sort of -oldest inhabitant of the place. Their lively imaginations now quickly -built up and established the belief that he was heard to complain, -somewhere under the convent, once every fifty years. Old Ellen Dumphy -was able to fix the period with exactness because when the mysterious -sound was last heard she was a young woman, and had her face bound up, -and was almost “disthracted wid the sore teeth.” - -But most interesting of all was the fact that there, before their eyes, -riding easily upon the waters of the Muirisc, lay the _Hen Hawk_, as -peacefully and safely at anchor as if no gale had ever thundered upon -the cliffs outside. The four men of her crew, when they made their -belated appearance in the morning sunlight out-of-doors, were eagerly -questioned, and they told with great readiness and a flowering wealth -of adjectives the marvelous story of how The O’Mahony aimed her in -pitch darkness at the bar, and hurled her over it at precisely the -psychological moment, with just the merest scraping of her keel. To the -seafaring senses of those who stood now gazing at the vessel there was -more witchcraft in this than in the subterranean voice of the Hostage -even. - -“Ah, thin, ’tis our O’Mahony’s the grand divil of a man!” they -murmured, admiringly. - -No work was to be expected, clearly, on the day after such an -achievement as this. The villagers stood about, and looked at the squat -coaster, snugly raising and sinking with the lazy movement of the tide, -and watched for the master of Muirisc to show himself. They had never -before been conscious of such perfect pride in and affection for this -strange Americanized chieftain of theirs. By an unerring factional -instinct, they felt that this apotheosis of The O’Mahony in their hearts -involved the discomfiture of O’Daly and the nuns, and they let the -hereditary bard feel it, too. - -“Ah, now, Cormac O’Daly,” one of the women called out to the poet, as he -hung, black-visaged and dejected, upon the skirts of the group, “tell me -man, was it anny of yer owld Diarmids and Cathals ye do be perplexin’ us -wid that wud a-steered that boat beyond over the bar at black midnight, -wid a gale outside fit to blow mountains into the say? Sure, it’s not -botherin’ his head wid books, or delutherin’ his moind wid ancestral -mummeries, or wearyin’ the bones an’ marrow out of the saints wid -attendin’ their business instead of his own, that _our_ O’Mahony do be -after practicin’.” - -The bard opened his lips to reply. Then the gleam of enjoyment in the -woman’s words which shone from all the faces roundabout, dismayed him. -He shook his head, and walked away in silence. Meanwhile The O’Mahony, -after a comfortable breakfast, and a brief consultation with Jerry, had -put on his hat and strolled out through the pretentious arched doorway -of his tumble-down abode. From the outer gate he saw the clustered -villagers upon the wharf, and guessed what they were saying and thinking -about him and his boat. He smiled contentedly to himself, and lighted -a cigar. Then, sucking this with gravity, hands in pockets and hat well -back on head, he turned and sauntered across the turreted corner of -his castle into the ancient church-yard, which lay between it and the -convent. The place was one crowded area of mortuary wreckage--flat -tombstones sunken deep into the earth; monumental tablets, once erect, -now tipping at every crazy angle; pre-historic, weather-beaten runic -crosses lying broken and prone; more modern and ambitious sarcophagi of -brick and stone, from which sides or ends had fallen away, revealing -to every eye their ghostly contents; the ground covered thickly with -nettles and umbrageous weeds, under which the unguided foot continually -encountered old skulls and human bones--a grave-yard such as can be seen -nowhere in the world save in western Ireland. - -The O’Mahony picked his way across this village Golgotha, past the ruins -of the ancient church, and into the grounds to the rear of the convent -buildings, clambering as he went over whole series of tumbled masonry -heaped in weed-grown ridges, until he stood upon the edge of the havoc -wrought by this latest storm. - -No rapt antiquary ever gazed with more eagerness upon the remains of a -pre-Aryan habitation than The O’Mahony now displayed in his scrutiny -of the destruction worked by last night’s storm, and of the group of -buildings its fury had left unscathed. He took a paper from his -pocket, and compared a rude drawing upon it with various points in the -architecture about him which he indicated with nods of the head. People -watching him might have differed as to whether he was a student of -antiquities, a builder or an insurance agent. Probably none would -have guessed that he was striving to identify some one of the numerous -chimneys-before him with a certain fireplace which he knew of, -five-and-twenty feet underground. - -As he stood thus, absorbed in calculation, he felt a little hand steal -into his big palm, and nestle there confidingly. His face put on a -pleased smile, even before he bent it toward the intruder. - -“Hello, Skeezucks, is that you?” he said, gently. “Well, they’ve gone -an’ busted your ole convent up the back, here, in great shape, ain’t -they?” - -Every one of the score of months that had passed since these two first -met, seemed to have added something to the stature of little Kate -O’Mahony. She had grown, in truth, to be a tall girl for her age--and an -erect girl, holding her head well in air, into the bargain. Her face had -lost its old shy, scared look--at least in this particular company. It -was filling out into the likeness of a pretty face, with a pleasant glow -of health upon the cheeks, and a happy twinkle in the big, dark eyes. - -For answer, the child lifted and swung his hand, and playfully butted -her head sidewise against his waist. - -“’Tis I that wouldn’t mind if it all came down,” she said, in the -softest West Carbery brogue the ear could wish. - -“What!” exclaimed the other, in mock consternation. “Well, I never! Why, -here’s a gal that don’t want to go to school, or learn now to read an’ -cipher or nothin’! P’r’aps you’d ruther work in the lobster fact’ry?” - -“No, I’d sail in the boat with you,” said Kate, promptly and with -confidence. - -The O’Mahony laughed aloud. - -“I guess you’d a got your fill of it yisterday, sis,” he remarked. - -“It’s that I’d have liked best of all,” she pursued. “Ah! take me with -you, O’Mahony, whin next the waves are up and the wind’s tearin’ fit to -bust itsilf. I’ll not die till I’ve been out in the thick of it, wance -for all.” - -“Why, gal alive, you’d a-be’n smashed into sausage-meat!” chuckled the -man. “Still, you’re right, though. They ain’t nothin’ else in the world -fit to hold a candle to it. Egad! Some time I _will_ take you, sis!” - -The child spoke more seriously: - -“Sure, we’re the O’Mahonys of the Coast of White Foam, according to -O’Heerin’s old verse, and it’s in my blood as well as yours.” - -“Right you are, sis!” he responded, smiling, as he added under his -breath: “an’ mebbe a trifle more.” Then, after a moment’s pause, he -changed the subject. - -“See here; you’re up on these things--in fact, they don’t seem to learn -you anything else--hain’t I heerd O’Daly tell about the old O’Mahonys -luggin’ round a box full o’ saints’ bones when they went on a rampage, -to sort o’ give ’em luck! I got to thinkin’ about it last night after -I went to bed, but I couldn’t jest git it straight in my head.” - -“It’s the _cathach_” (she pronounced it _caha_) “you mane,” Kate -answered. “Sometimes it contained bones, but more often ’twas a -crozieror a holy book from the saint’s own pen, or a part of his -vest-mints.” - -“No; I like the bones notion best,” said The O’Mahony. “There’s -something substantial an’ solid about bones. If you’ve got a genuine -saint’s bones, it’s a thing he’s bound to take an interest in, an’ see -through; whereas, them other things--his books an’ his clo’se an’ so -on--why, he may a-been sick an’ tired of ’em years ’fore he died.” - -It was the girl’s turn to laugh. - -“It’s a strange new fit of piety ye’ve on yeh, O’Mahony,” she said, with -the familiarity of a spoiled pet. “Sure, when I tell the nuns, they’ll -be lookin’ to see you build up a whole foine new convint for ‘em without -delay.” - -“No; I’m savin’ that till you git to be the boss nun,” said The -O’Mahony, dryly, and with a grin. - -“’Tis older than Methusalem ye’ll be thin!” asked the child, -laughingly. And with that she seized his hand once more and dragged him -forward to a closer inspection of the ruins. - -Some hours later, having been driven across country to Dunmanway by -Malachy, and thence taken the local train onward, The O’Mahony found -himself in the station at Ballineen, with barely time enough to hurry -across the tracks and leap into the train which was already starting -westward. In this he was borne back over the road he had just traversed, -until a stop was made at Manch station. The O’Mahony alighted here, much -pleased with the strategy which made him appear to have come from the -east. He took an outside car, and was driven some two miles into the -bleak, mountainous country beyond Toome, to a wayside inn known as -Kearney’s Retreat. Here he dismounted, bidding the carman solace himself -with drink, and wait. - -Entering the tavern, he paused at the bar and asked for two small -bottles of porter to be poured in one glass. Two or three men were -loitering about the room, and he spoke just loud enough to make sure -that all might hear him. Then, having drained the glass, and stood idly -conversing for a minute or two with the woman at the bar, he made his -way through a side door into the adjoining ball alley, where some young -fellows of the neighborhood chanced to be engaged in a game. - -He stood apart, watching their play, for only a few moments. Then one of -the men whom he had seen but not looked closely at in the bar, came up -to him, and said from behind, in an interrogative whisper: - -“Captain Harrier, I believe?” - -“Yes,” said The O’Mahony, “Captain Harrier--” with a vague notion of -having heard that voice before. - -Then he turned, and in the straggling roof-light of the alley beheld the -other’s face. It taxed to the utmost every element of self-possession in -him to choke down the exclamation which sprang to his lips. - -The man before him was Linsky!--Linsky risen from the dead, with the -scarred gash visible on his throat, and the shifty blue-green eyes still -bloodshot, and set with reddened eyelids in a freckled face. - -“Yes--Captain--Harrier,” he repeated, lingering upon each word, as his -brain fiercely strove to assert mastery over amazement, apprehension and -perplexity. - -The new-comer looked full into the The O’Mahony’s face without any sign -whatever of recognition. - -“Thin I’m to place mesilf at your disposal,” he said, briefly. “You know -more of what’s in the air than I do, no doubt. Everything is arranged, I -hear, for rising in both Cork an’ Tralee to-morrow, an’ in manny -places in both counties besides. Officially, however, I know nothing of -this--an’ have no right to know. I’m just to put mysilf at your command, -and deliver anny messages you desire to sind to other cinters in your -district. Here’s me papers.” - -The O’Mahony barely glanced at the inclosures of the envelope handed -him. They took the familiar form of a business letter of introduction, -and a commercial contract, signed by a firm-name which to the -uninitiated bore no significance. He noted that the name given was -“Major Lynch.” He observed also, with satisfaction, that his hand, as -it held the papers, was entirely steady. “Everybody’s been notified,” - he said, after a time, instinctively assuming a slight hoarseness of -speech. “I’ve been all over the ground, myself. You can meet me--let’s -see--say at the bottom of the black rock jest overlookin’ the marteller -tower at----at eleven o’clock, sharp, to-morrow forenoon. The rocks -behind the tower, mind--t’other side of the coast-guard houses. You’ll -see me land from my boat.” - -“I’ll not fail,” said the other. “I can bring a gun--moryah, I’m -shooting at say-gulls.” - -“They ain’t much need of that,” responded The O’Mahony. “You might git -stopped an’ questioned. There’ll be guns enough. Of course, the takin’ -of the tower’ll be as easy as rollin’ off a log. The thing’ll be to hold -it afterward.” - -“We’ll howld whatever we take, sir, all Ireland over,” said Major Lynch, -with enthusiasm. - -“I hope so! Good-bye. Mind, eleven sharp,” was the response, and the two -men separated. - -The O’Mahony did not wait for the finish of the game of ball, but -sauntered out of the alley through the end door, walked to his car, -and set off direct for Toome. At this place he decided to drive on to -Dunmanway station. Dismissing the carman at the door, and watching his -departure, he walked over to the hotel, joined the waiting Malachy, and -soon was well on his jolting way back to Muirisc. - -Curiously enough, the bearing of Linsky’s return upon his own -personal fortunes and safety bore a very small part in The O’Mahony’s -meditations, as he clung to his seat over the rough homeward road. All -that might take care of itself, and he pushed it almost contemptuously -aside in his mind. What he did ponder upon unceasingly, and with growing -distrust, was the suspicion with which the manner of the man’s offer to -deliver messages had inspired him. - - - - -CHAPTER XII--A TALISMAN AND A TRAITOR - -At five o’clock on this February morning it was still dark. For more -than half an hour a light had been from time to time visible, flitting -about in the inhabited parts of the castle. There was no answering -gleams from any of the cottage windows, along the other side of the -village green; but all the same, solitary figures began to emerge from -the cabins, until eighteen men had crossed the open space and were -gathered upon the little stone pier at the edge of the _muirisc_. They -stood silently together, with only now and again a whispered word, -waiting for they knew not what. - -Presently, by the faint semblance of light which was creeping up behind -the eastern hills, they saw Jerry, Malachy and Dominic approaching, each -bearing a burden on his back. These were two of the long coffin-like -boxes and two kegs, one prodigiously heavy, the other by comparison -light. They were deposited on the wharf without a word, and the two -first went back again, while Dominic silently led the others in the task -of bestowing what all present knew to be guns, lead and powder, on board -the _Hen Hawk_. This had been done, and the men had again waited for -some minutes before The O’Mahony made his appearanee. - -He advanced through the obscure morning twilight with a brisk -step, whistling softly as he came. The men noted that he wore -shooting-clothes, with gaiters to the knee, and a wide-brimmed, soft, -black hat, even then known in Ireland as the American hat, just as the -Americans had previously called it the Kossuth. - -Half-way, but within full view of the waiting group, he stopped, and -looked critically at the sky. Then he stepped aside from the path, and -took off this hat of his. The men wondered what it meant. - -Jerry was coming along again from the castle, his arms half filled -with parcels. He stopped beside the chief, and stood facing the path, -removing his cap as well. - -Then the puzzled observers saw Malachy looming out of the misty shadows, -also bare-headed, and carrying at arms length before him a square case, -about in bulk like a hat-box. As he passed The O’Mahony and Jerry they -bowed, and then fell in behind him, and marched, still uncovered, toward -the landing-place. - -The tide was at its flood, and the _Hen Hawk_ had been hauled by ropes -up close to the wharf. Malachy, with stolid face and solemn mien, strode -in fine military style over the gunwale and along the flush deck to the -bow. Here he deposited his mysterious burden, bowed to it, and then put -on the hat he had been carrying under his arm. - -The men crowded on board at this--all save two, who now rowed forward in -a small boat, and began pulling the _Hen Hawk_ out over the bar with a -hawser. As the unwieldy craft slowly moved, The O’Mahony turned a long, -ruminative gaze upon the sleeping hamlet they were leaving behind. The -whole eastern sky was awake now with light--light which lay in brilliant -bars of lemon hue upon the hill-tops, and mellowed upward through opal -and pearl into fleecy ashen tints. The two in the boat dropped behind, -fastened their tiny craft to the stern, and clambered on board. - -A fresh, chill breeze caught and filled the jib once they had passed the -bar, and the crew laid their hands upon the ropes, expecting orders to -hoist the mainsail and mizzen-sheets. But The O’Mahony gave no sign, and -lounged in silence against the tiller, spitting over the taffrail into -the water, until the vessel had rounded the point and stood well off -the cliffs, out of sight of Muirisc, plunging softly along through the -swell. Then he beckoned Dominic to the helm, and walked over toward the -mast, with a gesture which summoned the whole score of men about him. To -them he began the first speech he had ever made in his life: - -“Now, boys,” he said, “prob’ly you’ve noticed that the name’s been -painted off the starn of this ere vessel, over night. You must ’a’ -figured it out from that, that we’re out on the loose, so to speak. -Thay’s only a few of ye that have ever known me as a Fenian. It was agin -the rules that you should know me, but I’ve known you all, an’ I’ve be’n -watchin’ you drill, night after night, unbeknown to you. In fact, it -come to the same thing as my drillin’ you myself--because, until I -taught your center, Jerry, he knew about as much about it as a pig knows -about ironin’ a shirt. Well, now you all see me. I’m your boss Fenian in -these parts.” - -“Huroo!” cried the men, waving their hats. - -I don’t really suppose this intelligence surprised them in the least, -but they fell gracefully in with The O’Mahony’s wish that it should seem -to do so, as is the polite wont of their race. - -“Well,” he continued, colloquially, “here we are! We’ve been waitin’ and -workin’ for a deuce of a long time. Now, at last, they’s somethin’ for -us to do. It ain’t my fault that it didn’t come months and months ago. -But that don’t matter now. What I want to know is: are you game to -follow me?” - -“We are, O’Mahony!” they called out, as one man. - -“That’s right. I guess you know me well enough by this time to know I -don’t ask no man to go where I’m afeared to go myself. There’s goin’ to -be some fightin’, though, an’ you fellows are new to that sort of thing. -Now, I’ve b’en a soldier, on an’ off, a good share of my life. I ain’t a -bit braver than you are, only I know more about what it’s like than you -do. An’ besides, I should be all-fired sorry to have any of ye git hurt. -You’ve all b’en as good to me as your skins could hold, an’ I’ll do my -best to see you through this thing, safe an’ sound.” - -“Cheers for The O’Mahony!” some one cried out, excitedly; but he held up -a warning hand. - -“Better not holler till you git out o’ the woods,” he said, and then -went on: “Seein’ that you’ve never, any of you, be’n under fire, I’ve -thought of somethin’ that’ll help you to keep a stiff upper-lip, when -the time comes to need it. A good many of you are O’Mahonys born; all -of you come from men who have followed The O’Mahony of their time in -battle. Well, in them old days, you know, they used to carry their -_cathach_ with them, to bring ’em luck, same as American boys spit on -their bait when they’re fishin’. So I’ve had Malachy, here, bring along -a box, specially made for the purpose, an’ it’s chuck full of the bones -of a family saint of mine. We found him--me an’ Jerry--after the wind -had blown part of the convent down, layin’ just where he was put when -he died, with the crucifix in his hands, and a monk’s gown on. I ain’t a -very good man, an’ p’r’aps you fellows have noticed that I ain’t much of -a hand for church, or that sort of thing; but I says to myself, when I -found this dead an’ dried body of an O’Mahony who _was_ pious an’ good -an’ all that: ‘You shall come along with us, friend, an’ see our tussle -through.’ He was an Irishman in the days when Irishmen run their own -country in their own way, an’ I thought he’d be glad to come along with -us now, an’ see whether we was fit to call ourselves Irishmen, too. An’ -I reckon you’ll be glad, too, to have him with us.” - -Stirred by a solitary impulse, the men looked toward the box at the -bow--a rudely built little chest, with strips of worn leather nailed to -its sides and top--and took off their hats. - -“We are, O’Mahony!” they cried. - -“Up with your sails, then!” The O’Mahony shouted, with a sudden change -to eager animation. And in a twinkling the _Hen Hawk_ had ceased dal -lying, and, with stiffly bowed canvas and a buoyant, forward careen, was -kicking the spray behind her into the receding picture of the Dunmanus -cliffs. - -***** - -Nearly five hours later, a little council, or, one might better say, -dialogue of war, was held at the stern of the speeding vessel. -The rifles had long since been taken out and put together, and the -cartridges which Jerry had already made up distributed. The men were -gathered forward, ready for whatever adventure their chief had in mind. - -“I’m goin’ to lay to in a minute or two,” confided The O’Mahony to -Jerry, in an undertone. - -Jerry looked inquiringly up and down the deserted stretch of brown -headlands before them. Not a sign of habitation was in view. - -“Is it _this_ we’ve come to besayge and capture?” he asked, with -incredulity. - -“No. Right round that corner, though, lays the marteller tower we’re -after. Up to yesterday my plan was jest to sail bang up to her an’ -walk in. But somethin ’s happened to change my notions. They’ve sent a -fellow--an American Irishman--to be what they call my ‘cojutor.’ I don’t -jest know what it means; but, whatever it is, I don’t think much of it. -He’s waitin’ over there for me to land. Well, now, I’m goin’ to land -here instid, an’ take five of the men with me, an’ kind o’ santer down -toward the tower from the land side, keepin’ behind the hedges. You’ll -stay on board here, with Dominic at the helm under your orders, and only -the jib and mizzen-top up, and jest mosey along into the cove toward the -tower, keepin’ your men out o’ sight and watchin’ for me. If there’s a -nigger in the fence, I’ll smoke him out that way.” - -Some further directions in detail followed, and then the bulk of the -canvas was struck, and the vessel hove to. The small boat was drawn to -the side, and the landing party descended to it. One of their own number -took the oars, for it was intended to keep the boat in waiting on the -beach. Their guns lay in the bottom, and they were conscious of a -novel weight of ammunition in their pockets. They waved their hands in -salution to the friends and neighbors they were leaving, and then, with -a vigorous sweep of the oars, the boat went tossing on her course to the -barren, rocky shore. - -The O’Mahony, curled up on the seat at the bow, scanned the wide -prospect with a roving scrutiny. No sail was visible on the whole -horizon. A drab, hazy stain over the distant sky-line told only that the -track of the great Atlantic steamers lay outward many miles. On the -land side--where rough, blackened boulders rose in ugly points from the -lapping water, as outposts to serried ranks of lichened rocks which, in -their turn, straggled backward in slanting ascent to the summit, masked -by shaggy growths of furze--no token of human life was visible. - -[Illustration: 0143] - -A landing-place was found, and the boat securely drawm up on shore -beyond highwater mark. Then The O’Mahony led the way, gun in hand, -across the slippery reach of wet sea-weed, and thence, by winding -courses, obliquely up the hillside. He climbed from crag to crag with -the agility of a goat, but the practiced Muirisc men kept close at his -heels. - -Arrived at the top, he paused in the shelter of the furze bushes to -study the situation. - -It was a great and beautiful panorama upon which he looked meditatively -down. The broad bay lay proudly in the arms of an encircling wall of -cliffs, whose terraced heights rose and spread with the dignity of some -amphitheatre of the giants. At their base, the blue waters broke in -a caressing ripple of cream-like foam; afar off, the sunshine crowned -their purple heads with a golden haze. Through the center of this noble -sweep of sheltering hills cleft the wooded gorge of a river, whose -mouth kissed the strand in the screening shadow of a huge mound, reared -precipitously above the sea-front, but linked by level stretches of -sward to the mainland behind. On the summit of this mound, overlooking -the bay, was one of those curious old martello towers with which England -marked the low comedy stage of her panic about Bonaparte’s invasion. - -The tower--a squat, circular stone fort, with a basement for magazine -purposes, and an upper story for defensive operations--kept its look-out -for Corsican ghosts in solitude. Considerably to this side, on the edge -of the cliff, was a white cluster of coast-guard houses, in the yard of -which two or three elderly men in sailor attire could be seen sunning -themselves. Away in the distance, on the farther bend of the bay, the -roofs and walls of a cluster of cottages were visible, and above these, -among the trees, scattered glimpses of wealthier residences. - -Of all this vast spectacle The O’Mahony saw nothing but the martello -tower, and the several approaches to it past the coast-guard houses. He -chose the best of these, and led the way, crouching low behind the line -of hedges, until the whole party halted in the cover of a clump of -young sycamores, upon the edge of the open space leading to the mound. -A hundred feet away from them, at the base of a jagged bowlder of black -slatish substance, stood a man, his face turned toward the tower and the -sea. It was Linsky. - -After a time he lifted his hand, as if in signal to some one beyond. - -The O’Mahony, from his shelter behind, could see that the _Hen Hawk_ had -rounded the point, and was lazily rocking her way along across the bay, -shoreward toward the tower. For a moment he assumed that Linsky’s sign -was intended for the vessel. - -Then some transitory movement on the surface of the tower itself caught -his wandering glance, and in the instant he had mastered every detail of -a most striking incident. A man in a red coat had suddenly appeared at -the landward window of the martello tower, made a signal to Linskey, and -vanished like a flash. - -The O’Mahony thoughtfully raised his rifle, and fastened his attention -upon that portion of Linsky’s breast and torso which showed above the -black, unshaken sight at the end of its barrel. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII--THE RETREAT WITH THE PRISONERS - -The Hen Hawk was idly drifting into the cove toward the little -fishing-smack pier of stone and piles which ran out like a tongue from -the lower end of the mound. Only two of her men were visible on deck. A -group of gulls wheeled and floated about the thick little craft as she -crawled landward. - -These things The O’Mahony vaguely noted as a background to the figure of -the traitor by the rock, which he studied now with a hard-lined face and -stony glance over the shining rifle-barrel. - -He hesitated, let the weapon sink, raised it again--then once for all -put it down. He would not shoot Linsky. - -But the problem what to do instead pressed all the more urgently for -solution. - -The O’Mahony pondered it gravely, with an alert gaze scanning the whole -field of the rock, the towered mound and the waters beyond for helping -hints. All at once his face brightened in token of a plan resolved upon. -He whispered some hurried directions to his companions, and then, gun in -hand, quitted his ambush. Bending low, with long, stealthy strides, -he stole along the line of yew hedge to the rear of the rock which -sheltered Linsky. He reached it without discovery, and, still -noiselessly, half slipped, half leaped down the earthern bank beside it. -At this instant his shadow betrayed him. Linsky turned, his lips opened -to speak. Then, without a word, he reeled and fell like a log under a -terrific sidelong blow on jaw and skull from the stock of The O’Mahony’s -clubbed gun. - -The excited watchers from the sycamore shield behind saw him fall, and -saw their leader spring upon his sinking form and drag it backward -out of sight of the martello tower. Linsky was wearing a noticeable -russet-brown short coat. They saw The O’Mahony strip this off the -other’s prostrate body and exchange it for his own. Then he put on -Linsky’s hat--a drab, low-crowned felt, pulled well over his eyes--and -stood out boldly in the noon sunlight, courting observation from the -tower. He took a handkerchief from his pocket and spread it out upon the -black surface of the rock, and began pacing up and down before it with -his eyes on the tower. - -Presently the same red-coated apparition was momentarily visible at -the land-side window. The O’Mahony held up his hand and went through a -complicated gesture which should signify that he was coming over to the -tower, and desired the other to come down and talk with him. This other -gave a sign of comprehension and assent, and disappeared. - -The O’Mahony walked, unarmed, and with a light, springing step, across -the sloping sward to the tower. He paused at the side of its gray wall -for an instant, to note that the _Hen Hawk_ lay only a few feet distant -from the pier-end. Then he entered the open ground-door of the tower, -and found himself in a circular, low, stone room, which, though -whitewashed, seemed dark, after the bright sunlight outside. Some -barrels stood in a row against the wall, and one of these was filled -with soiled cotton-waste which had been used for cleaning guns. The -newcomer helped himself to a large handful of this, and took from his -pocket a compact coil of stout packing-cord. Then he moved toward the -little iron staircase at the other end of the chamber, and, leaning with -his back against it, waited. - -The next minute the door above opened, and the clatter of spurred boots -rang out on the metal steps. The O’Mahony’s sidelong glance saw two -legs, clad in blue regimental trowsers with a red stripe, descend past -his head, and then the flaring vision of a scarlet jacket. - -“Well, they’re landing, it seems,” said the officer, as his foot was on -the bottom step. - -The O’Mahony turned like a leopard, and sprang forward, flinging his -arm around the other’s neck, and jamming him backward against the steps -and wall, while, with his free hand, he thrust the greasy, noxious rags -into his mouth and face. The struggle between the two strong men was -fierce for a moment. Then the officer, blinded and choking under the -gag, felt himself being helplessly bound, as if with wires, so tightly -were the merciless ligatures drawn round arms and legs and head--and -then hoisted into mid-air, and ignominiously jolted forward through -space, with the effect of riding pickaback on a giant kangaroo. - -The O’Mahony emerged from the tower, bent almost double under the burden -of the stalwart captive, who still kept up a vain, writhing attempt at -resistance. The whole episode had lasted scarcely two minutes, and no -one above seemed to have heard the few muffled sounds of the conflict. - -[Illustration: 0151] - -With a single glance toward the companions he had left in hiding among -the sycamores, he began a hasty, staggering course diagonally down the -side of the mound toward the water-front. He did not even stop to learn -whether pursuit was on foot, or if his orders had been obeyed concerning -Linsky. - -At the foot of the hill he had to force his way through a thick thorn -hedge to gain the roadway leading to the pier. Weighted as he was, -the task was a difficult one, and when it was at last triumphantly -accomplished, his clothes hung in tatters about him, and he was covered -with scratches. He doggedly made his way onward, however, with bowed, -bare head and set teeth, stumbling along the quay to the vessel’s edge. -The _Hen Hawk_ had been brought up to the pier-corner, and The O’Mahony, -staggering over the gunwale, let his burden fall, none too gently, upon -the deck. - -A score of yards to the rear, came, at a loping dog-trot, the five men -he had left behind him among the trees. One of them bore an armful of -guns and his master’s discarded coat and hat. Each of the others grasped -either a leg or an arm of the still insensible Linsky, and, as they in -turn leapt upon the vessel, they slung him, face downward and supinely -limp, sprawling beside the officer. - -With all swiftness, sails were rattled up, and the weight of -half-a-dozen brawny shoulders laid against pike-poles to push the vessel -off. - -The tower had suddenly taken the alarm! The reverberating “boom-m-m” of -a cannon sent its echoes from cliff to cliff, and the casement windows -under the machicolated eaves were bristling with gun-barrels flashing in -the noon-day sun. - -For one anxious minute--even as the red-coats began to issue, like a -file of wasps, from the doorway at the bottom of the tower--the sails -hung slack. Then a shifting land-breeze caught and filled the sheets, -the _Hen Hawk_ shook herself, dipped her beak in the sunny waters--and -glided serenely forward. - -She was standing out to sea, a fair hundred yards from land, when the -score of soldiers came to the finish of their chase on the pier-end, and -gazed, with hot faces and short breath, upon her receding hull. She was -still within range, and they instinctively half-poised their guns -to shoot. But here was the difficulty: The O’Mahony had lifted the -grotesquely bound and gagged figure of their commanding officer, and -held it upright beside him at the helm. - -For this reason they forbore to shoot, and contented themselves with a -verbal volley of curses and shouts of rage, which may have startled the -circling gulls, but raised only a staid momentary smile on the gaunt -face of The O’Mahony. He shrilled back a prompt rejoinder in the teeth -of the breeze, which belongs to polite literature no more than did the -cries to which it was a response. - -Thus the _Hen Hawk_ ploughed her steady way out to open sea--until the -red-coats which had been dodging about on the heights above were lost to -sight through even the strongest glass, and the brown headlands of the -coast had become only dim shadows of blue haze on the sky line. - -***** - -Linsky had been borne below, to have his head washed and bandaged, and -then to sleep his swoon off, if so be that he was to recover sensibility -at all during what remained to him of terrestrial existence. The British -officer had even before that been relieved of the odious gun-rag gag, -and some of the more uncomfortable of his bonds. He had been given a -seat, too, on a coil of rope beside the capstan--against which he leaned -in obdurate silence, with his brows bent in a prolonged scowl of disgust -and wrath. More than one of the crew, and of the non-maritime Muirisc -men as well, had asked him if he wanted anything, and got not so much as -a shake of the head in reply. - -The O’Mahony paced up and down the forward deck, for a long time, -watching this captive of his, and vaguely revolving in his thoughts the -problem of what to do with him. The taking of prisoners had been no -part of his original scheme. Indeed, for that matter, nothing of this -original scheme seemed to be left. He had had, he realized now, a -distinct foreboding of Linsky’s treachery. Yet its discovery had as -completely altered everything as if it had come upon him entirely -unawares. He had done none of the things which he had planned to do. The -_cathach_ had been brought for nothing. Not a shot had been fired. The -martello tower remained untaken. - -When he ruminated upon these things he ground his teeth and pressed his -thin lips together. It was all Linsky’s doing. He had Linsky safe below, -however. It would be strange indeed if this fact did not turn out to -have interesting consequences; but there would be time enough later on -to deal with that. - -The presence of the British officer was of more immediate importance. -The O’Mahony walked again past the capstan, and looked his prisoner over -askance. He was a tall man, well on in the thirties, slender, yet with -athletic shoulders; his close-cropped hair and short moustache were of -the color of flax; his face and neck were weather-beaten and browned. -The face was a good one, with shapely features and a straightforward -expression, albeit, seen now at its worst, under a scowl and the smear -of the rags. After much hesitation The O’Mahony finally made up his mind -to speak, and walked around to confront the officer with an amiable nod. - -“S’pose you’re jest mad through an’ through at bein’ grabbed that _way_ -an’ tied up like a calf goin’ to market, an’ run out in that sort o’ -style,” he said, in a cheerfully confidential tone. “I know _I’d_ be -jest bilin’! But I hope you don’t bear no malice. It _had_ to be done, -an’ done that way, too! You kin see that yourself.” - -The Englishman looked up with surly brevity of glance at the speaker, -and then contemptuously turned his face away. He said never a word. - -The O’Mahony continued, affably: - -“One thing I’m sorry for: It _was_ pritty rough to have your mouth -stuffed with gun-wipers; but, really, there wasn’t anything else handy, -and time was pressin’. Now what d’ye say to havin’ a drink--jest to -rense the taste out o’ your mouth?” - -The officer kept his eyes fixed on the distant horizon. His lips -twitched under the mustache with a movement that might signify -temptation, but more probably reflected an impulse to tell his -questioner to go to the devil. Whichever it was he said nothing. - -The O’Mahony spoke again, with the least suspicion of acerbity in his -tone. - -“See here,” he said; “don’t flatter yourself that I’m worryin’ much -whether you take a drink or not; an’ I’m not a man that’s much given -to takin’ slack from anybody, whether they wear shoulder-straps or not. -You’re my pris’ner. I took you--took you myself, an’ let you have a -good lively rassle for your money. It wasn’t jest open an’ aboveboard, -p’r’aps, but then you was layin’ there with your men hid, dependin’ on -a sneak an’ a traitor to deliver me an’ my fellows into your hands. So -it’s as broad as ’tis long. Only I don’t want to make it especially -rough for you, an’ I thought I’d offer you a drink, an’ have a talk -with you about what’s to be done next. But if you’re too mad to talk or -drink, either, why, I kin wait till you cool down.” - -Once more the officer looked up, and this time, after some hesitation, -he spoke, stiffly; “I _should_ like some whisky and water, if you have -it--and will be good enough,” he said. - -The O’Mahony brought the beverage from below with his own hand. Then, as -on a sudden thought, he took out his knife, knelt down and cut all the -cords which still bound the other’s limbs. - -The officer got gingerly up on his feet, kicked his legs out straight -and stretched his arms. - -“I wish you had done that before,” he said, taking the glass and eagerly -drinking off the contents. - -“I dunno why I didn’t think of it,” said The O’Mahony, with genuine -regret. “Fact is, I had so many other things on my mind. This findin’ -yourself sold out by a fellow that you trusted with your life is enough -to kerflummux any man.” - -“That ought not to surprise any Irishman, I should think,” said the -other, curtly. “However much Irish conspiracies may differ in other -respects, they’re invariably alike in one thing. There’s always an -Irishman who sells the secret to the government.” - -The O’Mahony made no immediate answer. The bitter remark had suddenly -suggested to him the possibility that all the other movements in Cork -and Kerry, planned for that day, had also been betrayed! He had been too -gravely occupied with his own concerns to give this a thought before. -As he turned the notion over now in his mind, it assumed the form of a -settled conviction of universal treachery. - -“There’s a darned sight o’ truth in what you say,” he assented, -seriously, after a pause. - -The tone of the reply took the English officer by surprise. He looked up -with more interest, and the expression of cold sulkiness faded from his -face. “You got off with great luck,” he said. “If they had many more -like you, perhaps they might do something worth while. You’re an -Irish-American, I fancy? And you have seen military service?” - -The O’Mahony answered both questions with an affirmative nod. - -“Then I’m astonished,” the officer went on, “that you and men like you, -who know what war is really like, should come over here, and spend -your money and risk your lives and liberty, without the hope of doing -anything more than cause us a certain amount of bother. As a soldier, -you must know that you have no earthly chance of success. The odds are -ten thousand to one against you.” - -The O’Mahony’s eyes permitted themselves a momentary twinkle. “Well, -now, mister,” he said, carelessly; “I dunno so much about that. Take you -an’ me, now, f’r instance, jest as we stand: I don’t reckon that bettin’ -men ’u’d precisely tumble over one another in the rush to put their -money on _you_. Maybe I’m no judge, but that’s the way it looks to me. -What do you think yourself, now--honest Injun?” - -The Englishman was not responsive to this light view of the situation. -He frowned again, and pettishly shrugged his shoulders. - -“Of course, I did not refer to _that!_” he said. “My misadventure is -ridiculous and--ah--personally inconvenient--but it--ah--isn’t war. You -take nothing by it.” - -“Oh, yes--I’ve taken a good deal--too much, in fact,” said The O’Mahony, -going off into a brown study over the burden of his acquisitions which -his words conjured up. He paced up and down beside his prisoner for a -minute or two. Then he halted, and turned to him for counsel. - -“What do you think, yourself, would be the best thing for me to do with -you, now’t I’ve got you?” he asked. - -“Oh--really!--really, I must decline to advise with you upon the -subject,” the other replied, frostily. - -“On the one hand,” mused The O’Mahony, aloud, “you got scooped in afore -you had time to fire a shot, or do any mischief at all--so ’t we don’t -owe you no grudge, so to speak. Well, that’s in your favor. And then -there’s your mouth rammed full of gun-waste--that ought to count some on -your side, too.” - -The Englishman looked at him, curiosity struggling with dislike in his -glance, but said nothing. - -“On ’t’ other hand,” pursued The O’Mahony, “you ain’t quite a prisoner of -war, because you was openly dealin’ with a traitor and spy, and playin’ -to come the gouge game over me an’ my men. That’s a good deal ag’in’ -you. For sake of argument, let’s say the thing is a saw-off, so far as -what’s happened already is concerned. The big question is: What’s goin’ -to happen?” - -“Really--” the officer began again, and then closed his lips abruptly. - -“Yes,” the other went on, “that’s where the shoe pinches. I s’pose now, -if I was to land you on the coast yonder, anywhere, you wouldn’t give -your word to not start an alarm for forty-eight hours, would you?” - -“Certainly not!” said the Englishman, with prompt decision. - -“No, I thought not. Of course, the alarm’s been given hours ago, but -your men didn’t see me, or git enough of a notion of my outfit to make -their description dangerous. It’s different with you.” - -The officer nodded his head to indicate that he was becoming interested -in the situation, and saw the point. - -“So that really the most sensible thing I could do, for myself and -my men, ’u’d be to lash you to a keg of lead and drop you -overboard--wouldn’t it, now?” - -The Englishman kept his eyes fixed on the middle distance of gently, -heaving waters, and did not answer the question. The O’Mahony, watching -his unmoved countenance with respect, made pretense of waiting for a -reply, and leaned idly against the capstan to fill his pipe. After a -long pause he was forced to break the silence. - -“It sounds rough,” he said; “but it’s the safest way out of the thing. -Got a wife an’ family?” - -The officer turned for the fraction of an instant to scrowl indignantly, -the while he snapped out: - -“That’s none of your d----d business!” - -Whistling softly to himself, with brows a trifle lifted to express -surprise, The O’Mahony walked the whole length of the deck and back, -pondering this reply: - -“I’ve made up my mind,” he announced at last, upon his return. “We’ll -land you in an hour or so--or at least give you the dingey and some food -and drink, and let you row yourself in, say, six or seven miles. You can -manage it all right before nightfall--an’ I’ll take my chances on your -startin’ the hue-an’-cry.” - -“Understand, I promise nothing!” interposed the other. - -“No, that’s all right,” said The O’Mahony. “Mind, if I thought there was -any way by which you was likely to get these men o’ mine into trouble, -I’d have no more scruple about jumpin’ you into the water there than -I would about pullin’ a fish out of it. But, as I figure it out, they -don’t stand in any danger. As for me--well, as I said, I’ll take my -chances. It’ll make me a heap o’ trouble, I dare say, but I deserve -that. This trip o’ mine’s been a fool-performance from the word ‘go,’ -and it’s only fair I should pay for it.” - -The Englishman looked up at the yawl rigging, taut under the strain of -filled sails; at the men huddled together forward; last of all at his -captor. His eyes softened. - -“You’re not half a bad sort,” he said, “in--ah--spite of the gun-waste. -I should think it likely that your men would never be troubled, if they -go home, and--ah--behave sensibly.” - -The O’Mahony nodded as if a pledge had been given. - -“That’s what I want,” he said. “They are simply good fellows who jest -went into this thing on my account.” - -“But in all human probability,” the officer went on, “_you_ will be -caught and punished. It will be a miracle if you escape.” - -The O’Mahony blew smoke from his pipe with an incredulous grin, and the -other went on: - -“It does not rest alone with me, I assure you. A minute detailed -description of your person, Captain Harrier, has been in our possession -for two days.” - -“I-gad! that reminds me,” broke in The O’Mahony, his face darkening as -he spoke--“the man who gave you that name and that description is lyin’ -down-stairs with a cracked skull.” - -“I don’t know that it is any part of my duty,” said the officer; “to -interest myself in that person, or--ah--what befalls him.” - -“No,” said The O’Mahony, “I guess not! I guess not!” - - - - -CHAPTER XIV.--THE REINTERMENT OF LINSKY. - -The red winter sun sank to hide itself below the waste of Atlantic -waters as the _Hen Hawk_, still held snugly in the grasp of the breeze, -beat round the grim cliffs of Three-Castle Head, and entered Dun-manus -Bay. The Englishman had been set adrift hours before, and by this -time, no doubt, the telegraph had spread to every remotest point on the -Southern and Western coast warning descriptions of the vessel and its -master. Perhaps even now their winged flight into the west was being -followed from Cape Clear, which lay behind them in the misty and -darkening distance. Still the _Hen Hawk’s_ course was confidently shaped -homeward, for many miles of bog and moorland separated Muirisc from any -electric current. - -The O’Mahony had hung in meditative solitude over the tiller for -hours, watching the squatting groups of retainers playing silently at -“spoil-five” on the forward deck, and revolving in his mind the thousand -and one confused and clashing thoughts which this queer new situation -suggested. As the sun went down he called to Jerry, and the two, -standing together at the stern, looked upon the great ball of fire -descending behind the gray expanse of trackless waters, without a word. -Rude and untutored as they were, both were conscious, in some vague way, -that when this sun should rise again their world would be a different -thing. - -“Well, pard,” said the master, when only a bar of flaming orange marked -where the day had gone, “it’ll be a considerable spell, I reckon, afore -I see that sort o’ thing in these waters again.” - -“Is it l’avin’ the country we are, thin?” asked Jerry, in a sympathetic -voice. - -“No, not exactly. You’ll stay here. But _I_ cut sticks to-morrow.” - -“Sure, then, it’s not alone ye’ll be goin’. Egor! man, didn’t I take me -Bible-oath niver to l’ave yeh, the longest day ye lived? Ah--now, don’t -be talkin’!” - -“That’s all right, Jerry--but it’s got to be that way,” replied The -O’Mahony, in low regretful tones. “I’ve figured it all out. It’ll be -mighty tough to go off by myself without you, pard, but I can’t leave -the thing without somebody to run it for me, and you are the only one -that fills the bill. Now don’t kick about it, or make a fuss, or think -I’m using you bad. Jest say to yourself--‘Now he’s my friend, an’ I’m -his’n, and if he says I can be of most use to him here, why that settles -it.’ Take the helm for a minute, Jerry. I want to go for’ard an’ say a -word to the men.” - -The O’Mahony looked down upon the unintelligible game being played with -cards so dirty that he could not tell them apart, and worn by years of -use to the shape of an egg, and waited with a musing smile on his face -till the deal was exhausted. The players and onlookers formed a compact -group at his knees, and they still sat or knelt or lounged on the deck -as they listened to his words. - -“Boys,” he said, in the gravely gentle tone which somehow he had learned -in speaking to these men of Muirisc, “I’ve been tellin’ Jerry -somethin’ that you’ve got a right to know, too. I’m goin’ to light -out to-morrow--that is, quit Ireland for a spell. It may be for a good -while--maybe not. That depends. I hate like the very devil to go--but -it’s better for me to skip than to be lugged off to jail, and then to -state’s prison--better for me an’ better for you. If I get out, the rest -of you won’t be bothered. Now--hold on a minute till I git through!--now -between us we’ve fixed up Muirisc so that it’s a good deal easier to -live there than it used to be. There’ll be more mines opened up soon, -an’ the lobster fact’ry an’ the fishin’ are on a good footin’ now. I’m -goin’ to leave Jerry to keep track o’ things, along with O’Daly, an’ -they’ll let me know regular how matters are workin’, so you won’t suffer -by my not bein’ here.” - -“Ah--thin--it’s our hearts ’ll be broken entirely wid the grief,” wailed -Dominic, and the others, seizing this note of woe as their key, broke -forth in a chorus of lamentation. - -They scrambled to their feet with uncovered heads, and clustered -about him, jostling one another for possession of his hands, and -affectionately patting his shoulders and stroking his sleeves, the while -they strove to express in their own tongue, or in the poetic phrases -they had fashioned for themselves out of a practical foreign language, -the sincerity of their sorrow. But the Irish peasant has been schooled -through many generations to face the necessity of exile, and to view -the breaking of households, the separation of kinsmen, the recurring -miseries attendant upon an endless exodus across the seas, with the -philosophy of the inevitable. None of these men dreamed of attempting -to dissuade The O’Mahony from his purpose, and they listened with -melancholy nods of comprehension when he had secured silence, and spoke -again: - -“You can all see that it’s _got_ to be,” he said, in conclusion. “And -now I want you to promise me this: I don’t expect you’ll have trouble -with the police. They won’t get over from Balleydehob for another day or -two--and by that time I shall be gone, and the _Hen Hawk_, too--an’ if -they bring over the dingey I gave the Englishman to land in, why, of -course there won’t be a man, woman or child in Muirisc that ever laid -eyes on it before.” - -“Sure, Heaven ’u’d blast the eyes that ’u’d recognize that same boat,” - said one, and the others murmured their confidence in the hypothetical -miracle. - -“Well, then, what I want you to promise is this: That you’ll go on -as you have been doin’, workin’ hard, keepin’ sober, an’ behavin’ -yourselves, an’ that you’ll mind what Jerry says, same as if I said it -myself. An’ more than that--an’ now this is a thing I’m specially sot -on--that you’ll look upon that little gal, Kate O’Mahony, as if she was -a daughter of mine, an’ watch over her, an’ make things pleasant for -her, an’--an’ treat her like the apple of your eye.” - -If there was an apple in The O’Mahony’s eye, it was for the moment -hidden in a vail of moisture. The faces of the men and their words alike -responded to his emotion. - -Then one of them, a lean and unkempt old mariner, who even in this keen -February air kept his hairy breast and corded, sunburnt throat exposed, -and whose hawk-like eyes had flashed through fifty years of taciturnity -over heaven knows what wild and fantastic dreams born of the sea, spoke -up: - -“Sir, by your l’ave, I’ll mesilf be her bodyguard and her servant, and -tache her the wather as befits her blood, and keep the very sole of her -fut from harrum.” - -“Right you are, Murphy,” said The O’Mahony. “Make that your job.” - -No one remembered ever having heard Murphy speak so much at one time -before. To the surprise of the group, he had still more to say. - -“And, sir--I’m not askin’ it be way of ricompinse,” the fierce-faced old -boatman went on--“but w’u’d your honor grant us wan requist?” - -“You’ve only got to spit ’er out,” was the hearty response. - -“Thin, sir, give us over the man ye ’ve got down stairs.” - -The O’Mahony’s face changed its expression. He thought for a moment; -then asked: - -“What to do?” - -“To dale wid this night!” said Murphy, solemnly. - -There was a pause of silence, and then the clamor of a dozen eager -voices clashing one against the other in the cold wintry twilight: - -“Give him over, O’Mahony!” “L’ave him to us!” “Don’t be soilin’ yer -own hands wid the likes of him!” “Oh, l’ave him to us!” these voices -pleaded. - -The O’Mahony hesitated for a minute, then slowly shook his head. - -“No, boys, don’t ask it,” he said. “I’d like to oblige you, but I can’t. -He’s _my_ meat--I can’t give him up!” - -“W’u’d yer honor be for sparin’ him, thin?” asked one, with incredulity -and surprise. - -The O’Mahony of Muirisc looked over the excited group which surrounded -him, dimly recognizing the strangeness of the weirdly interwoven -qualities which run in the blood of Heber--the soft tenderness of nature -which through tears would swear loyalty unto death to a little child, -shifting on the instant to the ferocity of the wolf-hound burying its -jowl in the throat of its quarry. Beyond them were gathering the sea -mists, as by enchantment they had gathered ages before with vain intent -to baffle the sons of Milesius, and faintly in the halflight lowered the -beetling cliffs whereon The O’Mahonys, true sons of those sea-rovers, -had crouched watching for their prey this thousand of years. He could -almost feel the ancestral taste of blood in his mouth as he looked, and -thought upon his answer. - -“No, don’t worry about his gitting off,” he said, at last. “I ’ll take -care of that. You’ll never see him again--no one on top of this earth -’ll ever lay eyes on him again.” - -With visible reluctance the men forced themselves to accept this -compromise. The _Hen Hawk_ plunged doggedly along up the bay. - -***** - -Three hours later, The O’Mahony and Jerry, not without much stumbling -and difficulty, reached the strange subterranean chamber where they had -found the mummy of the monk. They bore between them the inert body of a -man, whose head was enveloped in bandages, and whose hands, hanging limp -at arm’s length, were discolored with the grime and mold from the -stony path over which they had dragged. They threw this burden on the -mediaeval bed, and, drawing long breaths of relief, turned to light some -candles in addition to the lantern Jerry had borne, and to kindle a fire -on the hearth. - -They talked in low murmurs meanwhile. The O’Mahony had told Jerry -something of what part Linsky had played in his life. Jerry, without -being informed with more than the general outlines of the story, was -able swiftly to comprehend his master’s attitude toward the man--an -attitude compounded of hatred for his treachery of to-day and gratitude -of the services which he had unconsciously performed in the past. He -understood to a nicety, too, what possibilities there were in the plan -which The O’Mahony now unfolded to him, as the fire began crackling up -the chimney. - -“I can answer for his gittin’ over that crack in the head,” said The -O’Mahony, heating and stirring a tin cup full of balsam over the flame. -“Once I’ve fixed this bandage on, we can bring him to with ammonia and -whisky, an’ give him some broth. He’ll live all right--an’ he’ll live -right here, d’ye mind. Whatever else happens, he’s never to git outside, -an’ he’s never to know where he is. Nobody but you is to so much as -dream of his bein’ down here--be as mum as an oyster about it, won’t -you? You’re to have sole charge of him, d’ye see--the only human being -he ever lays eyes on.” - -“Egor! I’ll improve his moind wid grand discourses on trayson and -informin’ an’ betrayin’ his oath, and the like o’ that, till he’ll be -fit to die wid shame.” - -“No--I dunno--p’r’aps it’d be better not to let him know _we_ know--jest -make him think we’re his friends, hidin’ him away from the police. -However, that can take care of itself. Say whatever you like to him, -only--” - -“Only don’t lay a hand on him--is it that ye were thinkin’?” broke in -Jerry. - -“Yes, don’t lick him,” said The O’Mahony. “He’s had about the worst -bat on the head I ever saw a a man git an’ live, to start with. No--be -decent with him, an’ give him enough to eat. Might let him have a -moderate amount o’ drink, too.” - -“I suppose there’ll be a great talk about his vanishin’ out o’ sight -all at wance among the Brotherhood,” suggested Jerry. - -“That don’t matter a darn,” said the other. “Jest you go ahead, an’ tend -to your own knittin’, an’ let the Brotherhood whistle. We’ve paid a good -stiff price to learn what Fenianism is worth, and we’ve learned enough. -Not any more on my plate, thankee! Jest give the boys the word that the -jig is up--that there won’t be any more drillin’ or meanderin’ round -generally. And speakin’ o’ drink--” - -A noise from the curtained bed in the alcove interrupted The O’Mahony’s -remarks upon this important subject. Turning, the two men saw that -Linsky had risen on the couch to a half-sitting posture, and, with -a tremulous hand, drawing aside the felt-like draperies, was staring -wildly at them out of blood-shot eyes. - -“For the love of God, what is it?” he asked, in a faint and moaning -voice. - -“Lay down there!--quick!” called out The O’Mahony, sternly; and Linsky -fell back prone without a protest. - -The O’Mahony had finished melting his gum, and he spread it now -salve-like upon a cloth. Then he walked over to where the wounded -man lay, with marvel-stricken eyes wandering over the archaic vaulted -ceiling. - -“Is it dead I am?” he groaned, with a vacuous glance at the new-comer. - -“No, you’ve been badly hurt in battle,” said the other, in curt tones. -“We can pull you through, perhaps; but you’ve got to shut up an’ lay -still. Hold your head this way a little more--that’s it.” - -The injured man submitted to the operation, for the most part, with -apparently closed eyes, but his next remark showed that he had been -gathering his wits together. - -“And how’s the battle gone, Captain Harrier?” he suddenly asked. “Is -Oireland free from the oppressor at last?” - -“No!” said The O’Mahony, with dry brevity--“but she’ll be free from -_you_ for a spell, or I miss _my_ guess most consumedly.” - - - - -CHAPTER XV--“TAKE ME WITH YOU, O’MAHONY.” - -The fair-weather promise of the crimson sunset was not kept. The -morning broke bloodshot and threatening, with dark, jagged storm-clouds -scudding angrily across the sky, and a truculent unrest moving the -waters of the bay to lash out at the rocks, and snarl in rising murmurs -among themselves. - -Every soul in Muirisc came soon enough to share this disquietude with -the elements. Such evil tidings as these, that The O’Mahony was quitting -the country, seemed veritably to take to themselves wings. The village, -despite the fact that the fishing season had not yet arrived, and that -there was nothing else to do, could not lie abed on such a morning, much -less sleep. Even the tiniest children, routed out from their nests -of straw close beside the chimney by the unwonted bustle, saw that -something was the matter. - -Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony heard the intelligence at a somewhat later hour, -even as she dallied with that second cup of coffee, which, in her -own phrase, put a tail to the breakfast. It was brought to her by a -messenger from the convent, who came to say that the Ladies of the -Hostage’s Tears desired her immediate presence upon an urgent matter. -Mrs. Fergus easily enough put two and two together, as she donned her -bonnet and _broché_ shawl. It was The O’Mahony’s departure that was to -be discussed, and the nuns were right in calling _that_ important. She -looked critically over the irregular walls of the castle, as she passed -it on her way to the convent. Here she had been born; here she had lived -in peace and plenty, after her brother’s death, until the heir from -America came to turn her out. Who knew? Perhaps she was to go back -again, after all. Mrs. Fergus agreed that the news was highly important. - -The first glance which she threw about her, after she had been ushered -in the reception-hall, revealed to her that not even she had guessed the -full importance of what was toward. - -The three nuns sat on their accustomed bench at one side of the fire, -and behind them, in his familiar chimney-corner, palsied old Father -Harrington lolled and half-dozed over the biscuit he was nibbling to -stay his stomach after mass. At the table, before a formidable array of -papers, was seated Cormac O’Daly, and at his side sat the person whose -polite name seemed to be Diarmid MacEgan, but whom Muirisc knew and -delighted in as Jerry. Mrs. Fergus made a mental note of surprise at -seeing him seated in such company, and then carried her gaze on to cover -the principal personage in the room. It was The O’Mahony, looking very -grave and preoccupied, and who stood leaning against the chimney-mantel -like a proprietor, who welcomed her with a nod and motioned her to a -seat. - -It was he, too, who broke the silence which solemnly enveloped the -conference. - -“Cousin Maggie,” he said, in explanation, to her, “we’ve got together -this little family party so early in the mornin’ for the reason that -time is precious. I’m goin’ away--for my health--in an hour or two, an’ -there are things to be arranged before I go. I may be away for years; -maybe I sha’n’t ever come back.” - -“Sure the suddenness of it’s fit to take one’s breath away!” Mrs. Fergus -exclaimed, and put her plump white hand to her bosom. “I’ve nerves that -bad, O’Mahony,” she added. - -“Yes, it is a sudden sort of spurt,” he assented. - -“And it’s your health, you say! Sure, I used to look on you as the -mortial picture of a grand, strong man.” - -“You can’t always tell by looks,” said The O’Mahony, gravely. “But--the -point’s this. I’m leaving O’Daly and Jerry here, as sort o’ joint bosses -of the circus, during my absence. Daly is to be ringmaster, so to speak, -while Jerry’ll be in the box-office, and kind o’ keep an eye to the -whole show, generally.” - -“I lamint, sir, that I’m not able to congratulate you on the felicity of -your mettyphor,” said Cor-mac O’Daly, whose swart, thin-visaged little -face wore an expression more glum than ever. - -“At any rate, you git at my meaning. I have signed two powers of -attorney, drawn up by O’Daly here as a lawyer, which gives them power to -run things for me, while I’m away. Everything is set out in the papers, -straight and square. I’m leaving my will, too, with O’Daly, an’ that I -wanted specially to speak to you about. I’ve got just one heir in this -whole world, an’ that’s your little gal, Katie. P’r’aps it’ll be as well -not to say anything to her about it, but I want you all to know. An’ I -want you an’ her to move back into my house, an live there jest as you -did afore I come. I’ve spoken to Mrs. Sullivan about it--she’s as good -as a farrow cow in a family--an’ she’ll stay right along with you, an’ -look after things. An’ Jerry here, he’ll see that your wheels are -kept greased--financially, I mean--an’--I guess that’s about all. Only -lookout for that little gal o’ yours as well as you know how--that’s -all. An’ I wish--I wish you’d send her over to me, to my house, in half -an hour or so--jest to say good-bye.” - -The O’Mahony’s voice had trembled under the suspicion of a quaver at the -end. He turned now, abruptly, took up his hat from the table, and left -the room, closely followed by Jerry. O’Daly rose as if to accompany -them, hesitated for a moment, and then seated himself again. - -The mother superior had heretofore preserved an absolute silence. She -bent her glance now upon Mrs. Fergus, and spoke slowly: - -“Ah, thin, Margaret O’Mahony,” she said, “d’ye mind in your day of good -fortune that, since the hour you were born, ye’ve been the child of our -prayers and the object of our ceaseless intercessions?” - -Mrs. Fergus put out her rounded lower lip a little and, rising from her -chair, walked slowly over to the little cracked mirror on the wall, to -run a correcting finger over the escalloped line of her crimps. - -“Ay,” she said at last, “I mind many things bechune me and you--not all -of thim prayers either.” - -While Mrs. Sullivan and Jerry were hard at work packing the scant -wardrobe and meager personal belongings of the master for his journey, -and the greater part of the population of Muirisc stood clustered on -the little quay, watching the _Hen Hawk_, bemoaning their own impending -bereavement, and canvassing the incredible good luck of Malachy, who was -to be the companion in this voyage to unknown parts--while the wind -rose outside, and the waters tumbled, and the sky grew overcast with -the sullen menace of a winter storm--The O’Mahony walked slowly, hand in -hand with little Kate, through the deserted churchyard. - -The girl had been weeping, and the tears still blurred her eyes and -stained her red cheeks with woe-begone smudges. She clung to her -companion’s hand, and pressed her head ever and again against his arm, -but words she had none. The man walked with his eyes bent on the ground -and his lips tightly closed together. So the two strolled in silence -till they had passed out from the place of tombs, and, following a -path which wound its way in ascent through clumps of budding furze -and miniature defiles among the rocks, had gained the summit of the -cliff-wall, under whose shelter the hamlet of Muirisc had for ages -nestled. Here they halted, looking down upon the gray ruins of castle, -church and convent, upon thatched cottage roofs, the throng on the quay, -the breakers’ line of foam against the rocks, and the darkened expanse -of white-capped waters beyond. - -“Don’t take on so, sis, any more; that’s a good gal,” said The O’Mahony, -at last, drawing the child’s head to his side, and gently stroking her -black hair. “It ain’t no good, an’ it breaks me all up. One thing I’m -glad of: It’s going to be rough outside. It seems to me I couldn’t ‘a’ -stood it to up an’ sail off in smooth, sunshiny weather. The higher she -rolls the better I’ll like it. It’s the same as havin’ somethin’ to bite -on, when you’ve got the toothache.” - -Kate, for answer, rubbed her head against his sleeve, but said nothing. - -After a long pause, he went on: “’Tain’t as if I was goin’ to be gone -forever an’ a day. Why, I may be poppin’ in any minit, jest when you -least expect it. That’s why I want you to study your lessons right -along, every day, so ’t when I turn up you’ll be able to show off A -number one. Maybe you’re bankin’ on my not bein’ able to tell whether -your book learnin’ is ‘all wool an’ a yard wide’ or not. I didn’t get -much of a show at school, I know. ’Twas ‘root hog or die’ with me when -I was a boy. But I’m jest a terror at askin’ questions. Why, I’ve busted -up whole schools afore now, puttin’ conundrums to ’m that even the -school-ma’ams couldn’t answer. So you look out for me when I come.” - The gentle effort at cheerfulness bore fruit not after its kind. Kate’s -little breast began to heave, and she buried her face against his coat. - -The O’Mahony looked wistfully down upon the village and the bay, patting -the child’s shoulder in silent token of sympathy. Then an idea occurred -to him. With his finger under her chin, he lifted Kate’s face till her -glance met his. - -“Oh, by the way,” he said, with animation, “have you got so you can write -pritty good?” - -The girl nodded her head, and looked away. - -“Why, then, look here,” he exclaimed, heartily, “what’s the matter with -your writin’ me real letters, say every few weeks, tellin’ me all that’s -goin’ on, an’ keepin’ me posted right up to date? Why, that’s jest -splendid! It’ll be almost the same as if I wasn’t away at all. Eh, won’t -it, skeezucks, eh?” He playfully put his arm around her shoulder, and -they began the descent of the path. The suggestion had visibly helped to -lighten her little heart, though she had said not a word. - -“Oh, yes,” he went on, “an’ another thing I wanted to say: It ain’t -a thing that you must ever ask about--or ought to know anything about -it--but we went out yisterday an’ made fools of ourselves, an’ if I -hadn’t had the luck of a brindled heifer, we’d all been in jail to-day. -Of course, I don’t know for certain, but I shouldn’t wonder if my luck -had something to do with a--what d’ye call it?--yes, _cathach_--that we -toted along with us. Well, I’m goin’ to turn that box over for you to -keep, when we git down to the house. I wouldn’t open if it I was you--it -ain’t a pritty sight for a little gal--just a few dead men’s bones--but -the box itself is all right, an’ it can’t do you no harm, to say the -least. An’, moreover--why, here it is in my pocket--here’s a ring we -found on his thumb--cur’ous enough--that you must keep for me, too. That -makes it like what we read about in the story-books, eh? A ring that the -beauteous damsel, with the hay-colored hair, sends to Alonzo when she -gets in trouble, eh, sis?” - -The child took the ring--a quaintly shaped thin band of gold, with a -carved precious stone of golden-brownish hue--and put it in her pocket. -Still she said nothing. - -At ten in the forenoon, in the presence of all Muirisc, The O’Mahony at -last gently pushed his way through the throng of keening old women and -excited younger friends, and stepped over the gunwale upon the deck, and -Jerry and O’Daly restrained those who would have followed him. He had -forced his face into a half-smile, to which he clung resolutely almost -to the end. He had offered many parting injunctions: to work hard -and drink little; to send the children to school; to keep an absolute -silence to all outsiders, whether from Skull, Goleen, Crookhaven, or -elsewhere, concerning him and his departure--and many other things. He -had shaken hands a hundred times across the narrow bar of water between -the boat and pier; and now the men in the dingey out in front had the -hawser taut, and the _Hen Hawk_ was moving under its strain, when a -shrill cry raised itself above the general clamor of lamentation and -farewells. - -At that moment of the vessel’s stirring, little Kate O’Mahony broke from -the group in which her mother and the nuns stood dignifiedly apart, and -ran wildly to the pier’s edge, where Jerry caught and for the moment -held her, struggling, over the widening chasm between the boat and the -quay. Her power to speak had come at last. - -“Take me with you, O’Mahony!” she cried, fighting like a wild thing to -free herself. “Oh, take me with you! You promised! You promised! _Take_ -me with you!” - -It was then that The O’Mahony’s face lost, in a flash, its perfunctory -smile. He half stretched out his hand--then swung himself on his heel -and marched to the prow of the vessel. He did not look back again upon -Muirisc. - -***** - -An hour later a police-car, bearing five armed men, halted at the point -on the mountain-road from Durrus where Muirisc comes first in view. The -constables, gazing out upon the broad expanse of Dunmanus Bay, saw on -the distant water-line a yawl-rigged coasting vessel, white against the -stormy sky. Some chance whim suggested to their minds an interest in -this craft. - -But when they descended into Muirisc they could not find a soul who had -the remotest notion of what a yawl-rig meant, much less of the identity -of the lugger which, even as they spoke, had passed out of sight. - - - - -CHAPTER XVI--THE LADY OF MUIRISC. - -In the parish of Kilmoe--which they pronounce with a soft prolonged -“moo-h,” like the murmuring call of one of their little bright-eyed, -black-coated cows--the inhabitants are wont to say that the next parish -is America. - -It is an ancient and sterile and storm-beaten parish, this Kilmoe, -thrust out in expiation of some forgotten sin or other to exist beyond -the pale of human companionship. Its sons and daughters, scattered in -tiny, isolated hamlets over its barren area, hear never a stranger’s -voice--and their own speech is slow and low of tone because the real -right to make a noise there belongs to the shrieking gulls and the wild, -west wind and the towering, foam-fanged waves, which dashed themselves, -in tireless rivalry with the thunder, against its cliffs. - -Slow, too, in growth and ripening are the wits of the men of Kilmoe. -They must have gray hairs before they are accounted more than boys; and -when, from sheer old age they totter into the grave, the feeling of -the parish is that they have been untimely cut off just as they were -beginning to get their brains in fair working: order. Very often these -aged men, if they dally and loiter on the way to the tomb in the hope of -becoming still wiser, are given a sharp and peremptory push forward by -starvation. It would not do for the men of Kilmoe to know too much. If -they did, they would all go somewhere else to live--and then what would -become of their landlord? - -Kilmoe once had a thriving and profitable industry, whereby a larger -population than it now contains kept body and soul together in more -intimate and comfortable relations than at present exist. The outlay -involved in this industry was very small, and the returns, though not -governed by any squalid, modern law of percentages, were, on the whole, -large. - -It was all very simple. Whenever a stormy, wind-swept night set in, the -men of Kilmoe tied a lighted lantern on the neck of a cow, and drove the -animal to walk along the strand underneath the sea-cliffs. This light, -rising and sinking with the movements of the cow, bore a quaint and -interesting resemblance to the undulations of an illuminated buoy or -boat, rocked on gentle waves; and strange seafaring crafts bent their -course in confidence toward it, until they were undeceived. Then the -men of Kilmoe would sally forth, riding the tumbling breakers with great -bravery and address, in their boats of withes and stretched skin, and -enter into possession of all the stranded strangers’ goods and chattels. -As for such strangers as survived the wreck, they were sometimes sold -into slavery; more often they were merely knocked on the head. Thus -Kilmoe lived much more prosperously than in these melancholy latter days -of dependence upon a precarious potato crop. - -In every family devoted to industrial pursuits there is one member who -is more distinguished for attention to the business than the others, and -upon whom its chief burdens fall. This was true of the O’Mahonys, who -for many centuries controlled and carried on the lucrative occupation -above described, on their peninsula of Ivehagh. There were branches -of the sept stationed in the more inland sea-castles of Rosbrin, -Ardintenant, Leamcon and Ballydesmond on the one side, and of Dunbeacon, -Dunmanus and Muirisc on the other, who did not expend all their -energies upon this, their genuine business, but took many vacations and -indefinitely extended holiday trips, for the improvement of their -minds and the gratification of their desire to whip the neighboring -O’Driscolls, O’Sullivans, O’Heas and O’Learys out of their boots. The -record of these pleasure excursions, in which sometimes the O’Mahonys -returned with great booty and the heads of their enemies on pikes, and -some other times did not come home at all, fills all the pages of the -Psalter of Rosbrin, beside occupying a good deal of space in the Annals -of Innisfallen and of the Four Masters, and needs not be enlarged upon -here. - -But it is evident that that gentleman of the family who, from choice -or sense of duty, lived in Kilmoe, must, have pursued the legitimate -O’Mahony vocation very steadily, without any frivolous interruptions or -the waste of time in visiting his neighbors. The truth is that he had no -neighbors, and nothing else under the sun with which to occupy his mind -but the affairs of the sea. This the observer will readily conclude when -he stands upon the promontory marked on the maps as Three-Castle Head, -with the whole world-dividing Atlantic at his feet, and looks over at -the group of ruined and moss-grown keeps which give the place its name. - -***** - -“Oh-h! Look there now, Murphy!” cried a tall and beautiful young woman, -who stood for the first time on this lofty sea-wall, viewing the somber -line of connected castles. “Sure, _here_ lived the true O’Mahony of -the Coast of White Foam! Why, man, what were we at Muirisc but poor -crab-catchers compared wid _him?_” - -She spoke in a tone of awed admiration, between long breaths of -wonderment, and her big eyes of Irish gray glowed from their cover of -sweeping lashes with surprised delight. She had taken off her hat--a -black straw hat, with a dignifiedly broad brim bound in velvet, and -enriched by a plume of the same somber hue--to save it from the wind, -which blew stiffly here; and this bold sea-wind, nothing loth, frolicked -boisterously with her dark curls instead. She put her hand on her -companion’s shoulder for steadiness, and continued the rapt gaze upon -this crumbling haunt of the dead and forgotten sea-lords. - -Twelve years had passed since, as a child of eight, Kate O’Mahony had -screamed out in despair after the departing _Hen Hawk_. That vessel had -never cleft the waters of Dunmanus since, and the fleeting years had -converted the memory of its master, into a kind of heroic legendary -myth, over which the elders brooded fondly, but which the youngsters -thought of as something scarcely less remote than the Firbolgs, or the -builders of the “Danes’ forts” on the furze-crowned hills about. - -But these same years, though they turned the absent into shadows, had -made of Kate a very lovely and complete reality. It would be small -praise to speak of her as the most beautiful girl on the peninsula, -since there is no other section of Ireland so little favored in that -respect, to begin with, and for the additional reason that whatever -maidenly comeliness there is existent there is habitually shrouded from -view by close-drawn shawls and enveloping hoods, even on the hottest of -summer noon-days. For all the stray traveller sees of young and pretty -faces in Ivehagh, he might as well be in the heart of the vailed (sp.) -Orient. - -And even with Kate, potential Lady of Muirisc though she was, this -fashion of a hat was novel. It seemed only yesterday since she had -emerged from the chrysalis of girlhood--girlhood with a shawl over its -head, and Heaven only knows what abysses of ignorant shyness and stupid -distrust inside that head. And, alas! it seemed but a swiftly on-coming -to-morrow before this new freedom was to be lost again, and the hat -exchanged forever for a nun’s vail. - -If Kate had known natural history better, she might have likened her lot -to that of the May-fly, which spends two years underground in its larva -state hard at work preparing to be a fly, and then, when it at last -emerges, lives only for an hour, even if it that long escapes the bill -of the swallow or the rude jaws of the trout. No such simile drawn -from stonyhearted Nature’s tragedies helped her to philosophy. She had, -perhaps, a better refuge in the health and enthusiasm of her own youth. - -In the company of her ancient servitor, Murphy, she was spending the -pleasant April days in visiting the various ruins of The O’Mahony’s -on Ivehagh. Many of these she viewed now for the first time, and the -delight of this overpowered and kept down in her mind the reflection -that perhaps she was seeing them all for the last time as well. - -“But how, in the name of glory, did they get up and down to their boats, -Murphy?” she asked, at last, strolling further out toward the edge to -catch the full sweep of the cliff front, which rises abruptly from the -beach below, sheer and straight, clear three hundred feet. - -“There’s never a nearer landing-place, thin, than where we left our -boat, a half-mile beyant here,” said Murphy. “Faith, miss, ’tis the -belafe they went up and down be the aid of the little people. ’T -is well known that, on windy nights, there do be grand carrin’s-on -hereabouts. Sure, in the lake forninst us it was that Kian O’Mahony saw -the enchanted woman with the shape on her of a horse, and died of the -sight. Manny’s the time me own father related to me that same.” - -“Oh, true; that _would_ be the lake of the legend,” said Kate. “Let us -go down to it, Murphy. I’ll dip me hand for wance in water that’s been -really bewitched.” - -The girl ran lightly down the rolling side of the hill, and across the -rock-strewn hollows and mounds which stretched toward the castellated -cliff. The base of the third and most inland tower was washed by a -placid fresh-water pond, covering an area of several acres, and heavily -fringed at one end with rushes. As she drew near a heron suddenly rose -from the reeds, hung awkwardly for a moment with its long legs dangling -in the air, and then began a slow, heavy flight seaward. On the moment -Kate saw another even more unexpected sight--the figure of a man on -the edge of the lake, with a gun raised to his shoulder, its barrel -following the heron’s clumsy course. Involuntarily she uttered a little -warning shout to the bird, then stood still, confused and blushing. -Stiff-jointed old Murphy was far behind. - -The stranger had heard her, if the heron had not. He lowered his weapon, -and for a moment gazed wonderingly across the water at this unlooked-for -apparition. Then, with his gun under his arm, he turned and walked -briskly toward her. Kate cast a searching glance backward for Murphy -in vain, and her intuitive movement to draw a shawl over her head was -equally fruitless. The old man was still somewhere behind the rocks, and -she had only this citified hat and even that not on her head. She could -see that the advancing sportsman was young and a stranger. - -He came up close to where she stood, and lifted his cap for an instant -in an off-hand way. Viewed thus nearly, he was very young, with a -bright, fresh-colored face and the bearing and clothes of a gentleman, -“I’m glad you stopped me, now that I think of it,” he said, with an easy -readiness of speech. “One has no business to shoot that kind of bird; -but I’d been tying about here for hours, waiting for something better to -turn up, till I was in a mood to bang at anything that came along.” - -He offered this explanation with a nonchalant half-smile, as if -confident ol its prompt acceptance. Then his face took on a more serious -look, as he glanced a second time at her own flushed countenance. - -“I hope I haven’t been trespassing,” he added, under the influence of -this revised impression. - -Kate was, in truth, frowning at him, and there were no means by which -he could guess that it was the effect of nervous timidity rather than -vexation. - -“’Tis not my land,” she managed to say at last, and looked back again -for Murphy. - -“No--I didn’t think it was anybody’s land,” he remarked, essaying -another propitiatory smile. “They told me at Goleen that I could shoot -as much as I liked. They didn’t tell me, though, that there was nothing -to shoot.” - -The young man clearly expected conversation; and Kate, stealing further -flash-studies of his face, began to be conscious that his manner and -talk were not specialty different from those of any nice girl of her own -age. She tried to think of something amiable to say. - -“’Tis not the sayson for annything worth shooting,” she said, and -then wondered if it was an impertinent remark. - -“I know that,” he replied. “But I’ve nothing else to do, just at the -moment, and you can keep yourself walking better if you’ve got a gun, -and then, of course, in a strange country there’s always the chance that -something curious _may_ turn up to shoot. Fact is, I didn’t care so -much after all whether I shot anything or not. You see, castles are new -things to me--we don’t grow ’em where I came from--and it’s fun to me -to mouse around among the stones and walls and so on. But this is the -wildest and lonesomest thing I’ve run up against yet. I give you my -word, I’d been lying here so long, watching those mildewed old towers -there and wondering what kind of folks built ’em and lived in ’em, -that when I saw you galloping down the rocks here--upon my word, I -half thought it was all a fairy story. You know the poor people really -believe in that sort of thing, here. Several of them have told me so.” - -Kate actually felt herself smiling upon the young man. “I’m afraid you -can’t always believe them,” she said. “Some of them have deludthering -ways with strangers--not that they mane anny harm by it, poor souls!” - -“But a young man down below here, to-day,” continued the other--“mind -you, a _young-man_--told me solemnly that almost every night he heard -with his own ears the shindy kicked up by the ghosts on the hill back -of his house, you know, inside one of those ringed Danes’ forts, as they -call ’em. He swore to it, honest Injun.” - -The girl started in spite of herself, stirred vaguely by the sound of -this curious phrase with which the young man had finished his remarks. -But nothing definite took shape in her thoughts concerning it> and she -answered him freely enough: - -“Ah, well, I’ll not say he intinded desate. They’re a poetic people, -sir, living here alone among the ruins of what was wance a grand -country, and now is what you see it, and they imagine visions to -thimselves. ’Tis in the air, here. Sure, you yourself”--she smiled -again as she spoke--“credited me with being a fairy. Of course,” she -added, hastily, “you had in mind the legend of the lake, here.” - -“How do you mean--legend?” asked the young man, in frank ignorance. - -“Sure, here in these very waters is a woman, with the shape of a horse, -who appears to people, and when they see her, they--they die, that’s -all.” - -“Well, that’s a good deal, I should think,” he responded, lightly. “No, -I hadn’t heard of that before; and, besides, you--why, you came down -the hill, there, skipping like a lamb on the mountains, not a bit like a -horse.” - -The while Kate turned his comparison over in her mind to judge whether -she liked it or not, the young man shifted his gun to his shoulder, as -if to indicate that the talk had lasted long enough. Then she swiftly -blamed herself for having left this signal to him. - -“I’ll not be keeping you,” she said, hurriedly. - -“Oh, bless you--not at all!” he protested. “Only I was afraid I was -keeping _you_. You see, time hangs pretty heavy on my hands just now, -and I’m tickled to death to have anybody to talk to. Of course, I like -to go around looking at the castles here, because the chances are that -some of my people some time or other helped build ’em. I know my -father was born somewhere in this part of County Cork.” - -Kate sniffed at him. - -“Manny thousands of people have been born here,” she said, with -dignity, “but it doesn’t follow that they had annything to do with these -castles.” The young man attached less importance to the point. - -“Oh, of course not,” he said, carelessly. “All I go by is the -probability that, way back somewhere, all of us O’Mahonys were related -to one another. But for that matter, so were all the Irish who--” - -“And are _you_ an O’Mahony, thin?” - -Kate was looking at him with shining eyes--and he saw now that she was -much taller and more beautiful than he had thought before. - -“That’s my name,” he said, simply. - -“An O’Mahony of County Cork?” - -“Well--personally I’m an O’Mahony of Houghton County, Michigan, but my -father was from around here, somewhere.” - -“Do you hear that, Murphy?” she said, instinctively turning to the -faithful companion of all her out-of-door life. But there was no Murphy -in sight. - -Kate stared blankly about her for an instant, before she remembered that -Murphy had never rejoined her at the lakeside. And now she thought she -could hear some vague sound of calling in the distance, rising above the -continuous crash of the breakers down below. - -“Oh, something has happened to him!” she cried, and started running -wildly back again. The young man followed close enough to keep her in -sight, and at a distance of some three hundred yards came up to her, -as she knelt beside the figure of an old peasant seated with his back -against a rock. - -Something had happened to Murphy. His ankle had turned on a stone, and -he could not walk a step. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII--HOW THE OLD BOATMAN KEPT HIS VOW. - -Oh, what’s to be done _now?_” asked Kate, rising to her feet and -casting a puzzled look about her. “Sure, me wits are abroad entirely.” - -No answer seemed forthcoming. As far inland as the eye could stretch, -even to the gray crown of Dunkelly, no sign of human habitation was -to be seen. The jutting headland of the Three Castles on which she -stood--with the naked primeval cliffs; the roughly scattered boulders -framed in scrub-furze too stunted and frightened in the presence of the -sea to venture upon blossoms; the thin ashen-green grass blown flat -to earth in the little sheltered nooks where alone its roots might -live--presented the grimmest picture of desolation she had ever seen. -An undersized sheep had climbed the rocks to gaze upon the intruders--an -animal with fleece of such a snowy whiteness that it looked like an -imitation baa-baa from a toy-shop--and Kate found herself staring into -its vacuous face with sympathy, so helplessly empty was her own mind of -suggestions. - -“’Tis two Oirish miles to the nearest house,” said Murphy, in a -despondent tone. - -Kate turned to the young man, and spoke wistfully: - -“If you’ll stop here, I’ll go for help,” she said. - -The young man from Houghton County laughed aloud. - -“If there’s any going to be done, I guess you’re not the one that’ll do -it,” he answered. “But, first of all, let’s see where we stand exactly. -How did you come here, anyhow?” - -“We rowed around from--from our home--a long way distant in that -direction,” pointing vaguely toward Dunmanus Bay, “and our boat was left -there at the nearest landing point, half a mile from here.” - -“Ah, well, _that’s_ all right,” said the young man. “It would take an -hour to get anybody over here to help, and that would be clean waste -of time, because we don’t need any help. I’ll just tote him over on my -back, all by my little self.” - -“Ah--you’d never try to do the likes of _that!_” deprecated the girl. - -“Why not?” he commented, cheerfully--and then, with a surprise which -checked further protest, she saw him tie his game-bag round his waist so -that it hung to the knee, get Murphy seated up on the rock against which -he had learned, and then take him bodily on his back, with the wounded -foot comfortably upheld and steadied inside the capacious leathern -pouch. - -“‘Why not,’ eh?” he repeated, as he straightened himself easily under -the burden; “why he’s as light as a bag of feathers. That’s one of -the few advantages of living on potatoes. Now you bring along the -gun--that’s a good girl--and we’ll fetch up at the boat in no time. You -do the steering, Murphy. Now, then, here we go!” - -The somber walls of the Three Castles looked down in silence upon this -strange procession as it filed past under their shadows--and if the -gulls which wheeled above and about the moss-grown turrets described the -spectacle later to the wraiths of the dead-and-gone O’Mahonys and to the -enchanted horse-shaped woman in the lake, there must have been a general -agreement that the parish of Kilmoe had seen never such another sight -before, even in the days of the mystic Tuatha de Danaan. - -The route to the boat abounded to a disheartening degree in rough and -difficult descents, and even more trying was the frequent necessity for -long _détours_ to avoid impossible barriers of rock. Moreover, Murphy -turned out to be vastly heavier than he had seemed at the outset. Hence -the young man, who had freely enlivened the beginning of the journey -with affable chatter, gradually lapsed into silence; and at last, -when only a final ridge of low hills separated them from the strand, -confessed that he would like to take off his coat. He rested for a -minute or two after this had been done, and wiped his wet brow. - -“Who’d think the sun could be so hot in April?” he said. “Why, where I -come from, we’ve just begun to get through sleighing.” - -“What is it you’d be slaying now?” asked Kate, innocently. “We kill our -pigs in the late autumn.” - -The young man laughed aloud as he took Murphy once more on his back. - -“Potato-bugs, chiefly,” was his enigmatic response. - -She pondered fruitlessly upon this for a brief time, as she followed on -with the gun and coat. Then her thoughts centered themselves once more -upon the young stranger himself, who seemed only a boy to look at, -yet was so stout and confident of himself, and had such a man’s way of -assuming control of things, and doing just what he wanted to do and what -needed to be done. - -Muirisc did not breed that sort of young man. He could not, from his -face, be more than three or four and twenty--and at that age all the men -she had known were mere slow-witted, shy and awkward louts of boys, -whom their fathers were quite free to beat with a stick, and who -never dreamed of doing anything on their own mental initiative, except -possibly to “boo” at the police or throw stones through the windows of -a boycotted shop, Evidently there were young men in the big unknown -outside world who differed immeasurably from this local standard. - -Oh, that wonderful outside world, which she was never going to see! She -knew that it was sinful and godless and pressed down and running over -with abominations, because the venerable nuns of the Hostage’s Tears had -from the beginning told her so, but she was conscious of a new and less -hostile interest in it, all the same, since it produced young men of -this novel type. Then she began to reflect that he was like Robert -Emmett, who was the most modern instance of a young man which the limits -of convent literature permitted her to know about, only his hair was -cut short, and he was fair, and he smiled a good deal, and--And lo, here -they were at the boat! She woke abruptly from her musing day-dream. - -The tide had gone out somewhat, and left the dingey stranded on the -dripping sea-weed. The young man seated Murphy on a rock, untied the -game-bag and put on his coat, and then in the most matter-of-fact way -tramped over the slippery ooze to the boat, pushed it off into the water -and towed it around by the chain to the edge of a little cove, whence -one might step over its side from a shore of clean, dry sand. He then, -still as if it were all a matter of course, lifted Murphy and put him in -the bow of the boat, and asked Kate to sit in the stern and steer. - -“I can talk to you, you know, now that your sitting there,” he said, -with his foot on the end of the oar-seat, after she had taken the place -indicated. “Oh--wait a minute! We were forgetting the gun and bag.” - -He ran lightly back to where these things lay upon the strand, and -secured them; then, turning, he discovered that Murphy had scrambled -over to the middle seat, taken the oars, and pushed the boat off. -Suspecting nothing, he walked briskly back to the water’s edge. - -“Shove her in a little,” he said, “and I’ll hold her while you get back -again into the bow. You mustn’t think of rowing, my good man.” - -But Murphy showed no sign of obedience. He kept his burnt, claw-shaped -hands clasped on the motionless, dipped oars, and his eager, bird-like -eyes fastened upon the face of his young mistress. As for Kate, she -studied the bottom of the boat with intentness, and absently stirred the -water over the boat-side with her finger-tips. - -“Get her in, man! Don’t you hear?” called the stranger, with a shadow -of impatience, over the six or seven feet of water which lay between him -and the boat. “Or _you_ explain it to him,” he said to Kate; “perhaps he -doesn’t understand me--tell him I’m going to row!” - -In response to this appeal, Kate lifted her head, and hesitatingly -opened her lips to speak--but the gaunt old boatman broke in upon her -confused silence: - -“Ah, thin--I understand well enough,” he shouted, excitedly, “an’ I’m -thankful to ye, an’ the longest day I live I’ll say a prayer for -ye--an’ sure ye’re a foine grand man, every inch of ye, glory be to the -Lord--an’ it’s not manny w’u’d ’a’ done what ye did this day--and the -blessin’ of the Lord rest an ye; but--” here he suddenly dropped his -high shrill, swift-chasing tones, and added in quite another voice--“if -it’s the same to you, sir, we’ll go along home as we are.” - -“What nonsense!” retorted the young man. “My time doesn’t matter in the -least--and you’re not fit to row a mile--let alone a long distance.” - -“It’s not with me fut I’ll be rowin’,” replied Murphy, rounding his back -for a sweep of the oars. - -“Can’t _you_ stop him, Miss--eh--young lady!” the young man implored -from the sands. - -Hope flamed up in his breast at sight of the look she bent upon Murphy, -as she leaned forward to speak--and then sank into plumbless depths. -Perhaps she had said something--he could not hear, and it was doubtful -if the old boatman could have heard either--for on the instant he had -laid his strength on the oars, and the boat had shot out into the bay -like a skater over the glassy ice. - -It was a score of yards away before the young man from Houghton County -caught his breath. He stood watching it--be it confessed--with his mouth -somewhat open and blank astonishment written all over his ruddy, boyish -face. Then the flush upon his pink cheeks deepened, and a sparkle came -into his eyes, for the young lady in the boat had risen and turned -toward him, and was waving her hand to him in friendly salutation. He -swung the empty game-bag wildly about his head in answer, and then the -boat darted out of view behind a jutting ridge of umber rocks, and he -was looking at an unbroken expanse of gently heaving water--all crystals -set on violet satin, under the April sun. - -He sent a long-drawn sighing whistle of bewilderment after the vanished -vision. - -Not a word had been exchanged between the two in the boat until after -Kate, yielding at the last moment to the temptation which had beset her -from the first, waved that unspoken farewell to her new acquaintance -and saw him a moment later abruptly cut out of the picture by the -intervening rocks. Then she sat down again and fastened a glare of -metallic disapproval, so to speak, upon Murphy. This, however, served no -purpose, since the boatman kept his head sagaciously bent over his task, -and rowed away like mad. - -“I take shame for you, Murphy!” she said at last, with a voice as full -of mingled anguish and humiliation as she could manage to make it. - -“Is it too free I am with complete strangers?” asked the guileful -Murphy, with the face of a trusting babe. - -“’Tis the rudest and most thankless old man in all West Carbery that -ye are!” she answered, sharply. - -“Luk at that now!” said Murphy, apparently addressing the handles of his -oars. “An’ me havin’ the intintion to burnin’ two candles for him this -very night!” - -“Candles is it! Murphy, once for all, ’t is a bad trick ye have of -falling to talking about candles and ‘Hail Marys’ and such holy matters, -whinever ye feel yourself in a corner--and be sure the saints like it no -better than I do.” - -The aged servitor rested for a moment upon his oars, and, being -conscious that evasion was of no further use, allowed an expression of -frankness to dominate his withered and weather-tanned face. - -“Well, miss,” he said, “an’ this is the truth I’m tellin’ ye--_‘t_ was -not fit that he should be sailin’ in the boat wid you.” - -Kate tossed her head impatiently. - -“And how long are you my director in--in such matters as these, Murphy?” - she asked, with irony. - -The old man’s eyes glistened with the emotions which a sudden swift -thought conjured up. - -“How long?” he asked, with dramatic effect. - -“Sure, the likes of me c’u’d be no directhor at all--but ’tis a dozen -years since I swore to his honor, The O’Mahony himself, that I’d -watch over ye, an’ protect ye, an’ keep ye from the lightest breath of -harrum--an’ whin I meet him, whether it be the Lord’s will in this world -or the nixt, I’ll go to him an’ I’ll take off me hat, an’ I’ll say: ‘Yer -honor, what old Murphy putt his word to, that same he kep!’ An’ is it -you, Miss Katie, that remimbers him that well, that ’u’d be blamin’ me -for that same?” - -“I don’t know if I’m so much blaming you, Murphy,” said Kate, much -softened by both the matter and the manner of this appeal, “but ’tis -different, wit’ this young man, himself an O’Mahony by name.” - -“Faith, be the same token, ’tis manny thousands of O’Mahonys there are -in foreign parts, I’m tould, an’ more thousands of ’em here at home, -an’ if it’s for rowin’ ’em all on Dunmanus Bay ye’d be, on the score -of their name, ’tis grand new boats we’d want.” - -Kate smiled musingly. - -“Did you mind, Murphy,” she asked, after a pause, “how like the sound of -his speech was to The O’Mahony’s?” - -“That I did not!” said Murphy, conclusively. - -“Ah, ye’ve no ears, man! I was that flurried at the time, I couldn’t -think what it was--but now, whin it comes back to me, it was like -talking to The O’Mahony himself. There was that one word, ‘onistinjun,’ -that The O’Mahony had forever on his tongue. Surely you noticed that!” - -“All Americans say that same,” Murphy explained carelessly. “’T is -well known most of ’em are discinded from the Injuns. ’Tis that -they m’ane.” It did not occur to Kate to question this bold -ethno-philological proposition. She leant back in her seat at the stern, -absent-mindedly toying with the ribbons of her hat, and watching the sky -over Murphy’s head. - -“Poor, dear old O’Mahony!” she sighed at last. - -“Amin to that miss!” murmured the boatman, between strokes. - -“’T is a year an’ more now, Murphy, since we had the laste sign in -the world from him. Ah, wirra! I’m beginnin’ to be afraid dead ’tis he -is!” - -“Keep your heart, miss; keep your heart!” crooned the old boatman, in -what had been for months a familiar phrase on his lips. “Sure no mortial -man ever stepped fut on green sod that ’ud take more killin’ than our -O’Mahony. Why, _coleen asthore_, wasn’t he foightin’ wid the French, -against the Prooshians, an’ thin wid the Turkeys against the Rooshians, -an’ bechune males, as ye’d say, didn’t he bear arms in Spain for the -Catholic king, like the thunderin’ rare old O’Mahony that he is, an’ did -ever so much as a scratch come to him--an’ him killin’ an’ destroyin’ -thim by hundreds? Ah, rest aisy about _him_, Miss Katie!” - -The two had long since exhausted, in their almost daily talks, every -possible phase of this melancholy subject. It was now April of 1879, and -the last word received from the absent chief had been a hastily scrawled -note dispatched from Adrianople, on New Year’s Day of 1878--when the -Turkish army, beaten finally at Plevna and decimated in the Schipka, -were doggedly moving backward toward the Bosphorus. Since that, there -had been absolute silence--and Kate and Murphy had alike, hoping against -hope, come long since to fear the worst. Though each strove to sustain -confidence in the other, there was no secret between their hearts as to -what both felt. - -“Murphy,” said Kate, rousing herself all at once from her reverie, -“there’s something I’ve been keeping from you--and I can’t hold it anny -longer. Do ye mind when Malachy wint away last winter?” - -“Faith I do,” replied the boatman. (Malachy, be it explained, had -followed The O’Mahony in all his wanderings up to the autumn of 1870, -when, in a skirmish shortly after Sedan, he had lost an arm and, upon -his release from the hospital, had been sent back to Muirisc.) “I mind -that he wint to Amerriky.” - -“Well, thin,” whispered Kate, bending forward as if the very waves had -ears, “it’s just that he didn’t do. I gave him money, and I gave him the -O’Mahony’s ring, and sint him to search the world over till he came upon -his master, or his master’s grave--and I charged him to say only this: -‘Come back to Muirisc! ’Tis Kate O’Mahony wants you!’ And now no one -knows this but me confessor and you.” - -The boatman gazed earnestly into her face. - -“An’ why for did ye say: ‘Come back?’” he asked. - -“Ah thin--well--‘tis O’Daly’s hard d’alin’s wid the tinants, and the -failure of the potatoes these two years and worse ahead and the birth of -me little step-brother--and--” - -“Answer me now, Katie darlint?” the old man adjured her, with glowing -eyes and solemn voice. “Is it the convint ye’re afraid of for yoursilf? -Is it of your own free will you’re goin’ to take your vows?” - -The girl had answered this question more than once before, and readily -enough. Now, for some reason which she could not have defined to -herself, she looked down upon the gliding water at her side, and -meditatively dipped her fingers into it, and let a succession of little -waves fling their crests up into her sleeve--and said nothing at all. - - - - -CHAPTER XVIII--THE GREAT O’DALY USURPATION. - -The stern natural law of mutability--of ceaseless growth, change and -decay--which the big, bustling, preoccupied outside world takes so -indifferently, as a matter of course, finds itself reduced to a bare -minimum of influence in such small, remote and out-of-the-way places as -Muirisc. The lapse of twelve years here had made the scantest and most -casual of marks upon the village and its inhabitants. Positively no -one worth mentioning had died--for even snuffy and palsied old Father -Harrington, though long since replaced at the convent _by_ a younger -priest, was understood to be still living on in the shelter of some -retreat for aged clergymen in Kerry or Clare. The three old nuns were -still the sole ladies of the Hostage’s Tears, and, like the rest of -Muirisc, seemed only a trifle the more wrinkled and worn under this -flight of time. - -Such changes as had been wrought had come in a leisurely way, without -attracting much attention. The mines, both of copper and of pyrites, -had prospered beyond the experience of any other section of Munster, -and this had brought into the immediate district a considerable alien -population. But these intrusive strangers had fortunately preferred -to settle in another hamlet in the neighborhood, and came rarely to -Muirisc. The village was still without a hotel, and had by this time -grown accustomed to the existence within its borders of a constabulary -barracks. Its fishing went forward sedately and without much profit; the -men of Muirisc only half believed the stories they heard of the modern -appliances and wonderful hauls at Baltimore and Crook-haven--and cared -even less than they credited. The lobster-canning factory had died a -natural death years before, and the little children of Muirisc, playing -about within sight of its roofless and rotting timbers, avoided closer -contact with the building under some vague and formless notion that it -was unlucky. The very idea that there had once been a man who thought -that Muirisc desired to put up lobsters in tins seemed to them -comic--and almost impious as well. - -But there was one alteration upon which the people of Muirisc bestowed a -good deal of thought--and on occasion and under their breath, not a few -bitter words. - -Cormac O’Daly, whom all the elders remembered as a mere “pote” and man -of business for the O’Mahonys, had suddenly in his old age blossomed -forth as The O’Daly, and as master of Muirisc. Like many other changes -which afflict human recollection, this had all come about by reason of -a woman’s vain folly. Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, having vainly cast -alluring glances upon successive relays of mining contractors and -superintendents, and of fish-buyers from Bristol and the Isle of Man, -and even, in the later stages, upon a sergeant of police--had at -last actually thrown herself in marriage at the grizzled head of -the hereditary bard. It cannot be said that the announcement of this -ill-assorted match had specially surprised the good people of Muirisc. -They had always felt that Mrs. Fergus would ultimately triumph in her -matrimonial resolutions, and the choice of O’Daly, though obviously -enough a last resort, did not shock their placid minds. It was rather -satisfactory than otherwise, when they came to think of it, that the -arrangement should not involve the introduction of a stranger, perhaps -even of an Englishman. - -But now, after nearly three years of this marriage, with a young O’Daly -already big enough to walk by himself among the pigs and geese in the -square--they said to themselves that even an Englishman would have been -better, and they bracketed the connubial tendencies of Mrs. Fergus and -the upstart ambition of Cormac under a common ban of curses. - -O’Daly had no sooner been installed in the castle than he had raised the -rents. Back had come the odious charge for turf-cutting, the tax on the -carrigeens and the tithe-levy upon the gathered kelp. In the best of -times these impositions would have been sorely felt; the cruel failure -of the potatoes in 1877 and ’78 had elevated them into the domain of -the tragic. - -For the first time in its history Muirisc had witnessed evictions. -Half way up the cliff stood the walls of four cottages, from which the -thatched roofs had been torn by a sheriff’s posse of policeman during -the bleakest month of winter. The gloomy spectacle, familiar enough -elsewhere throughout Ireland, had still the fascination of novelty in -the eyes of Muirisc. The villagers could not keep their gaze from those -gaunt, deserted walls. Some of the evicted people--those who were too -old or too young to get off to America and yet too hardy to die--still -remained in the neighborhood, sleeping in the ditches and subsisting -upon the poor charity of the cottagers roundabout. The sight of their -skulking, half-clad forms and hunger-pinched faces filled Muirisc with -wrathful humiliation. - -Almost worst still were the airs which latterly O’Daly had come to -assume. Even if the evictions and the rack-renting could have been -forgiven, Muirisc felt that his calling himself The O’Daly was -unpardonable. Everybody in Ivehagh knew that the O’Dalys had been mere -bards and singers for the McCarthys, the O’Mahonys, and other Eugenian -houses, and had not been above taking service, later on, under the -hatred Carews. That any scion of the sept should exalt himself now, in -the shoes of an O’Mahony, was simply intolerable. - -In proportion as Cormac waxed in importance, his coadjutor Jerry had -diminished. There was no longer any talk heard about Diarmid MacEgan; -the very pigs in the street knew him now to be plain Jerry Higgins. Only -the most shadowy pretense of authority to intermeddle in the affairs of -the estate remained to him. Unlettered goodnature and loyalty had stood -no chance whatever against the will and powers of the educated Cormac. -Muirisc did indeed cherish a nebulous idea that some time or other the -popular discontent would find him an effective champion, but Jerry -did nothing whatever to encourage this hope. He had grown stout and -red-faced through these unoccupied years, and lived by himself in a -barely habitable nook among the ruins of the castle, overlooking the -churchyard. Here he spent a great deal of his time, behind barred -doors and denying himself to all visitors--and Muirisc had long since -concluded that the companion of his solitude was a bottle. - -“I’ve a word more to whisper into your ear, Higgins,” said O’Daly, this -very evening, at the conclusion of some unimportant conversation about -the mines. - -The supper had been cleared away, and a tray of glasses flanking a -decanter stood on the table at which the speaker sat with his pipe. The -buxom and rubicund Mrs. Fergus--for so Muirisc still thought and spoke -of her--dozed comfortably in her arm-chair at one side of the bank -of blazing peat on the hearth, an open novel turned down on her lap. -Opposite her mother, Kate sat and sewed in silence, the while the men -talked. It was the room in which The O’Mahony had eaten his first meal -in Muirisc, twelve years before. - -“‘A word to whishper,’” repeated O’Daly, glancing at Jerry with severity -from under his beetling black brows, and speaking so loudly that even -Mrs. Sullivan in the kitchen might have heard--“times is that hard, and -work so scarce, that bechune now and midsummer I’d have ye look about -for a new place.” - -Jerry stared across the table at his co-trustee in blank amazement. -It was no surprise to him to be addressed in tones of harsh dislike -by O’Daly, or to see his rightful claims to attention contemptuously -ignored. But this sweeping suggestion took his breath away. - -“What place do ye mane?” he asked confusedly. “Where else in Muirisc -c’u’d I live so aisily?” - -“’T is not needful ye should live in Muirisc at all,” said O’Daly, -with cold-blooded calmness. “Sure, ’t is manny years since ye were -of anny service here. A lad at two shillings the week would more than -replace ye. In these bad times, and worse cornin’, ’t is impossible -ye should stay on here as ye’ve been doin’ these twelve years. I thought -I’d tell ye in sayson, Higgins--not to take ye unawares.” - -“Glory-be-to-the-world?” gasped Jerry, sitting upright in his chair, and -staring open-eyed. - -“’T is a dale of other alterations I have in me mind,” O’Daly went on, -hurriedly. “Sure, things have stuck in the mire far too long, waiting -for the comin’ to life of a dead man. ’T is to stir ’em up I will -now, an’ no delay. Me step-daughter, there, takes the vail in a few -days, an’ ’t is me intintion thin to rebuild large parts of the -convint, an’ mek new rules for it whereby gerrels of me own family can -be free to enter it as well as the O’Mahonys. For, sure, ’t is now -well known an’ universally consaded that the O’Daly’s were the most -intellectual an’ intelligent family in all the two Munsters, be rayson -of which all the ignorant an’ uncultivated ruffians like the MacCarthys -an’ The O’Mahony’s used to be beseechin’ ’em to make verses and write -books an’ divert ’em wid playin’ on the harp--an ’t is high time the -O’Daly’s came into their own ag’in, the same that they’d never lost but -for their wake good-nature in consintin’ to be bards on account of their -supayrior education. Why, man,” the swart-visaged little lawyer went -on, his black eyes snapping with excitement--“what d’ ye say to me great -ancestor, Cuchonnacht O’Daly, called _na Sgoile_, or ‘of the school,’ -who died at Clonard, rest his soul, Anno Domini 1139, the most -celebrated pote of all Oireland? An’ do ye mind thim eight an’ twenty -other O’Dalys in rigular descint who achaved distinction--” - -“Egor! If they were all such thieves of the earth as you are, the -world’s d------d well rid of ’em!” burst in Jerry Higgins. - -He had sprung to his feet, and stood now hotfaced and with clenched -fists, glaring down upon O’Daly. - -The latter pushed back his chair and instinctively raised an elbow to -guard his head. - -“Have a care, Higgins!” he shouted out--“you’re in the presence of -witnesses--I’m a p’aceable man--in me own domicile, too!” - -“I’ll ‘dommycille’ ye, ye blagyard!” Jerry snorted, throwing his burly -form half over the table. - -“Ah, thin, Jerry! Jerry!” A clear, bell-toned voice rang in his confused -ears, and he felt the grasp of a vigorous hand upon his arm. “Is it mad -ye are, Jerry, to think of striking the likes of him?” - -Kate stood at his side. The mere touch of her hand on his sleeve would -have sufficed for restraint, but she gripped his arm sharply, and turned -upon him a gaze of stern reproval. - -“’Tis elsewhere ye left your manners, Jerry!” she said, in a calm -enough voice, though her bosom was heaving. “When our bards became -insolent or turned rogues, they were sent outside to be beaten. ’T was -niver done in the presence of ladies.” - -Jerry’s puzzled look showed how utterly he failed to grasp her meaning. -There was no such perplexity in O’Daly’s mind. He, too, had risen, -and stood on the hearth beside his wife, who blinked vacuous inquiries -sleepily at the various members of the group in turn. - -“And _we_,” he said, with nervous asperity, “when our children become -impertinent, we trounce them off to their bed.” - -“Ah-h! No child of yours, O’Daly!” the girl made scornful answer, in -measured tones. - -“Well, thin,” the little man snarled, vehemently, “while ye’re under my -roof, Miss O’Mahony, ye’ll heed what I say, an’ be ruled by ’t. An’ -now ye force me to ’t, mark this: I’ll have no more of your gaddin’ -about with that old bag-o’-bones of a Murphy. ’T is not dacint or -fittin’ for a young lady--more especially when she’s to be a--wanderin’ -the Lord knows where, or--” - -Kate broke in upon his harangue with shrill laughter, half hysterical. - -“Is it an O’Daly that I hear discoorsin’ on dacency to an O’Mahony!” she -called out, ironically incredulous. “Well, thin--while that I’m under -your roof---” - -“Egor! Who made it his roof?” demanded Jerry. “Shure, be the papers The -O’Mahony wrote out wid his own hand for us--” - -“Don’t be interruptin’, Jerry!” said Kate, again with a restraining hand -on his arm. “I say this, O’Daly: The time I stop under this roof will be -just that while that it takes me to put on me hat. Not an instant longer -will I stay.” - -She walked proudly erect to the chest in the corner, took up her hat and -put it on her head. - -“Come now, Jerry,” she said, “I’ll walk wid you to me cousins, the -Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears. ’T will be grand news to thim that the -O’Dalys have come into _their own_ ag’in!” - -Cormac O’Daly instinctively moved toward the door to bar her egress. -Then a glance at Jerry’s heavy fists and angered face bred intuition of -a different kind, and he stepped back again. - -“Mind, once for all! I’ll not have ye here ag’in--neither one or other -of ye!” he shouted. - -Kate disdained response by even so much as a look. She moved over to the -arm-chair, and, stooping for an instant, lightly brushed with her lips -the flattened crimps which adorned the maternal forehead. Then, with -head high in air and a tread of exaggerated stateliness, she led the way -for Jerry out of the room and the house. - -Mrs. Fergus heard the front door close with a resounding clang, and the -noise definitely awakened her. She put up a correcting hand, and passed -it over her front hair. Then she yawned meditatively at the fire, and, -lifting the steaming kettle from the crane, filled one of the glasses on -the tray with hot water. Then she permitted herself a drowsy halfsmile -at the disordered appearance presented by her infuriated spouse. - -“Well, thin, ’tis not in Mother Agnes O’Mahony’s shoes I’m wishin’ -myself!” she said, upon reflection. “It’s right ye are to build thick -new walls to the convint. They’ll be needed, wid that girl inside!” - - - - -CHAPTER XIX--A BARGAIN WITH THE BURIED MAN. - -Though by daylight there seemed to lie but a step of space between the -ruined Castle of Muirisc and the portal of the Convent of the Hostage’s -Tears, it was different under the soft, starlit sky of this April -evening. The way was long enough, at all events, for the exchange of -many views between Kate and Jerry. - -“’Tis flat robbery he manes, Jerry,” the girl said, as the revolted -twain passed out together under the gateway. “With me safe in the -convint, sure he’s free to take everything for his son--me little -stepbrother--an’ thin there’s an ind to the O’Mahony’s, here where -they’ve been lords of the coast an’ the mountains an’ the castles since -before St. Patrick’s time--an’, luk ye! an O’Daly comes on! I’m fit to -tear out me eyes to keep them from the sight!” - -“But, Miss Katie,” put in Jerry, eagerly, “I’ve a thought in me -head--egor! The O’Mahony himself put writin’ to paper, statin’ how every -blessed thing was to be yours, the day he sailed away. Sure ’twas -meself was witness to that same, along wid O’Daly an’ your mother an’ -the nuns. To-morrow I’ll have the law on him!” - -“Ah, Jerry,” the girl sighed and shook her head; “ye’ve a good heart, -but it’s only grief ye’ll get tryin’ to match your wits against -O’Daly’s. What do _you_ know about papers an’ documents, an’ the like of -that, compared wid him? Why, man, he’s an attorney himself! ’T is thim -that putts the law on other people--worse luck!” - -“An’ him that usen’t to have a word for anny-thing but the praises of -The O’Mahonys!” exclaimed Jerry, lost once more in surprise at the scope -of O’Daly’s ambitions. - -“I, for one, never thrusted him!” said Kate, with emphasis. “’T was -not in nature that anny man could be that humble an’ devoted to a family -that wasn’t his own, as he pretinded.” - -“Weil, I dunno,” began Jerry, hesitatingly; “’t is my belafe he mint -honest enough, till that boy o’ his was born. A childless man is wan -thing, an’ a father’s another. ’T is that boy that’s turnin’ O’Daly’s -head.” - -Kate’s present mood was intolerant of philosophy. “Faith, Jerry,” she -said, with sharpness, “’t is _my_ belafe that if wan was to abuse the -divil in your hearin’, you’d say: ‘At anny rate, he has a fine, grand -tail.’” - -Jerry’s round face beamed in the vague starlight with a momentary smile. -“Ah, thin, Miss Katie!” he said, in gentle deprecation. Then, as upon a -hasty afterthought: “Egor! I’ll talk with Father Jago.” - -“Ye’ll do nothing of the kind!” Kate commanded. - -“He’s a young man, an’ he’s not Muirisc born, an’ he’s O’Daly’s fri’nd, -naturally enough, an’ he’s the chaplain of the convint. Sure, with half -an eye, ye can see that O’Daly’s got the convint on his side. My taking -the vail will profit thim, as well as him. Sure, that’s the point of it -all.” - -“Thin why not putt yer fut down,” asked Jerry, “an’ say ye’ll tek no -vail at all?” - -“I gave me word,” she answered, simply. - -“But aisy enough--ye can say as Mickey Dugan did on the gallus, to the -hangman: ‘Egor!’ said he, ‘I’ve changed my mind.’” - -“We don’t be changin’ _our_ minds!” said Kate, with proud brevity; -and thereupon she ran up the convent steps, and, after a little space, -filled with the sound of jangling bells and the rattle of bars and -chains, disappeared. - -Jerry pursued the small remnant of his homeward course in a deep, brown -study. He entered his abode by the churchyard postern, bolted the door -behind him and lighted a lamp, still in an absent-minded way. Such -flickering rays as pierced the smoky chimney cast feeble illumination -upon a sort of castellated hovel--a high, stone-walled room with arched -doorways and stately, vaulted ceiling above, but with the rude furniture -and squalid disorder of a laborer’s cottage below. - -But another idea did occur to him while he sat on the side of his bed, -vacantly staring at the floor--an idea which set his shrewd, brown -eyes aglow. He rose hastily, took a lantern down from a nail on the -whitewashed wall and lighted it. Then with a key from his pocket, he -unlocked a door at the farther end of the room, behind the bed, and -passed through the open passage, with a springing step, into the -darkness of a low, stone-walled corridor. - -The staircase down which we saw the guns and powder carried in secrecy, -on that February night in 1867, led Jerry to the concealed doorway in -the rounded wall which had been discovered. He applied the needful trick -to open this door; then carefully closed it behind him, and made his -way, crouching and stealthily, through the passage to the door at its -end. This he opened with another key and entered abruptly. - -“God save all here!” he called out upon the threshold, in the -half-jesting, half-sincere tone of one who, using an ancient formula at -the outset by way of irony, grows to feel that he means what it says. - -“God save you kindly!” was the prompt response, in a thin, strangely -vibrant voice: and on the instant the speaker came forward into -firelight. - -He was a slender man of middle age, with a pale, spectacled face, framed -by a veritable mane of dingy reddish hair thrown back from temples and -brow. This brow, thus bared, was broad and thoughtful besides being -wonderfully white, and, with the calm gray eyes, which shone steadily -through the glasses, seemed to constitute practically the whole face. -There were, one noted at a second glance, other portions of this face--a -weak, pointed nose, for example, and a mouth and chin hidden under -irregular outlines of straggling beard; but the brow and the eyes were -what the gaze returned to. The man wore a loose, nondescript sort of -gown, gathered at the waist with a cord. Save for a table against the -wall, littered with papers and writing materials and lighted by a lamp -in a bracket above, the chamber differed in little from its appearance -on that memorable night when the dead monk’s sleep of centuries had been -so rudely broken in upon. - -“I’m glad ye’ve come down ag’in to-day,” said the man of the brow and -eyes. “Since this mornin’, I’ve traced out the idintity of Finghin--the -one wid the brain-ball I told ye of--as clear as daylight. Not a -man-jack of ’em but ’ll see it now like the nose on their face.” - -“Ah, thin, that’s a mercy,” said Jerry, seating himself tentatively on -a corner of the table. “Egor! It looked at one toime there as if his -identity was gone to the divil intoirely. But l’ave you to smoke him -out!” - -“It can be proved that this Finghin is wan an’ the same wid the -so-called Fiachan Roe, who married the widow of the O’Dubhagain, in the -elevinth cintury.” - -“Ah, there ye have it!” said Jerry, shaking his head dejectedly. “He -_wud_ marry a widdeh, w’u’d he? Thin, be me sowl, ’tis a marvel to -grace he had anny idint--whatever ye call it--left at all. Well, sir, to -tell ye the truth, ’tis disappointed I am in Finghin. I credited him -with more sinse than to be marryin’ widdehs. An’ I suppose ye’ll l’ave -him out of your book altogether now. Egor, an’ serve him right, too!” - -The other smiled; a wan and fleeting smile of the eyes and brow. - -“Ah, don’t be talkin!” he said, pleasantly, and then added, with a sigh: -“More like he’ll l’ave _me_, wid me work undone. You’ll bear me witness, -sir, that I’ve been patient, an’ thried me best to live continted here -in this cave of the earth, an’ busy me mind wid work; but no man can -master his drames. ’Tis that that’s killin’ me. Every night, the -moment I’m asleep, faith, I’m out in the meadehs, wid flowers on the -ditches an’ birds singin’, an’ me fishin’ in the brook, like I was a boy -ag’in; an’ whin I wake up, me heart’s broke intirely! I tell ye, man, if -’t wasn’t for me book here, I’d go outside in spite of ’em all, an’ -let ’em hang me, if they like--jist for wan luk at the sky an’ wan -breath of fresh air.” - -Jerry swung his legs nonchalantly, but there was a new speculation -twinkling in his eyes as he regarded his companion. - -“Ah, it won’t be long now, Major Lynch,” he said, consolingly. “An’ have -ye much more to state in your book?” - -“All the translatin’ was finished long since, but _‘t_ is comparin’ the -various books together I am, an’ that takes a dale o’ time. There’s the -psalter o’ Timoleague Abbey, an’ the psalter o’ Sherkin, an’ the book -o’ St. Kian o’ Cape Clear, besides all the riccords of Muirisc that lay -loose in the chest. Yet I’m far from complainin’. God knows what I’d a’ -done without ’em.” - -There are many marvels in Irish archaeology. Perhaps the most wonderful -of all is the controlling and consuming spell it had cast over -Linksy, making it not only possible for him to live twelve years in an -underground dungeon, fairly contented, and undoubtedly occupied, -but lifting him bodily out of his former mental state and up into -an atmosphere of scholarly absorption and exclusively intellectual -exertion. He had entered upon this long imprisonment with only an -ordinary high-school education, and no special interest in or bent -toward books. By the merest chance he happened to have learned to speak -Irish, as a boy, and, later, to have been taught the written alphabet -of the language. His first days of solitude in the subterranean chamber, -after his recovery from the terrible blow on the head, had been whiled -away by glancing over the curious parchment writings and volumes in -the chest. Then, to kill time, he had essayed to translate one of the -manuscripts, and Jerry had obligingly furnished him with paper, pens and -ink. To have laboriously traced out the doubtful thread of continuity -running through the confused and legendary pedigrees of the fierce -Eugenian septs, to have lived for twelve long years buried in ancient -Munster genealogies, wearing the eyesight out in waking hours upon -archaic manuscripts, and dreaming by night of still more undecipherable -parchment chronicles, may well seem to us, who are out in the busy -noonday of the world, a colossal waste of time. No publisher alive would -have thought for a moment of printing Linsky’s compilations at his own -risk, and probably not more than twenty people would have regretted his -refusal the whole world over. But this consideration has never operated -yet to prevent archaeologists from devoting their time and energies -and fortunes to works which nobody on earth is going to read, much less -publish; Jerry was still contemplating Linsky with a grave new interest. - -“Ye’ve changed that much since--since ye came down here for your health. -’Tis my belafe not a mother’s son of ’em ’u’d recognize ye up -above,” he said, reflectively. - -Linsky spoke with eagerness: - -“Man alive! I’m jist dyin’ to make the attimpt!” - -“What--an’ turn yer back on all these foine riccords an’ statements that -_ye’ve_ kept yer hand to so long?” - -The other’s face fell. - -“Sure, I c’u’d come down ag’in,” Linsky said, hesitatingly. - -“We’ll see; we’ll see,” remarked Jerry. Then, in a careless manner, as -if he had not had this chiefly in mind from the beginning, he asked: -“Usen’t ye to be tellin’ me ye were a kind of an attorney, Major Lynch?” - -“I was articled to an attorney, wance upon a time, but I’d no time to -sthick to it.” - -“But ye’d know how to hev the law on a man, if he was yer inemy?” - -“Some of it is in me mind still, maybe,” replied Linsky, not with much -confidence. - -Jerry sprang lightly down from the table, walked over to the fire, and -stood with his back to it, his legs wide apart and his thumbs in his -waistcoat armholes, as he had seen The O’Mahony bear himself. - -“Well, Linsky, I’ve a bargain to offer ye,” he said, bluntly. - -Linsky stared in wild-eyed amazement. He had not heard the sound of this -name of his for years. - -“What--what was that name ye called?” he asked, with a faltering voice. - -“Ah, it’s all right,” remarked Jerry, with assurance. “Faith, I knew ye -wor Linsky from the beginning. An’ bechune ourselves, that’s but a drop -in the bucket to the rest I know.” - -Linsky’s surprise paralyzed his tongue. He could only pluck nervously at -the cord about his waist and gaze in confusion at his jailer-friend. - -“You believed all this time that ye were hid away down here by your -fri’nds, to save ye from the poliss, who were scourin’ the counthry to -arrest Fenians. Am I right?” Jerry asked, with a dawning smile on his -red face. - -The other nodded mechanically, still incomplete mystification. - -“An’ you all the time besachin’ to go out an’ take yer chances, an’ -me forever tellin’ ye ’twould be the ruin of the whole thund’rin’ -Brotherhood if ye were caught?” Jerry continued, the smile ripening as -he went on. - -Again Linsky’s answer was a puzzled nod of acquiescence. - -“Well, thin, there’s no Brotherhood left at all, an’ ’t is manny years -since the poliss in these parts had so much as a drame of you or of anny -Fenian under the sun.” - -“But why,” stammered Linsky, at last finding voice--“why--thin--” - -“Why are ye here?” Jerry amiably asked the question for him. “Only a -small matther of discipline, as his reverence w’u’d say, when he ordered -peas in our boots. To be open an’ above-board wid ye, man, ye were -caught attimptin’ to hand over the lot of us to the sojers, that day we -tried to take the fort. ’T is the gallus we might ’a’ got by rayson -of your informin’. Do ye deny that same?” Linsky made no answer, but he -looked now at the floor instead of at Jerry. In truth, he had been -so long immured, confronted daily with the pretense that he was being -hidden beyond the reach of the castle’s myrmidons, that this sudden -resurrection of the truth about his connection with Fenianism seemed -almost to refer to somebody else. - -“Well, thin,” pursued Jerry, taking instant advantage of the other’s -confusion, “egor, ’t was as a traitor ye were tried an’ condimned an’ -sintenced, while ye lay, sinseless wid that whack on the head. There wor -thim that w’u’d--uv--uv--well, not seen ye wake this side of purgatory, -or wherever else ye had yer ticket for. But there was wan man that saved -yer life from the rest--and he said: ‘No, don’t kill him, an’ don’t bate -him or lay a finger to him, an’ I’ll be at the expinse of keepin’ him in -a fine, grand place by himsilf, wid food of the best, an’ whishky aich -day, an’ books an’ writin’s to improve his learnin’, an’ no work to do, -an’ maybe, be the grace o’ God, he’ll come to think rightly about it -all, an’ be ashamed of himsilf an’ his dirty doin’s, an be fit ag’in to -come out an’ hold up his head amongst honest min.’ That’s the m’anin’ -of what he said, an’ I’m the man he said it to--an’ that’s why I’m here -now, callin’ ye by yer right name, an’ tellin’ ye the thruth.” - -Linsky hesitated for a minute or two, with downcast gaze and fingers -fidgeting at the ends of his waist-cord. Then he lifted his face, which -more than ever seemed all brow and eyes, and looked frankly at Jerry. - -“What ye say is a surprise to me,” he began, choosing his words as he -went. “Ye never let on what your thoughts were concernin’ me, an’ I grew -to forget how it was I came. But now you spake of it, sure ’tis the -same to me as if I’d niver been thinkin’ of anything else. Oh, thin, -tell that man who spoke up for me, whoever he may be, that I’ve no word -but praise for him. ’T was a poor divil of a wake fool he saved the -life of.” - -“Wid a mixin’ of rogue as well,” put in Jerry, by way of conscientious -parenthesis. - -“’Tis the same thing--the worst fool is the rogue; but I tuk to ’t -to keep soul an’ body together. Sure, I got into throuble in Cork, -as manny another boy did before me, an’ fled to Ameriky, an’ there I -listed, an’ came in at the tail of the war, an’ was shot down an’ robbed -where I lay, an’ was in the hospital for months; an’ whin I came out -divil a thing was there for me to putt me hand to; an’ the Fenians -was started, an’ I j’ined ’em. An’ there was a man I knew who made a -livin’ be sellin’ information of what winton, an’ the same offer came to -me through him--an’ me starvin’; an’ that’s the way of it.” - -“An’ a notorious bad way, at that!” said Jerry, sternly. - -“I’m of that same opinion,” Linsky went on, in all meakness. “Don’t -think I’m defindin’ meself. But I declare to ye, whin I look back on it, -’t is not like it was meself at all.” - -“Ay, there ye have it!” exclaimed Jerry. “Luk now! Min do be changin’ -and alterin’ all the while. I know a man--an old man--who used to be -honest an’ fair-spoken, an’ that devoted to a certain family, egor, he’d -laid down his life for ’em; an’ now, be rayson that he’s married a -widdeh, an’ got a boy of his own, what did he but turn rogue an’ lie -awake nights schamin’ to rob that same family! ’Tis that way we are! -An’ so wid you, Linsky, ’tis my belafe that ye began badly, an’ that -ye’re minded to ind well. Ye’re not the man ye were at all. ’T is part -by rayson, I think, of your studyin’ in thim holy books, an’ part, too,” - his eyes twinkled as he added, “be rayson of enjoyin’ my society every -day.” Linsky passed the humorous suggestion by unheeded, his every -perception concentrated upon the tremendous possibility which had with -such strange suddenness opened before him. - -“An’ what is it ye have in mind?” he asked breathlessly. “There was word -of a bargain.” - -“’Tis this,” explained Jerry: “An old thief of the earth--him I spoke -of that married the widdeh--is for robbin’ an’ plunderin’ the man that -saved your life. There’s more to the tale than I’m tellin’ ye, but -that’s the way of it; an’ I’ll die for it but I’ll prevint him; an’ ’t -is beyant my poor wits to do that same; an’ so ’t is your help I’m -needin’. An’ there ye have it!” - -The situation thus outlined did not meet the full measure of Linsky’s -expectations. His face fell. - -“Sure ye might have had me advice in anny case,” he said “if that’s all -it comes to; but I thought I was goin’ out.” - -“An’ why not?” answered Jerry. “Who’s stop-pin’ ye but me, an’ me -needin’ ye outside?” - -Linsky’s eyes glowed radiantly through their glasses. - -“Oh, but I’ll come!” he exclaimed. “An’ whatever ye bid me that I’ll -do!” - -“Ah, but,” Jerry shook his head dubiously, “’t is you that must be -biddin’ _me_ what to do.” - -“To the best of me power that I’ll do, too,” the other affirmed; and the -two men shook hands. - -“On to-morrow I’ll get clothes for ye at Bantry,” Jerry said, an hour -later, at the end of the conference they had been holding, “an’ nixt day -we’ll inthroduce ye to daylight an’ to--O’Daly.” - - - - -CHAPTER XX--NEAR THE SUMMIT OF MT. GABRIEL. - -A vast sunlit landscape under a smiling April sky--a landscape beyond -the uses of mere painters with their tubes and brushes and camp-stools, -where leagues of mountain ranges melted away into the shimmering haze -of distance, and where the myriad armlets of the blue Atlantic in view, -winding themselves about their lovers, the headlands, and placidly -nursing their children, the islands, marked as on a map the coastwise -journeys of a month--stretched itself out before the gaze of young -Bernard O’Mahony, of Houghton County, Michigan--and was scarcely thanked -for its pains. - -The young man had completed four-fifths of the ascent of Mount Gabriel, -from the Dunmanus side, and sat now on a moss-capped boulder, nominally -meditating upon the splendors of the panorama spread out before him, but -in truth thinking deeply of other things. He had not brought a gun, this -time, but had in his hand a small, brand-new hammer, with which, from -time to time, to point the shifting phases of his reverie, he idly -tapped the upturned sole of the foot resting on his knee. - -From this coign of vantage he could make out the white walls and -thatches of at least a dozen hamlets, scattered over the space of thrice -as many miles. Such of these as stood inland he did not observe a second -time. There were others, more distant, which lay close to the bay, -and these he studied intently as he mused, his eyes roaming along the -coast-line from one to another in baffled perplexity. There was -nothing obscure, about them, so far as his vision went. Everything--the -innumerable croft-walls dividing the wretched land below him into -holdings; the dark umber patches where the bog had been cut; the serried -layers of gray rock sloping transversely down the mountain-side, each -with its crown of canary-blossomed furze; the wide stretches of desolate -plain beyond, where no human habitation could be seen, yet where he knew -thousands of poor creatures lived, all the same, in moss-hidden hovels -in the nooks of the rocks; the pale sheen on the sea still further away, -as it slept in the sunlight at the feet of the cliffs--everything was as -sharp and distinct as the picture in a telescope. - -But all this did not help him to guess where the young woman in the -broad, black hat lived. - -Bernard had thought a great deal about this young woman during the -forty-eight hours which had elapsed since she stood up in the boat and -waved her hand to him in farewell. In a guarded way he had made some -inquiries at Goleen, where he was for the moment domiciled, but only to -learn that people on the east side of the peninsula are conscious of no -interest whatever in the people reputed to live on the west side. They -are six or eight Irish miles apart, and there is high land between them. -No one in Goleen could tell him anything about a beautiful dark young -woman with a broad, black hat. He felt that they did not even properly -imagine to themselves what he meant. In Goleen the young women are not -beautiful, and they wear shawls on their heads, not hats. - -Then he had conceived the idea of investigating the west shore for -himself. On the map in his guide-book this seemed a simple enough -undertaking, but now, as he let his gaze wander again along the vast -expanse of ragged and twisted coast-line, he saw that it would mean the -work of many days. - -And then--then he saw something else--a vision which fairly took his -breath away. - -Along the furze-hedge road which wound its way up the mountain-side -from Dunmanus and the south, two human figures were moving toward him, -slowly, and still at a considerable distance. One of these figures was -that of a woman, and--yes, it was a woman!--and she wore, a hat--as like -as could be to that broad-brimmed, black hat he had been dreaming of. -Bernard permitted himself no doubts. He was of the age of miracles. Of -course it was _she!_ - -Without a moment’s hesitation he slid down off his rocky perch and -seated himself behind a clump of furze. It would be time enough to -disclose his presence--if, indeed he did at all--when she had come up to -him. - -No such temptation to secrecy besets us. We may freely hasten down the -mountain-side to where Kate, walking slowly and pausing from time to -time to look back upon the broadening sweep of land and sea below her, -was making the ascent of Mount Gabriel. - -Poor old Murphy had been left behind, much against his will, to nurse -and bemoan his swollen ankle. The companion this time was a younger -brother of the missing Malachy, a lumpish, silent “boy” of twenty-five -or six, who slouched along a few paces behind his mistress and bore the -luncheon basket. This young man was known to all Muirisc as John Pat, -which was by way of distinguishing him from the other Johns who were -not also Patricks. As it was now well on toward nine centuries since the -good Brian Boru ordained that every Irishman should have a surname, -the presumption is that John Pat did possess such a thing, but feudal -Muirisc never dreamed of suggesting its common use. This surname had -been heard at his baptism; it might be mentioned again upon the occasion -of his marriage, though his wife would certainly be spoken of as Mrs. -John Pat, and in the end, if he died at Muirisc, the surname would be -painted in white letters on the black wooden cross set over his grave. -For all the rest he was just John Pat. - -And mediaeval Muirisc, too, could never have dreamed that his age and -sex might be thought by outsiders to render him an unsuitable companion -for Miss Kate in her wanderings over the countryside. In their eyes, and -in his own, he was a mere boy, whose mission was to run errands, carry -bundles or do whatever else the people of the castle bade him do; in -return for which they, in one way or another, looked to it that he -continued to live, and even on occasion, gave him an odd shilling or -two. - -“Look, now, John Pat,” said Kate, halting once more to look back; -“there’s Dunbeacon and Dun-manus and Muirisc beyant, and, may be if it -wasn’t so far, we could see the Three Castles, too; and whin we’re at -the top, we should be able to see Rosbrin and the White Castle and the -Black Castle and the strand over which Ballydesmond stood, on the other -side, as well. ’Tis my belafe no other family in the world can stand -and look down on sevin of their castles at one view.” - -John Pat looked dutifully along the coast-line as her gesture commanded, -and changed his basket into the other hand, but offered no comment. - -“And there, across the bay,” the girl went on, “is the land that’s -marked on the Four Masters’ map for the O’Dalys. Ye were there many’ -times, John Pat, after crabs and the like. Tell me, now, did ever you or -anny one else hear of a castle built there be the O’Dalys?” - -“Sorra a wan, Miss Katie.” - -“There you have it! My word, the impidince of thim O’Dalys--strolling -beggars, and hedge teachers, and singers of ballads be the wayside! -’Tis in the books, John Pat, that wance there was a king of Ireland -named Hugh Dubh--Hugh the Black--and these bards so perplexed and -brothered the soul out of him wid claims for money and fine clothes and -the best places at the table, and kept the land in such a turmoil by -rayson of the scurrilous verses they wrote about thim that gave thim -less than their demands--that Hugh, glory be to him, swore not a man of -’em should remain in all Ireland. ‘Out ye go,’ says he. But thin they -raised such a cry, that a wake, kindly man--St. Columbkill that was to -be--tuk pity on ’em, and interceded wid the king, and so, worse luck, -they kept their place. Ah, thin, if Hugh Dugh had had his way wid ’em -’t would be a different kind of Ireland we’d see this day!” - -“Well, this Hugh Dove, as you call him”--spoke up a clear, fresh-toned -male voice, which was not John Pat’s--“even he couldn’t have wanted a -prettier Ireland than this is, right here in front of us!” - -Kate, in vast surprise, turned at the very first sound of this strange -voice. A young man had risen to his feet from behind the furze hedge, -close beside her, his rosy-cheeked face wreathed in amiable smiles. She -recognized the wandering O’Ma-hony from Houghton County, Michigan, and -softened the rigid lines into which her face had been startled, as a -token of friendly recognition. - -“Good morning,” the young man added, as a ceremonious afterthought. -“Isn’t it a lovely day?” - -“You seem to be viewing our country hereabouts wid great complateness,” - commented Kate, with a half-smile, not wholly free from irony. There -really was no reason for suspecting the accidental character of the -encounter, save the self-conscious and confident manner in which the -young man had, on the instant, attached himself to her expedition. Even -as she spoke, he was walking along at her side. - -“Oh, yes,” he answered, cheerfully, “I’m mixing up business and -pleasure, don’t you see, all the while I’m here--and really they get so -tangled up together every once in a while, that I can’t tell which -is which. But just at this moment--there’s no doubt about it -whatever--pleasure is right bang-up on top.” - -“It _is_ a fine, grand day,” said Kate, with a shade of reserve. The -frankly florid compliment of the Occident was novel to her. - -“Yes, simply wonderful weather,” he pursued. “Only April, and here’s the -skin all peeling off from my nose.” - -Kate could not but in courtesy look at this afflicted feature. It was a -short good-humored nose, with just the faintest and kindliest suggestion -of an upward tilt at the end. One should not be too serious with the -owner of such a nose. - -“You have business here, thin?” she asked. “I thought you were looking -at castles--and shooting herons.” - -He gave a little laugh, and held up his hammer as a voucher. - -“I’m a mining engineer,” he explained: “I’ve been prospecting for a -company all around Cappagh and the Mizzen Head, and now I’m waiting to -hear from London what the assays are like. Oh, yes--that reminds me--I -ought to have asked before--how is the old man--the chap we had to carry -to the boat? I hope his ankle’s better.” - -“It is, thank you,” she replied. - -He chuckled aloud at the recollections which the subject suggested. - -“He soured on me, right from the start, didn’t hee?” the young man went -on. “I’ve laughed a hundred times since, at the way he chiseled me -out of my place in the boat--that is to say, _some_ of the time I’ve -laughed--but--but then lots of other times I couldn’t see any fun in it -at all. Do you know,” he continued, almost dolefully, “I’ve been hunting -all over the place for you.” - -“I’ve nothing to do wid the minerals on our lands,” Kate answered. “’T -is a thrushtee attinds to all that.” - -“Pshaw! I didn’t want to talk minerals to _you_.” - -“And what thin?” - -“Well--since you put it so straight--why--why, of course--I wanted to -ask you more about our people, about the O’Mahonys. You seemed to be -pretty well up on the thing. You see, my father died seven or eight -years ago, so that I was too young to talk to him much about where he -came from, and all that. And my mother, her people were from a different -part of Ireland, and so, you see--” - -“Ah, there’s not much to tell now,” said Kate, in a saddened tone. “They -were a great family once, and now are nothing at all, wid poor me as the -last of the lot.” - -“I don’t call that ‘nothing at all,’ by a jugful,” protested Bernard, -with conviction. - -Kate permitted herself a brief cousinly smile. - -“All the same, they end with me, and afther me comes in the O’Dalys.” - -Lines of thought raised themselves on the young man’s forehead and ran -down to the sunburnt nose. - -“How do you mean?” he asked, dubiously. - -“Are you--don’t mind my asking--are you going to marry one of that -name?” - -She shrugged her shoulders, to express repugnance at the very thought. - -“I’ll marry no one; laste of all an O’Daly,” she said, firmly. Then, -after a moment’s hesitation, she decided upon a further explanation. -“I’m goin’ to take me vows at the convint within the month,” she added. - -Bernard stared open-eyed at her. - -“I-gad!” was all he said. - -The girl’s face lightened at the sound of this exclamation, bringing -back as it did a flood of welcome memories. - -“I know you by that word for a true O’Mahony,--‘an American O’Mahoney,” - she said, with eager pleasure beaming in her deep-gray eyes. She turned -to her retainer: “You remimber that same word, John Pat. Who was it used -always to be saying ‘I-gad?’” - -John Pat searched the landscape with a vacuous glance. - -“W’u’d it be Father Harrington?” he asked. - -“Huh!” sniffed Kate, in light contempt, and turned again to the young -engineer, with a backward nod toward John Pat. “He’s an honest lad,” - she said, apologetically, “but the Lord only knows what’s inside of his -head. Ah, sir, there _was_ an O’Mahony here--‘tis twelve years now since -he sailed away; ah, the longest day Muirisc stands she ’ll not see -such another man--bold and fine, wid a heart in him like a lion, and yit -soft and tinder to thim he liked, and a janius for war and commence and -government that made Muirisc blossom like a rose. Ah, a grand man was -our O’Mahony!” - -“So you live at Muirisc, eh?” asked the practical Bernard. - -“’T was him used always to say ‘I-gad!’ whin things took him by -surprise,” remarked Kate, turning to study the vast downward view -attentively. - -“Well I said it because _I_ was taken by surprise,” said the young man. -“What else could a fellow say, with such a piece of news as that dumped -down on him? But say, you don’t mean it, do you--_you_ going to be a -nun?” - -She looked at him through luminous eyes, and nodded a grave affirmative. - -Bernard walked for a little way in silence, moodily eying the hammer in -his hand. Once or twice he looked up at his companion as if to speak, -then cast down his eyes again. At last, after he had helped her to cross -a low, marshy stretch at the base of a ridge of gray rock, and to climb -to the top of the boulder--for they had left the road now and were -making their way obliquely up the barren crest--he found words to utter. - -“You don’t mind my coming along with you,” he asked, “under the -circumstances?” - -“I don’t see how I’m to prevint you, especially wid you armed wid a -hammer,” she said, in gentle banter. - -“And I can ask you a plain question without offending you?” he went on; -and then, without waiting for an answer, put his question: “It’s just -this--I’ve only seen you twice, it’s true, but I feel as if I’d known -you for years, and, besides, we’re kind of relations--are you going to -do this of your own free will?” - -Kate, for answer, lifted her hand and pointed westward toward the -pale-blue band along the distant coast-line. - -“That castle you see yonder at the bridge--” she said, “’t was there -that Finghin, son of Diarmid Mor O’Mahony, bate the MacCarthys wid great -slaughter, in Anno Domini 1319.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXI--ON THE MOUNTAIN-TOP--AND AFTER. - -The two young people, with John Pat and the basket close behind, stood -at last upon the very summit of Gabriel--a wild and desolate jumble -of naked rocks piled helter-skelter about them, and at their feet a -strange, little, circular lake, which in all the ages had mirrored no -tree or flowering rush or green thing whatsoever, but knew only of -the clouds and of the lightning’s play and of the gathering of the -storm-demons for descent upon the homes of men. - -A solemn place is a mountain-top. The thin, spiritualized air is all -alive with mysteries, which, down below in the sordid atmosphere, visit -only the brains of men whom we lock up as mad. The drying-up of the -great globe-floods; the slow birth of vegetation; the rank growth of -uncouth monsters; the coming of the fleet-footed, bare-skinned savage -beast called man; the primeval aeons of warfare wherein knowledge -of fire, of metals, of tanned hides and habitations was laboriously -developed and the huger reptiles were destroyed; the dawn of history -through the clouds of sun and serpent worship; the weary ages of brutish -raids and massacres, of barbaric creeds and cruel lusts--all this the -mountain-tops have stood still and watched, and, so far as in them lay, -understood. - -Some have comprehended more of what they saw than others. The tallest -man is not necessarily the wisest. So there are very lofty mountains -which remain stupid, despite their advantages, and there are -relatively small mountains which have come to be almost human in their -understanding of and sympathy with the world-long drama they have -watched unfolding itself. The Brocken, for example, is scarcely -nipple-high to many another of its German brethren, yet which of the -rest has such rich memories, stretching back through countless centuries -of Teuton, Slav, Alemanni, Suevi, Frank and Celt to the days when -nomad strove with troglodyte, and the great cave-bear grappled with the -mammoth in the silent fastnesses of the Harz. - -In Desmond, the broad-based, conical Gabriel has as unique a character -of another kind. There is nothing of the frank and homely German -familiarity in the reputation it enjoys at home. To be sure, the -mountain is scarred to the throat by bogcutters; cabins and the ruins -of cabins lurk hidden in clefts of rocks more than half-way up its gray, -furze-clad sides; yet it produces the effect of standing sternly aloof -from human things. The peasants think of it as a sacred eminence. It has -its very name from the legend of the archangel, who flying across Europe -in disgust at man’s iniquities, could not resist the temptation to -descend for a moment to touch with his foot this beautiful mountain gem -in the crown of Carbery. - -Kate explained this legend to her young companion from Houghton County, -and showed him the marks of the celestial visitor’s foot plainly -visible in the rock. He bestowed such critical, not to say professional, -scrutiny upon these marks that she made haste to take up another branch -of the ancient fable. - -“And this little round lake here,” she went on, “they’ll all tell you -’t was made by bodily lifting out a great cylinder of rock and carting -it miles through the air and putting it down in the sea out there, where -it’s ever since been known as Fasnet Rock. They say the measurements are -precisely the same. I forget now if ’t was the Archangel Gabriel did -that, too, or the divil.” - -“The result comes to about the same thing,” commented the engineer. -“Whoever did it,” he went on, scanning the regularly rounded sides of -the pool, “made a good workmanlike job of it.” - -“No one’s ever been able to touch the bottom of it,” said Kate, with -pride. - -“Oh, come, now--I’ve heard that of every second lake in Ireland.” - -“Well--certainly _I’ve_ not tested it,” she replied, frostily, “but ’t -is well known that if you sink a bottle in this lake ’t will be found -out there in Dun-manus Bay fourteen hundred feet below us.” - -“Why, the very first principle of hydrostatics,” began Bernard, with -controversial eagerness. Then he stopped short, stroked his smooth chin, -and changed the subject abruptly. “Speaking of bottles,” he said, “I -see your man there is eying that lunch basket with the expression of a -meat-axe. Wouldn’t it be a clever idea to let him unpack it?” The while -John Pat stripped the basket of its contents, and spread them upon a -cloth in the mossy shadow of an overhanging boulder, the two by a common -impulse strolled over to the eastern edge of the summit. - -“Beyond Roaring Water Bay the O’Driscoll Castles begin,” said Kate. -“They tell me they’re poor trifles compared wid ours.” - -“I like to hear you say ‘ours,’” the young man broke in. “I want you -to keep right on remembering all the while that I belong to the family. -And--and I wish to heaven there was something I could do to show how -tickled to death I am that I do belong to it!” - -“I have never been here before,” Kate said, in a musing tone, which -carried in it a gentle apology for abstraction. “I did not know there -was anything so big and splendid in the world.” - -The spell of this mighty spectacle at once enchanted and oppressed her. -She stood gazing down upon it for some minutes, holding up her hand as -a plea for silence when her companion would have spoken. Then, with a -lingering sigh, she turned away and led the slow walk back toward the -lake. - -“’Twas like dreaming,” she said with gravity; “and a strange thought -came to me: ’Twas that this lovely Ireland I looked down upon was -beautiful with the beauty of death; that ’twas the corpse of me -country I was taking a last view of. Don’t laugh at me! I had just that -feeling. Ah, poor, poor Ireland!” - -Bernard saw tears glistening upon her long, black lashes, and scarcely -knew his own voice when he heard it, in such depths of melancholy was it -pitched. - -“Better times are coming now,” he said. “If we open up the mines we are -counting on it ought to give work to at least two hundred men.” - -She turned sharply upon him. - -“Don’t talk like that!” she said, in half command, half entreaty. “’T -is not trade or work or mines that keeps a nation alive when ’tis fit -to die. One can have them all, and riches untold, and still sink wid a -broken heart. ’T is nearly three hundred years since the first of -the exiled O’Mahonys sailed away yonder--from Skull and Crookhaven they -wint--to fight and die in Spain. Thin others wint--Conagher and Domnal -and the rest--to fight and die in France; and so for centuries the -stream of life has flowed away from Ireland wid every other family the -same as wid ours. What nation under the sun could stand the drain? ’T -is twelve years now since the best and finest of them all sailed away to -fight in France, and to--to die--oh, _wirra!_--who knows where? So”--her -great eyes flashed proudly through their tears--“don’t talk of mines to -me! ’T is too much like the English!” - -Bernard somehow felt himself grown much taller and older as he listened -to this outburst of passionate lamentation, with its whiplash end of -defiance, and realized that this beautiful girl was confiding it all to -him. He threw back his shoulders, and laid a hand gently on her arm. - -“Come, come,” he pleaded, with a soothing drawl, “_don’t_ give away like -that! We’ll take a bite of something to eat, and get down again where -the grass grows. Why, you’ve no idea--the bottom of a coal-mine is -sociable and lively compared with this. I’d get the blues myself up -here, in another half-hour!” - -A few steps were taken in silence, and then the young man spoke again, -with settled determination in his voice. - -“You can say what you like,” he ground out between his teeth, “or, -rather, you needn’t say any more than you like; but I’ve got my own -idea about this convent business, and I don’t like it, and I don’t for -a minute believe that you like it. Mind, I’m not asking you to tell me -whether you do or not--only I want you to say just this: Count on me -as your friend--call it cousin, too, if you like; keep me in mind as a -fellow who’ll go to the whole length of the rope to help you, and break -the rope like a piece of paper twine if it’s necessary to go further. -That’s all.” - -It is the property of these weird mountain-tops to make realities out of -the most unlikely things. On a lower terrestrial level Kate’s mind -might have seen nothing but fantastic absurdity in this proffer of -confidential friendship and succor, from a youth whom she met twice. -Here in the finer and more eager air, lifted up to be the companion of -clouds, the girl looked with grave frankness into his eyes and gave him -her hand in token of the bond. - -Without further words, they rejoined John Fat, and sat down to lunch. - -Indeed, there were few further words during the afternoon which John -Pat was not privileged to hear. He sat with them during the meal, in the -true democratic spirit of the sept relation, and he kept close behind -them on their rambling, leisurely descent of the mountain-side. From the -tenor of their talk he gathered vaguely that the strange young man -was some sort of relation from America, and as relations from America -present, perhaps, the one idea most universally familiar to the Irish -peasant’s mind, his curiosity was not aroused. Their conversation, for -the most part, was about that remarkable O’Mahony who had gone away -years ago and whom John Pat only dimly remembered. - -***** - -A couple of miles from Muirisc, the homeward-bound trio--for Bernard had -tacitly made himself a party to the entire expedition and felt as if -he, too, were going home--encountered, in the late afternoon, two men -sitting by the roadside ditch. - -“Oh, there’s Jerry,” said Kate to her companion--“Mr. Higgins, I -mane--wan of my trustees. I’ll inthroduce you to him.” - -Jerry’s demeanor, as the group approached him, bore momentary traces of -embarrassment. He looked at the man beside him, and then cast a backward -glance at the ditch, as if wishing that they were both safely -hidden behind its mask of stone wall and furze. But this was clearly -impossible; and the two stood up at an obvious suggestion from Jerry and -put as good a face upon their presence as possible. - -“This is a relation of _moine_ from Ameriky, too,” said Jerry, after -some words had passed, indicating the tall, thin, shambling, spectacled -figure beside him, “Mr. Joseph Higgins, of--of--of--” - -“Of Boston,” said the other, after an awkward pause. - -He seemed ill at ease in his badly fitting clothes, and looked furtively -from one to another of the faces before him. - -“An’ what d’ ye think, Miss Katie?” hurriedly continued Jerry. “Egor! -Be all the miracles of Moses, he’s possessed of more learnin’ about the -O’Mahonys than anny other man alive, Cormac O’Daly ’d be a fool to him. -An’, egor, he used to know _our_ O’Mahony whin he was in Ameriky, before -ever he came over to us!” - -“Ye’re wrong, Jerry,” said Mr. Joseph Higgins, with cautious hesitation, -“I didn’t say I knew him. I said I knew of him. I was employed to search -for him, whin he was heir to the estate, unbeknownst to himself, an’ I -wint to the town where he’d kept a cobbler’s shop--Tecumsy was the name -of it--an’ I made inquiries for Hugh O’Mahony, but--” - -“What’s that you say! Hugh O’Mahony--a shoemaker in Tecumseh, New York?” - broke in young Bernard, with sharp, almost excited emphasis. - -“’T is what I said,” responded the other, his pale face flushing -nervously, “only--only he’d gone to the war.” - -“An’ that was _our_ O’Mahony,” explained Jerry. - -“Glory be to God, he learned of the search made for him, an’ he came to -us afther the war.” - -Bernard was not sure that he had got the twitching muscles of his face -under control, but at least he could manage his tongue. - -“Oh, he came over here, did he?” he said, with a fair affectation of -polite interest. - -“You spoke as if you knew him,” put in Kate, eagerly. - -“My father knew him as well--as well as he knew himself,” answered -Bernard, with evasion, and then bit his lip in fear that he had said too -much. - - - - -CHAPTER XXII--THE INTELLIGENT YOUNG MAN. - -Within the next few days the people of Muirisc found themselves -becoming familiar with the spectacle of two strange figures walking -about among their narrow, twisted streets or across the open space of -common between the castle and the quay. The sight of new-comers -was still unusual enough in Muirisc to disturb the minds of the -inhabitants--but since the mines had been opened in the district the -old-time seclusion had never quite come back, and it was uneasily felt -that in the lapse of years even a hotel might come to be necessary. - -One of these strangers, a rickety, spindling, weirdeyed man in -spectacles, was known to be a cousin of Jerry Higgins, from America. The -story went that he was a great scholar, peculiarly learned in ancient -Irish matters. Muirisc took this for granted all the more readily -because he seemed not to know anything else--and watched his shambling -progress through the village streets by Jerry’s side with something of -the affectionate pity which the Irish peasant finds always in his heart -for the being he describes as a “nathural”. - -The other new-comer answered vastly better to Muirisc’s conceptions of -what a man from America should be like. He was young, fresh-faced and -elastic of step--with square shoulders, a lithe, vigorous frame and eyes -which looked with frank and cheerful shrewdness at all men and things. -He outdid even the most communicative of Muirisc’s old white-capped -women in polite salutations to passers-by on the highway, and he was -amiably untiring in his efforts to lure with pennies into friendly -converse the wild little girls of Muirisc, who watched him with -twinkling, squirrels’ eyes from under their shawls, and whisked off like -so many coveys of partridges, at his near approach; the little boys, -with the stronger sense of their sex, invariably took his pennies, but -no more than their sisters could they be induced to talk. - -There was a delightful absence of reserve in this young man from -America. Muirisc seemed to know everything about him all at once. His -name was O’Mahony, and his father had been a County-Cork man; he was a -mining engineer, and had been brought over to Europe by a mining company -as an expert in copper-ores and the refining of barytes; he was living -at Goleen, but liked Muirisc much better, both from a miner, a logical -point of view and socially; he was reckless in the expenditure of money -on the cars from Goleen and back and on the hire of boatmen at Muirisc; -he was filled to the top and running over with funny stories, he was -a good Catholic, he took the acutest interest in all the personal -narratives of the older inhabitants, and was free with his tobacco; -truly a most admirable young man! - -He had been about Muirisc and the immediate vicinity for a week or -so--breaking up an occasional rock with his hammer when he was sure -people were watching him, but more often lounging about in gossip on -the main street, or fishing in the harbor with a boatman who would -talk--when he made in a casual way the acquaintance of O’Daly. - -The little old man, white-haired now, but with the blue-black shadows -of clean shaving still staining high up his jaws and sunken cheeks, had -come down the street, nodding briefly to such villagers as saluted -him, and carrying his hands clasped at the buttons on the back of his -long-tailed coat. He had heard rumors of this young miner from America, -and paused now on the outskirts of a group in front of the cobbler’s -shop, whom Bernard was entertaining with tales of giant salmon in the -waters of Lake Superior. - -“Oh, this is Mr. O’Daly, I believe,” the young man had on the instant -interrupted his narrative to remark. “I’m glad to meet you, sir. I’d -been thinking of calling on you every day, but I know you’re a busy man, -and it’s only since yesterday that I’ve felt that I had real business -with you. My name’s O’Mahony, and I’m here for the South Desmond Barytes -Syndicate. Probably you know the name.” - -The O’Daly found his wrinkled old paw being shaken warmly in the grasp -of this affable young man before he had had time to be astonished. - -“O’Daly’s my name,” he said, hesitatingly. “And you have business with -me, you said?” - -“I guess you’ll think so!” responded the other. “I’ve just got word from -my superiors in London to go ahead, and naturally you’re the first man I -want to talk with.” And then they linked arms. - -“Well,” said the cobbler, as they watched the receding figures of the -pair, “my word, there’s more ways of killin’ a dog than chokin’ him wid -butter!” - -An hour later, Bernard sat comfortably ensconced in the easiest chair -afforded by the living-room of the castle, with the infant O’Daly on his -knee and a trio of grown-up people listening in unaffected pleasure -to his sprightly talk. He had at the outset mistaken Mrs. O’Daly for a -married sister of Kate’s--an error which he managed on the instant -to emphasize by a gravely deliberate wink at Kate--and now held the -mother’s heart completely by his genial attentions to the babe. He had -set old O’Daly all aglow with eager interest by his eulogy of Muirisc’s -mineral wealth as against all other districts in West Carbery. And all -the time, through anecdote, business converse, exchange of theories on -the rearing and precocity of infants and bright-flowing chatter on every -subject tinder the sun, he had contrived to make Kate steadily -conscious that she was the true object of his visit. Now and again the -consciousness grew so vivid that she felt herself blushing over the -embroidered altar-cloth at which she worked, in the shadow between the -windows. - -“Well, sir,” said Bernard, dandling the infant tenderly as he spoke, “I -don’t know what I wouldn’t give to be able, when I go back, to tell my -father how I’d seen the O’Mahony castles here, and all that, right on -the family’s old stamping-ground.” - -“Yer father died, ye say, manny years ago?” remarked O’Daly. - -“Sure, ‘manny’s not the word for it,” put in Mrs. O’Daly, with a -flattering smile. “He’s but a lad yet, for all he’s seen and done.” - -“Nobody could grow old in such an air as this,” said the young man, -briskly. “You, yourself, bear witness to that, Mrs. O’Daly. Yes, my -father died when I was a youngster. We moved out West after the War--I -was a little shaver then--and he didn’t live long after that.” - -“And would he be in the moines, too?” asked Cormac. - -“No; in the leather business,” answered Bernard, without hesitation. -“To the end of his days, he was always counting on coming back here to -Ireland and seeing the home of the O’Mahonys again. To hear him -talk, you’d have thought there wasn’t another family in Ireland worth -mentioning.” - -“’T was always that way wid thim O’Mahonys,” said O’Daly, throwing a -significant glance over his wife and step-daughter. “I can spake freely -to you, sir; for I’ll be bound ye favor yer mother’s side and ye were -not brought up among them; but bechune ourselves, there’s a dale o’ -nonsinse talked about thim same O’Mahonys. Did you ever hear yer father -mintion an O’Daly?” - -“Well--no--I can’t say I did,” answered the young man, bending his mind -to comprehension of what the old man might be driving at. - -“There ye have it!” said Cormac, bringing his hand down with emphasis on -the table. “Sir, ’t is a hard thing to say, but the ingrathitude of -thim O’Mahonys just passes belafe. Sure, ’t was we that made thim. -What were they but poyrutts and robbers of the earth, wid no since but -for raids an’ incursions, an’ burnin’ down abbeys an’ holy houses, and -makin’ war on their neighbors. An’ sure, ’t was we civilized ’em, we -O’Dalys, that they trate now as not fit to lace up their shoes. ’T -was we taught thim O’Mahonys to rade an’ write, an’ everything else -they knew in learnin’ and politeness. An’ so far as that last-mintioned -commodity goes”--this with a still more meaning, sidelong glance toward -the women--“faith, a dale of our labor was wasted intoirely.” - -Even if Kate would have taken up the challenge, the young man gave her -no time. - -“Oh, of course,” he broke in, “I’ve heard of the O’Dalys all my life. -Everybody knows about _them!_” - -“Luk at that now!” exclaimed Cormac, in high triumph. “Sure, ’t is -Ameriky’ll set all of us right, an’ keep the old learning up. Ye’ll -have heard, sir, of Cuchonnacht O’Daly, called _‘na Sgoile_, or ‘of the -school’--” - -“What, old Cocoanut!” cried Bernard, with vivacity, “I should think so!” - -“’T was he was our founder,” pursued Cormac, excitedly. “An’ after him -came eight-an’-twinty descindants, all the chief bards of Ireland. -An’ in comparatively late toimes they had a school at Drumnea, in -Kilcrohane, where the sons of the kings of Spain came for their complate -eddication, an’ the princes doid there, an’ are buried there in our -family vault--sure the ruins of the college remain to this day--” - -“You don’t mean to say you’re one of _that_ family, Mr. O’Daly?” asked -Bernard, with eagerness. - -“’T is my belafe I’m the head of it,” responded Cormac, with lofty -simplicity. “I’m an old man, sir, an’ of an humble nature, an’ I’d not -be takin’ honors on meself. But whin that bye there--that bye ye howld -on yer knee--grows up, an’ he the owner of Muirisc an’ its moines an’ -the fishin’, wid all his eddication an’ foine advantages--sure, if it -pl’ases him to asshume the dignity of _The_ O’Daly, an’ putt the grand -old family wance more where it belongs, I’m thinkin’ me bones ’ll rest -the aiser in their grave.” - -Bernard looked down with an abstracted air at the unpleasantly narrow -skull of the child on his knee, with its big ears and thin, plastered -ringlets that suggested a whimsical baby-caricature of the mother’s -crimps. He heard Kate rise behind him, walk across the floor and leave -the room with an emphatic closing of the door. To be frank, the impulse -burned hotly within him to cuff the infantile head of this future chief -of the O’Dalys. - -“I’ve a pome on the subject, which I composed last Aister Monday,” - O’Daly went on, “which I’d be deloighted to rade to ye.” - -“Unfortunately I must be hurrying along now,” said Bernard, rising on -the instant, and depositing the child on the floor. “I’m sorry, sir, -but--” - -“Sure, ’t is you do be droivin’ everybody from the house wid yer -pomes,” commented Mrs. O’Daly, ungenerously. - -“Oh, no, I assure you!” protested the young man. “I’ve often heard of -Mr. O’Daly’s verses, and very soon now I’m coming to get him to read -them all to me. Have you got some about Cocoanut, Mr. O’Daly?” - -“This particular one,” said Cormac, doggedly, “trates of a much later -period. Indeed, ’t is so late that it hasn’t happened at all yit. ’T is -laid in futurity, sir, an’ dales wid the grand career me son is to have -whin he takes his proud position as _The_ O’Daly, the proide of West -Carbery.” - -“Well, now, you’ve got to read me that the very first thing when I come -next time,” said Bernard. Then he added, with a smile: “For, you know, I -want you to let me come again.” - -“Sir, ye can’t come too soon or stop too long,” Mrs. O’Daly assured him. -“Sure, what wid there bein’ no railway to Muirisc an’ no gintry near by, -an’ what wid the dale we hear about the O’Dalys an’ their supayriority -over the O’Mahonys, an’ thim pomes, my word, we do be starvin’ for the -soight of a new face!” - -“Then I can’t be too glad that my face _is_ new,” promptly put in -Bernard, wreathing the countenance in question with beaming amiability. -“And in a few days I shall want to talk business with Mr. O’Daly, too, -about the mining rights we shall need to take up.” - -“Ye’ll be welcome always,” said O’Daly. - -And with that comforting pledge in his ears, the young man shook hands -with the couple and made his way out of the room. - -“Don’t trouble yourselves to come out,” he begged. “I feel already at -home all over the house.” - -“Now that’s a young man of sinse,” said the O’Daly, after the door had -closed behind their visitor. “’T is not manny ye’ll foind nowadays wid -such intelligince insoide his head.” - -“Nor so comely a face on the outside of it,” commented his wife. - -***** - -At the end of the hallway this intelligent young man was not surprised -to encounter Kate, and she made no pretense of not having waited for -him. Yet, as he approached, she moved to pass by. - -“’T is althered opinions you hold about the O’Mahonys and the -O’Dalys,” she said, with studied coldness and a haughty carriage of her -dark head. - -He caught her sleeve as she would have passed him. - -“See here,” he whispered, eagerly, “don’t you make a goose of yourself. -I’ve told more lies and acted more lies generally this afternoon for -_you_ than I would for all the other women on earth boiled together. -Sh-h! Just you keep mum, and we’ll see you through this thing slick and -clean.” - -“I want no lies told for me, or acted either,” retorted Kate. - -Her tone was proud enough still, but the lines of her face were -relenting. - -“No, I don’t suppose for a minute you do,” he murmured back, still -holding her sleeve, and with his other hand on the latch. “You’re too -near an angel for that. I tell you what: Suppose you just start in and -do as much praying as you can, to kind o’ balance the thing. It’ll -all be needed; for as far as I can see now, I’ve got some regular old -whoppers to come yet.” - -Then the young man released the sleeve, snatched up the hand at the end -of that sleeve, kissed it, and was gone before Kate could say another -word. - -When she had thought it all over, through hours of seclusion in her -room, she was still very much at sea as to what that word would have -been had time been afforded her in which to utter it. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIII--THE COUNCIL OF WAR. - -Having left the castle, Bernard walked briskly away across the open -square, past the quay and along the curling stretch of sands which led -to the path under the cliffs. He had taken the hammer from his pocket -and swung it as he strode onward, whistling as he went. - -A mile or so along the strand, he turned off at a footway leading up the -rocks, and climbed this nimbly to the top, gaining which, he began to -scan closely the broad expanse of dun-colored bog-plain which dipped -gradually toward Mount Gabriel. His search was not protracted. He had -made out the figures he sought, and straightway set out over the bog, -with a light, springing step, still timed to a whistled marching tune, -toward them. - -“Well, I’ve treed the coon!” was his remark when he had joined Jerry and -Linsky. “It was worth waiting for a week just to catch him like that, -with his guard down. Wait a minute, then I can be sure of what I’m -talking about.” - -The others had not invited this adjuration by any overt display of -impatience, and they watched the young man now take an envelope from -his pocket and work out a sum on its back with a pencil in placid if -open-eyed contentment. They both studied him, in fact, much as their -grandfathers might have gazed at the learned pig at a fair--as a being -with resources and accomplishments quite beyond the laborious necessity -of comprehension. - -He finished his ciphering, and gave them, in terse summary, the benefit -of it. - -“The way I figure the thing,” he said, with his eye on the envelope, -“is this: The mines were going all right when your man went away, -twelve years ago. The output then was worth, say, eight thousand pounds -sterling a year. Since then it has once or twice gone as high at twenty -thousand pounds, and once it’s been down to eleven thousand pouunds. -From all I can gather the average ought to have been, say, fourteen -thousand pounds. The mining tenants hold on the usual thirty-one-year -lease, paying fifty pounds a year to begin with, and then one-sixteenth -on the gross sales. There is a provision of a maximum surface-drainage -charge of two pounds an acre, but there’s nothing in that. On my -average, the whole royalties would be nine hundred and twenty-five -pounds a year. That, in twelve years, would be eleven thousand pounds. I -think, myself, that it’s a good deal more; but that’ll do as a starter. -And you say O’Daly’s been sending the boss two hundred pounds a year?” - -“At laste for tin years--not for the last two,” said Jerry. - -“Very well, then; you’ve got nine thousand pounds. The interest on that -for two years alone would make up all he sent away.” - -“An’ ’t is your idea that O’Daly has putt by all that money?” - -“And half as much more; and not a cent of it all belongs to him.” - -“Thrue for you; ’t is Miss Katie’s money,” mourned Jerry, shaking his -curly red head and disturbing his fat breast with a prolonged sigh. “But -she’ll never lay finger to anny of it. Oh, Cormac, you’re the divil!” - -The young man sniffed impatiently. - -“That’s the worst of you fellows,” he said, sharply. “You take fright -like a flock of sheep. What the deuce are you afraid of? No wonder -Ireland isn’t free, with men who have got to sit down and cry every -few minutes!” Then the spectacle of pained surprise on Jerry’s fat -face drove away his mood of criticism. “Or no; I don’t mean that,” - he hastened to add; “but really, there’s no earthly reason why O’Daly -shouldn’t be brought to book. There’s law here for that sort of thing as -much as there is anywhere else.” - -“’T was Miss Katie’s own words that I’d be a fool to thry to putt the -law on Cormac O’Daly, an’ him an attorney,” explained Jerry, in defiant -self-defense. - -“Perhaps that’s true about _your_ putting the law on him,” Bernard -permitted himself to say. “But you’re a trustee, you tell me, as much -as he is, and others can act for you and force him to give his accounts. -That can be done upon your trust-deed.” - -“Me paper, is it?” - -“Yes, the one the boss gave you.” - -“Egor! O’Daly has it. He begged me for it, to keep ’em together. If -I’d ask him for it, belike he’d refuse me. You’ve no knowledge of the -characther of that same O’Daly.” - -For just a moment the young man turned away, his face clouded with the -shadows of a baffled mind. Then he looked Jerry straight in the eye. - -“See here,” he said, “you trust me, don’t you? You believe that I want -to act square by you and help you in this thing?” - -“I do, sir,” said Jerry, simply. - -“Well, then, I tell you that O’Daly _can_ be made to show up, and the -whole affair can be set straight, and the young lady--my cousin--_can_ -be put into her own again. Only I can’t work in the dark. I can’t play -with a partner that ‘finesses’ against me, as a whist-player would say. -Now, who is this man here? I know he isn’t your cousin any more than he -is mine. What’s his game?” - -Linsky took the words out of his puzzled companion’s mouth. - -“’T is a long story, sir,” he said, “an’ you’d be no wiser if you were -told it. Some time, plase God, you’ll know it all. Just now’t is enough -that I’m bound to this man and to The O’Mahony, who’s away, an’ perhaps -dead an’ buried, an’ I’m heart an’ sowl for doin’ whatever I can to help -the young lady. Only, if you’ll not moind me sayin’ so, she’s her own -worst inemy. If she takes the bit in her mouth this way, an’ will go -into the convint, how, in the name of glory, are we to stop her or do -anything else?” - -“There are more than fifteen hundred ways of working _that_” replied -the young man from Houghton County, simulating a confidence he did not -wholly feel. “But let’s get along down toward the village.” - -They entered Muirisc through the ancient convent churchyard, and at -his door-way Jerry, as the visible result of much cogitation, asked the -twain in. After offering them glasses of whiskey and water and lighting -a pipe, Jerry suddenly resolved upon a further extension of confidence. -To Linsky’s astonishment, he took the lantern down from the wall, -lighted it, and opened the door at the back of the bed. - -“If you’ll come along wid us, sir,” he said to Bernard, “we’ll show you -something.” - -“There, here we can talk at our aise,” he remarked again, when finally -the three men were in the subterranean chamber, with the door closed -behind them. “Have you anything like _this_ in Ameriky?” - -Bernard was not so greatly impressed as they expected him to be. He -stolled about the vault-like room, sounding the walls with his boot, -pulling-aside the bed-curtains and investigating the drain. - -“Curious old place,” he said, at last. “What’s the idea?” - -“Sure, ’t is a sacret place intoirely,” explained Jerry. “Besides us -three, there’s not a man aloive who knows of it, exceptin’ The O’Mahony, -if be God’s grace he’s aloive. ’T was he discovered it. He’d the eyes -of a him-harrier for anny mark or sign in a wall. Well do I remimber our -coming here first. He lukked it all over, as you’re doing. - -“‘Egor!’ says he, ‘It may come in handy for O’Daly some day.’ There was -a dead man there on the bed, that dry ye c’u’d ’a’ loighted him wid a -match.” - -“’T is a part of the convint,” Linsky took up the explanation, “an’ -the chest, there, was full of deeds an’ riccorcls of the convint for -manny cinturies. ‘T was me work for years to decipher an’ thranslate -thim, unbeknownst to every soul in Muirisc. They were all in Irish.” - -“Yes, it’s a queer sort of hole,” said Bernard, musingly, walking -over to the table and holding up one of the ancient manuscripts to the -lamplight for investigation. “Why, this isn’t Irish, is it?” he asked, -after a moment’s scrutiny. “This is Latin.” - -“’T is wan of half a dozen ye see there on the table that I couldn’t -make out,” said Linsky. “I’m no Latin scholar meself. ’T was me -intintion to foind some one outside who c’u’d thranslate thim.” Bernard -had kept his eyes on the faded parchment. - -“Odd!” he said. “It’s from a bishop--Matthew O’Finn seems to be the -name--” - -“He was bishop of Ross in the early part of the fourteenth cintury,” put -in Linsky. - -“And this thing is a warning to the nuns here to close up their convent -and take in no more novices, because the church can’t recognize them or -their order. It’s queer old Latin, but that’s what I make it out to be.” - -“’T is an illegant scholar ye are, sir!” exclaimed Jerry, in honest -admiration. - -“No,” said Bernard; “only they started me in for a priest, and I got to -know Latin as well as I did English, or almost. But my godliness -wasn’t anywhere near high-water mark, and so I got switched off into -engineering. I dare say the change was a good thing all around. If -it’s all the same to you,” he added, turning to Linsky, “I’ll put this -parchment in my pocket for the time being, I want to look it over again -more carefully. You shall have it back.” - -The two Irishmen assented as a matter of course. This active-minded -and capable young man, who had mining figures at his finger’s ends, and -could read Latin, and talked lightly of fifteen hundred ways to outwit -O’Daly, was obviously one to be obeyed without questions. They sat now -and watched him with rapt eyes and acquiescent nods as he, seated on the -table with foot on knee, recounted to them the more salient points of -his interview with O’Daly. - -“He was a dacent ould man when I knew him first,” mused Jerry, in -comment, “an’ as full of praises for the O’Mahonys as an egg is of mate. -’T is the money that althered him; an’ thin that brat of a bye of his! -’T is since thin that he behaved like a nagur. An ’t is my belafe, -sir, that only for him Miss Katie’d never have dr’amed of interin’ that -thunderin’ old convint. The very last toime I was wid him, egor, he -druv us both from the house. ’T was the nuns made Miss Katie return -to him next day. ’T is just that, sir, that she’s no one else bechune -thim nuns an’ O’Daly, an’ they do be tossin’ her from wan to the other -of ’em like a blessid ball.” - -“The wonder is to me she’s stood it for a minute,” said Bernard; “a -proud girl like her.” - -“Ah, sir,” said Jerry, “it isn’t like in Ameriky, where every wan’s free -to do what phases him. What was the girl to do? Where was she to go if -she defied thim that was in authority over her? ’T is aisy to talk, -as manny’s the toime she’s said that same to me; but ’t is another -matther to _do!_” - -“There’s the whole trouble in a nutshell,” said Bernard. “Everybody -talks and nobody does anything.” - -“There’s truth in that sir,” put in Linsky; “but what are _you_ -proposin’ to do? There were fifteen hundred ways, you said. What’s wan -of ’em?” - -“Oh, there are fifteen hundred and two now,” responded Bernard, with -a smile. “You’ve helped me to two more since I’ve been down here--or, -rather, this missing O’Mahony of yours has helped me to one, and I -helped myself to the other.” - -The two stared in helpless bewilderment at the young man. - -“That O’Mahony seems to have been a right smart chap,” Bernard -continued. “No wonder he made things hum here in Muirisc. And a prophet -too. Why, the very first time he ever laid eyes on this cave here, by -your own telling, he saw just what it was going to be good for.” - -“I don’t folly ye,” said the puzzled Jerry. - -“Why, to put O’Daly in, of course,” answered the young man, lightly. -“That’s as plain as the nose on your face.” - -“Egor! ’T is a grand idea that same!” exclaimed Jerry, slapping his -thigh. “Only,” he added, with a sinking enthusiasm, “suppose he wouldn’t -come?” - -Bernard laughed outright. - -“That’ll be easy enough. All you have to do is to send word you want -to see him in your place up stairs; when he comes, tell him there’s -a strange discovery you’ve made. Bring him down here, let him in, and -while he’s looking around him just slip out and shut the door on him. I -notice it’s got a spring-lock from the outside. A thoughtful man, that -O’Mahony! Of course, you’ll want to bring down enough food and water to -last a week or so, first; perhaps a little whiskey, too. And I’d carry -up all these papers, moreover, and put ’em in your room above. Until -the old man got quieted down, he might feel disposed to tear things.” - -“Egor! I’ll do it!” cried Jerry, with sparkling eyes and a grin on his -broad face. “Oh, the art of man!” - -The pallid and near-sighted Linsky was less alive to the value of this -bold plan. - -“An’ what’ll ye do nixt?” he asked, doubtfully. - -“I’ve got a scheme which I’ll carry out to-morrow, by myself,” said -Bernard. “It’ll take me all day; and by the time I turn up the day -after, you must have O’Daly safely bottled up down here. Then I’ll be -in a position to read the riot act to everybody. First we’ll stand the -convent on its head, and then I’ll come down here and have a little -confidential talk with O’Daly about going to prison as a fraudulent -trustee.” - -“Sir, you’re well-named ‘O’Mahony,’” said Jerry, with beaming -earnestness, “I do be almost believin’ ye’re _his_ son!” - -Bernard chuckled as he sprang off the table to his feet. - -“There might be even stranger things than that,” he said, and laughed -again. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIV--THE VICTORY OF THE “CATHACH.” - -One day passed, and then another, and the evening of the third day drew -near--yet brought no returning Bernard. It is true that on the second -day a telegram--the first Jerry had ever received in his life--came -bearing the date of Cashel, and containing only the unsigned -injunction: - - _“Don’t be afraid.”_ - -It is all very well to say this, but Jerry and Linsky read over the -brief message many scores of times that day, and still felt themselves -very much afraid. - -Muirisc was stirred by unwonted excitement. In all its history, -the village had never resented anything else quite so much as the -establishment of a police barrack in its principal street, a dozen years -before. The inhabitants had long since grown accustomed to the sight -of the sergeant and his four men lounging about the place, and had even -admitted them to a kind of conditional friendship, but, none the less, -their presence had continued to present itself as an affront to Muirisc. -From one year’s end to another, no suspicion of crime had darkened the -peaceful fame of the hamlet. They had heard vague stories of grim and -violent deeds in other parts of the south and west, as the failure of -the potatoes and the greed of the landlords conspired together to -drive the peasantry into revolt, but in Muirisc, though she had had her -evictions and knew what it was to be hungry, it had occurred to no one -to so much as break a window. - -Yet now, all at once, here were fresh constables brought in from Bantry, -with an inspector at their head, and the amazed villagers saw these -newcomers, with rifles slung over their short capes, and little round -caps cocked to one side on their close-cropped heads, ransacking every -nook and cranny of the ancient town in quest of some mysterious thing, -the while others spread their search over the ragged rocks and moorland -roundabout. And then the astounding report flew from mouth to mouth that -Father Jago had read in a Dublin paper that O’Daly was believed to have -been murdered. - -Sure enough, now that they had thought of it, O’Daly had not been seen -for two or three days, but until this strange story came from without, -no one had given this a thought. He was often away, for days together, -on mining and other business, but it was said now that his wife, whom -Muirisc still thought of as Mrs. Fergus, had given the alarm, on the -ground that if her husband had been going away over night, he would -have told her. There was less liking for this lady than ever, when this -report started on its rounds. - -Three or four of the wretched, unwashed and half-fed creatures, who had -fled from O’Daly’s evictions to the shelter of the furze-clad ditches -outside, had been brought in and sharply questioned at the barracks, on -this third day, but of what they had said the villagers knew nothing. -And, now, toward evening, the excited groups of gossiping neighbors -at the corners saw Jerry Higgins himself, with flushed face and -apprehensive eye, being led past with his shambling cousin toward -constabulary headquarters by a squad of armed policemen. Close upon -the heels of this amazing spectacle came the rumor--whence started, who -could tell?--that Jerry had during the day received a telegram clearly -implicating him in the crime, At this, Muirisc groaned aloud. - -“’Tis wid you alone I want to spake,” said Kate, bluntly, to the -mother superior. - -The April twilight was deepening the shadows in the corners of the -convent’s reception hall, and mellowing into a uniformity of ugliness -the faces of the four Misses O’Daly who sat on the long bench before the -fireless hearth. These young women were strangers to Muirisc, and had -but yesterday arrived from their country homes in Kerry or the Macroom -district to enter the convent of which their remote relation was -patron. They were plain, small-farmers’ daughters, with flat faces, high -cheek-bones and red hands. They had risen in clumsy humility when Kate -entered the room, staring in admiration at her beauty, and even more at -her hat; they had silently seated themselves again at a sign from the -mother superior, still staring in round-eyed wonder at this novel kind -of young woman; and they clung now stolidly to their bench, in the -face of Kate’s remark. Perhaps they did not comprehend it, But they -understood and obeyed the almost contemptuous gesture by which the aged -nun bade them leave the room. - -“What is it thin, _Dubhdeasa?_” asked Mother Agnes, with affectionate -gravity, seating herself as she spoke. The burden of eighty years rested -lightly upon the lean figure and thin, wax-like face of the nun. Only a -close glance would have revealed the fine net-work of wrinkles covering -this pallid skin, and her shrewd observant eyes flashed still with the -keenness of youth. “Tell me, what is it?” - -“I’ve a broken heart in me, that’s all!” said the girl. - -She had walked to one of the two narrow little windows, and stood -looking out, yet seeing nothing for the mist of tears that might not -be kept down. Only the affectation of defiance preserved her voice from -breaking. - -“Here there will be rest and p’ace of mind,” intoned the other. “’T -is only a day more, Katie, and thin ye’ll be wan of us, wid all the -worriments and throubles of the world lagues behind ye.” - -The girl shook her head with vehemence and paced the stone floor -restlessly. - -“’T is I who’ll be opening the dure to ’em and bringing ’em all in -here, instead. No fear, Mother Agnes, they’ll folly me wherever I go.” - -The other smiled gently, and shook her vailed head in turn. - -“’T is little a child like you drames of the rale throubles of me,” - she murmured. “Whin ye’re older, ye’ll bless the good day that gave ye -this holy refuge, and saved ye from thim all. Oh, Katie, darlin’, when I -see you standing be me side in your habit--’t is mesilf had it made -be the Miss Maguires in Skibbereen, the same that sews the vestmints for -the bishop himself--I can lay me down, and say me _nunc dimittis_ wid a -thankful heart!” - -Kate sighed deeply and turned away. It was the trusting sweetness of -affection with which old Mother Agnes had enveloped her ever since the -promise to take vows had been wrung from her reluctant tongue that rose -most effectually always to restrain her from reconsidering that promise. -It was clear enough that the venerable O’Mahony nuns found in the speedy -prospect of her joining them the one great controlling joy of their -lives. Thinking upon this now, it was natural enough for her to say: - -“Can thim O’Daly girls rade and write, I wonder?” - -“Oh, they’ve had schooling, all of them. ’T is not what you had here, -be anny manes, but ’t will do.” - -“Just think, Mother Agnes,” Kate burst forth, “what it ‘ll be like to be -shut with such craytures as thim afther--afther you l’ave us!” - -“They’re very humble,” said the nun, hesitatingly. “’T is more of that -same spirit I’d fain be seeing in yourself, Katie! And in that they’ve -small enough resimblance to Cormac O’Daly, who’s raked ’em up from -the highways and byways to make their profession here. And oh--tell me -now--old Ellen that brings the milk mintioned to Sister Blanaid that -O’Daly was gone somewhere, and that there was talk about it.” - -“Talk, is it!” exclaimed Kate, whose introspective mood had driven this -subject from her mind, but who now spoke with eagerness. “That’s the -word for it, ‘talk.’ ’T is me mother, for pure want of something to -say, that putt the notion into Sergeant O’Flaherty’s thick skull, and, -w’u’d ye belave it, they’ve brought more poliss to the town, and they’re -worriting the loives out of the people wid questions and suspicions. -I’m told they’ve even gone out to the bog and arrested some of thim -poor wretches of O’Driscolls that Cormac putt out of their cottages last -winter. The idea of it!” - -“Where there’s so much smoke there’s some bit of fire,” said the older -woman. “Where _is_ O’Daly?” The girl shrugged her shoulders. - -“’T is not my affair!” she said, curtly. “I know where he’d be, if I’d -my will.” - -“Katie,” chanted the nun, in tender reproof, “what spirit d’ye call that -for a woman who’s within four-an’-twinty hours of making her profession! -Pray for yourself, child, that these worldly feelings may be taken from -ye!” - -“Mother Agnes,” said the girl, “if I’m to pretind to love Cormac O’Daly, -thin, wance for all, ’t is no use!” - -“We’re bidden to love all thim that despite--” The nun broke off her -quotation abruptly. A low wailing sound from the bowels of the earth -beneath them rose through the flags of the floor, and filled the chamber -with a wierd and ghostly dying away echo. Mother Agnes sprang to her -feet. - -“’T is the Hostage again!” she cried. “Sister Ellen vowed to me she -heard him through the night. Did _you_ hear him just now?” - -“I heard _it_,” said Kate, simply. - -The mother superior, upon reflection, seated herself again. - -“’T is a strange business,” she said, at last. Her shrewd eyes, -wandering in a meditative gaze about the chamber, avoided Katie’s face. -“’T is twelve years since last we heard him,” she mused aloud, “and -that was the night of the storm. ’T is a sign of misfortune to hear -him, they say--and the blowing down of the walls that toime was taken -be us to fulfill that same. But sure, within the week, The O’Mahoney had -gone on his thravels, and pious Cormac O’Daly had taken his place, -and the convint prospered more than ever. At laste _that_ was no -misfortune.” - -“Hark to me, Mother Agnes,” said Kate, with emphasis. “You never used to -favor the O’Mahonys as well I remimber, but you’re a fair-minded woman -and a holy woman, and I challenge ye now to tell me honest: Wasn’t -anny wan hair on The O’Mahony’s head worth the whole carcase of Cormac -O’Daly? ’T was an evil day for Muirisc whin he sailed away. If the -convint has prospered, me word, ’t is what nothing else in Muirisc has -done. And laving aside your office as a nun, is it sp’akin well for a -place to say that three old women in it are better off, and all the rist -have suffered?” - -“Katie!” admonished the other. “You’ll repint thim words a week hence! -To hearken to ye, wan would think yer heart was not in the profession -ye’re to make.” - -The girl gave a scornful, little laugh. - -“Did I ever pretind it was?” she demanded. - -“’T is you are the contrary crayture!” sighed the mother superior. -“Here now for all these cinturies, through all the storms and wars and -confiscations, this holy house has stud firm be the old faith. There -’s not another family in Ireland has kept the mass in its own chapel, -wid its own nuns kneeling before it, and never a break or interruption -at all. I’ll l’ave it to yer own sinse: Can ye compare the prosperity -of a little village, or a hundred of ’em, wid such a glorious and -unayqualed riccord as that? Why, girl, ’t is you should be proud -beyond measure and thankful that ye’re born and bred and selected -to carry on such a grand tradition. To be head of the convint of -the O’Mahonys ’t is more historically splindid than to be queen of -England.” - -“But if I come to be the head at all,” retorted Kate, “sure it will be a -convint of O’Dalys.” - -The venerable woman heaved another sigh and looked at the floor in -silence. - -Kate pursued her advantage eagerly. - -“Sure, I’ve me full share of pride in proper things,” she said, “and no -O’Mahony of them all held his family higher in his mind than I do. -And me blood lapes to every word you say about that same. But would -_you_--Agnes O’Mahony as ye were born--would you be asking me to have -pride in the O’Dalys? And that ’s what ’t is intinded to make of the -convint now. For my part, I’d be for saying: ‘L’ave the convint doy now -wid the last of the ladies of our own family rather than keep it alive -at the expinse of giving it to the O’Dalys.’” - -Mother Agnes shook her head. - -“I’ve me carnal feelings no less than you,” she said, “and me family -pride to subdue. But even if the victory of humility were denied me, -what c’u’d we do? For the moment, I’ll put this holy house to wan -side. What can _you_ do? How can you stand up forninst Cormac O’Daly’s -determination? Remimber, widout him ye’re but a homeless gerrel, Katie.” - -“And whose fault is that, Mother Agnes?” asked Kate, with swift glance -and tone. “Will ye be telling me ’t was The O’Mahony’s? Did he l’ave -me widout a four-penny bit, depindent on others, or was it that others -stole me money and desaved me, and to-day are keeping me out of me own? -Tell me that, Mother Agnes.” - -The nun’s ivory-tinted face flushed for an instant, then took on a -deeper pallor. Her gaze, lifted momentarily toward Kate, strayed beyond -her to vacancy. She rose to her full height and made a forward step, -then stood, fumbling confusedly at her beads, and with trembling, -half-opened lips. - -“’T is not in me power,” she stammered, slowly and with difficulty. -“There--there _was_ something--I’ve not thought of it for so long--I’m -forgetting strangely--” - -She broke off abruptly, threw up her withered hands in a gesture of -despair, and then, never looking at the girl, turned and with bowed head -left the room. - -Kate still stood staring in mingled amazement and apprehension at the -arched casement through which Mother Agnes had vanished, when the oak -door was pushed open again, and Sister Blanaid, a smaller and younger -woman, yet bent and half-palsied under the weight of years, showed -herself in the aperture. She bore in her arms, shoving the door aside -with it as she feebly advanced, a square wooden box, dust-begrimed and -covered in part with reddish cow-skin. - -“Take it away!” she mumbled. “’T is the mother-supayrior’s desire you -should take it from here. ’T is an evil day that’s on us! Go fling -this haythen box into the bay and thin pray for yourself and for her, -who’s taken that grief for ye she’s at death’s door!” - -The door closed again, and Kate found herself mechanically bearing this -box in her arms and making her way out through the darkened hallways to -the outer air. Only when she stood on the steps of the porch, and set -down her burden to adjust her hat, did she recognize it. Then, with a -murmuring cry of delight, she stooped and snatched it up again. It was -the _cathach_ which The O’Mahony had given her to keep. - -On the instant, as she looked out across the open green upon the harbor, -the bay, the distant peninsula of Kilcrohane peacefully gathering to -itself the shadows of the falling twilight--how it all came back to -her! On the day of his departure--that memorable black-letter day in her -life--he had turned over this rude little chest to her; he had told her -it was his luck, his talisman, and now should be hers. She had carried -it, not to her mother’s home, but to the tiny school-room in the old -convent, for safekeeping. She recalled now that she had told the nuns, -or Mother Agnes, at least, what it was. But then--then there came a -blank in her memory. She could not force her mind to remember when she -ceased to think about it--when it made its way into the lumber-room -where it had apparently lain so long. - -But, at all events, she had it now again. She bent her head to touch -with her lips one of the rough strips of skin nailed irregularly upon -it; then, with a shining face, bearing the box, like some sanctified -shrine, against her breast, she moved across the village-common toward -the wharf and the water. - -The injunction of quavering old Blanaid to cast it into the bay drifted -uppermost in her thoughts, and she smiled to herself. She had been -bidden, also, to pray; and reflection upon this chased the smile away. -Truly, there was need for prayer. Her perplexed mind called up, one by -one, in disheartening array, the miseries of her position, and drew new -unhappiness from the confusion of right and wrong which they presented. -How could she pray to be delivered from what Mother Agnes held up as the -duties of piety? And, on the other hand, what sincerity could there be -in any other kind of spiritual petition? - -She wandered along the shore-sands under the cliffs, the box tightly -clasped in her arms, her eyes musingly bent upon the brown reaches of -drenched seaweed which lay at play with the receding tide. - -Her mind conjured up the image of a smiling and ruddy young face, -sun-burned and thatched with crisp, curly brown hair--the face of that -curious young O’Mahony from Houghton County. His blue eye looked at her -half quizzically, half beseeching, but Kate resolutely drove the image -away. He was only the merest trifle less mortal than the others. - -So musing, she strolled onward. Suddenly she stopped, and lifted her -head triumphantly; the smile had flashed forth again upon her face, and -the dark eyes were all aglow. A thought had come to her--so convincing, -so unanswerable, so joyously uplifting, that she paused to marvel at -having been blind to it so long. Clear as noon sunlight on Mount Gabriel -was it what she should pray for. - -What _could_ it ever have been, this one crowning object of prayer, but -the return of The O’Mahony? - -As her mental vision adapted itself to the radiance of this revelation, -the abstracted glance which she had allowed to wander over the bay was -arrested by a concrete object. Two hundred yards from the water’s edge -a strange vessel had heaved to, and was casting anchor. Kate could hear -the chain rattling out from the capstan, even as she looked. - -The sight sent all prayerful thoughts scurrying out of her head. The -presence of vessels of the size of the new-comer was in itself most -unusual at Muirisc. But Kate’s practiced eye noticed a strange novelty. -The craft, though thick of beam and ungainly in line, carried the -staight running bowsprit of a cutter, and in addition to its cutter -sheets had a jigger lug-sail. The girl watched these eccentric sails as -they were dropped and reefed, with a curious sense of having seen -them somewhere before--as if in a vision or some old picture-book of -childhood. Confused memories stirred within her as she gazed, and held -her mind in daydream captivity. A figure she seemed vaguely to know, -stood now at the gunwale. - -The spell was rudely broken by a wild shout from the cliff close above -her. On the instant, amid a clatter of falling stones and a veritable -landslide of sand, rocks and turf, a human figure came rolling, -clambering and tumbling down the declivity, and ran toward her, its arms -stretched and waving with frantic gestures, and emitting inarticulate -cries and groans as it came. - -The astonished girl instinctively raised the box in her hands, to use -it as a missile. But, lo, it was old Murphy who, half stumbling to his -knees at her feet, fiercely clutched her skirts, and pointed in a frenzy -of excitement seaward! - -“Wid yer own eyes look at it--it, Miss Katie!” he screamed. “Ye can see -it yerself! It’s not dr’aming I am!” - -“It’s drunk ye are instead, thin, Murphy,” said the girl, sharply, -though in great wonderment. - -“Wid joy! Wid joy I’m drunk!” the old man shouted, dancing on the sands -and slippery sea-litter like one possessed, and whirling his arms about -his head. - -“Murphy, man! What ails ye? In the name of the Lord--what--” - -The browned, wild-eyed, ragged old madman had started at a headlong pace -across the wet waste of weeds, and plunged now through the breakers, -wading with long strides--knee-deep, then immersed to the waist. He -turned for an instant to shout back: “I’ll swim to him if I drown for -it! ’Tis the master come back!” - -The girl fell to her knees on the sand, then reverently bowed her head -till it rested upon the box before her. - - - - -CHAPTER XXV--BERNARD’S GOOD CHEER. - -Sorra a wink o’ sleep could I get the night,” groaned the wife of -O’Daly--Mrs. Fergus--“what with me man muthered, an’ me daughter -drowned, an’ me nerves that disthracted ’t was past the power of hot -dhrink to abate em.” - -It was early morning in the reception hall of the convent. The old nuns -sat on their bench in a row, blinking in the bright light which poured -through the casement as they gazed at their visitor, and tortured their -unworldly wits over the news she brought. The young chaplain, Father -Jago, had come in from the mass, still wearing soutane and beretta. He -leaned his burly weight against the mantel, smiling inwardly at thoughts -of breakfast, but keeping his heavy face drawn in solemn lines to fit -these grievous tidings. - -The mother superior sighed despairingly, and spoke in low, quavering -tones. “Here, too, no one sleeps a wink,” she said. “Ah, thin, ’t is -too much sorrow for us! By rayson of our years we’ve no stringth to bear -it.” - -“Ah--sure--’t is different wid you,” remarked Mrs. Fergus. “You’ve no -proper notion of the m’aning of sleep. Faith, all your life you’ve been -wakened bechune naps by your prayer-bell. ’T is no throuble to you. -You’re accustomed to ’t. But wid me--if I’ve me rest broken, I’m -killed entirely. ’T is me nerves!” - -“Ay, them nerves of yours--did I ever hear of ’em before?” put in -Mother Agnes, with a momentary gleam of carnal delight in combat on her -waxen face. Then sadness resumed its sway. “Aye, aye, Katie! Katie!” she -moaned, slowly shaking her vailed head. “Child of our prayers, daughter -of the White Foam, pride of the O’Mahonys, darlin’ of our hearts--what -ailed ye to l’ave us?” - -The mother superior’s words quavered upward into a wail as they ended. -The sound awakened the ancestral “keening” instinct in the other aged -nuns, and stirred the thin blood in their veins. They broke forth in -weird lamentations. - -“Her hair was the glory of Desmond, that weighty and that fine!” chanted -Sister Ellen. “Ah, wirra, wirra!” - -“She had it from me,” said Mrs. Fergus, her hand straying instinctively -to her crimps. Her voice had caught the mourning infection: “Ah-hoo! -Katie Avourneen,” she wailed in vocal sympathy. “Come back to us, -darlint!” - -“She’d the neck of the Swan of the Lake of Three Castles!” mumbled -Sister Blanaid. “’T was that same was said of Grace O’Sullivan--the -bride of The O’Mahony of Ballydivlin--an’ he was kilt on the strand -benayth the walls--an’ she lookin’ on wid her grand black eyes--” - -“Is it floatin’ in the waves ye are, _ma creevin cno_--wid the fishes -surroundin’ ye?” sobbed Mrs. Fergus. - -Sister Blanaid’s thick tongue took up the keening again. “’T was I -druv her out! ‘Go ’long wid ye,’ says I, ‘an’ t’row that haythen box o’ -yours into the bay’--an’ she went and t’rew her purty self in instead; -woe an’ prosthration to this house!--an’ may the Lord--” - -Father Jago at this took his elbow from the mantel and straightened -himself. “Whisht, now, aisy!” he said, in a tone of parental authority. -“There’s modheration in all things. Sure ye haven’t a scintilla -of evidence that there’s annyone dead at all. Where’s the sinse of -laminting a loss ye’re not sure of--and that, too, on an impty stomach?” - -“Nevir bite or sup more will I take till I’ve tidings of her!’ said the -mother superior. - -“The more rayson why I’ll not be waiting longer for ye now,” commented -the priest; and with this he left the room. As he closed the door behind -him, a grateful odor of frying bacon momentarily spread upon the air. -Mrs. Fergus sniffed it, and half rose from her seat; but the nuns clung -resolutely to their theme, and she sank back again. - -“’T is my belafe,” Sister Ellen began, “that voice we heard, ’t is -from no Hostage at all--’t is the banshee of the O’Mahonys.” - -The mother superior shook her head. - -“Is it likely, thin, Ellen O’Mahony,” she queried, “that _our_ banshee -would be distressed for an O’Daly? Sure the grand noise was made whin -Cormac himself disappeared.” - -“His marryin’ me--’t is clear enough that putt him in the family,” said -Mrs. Fergus. “’T would be flat injustice to me to ’ve my man go an’ -never a keen raised for him. I’ll stand on me rights for that much Agnes -O’Mahony.” - -“A fine confusion ye’d have of it, thin,” retorted the mother superior. -“The O’Dalys have their own banshee--she sat up her keen in Kilcrohane -these hundreds of years--and for ours to be meddlin’ because she’s -merely related by marriage--sure, ’t would not be endured.” - -The dubious problem of a family banshee’s duties has never been -elucidated beyond this point, for on the instant there came a violent -ringing of the big bell outside, the hoarse clangor of which startled -the women into excited silence. A minute later, the white-capped lame -old woman-servant threw open the door. - -A young man, with a ruddy, smiling face and a carriage of boyish -confidence, entered the room. He cast an inquiring glance over the -group. Then recognizing Mrs. Fergus, he gave a little exclamation of -pleasure, and advanced toward her with outstretched hand. - -“Why, how do you do, Mrs. O’Daly?” he exclaimed, cordially shaking her -hand. “Pray keep your seat. I’m just playing in luck to find _you_ here. -Won’t you--eh---be kind enough to--eh--introduce me?” - -“’T is a young gintleman from Ameriky, Mr. O’Mahony by name,” Mrs. -Fergus stammered, flushed with satisfaction in his remembrance, but -doubtful as to the attitude of the nuns. - -The ladies of the Hostage’s Tears had drawn themselves into as much -dignified erectness as their age and infirmities permitted. They eyed -this amazing new-comer in mute surprise. Mother Agnes, after the -first shock at the invasion, nodded frostily in acknowledgment of his -respectful bow. - -“Get around an’ spake to her in her north ear,” whispered Mrs. Fergus; -“she can’t hear ye in the other.” - -Bernard had been long enough in West Carbery to comprehend her meaning. -In that strange old district there is no right or left, no front or -back--only points of the compass. A gesture from Mrs. Fergus helped him -now to guess where the north might lie in matters auricular. - -“I didn’t stand on ceremony,” he said, laying his hat on the table and -drawing off his gloves. “I’ve driven over post-haste from Skibbereen -this morning--the car’s outside--and I rushed in here the first thing. -I--I hope sincerely that I’m in time.” - -“‘In toime?’” the superior repeated, in a tone of annoyed mystification. -“That depinds entoirely, sir, on your own intintions. I’ve no -information, sir, as to either who you are or what you’re afther doing.” - -“No, of course not,” said Bernard, in affable apology. “I ought to have -thought of that. I’ll explain things, ma’am, if you’ll permit me. As I -said, I’ve just raced over this morning from Skibbereen.” - -Mother Agnes made a stately inclination of her vailed head. - -“You had a grand morning for your drive,” she said. - -“I didn’t notice,” the young man replied, with a frank smile. “I was too -busy thinking of something else. The truth is, I spent last evening with -the bishop.” - -Again the mother superior bowed slightly. - -“An estimable man,” she remarked, coldly. - -“Oh, yes; nothing could have been friendlier,” pursued Bernard, “than -the way he treated me. And the day before that I was at Cashel, and had -a long talk with the archbishop. He’s a splendid old gentleman, too. Not -the least sign of airs or nonsense about him.” - -Mother Agnes rose. - -“I’m deloighted to learn that our higher clergy prodhuce so favorable an -impression upon you,” she said, gravely; “but, if you’ll excuse us, sir, -this is a house of mourning, and our hearts are heavy wid grief, and -we’re not in precisely the mood--” - -Bernard spoke in an altered tone: - -“Oh! I beg a thousand pardons! Mourning, did you say? May I ask--” - -Mrs. Fergus answered his unspoken question. - -“Don’t you know it, thin? ’T is me husband, Cormac O’Daly. Sure -he’s murdhered an’ his body’s nowhere to be found, an’ the poliss are -scourin’ all the counthry roundabout, an’ there’s a long account of ’t in -the _Freeman_ sint from Bantry, an’ more poliss have been dhrafted -into Muirisc, an’ they’ve arrested Jerry Higgins and that long-shanked, -shiverin’ _omadhaun_ of a cousin of his. ’T is known they had a -tellgram warnin’ thim not to be afraid--” - -“Oh, by George! Well, this _is_ rich!” - -The young man’s spontaneous exclamations brought the breathless -narrative of Mrs. Fergus to an abrupt stop. The women gazed at him in -stupefaction. His rosy and juvenile face had, at her first words, worn a -wondering and puzzled expression. Gradually, as she went on, a light -of comprehension had dawned in his eyes. Then he had broken in upon her -catalogue of woes with a broad grin on his face. - -“Igad, this _is_ rich!” he repeated. He put his hands in his pockets, -withdrew them, and then took a few steps up and down the room, chuckling -deeply to himself. - -The power of speech came first to Mother Agnes. “If ’t is to -insult our griefs you’ve come, young sir,” she began; “if that’s your -m’aning--” - -“Bless your heart, madam!” Bernard protested. “I’d be the last man in -the world to dream of such a thing. I’ve too much respect. I’ve an aunt -who is a religious, myself. No, what I mean is it’s all a joke--that is, -a mistake. O’Daly isn’t dead at all.” - -“What’s that you’re sayin’?” put in Mrs. Fergus, sharply. “Me man is -aloive, ye say?” - -“Why, of course”--the youngster went off into a fresh fit of -chuckling--“of course, he is--alive and kicking. Yes, especially -kicking!” - -“The Lord’s mercy on us!” said the mother superior. “And where would -Cormac be, thin!” - -“Well, that’s another matter. I don’t know that I can tell you just -now; but, take my word for it, he’s as alive as I am, and he’s perfectly -safe, too.” - -The astonished pause which followed was broken by the mumbling monologue -of poor half-palsied Sister Blanaid: - -“I putt the box in her hands, an’ I says, says I: ‘Away wid ye, now, an’ -t’row it into the say!’ An’ thin she wint.” - -The other women exchanged startled glances. In their excitement they had -forgotten about Kate. - -Before they could speak, Bernard, with a mystified glance at the -spluttering old lady, had taken up the subject of their frightened -thoughts. - -“But what I came for,” he said, looking from one to the other, “what I -was specially in a stew about, was to get here before--before Miss -Kate had taken her vows. The ceremony was set down for to-day, as I -understand. Perhaps I’m wrong; but that’s why I asked if I was in time.” - -“You _are_ in time,” answered Mother Agnes, solemnly. - -Her sepulchral tone jarred upon the young man’s ear. Looking into -the speaker’s pallid, vail-framed face, he was troubled vaguely by a -strange, almost sinister significance in her glance. - -“You’re in fine time,” the mother superior repeated, and bowed her head. - -“Man alive!” Mrs. Fergus exclaimed, rising and leaning toward him. -“You’ve no sinse of what you’re saying. Me daughter’s gone, too!” - -“‘Gone!’ How gone? What do you mean?” Bernard gazed in blank -astonishment into the vacuous face of Mrs. Fergus. Mechanically he -strode toward her and took her hand firmly in his. - -“Where has she gone to?” he demanded, as his scattered wits came under -control again. “Do you mean that she’s run away? Can’t you speak?” - -Mrs. Fergus, thus stoutly adjured, began to whimper: - -“They sint her from here--’t was always harsh they were wid her--ye -heard Sister Blanaid yerself say they sint her--an’ out she wint to walk -under the cliffs--some byes of Peggy Clancy saw her go--an’ she never -came back through the long night--an’ me wid no wink o’ sleep--an’ me -nerves that bad!” - -Overcome by her emotions, Mrs. Fergus, her hand still in Bernard’s -grasp, bent forward till her crimps rested on the young man’s shoulder. -She moved her forehead gingerly about till it seemed certain that the -ornaments were sustaining no injury. Then she gave her maternal feelings -full sway and sobbed with fervor against the coat of the young man from -Houghton County. - -“Don’t cry, Mrs. O’Daly,” was all Bernard could think of to say. - -The demonstration might perhaps have impressed him had he not perforce -looked over the weeping lady’s head straight into the face of the mother -superior. There he saw written such contemptuous incredulity that he -himself became conscious of skepticism. - -“_Don’t_ take on so!” he urged, this time less gently, and strove to -disengage himself. - -But Mrs. Fergus clung to his hand and resolutely buried her face against -his collar. Sister Ellen had risen to her feet beside Mother Agnes, -and he heard the two nuns sniff indignantly. Then he realized that the -situation was ridiculous. - -“What is it you suspect?” he asked of the mother superior, eager to make -a diversion of some kind. - -“You can’t be imagining that harm’s come to Miss Kate--that she ’s -drowned?” - -“That same _was_ our belafe,” said Mother Agnes, glaring icily upon him -and his sobbing burden. - -The inference clearly was that the spectacle before her affronted -eyes had been enough to overturn all previous convictions, of whatever -character. - -Bernard hesitated no longer. He almost wrenched his hand free and then -firmly pushed Mrs. Fergus away. - -“It’s all nonsense,” he said, assuming a confidence he did not wholly -feel. “She’s no more drowned than I am.” - -“Faith, I had me fears for _you_, wid such a dale of tears let loose -upon ye,” remarked Mother Agnes, dryly. - -The young man looked straight into the reverend countenance of the -superior and confided to it an audacious wink. - -“I’ll be back in no time,” he said, taking up his hat. “Now don’t you -fret another bit. She’s all right. I know it. And I’ll go and find her.” - And with that he was gone. - -An ominous silence pervaded the reception hall. The two nuns, still -standing, stared with wrathful severity at Mrs. Fergus. She bore their -gaze with but an indifferent show of composure, patting her disordered -crimps with an awkward hand, and then moving aimlessly across the room. - -“I’ll be going now, I’m thinking,” she said, at last, yet lingered in -spite of her words. - -The nuns looked slowly at one another, and uttered not a word. - -“Well, thin, ’t is small comfort I have, annyway, or consolation -either, from the lot of ye,” Mrs. Fergus felt impelled to remark, -drawing her shawl up on her head and walking toward the door. “An’ me -wid me throubles, an’ me nerves.” - -“Is it consolation you’re afther?” retorted Mother Agnes, bitterly. -“I haven’t the proper kind of shoulder on me for _your_ variety of -consolation.” - -“Thrue ye have it, Agnes O’Mahony,” Mrs. Fergus came back, with her -hand on the latch. “An’ by the same token, thim shoulders were small -consolation to you yourself, till you got your nun’s vail to hide -’em!” - -When she had flounced her way out, the mother superior remained -standing, her gaze bent upon the floor. - -“Sister Ellen,” she said at last, “me powers are failing me. ’T is -time I laid down me burden. For the first time in me life I was unayqual -to her impiddence.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVI--THE RESIDENT MAGISTRATE - - -When Bernard O’Mahony found himself outside the convent gateway, he -paused to consider matters. - -The warm spring sunlight so broadly enveloped the square in which he -stood, the shining white cottages and gray old walls behind him and the -harbor and pale-blue placid bay beyond, in its grateful radiance, that -it was not in nature to think gloomy thoughts. And nothing in the young -man’s own nature tended that way, either. - -Yet as he stopped short, looked about him, and even took off his hat -to the better ponder the situation, he saw that it was even more -complicated than he had thought. His plan of campaign had rested upon -two bold strategic actions. He had deemed them extremely smart, at the -time of their invention. Both had been put into execution, and, lo, the -state of affairs was worse than ever! - -The problem had been to thwart and overturn O’Daly and to prevent -Kate from entering the convent. These two objects were so intimately -connected and dependent one upon the other, that it had been impossible -to separate them in procedure. He had caused O’Daly to be immured -in secrecy in the underground cell, the while he went off to secure -episcopal interference in the convent’s plans. His journey had been -crowned with entire success. It had involved a trip to Cashel, it -is true, but he had obtained an order forbidding the ladies of the -Hostage’s Tears to add to their numbers. Returning in triumph with this -invincible weapon, he discovered now that O’Daly’s disappearance had -been placarded all over Ireland as a murder, that his two allies were in -custody as suspected assassins, and that--most puzzling and disturbing -feature of it all--Kate herself had vanished. - -He did not attach a moment’s credence to the drowning theory. Daughters -of the Coast of White Foam did not get drowned. Nor was it likely that -other harm had befallen a girl so capable, so selfreliant, so thoroughly -at home in all the districts roundabout. Obviously she was in hiding -somewhere in the neighborhood. The question was where to look for her. -Or, would it be better to take up the other branch of the problem first? - -His perplexed gaze, roaming vaguely over the broad space, was all at -once arrested by a gleam of flashing light in motion. Concentrating his -attention, he saw that it came from the polished barrel of a rifle borne -on the arm of a constable at the corner of the square. He put on his -hat and walked briskly over to this corner. The constable had gone, -and Bernard followed him up the narrow, winding little street to the -barracks. - -As he walked, he noted knots of villagers clustered about the cottage -doors, evidently discussing some topic of popular concern. In the -roadway before the barracks were drawn up two outside cars. A policeman -in uniform occupied the driver’s seat on each, and a half-dozen others -lounged about in the sunshine by the gate-posts, their rifles slung over -their backs and their round, visorless caps cocked aggressively over -their ears. These gentry bent upon him a general scowl as he walked past -them and into the barracks. - -A dapper, dark-faced, exquisitely dressed young gentleman, wearing -slate-tinted gloves and with a flower in his button-hole, stood in the -hall-way--two burly constables assisting him meanwhile to get into a -light, silk-lined top-coat. - -“Come, you fool! Hold the sleeve lower down, can’t you!” this young -gentleman cried, testily, as Bernard entered. The two constables divided -the epithet between them humbly, and perfected their task. - -“I want to see the officer in charge here,” said Bernard, prepared by -this for discourtesy. - -The young gentleman glanced him over, and on the instant altered his -demeanor. - -“I am Major Snaffle, the resident magistrate,” he said, with great -politeness. “I’ve only a minute to spare--I’m driving over to Bantry -with some prisoners--but if you’ll come this way--” and without further -words, he led the other into a room off the hall, the door of which the -two constables rushed to obsequiously open. - -“I dare say those are the prisoners I have come to talk about,” remarked -Bernard, when the door had closed behind them. He noted that this was -the first comfortably furnished room he had seen in Ireland, as he took -the seat indicated by the major’s gesture. - -Major Snaffle lifted his brows slightly at this, and fastened his bright -brown eyes in a keen, searching glance upon Bernard’s face. - -“Hm-m!” he said. “You are an American, I perceive.” - -“Yes--my name’s O’Mahony. I come from Michigan.” - -At sound of this Milesian cognomen, the glance of the stipendiary grew -keener still, if possible, and the corners of his carefully trimmed -little mustache were drawn sharply down. There was less politeness in -the manner and tone of his next inquiry. - -“Well--what is your business? What do you want to say about them?” - -“First of all,” said Bernard, “let’s be sure we’re talking about the -same people. You’ve got two men under arrest here--Jerry Higgins of this -place, and a cousin of his from--from Boston, I think it is.” - -The major nodded, and kept his sharp gaze on the other’s countenance -unabated. - -“What of that?” he asked, now almost brusquety. - -“Well, I only drove in this morning--I’m in the mining business, -myself--but I understand they’ve been arrested for the m---- that is, on -account of the disappearance of old Mr. O’Daly.” - -The resident magistrate did not assent by so much as a word. “Well? -What’s that to you?” he queried, coldly. - -“It’s this much to me,” Bernard retorted, not with entire good-temper, -“that O’Daly isn’t dead at all.” - -Major Snaffle’s eyebrows went up still further, with a little jerk. He -hesitated for a moment, then said: “I hope you know the importance of -what you are saying. We don’y like to be fooled with.” - -“The fooling has been done by these who started the story that he was -murdered,” remarked Bernard. - -“One must always be prepared for that--at some stage of a case--among -these Irish,” said the resident magistrate. “I’ve only been in Ireland -two years, but I know their lying tricks as well as if I’d been born -among them. Service in India helps one to understand all the inferior -races.” - -“I haven’t been here even two months,” said the young man from Houghton -County, “but so far as I can figure it out, the Irishmen who do the -bulk of the lying wear uniforms and monkey-caps like paper-collar boxes -perched over one ear. The police, I mean.” - -“We won’t discuss _that_,” put in the major, peremptorily. “Do you know -where O’Daly is?” - -“Yes, sir, I do,” answered Bernard. - -“Where?” - -“You wouldn’t know if I told you, but I’ll take you to the place--that -is, if you’ll let me talk to your prisoners first.” - -Major Snaffle turned the proposition over in his mind. “Take me to the -place,” he commented at last; “that means that you’ve got him hidden -somewhere, I assume.” - -Bernard looked into the shrewd, twinkling eyes with a new respect. -“That’s about the size of,” he assented. - -“Hra-m! Yes. That makes a new offense of it, with _you_ as an accessory, -I take it--or ought I to say principal?” - -Bernard was not at all dismayed by this shift in the situation. - -“Call it what you like,” he answered. “See here, major,” he went on, -in a burst of confidence, “this whole thing’s got nothing to do with -politics or the potato crop or anything else that need concern you. It’s -purely a private family matter. In a day or two, it’ll be in such shape -that I can tell you all about it. For that matter, I could now, only -it’s such a deuce of a long story.” - -The major thought again. - -“All right,” he said. “You can see the prisoners in my presence, and -then I’ll give you a chance to produce O’Daly. I ought to warn you, -though, that it may be all used against you, later on.” - -“I’m not afraid of that,” replied Bernard. - -A minute later, he was following the resident magistrate up a winding -flight of narrow stone stairs, none too clean. A constable, with a bunch -of keys jingling in his hand, preceded them, and, at the top, threw open -a heavy, iron-cased door. The solitary window of the room they entered -had been so blocked with thick bars of metal that very little light came -through. Bernard, with some difficulty, made out two figures lying in -one corner on a heap of straw and old cast-off clothing. - -“Get up! Here’s some one to see you!” called out the major, in the -same tone he had used to the constables while they were helping on the -overcoat. - -Bernard, as he heard it, felt himself newly informed as to the spirit -in which India was governed. Perhaps it was necessary there; but it made -him grind his teeth to think of its use in Ireland. - -The two figures scrambled to their feet, and Bernard shook hands with -both. - -“Egor, sir, you’re a sight for sore eyes!” exclaimed Jerry, effusively, -wringing the visitor’s fingers in his fat clasp. “Are ye come to take us -out?” - -“Yes, that’ll be easy enough,” said Bernard. “You got my telegram all -right?” - -Major Snaffle took his tablets from a pocket, and made a minute on them -unobserved. - -“I did--I did,” said Jerry, buoyantly. Then with a changed expression -he added, whispering: “An’ that same played the divil intirely. ’T was -for that they arrested us.” - -“Don’t whisper!” interposed the resident magistrate, curtly. - -“Egor! I’ll say nothing at all,” said Jerry, who seemed now for the -first time to consider the presence of the official. - -“Yes--don’t be afraid,” Bernard urged, reassuringly. “It’s all right -now. Tell me, is O’Daly in the place we know of?” - -“He is, thin! Egor, unless he’d wings on him, and dug his way up through -the sayling, like a blessed bat.” - -“Did he make much fuss?” - -“He did not--lastewise we didn’t stop to hear, He came down wid us aisy -as you plaze, an’ I unlocked the dure. ’T is a foine room,’ says I. -‘’T is that,’ says he. ‘Here’s whishky,’ says I. ‘I’d be lookin’ for -that wherever you were,’ says he, ‘even to the bowels of the earth.’ -‘An’ why not?’ says I. ‘What is it the priest read to us, that it makes -a man’s face to shine wid oil?’ ‘A grand scholar ye are, Jerry,’ says -he--” - -“Cut it short, Jerry!” interposed Bernard. “The main thing is you left -him there all right?” - -“Well, thin, we did, sir, an’ no mistake.” - -“My plan is, major,”--Bernard turned to the resident magistrate--“to -take my friend here, Jerry Higgins, with us, to the place I’ve been -speaking of. We’ll leave the other man here, as the editors say in my -country, as a ‘guarantee of good faith.’ The only point is that we three -must go alone. It wouldn’t do to take any constables with us. In fact, -there’s a secret about it, and I wouldn’t feel justified in giving it -away even to you, if it didn’t seem necessary. We simply confide it to -you.” - -“You can’t confide anything to me,” said the resident magistrate. -“Understand clearly that I shall hold myself free to use everything I -see and learn, if the interests of justice seem to demand it.” - -“Yes, but that isn’t going to happen,” responded Bernard. “The interests -of justice are all the other way, as you’ll see, later on. What I mean -is, if the case isn’t taken into court at all--as it won’t be--we can -trust you not to speak about this place.” - -“Oh--in my private capacity--that is a different matter.” - -“And you won’t be afraid to go alone with us?--it isn’t far from here, -but, mind, it is downright lonesome.” - -Major Snaffle covered the two men--the burly, stout Irishman and the -lithe, erect, close-knit young American--with a comprehensive glance. -The points of his mustache trembled momentarily upward in the beginning -of a smile. “No--not the least bit afraid,” the dapper little gentleman -replied. - -The constables at the outer door stood with their big red hands to their -caps, and saw with amazement the major, Bernard and Jerry pass them and -the cars, and go down the street abreast. The villagers, gathered about -the shop and cottage doors, watched the progress of the trio with even -greater surprise. It seemed now, though, that nothing was too marvelous -to happen in Muirisc. Some of them knew that the man with the flower in -his coat was the stipendary magistrate from Bantry, and, by some obscure -connection, this came to be interpreted throughout the village as -meaning that the bodies of both O’Daly and Miss Kate had been found. The -stories which were born of this understanding flatly contradicted one -another at every point as they flew about, but they made a good enough -basis for the old women of the hamlet to start keening upon afresh. - -The three men, pausing now and again to make sure they were not -followed, went at a sharp pace around through the churchyard to the door -of Jerry’s abode, and entered it. The key and the lantern were found -hanging upon their accustomed pegs. Jerry lighted the candle, pushed -back the bed, and led the descent of the narrow, musty stairs through -the darkness. The major came last of all. - -“I’ve only been down here once myself,” Bernard explained to him, over -his shoulder, as they made their stumbling way downward. “It seems the -place was discovered by accident, in the old Fenian days. I suppose the -convent used it in old times--they say there was a skeleton of a monk -found in it.” - -“Whisht, now!” whispered Jerry, as, having passed through the long, low -corridor leading from the staircase, he came to a halt at the doorway. -“Maybe we’ll surproise him.” - -He unlocked the door and flung it open. No sound of life came from -within. - -“Come along out ‘o that, Cormac!” called Jerry, into the mildewed -blackness. - -There was no answer. - -Bernard almost pushed Jerry forward into the chamber, and, taking the -lantern from him, held it aloft as he moved about. He peered under the -table; he opened the great muniment chest; he pulled back the curtains -to scrutinize the bed. There was no sign of O’Daly anywhere. - -“Saints be wid us!” gasped Jerry, crossing himself, “the divil’s flown -away wid his own!” - -Bernard, from staring in astonishment into his confederate’s fat face, -let his glance wander to the major. That official had stepped over the -threshold of the chamber, and stood at one side of the open door. He -held a revolver in his gloved, right hand. - -“Gentlemen,” he said, in a perfectly calm voice, “my father served in -Ireland in Fenian times, and an American-Irishman caught him in a trap, -gagged him with gun-rags, and generally made a fool of him. Such things -do not happen twice in any intelligent family. You will therefore walk -through this door, arm in arm, handing me the lantern as you pass, and -you will then go up the stairs six paces ahead of me. If either of you -attempts to do anything else, I will shoot him down like a dog.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVII--THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY. - -Bernard had never before had occasion to look into the small and -ominously black muzzle of a loaded revolver. An involuntary twitching -seized upon his muscles as he did so now, but his presence of mind did -not desert him. - -“No! Don’t shoot!” he called out. The words shook as he uttered them, -and seemed to his nervously acute hearing to be crowded parts of a -single sound. “That’s rank foolishness!” he added, hurriedly. “There’s -no trick! Nobody dreams of touching you. I give you my word I’m more -astonished than you are!” - -The major seemed to be somewhat impressed by the candor of the young -man’s tone. He did not lower the weapon, but he shifted his finger away -from the trigger. - -“That may or may not be the case,” he said with a studious affectation -of calm in his voice. “At all events, you will at once do as I said.” - -“But see here,” urged Bernard, “there’s an explanation to everything. -I’ll swear that old O’Daly was put in here by our friend here--Jerry -Higgins. That’s straight, isn’t it, Jerry?” - -“It is, sir!” said Jerry, fervently, with eye askance on the revolver. - -“And it’s evident enough that he couldn’t have got out by himself.” - -“That he never did, sir.” - -“Well, then--let’s figure. How many people know of this place?” - -“There’s yoursilf,” responded Jerry, meditatively, “an’ mesilf an’ -Linsky--me cousin, Joseph Higgins, I mane. That’s all, if ye l’ave -O’Daly out. An’ that’s what bothers me wits, who the divil _did_ l’ave -him out?” - -“This cousin of yours, as you call him,” put in the resident -magistrate--“what did he mean by speaking of him as Linsky? No lying, -now.” - -“Lying, is it, your honor? ’T is aisy to see you’re a stranger in -these parts, to spake that word to me. Egor, ’t is me truth-tellin ’s -kept me the poor man I am. I remember, now, sir, wance on a time whin I -was only a shlip of a lad--” - -“What did you call him Linsky for?” Major Snaffle demanded, -peremptorily. - -“Well, sir,” answered Jerry, unabashed, “’t is because he’s freckles on -him. ‘Linsky’ is the Irish for a ‘freckled man!’ Sure, O’Daly would tell -you the same--if yer honor could find him.” - -The major did not look entirely convinced. - -“I don’t doubt it,” he said, with grim sarcasm; “every man, woman and -child of you all would tell the same. Come now--we’ll get up out of -this. Link your arms together, and give me the lantern.” - -“By your lave, sir,” interposed Jerry, “that trick ye told us of your -father--w’u’d that have been in a marteller tower, on the coast beyant -Kinsale? Egor, sir, I was there! ’T was me tuk the gun-rags from your -father’s mouth. Sure, ’t is in me ricolliction as if ’t was -yesterday. There stud The O’Mahony--” - -At the sound of the name on his tongue, Jerry stopped short. The secret -of that expedition had been preserved so long. Was there danger in -revealing it now. - -To Bernard the name suggested another thought. He turned swiftly to -Jerry. - -“Look here!” he said. “You forgot something. The O’Mahony knew of this -place.” - -“Well, thin, he did, sir,” assented Jerry. “’T was him discovered it -altogether.” - -“Major,” the young man exclaimed, wheeling now to again confront the -magistrate with his revolver, “there’s something queer about this whole -thing. I don’t understand it any more than you do. Perhaps if we put our -heads together we could figure it out between us. It’s foolishness to -stand like this. Let me light the candles here, and all of us sit down -like white men. That’s it,” he added as he busied himself in carrying -out his suggestion, to which the magistrate tacitly assented. “Now we -can talk. We’ll sit here in front of you, and you can keep out your -pistol, if you like.” - -“Well?” said Major Snaffle, inquiringly, when he had seated himself -between the others and the door, yet sidewise, so that he might not be -taken unawares by any new-comer. - -“Tell him, Jerry, who this O’Mahony of yours was,” directed Bernard. - -“Ah, thin--a grand divil of a man!” said Jerry, with enthusiasm. “’T -was he was the master of all Muirisc. Sure ’t was mesilf was the first -man he gave a word to in Ireland whin he landed at the Cove of Cork. -‘Will ye come along wid me?’ says he. ‘To the inds of the earth!’ says -I. And wid that--” - -“He came from America, too, did he?” queried the major. “Was that the -same man who--who played the trick on my father? You seem to know about -that.” - -“Egor, ’t was the same!” cried Jerry, slapping his fat knee and -chuckling with delight at the memory. “’T was all in the winkin’ of -an eye--an’ there he had him bound like a calf goin’ to the fair, an’ he -cartin’ him on his own back to the boat. Up wint the sails, an’ off we -pushed, an’ the breeze caught us, an’ whin the soldiers came, faith, -’t was safe out o’ raych we were. An’ thin The O’Mahony--God save -him!--came to your honor’s father--” - -“Yes, I know the story,” interrupted the major. “It doesn’t amuse me as -it does you. But what has this man--this O’Mahony--got to do with this -present case?” - -“It’s like this,” explained Bernard, “as I understand it: He left -Ireland after this thing Jerry’s been telling you about and went -fighting in other countries. He turned his property over to two trustees -to manage for the benefit of a little girl here--now Miss Kate O’Mahony. -O’Daly was one of the trustees. What does he do but marry the girl’s -mother--a widow--and lay pipes to put the girl in a convent and -steal all the money. I told you at the beginning that it was a family -squabble. I happened to come along this way, got interested in the -thing, and took a notion to put a spoke in O’Daly’s wheel. To manage -the convent end of the business I had to go away for two or three days. -While I was gone, I thought it would be safer to have O’Daly down here -out of mischief. Now you’ve got the whole story. Or, no, that isn’t all, -for when I got back I find that the young lady herself has disappeared; -and, lo and behold, here’s O’Daly turned up missing, too!” - -“What’s that you say?” asked Major Snaffle. “The young lady gone, also?” - -“Is it Miss Kate?” broke in Jerry. “Oh, thin, ’t is the divil’s worst -work! Miss Kate not to be found--is that your m’aning? ’T is not -consayvable.” - -“Oh, I don’t think there’s anything serious in _that_,” said Bernard. -“She’ll turn out to be safe and snug somewhere when everything’s cleared -up. But, in the meantime, where’s O’Daly? How did he get out of here?” - -The major rose and walked over to the door. He examined its fastenings -and lock with attention. - -“It can only be opened from the outside,” he remarked as he returned to -his seat. - -“I know that,” said Bernard. “And I’ve got a notion that there’s only -one man alive who could have come and opened it.” - -“Is it Lin--me cousin, you mane?” asked Jerry. - -“Egor! He was never out of me sight, daylight or dark, till they -arrested us together.” - -“No,” replied Bernard. “I didn’t mean him. The man I’m thinking of is -The O’Mahony himself.” - -Jerry leaped to his feet so swiftly that the major instinctively -clutched his revolver anew. But there was no menace in Jerry’s manner. -He stood for a moment, his fat face reddened in the candle’s pale glow, -his gray eyes ashine, his mouth expanding in a grin of amazed delight. -Then he burst forth in a torrent of eager questioning. - -“Don’t you mane it?” he cried. “The O’Mahony come back to his own ag’in? -W’u’d he--is it--oh, thin, ‘t is too good to be thrue, sir! An’ we -sittin’ here! An’ him near by! An’ me not--ah, come along out ’o this! -An’ ye’re not desayvin’ us, sir? He’s thruly come back to us?” - -“Don’t go too fast,” remonstrated Bernard “It’s only guess-work There’s -nothing sure about it at all. Only there’s no one else who _could_ have -come here.” - -“Thrue for ye, sir!” exclaimed Jerry, all afire now with joyous -confidence. “’T is a fine, grand intelligince ye have, sir. An’ will -we be goin’, now, major, to find him?” - -Under the influence of Jerry’s great excitement, the other two had risen -to their feet as well. - -The resident magistrate toyed dubiously with his revolver, casting sharp -glances of scrutiny from one to the other of the faces before him, the -while he pondered the probabilities of truth in the curious tale to -which he had listened. - -The official side of him clamored for its entire rejection as a lie. -Like most of his class, with their superficial and hostile observation -of an alien race, his instincts were all against crediting anything -which any Irish peasant told him, to begin with. Furthermore, the half -of this strange story had been related by an Irish-American--a type -regarded by the official mind in Ireland with a peculiar intensity of -suspicion. Yes, he decided, it was all a falsehood. - -Then he looked into the young man’s face once more, and wavered. It -seemed an honest face. If its owner had borne even the homeliest and -most plebeian of Saxon labels, the major was conscious that he should -have liked him. The Milesian name carried prejudice, it was true, but-- - -“Yes, we will go up,” he said, “in the manner I described. I don’t see -what your object would be in inventing this long rigmarole. Of course, -you can see that if it isn’t true, it will be so much the worse for -you.” - -“We ought to see it by this time,” said Bernard, with a suggestion of -weariness. “You’ve mentioned it often enough. Here, take the lantern. -We’ll go up ahead. The door locks itself. I have the key.” - -The three men made their way up the dark, tortuous flight of stairs, -replaced the lantern and key on their peg in Jerry’s room, and emerged -once more into the open. They filled their lungs with long breaths of -the fresh air, and then looked rather vacuously at one another. The -major had pocketed his weapon. - -“Well, what’s the programme?” asked Bernard. - -Before any answer came, their attention was attracted by the figure of -a stranger, sauntering about among the ancient stones and black wooden -crosses scattered over the weed-grown expanse of the churchyard. He was -engaged in deciphering the names on the least weather-beaten of these -crosses, but only in a cursory way and with long intermittent glances -over the prospect of ivy-grown ruins and gray walls, turrets and gables -beyond. As they watched him, he seemed suddenly to become aware of their -presence. Forthwith he turned and strolled toward them. - -As he advanced, they saw that he was a tall and slender man, whose -close-cut hair and short mustache and chin tuft produced an effect of -extreme whiteness against a notably tanned and sun-burnt skin. Though -evidently well along in years, he walked erect and with an elastic and -springing step. He wore black clothes of foreign, albeit genteel aspect. -The major noted on the lapel of his coat a tell-tale gleam of red -ribbon--and even before that had guessed him to be a Frenchman and a -soldier. He leaped swiftly to the further assumption that this was The -O’Mahony, and then hesitated, as Jerry showed no sign of recognition. - -The stranger halted before them with a little nod and a courteous upward -wave of his forefinger. - -“A fine day, gentlemen,” he remarked, with politeness. - -Major Snaffle had stepped in front of his companions. - -“Permit me to introduce myself,” he said, with a sudden resolution, “I -am the stipendiary magistrate of the district. Would you kindly tell me -if you are informed as to the present whereabouts of Mr. Cormac O’Daly, -of this place?” - -The other showed no trace of surprise on his browned face. - -“Mr. O’Daly and his step-daughter,” he replied, affably enough, “are -just now doing me the honor of being my guests, aboard my vessel in the -harbor.” - -Then a twinkle brightened his gray eyes as he turned their glance upon -Jerry’s red, moon-like face. He permitted himself the briefest of dry -chuckles. - -“Well, young man,” he said, “they seem to have fed you pretty well, -anyway, since I saw you last.” For another moment Jerry stared in -round-eyed bewilderment at the speaker. Then with a wild “Huroo!” he -dashed forward, seized his hand and wrung it in both of his. - -“God bless ye! God bless ye!” he gasped, between little formless -ejaculations of dazed delight. “God forgive me for not knowin’ -ye--you’re that althered! But for you’re back amongst us--aloive and -well--glory be to the world!” - -He kept close to The O’Mahony’s side as the group began now to move -toward the gate of the churchyard, pointing to him with his fat thumb, -as if to call all nature to witness this glorious event, and murmuring -fondly to himself: “You’re come home to us!” over and over again. - -“I am much relieved to learn what you tell me, Mr.---- Or rather, I -believe you are O’Mahony without the mister,” said Major Snaffle, as -they walked out upon the green. “I dare say you know--this has been -a very bad winter all over the west and south’, and crime seems to be -increasing, instead of the reverse, as spring advances. We have had -the gravest reports about the disaffection in this district--especially -among your tenants. That’s why we gave such ready credence to the theory -of murder.” - -“Murder?” queried The O’Mahony. “Oh, I see--you thought O’Daly had been -murdered?” - -“Yes, we arrested your man Higgins, here, yesterday. I was just on the -point of starting with him to Bantry jail, an hour ago, when this -young gentleman--” the major made a backward gesture to indicate -Bernard--“came and said he knew where O’Daly was. He took me down to -that curious underground chamber--” - -“Who took you down, did you say?” asked The O’Mahony, sharply. He turned -on his heel as he spoke, as did the major. - -To their considerable surprise, Bernard was no longer one of the party. -Their dumfounded gaze ranged the expanse of common round about. He was -nowhere to be seen. - -The O’Mahoney looked almost sternly at Jerry. - -“Who is this young man you had with you--who seems to have taken to -running things in my absence?” he demanded. - -Poor Jerry, who had been staring upward at the new-comer with the dumb -admiration of an affectionate spaniel, cowered humbly under this glance -and tone. - -“Well, yer honor,” he stammered, plucking at the buttons of his coat in -embarrassment, “egor, for the matter of that--I--I don’t rightly know.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVIII--A MARINE MORNING CALL. - -The young man from Houghton County, strolling along behind these -three men, all so busily occupied with one another, had, of a sudden, -conceived the notion of dropping silently out of the party. - -He had put the idea into execution and was secure from observation on -the farther side of the ditch, before the question of what he should do -next shaped itself in his mind. Indeed, it was not until he had made his -way to the little old-fashioned pier and come to an enforced halt among -the empty barrels, drying nets and general marine odds and ends which -littered the landing-stage, that he knew what purpose had brought him -hither. - -But he perceived it now with great clearness. What other purpose, in -truth, did existence itself contain for him? - -“I want to be rowed over at once to that vessel there,” he called out to -John Pat, who made one of a group of Muirisc men, in white jackets and -soft black hats, standing beneath him on the steps. As he descended and -took his seat in one of the waiting dingeys, he noted other clusters of -villagers along the shore, all concentrating an eager interest upon the -yawl-rigged craft which lay at anchor in the harbor. They pointed to -it incessant as they talked, and others could be seen running forward -across the green to join them. He had never supposed Muirisc capable of -such a display of animation. - -“The people seem tickled to death to get The O’Mahony back again,” he -remarked to John Pat, as they shot out under the first long sweep of the -oars. - -“They are, sir,” was the stolid response. - -“Did your brother come back with him--that one-armed man who went after -him--Malachy, I think they called him?” - -“He did, sur,” said Pat, simply. - -“Well”--Bernard bent forward impatiently--“tell me about it! Where did -he find him? What do people say?” - -“They do be saying manny things,” responded the oarsman, rounding his -shoulders to the work. - -Bernard abandoned the inquiry, with a grunt of discouragement, and -contented himself perforce by watching the way in which the strange -craft waxed steadily in size as they sped toward her. In a minute or two -more, he was alongside and clambering up a rope-ladder, which dangled -its ends in the gently heaving water. - -Save for a couple of obviously foreign sailors lolling in the sunshine -upon a sail in the bows, there was no one on deck. As he looked about, -however, in speculation, the apparition of a broad, black hat, with -long, curled plumes, rose above the companionway. He welcomed it with an -exclamation of delight, and ran forward with outstretched hands. - -The wearer of the hat, as she stepped upon the deck and confronted this -demonstration, confessed to surprise by stopping short and lifting her -black brows in inquiry. Bernard sheepishly let his hands fall to his -side before the cool glance with which she regarded him. - -“Is it viewing the vessel you are?” she asked. “Her jigger lug-sail is -unusual, I’m told.” - -The young man’s blue eyes glistened in reproachful appeal. - -“What do I know about lugger jig-sails, or care, either,” he asked. “I -hurried here the moment I heard, to--to see _you!_” - -“’T is flattered I am, I’m sure,” said Kate, dryly, looking away from -him to the brown cliffs beyond. - -“Come, be fair!” Bernard pleaded. “Tell me what the matter is. I thought -I had every reason to suppose you’d be glad to see me. It’s plain enough -that you are not; but you--you _might_ tell me why. Or no,” he went on, -with a sudden change of tone, “I won’t ask you. It’s your own affair, -after all. Only you’ll excuse the way I rushed up to you. I’d had -my head full of your affairs for days past, and then your -disappearance--they thought you were drowned, you know--and I--I--” - -The young man broke off with weak inconclusiveness, and turned as if to -descend the ladder again. But John Pat had rowed away with the boat, and -he looked blankly down upon the clear water instead. - -Kate’s voice sounded with a mellower tone behind him. - -“I wouldn’t have ye go in anger,” she said. - -Bernard wheeled around in a flash. - -“Anger!” he cried, with a radiant smile chasing all the shadows from his -face. “Why, how on earth _could_ I be angry with _you?_ No; but I was -going away most mightily down in the mouth, though--that is,” he added, -with a rueful kind of grin, “if my boat hadn’t gone off without me. But, -honestly, now, when I drove in here this morning from Skibbereen, -I felt like a victorious general coming home from the wars. I’d done -everything I wanted to do. I had the convent business blocked, and I had -O’Daly on the hip; and I said to myself, as we drove along: ‘She’ll -be glad to see me.’ I kept saying that all the while, straight from -Skibbereen to Muirisc. Well, then--you can guess for yourself--it was -like tumbling backward into seven hundred feet of ice-water!” - -Kate’s face had gradually lost its implacable rigidity, and softened now -for an instant into almost a smile. - -“So much else has happened since that drive of yours,” she said gently. -“And what were ye doing at Skibbereen?” - -“Well, you’ll open _your_ eyes!” predicted Bernard, all animation once -again; and then he related the details of his journey to Skibbereen and -Cashel, of his interviews with the prelates and of the manner in which -he had, so to speak, wound up the career of the convent of the Hostage’s -Tears. “It hadn’t had any real, rightdown legitimate title to existence, -you know,” he concluded, “these last five hundred years. All it needed -was somebody to call attention to this fact, you see, and, bang, the -whole thing collapsed like a circus-tent in a cyclone!” - -The girl had moved over to the gunwale, and now leaning over the rail, -looked meditatively into the water below. - -“And so,” she said, with a pensive note in her voice, “there’s an end -to the historic convent of the O’Mahonys! No other family in Ireland -had one--’t was the last glory of our poor, hunted and plundered and -poverty-striken race; and now even that must depart from us.” - -“Well--hang it all!” remonstrated Bernard--“it’s better that way than -to have _you_ locked up all your life. I feel a little blue myself about -closing up the old convent, but there’s something else I feel a thousand -times more strongly about still.” - -“Yes--isn’t it wonderful?--the return of The O’Mahony!” said Kate. “Oh, -I hardly know still if I’m waking or not. ’T was all like a blessid -vision, and ’t _was_ supernatural in its way; I’ll never believe -otherwise. There was I on the strand yonder, with the talisman he’d -given me in me arms, praying for his return--and, behold you there was -this boat of his forninst me! Oh! Never tell me the age of miracles is -past?” - -“I won’t--I promise you!” said Bernard, with fervor. “I’ve seen one -myself since I’ve been here. It was at the Three Castles. I had my gun -raised to shoot a heron, when an enchanted fairy--” - -“Nothing to do but he’d bring me on board,” Kate put in, hastily. “Old -Murphy swam out to him ahead of us, screaming wid delight like one -possessed. And we sat and talked for hours--he telling strange stories -of the war’s he’d been in wid the French, and thin wid Don Carlos, -and thin the Turks, and thin wid some outlandish people in a Turkish -province--until night fell, and he wint ashore. And whin he came back he -brought O’Daly wid him--where in the Lord’s name he found him passes my -understanding, and thin we up sail and beat down till we stood off -Three Castle Head. There we lay all night--O’Mahony gave up his cabin -to me--and this morning back we came again. And now--the Lord be -praised!--there’s an ind to all our throubles!” - -“Well,” said Bernard, with deliberation, “I’m glad. I really _am_ glad. -Although, of course, it’s plain enough to see, there’s an end to me, -too.” - -A brief time of silence passed, as the two, leaning side by side on the -rail, watched the slow rise and sinking of the dull-green wavelets. - -“You’re off to Ameriky, thin?” Kate finally asked, without looking up. - -The young man hesitated. - -“I don’t know yet,” he said, slowly. “I’ve got a curious hand dealt out -to me. I hardly know how to play it. One thing is sure, though: hearts -are trumps.” - -He tried to catch her glance, but she kept her eyes resolutely bent upon -the water. - -“You know what I want to say,” he went on, moving his arm upon the rail -till there was the least small fluttering suggestion of contact with -hers. “It must have said itself to you that day upon the mountain-top, -or, for that matter, why, that very first time I saw you I went away -head over heels in love. I tell you, candidly, I haven’t thought or -dreamed for a minute of anything else from that blessed day. It’s all -been fairyland to me ever since. I’ve been so happy! May I stay in -fairyland, Kate?” - -She made no answer. Bernard felt her arm tremble against his for an -instant before it was withdrawn. He noted, too, the bright carmine flush -spring to her cheek, overmantle her dark face and then fade away before -an advancing pallor. A tear glittered among her downcast lashes. - -“You mustn’t deny me _my_ age of miracles!” he murmuringly pleaded. “It -_was_ a miracle that we should have met as we did; that I should have -found you afterward as I did; that I should have turned up just when -you needed help the most; that the stray discovery of an old mediæval -parchment should have given me the hint what to do. Oh, don’t _you_ feel -it, Kate? Don’t _you_ realize, too, dear, that there was fate in it all? -That we belonged from the beginning to each other?” - -Very white-faced and grave, Kate lifted herself erect and looked at him. -It was with an obvious effort that she forced herself to speak, but her -words were firm enough and her glance did not waver. - -“Unfortunately,” she said, “_your_ miracle has a trick in it. Even if -’t would have pleased me to believe in it, how can I, whin ’t is -founded on desate.” - -Bernard stared at her in round-eyed wonderment. - -“How ‘deceit’?” he stammered. “How do you mean? Is it about kidnapping -O’Daly? We only did that--” - -“No, ’t is _this_,” said Kate--“we ‘ll be open with each other, and -it’s a grief to me to say it to you, whom I have liked so much, but you -‘re no O’Ma-hony at all.” - -The young man with difficulty grasped her meaning. - -“Well, if you remember, I never said I knew my father was one of _the_ -O’Mahonys, you know. All I said was that he came from somewhere in -County Cork. Surely, there was no deceit in that.” - -She shook her head. - -“No; what ye said was that your name was O’Mahony.” - -“Well, so it is. Good heavens! _That_ isn’t disputed, is it?” - -“And you said, moreover,” she continued, gravely, “that your father knew -_our_ O’Mahony as well almost as he knew himsilf.” - -“Oh-h!” exclaimed Bernard, and fell thereupon into confused rumination -upon many thoughts which till then had been curiously subordinated in -his mind. - -“And, now,” Kate went on, with a sigh, “whin I mintion this to The -O’Mahony himself, he says he never in his life knew any one of your -father’s name. O’Daly was witness to it as well.” - -Bernard had his elbows once more on the rail. He pushed his chin hard -against his upturned palms and stared at the skyline, thinking as he had -never been forced to think before. - -“Surely there was no need for the--the misstatement,” said Kate, in -mournful recognition of what she took to be his dumb self-reproach. “See -now how useless it was--and a thousand times worse than useless! See how -it prevints me now from respecting you and being properly grateful to -you for what you’ve done on me behalf, and--and--” - -She broke off suddenly. To her consternation she had discovered that -the young man, so far from being stricken speechless in contrition, was -grinning gayly at the distant landscape. - -Turning with abruptness she walked indignantly aft. Cormac O’Daly -had come up from below, and stood wistfully gazing landward over the -taffrail. She joined him, and stood at his side flushed and wrathful. - -Bernard was not wholly able to chase the smile from his face as he rose -and sauntered over toward her. She turned her back as he approached and -tapped the deck nervously with her foot. Nothing dismayed, he addressed -himself to O’Daly, who seemed unable to decide whether also to look the -other way or not. - -“Good morning, sir,” he said affably. “You’re quite a stranger, Mr. -O’Daly.” - -Kate, at his first word, had walked briskly away up the deck. Cormac’s -little black eyes snapped viciously at the intruder. - -“At laste I’m not such a stranger,” he retorted, “but that me thrue name -is known, an’ I’m here be the invitation of the owner.” - -“I’m sorry you take things so hard, Mr. O’Daly,” said Bernard. “An easy -disposition would come very handy to you, seeing the troubles you ’ve -got to go through with yet.” - -The small man gazed apprehensively at his tormentor. - -“I don’t folly ye,” he stammered. - -“I’m going to propose that you _shall_ follow me, sir,” replied the -young man in an authoritative tone. “I understand that in conversation -last night between your step-daughter and you and _The_--the owner of -this vessel, the question of my name was brought up, and that it was -decided that I was a fraud. Now, I’m not much given to making a fuss, -but there are some things, especially at certain times, that I can’t -stand--not for one little minute. This is one of ’em. Now I’m going to -suggest that we hail one of those boats there and go ashore at once--you -and Miss Kate and I--and clear this matter up without delay.” - -“We’ll remain here till The O’Mahony returns!” said O’Daly, stiffly. -“’T was his request. ’T is no interest of mine to clear the matther -up, as you call it.” - -“Well, it was no interest of mine, Mr. O’Daly,” remarked Bernard, -placidly, “to go over the mining contracts you’ve made as trustee -during the past dozen years and figure out all the various items of -the estate’s income; but I’ve done it. It makes a very curious little -balance-sheet. I had intended to fetch it down with me to-day and go -over it with you in your underground retreat.” - -“In the devil’s name, who are you?” snarled Cormac, with livid face and -frightened eyes. “That’s just what I proposed we should go right and -settle. If you object, why, I shall go alone. But in that case, it may -happen that I shall have to discuss with the gentleman who has just -arrived the peculiarities of that balance-sheet I spoke of. What do you -think, eh?” - -O’Daly did not hesitate. - -“Sur, I’ll go wid you,” he said. “The O’Mahony has no head for figures. -’T would be flat injustice to bother him wid ’em, and he only newly -landed.” Bernard walked lightly across the deck, humming a little tune -to himself as he advanced, and baiting a short foot from where Kate -stood. - -“O’Daly’s going ashore with me,” he remarked. “He dare not!” she -answered, over her shoulder. “The O’Mahony bade him stop here.” - -“Well, this is more or less of a free country, and he’s changed his -mind. He’s going with me. I--I want you to come, too.” - -“’Tis loikely!” she said, with a derisive sniff. - -“Kate,” he said, drawing nearer to her by a step and speaking in low, -earnest tones, “I hate to plead this sort of thing; but you have nothing -but candid and straightforward friendship from me. I’ve done a trifle -of lying _for_ you, perhaps, but none _to_ you. I’ve worked for you as I -never worked for myself. I’ve run risks for you which nothing else under -the sun would have tempted me into. All that doesn’t matter. Leave that -out of the question. I did it because I love you. And for that selfsame -reason I come now and ask this favor of you. You can send me away -afterward, if you like; but you _can’t_ bear to stop here now, thinking -these things of me, and refusing to come out and learn for yourself -whether they are true or false, for that would be unfair, and it’s not -in your blood--in _our_ blood--to be that.” - -The girl neither turned to him nor spoke, but he could see the outline -of her face as she bowed her head and gazed in silence at the murmuring -water; and something in this sight seemed to answer him. - -He strode swiftly to the other side of the vessel, and exultantly waved -his handkerchief in signal to the boatmen on the shore. - - - - -CHAPTER XXIX--DIAMOND CUT PASTE. - -The O’Mahony sat once more in the living-room of his castle--sat -very much at his ease, with a cigar between his teeth, and his feet -comfortably stretched out toward the blazing bank of turf on the stone -hearth. - -A great heap of papers lay upon the table at his elbow--the contents of -O’Daly’s strong-box, the key to which he had brought with him from -the vessel--but not a single band of red tape had been untied. The -O’Mahony’s mood for investigation had exhausted itself in the work -of getting the documents out. His hands were plunged deep into his -trousers’ pockets now, and he gazed into the glowing peat. - -His home-coming had been a thing to warm the most frigid heart. His own -beat delightedly still at the thought of it. From time to time there -reached his ears from the square without a vague braying noise, the -sound of which curled his lips into the semblance of a grin. It seemed -so droll to him that Muirisc should have a band--a fervent half-dozen -of amateurs, with ancient and battered instruments which successive -generations of regimental musicians bad pawned at Skibbereen or Bantry, -and on which they played now, neither by note nor by ear, but solely by -main strength. - -The tumult of discord which they produced was dreadful, but The O’Mahony -liked it. He had been pleasurably touched, too, by the wild enthusiasm -of greeting with which Muirisc had met him when he disclosed himself on -the main street, walking up to the police-station with Major Snaffle -and Jerry. All the older inhabitants he knew, and shook hands with. The -sight of younger people among them whom he did not know alone kept alive -the recollection that he had been absent twelve long years. Old and -young alike, and preceded by the hurriedly summoned band, they had -followed him in triumphal procession when he came down the street -again, with the liberated Jerry and Linsky at his heels. They were still -outside, cheering and madly bawling their delight whenever the bandsmen -stopped to take breath. Jerry, Linsky and the one-armed Malachy were -out among them, broaching a cask of porter from the castle cellar; Mrs. -Fergus and Mrs. Sullivan were in the kitchen cutting up bread and meat -to go with the drink. - -No wonder there were cheers! Small matter for marvel was it, either, -that The O’Mahony smiled as he settled down still more lazily in his -arm-chair and pushed his feet further toward the fire. - -Presently he must go and fetch O’Daly and Kate from the vessel--or no, -when Jerry came in he would send him on that errand. After his long -journey The O’Mahony was tired and sleepy--all the more as he had sat up -most of the night, out on deck, talking with O’Daly. What a journey -it had been! Post-haste from far away, barbarous Armenia, where the -faithful Malachy had found him in command of a Turkish battalion, -resting after the task of suppressing a provincial rebellion. Home -they had wended their tireless way by Constantinople and Malta and -mistral-swept Marseilles, and thence by land across to Havre. Here, -oddly enough, he had fallen in with the French merchant to whom he had -sold the _Hen Hawk_ twelve years before--the merchant’s son had served -with him in the Army of the Loire three years later, and was his -friend--and he had been able to gratify the sudden fantastic whim of -returning as he had departed in the quaint, flush-decked, yawl-rigged -old craft. It all seemed like a dream! - -“If your honor plazes, there’s a young gintleman at the dure--a Misther -O’Mahony, from America--w’u’d be afther having a word wid ye.” - -It was the soft voice of good old Mrs. Sullivan that spoke. - -The O’Mahony woke with a start from his complacent day-dream. He drew -his feet in, sat upright, and bit hard on his cigar for a minute in -scowling reflection. - -“Show him in,” he said, at last, and then straightened himself -truculently to receive this meddling new-comer. He fastened a stern and -hostile gaze upon the door. - -Bernard seemed to miss entirely the frosty element in his reception. He -advanced with a light step, hat in hand, to the side of the hearth, and -held one hand with familiar nonchalance over the blaze, while he nodded -amiably at his frowning host. - -“I skipped off rather suddenly this morning,” he said, with a pleasant -half-smile, “because I didn’t seem altogether needful to the party for -the minute, and I had something else to do. I’ve dropped in now to say -that I’m as glad as anybody here to see you back again. I’ve only been -about Muirisc a few weeks, but I already feel as if I’d been born -and brought up here. And so I’ve come around to do my share of the -welcoming.” - -“You _seem_ to have made yourself pretty much at home, sir,” commented -The O’Mahony, icily. - -“You mean putting O’Daly down in the family vault?” queried the young -man. “Yes, perhaps it was making a little free, but, you see, time -pressed. I couldn’t be in two places at once, now, could I? And while -I went off to settle the convent business, there was no telling what -O’Daly mightn’t be up to if we left him loose; so I thought it was best -to take the liberty of shutting him up. You found him there, I judge, -and took him out.” - -The O’Mahony nodded curtly, and eyed his visitor with cool disfavor. - -“As long as you’re here, sir, you might as well take a seat,” he said, -after a minute’s pause. “That ’s it. Now, sir, first of all, perhaps -you wouldn’t mind telling me who you are and what the devil you mean, -sir, by coming here and meddling in this way with other people’s private -affairs.” - -“Curious, isn’t it,” remarked the young man from Houghton County, -blandly, “how we Americans lug in the word ‘sir’ every other breath? -They tell me no Englishman ever uses it at all.” - -The O’Mahony stirred in his chair. - -“I’m not as easy-going a man or as good-natured as I used to be, my -young friend,” he said, with an affectation of calm, through which ran a -threatening note. - -“I shouldn’t have thought it,” protested Bernard. “You seemed the pink -of politeness out there in the graveyard this morning. But I suppose -years of campaigning--” - -“See here!” the other interposed abruptly. “Don’t fool with me. It’s -a risky game! Unless you want trouble, stop monkeying and answer my -question straight: Who are you?” - -The young man had ceased smiling. His face had all at once become very -grave, and he was staring at The O’Mahony with wide-open, bewildered -eyes. - -“True enough!” he gasped, after his gaze had been so protracted that the -other half rose from his seat in impatient anger. “Why--yes, sir! I’ll -swear to it--well--this _does_ beat all!” - -“Your _cheek_ beats all!” broke in The O’Mahony, springing to his feet -in a gust of choleric heat. - -Bernard stretched forth a restraining hand. - -“Wait a minute,” he said, in evidently sincere anxiety not to be -misunderstood, and picking his words slowly as he went along, “hold -on--I’m not fooling! Please sit down again. I’ve got something -important, and mighty queer, too, to say to you.” - -The O’Mahony, with a grunt of reluctant acquiescing, sat down once more. -The two men looked at each other with troubled glances, the one vaguely -suspicious, the other still round-eyed with surprise. - -“You ask who I am,” Bernard began. “I’ll tell you. I was a little -shaver--oh, six or seven years old--just at the beginning of the War. My -father enlisted when they began raising troops. The recruiting tent in -our town was in the old hay-market by the canal bridge. It seems to me, -now, that they must have kept my father there for weeks alter he ’d -put his uniform on. I used to go there every day, I know, with my mother -to see him. But there was another soldier there--this is the queer thing -about a boy’s memory--I remember him ever so much better than I do my -own father. It’s--let’s see--eighteen years now, but I’d know him to -this day, wherever I met him. He carried a gun, and he walked all day -long up and down in front of the tent, like a polar bear in his cage. -We boys thought he was the most important man in the whole army. Some of -them knew him--he belonged to our section originally, it seems--and they -said he’d been in lots of wars before. I can see him now, as plainly -as--as I see you. His name was Tisdale--Zeb, I think it was--no, Zeke -Tisdale.” - -Perhaps The O’Mahony changed color. He sat with his back to the window, -and the ruddy glow from the peat blaze made it impossible to tell. But -he did not take his sharp gray eye off Bernard’s face, and it never so -much as winked. - -“Very interesting,” he said, “but it doesn’t go very far toward -explaining who you are. If I’m not mistaken, _that_ was the question.” - -“Me?” answered Bernard, “Oh, yes, I forgot that. Well, sir, I am -the only surviving son of one Hugh O’Mahony, who was a shoemaker in -Tecumseh, who served in the same regiment, perhaps the same company, -with this Zeke Tisdale I’ve told you about, and who, after the War, -moved out to Michigan where he died.” - -An oppressive silence settled upon the room. The O’Mahony still looked -his companion straight in the face, but it was with a lack-luster eye -and with the effect of having lost the physical power to look elsewhere. -He drummed with his fingers in a mechanical way on the arms of the -chair, as he kept up this abstracted and meaningless gaze. - -There fell suddenly upon this long-continued silence the reverberation -of an exceptionally violent outburst of uproar from the square. - -“Cheers for The O’Mahony!” came from one of the lustiest of the now -well-lubricated throats; and then followed a scattering volley of wild -hurroos and echoing yells. - -As these died away, a shrill voice lifted itself, screaming: - -“Come out, O’Mahony, an’ spake to us! We’re dyin’ for a sight of you!” - -The elder man had lifted his head and listened. Then he squinted and -blinked his eyelids convulsively and turned his head away, but not -before Bernard had caught the glint of moisture in his eyes. - -The young man had not been conscious of being specially moved by what -was happening. All at once he could feel his pulses vibrating like the -strings of a harp. His heart had come up into his throat. Nothing was -visible to him but the stormy affection which Muirisc bore for this -war-born, weather-beaten old impostor. And, clearly enough, _he_ himself -was thinking of only that. - -Bernard rose and stepped to the hearth, instinctively holding one of his -hands backward over the fire, though the room was uncomfortably hot. - -“They’re calling for you outside, sir,” he said, almost deferentially. - -The remark seemed stupid after he had made it, but nothing else had come -to his tongue. - -The lurking softness in his tone caught the other’s ear, and he turned -about fiercely. - -“See here!” he said, between his teeth. “How much more of this is there -going to be? I’ll fight you where you stand--here!--now!--old as I -am--or I’ll--I’ll do something else--anything else--but d----m me if I’ll -take any slack or soft-soap from _you!_” - -This unexpected resentment of his sympathetic mood impressed Bernard -curiously. Without hesitation, he stretched forth his hand. No -responsive gesture was offered, but he went on, not heeding this. . - -“My dear sir,” he said, “they are calling for you, as I said. They -are hollering for ‘The O’Mahony of Muirisc.’ You are The O’Mahony of -Muirisc, and will be till you die. You hear _me!_” - -The O’Mahony gazed for a puzzled minute into his young companion’s face. - -“Yes--I hear you,” he said, hesitatingly. - -“_You_--are The--O’Mahony--of--Muirisc!” repeated Bernard, with a -deliberation and emphasis; “and I’ll whip any man out of his boots who -says you’re not, or so much as looks as if he doubted it!” - -The old soldier had put his hands in his pockets and began walking -slowly up and down the chamber. After a time he looked up. - -“I s’pose you can prove all this that you’ve been saying?” he asked, in -a musing way. - -“No--prove nothing! Don’t want to prove anything!” rejoined Bernard, -stoutly. - -Another pause. The elder man halted once more in his meditative pacing -to and fro. - -“And you say I _am_ The--The O’Mahony of Muirisc?” he remarked. - -“Yes, I said it; I mean it!” - -“Well, but--” - -“There’s no ‘but’ about it, sir!” - -“Yes, there is,” insisted The O’Mahony, drawing near and tentatively -surrendering his hand to the other’s prompt and cordial clasp. -“Supposing it all goes as you say--supposing I _am_ The O’Mahony--what -are _you_ going to be?” - -The young man’s eyes glistened and a happy change--half-smile, -half-blush--blossomed all over his face. - -“Well,” he said, still holding the other’s hand in his, “I don’t -know just how to tell you--because I am not posted on the exact -relationships; but I’ll put it this way: If it was your daughter that -you ’d left on the vessel there with O’Daly, I’d say that what I -propose to be was your son-in-law. See?” - -It was only too clear that The O’Mahony did see. He had frowned at the -first adumbration of the idea. He pulled his hand away now, and pushed -the young man from him. - -“No, you don’t!” he cried, angrily. “No, sirree! You can’t make any -such bargain as that with _me!_ Why--I’d ’a’ thought you’d ’a’ known -me better! _Me_, going into a deal, with little Katie to be traded off? -Why, man, you’re a fool!” - -The O’Mahony turned on his heel contemptuously and strode up and down -the room, with indignant sniffs at every step. All at once he stopped -short. - -“Yes,” he said, as if in answer to an argument with himself, “I’ll tell -you to get out of this! You can go and do what you like--just whatever -you may please--but I’m boss here yet, at all events, and I don’t want -anybody around me who could propose that sort of thing. _Me_ make Kate -marry you in order to feather my own nest! There’s the door, young man!” - -Bernard looked obdurately past the outstretched forefinger into the -other’s face. - -“Who said anything about your _making_ her marry me?” he demanded. “And -who talked about a deal? Why, look here, colonel”--the random title -caught the ear of neither speaker nor impatient listener--“look at it -this way: They all love you here in Muirisc; they’re just boiling over -with joy because they’ve got you here. That sort of thing doesn’t happen -so often between landlords and tenants that one can afford to bust it up -when it does occur. And I--well--a man would be a brute to have tried to -come between you and these people. Well, then, it’s just the same with -me and Katie. We love each other--we are glad when we’re together; we’re -unhappy when we’re apart. And so I say in this case as I said in the -other, a mane between you and these people. Well, then, it’s just the -same with me and Katie. We love each other--we are glad when we’re -together; we’re unhappy when we’re apart. And so I say in this case as I -said in the other, a man would be a brute--” - -“Do you mean to tell me--” The O’Mahony broke in, and then was himself -cut short. - -“Yes, I _do_ mean to tell you,” interrupted Bernard; “and, what’s more, -she means to tell you, too, if you put on your hat and walk over to the -convent.” Noting the other’s puzzled glance, he hastened on to explain: -“I rowed over to your sloop, or ship, or whatever you call it, after -I left you this morning, and I brought her and O’Daly back with me on -purpose _to_ tell you.” - -Before The O’Mahony had mastered this confusing piece of information, -much less prepared verbal comment upon it, the door was thrust open; -and, ushered in, as it were, by the sharply resounding clamor of the -crowd outside, the burly figure of Jerry Higgins appeared. - -“For the love o’ God, yer honor,” he exclaimed, in a high fever of -excitement, “come along out to ‘em! Sure they’re that mad to lay eyes -on ye, they’re ’ating each other like starved lobsters in a pot! -Ould Barney Driscoll’s the divil wid the dhrink in him, an’ there he is -ragin’ up an’ down, wid his big brass horn for a weapon, crackin’ skulls -right an’ left; an’ black Clancy’s asleep in his drum--‘t was Sheehan -putt him into it neck an’ crop--an’ ’t is three constables work to -howld the boys from rollin’ him round in it, an--an--” - -“All right, Jerry,” said The O’Mahony; “I’ll come right along.” - -He put on his hat and relighted his cigar, in slow and silent -deliberation. He tarried thereafter for a moment or two with an -irresolute air, looking at the smoke-rings abstractedly as he blew them -into the air. - -Then, with a sudden decision, he walked over and linked Bernard’s arm -in his own. They went out together without a word. In fact, there was no -need for words. - - - - -CHAPTER XXX--A FAREWELL FEAST. - -We enter the crumbling portals of the ancient convent of the O’Mahonys -for a final visit. The reddened sun, with its promise of a kindly -morrow, hangs low in the western heavens and pushes the long shadow of -the gateway onward to the very steps of the building. We have no call -to set the harsh-toned jangling old bell in motion. The door is open and -the hall is swept for guests. - -This hour of waning day marked a unique occurrence in the annals of the -House of the Hostage’s Tears. Its nuns were too aged and infirm to go to -the castle to offer welcome to the newly returned head of the family. So -The O’Mahony came to them instead. He came like the fine old chieftain -of a sept, bringing his train of followers with him. For the first time -within the recollection of man, a long table had been spread in the -reception-hall, and about it were gathered the baker’s dozen of people -we have come to know in Muirisc. Even Mrs. Sullivan, flushed scarlet -from her labor in the ill-appointed convent kitchen, and visibly -disheartened at its meagre results, had her seat at the board beside -Father Jago. But they were saved from the perils of a party of thirteen -because the one-armed Malachy, dour-faced and silent, but secretly -bursting with pride and joy, stood at his old post behind his master’s -chair. - -There had not been much to eat, and the festival stood thus early at the -stage of the steaming kettle and the glasses so piping hot that fingers -shrank from contact, though the spirit beckoned. And there was not one -less than twelve of these scorching tumblers--for in remote Muirisc the -fame of Father Mathew remained a vague and colorless thing like that of -Mahomet or Sir Isaac Newton--and, moreover, was not The O’Mahony come -home? - -“Yes, sir,” The O’Mahony said from his place at the right hand of Mother -Agnes, venturing an experimental thumb against his glass and sharply -withdrawing it, “wherever I went, in France or Spain or among the Turks, -I found there had been a soldier O’Mahony there before me. Why, a French -general told me that right at one time--quite a spell back, I should -judge--there were fourteen O’Mahonys holding commissions in the French -army. Yes, I remember, it was in the time of Louis XIX.” - -“You’re wrong, O’Mahony,” interrupted Kate, with the smile of a spoiled, -favorite child, “’t was nineteen O’Mahonys in the reign of Louis XIV.” - -“Same thing,” he replied, pleasantly. “It’s as broad as it is long. -There the O’Mahony’s were, anyway, and every man of ’em a fighter. It -set me to figuring that before they went away--when they were all cooped -up here together on this little neck of land--things must have been kept -pretty well up to boiling point all the year round.” - -“An’ who was it ever had the power to coop ’em up here?” demanded -Cormac O’Daly, with enthusiasm. “Heaven be their bed! ’T was not in -thim O’Mahonys to endure it! Forth they wint in all directions, wid -bowld raids an’ incursions, b’ating the O’Heas an’ def’ating the Coffeys -wid slaughter, an’ as for the O’Driscolls--huh!--just tearing ’em -up bodily be the roots! Sir, _t_ was a proud day whin an O’Daly first -attached himself to the house of the O’Mahonys--such grand min as -they, were, so magnanimous, so pious, so intelligent, so ferocious an’ -terrifying--sir, me old blood warms at thought of ’em!” - -The caloric in Cormac’s veins impelled him at this juncture to rise to -this feet. He took a sip from his glass, then adjusted his spectacles, -and produced the back of an envelope from his pocket. - -“O’Mahony,” he said, with a voice full of emotion, “I’ve a slight pome -here, just stated down hurriedly that I’ll take the liberty to rade to -the company assimbled. ’T is this way it runs: - - ‘Hark to thim joyous sounds that rise. - - Making the face of Muirisc to be glad! - - ’T is the devil’s job to believe one’s eyes--’” - -“Well, thin, don’t be trying!” brusquely interrupted Mrs. Fergus. As the -poet paused and strove to cow his spouse with a sufficiently indignant -glance, she leaned over the table and addressed him in a stage whisper, -almost audible to the deaf old nuns themselves. - -“Sit down, me man!” she adjured him. “’T is laughing at ye they are! -Sure, doesn’t his honor know how different a chune ye raised while -he was away! ’T is your part to sing small, now, an’ keep the ditch -betwixt you an’ observation.” - -Cormac sat down at once, and submissively put the paper back in his -pocket. It was a humble and wistful glance which he bent through his -spectacles at the chieftain, as that worthy resumed his remarks. - -The O’Mahony did not pretend to have missed the adjuration of Mrs. -Fergus. - -“That started off well enough, O’Daly,” he said; “but you’re getting too -old to have to hustle around and turn out poetry to order, as you used -to. I’ve decided to allow you to retire--to sort of knock off your shoes -and let you run in the pasture. You can move into one of the smaller -houses and just take things easy.” - -“But, sir--me secretarial juties--” put in O’Daly, with quavering voice. - -“There’ll be no manner of trouble about that,” said the O’Mahony, -reassuringly. “My friend, here, Joseph Higgins, of Boston, he will look -out for that. I don’t know that you’re aware of it, but I took a good -deal of interest in him many years ago--before I went away--and I -foresaw a future for him. It hasn’t turned out jest as I expected, but -I’m satisfied, all the same. Before I left, I arranged that he should -pursue his studies during my absence.” A grimly quizzical smile played -around the white corners of his mustache as he added: “I understand that -he jest stuck to them studies night and day--never left ’em once for -so much as to go out and take a walk for the whole twelve years.” - -“Surely, sir,” interposed Father Jago, “that’s most remarkable! I never -heard tell of such studiosity in Maynooth itself!” - -The O’Mahony looked gravely across the table at Jerry, whose broad, -shining face was lobster-red with the exertion of keeping itself -straight. - -“I believe there’s hardly another case on record,” he said. “Well, as -I was remarking, it’s only natural, now, that I should make him my -secretary and bookkeeper. I’ve had a long talk with him about it--and -about other things, too--and I guess there ain’t much doubt about our -getting along together all right.” - -“And is it your honor’s intintion--Will--will he take over my functions -as bard as well?” Cormac ventured to inquire. He added in deprecating -tones: “Sure, they’ve always been considered hereditary.” - -“No; I think we’ll let the bard business slide for the time being,” - answered The O’Mahony. “You see, I’ve been going along now a good many -years without any poet, so I’ve got used to it. There was one fellow out -at Plevna--an English newspaper man--who did compose some verses about -me--he seemed to think they were quite funny--but I shot off one of -his knee-pans, and that sort of put a damper on poetry, so far as I was -concerned. However, we’ll see how your boy turns out. Maybe, if he takes -a shine to that sort of thing--” - -“Then you’re to stay with us?” inquired Mother Agnes. “So grand ye are -wid your decorations an’ your foreign titles--sure, they tell me -you’re Chevalier an’ O’Mahony Bey both at wance--’t will be dull as -ditch-water for you here.” - -“No, I reckon not,” replied The O’Mahony. “I’ve had enough of it. It’s -nigh on to forty years since I first tagged along in the wake of a drum -with a musket on my shoulder. I don’t know why I didn’t come back years -ago. I was too shiftless to make up my mind, I suppose. No, I’m going to -stay here--going to die here--right among these good Muirisc folks, who -are thumping each other to pieces outside on the green. Talk about its -being dull here--why, Mother Agnes, ’t would have done your heart -good to see old Barney Driscoll laying about him with that overgrown, -double-barreled trumpet of his. I haven’t seen anything better since we -butted our heads up against Schipka Pass.” - -“’T will be grand tidings for the people--that same,” interposed Kate, -with happiness in glance and tone. - -The O’Mahony looked tenderly at her. - -“That reminds me,” he said, and then turned to the nuns, lifting his -voice in token that he especially addressed them. “There was some talk, -I understand, about little Katie here--” - -“Little, is it!” laughed the girl. “Sure, to pl’ase you I’d begin -growing again, but that there’d be no house in Muirisc to hold me.” - -“Some talk about big Kate here, then,” pursued the O’Mahony, “going into -the convent. Well, of course, that’s all over with now.” He hesitated -for a moment, and decided to withhold all that cruel information about -episcopal interference. “And I’ve been thinking it over,” he resumed, -“and have come to the conclusion that we’d better not try to bolster up -the convent with new girls from outside. It’s always been kept strictly -inside the family. Now that that can’t be done, it’s better to let it -end with dignity. And that it can’t help doing, because as long as it’s -remembered, men will say that its last nuns were its best nuns.” - -He closed with a little bow to the Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears. Mother -Agnes acknowledged the salutation and the compliment with a silent -inclination of her vailed head. If her heart took grief, she did not say -so. - -“And your new secretary--” put in Cormac, diffidently yet with -persistence, “has he that acquaintance an’ familiarity wid mining -technicalities and conthracts that would fit him to dale wid ’em -satisfactorily?” - -A trace of asperity, under which O’Daly definitely wilted, came into The -O’Mahony’s tone. - -“There is such a thing as being too smart about mining contracts,” he -said with meaning. Then, with a new light in his eyes he went on: “The -luckiest thing that ever happened on this footstool, I take it, has -occurred right here. The young man who sits opposite me is a born -O’Mahony, the only son of the man who, if I hadn’t turned up, would have -had rightful possession of all these estates. You have seen him about -here for some weeks. I understand that you all like him. Indeed, it’s -been described to me that Mrs. Fergus here has quite an affection for -him--motherly, I presume.” - -Mrs. Fergus raised her hand to her hair, and preened her head. - -“An’ not so old, nayther, O’Mahony,” she said, defiantly. “Wasn’t I -married first whin I was a mere shlip of a girl?” - -Sister Ellen looked at Mother Agnes, and lifted up both her hands. The -O’Mahony proceeded, undisturbed: - -“As I’ve said, you all like him. I like him too, for his own sake, -and--and his father’s sake--and--But that can wait for a minute. It’s a -part of the general good luck which has brought him here that he turns -out to be a trained mining engineer--just the sort of a man, of all -others, that Muirisc needs. He tells me that we’ve only scratched the -surface of things roundabout here yet. He promises to get more wealth -for us and for Muirisc out of an acre than we’ve been getting out of a -townland. Malachy, go out and look for old Murphy, and if he can walk, -bring him in here.” - -The O’Mahony composedly busied himself in filling his glass afresh, -the while Malachy was absent on his quest. The others, turning their -attention to the boyish-faced, blushing young man whom the speaker had -eulogized so highly, noted that he sat next, and perhaps unnecessarily -close, to Kate, and that she, also betrayed a suspicious warmth of -countenance. Vague comprehension of what was coming began to stir in -their minds as Malachy reappeared. Behind him came Murphy, who leaned -against the wall by the door, hat in hand, and clung with a piercing, -hawk-like gaze to the lightest movement on the master’s face. - -The O’Mahony rose to his feet, glass in hand. - -“Murphy,” he said, “I gave her to you to look after--to take care -of--the Lady of Muirisc.” - -“You did, sir!” shouted the withered and grimy old water-rat, -straightening himself against the wall. - -“You’ve done it well, sir,” declared The O’Mahony. “I’m obliged to you. -And I wanted you in particular to hear what I’m going to say. Malachy, -get a glass for yourself and give one to Murphy.” - -The one-armed servitor leaned gravely forward and whispered in The -O’Mahony’s ear. - -“I don’t care a button,” the other protested. “You can see him home. -This is as much his funeral as it is anybody else’s on earth. That’s it. -Are you all filled? Now, then, ladies and gentlemen, I am getting along -in years. I am a childless man. You’ve all been telling me how much I’ve -changed these last twelve years. There’s one thing I haven’t changed a -bit in. I used to think that the cutest, cunningest, all-fired loveliest -little girl on earth was Katie here. Well, I think just the same now. -If I was her father, mother, sister, hired girl and dog under the wagon, -all in one, I couldn’t be fonder of her than I am. She was the apple -of my eye then; she is now. I’d always calculated that she should be -my heir. Well, now, there turns up this young man, who is as much an -O’Mahony of the real stock as Kate is. There’s a providence in these -things. They love each other. They will marry. They will live in the -castle, where they’ve promised to give me board and lodging, and when I -am gone, they will come after me. I’m going to have you all get up and -drink the health of my young--nephew--Bernard, and of his bride, our -Kate, here, and--and of the line of O’Mahonys to come.” - -When the clatter of exclamations and clinking glasses had died down, it -was Kate who made response--Kate, with her blushing, smiling face held -proudly up and a glow of joyous affection in her eyes. . - -“If that same line of O’Mahonys to come stretched from here to the top -of Mount Gabriel,” she said, in a clear voice, “there’d not be amongst -thim all the ayqual to _our_ O’Mahony.” - - -THE END. - - - - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Return of The O'Mahony, by Harold Frederic - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY *** - -***** This file should be named 54900-0.txt or 54900-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/4/9/0/54900/ - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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Thus, we do not -necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper -edition. - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search -facility: www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - diff --git a/old/54900-0.zip b/old/54900-0.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 75672ad..0000000 --- a/old/54900-0.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54900-h.zip b/old/54900-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index ed3d5f0..0000000 --- a/old/54900-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/54900-h/54900-h.htm b/old/54900-h/54900-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 8149e93..0000000 --- a/old/54900-h/54900-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,11775 +0,0 @@ -<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> - -<!DOCTYPE html - PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > - -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8" /> - <title>The Return of The O'Mahony, by Harold Frederic</title> - <meta content="pg2html (binary v0.17)" /> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> - - body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} - P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .75em; margin-bottom: .75em; } - H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } - hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} - .foot { margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%; text-align: justify; font-size: 80%; font-style: italic;} - blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} - .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} - .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} - .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} - .xx-small {font-size: 60%;} - .x-small {font-size: 75%;} - .small {font-size: 85%;} - .large {font-size: 115%;} - .x-large {font-size: 130%;} - .indent5 { margin-left: 5%;} - .indent10 { margin-left: 10%;} - .indent15 { margin-left: 15%;} - .indent20 { margin-left: 20%;} - .indent30 { margin-left: 30%;} - .indent40 { margin-left: 40%;} - div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } - div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } - .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} - .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} - .pagenum {position: absolute; right: 1%; font-size: 0.6em; - font-variant: normal; font-style: normal; - text-align: right; background-color: #FFFACD; - border: 1px solid; padding: 0.3em;text-indent: 0em;} - .side { float: left; font-size: 75%; width: 15%; padding-left: 0.8em; - border-left: dashed thin; text-align: left; - text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; - font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} - .head { float: left; font-size: 90%; width: 98%; padding-left: 0.8em; - border-left: dashed thin; text-align: center; - text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; - font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} - p.pfirst, p.noindent {text-indent: 0} - span.dropcap { float: left; margin: 0 0.1em 0 0; line-height: 0.8 } - pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} - -</style> - </head> - <body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Return of The O'Mahony, by Harold Frederic - -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'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: The Return of The O'Mahony - A Novel - -Author: Harold Frederic - -Illustrator: Warren B. Davis - -Release Date: June 13, 2017 [EBook #54900] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY *** - - - - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - - - - - -</pre> - - <div style="height: 8em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h1> - THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY - </h1> - <h3> - <i>A Novel</i> - </h3> - <h2> - By Harold Frederic - </h2> - <h4> - Author Of “The Lawton Girl” “Seth’s Brother’s Wife” Etc. - </h4> - <h2> - With Illustrations By Warren B. Davis. - </h2> - <h4> - New York: G. W. Dillingham Co., Publishers, - </h4> - <h3> - 1892 - </h3> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0001" id="linkimage-0001"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0010.jpg" alt="0010 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0010.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0002" id="linkimage-0002"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0011.jpg" alt="0011 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0011.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - <b>CONTENTS</b> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY</b> </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I.—THE FATHER OF COMPANY F. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II—THE VIDETTE POST. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III—LINSKY’S BRIEF MILITARY CAREER. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV.—THE O’MAHONY ON ERIN’S SOIL. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V.—THE INSTALLATION OF JERRY. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI—THE HEREDITARY BARD. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII—THE O’MAHONY’S HOME-WELCOME. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII—TWO MEN IN A BOAT. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX—THE VOICE OF THE HOSTAGE. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X—HOW THE “HEN HAWK” WAS BROUGHT - IN. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI—A FACE FROM OUT THE - WINDING-SHEET. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII—A TALISMAN AND A TRAITOR </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII—THE RETREAT WITH THE PRISONERS - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV.—THE REINTERMENT OF LINSKY. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER XV—“TAKE ME WITH YOU, O’MAHONY.” - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI—THE LADY OF MUIRISC. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII—HOW THE OLD BOATMAN KEPT HIS - VOW. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII—THE GREAT O’DALY USURPATION. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX—A BARGAIN WITH THE BURIED MAN. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX—NEAR THE SUMMIT OF MT. GABRIEL. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI—ON THE MOUNTAIN-TOP—AND - AFTER. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII—THE INTELLIGENT YOUNG MAN. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER XXIII—THE COUNCIL OF WAR. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV—THE VICTORY OF THE “CATHACH.” - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0025"> CHAPTER XXV—BERNARD’S GOOD CHEER. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0026"> CHAPTER XXVI—THE RESIDENT MAGISTRATE </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0027"> CHAPTER XXVII—THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY. - </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0028"> CHAPTER XXVIII—A MARINE MORNING CALL. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0029"> CHAPTER XXIX—DIAMOND CUT PASTE. </a> - </p> - <p class="toc"> - <a href="#link2HCH0030"> CHAPTER XXX—A FAREWELL FEAST. </a> - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h1> - THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY - </h1> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER I.—THE FATHER OF COMPANY F. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">Z</span>EKE TISDALE was - the father of Company F. Not that this title had ever been formally - conferred upon him, or even recognized in terms, but everybody understood - about it. Sometimes Company F was for whole days together exceedingly - proud of the relation—but alas! more often it viewed its parent with - impatient levity, not to say contempt. In either case, it seemed all the - same to Zeke. - </p> - <p> - He was by no means the oldest man in the company, at least as appearances - went. Some there were gathered about the camp-fire, this last night in - March of ‘65, who looked almost old enough to be <i>his</i> father—gray, - gaunt, stiff-jointed old fighters, whose hard service stretched back - across four years of warfare to Lincoln’s first call for troops, and who - laughed now grimly over the joke that they had come out to suppress the - Rebellion within ninety days, and had the job still unfinished on their - hands at the end of fourteen hundred. - </p> - <p> - But Zeke, though his mud-colored hair and beard bore scarcely a trace of - gray, and neither his placid, unwrinkled face nor his lithe, elastic form - suggested age, somehow produced an impression of seniority upon all his - comrades, young and old alike. He had been in the company from the - beginning, for one thing; but that was not all. It was certain that he had - been out in Utah at the time of Albert Sidney Johnston’s expedition—perhaps - had fought under him. It seemed pretty well established that before this - Mormon episode he had been with Walker in Nicaragua. Over the mellowing - canteen he had given stray hints of even other campaigns which his skill - had illumined and his valor adorned. Nobody ever felt quite sure how much - of this was true—for Zeke had a child’s disregard for any mere - veracity which might mar the immediate effects of his narratives—but - enough passed undoubted to make him the veteran of the company. And <i>that</i> - was not all. - </p> - <p> - For cold-blooded intrepidity in battle, for calm, clear-headed rashness on - the skirmish-line, Zeke had a fame extending beyond even his regiment and - the division to which it belonged. Men in regiments from distant States, - who met with no closer bond than that they all wore the badge of the same - army corps, talked on occasion of the fellow in the —th New York, - who had done this, that or the other dare-devil feat, and yet never got - his shoulder-straps. It was when Company F men heard this talk that they - were most proud of Zeke—proud sometimes even to the point of keeping - silence about his failure to win promotion. - </p> - <p> - But among themselves there was no secret about this failure. Once the - experiment had been made of lifting Zeke to the grade of corporal—and - the less said about its outcome the better. Still, the truth may as well - be told. Brave as any lion, or whatever beast should best typify absolute - fearlessness in the teeth of deadly peril, Zeke in times of even temporary - peace left a deal to be desired. His personal habits, or better, perhaps, - the absence of them, made even the roughest of his fellows unwilling to be - his tent-mate. As they saw him lounging about the idle camp, he was - shiftless, insubordinate, taciturn and unsociable when sober, wearisomely - garrulous when drunk—the last man out of four-score whom the company - liked to think of as its father. - </p> - <p> - And Company F had had nothing to do, now, for a good while. Through the - winter it had lain in its place on the great, steel-clad intrenched line - which waited, jaws open, for the fall of Petersburg. The ready-made - railroad from City Point was at its back, and food was plenty. But now, as - spring came on—the wet, warm Virginian spring, with every meadow a - swamp, every road a morass, every piece of bright-green woodland an - impassable tangle—the strategy of the closing act in the dread drama - sent Company F away to the South and West, into the desolate backwoods - country where no roads existed, and no foraging, be it never so vigilant, - promised food. The movement really reflected Grant’s fear lest, before the - final blow was struck, Lee should retreat into the interior. But Company F - did not know what it meant, and disliked it accordingly, and, by the end - of the third day in its quarters, was both hungry and quarrelsome. - </p> - <p> - Evening fell upon a gloomy, rain-soaked day, which the men had miserably - spent in efforts to avoid getting drenched to the skin, and in devices to - preserve dry spots upon which to sleep at night. Permission to build a - fire, which had been withheld ever since their arrival, had only come from - division headquarters an hour ago; and as they warmed themselves now over - the blaze, biting the savorless hard-tack, and sipping the greasy fluid of - beans and chicory from their tin cups, they still looked sulkily upon the - line of lights which began to dot the ridge on which they lay, and noted - the fact that their division had grown into an army corps, almost as if it - had been a grievance. Distant firing had been heard all day, but it seemed - a part of their evil luck that it <i>should</i> be distant. - </p> - <p> - They stared, too, with a sullen indifference at the spectacle of a - sergeant who entered their camp escorting a half-dozen recruits, and, with - stiff salutation, turned them over to the captain at the door of his tent. - The men of Company F might have studied these bounty-men, as they stood in - file waiting for the company’s clerk to fill out his receipt, with more - interest, had it been realized that they were probably the very last men - to be enrolled by the Republic for the Civil War. But nobody knew that, - and the arrival of recruits was an old story in the —th New York, - which had been thrust into every available hellpit, it seemed to the men, - since that first cruel corner at Bull Run. So they scowled at the - newcomers in their fresh, clean uniforms, as these straggled doubtfully - toward the fire, and gave them no welcome whatever. - </p> - <p> - Hours passed under the black sky, into which the hissing, spluttering fire - of green wood was too despondent to hurl a single spark. The men stood or - squatted about the smoke-ringed pile on rails and fence-boards which they - had laid to save them from the soft mud—in silence broken only by - fitful words. From time to time the monotonous call of the sentries out in - the darkness came to them like the hooting of an owl. Sharp shadows on the - canvas walls of the captain’s tent and the sound of voices from within - told them that the officers were playing poker. Once or twice some moody - suggestion of a “game” fell upon the smoky air outside, but died away - unanswered. It was too wet and muddy and generally depressing. The low - west wind which had risen since nightfall carried the threat of more rain. - </p> - <p> - “Grant ain’t no good, nor any other dry-land general, in this dripping old - swamp of a country,” growled a grizzled corporal, whose mud-laden heels - had slipped off his rail. “The man we want here is Noah. This is his job, - and nobody else’s.” - </p> - <p> - “There’d be one comfort in that, anyway,” said another, well read in the - Bible. “When the rain was all over, he set up drinks.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you make any mistake,” put in a third. “He shut himself up in his - tent, and played his booze solitaire. He didn’t even ask in the officers - of the ark and propose a game.” - </p> - <p> - “I—I ‘ve got a small flask with me,” one of the recruits diffidently - began. “I was able to get it to-day at Dinwiddie Court House. Paid more - for it I suppose, than—” - </p> - <p> - In the friendly excitement created by the recruit’s announcement, and his - production of a flat, brown bottle, further explanation was lost. Nobody - cared how much he had paid. Two dozen of his neighbors took a lively - interest in what he had bought. The flask made its tour of only a segment - of the circle, amid a chorus of admonitions to drink fair, and came back - flatter than ever and wholly empty. But its ameliorating effect became - visible at once. One of the recruits was emboldened to tell a story he had - heard at City Point, and the veterans consented to laugh at it. - Conversation sprang up as the fire began to crackle under a shift of wind, - and the newcomers disclosed that they all had clean blankets, and that - several had an excess of chewing tobacco. At this last, all reserve was - cleared away. Veterans and recruits spat into the fire now from a common - ground of liking, and there was even some rivalry to secure such - thoughtful strangers as tent-mates. - </p> - <p> - Only one of the newcomers stood alone in the muddiest spot of the circle, - before a part of the fire which would not burn. He seemed to have no share - in the confidences of his fellow-recruits. None of their stories or - reminiscences referred to him, and neither they nor any veteran had - offered him a word during the evening. - </p> - <p> - He was obviously an Irishman, and it was equally apparent that he had just - landed. There was an indefinable something in the way he stood, in his - manner of looking at people, in the very awkwardness with which his - ill-fitting uniform hung upon him, which spoke loudly of recent - importation. This in itself would have gone some way toward prejudicing - Company F against him, for Castle Garden recruits were rarely popular, - even in the newest regiments. But there was a much stronger reason for the - cold shoulder turned upon him. - </p> - <p> - This young man who stood alone in the mud—he could hardly have got - half through the twenties—had a repellent, low-browed face, covered - with freckles and an irregular stubble of reddish beard, and a furtive - squint in his pale, greenish-blue eyes. The whites of these eyes showed - bloodshot, even in the false light of the fire, and the swollen lines - about them spoke plainly of a prolonged carouse. They were not Puritans, - these men of Company F, but with one accord they left Andrew Linsky—the - name the roster gave him—to himself. - </p> - <p> - Time came, after the change of guard, when those who were entitled to - sleep must think of bed. The orderly-sergeant strolled up to the fire, and - dropped a saturnine hint to the effect that it would be best to sleep with - one eye open; signs pointed to a battle next day, and the long roll might - come before morning broke. Their brigade was on the right of a line into - which two corps had been dumped during the day, and apparently this - portended the hottest kind of a fight; moreover, it was said Sheridan was - on the other side of the ridge. Everybody knew what that meant. - </p> - <p> - “We ought to be used to hot corners by this time,” said the grizzled - corporal, in comment, “but it’s the deuce to go into ’em on empty - stomachs. We’ve been on half-rations two days.” - </p> - <p> - “There’ll be the more to go round among them that’s left,” said the - sergeant, grimly, and turned on his heel. - </p> - <p> - The Irishman, pulling his feet with difficulty out of the ooze into which - they had settled, suddenly left his place and walked over to the corporal, - lifting his hand in a sidelong, clumsy salute. - </p> - <p> - “Wud ye moind tellin me, sur, where I’m to sleep?” he asked, saluting - again. - </p> - <p> - The corporal looked at his questioner, spat meditatively into the embers, - then looked again, and answered, briefly: - </p> - <p> - “On the ground.” - </p> - <p> - Linsky cast a glance of pained bewilderment, first down at the mud into - which he was again sinking, then across the fire into the black, - wind-swept night. - </p> - <p> - “God forgive me for a fool,” he groaned aloud, “to lave a counthry where - even the pigs have straw to drame on.” - </p> - <p> - “Where did you expect to sleep—in a balloon?” asked the corporal, - with curt sarcasm. Then the look of utter hopelessness on the other’s ugly - face prompted him to add, in a softer tone; “You must hunt up a tent-mate - for yourself—make friends with some fellow who’ll take you in.” - </p> - <p> - “Sorra a wan’ll be friends wid me,” said the despondent recruit. “I’m - waitin’ yet, the furst dacent wurrud from anny of ’em.” - </p> - <p> - The corporal’s face showed that he did not specially blame them for their - exclusiveness, but his words were kindly enough. - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps I can fix you out,” he said, and sent a comprehensive glance - round the group which still huddled over the waning fire, on the other - side. - </p> - <p> - “Hughie, here’s a countryman of yours,” he called out to a lean, tall, - gray-bearded private who, seated on a rail, had taken off his wet boots - and was scraping the mud from them with a bayonet; “can you take him in?” - </p> - <p> - “I have some one already,” the other growled, not even troubling to lift - his eyes from his task. - </p> - <p> - It happened that this was a lie, and that the corporal knew it to be one. - He hesitated for a moment, dallying with the impulse to speak sharply. - Then, reflecting that Hugh O’Mahony was a quarrelsome and unsociable - creature with whom a dispute was always a vexation to the spirit, he - decided to say nothing. - </p> - <p> - How curiously inscrutable a thing is chance! Upon that one decision turned - every human interest in this tale, and most of all, the destiny of the - sulky man who sat scraping his boots. The Wheel of Fortune, in this little - moment of silence, held him poised within the hair’s breadth of a - discovery which would have altered his career in an amazing way, and - changed the story of a dozen lives. But the corporal bit his lip and said - nothing. O’Mahony bent doggedly over his work—and the wheel rolled - on. - </p> - <p> - The corporal’s eye, roaming about the circle, fell upon the figure of a - man who had just approached the fire and stood in the full glare of the - red light, thrusting one foot close to the blaze, while he balanced - himself on the other. His ragged hair and unkempt beard were of the color - of the miry clay at his feet. His shoulders, rounded at best, were - unnaturally drawn forward by the exertion of keeping his hands in his - pockets, the while he maintained his balance. His face, of which snub nose - and grey eyes alone were visible in the frame of straggling hair and under - the shadow of the battered foragecap visor, wore a pleased, almost merry, - look in the flickering, ruddy light. He was humming a droning sort of tune - to himself as he watched the steam rise from the wet leather. - </p> - <p> - “Zeke’s happy to-night; that means fight tomorrow, sure as God made little - fishes,” said the corporal to nobody in particular. Then he lifted his - voice: - </p> - <p> - “Have you got a place in your diggin’s for a recruit, Zeke—say just - for to-night?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - Zeke looked up, and sauntered forward to where they stood, hands still in - pockets. - </p> - <p> - “Well—I don’t know,” he drawled. “Guess so—if he don’t snore - too bad.” - </p> - <p> - He glanced Linsky over with indolent gravity. It was plain that he didn’t - think much of him. - </p> - <p> - “Got a blanket?” he asked, abruptly. - </p> - <p> - “I have that,” the Irishman replied. - </p> - <p> - “Anything to drink?” - </p> - <p> - Linsky produced from his jacket pocket a flat, brown bottle, twin brother - to that which had been passed about the camp-fire circle earlier in the - evening, and held it up to the light. - </p> - <p> - “They called it whiskey,” he said, in apology; “an’ be the price I paid - fur it, it moight a’ been doimonds dissolved in angel’s tears; but the - furst sup I tuk of it, faith, I thought it ’ud tear th’ t’roat from - me!” - </p> - <p> - Zeke had already linked Linsky’s arm within his own, and he reached forth - now and took the bottle. - </p> - <p> - “It’s p’zen to a man that ain’t used to it,” he said, with a grave wink to - the corporal. “Come along with me, Irish; mebbe if you watch me close you - can pick up points about gittin’ the stuff down without injurin’ your - throat.” - </p> - <p> - And, with another wink, Zeke led his new-found friend away from the fire, - picking his steps through the soft mud, past dozens of little tents - propped up with rails and boughs, walking unconsciously toward a strange, - new, dazzling future. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER II—THE VIDETTE POST. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">Z</span>eke’s tent—a - low and lop-sided patchwork of old blankets, strips of wagon-covering and - stray pieces of cast-off clothing—was pitched on the high ground - nearest to the regimental sentry line. At its back one could discern, by - the dim light of the camp-fires, the lowering shadows of a forest. To the - west a broad open slope descended gradually, its perspective marked to the - vision this night by red points of light, diminishing in size as they - receded toward the opposite hill’s dead wall of blackness. Upon the crown - of this wall, nearly two miles distant, Zeke’s sharp eyes now discovered - still other lights which had not been visible before. - </p> - <p> - “Caught sight of any Rebs yet since you been here, Irish?” he asked, as - the two stood halted before his tent. - </p> - <p> - “I saw some prisoners at what they call City Point, th’ day before - yesterday—the most starved and miserable divils ever I laid eyes on. - That’s what I thought thin, but I know betther now. Sure they were princes - compared wid me this noight.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, it’s dollars to doughnuts them are their lights over yonder on the - ridge,” said Zeke. - </p> - <p> - “You’ll see enough of ’em to-morrow to last a lifetime.” - </p> - <p> - Linksy looked with interest upon the row of dim sparks which now crowned - the whole long crest. He had brought his blanket, knapsack and rifle from - the stacks outside company headquarters, and stood holding them as he - gazed. - </p> - <p> - “Faith,” he said at last, “if they’re no more desirous of seeing me than I - am thim, there’s been a dale of throuble wasted in coming so far for both - of us.” - </p> - <p> - Zeke, for answer, chuckled audibly, and the sound of this was succeeded by - a low, soft gurgling noise, as he lifted the flask to his mouth and threw - back his head. Then, after a satisfied “A-h!” he said: - </p> - <p> - “Well, we’d better be turning in now,” and kicked aside the door-flap of - his tent. - </p> - <p> - “And is it here we’re to sleep?” asked Linsky, making out with difficulty - the outlines of the little hut-like tent. - </p> - <p> - “I guess there won’t be much sleep about it, but this is our shebang. Wait - a minute.” He disappeared momentarily within the tent, entering it on - all-fours, and emerged with an armful of sticks and paper. “Now you can - dump your things inside there. I’ll have a fire out here in the jerk of a - lamb’s tail.” - </p> - <p> - The Irishman crawled in in turn, and presently, by the light of the blaze - his companion had started outside, was able to spread out his blanket in - some sort, and even to roll himself up in it, without tumbling the whole - edifice down. There was a scant scattering of straw upon which to lie, but - underneath this he could feel the chill of the damp earth. He managed to - drag his knapsack under his head to serve as a pillow, and then, - shivering, resigned himself to fate. - </p> - <p> - The fire at his feet burned so briskly that soon he began to be pleasantly - conscious of its warmth stealing through the soles of his thick, wet - soles. - </p> - <p> - “I’m thinkin’ I’ll take off me boots,” he called out. “Me feet are just - perished wid the cold.” - </p> - <p> - “No. You couldn’t get ’em on again, p’r’aps, when we’re called, and - I don’t want any such foolishness as that. When we get out, it’ll have to - be at the drop of the hat—double quick. How many rounds of - cartridges you got?” - </p> - <p> - “This bag of mine they gave me is that filled wid ’em the weight of - it would tip an outside car.” - </p> - <p> - “Can you shoot?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know if I can. I haven’t tried that same yet.” - </p> - <p> - A long silence ensued, Zeke squatting on a cracker-box beside the fire, - flask in hand, Linsky concentrating his attention upon the warmth at the - soles of his feet, and drowsily mixing up the Galtee Mountains with the - fire-crowned hills of a strange, new world, upon one of which he lay. Then - all at once he was conscious that Zeke had crept into the tent, and was - lying curled close beside him, and that the fire outside had sunk to a - mass of sparkless embers. He half rose from his recumbent posture before - these things displaced his dreams; then, as he sank back again, and closed - his eyes to settle once more into sleep, Zeke spoke: - </p> - <p> - “Don’t do that again! You got to lie still here, or you’ll bust the hull - combination. If you want to turn over, tell me, and we’ll flop together—otherwise - you’ll have the thing down on our heads.” There came another pause, and - Linsky almost believed himself to be asleep again. But Zeke was wakeful. - </p> - <p> - “Say, Irish,” he began, “that country of yourn must be a pretty tough - place, if this kind of thing strikes you fellows as an improvement on it.” - </p> - <p> - “Sur,” said Linsky, with sleepy dignity, “ther’s no other counthry on - earth fit to buckle Ireland’s shoe’s—no offence to you.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, you always give us that; but if it’s so fine a place, why in ——— - don’t you stay there? What do you all pile over here for?” - </p> - <p> - “I came to America on business,” replied Linsky, stiffly. - </p> - <p> - “Business of luggin’ bricks up a ladder!” - </p> - <p> - “Sur, I’m a solicitor’s clark.” - </p> - <p> - “How do you mean—‘Clark?’ Thought your name was Linsky?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s what you call ‘clurk’—a lawyer’s clurk—and I’ll be a - lawyer mesilf, in toime.” - </p> - <p> - “That’s worse still. There’s seven hundred times as many lawyers here - already as anybody wants.” - </p> - <p> - “I had no intintion of stoppin’. My business was to foind a certain man, - the heir to a great estate in Ireland, and thin to returrun; but I didn’t - foind my man—and—sure, it’s plain enough I didn’t returrun, - ayether; and I’ll go to sleep now, I’m thinkin’.” Zeke paid no attention - to the hint. - </p> - <p> - “Go on,” he said. “Why didn’t you go back, Irish?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s aisy enough,” Linsky replied, with a sigh. “Tin long weeks was I - scurryin’ from wan ind of the land to the other, lukkin’ for this - invisible divil of a Hugh O’Mahony”—Zeke stretched out his feet here - with a sudden movement, unnoted by the other—“makin’ inquiries here, - foindin’ traces there, gettin’ laughed at somewhere else, till me heart - was broke entoirely. ‘He’s in the army,’ says they. ‘Whereabouts?’ says I. - Here, there, everwhere they sint me on a fool’s errand. Plintv of places I - came upon where he had been, but divil a wan where he was; and thin I gave - it up and wint to New York to sail, and there I made some fri’nds, and - wint out wid ’em and they spoke fair, and I drank wid ’em, - and, faith, whin I woke I was a soldier, wid brass buttons on me and a - gun; and that’s the truth of it—worse luck! And <i>now</i> I’ll - sleep!” - </p> - <p> - “And this Hugh What-d’ye-call-him—the fellow you was huntin’ after—where - did he live before the war?” - </p> - <p> - “’Twas up in New York State—a place they call Tecumsy—he’d - been a shoemaker there for years. I have here among me papers all they - know about him and his family there. It wan’t much, but it makes his - identity plain, and that’s the great thing.” - </p> - <p> - “And what d’ye reckon has become of him?” - </p> - <p> - “If ye ask me in me capacity as solicitor’s clark, I’d say that, for - purposes of law, he’d be aloive till midsummer day next, and thin doy be - process of statutory neglict, and niver know it as long as he lives; but - if you ask me proivate opinion, he’s as dead as a mackerel; and, if he - isn’t, he will be in good toime, and divil a ha’porth of shoe-leather will - I waste more on him. And now good-noight to ye, sur!” - </p> - <p> - Linsky fell to snoring before any reply came. Zeke had meant to tell him - that they were to rise at three and set out upon a venturesome - vidette-post expedition together. He wondered now what it was that had - prompted him to select this raw and undrilled Irishman as his comrade in - the enterprise which lay before him. Without finding an answer, his mind - wandered drowsily to another question—Ought O’Mahony to be told of - the search for him or not? That vindictive and sullen Hughie should be - heir to anything seemed an injustice to all good fellows; but heir to what - Linsky called a great estate!—that was ridiculous! What would an - ignorant cobbler like him do with an estate? - </p> - <p> - Zeke was not quite clear in his mind as to what an “estate” was, but - obviously it must be something much too good for O’Mahony. And why, sure - enough! Only a fortnight before, while they were still at Fort Davis, this - O’Mahony had refused to mend his boot for him, even though his - frost-bitten toes had pushed their way to the daylight between the sole - and upper. Zeke could feel the toes ache perceptibly as he thought on this - affront. Sleepy as he was, it grew apparent to him that O’Mahony would - probably never hear of that inheritance; and then he went off bodily into - dream-land, and was the heir himself, and violently resisted O’Mahony’s - attempts to dispossess him, and—and then it was three o’clock, and - the sentry was rolling him to and fro on the ground with his foot to wake - him. - </p> - <p> - “Sh-h! Keep as still as you can,” Zeke admonished the bewildered Linsky, - when he, too, had been roused to consciousness. “We mustn’t stir up the - camp.” - </p> - <p> - “Is it desertin’ ye are?” asked the Irishman, rubbing his eyes and sitting - upright. - </p> - <p> - “Sh-h! you fool—no! Feel around for your gun and knapsack and cap, - and bring ’em out,” whispered Zeke from the door of the tent. - </p> - <p> - Linsky obeyed mechanically, groping in the utter darkness for what seemed - to him an age, and then crawling awkwardly forth. As he rose to his feet, - he could hardly distinguish his companion standing beside him. Only faint, - dusky pillars of smoke, reddish at the base, gray above, rising like - slenderest palms to fade in the obscurity overhead, showed where the fires - in camp had been. The clouded sky was black as ink. - </p> - <p> - “Fill your pockets with cartridges,” he heard Zeke whisper. “We’ll prob’ly - have to scoot for our lives. We don’t want no extra load of knapsacks.” - </p> - <p> - It strained Linsky’s other perceptions even more than it did his sight to - follow his comrade in the tramp which now began. He stumbled over roots - and bushes, sank knee-deep in swampy holes, ran full tilt into trees and - fences, until it seemed to him they must have traveled miles, and he could - hardly drag one foot after the other. The first shadowy glimmer of dawn - fell upon them after they had accomplished a short but difficult descent - from the ridge and stood at its foot, on the edge of a tiny, alder-fringed - brook. The Irishman sat down on a fallen log for a minute to rest; the - while Zeke, as fresh and cool as the morning itself, glanced critically - about him. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, here we are,” he said as last. “We can strike through here, get up - the side hill, and sneak across by the hedge into the house afore it’s - square daylight. Come on, and no noise now!” - </p> - <p> - Linsky took up his gun and followed once more in the other’s footsteps as - well as might be. The growing light from the dull-gray east made it a - simpler matter now to get along, but he still stumbled so often that Zeke - cast warning looks backward upon him more than once. At last they reached - the top of the low hill which had confronted them. - </p> - <p> - It was near enough to daylight for Linsky to see, at the distance of an - eighth of a mile, a small, red farm-house, flanked by a larger barn. A - tolerably straight line of thick hedge ran from close by where they stood, - to within a stone’s throw of the house. All else was open pasture and - meadow land. - </p> - <p> - “Now bend your back,” said Zeke. “We’ve got to crawl along up this side of - the fence till we git opposite that house, and then, somehow or other, - work across to it without bein’ seen.” - </p> - <p> - “Who is it that would see us?” - </p> - <p> - “Why, you blamed fool, them woods there”—pointing to a long strip of - undergrowth woodland beyond the house—“are as thick with Johnnies as - a dog is with fleas.” - </p> - <p> - “Thin that house is no place for any dacent man to be in,” said Linsky; - but despite this conviction he crouched down close behind Zeke and - followed him in the stealthy advance along the hedge. It was back-breaking - work, but Linsky had stalked partridges behind the ditch-walls of his - native land, and was able to keep up with his guide without losing breath. - </p> - <p> - “Faith, it’s loike walking down burrds,” he whispered ahead; “only that - it’s two-legged partridges we’re after this toime.” - </p> - <p> - “How many legs have they got in Ireland?” Zeke muttered back over his - shoulder. - </p> - <p> - “Arrah, it’s milking-stools I had in moind,” returned Linsky, readily, - with a smile. - </p> - <p> - “Sh-h! Don’t talk. We’re close now.” - </p> - <p> - Sure enough, the low roof and the top of the big square chimney of stone - built outside the red clapboard end of the farmhouse were visible near at - hand, across the hedge. Zeke bade Linsky sit down, and opening the big - blade of a huge jackknife, began to cut a hole through the thorns. Before - this aperture had grown large enough to permit the passage of a man’s - body, full daylight came. It was not a very brilliant affair, this full - daylight, for the morning was overcast and gloomy, and the woods beyond - the house, distant some two hundred yards, were half lost in mist. But - there was light enough for Linsky, idly peering through the bushes, to - discern a grey-coated sentry pacing slowly along the edge of the woodland. - He nudged Zeke, and indicated the discovery by a gesture. - </p> - <p> - Zeke nodded, after barely lifting his eyes, and then pursued his - whittling. - </p> - <p> - “I saw him when we first come,” he said, calmly. - </p> - <p> - “And is it through this hole we’re goin’ out to be kilt?” - </p> - <p> - “You ask too many questions, Irish,” responded Zeke. He had finished his - work and put away the knife. He rolled over now to a half-recumbent - posture, folded his hands under his head, and asked: - </p> - <p> - “How much bounty did you git?” - </p> - <p> - “Is it me? Faith, I was merely a disbursing agent in the thransaction. - They gave me a roll of paper notes, they said, but divil a wan could I - foind when I come to mesilf and found mesilf a soldier. It’s thim new - fri’nds o’ moine that got the bounty.” - </p> - <p> - “So you didn’t enlist to git the money?” - </p> - <p> - “Sorra a word did I know about enlistin’, or bounty, or anything else, for - four-and-twenty hours afther the mischief was done. Is it money that ’ud - recompinse a man for sittin’ here in the mud, waitin’ to be blown to bits - by a whole plantation full of soldiers, as I am here, God help me? Is it - money you say? Faith, I’ve enough to take me back to Cork twice over. What - more do I want? And I offered the half of it to the captain, or gineral, - or whatever he was, to lave me go, when I found what I’d done; but he - wouldn’t hearken to me.” - </p> - <p> - Zeke rolled over to take a glance through the hedge. - </p> - <p> - “Tell me some more about that fellow you were tryin’ to find,” he said, - with his gaze fixed on the distant sentry. “What’ll happen now that you - haven’t found him?” - </p> - <p> - “If he remains unknown until midsummer-day next, the estate goes to some - distant cousins who live convanient to it.” - </p> - <p> - “And he can’t touch it after that, s’posin’ he should turn up?” - </p> - <p> - “The law of adverse possession is twinty years, and only five of ’em - have passed. No; he’d have a claim these fifteen years yet. But rest aisy. - He’ll never be heard of.” - </p> - <p> - “And you wrote and told ’em in Ireland that he couldn’t be found?” - </p> - <p> - “That I did—or—Wait now! What I wrote was that he was in the - army, and I was afther searching for him there. Sure, whin I got to New - York, what with the fri’nds and the drink and—and this foine - soldiering of moine, I niver wrote at all. It’s God’s mercy I didn’t lose - me papers on top of it all, or it would be if I was likely ever to git out - of this aloive.” - </p> - <p> - Zeke lay silent and motionless for a time, watching the prospect through - this hole in the hedge. - </p> - <p> - “Hungry, Irish?” he asked at last, with laconic abruptness. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve a twist on me like the County Kerry in a famine year.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, then, double yourself up and follow me when I give the word. I’ll - bet there’s something to eat in that house. Give me your gun. We’ll put - them through first. That’s it. Now, then, when that fellow’s on t’other - side of the house. <i>Now!</i>” - </p> - <p> - With lizard-like swiftness, Zeke made his way through the aperture, and, - bending almost double, darted across the wet sward toward the house. - </p> - <p> - Linsky followed him, doubting not that the adventure led to certain death, - but hoping that there would be breakfast first. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER III—LINSKY’S BRIEF MILITARY CAREER. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">Z</span>eke, though - gliding over the slippery ground with all the speed at his command, had - kept a watch on the further corner of the house. He straightened himself - now against the angle of the projecting, weather-beaten chimney, and drew - a long breath. - </p> - <p> - “He didn’t see us,” he whispered reassuringly to Linsky, who had also - drawn up as flatly as possible against the side of the house. - </p> - <p> - “Glory be to God!” the recruit ejaculated. - </p> - <p> - After a brief breathing spell, Zeke ventured out a few feet, and looked - the house over. There was a single window on his side, opening upon the - ground floor. Beckoning to Linsky to follow, lie stole over to the window, - and standing his gun against the clapboards, cautiously tested the sash. - It moved, and Zeke with infinite pains lifted it to the top, and stuck his - knife in to hold it up. Then, with a bound, he raised himself on his arms, - and crawled in over the sill. - </p> - <p> - It was at this moment, as Linsky for the first time stood alone, that a - clamorous outburst of artillery-fire made the earth quiver under his feet. - The crash of noises reverberated with so many echoes from hill to hill - that he had no notion whence they had proceeded, or from what distance. - The whole broad vailey before him, with its sodden meadows and wet, - mist-wrapped forests showed no sign of life or motion. But from the crest - of the ridge which they had quitted before daybreak there rose now, and - whitened the gray of the overhanging clouds, a faint film of smoke—while - suddenly the air above him was filled with a strange confusion of - unfamiliar sounds, like nothing so much as the hoarse screams of a flock - of giant wild-fowl; and then this affrighting babel ceased as swiftly as - it had arisen, and he heard the thud and swish of splintered tree-tops and - trunks falling in the woodland at the back of the house. The Irishman - reasoned it out that they were firing from the hill he had left, over at - the hill upon which he now stood, and was not comforted by the discovery. - </p> - <p> - While he stared at the ascending smoke and listened to the din of the - cannonade, he felt himself sharply poked on the shoulder, and started - nervously, turning swiftly, gun in hand. It was Zeke, who stood at the - window, and had playfully attracted his attention with one of the long - sides of bacon which the army knew as “sow-bellies.” He had secured two of - these, which he now handed out to Linsky; then came a ham and a bag of - meal; and lastly, a twelve-quart pan of sorghum molasses. When the - Irishman had lifted down the last of these spoils, Zeke vaulted lightly - out. - </p> - <p> - “Guess we’ll have a whack at the ham,” he said cheerfully. “It’s good - raw.” - </p> - <p> - The two gnawed greedily at the smoked slices cut from the thick of the - ham, as became men who had been on short rations. Zeke listened to the - firing, and was visibly interested in noting all that was to be seen and - guessed of its effects and purpose, meanwhile, but the ham was an - effectual bar to conversation. - </p> - <p> - Suddenly the men paused, their mouths full, their senses alert. The sound - of voices rose distinctly, and close by, from the other side of the house. - Zeke took up his gun, cocked it, and crept noiselessly forward to the - corner. After a moment’s attentive listening here, and one swift, cautious - peep, he tiptoed back again. - </p> - <p> - “Take half the things,” he whispered, pointing to the provisions, “and - we’ll get back again to the fence. There’s too many of ’em for us - to try and hold the house. They’d burn us alive in there!” - </p> - <p> - The pan of sorghum fell to Linsky’s care, and Zeke, with both guns and all - the rest in some mysterious manner bestowed about him, made his way, - crouching and with long strides, toward the hedge. He got through the hole - undiscovered, dragging his burden after him. Then he took the pan over the - hedge, while Linsky should in turn crawl through. But the burlier Irishman - caught in the thorns, slipped, and clutched Zeke’s arm, with the result - that the whole contents of the pan were emptied upon Linsky’s head. - </p> - <p> - Then Zeke did an unwise thing. He cast a single glance at the spectacle - his comrade presented—with the thick, dark molasses covering his cap - like an oilskin, soaking into his hair, and streaming down his bewildered - face in streaks like an Indian’s war-paint—and then burst forth in a - resounding peal of laughter. - </p> - <p> - On the instant two men in gray, with battered slouch hats and guns, - appeared at the corner of the house, looking eagerly up and down the hedge - for some sign of a hostile presence. Zeke had dropped to his knees in time - to prevent discovery. It seemed to be with a part of the same swift - movement that he lifted his gun, sighted it as it ran through the thorns, - and fired. While the smoke still curled among the branches and spiked - twigs, he had snatched up Linsky’s gun and fire a second shot. The two men - in gray lay sprawling and clutching at the wet grass, one on top of the - other. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0003" id="linkimage-0003"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0039.jpg" alt="0039 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0039.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - “Quick, Irish! We must make a break!” Zeke hissed at Linsky. “Grab what - you can and run!” - </p> - <p> - Linsky, his eyes and mouth full of molasses, and understanding nothing at - all of what had happened, found himself a moment later careering blindly - and in hot haste down the open slope, the ham and the bag of meal under - one arm, his gun in the other hand. A dozen minie-bullets sang through the - damp air about him as he tore along after Zeke, and he heard vague volleys - of cheering arise from the meadow to his right; but neither stopped his - course. - </p> - <p> - It was barely three minutes—though to Linsky, at least, it seemed an - interminable while—before the two came to a halt by a clump of trees - on the edge of the ravine. In the shelter of these broad hemlock trunks - they stood still, panting for breath. Then Zeke looked at Linsky again, - and roared with laughter till he choked and went into a fit of coughing. - </p> - <p> - The Irishman had thrown down his provisions and gun, and seated himself on - the roots of his tree. He ruefully combed the sticky fluid from his hair - and stubble beard with his fingers now, and strove to clean his face on - his sleeve. Between the native temptation to join in the other’s merriment - and the strain of the last few minutes’ deadly peril, he could only blink - at Zeke, and gasp for breath. - </p> - <p> - “Tight squeak—eh, Irish?” said Zeke at last, between dying-away - chuckles. - </p> - <p> - “And tell me, now,” Linsky began, still panting heavily, his besmeared - face red with the heat of the chase, “fwat the divil were we doin’ up - there, anny-way? No Linsky or Lynch—’tis the same name—was - ever called coward yet—but goin’ out and defoyin’ whole armies - single-handed is no fit worrk for solicitors’ clarks. Spacheless and - sinseless though I was with the dhrink, sure, if they told me I was to - putt down the Rebellion be meself, I’d a’ had the wit to decloine.” - </p> - <p> - “That was a vidette post we were on,” explained Zeke. - </p> - <p> - “There’s a shorter name for it—God save us both from goin’ there. - But fwat was the intintion? ’Tis that that bothers me entoirely.” - </p> - <p> - “Look there!” was Zeke’s response. He waved his hand comprehensively over - the field they had just quitted, and the Irishman rose to his feet and - stepped aside from his tree to see. - </p> - <p> - The little red farm-house was half hidden in a vail of smoke. Dim shadows - of men could be seen flitting about its sides, and from these shadows shot - forth tongues of momentary flame. The upper end of the meadow was covered - thick with smoke, and through this were visible dark masses of men and the - same spark-like flashing of fiery streaks. Along the line of the hedge, - closer to the house, still another wall of smoke arose, and Linsky could - discern a fringe of blue-coated men lying flat under the cover of the - thorn-bushes, whom he guessed to be sharp-shooters. - </p> - <p> - “That’s what we went up there for—to start that thing a-goin’,” said - Zeke, not without pride. “See the guide—that little flag there by - the bushes? That’s our regiment. They was comin’ up as we skedaddled out. - Didn’t yeh hear ’em cheer? They was cheerin’ for us, Irish—that - is, some for us and a good deal for the sow-bellies and ham.” - </p> - <p> - No answer came, and Zeke stood for a moment longer, taking in with his - practiced gaze the details of the fight that was raging before him. - Half-spent bullets were singing all about him, but he seemed to give them - no more thought than in his old Adirondack home he had wasted on - mosquitoes. The din and deafening rattle of this musketry war had kindled - a sparkle in his gray eyes. - </p> - <p> - “There they go, Irish! Gad! we’ve got ’em on the run! We kin scoot - across now and jine our men.” - </p> - <p> - Still no answer. Zeke turned, and, to his amazement, saw no Linsky at his - side. Puzzled, he looked vaguely about among the trees for an instant. - Then his wandering glance fell, and the gleam of battle died out of his - eyes as he saw the Irishman lying prone at his very feet, his face flat in - the wet moss and rotting leaves, an arm and leg bent under the prostrate - body. So wrapt had Zeke’s senses been in the noisy struggle outside, he - had not heard his comrade’s fall. - </p> - <p> - The veteran knelt, and gently turned Linsky over on his back. A wandering - ball had struck him in the throat. The lips were already colorless, and - from their corners a thin line of bright blood had oozed to mingle - grotesquely with the molasses on the unshaven jaw. To Zeke’s skilled - glance it was apparent that the man was mortally wounded—perhaps - already dead, for no trace of pulse or heartbeat could be found. He softly - closed the Irishman’s eyes, and put the sorghum-stained cap over his face. - </p> - <p> - Zeke rose and looked forth again upon the scene of battle. His regiment - had crossed the fence and gained possession of the farm-house, from which - they were firing into the woods beyond. Further to the left, through the - mist of smoke which hung upon the meadow, he could see that large masses - of troops in blue were being pushed forward. He thought he would go and - join his company. He would tell the fellows how well Linsky had behaved. - Perhaps, after the fight was all over, he would lick Hugh O’Mahony for - having spoken so churlishly to him. - </p> - <p> - He turned at this and looked down again upon the insensible Linsky. - </p> - <p> - “Well, Irish, you had sand in your gizzard, anyway,” he said, aloud. “I’ll - whale the head off ’m O’Mahony, jest on your account.” - </p> - <p> - Then, musing upon some new ideas which these words seem to have suggested, - he knelt once more, and, unbuttoning Linsky’s jacket, felt through his - pockets. - </p> - <p> - He drew forth a leather wallet and a long linen-lined envelope containing - many papers. The wallet had in it a comfortable looking roll of green, - backs, but Zeke’s attention was bestowed rather upon the papers. - </p> - <p> - “So these would give O’Mahony an estate, eh?” he pondered, half aloud, - turning them over. “It ’ud be a tolerable good bet that he never - lays eyes on ’em. We’ll fix that right now, for fear of accidents.” - </p> - <p> - He began to kick about in the leaves, as he rose a second time, thinking - hard upon the problem of what to do with the papers. He had no matches. He - might cut down a cartridge, and get a fire by percussion—but that - would take time. So, for that matter, would digging a hole to bury the - papers. - </p> - <p> - All at once his abstracted face lost its lines of labor, and brightened - radiantly. He thrust wallet and envelope into his own pocket, and - smilingly stepped forward once more to see what the field of battle was - like. The farm-house had become the headquarters of a general and his - staff, and the noise of fighting had passed away to the furthest confines - of the woods. - </p> - <p> - “This darned old campaign won’t last up’ard of another week,” he said, in - satisfied reverie. “I reckon I’ve done my share in it, and somethin’ to - lap over on the next. Nobody ’ll be a cent the wuss off if I turn - up missin’ now.” - </p> - <p> - Gathering up the provisions and his gun, Zeke turned abruptly, and made - his way down the steep side-hill into the forest, each long stride bearing - him further from Company F’s headquarters. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER IV.—THE O’MAHONY ON ERIN’S SOIL. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>t became known - among the passengers on the <i>Moldavian</i>, an hour or so before bedtime - on Sunday evening, April 23, 1865, that the lights to be seen in the - larboard distance were really on the Irish coast. The intelligence ran - swiftly through all quarters of the vessel. Its truth could not be - doubted; the man on the bridge said that it truly was Ireland; and if he - had not said so, the ship’s barber had. - </p> - <p> - Excitement over the news reached its highest point in the steerage, - two-thirds of the inmates of which hung now lovingly upon the port rail of - the forward deck, to gaze with eager eyes at the far-off points of - radiance glowing through the soft northern spring night. - </p> - <p> - Farther down the rail, from the obscurity of the jostling throng, a stout - male voice sent up the opening bars of the dear familiar song, “The Cove - of Cork.” The ballad trembled upon the air as it progressed, then broke - into something like sobs, and ceased. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, Barney,” a sympathetic voice cried out, “’tis no longer the - Cove; ’tis Queenstown they’re after calling it now. Small wandher - the song won’t listen to itself be sung!” - </p> - <p> - “But they haven’t taken the Cove away—God bless it!” the other - rejoined, bitterly. “’Tis there, beyant the lights, waitin’ for its - honest name to come back to it when—when things are set right once - more.” - </p> - <p> - “Is it the Cove you think you see yonder?” queried another, captiously. - “Thim’s the Fastnet and Cape Clear lights. We’re fifty miles and more from - Cork.” - </p> - <p> - “Thin if ’twas daylight,” croaked an old man between coughs, “we’d - be in sight of The O’Mahony’s castles, or what bloody Cromwell left of - them.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s mad ye are, Martin,” remonstrated a female voice. “The’re laygues - beyant on Dunmanus Bay. Wasn’t I born mesilf at Durrus?” - </p> - <p> - “The O’Mahony of Murrisk is on board,” whispered some one else, “returnin’ - to his estates. I had it this day from the cook’s helper. The quantity of - mate that same O’Mahony’s been ’atin’! An’ dhrink, is it? Faith, - there’s no English nobleman could touch him!” - </p> - <p> - On the saloon deck, aft, the interest excited by these distant lights was - less volubly eager, but it had sufficed to break up the card-games in the - smoking-room, and even to tempt some malingering passengers from the - cabins below. Such talk as passed among the group lounging along the rail, - here in the politer quarter, bore, for the most part, upon the record of - the <i>Moldavian</i> on this and past voyages, as contrasted with the - achievements of other steamships. No one confessed to reverential - sensations in looking at the lights, and no one lamented the change of - name which sixteen years before, had befallen the Cove of Cork; but there - was the liveliest speculation upon the probabilities of the <i>Bahama</i>, - which had sailed from New York the same day, having beaten them into the - south harbor of Cape Clear, where, in those exciting war times, before the - cable was laid, every ocean steamer halted long enough to hurl overboard - its rubber-encased budget of American news, to be scuffled for in the - swell by the rival oarsmen of the cape, and borne by the successful boat - to the island, where relays of telegraph clerks then waited day and night - to serve Europe with tidings of the republic’s fight for life. - </p> - <p> - This concentration of thought upon steamer runs and records, to the - exclusion of interest in mere Europe, has descended like a mantle upon the - first-cabin passengers of our own later generation. But the voyagers in - the <i>Moldavian</i> had a peculiar warrant for their concern. They had - left America on Saturday, April 15, bearing with them the terrible news of - Lincoln’s assassination in Ford’s Theatre, the previous evening, and it - meant life-long distinction—in one’s own eyes at least—to be - the first to deliver these tidings to an astounded Old World. Eight days’ - musing on this chance of greatness had brought them to a point where they - were prepared to learn with equanimity that the rival <i>Bahama</i> had - struck a rock outside, somewhere. One of their number, a little Jew - diamond merchant, now made himself quite popular by relating his personal - recollections of the calamity which befel her sister ship, the <i>Anglia</i>, - eighteen months ago, when she ran upon Blackrock in Galway harbor. - </p> - <p> - One of these first-cabin passengers, standing for a time irresolutely upon - the outskirts of this gossiping group, turned abruptly when the - under-sized Hebrew addressed a part of his narrative to him, and walked - off alone into the shadows of the stern. He went to the very end, and - leaned over the taff-rail, looking down upon the boiling, phosphorescent - foam of the vessel’s wake. He did not care a button about being able to - tell Europe of the murder of Lincoln and Seward—for when they left - the secretary was supposed, also, to have been mortally wounded. His - anxieties were of a wholly different sort. - </p> - <p> - He, The O’Mahony of Muirisc, was plainly but warmly clad, with a new, - shaggy black overcoat buttoned to the chin, and a black slouch hat drawn - over his eyes. His face was clean shaven, and remarkably free from lines - of care and age about the mouth and nostrils, though the eyes were set in - wrinkles. The upper part of the face was darker and more weather-beaten, - too, than the lower, from which a shrewd observer might have guessed that - until very recently he had always worn a beard. - </p> - <p> - There were half a dozen shrewd observers on board the <i>Moldavian</i> - among its cabin passengers—men of obvious Irish nationality, whose - manner with one another had a certain effect of furtiveness, and who were - described on the ship’s list by distinctively English names, like Potter, - Cooper and Smith; and they had watched the O’Mahony of Muirisc very - closely during the whole voyage, but none of them had had doubts about the - beard, much less about the man’s identity. In truth, they looked from day - to day for him to give some sign, be it never so slight, that his errand - to Ireland was a political one. They were all Fenians—among the - advance guard of that host of Irishmen who returned from exile at the - close of the American War—and they took it for granted that the - solitary and silent O’Mahony was a member of the Brotherhood. The more - taciturn he grew, the more he held aloof, the firmer became their - conviction that his rank in the society was exalted and his mission - important. The very fact that he would not be drawn into conversation and - avoided their company was proof conclusive. They left him alone, but - watched him with lynx-like scrutiny. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony had been conscious of this ceaseless observation, and he - mused upon it now as he watched the white whirl of churned waters below. - The time was close at hand when he should know whether it had meant - anything or not; there was comfort in that, at all events. He was less a - coward than any other man he knew, but, all the same, this unending - espionage had worn upon his nerve. Doubtless, that was in part because - sea-voyaging was a novelty to him. He had not been ill for a moment. In - fact, he could not remember to have ever eaten and drunk more in any eight - days of his life. If it had not been for the confounded watchfulness of - the Irishmen, he would have enjoyed the whole experience immensely. But it - was evident that they were all in collusion—“in cahoots,” he phrased - it in his mind—and had a common interest in noting all his - movements. What could it mean? Strange as it may seem, The O’Mahony had - never so much as heard of the Fenian Brotherhood. - </p> - <p> - He rose from his lounging meditation presently, and sauntered forward - again along the port deck. The lights from the coast were growing more - distinct in the distance, and, as he paused to look, he fancied he could - discern a dark line of shore below them. - </p> - <p> - “I suppose your ancistral estates are lyin’ further west, sir,” spoke a - voice at his side. The O’Mahony cast a swift half-glance around, and - recognized one of the suspected spies. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, a good deal west,” he growled, curtly. - </p> - <p> - The other took no offense. - </p> - <p> - “Sure,” he went on, pleasantly, “the O’Mahonys and the O’Driscolls, not to - mintion the McCarthys, chased each other around that counthry yonder at - such a divil of a pace it’s hard tellin’ now which belonged to who.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, we did hustle round considerable,” assented The O’Mahony, with - frigidity. - </p> - <p> - “You’re manny years away from Ireland, sir?” pursued the man. - </p> - <p> - “Why?” - </p> - <p> - “I notice you say ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ It takes a long absence to tache an - Irishman that.” - </p> - <p> - “I’ve been away nearly all my life,” said The O’Mahony, sharply—“ever - since I was a little boy and turning on his heel, he walked to the - companionway and disappeared down the stairs. - </p> - <p> - “Faith, I’m bettin’ it’s the gineral himself!” said the other, looking - after him. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - To have one’s waking vision greeted, on a soft, warm April morning, by the - sight of the Head of Kinsale in the sunlight—with the dark rocks - capped in tenderest verdure and washed below by milkwhite breakers; with - the smooth water mirroring the blue of the sky upon its bosom, yet - revealing as well the marbled greens of its own crystalline depths; with - the balmy scents of fresh blossoms meeting and mingling in the languorous - air of the Gulf Stream’s bringing—can there be a fairer finish to - any voyage over the waters of the whole terrestrial ball! - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony had been up on deck before any of his fellow-passengers, - scanning the novel details of the scene before him. The vessel barely kept - itself in motion through the calm waters. The soft land breeze just - availed to turn the black column of smoke rising from the funnel into a - sort of carboniferous leaning tower. The pilot had been taken on the - previous evening. They waited now for the tug, which could be seen passing - Roche’s Point with a prodigious spluttering and splashing of side-paddles. - Before its arrival, the <i>Moldavian</i> lay at rest within full view of - the wonderful harbor—her deck thronged with passengers dressed now - in fine shore apparel and bearing bags and rugs, who bade each other - good-bye with an enthusiasm which nobody believed in, and edged along as - near as possible where the gang-plank would be. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony walked alone down the plank, rebuffing the porters who sought - to relieve him of his heavy bags. He stood alone at the prow of the tug, - as it waddled and puffed on its rolling way back again, watching the - superb amphitheatre of terraced stone houses, walls, groves and gardens - toward which he had voyaged these nine long days, with an anxious, almost - gloomy face. The Fenians, still closely observing him, grew nervous with - fear that this depression forboded a discovery of contra-brand arms in his - baggage. - </p> - <p> - But no scandal arose. The custom officers searched fruitlessly through the - long platforms covered with luggage, with a half perfunctory and wholly - whimsical air, as if they knew perfectly well that the revolvers they - pretended to be looking for were really in the pockets of the passengers. - Then other good-byes, distinctly less enthusiastic, were exchanged, and - the last bonds of comradeship which life on the <i>Moldavian</i> had - enforced snapped lightly as the gates were opened. - </p> - <p> - Everybody else seemed to know where to go. The O’Mahony stood for so long - a time just outside the gates, with his two big valises at his feet and - helpless hesitation written all over his face, that even some of the swarm - of beggars surrounding him could not wait any longer, and went away giving - him up. To the importunities of the others, who buzzed about him like - blue-bottles on a sunny window-pane, he paid no heed; but he finally - beckoned to the driver of the solitary remaining outside car, who had been - flicking his broker, whip invitingly at him, and who now turned his - vehicle abruptly round and drove it, with wild shouts of factitious - warning, straight through the group of mendicants, overbearing their loud - cries of remonstrance with his superior voice, and cracking his whip like - mad. He drew up in front of the bags with the air of a lord mayor’s - coachman, and took off his shapeless hat in salutation. - </p> - <p> - “I want to go to the law office of White & Carmody,” The O’Mahony - said, brusquely. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0004" id="linkimage-0004"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0055.jpg" alt="0055 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0055.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - “Right, your honor,” the carman answered, dismounting and lifting the - luggage to the well of the car, and then officiously helping his patron to - mount to his sidelong seat. He sprang up on the other side, screamed “Now - thin, Maggie!” to his poor old horse, flipped his whip derisively at the - beggars, and started off at a little dog-trot, clucking loudly as he went. - </p> - <p> - He drove through all the long ascending streets of Queenstown at this - shambling pace, traversing each time the whole length of the town, until - finally they gained the terraced pleasure-road at the top. Here the driver - drew rein, and waved his whip to indicate the splendid scope of the view - below—the gray roof of the houses embowered in trees, the river’s - crowded shipping, the castellated shore opposite, the broad, island-dotted - harbor beyond. - </p> - <p> - “L’uk there, now!” he said, proudly. “Have yez annything like that in - Ameriky?” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony cast only an indifferent glance upon the prospect, - </p> - <p> - “Yes—but where’s White & Carmody’s office?” he asked. “That’s - what I want.” - </p> - <p> - “Right, your honor,” was the reply; and with renewed clucking and cracking - of the dismantled whip, the journey was resumed. That is to say, they - wound their way back again down the hill, through all the streets, until - at last the car stopped in front of the Queen’s Hotel. - </p> - <p> - “Is it thrue what they tell me, sir, that the Prisidint is murdhered?” the - jarvey asked, as they came to a halt. - </p> - <p> - “Yes—but where the devil is that law-office?” - </p> - <p> - “Sure, your honor, there’s no such names here at all,” the carman replied, - pleasantly. “Here’s the hotel where gintleman stop, an’ I’ve shown ye the - view from the top, an’ it’s plased I am ye had such a clear day for it—and - wud ye like to see Smith-Barry’s place, after lunch?” - </p> - <p> - The stranger turned round on his seat to the better comment upon this - amazing impudence, beginning a question harsh of purpose and profane in - form. - </p> - <p> - Then the spectacle of the ragged driver’s placidly amiable face and - roguish eye; of the funny old horse, like nothing so much in all the world - as an ancient hair-trunk with legs at the corners, yet which was driven - with the noise and ostentation of a six-horse team; of the harness tied up - with ropes; the tumble-down car; the broken whip; the beggars—all - this, by a happy chance, suddenly struck The O’Mahony in a humorous light. - Even as his angered words were on the air he smiled in spite of himself. - It was a gaunt, reluctant smile, the merest curling of the lips at their - corners; but it sufficed in a twinkling to surround him with beaming - faces. He laughed aloud at this, and on the instant driver and beggars - were convulsed with merriment. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony jumped off the car. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll run into the hotel and find out where I want to go,” he said. “Wait - here.” - </p> - <p> - Two minutes passed. - </p> - <p> - “These lawyers live in Cork,” he explained on his return. “It seems this - is only Queenstown. I want you to go to Cork with me.” - </p> - <p> - “Right, your honor,” said the driver, snapping his whip in preparation. - </p> - <p> - “But I don’t want to drive; it’s too much like a funeral. We ain’t - a-buryin’ anybody.” - </p> - <p> - “Is it Maggie your honor manes? Sure, there’s no finer quality of a mare - in County Cork, if she only gets dacent encouragement.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes; but we ain’t got time to encourage her. Go and put her out, and - hustle back here as quick as you can. I’ll pay you a good day’s wages. - Hurry, now; we’ll go by train.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony distributed small silver among the beggars the while he - waited in front of the hotel. - </p> - <p> - “That laugh was worth a hundred dollars to me,” he said, more to himself - than to the beggars. “I hain’t laughed before since Linsky spilt the - molasses over his head.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER V.—THE INSTALLATION OF JERRY. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he visit to White - & Carmody’s law-office had weighed heavily upon the mind of The - O’Mahony during the whole voyage across the Atlantic, and it still was the - burden of his thoughts as he sat beside Jerry Higgins—this he - learned to be the car-driver’s name—in the train which rushed up the - side of the Lea toward Cork. The first-class compartment to which Jerry - had led the way was crowded with people who had arrived by the <i>Moldavian</i>, - and who scowled at their late fellow-passenger for having imposed upon - them the unsavory presence of the carman. The O’Mahony was too deeply - occupied with his own business to observe this. Jerry smiled blandly into - the hostile faces, and hummed a “come-all-ye” to himself. - </p> - <p> - When, an hour or so after their arrival, The O’Mahony emerged from the - lawyers’ office the waiting Jerry scarcely knew him for the same man. The - black felt hat, which had been pulled down over his brows, rested with - easy confidence now well back on his head; his gray eyes twinkled with a - pleasant light; the long face had lost its drawn lines and saturnine - expression, and reflected content instead. - </p> - <p> - “Come along somewhere where we can get a drink,” he said to Jerry; but - stopped before they had taken a dozen steps, attracted by the sign and - street-show of a second-hand clothing shop. “Or no,” he said, “come in - here first, and I’ll kind o’ spruce you up a bit so’t you can pass muster - in society.” - </p> - <p> - When they came upon the street again, it was Jerry who was even more - strikingly metamorphosed. The captious eye of one whose soul is in clothes - might have discerned that the garments he now wore had not been originally - designed for Jerry. The sleeves of the coat were a trifle long; the legs - of the trousers just a suspicion short. But the smile with which he - surveyed the passing reflections of his improved image in the shop-windows - was all his own. He strode along jauntily, carrying the heavy bags as if - they had been mere featherweight parcels. - </p> - <p> - The two made their way to a small tavern near the quays, which Jerry knew - of, and where The O’Mahony ordered a room, with a fire in it, and a - comfortable meal to be laid therein at once. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, it’s not becomin’ that I should ate along wid your honor,” Jerry - remonstrated, when they had been left alone in the dingy little chamber, - overlooking the street and the docks beyond. - </p> - <p> - At this protest The O’Mahony lifted his brows in unaffected surprise. - </p> - <p> - “What’s the matter with <i>you?</i>” he asked, half-derisively; and no - more was said on the subject. - </p> - <p> - No more was said on any subject, for that matter, until fish had succeeded - soup, and the waiter was making ready for a third course. Then the founder - of the feast said to this menial: - </p> - <p> - “See here, you, don’t play this on me! Jest tote in whatever more you’ve - got, an’ put er down, an’ git out. We don’t want you bobbin’ in here every - second minute, all the afternoon.” - </p> - <p> - The waiter, with an aggrieved air, brought in presently a tray loaded with - dishes, which he plumped down all over The O’Mahony’s half of the table. - </p> - <p> - “That’s somethin’ like it,” said that gentleman, approvingly; “you’ll get - the hang of your business in time, young man,” as the servant left the - room. Then he heaped up Jerry’s plate and his own, ruminated over a - mouthful or two, with his eyes searching the other’s face—and began - to speak. - </p> - <p> - “Do you know what made me take a shine to you?” he asked, and then made - answer: “’Twas on account of your dodrotted infernal cheek. It made - me laugh—an’ I’d got so it seemed as if I wasn’t never goin’ to - laugh any more. That’s why I cottoned to you—an’ got a notion you - was jest the kind o’ fellow I wanted. D’ye know who I am?” - </p> - <p> - Jerry’s quizzical eyes studied his companion’s face in turn, first - doubtingly, then with an air of reassurance. - </p> - <p> - “I do not, your honor,” he said at last, visibly restraining the impulse - to say a great deal more. - </p> - <p> - “I’m the O’Mahony of Murrisk, an’ I’m returnin’ to my estates.” - </p> - <p> - Jerry did prolonged but successful battle once more with his sense of - humor and loquacious instincts. - </p> - <p> - “All right, your honor,” he said, with humility. - </p> - <p> - “Maybe I don’t look like an Irishman or talk like one,” the other went on, - “but that’s because I was taken to America when I was a little shaver, - knee-high to a grasshopper, an’ my folks didn’t keep up no connection with - Irishmen. That’s how I lost my grip on the hull Ireland business, don’t - you see?” - </p> - <p> - “Sure, your honor, it’s as clear as Spike Island in the sunshine.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, that’s how it was. And now my relations over here have died off—that - is, all that stood in front of me—and so the estates come to me, and - I’m The O’Mahony.” - </p> - <p> - “An’ it’s proud ivery mother’s son of your tin-ints ‘ll be at that same, - your honor.” - </p> - <p> - “At first, of course, I didn’t know but the lawyers ’ud make a kick - when I turned up and claimed the thing. Generally you have to go to law, - an’ take your oath, an’ fight everybody. But, pshaw! why they jest - swallered me slick’n clean, as if I’d had my ears pinned back an’ be’n - greased all over. Never asked ‘ah,’ ‘yes,’ or ‘no.’ Didn’t raise a single - question. I guess there ain’t no White in the business now. I didn’t see - him or hear anything about him. But Carmody’s a reg’lar old brick. They - wasn’t nothin’ too good for me after he learnt who I was. But what fetched - him most was that I’d seen Abe Lincoln, close to, dozens o’ times. He was - crazy to know all about him, an’ the assassination, an’ what I thought ’ud - be the next move; so’t we hardly talked about The O’Mahony business at - all. An’ it seems ther’s been a lot o’ shenanigan about it, too. The - fellow that came out to America to—to find me—Linsky his name - was—why, darn my buttons, if he hadn’t run away from Cork, an’ stole - my papers along with a lot of others, countin’ on peddlin’ ’em over - there an’ collarin’ the money.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, the thief of the earth!” said Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “Well, he got killed there, in about the last battle there was in the war; - an’ ’twas by the finding of the papers on him that—that I - came by my rights.” - </p> - <p> - “Glory be to God!” commented Jerry, as he buried his jowl afresh in the - tankard of stout. - </p> - <p> - A term of silence ensued, during which what remained of the food was - disposed of. Then The O’Mahony spoke again: - </p> - <p> - “Are you a man of family?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, your honor, I’ve never rightly, come by the truth of it, but there - are thim that says I’m descinded from the O’Higginses of Westmeath. I’d - not venture to take me Bible oath on it, but—” - </p> - <p> - “No, I don’t mean that. Have you got a wife an’ children?” - </p> - <p> - “Is it me, your honor? Arrah, what girl that wasn’t blind an’ crippled an’ - deminted wid fits wud take up wid the likes of me?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, what is your job down at Queenstown like? Can you leave it right - off, not to go back any more?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s no job at all. Sure, I jist take out Mikey Doolan’s car, wid that - thund’rin’ old Maggie, givin’ warnin’ to fall to pieces on the road in - front of me, for friendship—to exercise ’em like. It’s not - till every other horse and ass in Queenstown’s ingaged that anny mortial - sow ’ll ride on my car. An’ whin I gets a fare, why, I do be after - that long waitin’ that—” - </p> - <p> - “That you drive ’em up on top of the hill whether they want to go - or not, eh?” asked The O’Mahony, with a grin. - </p> - <p> - Jerry took the liberty of winking at his patron in response. - </p> - <p> - “Egor! that’s the way of it, your honor,” he said, pleasantly. - </p> - <p> - “So you don’t have to go back there at all?” pursued the other. - </p> - <p> - “Divila rayson have I for ever settin’ fut in the Cove ag’in, if your - honor has work for me elsewhere.” - </p> - <p> - “I guess I can fix that,” said The O’Mahony, speaking more slowly, and - studying his man as he spoke. “You see, I ain’t got a man in this hull - Ireland that I can call a friend. I don’t know nothin’ about your ways, no - more’n a babe unborn. It took me jest about two minutes, after I got out - through the Custom House, to figger out that I was goin’ to need some one - to sort o’ steer me—and need him powerful bad, too. Why, I can’t - even reckon in your blamed money, over here. You call a shillin’ what we’d - call two shillin’s, an’ there ain’t no such thing as a dollar. Now, I’m - goin’ out to my estates, where I don’t know a livin’ soul, an’ prob’ly - they’d jest rob me out o’ my eye-teeth, if I hadn’t got some one to look - after me—some one that knew his way around. D’ye see?” - </p> - <p> - The car-driver’s eyes sparkled, but he shook his curly red head with - doubt, upon reflection. - </p> - <p> - “You’ve been fair wid me, sir,” he said, after a pause, “an’ I’ll not be - behind you in honesty. You don’t know me at all. What the divil, man!—why, - I might be the most rebellious rogue in all County Cork.” He scratched his - head with added dubiety, as he went on; “An’, for the matter of that, - faith, if you did know me, it’s some one else you’d take. There’s no one - in the Cove that ’ud give me a character.” - </p> - <p> - “You’re right,” observed The O’Mahony. “I don’t know you from a side o’ - soleleather. But that’s my style. I like a fellow, or I don’t like him, - and I do it on my own hook, follerin’ my own notions, and just to suit - myself. I’ve been siz’in’ you up, all around, an’ I like the cut o’ your - gib. You might be washed up a trifle more, p’r’aps, and have your hair - cropped; but them’s details. The main point is, that I believe you’ll act - fair and square with me, an see to it that I git a straight deal!” - </p> - <p> - “Sir, I’ll go to the end of the earth for you,” said Jerry. He rose, and - by an instinctive movement, the two men shook hands across the table. - </p> - <p> - “That’s right,” said The O’Mahony, referring more to the clasping of hands - than to the vow of fealty. “That’s the way I want ’er to stand. - Don’t call me ‘yer honor,’ or any o’ that sort o’ palaver. I’ve been a - poor man all my life. I ain’t used to bossin’ niggers around, or playin’ - off that I’m better’n other folks. Now that I’m returnin’ to my estates, - prob’ly I’ll have to stomach more or less of that sort o’ nonsense. That’s - one of the things I’ll want you to steer me in.” - </p> - <p> - “An’ might I be askin’, where are these estates, sir?” - </p> - <p> - “So far’s I can make out, they’re near where we come in sight of Ireland - first; it can’t be very far from here. They’re on the seashore—I - know that much. We go to Dunmanway, wherever that is, by the railroad - to-morrow, and there the lawyers have telegraphed to have the agent meet - us. From there on, we’ve got to stage it. The place itself is Murrisk, - beyond Skull—nice, comfortable, soothin’ sort o’ names you Irish - have for your towns, eh?” - </p> - <p> - “And what time’ll we be startin’ to-morrow?” - </p> - <p> - “The train leaves at noon—that is, for Dunmanway.” - </p> - <p> - “Thank God for that,” said Jerry, with a sigh of relief. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony turned upon him with such an obviously questioning glance - that he made haste to explain: - </p> - <p> - “I’ll be bound your honor hasn’t been to mass since—since ye were - like that grasshopper ye spoke about.” - </p> - <p> - “Mass—no—how d’ye mean? What is it?” - </p> - <p> - “Luk at that, now!” exclaimed Jerry, triumphantly. “See what ’d ’a’ - come to ye if ye’d gone to your estates without knowing the first word of - your Christian obligations! We’ll rise early to-morrow, and I’ll get ye - through all the masses there are in Cork, betune thin an’ midday.” - </p> - <p> - “Gad! I’d clean forgotten that,” said The O’Mahony. “An’ now let’s git out - an’ see the town.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER VI—THE HEREDITARY BARD. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>wo hours and more - of the afternoon were spent before The O’Mahony and his new companion next - day reached Dunmanway. - </p> - <p> - The morning had been devoted, for the most part, to church-going, and The - O’Mahony’s mind was still confused with a bewildering jumble of candles, - bells and embroidered gowns; of boys in frocks swinging little kettles of - smoke by long chains; of books printed on one side in English and on the - other in an unknown tongue; of strange necessities for standing, kneeling, - sitting all together, at different times, for no apparent reason which he - could discover, and at no word of command whatever. He meditated upon it - all now, as the slow train bumped its wandering way into the west, as upon - some novel kind of drill, which it was obviously going to take him a long - time to master. He had his moments of despondency at the prospect, until - he reflected that if the poorest, least intelligent, hod-carrying Irishman - alive knew it all, he ought surely to be able to learn it. This hopeful - view gaining predominance at last in his thoughts, he had leisure to look - out of the window. - </p> - <p> - The country through which they passed was for a long distance fairly - level, with broad stretches of fair grass-fields and strips of ploughed - land, the soil of which seemed richness, itself. The O’Mahony noted this, - but was still more interested in the fact that stone was the only building - material anywhere in sight. The few large houses, the multitude of cabins, - the high fences surrounding residences, the low fences limiting farm - lands, even the very gateposts—all were of gray stone, and all as - identical in color and aspect as if Ireland contained but a single quarry. - </p> - <p> - The stone had come to be a very prominent feature in the natural landscape - as well, before their journey by rail ended—a cold, wild, - hard-featured landscape, with scant brown grass barely masking the black - of the bog lands, and dying of! at the fringes of gaunt layers of rock - which thrust their heads everywhere upon the vision. The O’Mahony observed - with curiosity that as the land grew poorer, the population, housed all in - wretched hovels, seemed to increase, and the burning fire-yellow of the - furze blossoms all about made lurid mockery of the absence of crops. - </p> - <p> - Dunmanway was then the terminus of the line, which has since been pushed - onward to Bantry. The two travellers got out here and stood almost alone - on the stone platform with their luggage. They were, indeed, the only - first-class passengers in the train. - </p> - <p> - As they glanced about them, they were approached by a diminutive man, past - middle age, dressed in a costume which The O’Mahony had seen once or twice - on the stage, but never before in every-day life. He was a clean-shaven, - swarthy-faced little man, lean as a withered bean-pod, and clad in a - long-tailed coat with brass buttons, a long waist-coat, drab corduroy - knee-breeches and gray worsted stockings. On his head he wore a high silk - hat of antique pattern, dulled and rusty with extreme age. He took this - off as he advanced, and looked from one to the other of the twain - doubtingly. - </p> - <p> - “Is it The O’Mahony of Muirisc that I have the honor to see before me?” he - asked, his little ferret eyes dividing their glances in hesitation between - the two. - </p> - <p> - “I’m your huckleberry,” said The O’Mahony, and held out his hand. - </p> - <p> - The small man bent his shriveled form double in salutation, and took the - proffered hand with ceremonious formality. - </p> - <p> - “Sir, you’re kindly welcome back to your ancesthral domain,” he said, with - an emotional quaver in his thin, high voice. “All your people are waitin’ - with anxiety and pleasure for the sight of your face.” - </p> - <p> - “I hope they’ve got us somethin’ to eat,” said The O’Mahony. “We had - breakfast at daybreak this morning, so’s to work the churches, and I’m—” - </p> - <p> - “His honor,” hastily interposed Jerry, “is that pious he can’t sleep of a - mornin’ for pinin’ to hear mass.” - </p> - <p> - The little man’s dark face softened at the information. He guessed Jerry’s - status by it, as well, and nodded at him while he bowed once more before - The O’Mahony. - </p> - <p> - “I took the liberty to order some slight refresh-mints at the hotel, sir, - against your coming,” he said. “If you’ll do me the condescinsion to - follow me, I will conduct you thither without delay.” - </p> - <p> - They followed their guide, as he, bearing himself very proudly and - swinging his shoulders in rhythm with his gait, picked his way across the - square, through the mud of the pig-market, and down a narrow street of - ancient, evil-smelling rookeries, to the chief tavern of the town—a - cramped and dismal little hostelry, with unwashed children playing with a - dog in the doorway, and a shock-headed stable-boy standing over them to do - with low bows the honors of the house. - </p> - <p> - The room into which they were shown, though no whit cleaner than the rest, - had a comfortable fire upon the grate, and a plentiful meal, of cold meat - and steaming potatoes boiled in their jackets, laid on the table. Jerry - put down the bags here, and disappeared before The O’Mahony could speak. - The O’Mahony promptly sent the waiter after him, and upon his return spoke - with some sharpness: - </p> - <p> - “Jerry, don’t give me any more of this,” he said. “You can chore it - around, and make yourself useful to me, as you’ve always done; but you git - your meals with me, d’ ye hear? Right alongside of me, every time.” - </p> - <p> - Thus the table was laid for three, and the O’Mahony made his companions - acquainted with each other. - </p> - <p> - “This is Jerry Higgins,” he explained to the wondering, swart-visaged - little man. “He’s sort o’ chief cook and bottle-washer to the - establishment, but he’s so bashful afore strangers, I have to talk sharp - to him now an’ then. And let’s see—I don’t think the lawyer told me - your name.” - </p> - <p> - “I am Cormac O’Daly,” said the other, bowing with proud humility. “An - O’Mahony has had an O’Daly to chronicle his deeds of valor and daring, to - sing his praises of person and prowess, since ages before Kian fought at - Clontarf and married the daughter of the great Brian Boru. Oppression and - poverty, sir, have diminished the position of the bard in most parts of - Ireland, I’m informed. All the O’Dalys that informer times were bards to - The O’Neill in Ulster, The O’Reilly of Brefny, The MacCarthy in Desmond - and The O’Farrell of Annaly—faith, they’ve disappeared from the face - of the earth. But in Muirisc—glory be to the Lord!—. there’s - still an O’Daly to welcome the O’Mahony back and sing the celebration of - his achievements.” - </p> - <p> - “Sort o’ song-and-dance man, then, eh?” said The O’Mahony. “Well, after - dinner we’ll push the table back an’ give you a show. But let’s eat - first.” - </p> - <p> - The little man for the moment turned upon the speaker a glance of - surprise, which seemed to have in it the elements of pain. Then he spoke, - as if reassured: - </p> - <p> - “Ah, sir, in America, where I’m told the Irish are once more a rich and - powerful people, our ancient nobility would have their bards, with rale - harps and voices for singing. But in this poor country it’s only a - mettyphorical existence a bard can have. Whin I spoke the word ‘song,’ my - intintion was allegorical. Sure, ’tis drivin’ you from the house - I’d be after doing, were I to sing in the ginuine maning of the word. But - I have here some small verses which I composed this day, while I was - waitin’ in the pig-market, that you might not be indisposed to listen to, - and to accept.” - </p> - <p> - O’Daly drew from his waistcoat pocket a sheet of soiled and crumpled paper - forthwith, on which some lines had been scrawled in pencil. Smoothing this - out upon the table, he donned a pair of big, hornrimmed spectacles, and - proceeded to decipher and slowly read out the following, the while the - others ate and, marveling much, listened: - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <h3> - I. - </h3> - <p class="indent10"> - “What do the gulls scream as they wheel - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - Along Dunmanus’ broken shore? - </p> - <p class="indent10"> - What do the west winds, keening shrill, - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - Call to each othir for evermore? - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - From Muirisc’s reeds, from Goleen’s weeds, - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - From Gabriel’s summit, Skull’s low lawn, - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - The echoes answer, through their tears, - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - ‘O’Mahony’s gone! O’Mahony’s gone!’ - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <h3> - II. - </h3> - <p class="indent10"> - “But now the sunburst brightens all, - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - The clouds are lifted, waters gleam, - </p> - <p class="indent10"> - Long pain forgotten, glad tears fall, - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - At waking from this evil dream. - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - The cawing rooks, the singing brooks, - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - The zephyr’s sighs, the bee’s soft hum, - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - All tell the tale of our delight— - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - O’Mahony’s come! O’Mahony’s come! - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <h3> - III. - </h3> - <p class="indent10"> - “O’Mahony of the white-foamed coast, - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - Of Kinalmeaky’s nut-brown plains, - </p> - <p class="indent10"> - Lord of Rosbrin, proud Raithlean’s boast, - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - Who over the waves and the sea-mist reigns. - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - Let Clancy quake! O’Driscoll shake! - </p> - <p class="indent30"> - The O’Casey hide his head in fear! - </p> - <p class="indent15"> - While Saxons flee across the sea— - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - O’Mahony’s here! O’Mahony’s here!” - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <p> - The bard finished his reading with a trembling voice, and looked at his - auditors earnestly through moistened eyes. The excitement had brought a - dim flush of color upon his leathery cheeks where the blue-black line of - close shaving ended. - </p> - <p> - “It’s to be sung to the chune of ‘The West’s Awake!’” he said at last, - with diffidence. - </p> - <p> - “You did that all with your own jack-knife, eh?” remarked the The - O’Mahony, nodding in approbation. “Well, sir, it’s darned good!” - </p> - <p> - “Then you’re plased with it, sir?” asked the poet. - </p> - <p> - “‘Pleased!’ Why, man, if I’d known they felt that way about it, I’d have - come years ago. ‘Pleased?’ Why it’s downright po’try.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, that it is, sir,” put in Jerry, sympathetically. “And to think of it - that he did it all in the pig-market whiles he waited for us! Egor! ’twould - take me the best part of a week to conthrive as much!” - </p> - <p> - O’Daly glanced at him with severity. - </p> - <p> - “Maybe more yet,” he said, tersely, and resumed his long-interrupted meal. - </p> - <p> - “And you’re goin’ to be around all the while, eh, ready to turn these - poems out on short notice?” the O’Mahony asked. - </p> - <p> - “Sir, an O’Daly’s poor talents are day and night at the command of the - O’Mahony of Muirisc,” the bard replied. Then, scanning Jerry, he put a - question: - </p> - <p> - “Is Mr. Higgins long with you, sir?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes; a long while,” answered The O’Mahony, without a moment’s - hesitation. “Yes—I wouldn’t know how to get along without him—he’s - been one of the family so long, now.” - </p> - <p> - The near-sighted poet failed to observe the wink which was exchanged - across the table. - </p> - <p> - “The name Higgins,” he remarked, “is properly MacEgan. It is a very - honorable name. They were hereditary Brehons or judges, in both Desmond - and Ormond, and, later, in Connaught, too. The name is also called - O’Higgins and O’Hagan. If you would permit me to suggest, sir,” he went - on, “it would be betther at Muirisc if Mr. Higgins were to resume his - ancestral appellation, and consint to be known as MacEgan. The children - there are that well grounded in Irish history, the name would secure for - him additional respect in their eyes. And moreover, sir, saving Mr. - Higgins’s feelings, I observed that you called him ‘Jerry.’ Now ‘Jerry’ is - appropriate when among intimate friends or relations, or bechune master - and man—and its more ceremonious form, Jeremiah, is greatly used in - the less educated parts of this country. But, sir, Jeremiah is, strictly - speaking, no name for an Irishman at all, but only the cognomen of a - Hebrew bard who followed the Israelites into captivity, like Owen Ward did - the O’Neils into exile. It’s a base and vulgar invintion of the Saxons—this - new Irish Jeremiah—for why? because their thick tongues could not - pronounce the beautiful old Irish name Diarmid or Dermot. Manny poor - people for want of understanding, forgets this now. But in Muirisc the - laste intelligent child knows betther. Therefore, I would suggest that - when we arrive at your ancesthral abode, sir, Mr. Higgins’s name be given - as Diarmid MacEgan.” - </p> - <p> - “An’ a foine bould name it is, too!” said Jerry. “Egor! if I’m called - that, and called rigular to me males as well, I’ll put whole inches to my - stature.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, O’Daly,” said The O’Mahony, “you just run that part of the show to - suit yourself. If you hear of anything that wants changin’ any time, or - whittlin’ down or bein’ spelt different, you can interfere right then an’ - there without sayin’ anything to me. What I want is to have things done - correct, even if we’re out o’ pocket by it. You’re the agent of the - estate, ain’t you?” - </p> - <p> - “I am that, sir; and likewise the postmaster, the physician, the - precepthor, the tax-collector, the clerk of the parish, the poor law - guardian and the attorney; not to mintion the proud hereditary post to - which I’ve already adverted, that of bard and historian to The O’Mahony. - But, sir, I see that your family carriage is at the dure. We’ll be - startin’ now, if it’s your pleazure. It’s a long journey we’ve before us.” - </p> - <p> - When the bill had been called for and paid by O’Daly, and they had reached - the street, The O’Mahony surveyed with a lively interest the strange - vehicle drawn up at the curb before him. In principle it was like the - outside cars he had yesterday seen for the first time, but much lower, - narrower and longer. The seats upon which occupants were expected to place - themselves back to back, were close together, and cushioned only with worn - old pieces of cow-skin. Between the shafts was a shaggy and unkempt little - beast, which was engaged in showing its teeth viciously at the children - and the dog. The whole equipage looked a century old at the least. - </p> - <p> - At the end of four hours the rough-coated pony was still scurrying along - the stony road at a rattling pace. It had galloped up the hills and raced - down into the valleys with no break of speed from the beginning. The - O’Mahony, grown accustomed now to maintaining his seat, thought he had - never seen such a horse before, and said so to O’Daly, who sat beside him, - Jerry and the bag being disposed on the opposite side, and the driver, a - silent, round-shouldered, undersized young man sitting in front with his - feet on the shafts. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, sir, our bastes are like our people hereabouts,” replied the bard—“not - much to look at, but with hearts of goold. They’ll run till they fall. - But, sir—halt, now, Malachy!—yonder you can see Muirisc.” - </p> - <p> - The jaunting-car stopped. The April twilight was gathering in the clear - sky above them, and shadows were rising from the brown bases of the - mountains to their right. The whole journey had been through a bleak and - desolate moor and bog land, broken here and there by a lonely glen, in the - shelter of which a score of stone hovels were clustered, and to which all - attempts at tillage were confined. - </p> - <p> - Now, as The O’Mahony looked, he saw stretched before him, some hundred - feet below, a great, level plain, from which, in the distance, a solitary - mountain ridge rose abruptly. This plain was wedgeshaped, and its outlines - were sharply defined by the glow of evening light upon the waters - surrounding it—waters which dashed in white-breakers against the - rocky coast nearest by, but seemed to lie in placid quiescence on the - remote farther shore. - </p> - <p> - It was toward this latter dark line of coast, half-obscured now as they - gazed by rising sea-mists, that O’Daly pointed; and The O’Mahony, scanning - the broad, dusky landscape, made out at last some flickering sparks of - reddish light close to where the waters met the land. - </p> - <p> - “See, O’Mahoney, see!” the little man cried, his claw-like hand trembling - as he pointed. “Those lights burned there for Kian when he never returned - from Clontarf, eight hundred years ago; they are burning there now for - you!” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER VII—THE O’MAHONY’S HOME-WELCOME. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he road from the - brow of the hill down to the plain wound in such devious courses through - rock-lined defiles and bog-paths shrouded with stunted tangles of - scrub-trees, that an hour elapsed before The O’Mahony again saw the fires - which had been lighted to greet his return. This hour’s drive went in - silence, for the way was too rough for talk. Darkness fell, and then the - full moon rose and wrapped the wild landscape in strange, misty lights and - weird shadows. - </p> - <p> - All at once the car emerged from the obscurity of overhanging trees and - bowlders, and the travellers found themselves in the very heart of the - hamlet of Muirisc. The road they had been traversing seemed to have come - suddenly to an end in a great barn-yard, in the center of which a bonfire - was blazing, and around which, in the reddish flickering half-lights, a - lot of curiously shaped stone buildings, little and big, old and new, were - jumbled in sprawling picturesqueness. - </p> - <p> - About the fire a considerable crowd of persons were gathered—thin, - little men in long coats and knee-breeches; old, white-capped women with - large, black hooded cloaks; younger women with crimson petticoats and bare - feet and ankles, children of all sizes and ages clustering about their - skirts—perhaps a hundred souls in all. Though The O’Mahony had very - little poetic imagination or pictorial sensibility, he was conscious that - the spectacle was a curious one. - </p> - <p> - As the car came to a stop, O’Daly leaped lightly to the ground, and ran - over to the throng by the bonfire. - </p> - <p> - “Now thin!” he called out, with vehemence, “have ye swallowed ye’re - tongues? Follow me now! Cheers for The O’Mahony! Now thin! One—two—” - </p> - <p> - The little man waved his arms, and at the signal, led by his piping voice, - the assembled villagers sent up a concerted shout, which filled the - shadowed rookeries round about with rival echoes of “hurrahs” and - “hurroos,” and then broke, like an exploding rocket, into a shower of high - pitched, unintelligible ejaculations. - </p> - <p> - Amidst this welcoming chorus of remarks, which he could not understand, - The O’Mahony alighted, and walked toward the fire, closely followed by - Jerry, and by Malachy, the driver, bearing the bags. - </p> - <p> - For a moment he almost feared to be overthrown by the spontaneous rush - which the black-cloaked old women made upon him, clutching at his arms and - shoulders and deafening his ears with a babel of outlandish sounds. But - O’Daly came instantly to his rescue, pushing back the eager crones with - vigorous roughness, and scolding them in two languages in sharp peremptory - tones. - </p> - <p> - “Back there wid ye, Biddy Quinn! Now thin, ould deludherer, will ye hould - yer pace! Come along out o’ that, Pether’s Mag! Lave his honor a free - path, will ye!” Thus, with stern remonstrance, backed by cuffs and pushes, - O’Daly cleared the way, and The O’Mahony found himself half-forced, - half-guided away from the fire and toward a tall and sculptured archway, - which stood, alone, quite independent of any adjoining wall, upon the - nearest edge of what he took to be the barnyard. - </p> - <p> - Passing under this impressive mediæval gateway, he confronted a strange - pile of buildings, gray and hoar in the moonlight where their surface was - not covered thick with ivy. There were high pinnacles thrusting their - jagged points into the sky line, which might be either chimneys or - watch-towers; there were lofty gabled walls, from which the roofs had - fallen; there were arched window-holes, through which vines twisted their - umbrageous growth unmolested; and side by side with these signs of bygone - ruin, there were puzzling tokens of present occupation. - </p> - <p> - A stout, elderly woman, in the white, frilled cap of her district, with a - shawl about her shoulders and a bright-red skirt, stood upon the steps of - what seemed the doorway of a church, bowing to the new-comer. Behind her, - in the hall, glowed the light of a hospitable, homelike fire. - </p> - <p> - “It is his honor come back to his own, Mrs. Sullivan,” the stranger heard - O’Daly’s voice call out. - </p> - <p> - “And it’s kindly welcome ye are, sir,” said the woman, bowing again. “Yer - honor doen’t remimber me, perhaps. I was Nora O’Mara, thin, in the day - whin ye were a wee bit of a lad, before your father and mother—God - rest their sowls!—crossed the say.” - </p> - <p> - “I’m afraid I doen’t jest place you,” said The O’Mahony. “I’m the worst - hand in the world at rememberin’ faces.” - </p> - <p> - The woman smiled. - </p> - <p> - “Molare! It’s not be me face that anny boy of thirty years back ’ud - recognize me now,” she said, as she led the way for the party into the - house. “There were thim that had a dale of soft-sawderin’ words to spake - about it thin; but they’ve left off this manny years ago.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s your cooking and your fine housekeeping that we do be praising now - with every breath, Mrs. Sullivan; and sure that’s far more complimintary - to you than mere eulojums on skin-deep beauty, that’s here to-day and gone - to-morrow, and that was none o’ your choosing at best,” said O’Daly, as - they entered the room at the end of the passage. - </p> - <p> - “Thrue for you, Cormac O’Daly,” the housekeeper responded, with twinkling - eyes; “and I’m thinkin’, if we’d all of us the choosin’ of new faces, what - an altered appearance you’d presint, without delay.” - </p> - <p> - A bright, glowing bank of peat on the hearth filled the room with cozy - comfort. - </p> - <p> - It was a small, square chamber, roofed with blackened oak beams, and - having arched doors and windows. Its walls, partly of stone, partly of - plaster roughly scratched, were whitewashed. The sanded floor was bare, - save for a cowskin mat spread before the fire. A high, black-wood - sideboard at one end of the room, a half-dozen stiffbacked, uncompromising - looking chairs, and a table in the center, heaped with food, but without a - cloth, completed the inventory of visible furniture. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. O’Sullivan bustled out of the room, leaving the men together. The - O’Mahony sent a final inquisitive glance from ceiling to uncarpeted floor. - </p> - <p> - “So this is my ranch, eh?” he said, taking off his hat. - </p> - <p> - “Sir, you’re welcome to the ancesthral abode of the O’Mahony’s of - Muirisc,” answered O’Daly, gravely. “The room we stand in often enough - sheltered stout Conagher O’Mahony, before confiscation dhrove him forth, - and the ruffian Boyle came in. ’Tis far oldher, sir, than - Ballydesmond or even Dunmanus.” - </p> - <p> - “So old, the paper seems to have all come off’n the walls,” said The - O’Mahony. “Well, we’ll git in a rocking-chair or so and a rag-carpet and - new paper, an’ spruce her up generally. I s’pose there’s lots o’ more room - in the house.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, sir, rightly spakin’, there is a dale more, but it’s mostly not - used, by rayson of there being no roof overhead. There’s this part of the - castle that’s inhabitable, and there’s a part of the convent forninst the - porch where the nuns live, but there’s more of both, not to mintion the - church, that’s ruined entirely. Whatever your taste in ruins may plase to - be, there’ll be something here to delight you. We have thim that’s a - thousand years old, and thim that’s fallen into disuse since only last - winter. Anny kind you like: Early Irish, pray-Norman, posht-Norman, - Elizabethan, Georgian, or very late Victorian—here the ruins are for - you, the natest and most complate and convanient altogether to be found in - Munster.” - </p> - <p> - The eyes of the antiquarian bard sparkled with enthusiasm as he recounted - the architectural glories of Muirisc. There was no answering glow in the - glance of The O’Mahony. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll have a look round first thing in the morning,” he said, after the - men had seated themselves at the table. - </p> - <p> - A bright-faced, neatly clad girl divided with Mrs. O’Sullivan the task of - bringing the supper from the kitchen beyond into the room; but it was - Malachy, wearing now a curiously shapeless long black coat, instead of his - driver’s jacket, who placed the dishes on the table, and for the rest - stood in silence behind his new master’s chair. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony grew speedily restless under the consciousness of Malachy’s - presence close at his back. - </p> - <p> - “We can git along without him, can’t we?” he asked O’Daly, with a curt - backward nod. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, no, sir,” pleaded the other. “The boy ’ud be heart-broken if - ye sint him away. ’Twas his grandfather waited on your - great-uncle’s cousin, The O’Mahony of the Double Teeth; and his father - always served your cousins four times removed, who aich in his turn held - the title; and the old man sorrowed himsilf to death whin the last of ’em - desaysed, and your honor couldn’t be found, and there was no more an - O’Mahony to wait upon. The grief of that good man wud ’a’ brought - tears to your eyes. There was no keeping him from the dhrink day or night, - sir, till he made an ind to him-silf. And young Malachy, sir, he’s - composed of the same determined matarial.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, of course, if he’s so much sot on it as all that,” said The - O’Mahony, relenting. “But I wanted to feel free to talk over affairs with - you—money matters and so on; and—” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, sir, no fear about Malachy. Not a word of what we do be saying does - he comprehind.” - </p> - <p> - “Deef and dumb, eh?” - </p> - <p> - “Not at all; but he has only the Irish.” In answer to O’Mahony’s puzzled - look, O’Daly added in explanation: “It’s the glory of Muirisc, sir, that - we hould fast be our ancient thraditions and tongue. In all the place - there’s not rising a dozen that could spake to you in English. And—I - suppose your honor forgets the Irish entoirely? Or perhaps your parents - neglected to tache it to you?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said The O’Mahony; “they never taught me any Irish at all; - leastways, not that I remember.” - </p> - <p> - “Luk at that now!” exclaimed O’Daly, sadly, as he took more fish upon his - plate. - </p> - <p> - “It’s goin’ to be pritty rough sleddin’ for me to git around if nobody - understands what I say, ain’t it?” asked The O’Mahony, doubtfully. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, not at all,” O’Daly made brisk reply. “It’s part of my hereditary - duty to accompany you on all your travels and explorations and incursions, - to keep a record of the same, and properly celebrate thim in song and - history. The last two O’Mahonys betwixt ourselves, did nothing but dhrink - at the pig-market at Dunmanway once a week, and dhrink at Mike Leary’s - shebeen over at Ballydivlin the remainding days of the week, and dhrink - here at home on Sundays. To say the laste, this provided only indifferent - opportunities for a bard. But plase the Lord bether times have come, now.” - </p> - <p> - Malachy had cleared the dishes from the board, and now brought forward a - big square decanter, a sugar-bowl, a lemon fresh cut in slices, three - large glasses and one small one. O’Daly at this lifted a steaming copper - kettle from the crane over the fire, and began in a formally ceremonious - and deliberate manner the brewing of the punch. The O’Mahony watched the - operation with vigilance. Then clay pipes and tobacco were produced, and - Malachy left the room. - </p> - <p> - “What I wanted to ask about,” said The O’Mahony, after a pause, and - between sips from his fragrant glass, “was this: That lawyer, Carmody, - didn’t seem to know much about what the estate was worth, or how the money - came in, or anything else. All he had to do, he said, was to snoop around - and find out where I was. All the rest was in your hands. What I want to - know is jest where I stand.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, sir, that’s not hard to demonsthrate. You’re The O’Mahony of - Muirisc. You own in freehold the best part of this barony—some nine - thousand acres. You have eight-and-thirty tinants by lasehold, at a total - rintal of close upon four hundred pounds; turbary rights bring in rising - twinty pounds; the royalty on the carrigeens bring ten pounds; your own - farms, with the pigs, the barley, the grazing and the butter, produce - annually two hundred pounds—a total of six hundred and thirty - pounds, if I’m not mistaken.” - </p> - <p> - “How much is that in dollars?” - </p> - <p> - “About three thousand one hundred and fifty dollars, sir.” - </p> - <p> - “And that comes in each year?” said The O’Mahony, straightening himself in - his chair. - </p> - <p> - “It does that,” said O’Daly; then, after a pause, he added dryly: “and - goes out again.” - </p> - <p> - “How d’ye mean?” - </p> - <p> - “Sir, the O’Mahonys are a proud and high-minded race, and must live - accordingly. And aich of your ancestors, to keep up his dignity, borrowed - as much money on the blessed land as ever he could raise, till the - inthrest now ates up the greater half of the income. If you net two - hundred pounds a year—that is to say, one thousand dollars—you’re - doing very well indeed. In the mornin’ I’ll be happy to show you all me - books and Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony.” - </p> - <p> - “Who’s she?” - </p> - <p> - “The sister of the last of The O’Mahonys before you, sir, who married - another of the name only distantly related, and has been a widow these - five years, and would be owner of the estate if her brother had broken the - entail as he always intinded, and never did by rayson that there was so - much dhrinking and sleeping and playing ‘forty-five’ at Mike Leary’s to be - done, he’d no time for lawyers. Mrs. Fergus has been having the use of the - property since his death, sir, being the nearest visible heir.” - </p> - <p> - “And so my comin’ threw her out, eh? Did she take it pritty hard?” - </p> - <p> - “Sir, loyalty to The O’Mahony is so imbedded in the brest of every sowl in - Muirisc, that if she made a sign to resist your pretinsions, her own - frinds would have hooted her. She may have some riservations deep down in - her heart, but she’s too thrue an O’Mahony to revale thim.” - </p> - <p> - More punch was mixed, and The O’Mahony was about to ask further questions - concerning the widow he had dispossessed, when the door opened and a novel - procession entered the room. - </p> - <p> - Three venerable women, all of about the same height, and all clad in a - strange costume of black gowns and sweeping black vails, their foreheads - and chins covered with stiff bands of white linen, and long chains of - beads ending in a big silver-gilt cross swinging from their girdles, - advanced in single file toward the table—then halted, and bowed - slightly. - </p> - <p> - O’Daly and Jerry had risen to their feet upon the instant of this curious - apparition, but the The O’Mahony kept his seat, and nodded with - amiability. - </p> - <p> - “How d’ do?” he said, lightly. “It’s mighty neighborly of you to run in - like this, without knockin’, or standin’ on ceremony. Won’t you sit down, - ladies? I guess you can find chairs.” - </p> - <p> - “These are the Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears, your honor,” O’Daly hastened - to explain, at the same time energetically winking and motioning to him to - stand. - </p> - <p> - But The O’Mahony did not budge. - </p> - <p> - “I’m glad to see you,” he assured the nuns once more. “Take a seat, won’t - you? O’Daly here’ll mix you up one o’ these drinks o’ his’n, I’m sure, if - you’ll give the word.” - </p> - <p> - “We thank you, O’Mahony,” said the foremost of the aged women, in a deep, - solemn voice, but paying no heed to the chairs which O’Daly and Jerry had - dragged forward. “We come solely to do obeisance to you as the heir and - successor of our pious founder, Diarmid of the Fine Steeds, and to presint - to you your kinswoman—our present pupil, and the solitary hope of - our once renowned order.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony gathered nothing of her meaning from this lugubrious wail of - words, and glanced over the speaker’s equally aged companions in vain for - any sign of hopefulness, solitary or otherwise. Then he saw that the - hindmost of the nuns had produced, as if from the huge folds of her black - gown, a little girl of six or seven, clad in the same gloomy tint, whom - she was pushing forward. - </p> - <p> - The child advanced timidly under pressure, gazing wonderingly at The - O’Mahony, out of big, heavily fringed hazel eyes. Her pale face was made - almost chalk-like by contrast with a thick tangle of black hair, and wore - an expression of apprehensive shyness almost painful to behold. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony stretched out his hands and smiled, but the child hung back, - and looked not in the least reassured. He asked her name with an effort at - jovialty. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0005" id="linkimage-0005"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0089.jpg" alt="0089 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0089.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - “Kate O’Mahony, sir,” she said, in a low voice, bending her little knees - in a formal bob of courtesy. - </p> - <p> - “And are you goin’ to rig yourself out in those long gowns and vails, too, - when you grow up, eh, siss?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - “The daughters of The O’Mahonys of Muirisc, with only here and there a - thrifling exception, have been Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears since the - order was founded here in the year of Our Lord 1191,” said the foremost - nun, stiffly. “After long years, in which it seemed as if the order must - perish, our prayers were answered, and this child of The O’Mahonys was - sent to us, to continue the vows and obligations of the convent, and - restore it, if it be the saints’ will, to its former glory.” - </p> - <p> - “Middlin’ big job they’ve cut out for you, eh, siss?” commented The - O’Mahony, smilingly. - </p> - <p> - The pleasant twinkle in his eye seemed to attract the child. Her face lost - something of its scared look, and she of her own volition moved a step - nearer to his outstretched hands. Then he caught her up and seated her on - his knee. - </p> - <p> - “So you’re goin’ to sail in, eh, an’ jest make the old convent hum again? - Strikes me that’s a pritty chilly kind o’ look-out for a little gal like - you. Wouldn’t you now, honest Injun, rather be whoopin’ round barefoot, - with a nanny-goat, say, an’ some rag dolls, an’—an’—climbin’ - trees an’ huntin’ after eggs in the hay-mow—than go into partnership - with grandma, here, in the nun business?” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony had trotted the child gently up and down, the while he - propounded his query. Perhaps it was its obscure phraseology which - prompted her to hang her head, and obstinately refuse to lift it even when - he playfully put his finger under her chin. She continued to gaze in - silence at the floor; but if the nuns could have seen her face they would - have noted that presently its expression lightened and its big eyes - flashed, as The O’Mahony whispered something into her ear. The good women - would have been shocked indeed could they also have heard that something. - </p> - <p> - “Now don’t you fret your gizzard, siss,” he had whispered—“you - needn’t be a nun for one solitary darned minute, if you don’t want to be.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER VIII—TWO MEN IN A BOAT. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> fishing-boat lay - at anchor in a cove of Dun-manus Bay, a hundred rods from shore, softly - rising and sinking with the swell of the tide which stirred the blue - waters with all gentleness on this peaceful June morning. Two men sat in - lounging attitudes at opposite ends of the little craft, yawning lazily in - the sunshine. They held lines in their hands, but their listless and - wandering glances made it evident that nothing was further from their - thoughts than the catching of fish. - </p> - <p> - The warm summer air was so clear that the hamlet of Muirisc, whose gray - walls, embroidered with glossy vines, and tiny cottages white with - lime-wash were crowded together on the very edge of the shore, seemed - close beside them, and every grunt and squawk from sty or barn-yard came - over the lapping waters to them as from a sounding-board. The village, - engirdled by steep, sheltering cliffs, and glistening in the sunlight, - made a picture which artists would have blessed their stars for. The two - men in the boat looked at it wearily. - </p> - <p> - “Egor, it’s my belafe,” said the fisher at the bow, after what seemed an - age of idle silence, “that the fishes have all follied the byes an’ - gerrels, an’ betaken thimselves to Ameriky.” He pulled in his line, and - gazed with disgust at the intact bait. “Luk at that, now!” he continued. - “There’s a male fit for the holy Salmon of Knowledge himsilf, that taught - Fin MacCool the spache of animals, and divil a bite has the manest shiner - condiscinded to make at it.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, darn the fish!” replied the other, with a long sigh. “I don’t care - whether we catch’ any or not. It’s worth while to come out here even if we - never get a nibble and baked ourselves into bricks, jest to get rid of - that infernal O’Daly.” - </p> - <p> - It was The O’Mahony who spake, and he invested the concluding portion of - his remark with an almost tearful earnestness. During the pause which - ensued he chewed vigorously upon the tobacco in his mouth, and spat into - the sea with a stern expression of countenance. - </p> - <p> - “I tell you what, Jerry,” he broke out with at last—“I can’t stand - much more of that fellow. He’s jest breakin’ me up piecemeal. I begin to - feel like Jeff Davis—that it ’ud have bin ten dollars in my - pocket if I’d never bin born.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, sure, your honor,” said Jerry, “ye’ll git used to it in time. He - manes for the best.” - </p> - <p> - “That’s jest what makes me tired,” rejoined The O’Mahony; “that’s what - they always said about a fellow when he makes a confounded nuisance of - himself. I hate fellows that mean for the best. I’d much rather he meant - as bad as he knew how. P’raps then he’d shut up and mind his own business, - and leave me alone part of the time. It’s bad enough to have your estate - mortgaged up to the eyebrows, but to have a bard piled on top o’ the - mortgages—egad, it’s more’n flesh and blood can stand! I don’t - wonder them other O’Mahonys took to drink.” - </p> - <p> - “There’s a dale to be said for the dhrink, your honor,” commented the - other, tentatively. - </p> - <p> - “There can be as much said as you like,” said The O’Mahony, with firmness, - “but <i>doin</i>’ is a hoss of another color. I’m goin’ to stick to the - four drinks a day an’ two at night; an’ what’s good enough for me’s good - enough for you. That bat of ours the first week we come settled the thing. - I said to myself: ‘There’s goin’ to be one O’Mahony that dies sober, or - I’ll know the reason why!’” - </p> - <p> - “Egor, Saint Pether won’t recognize ye, thin,” chuckled Jerry; and the - other grinned grimly in spite of himself. - </p> - <p> - “Do you know I’ve bin fig’rin’ to myself on that convent business,” The - O’Mahony mused aloud, after a time, “an’ I guess I’ve pritty well sized it - up. The O’Mahonys started that thing, accordin’ to my notion, jest to coop - up their sisters in, where board and lodgin’ ’ud come cheap, an’ - one suit o’ clothes ’ud last a lifetime, in order to leave more - money for themselves for whisky. I ain’t sayin’ the scheme ain’t got some - points about it. You bar out all that nonsense about bonnets an’ silk - dresses an’ beads an’ fixin’s right from the word go, and you’ve got ’em - safe under lock an’ key, so ’t they can’t go gallivantin’ round an’ - gittin’ into scrapes. But I’ll be dodrotted if I’m goin’ to set still an’ - see ’em capture that little gal Katie agin her will. You hear <i>me!</i> - An’ another thing, I’m goin’ to put my foot down about goin’ to church - every mornin’. Once a week’s goin’ to be my ticket right from now. An’ you - needn’t show up any oftener yourself if you don’t want to. It’s high time - we had it out whether it’s me or O’Daly that’s runnin’ this show.” - </p> - <p> - “Sure, rightly spakin’, your honor’s own sowl wouldn’t want no more than a - mass aich Sunday,” expounded Jerry, concentrating his thoughts upon the - whole vast problem of dogmatic theology. “But this is the throuble of it, - you see, sir: there’s the sowls of all thim other O’Mahonys that’s gone - before, that the nuns do be prayin’ for to git out of purgatory, an’—” - </p> - <p> - “That’s all right,” broke in The O’Mahony, “but my motto is: let every - fellow hustle for himself. They’re on the spot, wherever it is, an’ - they’re the best judges of what they want; an’ if they ain’t got sand - enough to sail in an’ git it, I don’t see why I should be routed up out of - bed every mornin’ at seven o’clock to help ’em. To tell the truth, - Jerry, I’m gittin’ all-fired sick of these O’Mahonys. This havin’ dead men - slung at you from mornin’ to night, day in an’ day out, rain or shine, - would have busted up Job himself.” - </p> - <p> - “I’m thinking, sir,” said Jerry, with a merry twinkle in his eyes, - “there’s no havin’ annything in this worruld without payin’ for that same. - ’Tis the pinalty of belongin’ to a great family. Egor, since O’Daly - thranslated me into a MacEgan I’ve had no pace of me life, by rayson of - the necessity to demane mesilf accordin’.” - </p> - <p> - “Why, darn it all, man,” pursued the other, “I can’t do a solitary thing, - any time of day, without O’Daly luggin’ up what some old rooster did a - thousand years ago. He follows me round like my shadow, blatherin’ about - what Dermid of the Bucking Horses did, an’ what Conn of the Army Mules - thought of doin’ and didn’t, and what Finn of the Wall-eyed Pikes would - have done if he could, till I git sick at my stomach. He won’t let me lift - my ‘finger to do anything, because The O’Mahony mustn’t sile his hands - with work, and I have to stand round and watch a lot of bungling cusses - pretend to do it, when they don’t know any more about the work than a - yellow dog.” - </p> - <p> - “Faith, ye’ll not get much sympathy from the gintry of Ireland on <i>that</i> - score,” said Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “An’ then that Malachy—he gives me a cramp! he ain’t got a grin in - his whole carcass, an’ he can’t understand a word that I say, so that - O’Daly has that for another excuse to hang around all the while. Take my - steer, Jerry; if anybody leaves you an estate, you jest inquire if there’s - a bard and a hereditary dumb waiter that go with it; an’ if there is, you - jest sashay off somewhere else.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, sir, but an estate’s a great thing.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes—to tell about. But now jest look at the thing as she stands. - I’m the O’Mahony an’ all that, an’ I own more land than you can shake a - stick at; but what does it all come to? Why, when the int’rest is paid, I - am left so poor that if churches was sellin’ at two cents apiece, I - couldn’t buy the hinge on a contribution box. An’ then it’s downright - mortifyin’ to me to have to git a livin’ by takin’ things away from these - poverty-stricken devils here. I’m ashamed to look ’em in the face, - knowin’ as I do how O’Daly makes ’em whack up pigs, an’ geese, an’ - chickens, an’ vegetables, an’ fish, not to mention all the money they can - scrape together, just to keep me in idleness. It ain’t fair. Every time - one of ’em comes in, to bring me a peck o’ peas, or a pail o’ - butter, or a shillin’ that he’s managed to earn somewhere, I say to - myself: ‘Ole hoss, if you was that fellow, and he was loafin’ round as The - O’Mahony, you’d jest lay for him and kick the whole top of his head off, - and serve him darned well right, too.’” - </p> - <p> - Jerry looked at his master now with a prolonged and serious scrutiny, - greatly differing from his customary quizzical glance. - </p> - <p> - “Throo for your honor,” he said at last, in a hesitating way, as if his - remark disclosed only half his thought. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, sirree, I’m sourin’ fast on the hull thing,” The O’Mahony exclaimed. - “To do nothin’ all day long but to listen to O’Daly’s yarns, an’ make - signs at Malachy, an’ think how long it is between drinks—that ain’t - no sort o’ life for a white man. Egad! if there was any fightin’ goin’ on - anywhere in the world, darn me if I would not pull up stakes an’ light out - for it. Another six months o’ this, an’ my blood’ll all be turned to - butter-milk.” - </p> - <p> - The distant apparition of a sailing-vessel hung upon the outer horizon, - the noon sun causing the white squares of canvas to glow like jewels upon - the satin sheen of the sea. Jerry stole a swift glance at his companion, - and then bent a tong meditative gaze upon the passing vessel, humming - softly to himself as he looked. At last he turned to his companion with an - air of decision. - </p> - <p> - “O’Mahony,” he said, using the name thus for the first time, “I’m resolved - in me mind to disclose something to ye. It’s a sacret I’m goin’ to tell - you.” - </p> - <p> - He spoke with impressive solemnity, and the other looked up with interest - awakened. - </p> - <p> - “Go ahead,” he said. - </p> - <p> - “Well, sir, your remarks this day, and what I’ve seen wid me own eyes of - your demaynor, makes it plane that you’re a frind of Ireland. Now there’s - just wan way in the worruld for a frind of Ireland to demonsthrate his - affection—and that’s be enrollin’ himsilf among thim that’ll fight - for her rights. Sir, I’ll thrust ye wid me sacret. I’m a Fenian.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony’s attentive face showed no light of comprehension. The word - which Jerry had uttered with such mystery conveyed no meaning to him at - all at first; then he vaguely recalled it as a sort of slang description - of Irishmen in general, akin to “Mick” and “bogtrotter.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, what of it?” he asked, wonderingly. - </p> - <p> - Jerry’s quick perception sounded at once the depth of his ignorance. - </p> - <p> - “The Fenians, sir,” he explained, “are a great and sacret society, wid - tins of thousands of min enlisted here, an’ in Ameriky, an’ among the - Irish in England, wid intint to rise up as wan man whin the time comes, - an’ free Ireland. It’s a regular army, sir, that we’re raisin’, to conquer - back our liberties, and dhrive the bloody Saxon foriver away from Erin’s - green shores.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony let his puzzled gaze wander along the beetling coast-line of - naked rocks. - </p> - <p> - “So far’s I can see, they ain’t green,” he said; “they’re black and drab. - An’ who’s this fellow you call Saxon? I notice O’Daly lugs him into about - every other piece o’ po’try he nails me with, evenin’s.” - </p> - <p> - “Sir, it’s our term for the Englishman, who oppreases us, an’ dhrives us - to despair, an’ prevints our holdin’ our hieads up amongst the nations of - the earth. Sure, sir, wasn’t all this counthry roundabout for a three - days’ journey belongin’ to your ancesthors, till the English stole it and - sold it to Boyle, that thief of the earth—and his tomb, be the same - token, I’ve seen many a time at Youghal, where I was born. But—awh, - sir, what’s the use o’ talkin’? Sure, the blood o’ the O’Mahonys ought to - stir in your veins at the mere suspicion of an opporchunity to sthrike a - blow for your counthry.” The O’Mahony yawned and stretched his long arms - lazily in the sunshine. - </p> - <p> - “Nary a stir,” he said, with an idle half-grin. “But what the deuce is it - you’re drivin’ at anyway?” - </p> - <p> - “Sir, I’ve towld ye we’re raisin’ an army—a great, thund’rin’ secret - army—and whin it’s raised an’ our min all dhrilled an’ our guns an’ - pikes all handy—sure, thin we’ll rise and fight. An’ it’s much - mistaken I am in you, O’Mahony, if you’d be contint to lave this fun go on - undher your nose, an’ you to have no hand in it.” - </p> - <p> - “Of course I want to be in it,” said The O’Mahony, evincing more interest. - “Only I couldn’t make head or tail of what you was talkin’ about. An’ I - don’t know as I see yet jest what the scheme is. But you can count me in - on anything that’s got gunpowder in it, an’ that’ll give me somethin’ to - do besides list’nin’ to O’Daly’s yawp.” - </p> - <p> - “We’ll go to Cork to-morrow, thin, if it’s convanient to you,” said Jerry, - eagerly. “I’ll spake to my ‘B,’ or captain, that is, an’ inthroduce ye, - through him, to the chief organizer of Munster, and sure, they’ll mak’ ye - an’ ‘A,’ the same as a colonel, an’ I’ll get promotion undher ye—an’, - Egor! we’ll raise a rigiment to oursilves entirely—an’ Muirisc’s the - very darlin’ of a place to land guns an’ pikes an’ powdher for all Ireland—an’ - ’tis we’ll get the credit of it, an’ get more promotion still, - till, faith, there’ll be nothin’ too fine for our askin’, an’ we’ll carry - the whole blessed Irish republic around in our waistcoat pocket. What the - divil, man! We’ll make ye presidint, an’ I’ll have a place in the poliss.” - </p> - <p> - “All right,” said The O’Mahony, “we’ll git all the fun there is out of it; - but there’s one thing, mind, that I’m jest dead set about.” .. - </p> - <p> - “Ye’ve only to name it, sir, an’ they’ll be de-loighted to plase ye.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, it’s this: O’Daly’s got to be ruled out o’ the thing. I’m goin’ to - have one deal without any hereditary bard in it, or I don’t play.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER IX—THE VOICE OF THE HOSTAGE. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>e turn over now a - score of those fateful pages on which Father Time keeps his monthly - accounts with mankind, passing from sunlit June, with its hazy radiance - lying softly upon smooth waters, to bleak and shrill February—the - memorable February of 1867. - </p> - <p> - A gale had been blowing outside beyond the headlands all day, and by - nightfall the minor waters of Dunmanus Bay had suffered such prolonged - pulling and hauling and buffeting from their big Atlantic neighbors that - they were up in full revolt, hurling themselves with thunderous roars of - rage against the cliffs of their coast line, and drenching the darkness - with scattered spray. The little hamlet of Muirisc, which hung to its low, - nestling nook under the rocks in the very teeth of this blast, shivered, - soaked to the skin, and crossed itself prayerfully as the wind shrieked - like a banshee about its roofless gables and tower-walls and tore at the - thatches of its clustered cabins. - </p> - <p> - The three nuns of the Hostage’s Tears, listening to the storm without, - felt that it afforded an additional justification for the infraction of - their rules which they were for this evening, by no means for the first - time, permitting themselves. Religion itself rebelled against solitude on - such a night. - </p> - <p> - Time had been when this convent, enlarged though it was by the piety of - successive generations of early lords of Muirisc, still needed more room - than it had to accommodate in comfort its host of inmates. But that time, - alas! was now a musty tradition of bygone ages. Even before the great - sectarian upheaval of the mid-Tudor period, the ancient family order of - the Hostage’s Tears had begun to decline. I can’t pretend to give the - reason. Perhaps the supply of The O’Mahony’s daughters fell off; possibly - some obscure shift of fashion rendered marriage more attractive in their - eyes. Only this I know, that when the Commissioners of Elizabeth, gleaning - in the monastic stubble which the scythe of Henry had laid bare, came upon - the nuns at Muirisc, whom the first sweep of the blade had missed, they - found them no longer so numerous as they once had been. Ever since then - the order had dwindled visibly. The three remaining ladies had, in their - own extended cloistral career, seen the last habitable section of the - convent fall into disuse and decay, until now only their own gaunt, - stone-walled trio of cells, the school-room, the tiny chapel, and a - chamber still known by the dignified title of the “reception hall,” were - available for use. - </p> - <p> - Here it was that a great mound of peat sparkled and glowed on the hearth, - under a capricious draught which now sucked upward with a whistling swoop - whole clods of blazing turf—now, by a contradictory freak, - half-filled the room with choking bog-smoke. Still, even when eyes were - tingling and nostrils aflame, it was better to be here than outside, and - better to have company than be alone. - </p> - <p> - Both propositions were shiningly clear to the mind of Corinac O’Daly, as - he mixed a second round of punch, and, peering through the steam from his - glass at the audience gathered by the hearth, began talking again. The - three aged nuns, who had heard him talk ever since he was born, sat - decorously together on a bench and watched him, and listened as - attentively as if his presence were a complete novelty. Their chaplain, a - snuffy, half-palsied little old man, Father Harrington to wit, dozed and - blinked and coughed at the smoke in his chair by the fire as harmlessly as - a house-cat on the rug. Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, a plump and buxom widow in - the late twenties, with a comely, stupid face, framed in little waves of - black, crimped hair pasted flat to the skin, sat opposite the priest, - glass in hand. Whenever the temptation to yawn became too strong, she - repressed it by sipping at the punch. - </p> - <p> - “Anny student of the ancient Irish, or I might say Milesian charachter,” - said O’Daly, with high, disputatious voice, “might discern in our present - chief a remarkable proof of what the learned call a reversion of toypes. - It’s thrue what you say, Mother Agnes, that he’s unlike and teetotally - different from anny other O’Mahony of our knowledge in modhern times. But - thin I ask mesilf, what’s the maning of this? Clearly, that he harks back - on the ancesthral tree, and resimbles some O’Mahony we <i>don’t</i> know - about! And this I’ve been to the labor of thracing out. Now attind to me! - ’Tis in your riccords, that four ginerations afther your foundher, - Diarmid of the Fine Steeds, there came an O’Mahony of Muirisc called - Teige, a turbulent and timpistuous man, as his name in the chronicles, - Teige Goarbh, would indicate. ’Tis well known that he viewed holy - things with contimpt. ’Twas he that wint on to the very althar at - Rosscarbery, in the chapel of St. Fachnau Mougah, or the hairy, and - cudgeled wan of the daycons out of the place for the rayson that he - stammered in his spache. ’Twas he that hung his bard, my ancestor - of that period, up by the heels on a willow-tree, merely because he fell - asleep over his punch, afther dinner, and let the rival O’Dugan bard stale - his new harp from him, and lave a broken and disthressful old insthrumint - in its place. Now there’s the rale ancestor of our O’Mahony. ’Tis - as plain as the nose on your face. And—now I remimber—sure ’twas - this same divil of a Teige Goarbh who was possessed to marry his own - cousin wance removed, who’d taken vows here in this blessed house. ‘Marry - me now,’ says he. ‘I’m wedded to the Lord,’ says she. ‘Come along out o’ - that now,’ says he. ‘Not a step,’ says she. And thin, faith, what did the - rebellious ruffian do but gather all the straw and weeds and wet turf - round about, and pile ’em undernayth, and smoke the nuns out like a - swarm o’ bees. Sure, that’s as like our O’Mahony now as two pays in a - pod.” - </p> - <p> - As the little man finished, a shifty gust blew down the flue, and sent a - darkling wave of smoke over the good people seated before the fire. They - were too used to the sensation to do more than cough and rub their eyes. - The mother-superior even smiled sternly through the smoke. - </p> - <p> - “Is your maning that O’Mahony is at present on the roof, striving to smoke - us out?” she asked, with iron clad sarcasm. - </p> - <p> - “Awh, get along wid ye, Mother Agnes,” wheezed the little priest, from his - carboniferous corner. - </p> - <p> - “Who would he be afther demanding in marriage here?” - </p> - <p> - O’Daly and the nuns looked at their aged and shaky spiritual director with - dulled apprehension. He spoke so rarely, and had a mind so far removed - from the mere vanities and trickeries of decorative. conversation, that - his remark puzzled them. Then, as if through a single pair of eyes, they - saw that Mrs. Fergus had straightened herself in her chair, and was - simpering and preening her head weakly, like a conceited parrot. - </p> - <p> - The mother-superior spoke sharply. - </p> - <p> - “And do you flatther yoursilf, Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, that the head of our - house is blowing smoke down through the chimney for <i>you?</i>” she - asked. “Sure, if he was, thin, ’twould be a lamint-able waste of - breath. Wan puff from a short poipe would serve to captivate <i>you!</i>” - </p> - <p> - Cormac O’Daly made haste to bury his nose in his glass. Long acquaintance - with the attitude of the convent toward the marital tendencies of Mrs. - Fergus had taught him wisdom. It was safe to sympathize with either side - of the long-standing dispute when the other side was unrepresented. But - when the nuns and Mrs. Fergus discussed it together, he sagaciously held - his peace. - </p> - <p> - “Is it sour grapes you’re tasting, Agnes O’Mahony?” put in Mrs. Fergus, - briskly. In new matters, hers could not be described as an alert mind. But - in this venerable quarrel she knew by heart every retort, innuendo and - affront which could be used as weapons, and every weak point in the - other’s armor. - </p> - <p> - “Sour grapes! <i>me!</i>” exclaimed the mother-superior, with as lively an - effect of indignation as if this rejoinder had not been flung in her face - every month or so for the past dozen years. “D’ye harken to that, Sister - Blanaid and Sister Ann! It’s <i>me</i>, after me wan-and-fifty years of - life in religion, that has this ojus imputation put on me! Whisht now! - don’t demane yourselves by replyin’! We’ll lave her to the condimnation of - her own conscience.” - </p> - <p> - The two nuns had made no sign of breaking their silence before this - admonition came, and they gazed now at the peat fire placidly. But the - angered mother-superior ostentatiously took up her beads, and began - whispering to herself, as if her thoughts were already millions of miles - away from her antagonist with the crimped hair and the vacuous smile. - </p> - <p> - “It’s persecuting me she’s been these long years back,” Mrs. Fergus said - to the company at large, but never taking her eyes from the - mother-superior’s flushed face; “and all because I married me poor - desaysed husband, instead of taking me vows under her.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, that poor desaysed husband!” Mother Agnes put in, with an ironical - drawl in the words. “Sure, whin he was aloive, me ears were just worn out - with listening to complaints about him! Ah, thin! ’Tis whin we’re - dead that we’re appreciated!” - </p> - <p> - “All because I married,” pursued Mrs. Fergus, doggedly, “and wouldn’t come - and lock mesilf up here, like a toad in the turf, and lave me brothers - free to spind the money in riot and luxurious livin’. May be, if God’s - will had putt a squint on me, or given me shoulders a twist like Danny at - the fair, or otherwise disfigured me faytures, I’d have been glad to take - vows. Mortial plainness is a great injucement to religion.” - </p> - <p> - The two nuns scuffled their feet on the stone floor and scowled at the - fire. Mother Agnes put down her beads, and threw a martyr-like glance - upward at the blackened oak roof. - </p> - <p> - “Praise be to the saints,” she said, solemnly, “that denied us the snare - of mere beauty without sinse, or piety, or respect for old age, or - humility, or politeness, or gratitude, or—” - </p> - <p> - “Very well, thin, Agnes O’Mahony,” broke in Mrs. Fergus, promptly. “If - ye’ve that opinion of me, it’s not becomin’ that I should lave me daughter - wid ye anny longer. I’ll take her meself to Kenmare next week—the - ride over the mountains will do me nervous system a power o’ good—and - <i>there</i> she’ll learn to be a lady.” - </p> - <p> - Cormac O’Daly lifted his head and set down his glass. He knew perfectly - well that with this familiar threat the dispute always came to an end. - Indeed, all the parties to the recent contention now of their own accord - looked at him, and resettled themselves in their seats, as if to notify - him that his turn had come round again. - </p> - <p> - “I’m far from denying,” he said, as if there had been no interruption at - all, “that our O’Mahony is possessed of qualities which commind him to the - vulgar multichude. It’s thrue that he rejewced rints all over the estate, - and made turbary rights and the carrigeens as free as wather, and yet more - than recouped himself by opening the copper mines beyant Ardmahon, and - laysing thim to a company for a foine royalty. It’s thrue he’s the first - O’Mahony for manny a gineration who’s paid expinses, let alone putting - money by in the bank.” - </p> - <p> - “And what more would ye ask?” said Mrs. Fergus. “Sure, whin he’s done all - this, and made fast frinds with every man, women and child roundabout into - the bargain, what more would ye want?” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, what’s money, Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony,” remonstrated O’Daly, “and what’s - popularity wid the mere thoughtless peasanthry, if ye’ve no ancesthral - proide, no love and reverence for ancient family thraditions, no devout - desoire to walk in the paths your forefathers trod?” - </p> - <p> - “Faith, thim same forefathers trod thim with a highly unsteady step, thin, - bechune oursilves,” commented Mrs. Fergus. - </p> - <p> - “But their souls were filled with blessid piety,” said Mother Agnes, - gravely. “If they gave small thought to the matter of money, and loike - carnal disthractions, they had open hands always for the needs of the - church, and of the convint here, and they made holy indings, every soul of - ’em.” - </p> - <p> - “And they respected the hereditary functions of their bards,” put in - O’Daly, with a conclusive air. - </p> - <p> - At the moment, as there came a sudden lull in the tumult of the storm - outside, those within the reception-room heard a distinct noise of - knocking, which proceeded from beneath the stone-flags at their feet. - Three blows were struck, with a deadened thud as upon wet wood, and then - the astounded listeners heard a low, muffled sound, strangely like a human - voice, from the same depths. - </p> - <p> - The tempest’s furious screaming rose again without, even as they listened. - All six crossed themselves mechanically, and gazed at one another with - blanched faces. - </p> - <p> - “It is the Hostage,” whispered the mother-superior, glancing impressively - around, and striving to dissemble the tremor which forced itself upon her - lips. “For wan-and-fifty years I’ve been waiting to hear the sound of him. - My praydecessor, Mother Ellen, rest her sowl, heard him wance, and nixt - day the roof of the church fell in. Be the same token, some new disasther - is on fut for us, now.” - </p> - <p> - Cormac O’Daly was as frightened as the rest, but, as an antiquarian, he - could not combat the temptation to talk. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis now just six hundred and seventy years,” he began, in a husky - voice, “since Diarmid of the Fine Steeds founded this convint, in - expiation of his wrong to young Donal, Prince of Connaught. ’Twas - the custom thin for the kings and great princes in Ireland to sind their - sons as hostages to the palaces of their rivals, to live there as - security, so to spake, for their fathers’ good behavior and peaceable - intintions. ’Twas in this capacity that young Donal O’Connor came - here, but Diarmid thrated him badly—not like his father’s son at all—and - immured him in a dungeon convanient in the rocks. His mother’s milk was in - the lad, and he wept for being parted from her till his tears filled the - earth, and a living well sprung from thim the day he died. So thin Diarmid - repinted and built a convint; and the well bubbled forth healing wathers - so that all the people roundabout made pilgrimages to it, and with their - offerings the O’Mahonys built new edifices till ’twas wan of the - grandest convints in Desmond; and none but fay-males of the O’Mahony blood - saying prayers for the sowl of the Hostage.” - </p> - <p> - The nuns were busy with their beads, and even Mrs. Fergus bent her head. - At last it was Mother Agnes who spoke, letting her rosary drop. - </p> - <p> - “’Twas whin they allowed the holy well to be choked up and lost - sight of among fallen stones that throuble first come to the O’Mahonys,” - she said solemnly. “’Tis mesilf will beg The O’Mahony, on binded - knees, to dig it open again. Worse luck, he’s away to Cork or Waterford - with his boat, and this storm’ll keep him from returning, till, perhaps, - the final disasther falls on us and our house, and he still absinting - himsilf. Wirra! What’s that?” - </p> - <p> - The mother-superior had been forced to lift her voice, in concluding, to - make it distinct above the hoarse roar of the elements outside. Even as - she spoke, a loud crackling noise was heard, followed by a crash of - masonry which deafened the listeners’ ears and shook the walls of the room - they sat in. - </p> - <p> - With a despairing groan, the three nuns fell to their knees and bowed - their vailed heads over their beads. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER X—HOW THE “HEN HAWK” WAS BROUGHT IN. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he good people of - Muirisc had shut themselves up in their cabins, on this inclement evening - of which I have spoken, almost before the twilight faded from the - storm-wrapt outlines of the opposite coast. If any adventurous spirit of - them all had braved the blast, and stood out on the cliff to see night - fall in earnest upon the scene, perhaps between wild sweeps of drenching - and blinding spray, he might have caught sight of a little vessel, with - only its jib set, plunging and laboring in the trough of the Atlantic - outside. And if the spectacle had met his eyes, unquestionably his first - instinct would have been to mutter a prayer for the souls of the doomed - men upon this fated craft. - </p> - <p> - On board the <i>Hen Hawk</i> a good many prayers had already been said. - The small coaster seemed, to its terrified crew, to have shrunk to the - size of a walnut shell, so wholly was it the plaything of the giant waters - which heaved and tumbled about it, and shook the air with the riotous - tumult of their sport. There were moments when the vessel hung poised and - quivering upon the very ridge of a huge mountain of sea, like an Alpine - climber who shudders to find himself balanced upon a crumbling foot of - rock between two awful depths of precipice; then would come the breathless - downward swoop into howling space and the fierce buffeting of ton-weight - blows as the boat staggered blindly at the bottom of the abyss; then again - the helpless upward sweep, borne upon the shoulders of titan waves which - reared their vast bulk into the sky, the dizzy trembling upon the summit, - and the hideous plunge—a veritable nightmare of torture and despair. - </p> - <p> - Five men lay or knelt on deck huddled about the mainmast, clinging to its - hoops and ropes for safety. Now and again, when the vessel was lifted to - the top of the green walls of water, they caught vague glimpses of the - distant rocks, darkling through the night mists, which sheltered Muirisc, - their home—and knew in their souls that they were never to reach - that home alive. The time for praying was past. Drenched to the skin, - choked with the salt spray, nearly frozen in the bitter winter cold, they - clung numbly to their hold, and awaited the end. - </p> - <p> - One of them strove to gild the calamity with cheerfulness, by humming and - groaning the air of a “come-all-ye” ditty, the croon of which rose with - quaint persistency after the crash of each engulfing wave had passed. The - others were, perhaps, silently grateful to him—but they felt that if - Jerry had been a born Muirisc man, he could not have done it. - </p> - <p> - At the helm, soaked and gaunt as a water-rat, with his feet braced against - the waist-rails, and the rudder-bar jammed under his arm and shoulder, was - a sixth man—the master and owner of the <i>Hen Hawk</i>. The strain - upon his physical strength, in thus by main force holding the tiller - right, had for hours been unceasing—and one could see by his - dripping face that he was deeply wearied. But sign of fear there was none. - </p> - <p> - Only a man brought up in the interior of a country, and who had come to - the sea late in life, would have dared bring this tiny cockle-shell of a - coaster into such waters upon such a coast. The O’Ma-hony might himself - have been frightened had he known enough about navigation to understand - his present danger. As it was, all his weariness could nor destroy the - keen sense of pleasurable excitement he had in the tremendous experience. - He forgot crew and cargo and vessel itself in the splendid zest of this - mad fight with the sea and the storm. He clung to the tiller determinedly, - bowing his head to the rush of the broken waves when they fell, and - bending knees and body this way and that to answer the wild tossings and - sidelong plung-ings of the craft—always with a light as of battle in - his gray eyes. It was ever so much better than fighting with mere men. - </p> - <p> - The gloom of twilight ripened into pitchy darkness, broken only by - momentary gleams of that strange, weird half-light which the rushing waves - generate in their own crests of foam. The wind rose in violence when the - night closed in, and the vessel’s timbers creaked in added travail as huge - seas lifted and hurled her onward through the black chaos toward the - rocks. The men by the mast could every few minutes discern the red lights - from the cottage windows of Muirisc, and shuddered anew as the glimmering - sparks grew nearer. - </p> - <p> - Four of these five unhappy men were Muirisc born, and knew the sea as they - knew their own mothers. The marvel was that they had not revolted against - this wanton sacrifice of their lives to the whim or perverse obstinacy of - an ignorant landsman, who a year ago had scarcely known a rudder from a - jib-boom. They themselves dimly wondered at it now, as they strained their - eyes for a glimpse of the fatal crags ahead. They had indeed ventured upon - some mild remonstrance, earlier in the day, while it had still been - possible to set the mainsail, and by long tacks turn the vessel’s course. - But The O’Mahony had received their suggestion with such short temper and - so stern a refusal, that there had been nothing more to be said—bound - to him as Muirisc men to their chief, and as Fenians to their leader, as - they were. And soon thereafter it became too late to do aught but scud - bare-poled before the gale; and now there was nothing left but to die. - </p> - <p> - They could hear at last, above the shrill clamor of wind and rolling - waves, the sullen roar of breakers smashing against the cliffs. They - braced themselves for the great final crash, and muttered fragments of the - Litany of the Saints between clenched teeth. - </p> - <p> - A prodigious sea grasped the vessel and lifted it to a towering height, - where for an instant it hung trembling. Then with a leap it made a - sickening dive down, down, till it was fairly engulfed in the whirling - floods which caught it and swept wildly over its decks. A sinister thrill - ran through the stout craft’s timbers, and upon the instant came the harsh - grinding sound of its keel against the rocks. The men shut their eyes. - </p> - <p> - A dreadful second—and lo! the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, shaking herself - buoyantly like a fisher-fowl emerging after a plunge, floated upon gently - rocking waters—with the hoarse tumult of storm and breakers - comfortably behind her, and at her sides only the sighing-harp music of - the wind in the sea-reeds. - </p> - <p> - “Hustle now, an’ git out your anchor!” called out the cheerful voice of - The O’Mahony, from the tiller. - </p> - <p> - The men scrambled from their knees as in a dream. They ran out the chain, - reefed the jib, and then made their way over the flush deck aft, slapping - their arms for warmth, still only vaguely realizing that they were - actually moored in safety, inside the sheltered salt-water marsh, or <i>muirisc</i>, - which gave their home its name. - </p> - <p> - This so-called swamp was at high tide, in truth, a very respectable inlet, - which lay between the tongue of arable land on which the hamlet was built - and the high jutting cliffs of the coast to the south. Its entrance, a - stretch of water some forty yards in width, was over a bar of rock which - at low tide could only be passed by row-boats. At its greatest daily - depth, there was not much water to spare under the forty-five tons of the - Hen Hawk. She had been steered now in utter darkness, with only the - scattered and confusing lights of the houses to the left for guidance, - unerringly upon the bar, and then literally lifted and tossed over it by - the great rolling wall of breakers. She lay now tossing languidly on the - choppy waters of the marsh, as if breathing hard after undue exertion—secure - at last behind the cliffs. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony slapped <i>his</i> arms in turn, and looked about him. He was - not in the least conscious of having performed a feat which any yachtsman - in British waters would regard as incredible. - </p> - <p> - “Now, Jerry,” he said, calmly, “you git ashore and bring out the boat. You - other fellows open the hatchway, an’ be gittin’ the things out. Be careful - about your candle down-stairs. You know why. It won’t do to have a light - up here on deck. Some of the women might happen to come out-doors an see - us.” - </p> - <p> - Without a word, the crew, even yet dazed at their miraculous escape, - proceeded to carry out his orders. The O’Mahony bit from his plug a fresh - mouthful of tobacco, and munched it meditatively, walking up and down the - deck in the darkness, and listening to the high wind howling overhead. - </p> - <p> - The <i>Hen Hawk</i> had really been built at Barnstable, a dozen years - before, for the Devon fisheries, but she did not look unlike those - unwieldy Dutch boats which curious summer visitors watch with unfailing - interest from the soft sands of Scheveningen. - </p> - <p> - Her full-flushed deck had been an afterthought, dating back to the time - when her activities were diverted from the fishing to the carrying - industry. The O’Mahony had bought her at Cork, ostensibly for use in the - lobster-canning enterprise which he had founded at Muirisc. Duck-breasted, - squat and thick-lined, she looked the part to perfection. - </p> - <p> - The men were busy now getting out from the hold below a score of small - kegs, each wrapped in oil skin swathings, and, after these, more than a - score of long, narrow wooden cases, which, as they were passed up the - little gangway from the glow of candlelight into the darkness, bore a - gloomy resemblance to coffins. An hour passed before the empty boat - returned from shore, having landed its finishing load, and the six men, - stiff and chilled, clumsily swung themselves over the side of the vessel - into it. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, it’s a new layse of life, I’m beginnin’,” murmured one of them, - Dominic by name, as he clambered out upon the stone landing-place. “It’s - dead I was intoirely—an’ restricted agin, glory be to the Lord!” - </p> - <p> - “Sh-h! You shall have some whisky to make a fresh start on when we’re - through,” said The O’Mahony. “Jerry, you run ahead an’ open the side door. - Don’t make any noise. Mrs. Sullivan’s got ears that can hear grass - growin’. We’ll follow on with the things.” - </p> - <p> - The carrying of the kegs and boxes across the village common to the - castle, in which the master bore his full share of work, consumed nearly - another hour. Some of the cottage lights ceased to burn. Not a soul - stirred out of doors. - </p> - <p> - The entrance opened by Jerry was a little postern door, access to which - was gained through the deserted and weed-grown church-yard, and the - possible use of which was entirely unsuspected by even the housekeeper, - let alone the villagers at large. The men bore their burdens through this, - traversing a long, low-arched passage-way, built entirely of stone and - smelling like an ancient tomb. Thence their course was down a precipitous, - narrow stairway, winding like the corkscrew stairs of a tower, until, at a - depth of thirty feet or more, they reached a small square chamber, the air - of which was mustiness itself. Here a candle was fastened in a bracket, - and the men put down their loads. Here, too, it was that Jerry, when the - last journey had been made, produced a bottle and glasses and dispensed - his master’s hospitality in raw spirits, which the men gulped down without - a whisper about water. - </p> - <p> - “Mind!—day after to-morrow; five o’clock in the morning, sharp!” - said The O’Mahony, in admonitory tones. Then he added, more softly: “Jest - take it easy to-morrow; loaf around to suit yourselves, so long’s you keep - sober. You’ve had a pritty tough day of it Good-night. Jerry’n me’ll do - the rest. Jest pull the door to when you go out.” - </p> - <p> - With answering “Good nights,” and a formal hand-shake all around, the four - villagers left the room. Their tired footsteps were heard with diminishing - distinctness as they went up the stairs. - </p> - <p> - Jerry turned and surveyed his master from head to foot by the light of the - candle on the wall. - </p> - <p> - “O’Mahony,” he said, impressively, “you’re a divil, an’ no mistake!” - </p> - <p> - The other put the bottle to his mouth first. Then he licked his lips and - chuckled grimly. - </p> - <p> - “Them fellows was scared out of their boots, wasn’t they? An’ you, too, - eh?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - “Well, sir, you know it as well as I, the lives of the lot of us would - have been high-priced at a thruppenny-bit.” - </p> - <p> - “Pshaw, man! You fellows don’t know what fun is. Why, she was safe as a - house every minute. An’ here I was, goin’ to compliment you on gittin’ - through the hull voyage without bein’ sick once—thought, at last, I - was really goin’ to make a sailor of you.” - </p> - <p> - “Egor, afther to-day I’ll believe I’ve the makin’ of annything under the - sun in me—or on top of it, ayther. But, sure, sir, you’ll not deny - ’twas timptin’ providence saints’ good-will to come in head over - heels under wather, the way we did?” - </p> - <p> - “We <i>had</i> to be here—that’s all,” said The O’Mahony, briefly. - “I’ve got to meet a man tomorrow, at a place some distance from here, sure - pop; and then there’s the big job on next day.” Jerry said no more, and - The O’Mahony took the candle down from the iron ring in the wall. - </p> - <p> - “D’ye know, I noticed somethin’ cur’ous in the wall out on the staircase - here as we come down?” he said, bearing the light before him as he moved - to the door. “It’s about a dozen steps up. Here it is! What d’ye guess - that might a-been?” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony held the candle close to the curved wall, and indicated with - his free hand a couple of regular and vertical seams in the masonry, about - two feet apart, and nearly a man’s height in length. - </p> - <p> - “There’s a door there, or I’m a Dutchman,” he said, lifting and lowering - the light in his scrutiny. - </p> - <p> - The mediæval builders could have imagined no sight more weird than that of - the high, fantastic shadows thrown upon the winding, well-like walls by - this drenched and saturnine figure, clad in oilskins instead of armor, and - peering into their handiwork with the curiosity of a man nurtured in a - log-cabin. - </p> - <p> - “Egor, would it be a dure?” exclaimed the wondering Jerry. - </p> - <p> - His companion handed the candle to him, and took from his pocket a big - jack-knife—larger, if anything, than the weapon which had been left - under the window of the little farm-house at Five Forks. He ran the large - blade up and down the two long, straight cracks, tapping the stonework - here and there with the butt of the handle afterward. Finally, after - numerous experiments, he found the trick—a bolt to be pushed down by - a blade inserted not straight but obliquely—and a thick, iron-bound - door, faced with masonry, but with an oaken lining, swung open, heavily - and unevenly, upon some concealed pivots. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony took the light once more, thrust it forward to make sure of - his footing, and then stepped over the newly-discovered threshold, Jerry - close at his heels. They pushed their way along a narrow and evil-smelling - passage, so low that they were forced to bend almost double. Suddenly, - after traversing this for a long distance, their path was blocked by - another door, somewhat smaller than the other. This gave forth a hollow - sound when tested by blows. - </p> - <p> - “It ain’t very thick,” said The O’Mahony. “I’ll put my shoulder against - it. I guess I can bust her open.” - </p> - <p> - The resistance was even less than he had anticipated. One energetic shove - sufficed; the door flew back with a swift splintering of rotten wood. The - O’Mahony went stumbling sidelong into the darkness as the door gave way. - At the moment a strange, rumbling sound was heard at some remote height - above them, and then a crash nearer at hand, the thundering reverberation - of which rang with loud echoes through the vault-like passage. The - concussion almost put out the candle, and Jerry noted that the hand which - he instinctively put out to shield the flame was trembling. - </p> - <p> - “Show a light in here, can’t ye?” called out The O’Mahony from the black - obscurity beyond the broken door. “Sounds as if the hull darned castle ’d - been blown down over our heads.” - </p> - <p> - Jerry timorously advanced, candle well out in front of him. Its small - radiance served dimly to disclose what seemed to be a large chamber, or - even hall, high-roofed and spacious. Its floor of stone flags was covered - with dry mold. The walls were smoothed over with a gray coat of - plastering, whole patches of which had here and there fallen, and more of - which tumbled even now as they looked. They saw that this plastering had - been decorated by zigzag, saw-toothed lines in three or four colors, now - dulled and in places scarcely discernible. The room was irregularly - shaped. At its narrower end was a big, roughly built fireplace, on the - hearth of which lay ashes and some charred bits of wood, covered, like the - stone itself, by a dry film of mold. The O’Mahony held the candle under - the flue. The way in which the flame swayed and pointed itself showed that - the chimney was open. - </p> - <p> - Cooking utensils, some of metal, some of pottery, but all alike of strange - form, were bestowed on the floor on either side of the hearth. There was a - single wooden chair, with a high, pointed back, standing against the wall, - and in front of this lay a rug of cowskin, the reddish hair of which came - off at the touch. Beside this chair was a low, oblong wooden chest, with a - lifting-lid curiously carved, and apparently containing nothing but rolls - of parchment and leather-bound volumes. - </p> - <p> - At the other and wider end of the room was an archway built in the stone, - and curtained by hangings of thick, mildewed cloth. The O’Mahony drew - these aside, and Jerry advanced with the light. - </p> - <p> - In a little recess, and reaching from side to side of the arched walls, - was built a bed of oaken beams, its top the height of a man’s middle. - Withered and faded straw lay piled on the wood, and above this both thick - cloth similar to the curtains and finer fabrics which looked like silk. - The candle shook in Jerry’s hand, and came near to falling, at the - discovery which followed. - </p> - <p> - On the bed lay stretched the body of a bearded and tonsured man, clad in a - long, heavy, dark woolen gown, girt at the waist with a leathern thong—as - strangely dried and mummified as are the dead preserved in St. Michan’s - vaults at Dublin or in the Bleikeller of the Dom at Bremen. The shriveled, - tan-colored face bore a weird resemblance to that of the hereditary bard. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony looked wonderingly down upon this grim spectacle, the while - Jerry crossed himself. - </p> - <p> - “Guess there won’t be much use of callin’ a doctor for <i>him</i>,” said - the master, at last. - </p> - <p> - Then he backed away, to let the curtains fall, and yawned. - </p> - <p> - “I’m about tuckered out,” he said, stretching his arms. “Let’s go up now - an’ take somethin’ warm, and git to bed. We’ll keep mum about this place. - P’rhaps—I shouldn’t wonder—it might come in handy for O’Daly.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XI—A FACE FROM OUT THE WINDING-SHEET. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he sun was shining - brightly in a clear sky next morning, when the people of Muirisc finally - got up out of bed, and, still rubbing their eyes, strolled forth to note - the ravages of last night’s storm, and talk with one another about it. - </p> - <p> - There was much to marvel at and discuss at length in garrulous groups - before the cottage doors. One whole wing of the ancient convent structure—that - which tradition ascribed to the pious building fervor of Cathal <i>an - Diomuis</i>, or “the Haughty”—had been thrown down during the night, - and lay now a tumbled mass of stones and timber piled in wild disorder - upon the <i>débris</i> of previous ruins. But inasmuch as the fallen - building had long been roofless and disused, and its collapse meant only - another added layer of chaos in the deserted convent-yard, Muirisc did not - worry its head much about it, and even yawned in Cormac O’Daly’s face as - he wandered from one knot of gossips to another, relating legends about - Cathal the Proud. - </p> - <p> - What interested them considerably more was the report, confirmed now by - O’Daly himself, that just before the crash came, six people in the - reception hall of the convent had distinctly heard the voice of the - Hostage from the depths below the cloistral building. Everybody in Muirisc - knew all about the Hostage. They had been, so to speak, brought up with - him. Prolonged familiarity with the pathetic story of his death in exile, - here at Muirisc, and constant contact with his name as perpetuated in the - title of their unique convent, made him a sort of oldest inhabitant of the - place. Their lively imaginations now quickly built up and established the - belief that he was heard to complain, somewhere under the convent, once - every fifty years. Old Ellen Dumphy was able to fix the period with - exactness because when the mysterious sound was last heard she was a young - woman, and had her face bound up, and was almost “disthracted wid the sore - teeth.” - </p> - <p> - But most interesting of all was the fact that there, before their eyes, - riding easily upon the waters of the Muirisc, lay the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, as - peacefully and safely at anchor as if no gale had ever thundered upon the - cliffs outside. The four men of her crew, when they made their belated - appearance in the morning sunlight out-of-doors, were eagerly questioned, - and they told with great readiness and a flowering wealth of adjectives - the marvelous story of how The O’Mahony aimed her in pitch darkness at the - bar, and hurled her over it at precisely the psychological moment, with - just the merest scraping of her keel. To the seafaring senses of those who - stood now gazing at the vessel there was more witchcraft in this than in - the subterranean voice of the Hostage even. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, thin, ’tis our O’Mahony’s the grand divil of a man!” they - murmured, admiringly. - </p> - <p> - No work was to be expected, clearly, on the day after such an achievement - as this. The villagers stood about, and looked at the squat coaster, - snugly raising and sinking with the lazy movement of the tide, and watched - for the master of Muirisc to show himself. They had never before been - conscious of such perfect pride in and affection for this strange - Americanized chieftain of theirs. By an unerring factional instinct, they - felt that this apotheosis of The O’Mahony in their hearts involved the - discomfiture of O’Daly and the nuns, and they let the hereditary bard feel - it, too. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, now, Cormac O’Daly,” one of the women called out to the poet, as he - hung, black-visaged and dejected, upon the skirts of the group, “tell me - man, was it anny of yer owld Diarmids and Cathals ye do be perplexin’ us - wid that wud a-steered that boat beyond over the bar at black midnight, - wid a gale outside fit to blow mountains into the say? Sure, it’s not - botherin’ his head wid books, or delutherin’ his moind wid ancestral - mummeries, or wearyin’ the bones an’ marrow out of the saints wid - attendin’ their business instead of his own, that <i>our</i> O’Mahony do - be after practicin’.” - </p> - <p> - The bard opened his lips to reply. Then the gleam of enjoyment in the - woman’s words which shone from all the faces roundabout, dismayed him. He - shook his head, and walked away in silence. Meanwhile The O’Mahony, after - a comfortable breakfast, and a brief consultation with Jerry, had put on - his hat and strolled out through the pretentious arched doorway of his - tumble-down abode. From the outer gate he saw the clustered villagers upon - the wharf, and guessed what they were saying and thinking about him and - his boat. He smiled contentedly to himself, and lighted a cigar. Then, - sucking this with gravity, hands in pockets and hat well back on head, he - turned and sauntered across the turreted corner of his castle into the - ancient church-yard, which lay between it and the convent. The place was - one crowded area of mortuary wreckage—flat tombstones sunken deep - into the earth; monumental tablets, once erect, now tipping at every crazy - angle; pre-historic, weather-beaten runic crosses lying broken and prone; - more modern and ambitious sarcophagi of brick and stone, from which sides - or ends had fallen away, revealing to every eye their ghostly contents; - the ground covered thickly with nettles and umbrageous weeds, under which - the unguided foot continually encountered old skulls and human bones—a - grave-yard such as can be seen nowhere in the world save in western - Ireland. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony picked his way across this village Golgotha, past the ruins - of the ancient church, and into the grounds to the rear of the convent - buildings, clambering as he went over whole series of tumbled masonry - heaped in weed-grown ridges, until he stood upon the edge of the havoc - wrought by this latest storm. - </p> - <p> - No rapt antiquary ever gazed with more eagerness upon the remains of a - pre-Aryan habitation than The O’Mahony now displayed in his scrutiny of - the destruction worked by last night’s storm, and of the group of - buildings its fury had left unscathed. He took a paper from his pocket, - and compared a rude drawing upon it with various points in the - architecture about him which he indicated with nods of the head. People - watching him might have differed as to whether he was a student of - antiquities, a builder or an insurance agent. Probably none would have - guessed that he was striving to identify some one of the numerous - chimneys-before him with a certain fireplace which he knew of, - five-and-twenty feet underground. - </p> - <p> - As he stood thus, absorbed in calculation, he felt a little hand steal - into his big palm, and nestle there confidingly. His face put on a pleased - smile, even before he bent it toward the intruder. - </p> - <p> - “Hello, Skeezucks, is that you?” he said, gently. “Well, they’ve gone an’ - busted your ole convent up the back, here, in great shape, ain’t they?” - </p> - <p> - Every one of the score of months that had passed since these two first - met, seemed to have added something to the stature of little Kate - O’Mahony. She had grown, in truth, to be a tall girl for her age—and - an erect girl, holding her head well in air, into the bargain. Her face - had lost its old shy, scared look—at least in this particular - company. It was filling out into the likeness of a pretty face, with a - pleasant glow of health upon the cheeks, and a happy twinkle in the big, - dark eyes. - </p> - <p> - For answer, the child lifted and swung his hand, and playfully butted her - head sidewise against his waist. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis I that wouldn’t mind if it all came down,” she said, in the - softest West Carbery brogue the ear could wish. - </p> - <p> - “What!” exclaimed the other, in mock consternation. “Well, I never! Why, - here’s a gal that don’t want to go to school, or learn now to read an’ - cipher or nothin’! P’r’aps you’d ruther work in the lobster fact’ry?” - </p> - <p> - “No, I’d sail in the boat with you,” said Kate, promptly and with - confidence. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony laughed aloud. - </p> - <p> - “I guess you’d a got your fill of it yisterday, sis,” he remarked. - </p> - <p> - “It’s that I’d have liked best of all,” she pursued. “Ah! take me with - you, O’Mahony, whin next the waves are up and the wind’s tearin’ fit to - bust itsilf. I’ll not die till I’ve been out in the thick of it, wance for - all.” - </p> - <p> - “Why, gal alive, you’d a-be’n smashed into sausage-meat!” chuckled the - man. “Still, you’re right, though. They ain’t nothin’ else in the world - fit to hold a candle to it. Egad! Some time I <i>will</i> take you, sis!” - </p> - <p> - The child spoke more seriously: - </p> - <p> - “Sure, we’re the O’Mahonys of the Coast of White Foam, according to - O’Heerin’s old verse, and it’s in my blood as well as yours.” - </p> - <p> - “Right you are, sis!” he responded, smiling, as he added under his breath: - “an’ mebbe a trifle more.” Then, after a moment’s pause, he changed the - subject. - </p> - <p> - “See here; you’re up on these things—in fact, they don’t seem to - learn you anything else—hain’t I heerd O’Daly tell about the old - O’Mahonys luggin’ round a box full o’ saints’ bones when they went on a - rampage, to sort o’ give ’em luck! I got to thinkin’ about it last - night after I went to bed, but I couldn’t jest git it straight in my - head.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s the <i>cathach</i>” (she pronounced it <i>caha</i>) “you mane,” Kate - answered. “Sometimes it contained bones, but more often ’twas a - crozieror a holy book from the saint’s own pen, or a part of his - vest-mints.” - </p> - <p> - “No; I like the bones notion best," said The O’Mahony. “There’s something - substantial an’ solid about bones. If you’ve got a genuine saint’s bones, - it’s a thing he’s bound to take an interest in, an’ see through; whereas, - them other things—his books an’ his clo’se an’ so on—why, he - may a-been sick an’ tired of ’em years ’fore he died.” - </p> - <p> - It was the girl’s turn to laugh. - </p> - <p> - “It’s a strange new fit of piety ye’ve on yeh, O’Mahony,” she said, with - the familiarity of a spoiled pet. “Sure, when I tell the nuns, they’ll be - lookin’ to see you build up a whole foine new convint for ‘em without - delay.” - </p> - <p> - “No; I’m savin’ that till you git to be the boss nun,” said The O’Mahony, - dryly, and with a grin. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis older than Methusalem ye’ll be thin!” asked the child, - laughingly. And with that she seized his hand once more and dragged him - forward to a closer inspection of the ruins. - </p> - <p> - Some hours later, having been driven across country to Dunmanway by - Malachy, and thence taken the local train onward, The O’Mahony found - himself in the station at Ballineen, with barely time enough to hurry - across the tracks and leap into the train which was already starting - westward. In this he was borne back over the road he had just traversed, - until a stop was made at Manch station. The O’Mahony alighted here, much - pleased with the strategy which made him appear to have come from the - east. He took an outside car, and was driven some two miles into the - bleak, mountainous country beyond Toome, to a wayside inn known as - Kearney’s Retreat. Here he dismounted, bidding the carman solace himself - with drink, and wait. - </p> - <p> - Entering the tavern, he paused at the bar and asked for two small bottles - of porter to be poured in one glass. Two or three men were loitering about - the room, and he spoke just loud enough to make sure that all might hear - him. Then, having drained the glass, and stood idly conversing for a - minute or two with the woman at the bar, he made his way through a side - door into the adjoining ball alley, where some young fellows of the - neighborhood chanced to be engaged in a game. - </p> - <p> - He stood apart, watching their play, for only a few moments. Then one of - the men whom he had seen but not looked closely at in the bar, came up to - him, and said from behind, in an interrogative whisper: - </p> - <p> - “Captain Harrier, I believe?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” said The O’Mahony, “Captain Harrier—” with a vague notion of - having heard that voice before. - </p> - <p> - Then he turned, and in the straggling roof-light of the alley beheld the - other’s face. It taxed to the utmost every element of self-possession in - him to choke down the exclamation which sprang to his lips. - </p> - <p> - The man before him was Linsky!—Linsky risen from the dead, with the - scarred gash visible on his throat, and the shifty blue-green eyes still - bloodshot, and set with reddened eyelids in a freckled face. - </p> - <p> - “Yes—Captain—Harrier,” he repeated, lingering upon each word, - as his brain fiercely strove to assert mastery over amazement, - apprehension and perplexity. - </p> - <p> - The new-comer looked full into the The O’Mahony’s face without any sign - whatever of recognition. - </p> - <p> - “Thin I’m to place mesilf at your disposal,” he said, briefly. “You know - more of what’s in the air than I do, no doubt. Everything is arranged, I - hear, for rising in both Cork an’ Tralee to-morrow, an’ in manny places in - both counties besides. Officially, however, I know nothing of this—an’ - have no right to know. I’m just to put mysilf at your command, and deliver - anny messages you desire to sind to other cinters in your district. Here’s - me papers.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony barely glanced at the inclosures of the envelope handed him. - They took the familiar form of a business letter of introduction, and a - commercial contract, signed by a firm-name which to the uninitiated bore - no significance. He noted that the name given was “Major Lynch.” He - observed also, with satisfaction, that his hand, as it held the papers, - was entirely steady. “Everybody’s been notified,” he said, after a time, - instinctively assuming a slight hoarseness of speech. “I’ve been all over - the ground, myself. You can meet me—let’s see—say at the - bottom of the black rock jest overlookin’ the marteller tower at——at - eleven o’clock, sharp, to-morrow forenoon. The rocks behind the tower, - mind—t’other side of the coast-guard houses. You’ll see me land from - my boat.” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll not fail,” said the other. “I can bring a gun—moryah, I’m - shooting at say-gulls.” - </p> - <p> - “They ain’t much need of that,” responded The O’Mahony. “You might git - stopped an’ questioned. There’ll be guns enough. Of course, the takin’ of - the tower’ll be as easy as rollin’ off a log. The thing’ll be to hold it - afterward.” - </p> - <p> - “We’ll howld whatever we take, sir, all Ireland over,” said Major Lynch, - with enthusiasm. - </p> - <p> - “I hope so! Good-bye. Mind, eleven sharp,” was the response, and the two - men separated. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony did not wait for the finish of the game of ball, but - sauntered out of the alley through the end door, walked to his car, and - set off direct for Toome. At this place he decided to drive on to - Dunmanway station. Dismissing the carman at the door, and watching his - departure, he walked over to the hotel, joined the waiting Malachy, and - soon was well on his jolting way back to Muirisc. - </p> - <p> - Curiously enough, the bearing of Linsky’s return upon his own personal - fortunes and safety bore a very small part in The O’Mahony’s meditations, - as he clung to his seat over the rough homeward road. All that might take - care of itself, and he pushed it almost contemptuously aside in his mind. - What he did ponder upon unceasingly, and with growing distrust, was the - suspicion with which the manner of the man’s offer to deliver messages had - inspired him. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XII—A TALISMAN AND A TRAITOR - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>t five o’clock on - this February morning it was still dark. For more than half an hour a - light had been from time to time visible, flitting about in the inhabited - parts of the castle. There was no answering gleams from any of the cottage - windows, along the other side of the village green; but all the same, - solitary figures began to emerge from the cabins, until eighteen men had - crossed the open space and were gathered upon the little stone pier at the - edge of the <i>muirisc</i>. They stood silently together, with only now - and again a whispered word, waiting for they knew not what. - </p> - <p> - Presently, by the faint semblance of light which was creeping up behind - the eastern hills, they saw Jerry, Malachy and Dominic approaching, each - bearing a burden on his back. These were two of the long coffin-like boxes - and two kegs, one prodigiously heavy, the other by comparison light. They - were deposited on the wharf without a word, and the two first went back - again, while Dominic silently led the others in the task of bestowing what - all present knew to be guns, lead and powder, on board the <i>Hen Hawk</i>. - This had been done, and the men had again waited for some minutes before - The O’Mahony made his appearanee. - </p> - <p> - He advanced through the obscure morning twilight with a brisk step, - whistling softly as he came. The men noted that he wore shooting-clothes, - with gaiters to the knee, and a wide-brimmed, soft, black hat, even then - known in Ireland as the American hat, just as the Americans had previously - called it the Kossuth. - </p> - <p> - Half-way, but within full view of the waiting group, he stopped, and - looked critically at the sky. Then he stepped aside from the path, and - took off this hat of his. The men wondered what it meant. - </p> - <p> - Jerry was coming along again from the castle, his arms half filled with - parcels. He stopped beside the chief, and stood facing the path, removing - his cap as well. - </p> - <p> - Then the puzzled observers saw Malachy looming out of the misty shadows, - also bare-headed, and carrying at arms length before him a square case, - about in bulk like a hat-box. As he passed The O’Mahony and Jerry they - bowed, and then fell in behind him, and marched, still uncovered, toward - the landing-place. - </p> - <p> - The tide was at its flood, and the <i>Hen Hawk</i> had been hauled by - ropes up close to the wharf. Malachy, with stolid face and solemn mien, - strode in fine military style over the gunwale and along the flush deck to - the bow. Here he deposited his mysterious burden, bowed to it, and then - put on the hat he had been carrying under his arm. - </p> - <p> - The men crowded on board at this—all save two, who now rowed forward - in a small boat, and began pulling the <i>Hen Hawk</i> out over the bar - with a hawser. As the unwieldy craft slowly moved, The O’Mahony turned a - long, ruminative gaze upon the sleeping hamlet they were leaving behind. - The whole eastern sky was awake now with light—light which lay in - brilliant bars of lemon hue upon the hill-tops, and mellowed upward - through opal and pearl into fleecy ashen tints. The two in the boat - dropped behind, fastened their tiny craft to the stern, and clambered on - board. - </p> - <p> - A fresh, chill breeze caught and filled the jib once they had passed the - bar, and the crew laid their hands upon the ropes, expecting orders to - hoist the mainsail and mizzen-sheets. But The O’Mahony gave no sign, and - lounged in silence against the tiller, spitting over the taffrail into the - water, until the vessel had rounded the point and stood well off the - cliffs, out of sight of Muirisc, plunging softly along through the swell. - Then he beckoned Dominic to the helm, and walked over toward the mast, - with a gesture which summoned the whole score of men about him. To them he - began the first speech he had ever made in his life: - </p> - <p> - “Now, boys,” he said, “prob’ly you’ve noticed that the name’s been painted - off the starn of this ere vessel, over night. You must ’a’ figured - it out from that, that we’re out on the loose, so to speak. Thay’s only a - few of ye that have ever known me as a Fenian. It was agin the rules that - you should know me, but I’ve known you all, an’ I’ve be’n watchin’ you - drill, night after night, unbeknown to you. In fact, it come to the same - thing as my drillin’ you myself—because, until I taught your center, - Jerry, he knew about as much about it as a pig knows about ironin’ a - shirt. Well, now you all see me. I’m your boss Fenian in these parts.” - </p> - <p> - “Huroo!” cried the men, waving their hats. - </p> - <p> - I don’t really suppose this intelligence surprised them in the least, but - they fell gracefully in with The O’Mahony’s wish that it should seem to do - so, as is the polite wont of their race. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” he continued, colloquially, “here we are! We’ve been waitin’ and - workin’ for a deuce of a long time. Now, at last, they’s somethin’ for us - to do. It ain’t my fault that it didn’t come months and months ago. But - that don’t matter now. What I want to know is: are you game to follow me?” - </p> - <p> - “We are, O’Mahony!” they called out, as one man. - </p> - <p> - “That’s right. I guess you know me well enough by this time to know I - don’t ask no man to go where I’m afeared to go myself. There’s goin’ to be - some fightin’, though, an’ you fellows are new to that sort of thing. Now, - I’ve b’en a soldier, on an’ off, a good share of my life. I ain’t a bit - braver than you are, only I know more about what it’s like than you do. - An’ besides, I should be all-fired sorry to have any of ye git hurt. - You’ve all b’en as good to me as your skins could hold, an’ I’ll do my - best to see you through this thing, safe an’ sound.” - </p> - <p> - “Cheers for The O’Mahony!” some one cried out, excitedly; but he held up a - warning hand. - </p> - <p> - “Better not holler till you git out o’ the woods,” he said, and then went - on: “Seein’ that you’ve never, any of you, be’n under fire, I’ve thought - of somethin’ that’ll help you to keep a stiff upper-lip, when the time - comes to need it. A good many of you are O’Mahonys born; all of you come - from men who have followed The O’Mahony of their time in battle. Well, in - them old days, you know, they used to carry their <i>cathach</i> with - them, to bring ’em luck, same as American boys spit on their bait - when they’re fishin’. So I’ve had Malachy, here, bring along a box, - specially made for the purpose, an’ it’s chuck full of the bones of a - family saint of mine. We found him—me an’ Jerry—after the wind - had blown part of the convent down, layin’ just where he was put when he - died, with the crucifix in his hands, and a monk’s gown on. I ain’t a very - good man, an’ p’r’aps you fellows have noticed that I ain’t much of a hand - for church, or that sort of thing; but I says to myself, when I found this - dead an’ dried body of an O’Mahony who <i>was</i> pious an’ good an’ all - that: ‘You shall come along with us, friend, an’ see our tussle through.’ - He was an Irishman in the days when Irishmen run their own country in - their own way, an’ I thought he’d be glad to come along with us now, an’ - see whether we was fit to call ourselves Irishmen, too. An’ I reckon - you’ll be glad, too, to have him with us.” - </p> - <p> - Stirred by a solitary impulse, the men looked toward the box at the bow—a - rudely built little chest, with strips of worn leather nailed to its sides - and top—and took off their hats. - </p> - <p> - “We are, O’Mahony!” they cried. - </p> - <p> - “Up with your sails, then!” The O’Mahony shouted, with a sudden change to - eager animation. And in a twinkling the <i>Hen Hawk</i> had ceased dal - lying, and, with stiffly bowed canvas and a buoyant, forward careen, was - kicking the spray behind her into the receding picture of the Dunmanus - cliffs. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - Nearly five hours later, a little council, or, one might better say, - dialogue of war, was held at the stern of the speeding vessel. The rifles - had long since been taken out and put together, and the cartridges which - Jerry had already made up distributed. The men were gathered forward, - ready for whatever adventure their chief had in mind. - </p> - <p> - “I’m goin’ to lay to in a minute or two,” confided The O’Mahony to Jerry, - in an undertone. - </p> - <p> - Jerry looked inquiringly up and down the deserted stretch of brown - headlands before them. Not a sign of habitation was in view. - </p> - <p> - “Is it <i>this</i> we’ve come to besayge and capture?” he asked, with - incredulity. - </p> - <p> - “No. Right round that corner, though, lays the marteller tower we’re - after. Up to yesterday my plan was jest to sail bang up to her an’ walk - in. But somethin ’s happened to change my notions. They’ve sent a - fellow—an American Irishman—to be what they call my ‘cojutor.’ - I don’t jest know what it means; but, whatever it is, I don’t think much - of it. He’s waitin’ over there for me to land. Well, now, I’m goin’ to - land here instid, an’ take five of the men with me, an’ kind o’ santer - down toward the tower from the land side, keepin’ behind the hedges. - You’ll stay on board here, with Dominic at the helm under your orders, and - only the jib and mizzen-top up, and jest mosey along into the cove toward - the tower, keepin’ your men out o’ sight and watchin’ for me. If there’s a - nigger in the fence, I’ll smoke him out that way.” - </p> - <p> - Some further directions in detail followed, and then the bulk of the - canvas was struck, and the vessel hove to. The small boat was drawn to the - side, and the landing party descended to it. One of their own number took - the oars, for it was intended to keep the boat in waiting on the beach. - Their guns lay in the bottom, and they were conscious of a novel weight of - ammunition in their pockets. They waved their hands in salution to the - friends and neighbors they were leaving, and then, with a vigorous sweep - of the oars, the boat went tossing on her course to the barren, rocky - shore. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony, curled up on the seat at the bow, scanned the wide prospect - with a roving scrutiny. No sail was visible on the whole horizon. A drab, - hazy stain over the distant sky-line told only that the track of the great - Atlantic steamers lay outward many miles. On the land side—where - rough, blackened boulders rose in ugly points from the lapping water, as - outposts to serried ranks of lichened rocks which, in their turn, - straggled backward in slanting ascent to the summit, masked by shaggy - growths of furze—no token of human life was visible. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0006" id="linkimage-0006"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0143.jpg" alt="0143 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0143.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - A landing-place was found, and the boat securely drawm up on shore beyond - highwater mark. Then The O’Mahony led the way, gun in hand, across the - slippery reach of wet sea-weed, and thence, by winding courses, obliquely - up the hillside. He climbed from crag to crag with the agility of a goat, - but the practiced Muirisc men kept close at his heels. - </p> - <p> - Arrived at the top, he paused in the shelter of the furze bushes to study - the situation. - </p> - <p> - It was a great and beautiful panorama upon which he looked meditatively - down. The broad bay lay proudly in the arms of an encircling wall of - cliffs, whose terraced heights rose and spread with the dignity of some - amphitheatre of the giants. At their base, the blue waters broke in a - caressing ripple of cream-like foam; afar off, the sunshine crowned their - purple heads with a golden haze. Through the center of this noble sweep of - sheltering hills cleft the wooded gorge of a river, whose mouth kissed the - strand in the screening shadow of a huge mound, reared precipitously above - the sea-front, but linked by level stretches of sward to the mainland - behind. On the summit of this mound, overlooking the bay, was one of those - curious old martello towers with which England marked the low comedy stage - of her panic about Bonaparte’s invasion. - </p> - <p> - The tower—a squat, circular stone fort, with a basement for magazine - purposes, and an upper story for defensive operations—kept its - look-out for Corsican ghosts in solitude. Considerably to this side, on - the edge of the cliff, was a white cluster of coast-guard houses, in the - yard of which two or three elderly men in sailor attire could be seen - sunning themselves. Away in the distance, on the farther bend of the bay, - the roofs and walls of a cluster of cottages were visible, and above - these, among the trees, scattered glimpses of wealthier residences. - </p> - <p> - Of all this vast spectacle The O’Mahony saw nothing but the martello - tower, and the several approaches to it past the coast-guard houses. He - chose the best of these, and led the way, crouching low behind the line of - hedges, until the whole party halted in the cover of a clump of young - sycamores, upon the edge of the open space leading to the mound. A hundred - feet away from them, at the base of a jagged bowlder of black slatish - substance, stood a man, his face turned toward the tower and the sea. It - was Linsky. - </p> - <p> - After a time he lifted his hand, as if in signal to some one beyond. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony, from his shelter behind, could see that the <i>Hen Hawk</i> - had rounded the point, and was lazily rocking her way along across the - bay, shoreward toward the tower. For a moment he assumed that Linsky’s - sign was intended for the vessel. - </p> - <p> - Then some transitory movement on the surface of the tower itself caught - his wandering glance, and in the instant he had mastered every detail of a - most striking incident. A man in a red coat had suddenly appeared at the - landward window of the martello tower, made a signal to Linskey, and - vanished like a flash. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony thoughtfully raised his rifle, and fastened his attention - upon that portion of Linsky’s breast and torso which showed above the - black, unshaken sight at the end of its barrel. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XIII—THE RETREAT WITH THE PRISONERS - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he Hen Hawk was - idly drifting into the cove toward the little fishing-smack pier of stone - and piles which ran out like a tongue from the lower end of the mound. - Only two of her men were visible on deck. A group of gulls wheeled and - floated about the thick little craft as she crawled landward. - </p> - <p> - These things The O’Mahony vaguely noted as a background to the figure of - the traitor by the rock, which he studied now with a hard-lined face and - stony glance over the shining rifle-barrel. - </p> - <p> - He hesitated, let the weapon sink, raised it again—then once for all - put it down. He would not shoot Linsky. - </p> - <p> - But the problem what to do instead pressed all the more urgently for - solution. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony pondered it gravely, with an alert gaze scanning the whole - field of the rock, the towered mound and the waters beyond for helping - hints. All at once his face brightened in token of a plan resolved upon. - He whispered some hurried directions to his companions, and then, gun in - hand, quitted his ambush. Bending low, with long, stealthy strides, he - stole along the line of yew hedge to the rear of the rock which sheltered - Linsky. He reached it without discovery, and, still noiselessly, half - slipped, half leaped down the earthern bank beside it. At this instant his - shadow betrayed him. Linsky turned, his lips opened to speak. Then, - without a word, he reeled and fell like a log under a terrific sidelong - blow on jaw and skull from the stock of The O’Mahony’s clubbed gun. - </p> - <p> - The excited watchers from the sycamore shield behind saw him fall, and saw - their leader spring upon his sinking form and drag it backward out of - sight of the martello tower. Linsky was wearing a noticeable russet-brown - short coat. They saw The O’Mahony strip this off the other’s prostrate - body and exchange it for his own. Then he put on Linsky’s hat—a - drab, low-crowned felt, pulled well over his eyes—and stood out - boldly in the noon sunlight, courting observation from the tower. He took - a handkerchief from his pocket and spread it out upon the black surface of - the rock, and began pacing up and down before it with his eyes on the - tower. - </p> - <p> - Presently the same red-coated apparition was momentarily visible at the - land-side window. The O’Mahony held up his hand and went through a - complicated gesture which should signify that he was coming over to the - tower, and desired the other to come down and talk with him. This other - gave a sign of comprehension and assent, and disappeared. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony walked, unarmed, and with a light, springing step, across the - sloping sward to the tower. He paused at the side of its gray wall for an - instant, to note that the <i>Hen Hawk</i> lay only a few feet distant from - the pier-end. Then he entered the open ground-door of the tower, and found - himself in a circular, low, stone room, which, though whitewashed, seemed - dark, after the bright sunlight outside. Some barrels stood in a row - against the wall, and one of these was filled with soiled cotton-waste - which had been used for cleaning guns. The newcomer helped himself to a - large handful of this, and took from his pocket a compact coil of stout - packing-cord. Then he moved toward the little iron staircase at the other - end of the chamber, and, leaning with his back against it, waited. - </p> - <p> - The next minute the door above opened, and the clatter of spurred boots - rang out on the metal steps. The O’Mahony’s sidelong glance saw two legs, - clad in blue regimental trowsers with a red stripe, descend past his head, - and then the flaring vision of a scarlet jacket. - </p> - <p> - “Well, they’re landing, it seems,” said the officer, as his foot was on - the bottom step. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony turned like a leopard, and sprang forward, flinging his arm - around the other’s neck, and jamming him backward against the steps and - wall, while, with his free hand, he thrust the greasy, noxious rags into - his mouth and face. The struggle between the two strong men was fierce for - a moment. Then the officer, blinded and choking under the gag, felt - himself being helplessly bound, as if with wires, so tightly were the - merciless ligatures drawn round arms and legs and head—and then - hoisted into mid-air, and ignominiously jolted forward through space, with - the effect of riding pickaback on a giant kangaroo. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony emerged from the tower, bent almost double under the burden - of the stalwart captive, who still kept up a vain, writhing attempt at - resistance. The whole episode had lasted scarcely two minutes, and no one - above seemed to have heard the few muffled sounds of the conflict. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0007" id="linkimage-0007"> </a> - </p> - <div class="fig" style="width:50%;"> - <img src="images/0151.jpg" alt="0151 " width="100%" /><br /> - </div> - <h5> - <a href="images/0151.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a> - </h5> - <p> - With a single glance toward the companions he had left in hiding among the - sycamores, he began a hasty, staggering course diagonally down the side of - the mound toward the water-front. He did not even stop to learn whether - pursuit was on foot, or if his orders had been obeyed concerning Linsky. - </p> - <p> - At the foot of the hill he had to force his way through a thick thorn - hedge to gain the roadway leading to the pier. Weighted as he was, the - task was a difficult one, and when it was at last triumphantly - accomplished, his clothes hung in tatters about him, and he was covered - with scratches. He doggedly made his way onward, however, with bowed, bare - head and set teeth, stumbling along the quay to the vessel’s edge. The <i>Hen - Hawk</i> had been brought up to the pier-corner, and The O’Mahony, - staggering over the gunwale, let his burden fall, none too gently, upon - the deck. - </p> - <p> - A score of yards to the rear, came, at a loping dog-trot, the five men he - had left behind him among the trees. One of them bore an armful of guns - and his master’s discarded coat and hat. Each of the others grasped either - a leg or an arm of the still insensible Linsky, and, as they in turn leapt - upon the vessel, they slung him, face downward and supinely limp, - sprawling beside the officer. - </p> - <p> - With all swiftness, sails were rattled up, and the weight of half-a-dozen - brawny shoulders laid against pike-poles to push the vessel off. - </p> - <p> - The tower had suddenly taken the alarm! The reverberating “boom-m-m” of a - cannon sent its echoes from cliff to cliff, and the casement windows under - the machicolated eaves were bristling with gun-barrels flashing in the - noon-day sun. - </p> - <p> - For one anxious minute—even as the red-coats began to issue, like a - file of wasps, from the doorway at the bottom of the tower—the sails - hung slack. Then a shifting land-breeze caught and filled the sheets, the - <i>Hen Hawk</i> shook herself, dipped her beak in the sunny waters—and - glided serenely forward. - </p> - <p> - She was standing out to sea, a fair hundred yards from land, when the - score of soldiers came to the finish of their chase on the pier-end, and - gazed, with hot faces and short breath, upon her receding hull. She was - still within range, and they instinctively half-poised their guns to - shoot. But here was the difficulty: The O’Mahony had lifted the - grotesquely bound and gagged figure of their commanding officer, and held - it upright beside him at the helm. - </p> - <p> - For this reason they forbore to shoot, and contented themselves with a - verbal volley of curses and shouts of rage, which may have startled the - circling gulls, but raised only a staid momentary smile on the gaunt face - of The O’Mahony. He shrilled back a prompt rejoinder in the teeth of the - breeze, which belongs to polite literature no more than did the cries to - which it was a response. - </p> - <p> - Thus the <i>Hen Hawk</i> ploughed her steady way out to open sea—until - the red-coats which had been dodging about on the heights above were lost - to sight through even the strongest glass, and the brown headlands of the - coast had become only dim shadows of blue haze on the sky line. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - Linsky had been borne below, to have his head washed and bandaged, and - then to sleep his swoon off, if so be that he was to recover sensibility - at all during what remained to him of terrestrial existence. The British - officer had even before that been relieved of the odious gun-rag gag, and - some of the more uncomfortable of his bonds. He had been given a seat, - too, on a coil of rope beside the capstan—against which he leaned in - obdurate silence, with his brows bent in a prolonged scowl of disgust and - wrath. More than one of the crew, and of the non-maritime Muirisc men as - well, had asked him if he wanted anything, and got not so much as a shake - of the head in reply. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony paced up and down the forward deck, for a long time, watching - this captive of his, and vaguely revolving in his thoughts the problem of - what to do with him. The taking of prisoners had been no part of his - original scheme. Indeed, for that matter, nothing of this original scheme - seemed to be left. He had had, he realized now, a distinct foreboding of - Linsky’s treachery. Yet its discovery had as completely altered everything - as if it had come upon him entirely unawares. He had done none of the - things which he had planned to do. The <i>cathach</i> had been brought for - nothing. Not a shot had been fired. The martello tower remained untaken. - </p> - <p> - When he ruminated upon these things he ground his teeth and pressed his - thin lips together. It was all Linsky’s doing. He had Linsky safe below, - however. It would be strange indeed if this fact did not turn out to have - interesting consequences; but there would be time enough later on to deal - with that. - </p> - <p> - The presence of the British officer was of more immediate importance. The - O’Mahony walked again past the capstan, and looked his prisoner over - askance. He was a tall man, well on in the thirties, slender, yet with - athletic shoulders; his close-cropped hair and short moustache were of the - color of flax; his face and neck were weather-beaten and browned. The face - was a good one, with shapely features and a straightforward expression, - albeit, seen now at its worst, under a scowl and the smear of the rags. - After much hesitation The O’Mahony finally made up his mind to speak, and - walked around to confront the officer with an amiable nod. - </p> - <p> - “S’pose you’re jest mad through an’ through at bein’ grabbed that <i>way</i> - an’ tied up like a calf goin’ to market, an’ run out in that sort o’ - style,” he said, in a cheerfully confidential tone. “I know <i>I’d</i> be - jest bilin’! But I hope you don’t bear no malice. It <i>had</i> to be - done, an’ done that way, too! You kin see that yourself.” - </p> - <p> - The Englishman looked up with surly brevity of glance at the speaker, and - then contemptuously turned his face away. He said never a word. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony continued, affably: - </p> - <p> - “One thing I’m sorry for: It <i>was</i> pritty rough to have your mouth - stuffed with gun-wipers; but, really, there wasn’t anything else handy, - and time was pressin’. Now what d’ye say to havin’ a drink—jest to - rense the taste out o’ your mouth?” - </p> - <p> - The officer kept his eyes fixed on the distant horizon. His lips twitched - under the mustache with a movement that might signify temptation, but more - probably reflected an impulse to tell his questioner to go to the devil. - Whichever it was he said nothing. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony spoke again, with the least suspicion of acerbity in his - tone. - </p> - <p> - “See here,” he said; “don’t flatter yourself that I’m worryin’ much - whether you take a drink or not; an’ I’m not a man that’s much given to - takin’ slack from anybody, whether they wear shoulder-straps or not. - You’re my pris’ner. I took you—took you myself, an’ let you have a - good lively rassle for your money. It wasn’t jest open an’ aboveboard, - p’r’aps, but then you was layin’ there with your men hid, dependin’ on a - sneak an’ a traitor to deliver me an’ my fellows into your hands. So it’s - as broad as ’tis long. Only I don’t want to make it especially - rough for you, an’ I thought I’d offer you a drink, an’ have a talk with - you about what’s to be done next. But if you’re too mad to talk or drink, - either, why, I kin wait till you cool down.” - </p> - <p> - Once more the officer looked up, and this time, after some hesitation, he - spoke, stiffly; “I <i>should</i> like some whisky and water, if you have - it—and will be good enough,” he said. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony brought the beverage from below with his own hand. Then, as - on a sudden thought, he took out his knife, knelt down and cut all the - cords which still bound the other’s limbs. - </p> - <p> - The officer got gingerly up on his feet, kicked his legs out straight and - stretched his arms. - </p> - <p> - “I wish you had done that before,” he said, taking the glass and eagerly - drinking off the contents. - </p> - <p> - “I dunno why I didn’t think of it,” said The O’Mahony, with genuine - regret. “Fact is, I had so many other things on my mind. This findin’ - yourself sold out by a fellow that you trusted with your life is enough to - kerflummux any man.” - </p> - <p> - “That ought not to surprise any Irishman, I should think,” said the other, - curtly. “However much Irish conspiracies may differ in other respects, - they’re invariably alike in one thing. There’s always an Irishman who - sells the secret to the government.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony made no immediate answer. The bitter remark had suddenly - suggested to him the possibility that all the other movements in Cork and - Kerry, planned for that day, had also been betrayed! He had been too - gravely occupied with his own concerns to give this a thought before. As - he turned the notion over now in his mind, it assumed the form of a - settled conviction of universal treachery. - </p> - <p> - “There’s a darned sight o’ truth in what you say,” he assented, seriously, - after a pause. - </p> - <p> - The tone of the reply took the English officer by surprise. He looked up - with more interest, and the expression of cold sulkiness faded from his - face. “You got off with great luck,” he said. “If they had many more like - you, perhaps they might do something worth while. You’re an - Irish-American, I fancy? And you have seen military service?” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony answered both questions with an affirmative nod. - </p> - <p> - “Then I’m astonished,” the officer went on, “that you and men like you, - who know what war is really like, should come over here, and spend your - money and risk your lives and liberty, without the hope of doing anything - more than cause us a certain amount of bother. As a soldier, you must know - that you have no earthly chance of success. The odds are ten thousand to - one against you.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony’s eyes permitted themselves a momentary twinkle. “Well, now, - mister,” he said, carelessly; “I dunno so much about that. Take you an’ - me, now, f’r instance, jest as we stand: I don’t reckon that bettin’ men - ’u’d precisely tumble over one another in the rush to put their - money on <i>you</i>. Maybe I’m no judge, but that’s the way it looks to - me. What do you think yourself, now—honest Injun?” - </p> - <p> - The Englishman was not responsive to this light view of the situation. He - frowned again, and pettishly shrugged his shoulders. - </p> - <p> - “Of course, I did not refer to <i>that!</i>” he said. “My misadventure is - ridiculous and—ah—personally inconvenient—but it—ah—isn’t - war. You take nothing by it.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes—I’ve taken a good deal—too much, in fact,” said The - O’Mahony, going off into a brown study over the burden of his acquisitions - which his words conjured up. He paced up and down beside his prisoner for - a minute or two. Then he halted, and turned to him for counsel. - </p> - <p> - “What do you think, yourself, would be the best thing for me to do with - you, now’t I’ve got you?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - “Oh—really!—really, I must decline to advise with you upon the - subject,” the other replied, frostily. - </p> - <p> - “On the one hand,” mused The O’Mahony, aloud, “you got scooped in afore - you had time to fire a shot, or do any mischief at all—so ’t - we don’t owe you no grudge, so to speak. Well, that’s in your favor. And - then there’s your mouth rammed full of gun-waste—that ought to count - some on your side, too.” - </p> - <p> - The Englishman looked at him, curiosity struggling with dislike in his - glance, but said nothing. - </p> - <p> - “On ’t’ other hand,” pursued The O’Mahony, “you ain’t quite a - prisoner of war, because you was openly dealin’ with a traitor and spy, - and playin’ to come the gouge game over me an’ my men. That’s a good deal - ag’in’ you. For sake of argument, let’s say the thing is a saw-off, so far - as what’s happened already is concerned. The big question is: What’s goin’ - to happen?” - </p> - <p> - “Really—” the officer began again, and then closed his lips - abruptly. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” the other went on, “that’s where the shoe pinches. I s’pose now, if - I was to land you on the coast yonder, anywhere, you wouldn’t give your - word to not start an alarm for forty-eight hours, would you?” - </p> - <p> - “Certainly not!” said the Englishman, with prompt decision. - </p> - <p> - “No, I thought not. Of course, the alarm’s been given hours ago, but your - men didn’t see me, or git enough of a notion of my outfit to make their - description dangerous. It’s different with you.” - </p> - <p> - The officer nodded his head to indicate that he was becoming interested in - the situation, and saw the point. - </p> - <p> - “So that really the most sensible thing I could do, for myself and my men, - ’u’d be to lash you to a keg of lead and drop you overboard—wouldn’t - it, now?” - </p> - <p> - The Englishman kept his eyes fixed on the middle distance of gently, - heaving waters, and did not answer the question. The O’Mahony, watching - his unmoved countenance with respect, made pretense of waiting for a - reply, and leaned idly against the capstan to fill his pipe. After a long - pause he was forced to break the silence. - </p> - <p> - “It sounds rough,” he said; “but it’s the safest way out of the thing. Got - a wife an’ family?” - </p> - <p> - The officer turned for the fraction of an instant to scrowl indignantly, - the while he snapped out: - </p> - <p> - “That’s none of your d——d business!” - </p> - <p> - Whistling softly to himself, with brows a trifle lifted to express - surprise, The O’Mahony walked the whole length of the deck and back, - pondering this reply: - </p> - <p> - “I’ve made up my mind,” he announced at last, upon his return. “We’ll land - you in an hour or so—or at least give you the dingey and some food - and drink, and let you row yourself in, say, six or seven miles. You can - manage it all right before nightfall—an’ I’ll take my chances on - your startin’ the hue-an’-cry.” - </p> - <p> - “Understand, I promise nothing!” interposed the other. - </p> - <p> - “No, that’s all right,” said The O’Mahony. “Mind, if I thought there was - any way by which you was likely to get these men o’ mine into trouble, I’d - have no more scruple about jumpin’ you into the water there than I would - about pullin’ a fish out of it. But, as I figure it out, they don’t stand - in any danger. As for me—well, as I said, I’ll take my chances. - It’ll make me a heap o’ trouble, I dare say, but I deserve that. This trip - o’ mine’s been a fool-performance from the word ‘go,’ and it’s only fair I - should pay for it.” - </p> - <p> - The Englishman looked up at the yawl rigging, taut under the strain of - filled sails; at the men huddled together forward; last of all at his - captor. His eyes softened. - </p> - <p> - “You’re not half a bad sort,” he said, “in—ah—spite of the - gun-waste. I should think it likely that your men would never be troubled, - if they go home, and—ah—behave sensibly.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony nodded as if a pledge had been given. - </p> - <p> - “That’s what I want,” he said. “They are simply good fellows who jest went - into this thing on my account.” - </p> - <p> - “But in all human probability,” the officer went on, “<i>you</i> will be - caught and punished. It will be a miracle if you escape.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony blew smoke from his pipe with an incredulous grin, and the - other went on: - </p> - <p> - “It does not rest alone with me, I assure you. A minute detailed - description of your person, Captain Harrier, has been in our possession - for two days.” - </p> - <p> - “I-gad! that reminds me,” broke in The O’Mahony, his face darkening as he - spoke—“the man who gave you that name and that description is lyin’ - down-stairs with a cracked skull.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know that it is any part of my duty,” said the officer; “to - interest myself in that person, or—ah—what befalls him.” - </p> - <p> - “No,” said The O’Mahony, “I guess not! I guess not!” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XIV.—THE REINTERMENT OF LINSKY. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he red winter sun - sank to hide itself below the waste of Atlantic waters as the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, - still held snugly in the grasp of the breeze, beat round the grim cliffs - of Three-Castle Head, and entered Dun-manus Bay. The Englishman had been - set adrift hours before, and by this time, no doubt, the telegraph had - spread to every remotest point on the Southern and Western coast warning - descriptions of the vessel and its master. Perhaps even now their winged - flight into the west was being followed from Cape Clear, which lay behind - them in the misty and darkening distance. Still the <i>Hen Hawk’s</i> - course was confidently shaped homeward, for many miles of bog and moorland - separated Muirisc from any electric current. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony had hung in meditative solitude over the tiller for hours, - watching the squatting groups of retainers playing silently at - “spoil-five” on the forward deck, and revolving in his mind the thousand - and one confused and clashing thoughts which this queer new situation - suggested. As the sun went down he called to Jerry, and the two, standing - together at the stern, looked upon the great ball of fire descending - behind the gray expanse of trackless waters, without a word. Rude and - untutored as they were, both were conscious, in some vague way, that when - this sun should rise again their world would be a different thing. - </p> - <p> - “Well, pard,” said the master, when only a bar of flaming orange marked - where the day had gone, “it’ll be a considerable spell, I reckon, afore I - see that sort o’ thing in these waters again.” - </p> - <p> - “Is it l’avin’ the country we are, thin?” asked Jerry, in a sympathetic - voice. - </p> - <p> - “No, not exactly. You’ll stay here. But <i>I</i> cut sticks to-morrow.” - </p> - <p> - “Sure, then, it’s not alone ye’ll be goin’. Egor! man, didn’t I take me - Bible-oath niver to l’ave yeh, the longest day ye lived? Ah—now, - don’t be talkin’!” - </p> - <p> - “That’s all right, Jerry—but it’s got to be that way,” replied The - O’Mahony, in low regretful tones. “I’ve figured it all out. It’ll be - mighty tough to go off by myself without you, pard, but I can’t leave the - thing without somebody to run it for me, and you are the only one that - fills the bill. Now don’t kick about it, or make a fuss, or think I’m - using you bad. Jest say to yourself—‘Now he’s my friend, an’ I’m - his’n, and if he says I can be of most use to him here, why that settles - it.’ Take the helm for a minute, Jerry. I want to go for’ard an’ say a - word to the men.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony looked down upon the unintelligible game being played with - cards so dirty that he could not tell them apart, and worn by years of use - to the shape of an egg, and waited with a musing smile on his face till - the deal was exhausted. The players and onlookers formed a compact group - at his knees, and they still sat or knelt or lounged on the deck as they - listened to his words. - </p> - <p> - “Boys,” he said, in the gravely gentle tone which somehow he had learned - in speaking to these men of Muirisc, “I’ve been tellin’ Jerry somethin’ - that you’ve got a right to know, too. I’m goin’ to light out to-morrow—that - is, quit Ireland for a spell. It may be for a good while—maybe not. - That depends. I hate like the very devil to go—but it’s better for - me to skip than to be lugged off to jail, and then to state’s prison—better - for me an’ better for you. If I get out, the rest of you won’t be - bothered. Now—hold on a minute till I git through!—now between - us we’ve fixed up Muirisc so that it’s a good deal easier to live there - than it used to be. There’ll be more mines opened up soon, an’ the lobster - fact’ry an’ the fishin’ are on a good footin’ now. I’m goin’ to leave - Jerry to keep track o’ things, along with O’Daly, an’ they’ll let me know - regular how matters are workin’, so you won’t suffer by my not bein’ - here.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah—thin—it’s our hearts ’ll be broken entirely wid the - grief,” wailed Dominic, and the others, seizing this note of woe as their - key, broke forth in a chorus of lamentation. - </p> - <p> - They scrambled to their feet with uncovered heads, and clustered about - him, jostling one another for possession of his hands, and affectionately - patting his shoulders and stroking his sleeves, the while they strove to - express in their own tongue, or in the poetic phrases they had fashioned - for themselves out of a practical foreign language, the sincerity of their - sorrow. But the Irish peasant has been schooled through many generations - to face the necessity of exile, and to view the breaking of households, - the separation of kinsmen, the recurring miseries attendant upon an - endless exodus across the seas, with the philosophy of the inevitable. - None of these men dreamed of attempting to dissuade The O’Mahony from his - purpose, and they listened with melancholy nods of comprehension when he - had secured silence, and spoke again: - </p> - <p> - “You can all see that it’s <i>got</i> to be,” he said, in conclusion. “And - now I want you to promise me this: I don’t expect you’ll have trouble with - the police. They won’t get over from Balleydehob for another day or two—and - by that time I shall be gone, and the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, too—an’ if - they bring over the dingey I gave the Englishman to land in, why, of - course there won’t be a man, woman or child in Muirisc that ever laid eyes - on it before.” - </p> - <p> - “Sure, Heaven ’u’d blast the eyes that ’u’d recognize that - same boat,” said one, and the others murmured their confidence in the - hypothetical miracle. - </p> - <p> - “Well, then, what I want you to promise is this: That you’ll go on as you - have been doin’, workin’ hard, keepin’ sober, an’ behavin’ yourselves, an’ - that you’ll mind what Jerry says, same as if I said it myself. An’ more - than that—an’ now this is a thing I’m specially sot on—that - you’ll look upon that little gal, Kate O’Mahony, as if she was a daughter - of mine, an’ watch over her, an’ make things pleasant for her, an’—an’ - treat her like the apple of your eye.” - </p> - <p> - If there was an apple in The O’Mahony’s eye, it was for the moment hidden - in a vail of moisture. The faces of the men and their words alike - responded to his emotion. - </p> - <p> - Then one of them, a lean and unkempt old mariner, who even in this keen - February air kept his hairy breast and corded, sunburnt throat exposed, - and whose hawk-like eyes had flashed through fifty years of taciturnity - over heaven knows what wild and fantastic dreams born of the sea, spoke - up: - </p> - <p> - “Sir, by your l’ave, I’ll mesilf be her bodyguard and her servant, and - tache her the wather as befits her blood, and keep the very sole of her - fut from harrum.” - </p> - <p> - “Right you are, Murphy,” said The O’Mahony. “Make that your job.” - </p> - <p> - No one remembered ever having heard Murphy speak so much at one time - before. To the surprise of the group, he had still more to say. - </p> - <p> - “And, sir—I’m not askin’ it be way of ricompinse,” the fierce-faced - old boatman went on—“but w’u’d your honor grant us wan requist?” - </p> - <p> - “You’ve only got to spit ’er out,” was the hearty response. - </p> - <p> - “Thin, sir, give us over the man ye ’ve got down stairs.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony’s face changed its expression. He thought for a moment; then - asked: - </p> - <p> - “What to do?” - </p> - <p> - “To dale wid this night!” said Murphy, solemnly. - </p> - <p> - There was a pause of silence, and then the clamor of a dozen eager voices - clashing one against the other in the cold wintry twilight: - </p> - <p> - “Give him over, O’Mahony!” “L’ave him to us!” “Don’t be soilin’ yer own - hands wid the likes of him!” “Oh, l’ave him to us!” these voices pleaded. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony hesitated for a minute, then slowly shook his head. - </p> - <p> - “No, boys, don’t ask it,” he said. “I’d like to oblige you, but I can’t. - He’s <i>my</i> meat—I can’t give him up!” - </p> - <p> - “W’u’d yer honor be for sparin’ him, thin?” asked one, with incredulity - and surprise. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony of Muirisc looked over the excited group which surrounded - him, dimly recognizing the strangeness of the weirdly interwoven qualities - which run in the blood of Heber—the soft tenderness of nature which - through tears would swear loyalty unto death to a little child, shifting - on the instant to the ferocity of the wolf-hound burying its jowl in the - throat of its quarry. Beyond them were gathering the sea mists, as by - enchantment they had gathered ages before with vain intent to baffle the - sons of Milesius, and faintly in the halflight lowered the beetling cliffs - whereon The O’Mahonys, true sons of those sea-rovers, had crouched - watching for their prey this thousand of years. He could almost feel the - ancestral taste of blood in his mouth as he looked, and thought upon his - answer. - </p> - <p> - “No, don’t worry about his gitting off,” he said, at last. “I ’ll - take care of that. You’ll never see him again—no one on top of this - earth ’ll ever lay eyes on him again.” - </p> - <p> - With visible reluctance the men forced themselves to accept this - compromise. The <i>Hen Hawk</i> plunged doggedly along up the bay. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - Three hours later, The O’Mahony and Jerry, not without much stumbling and - difficulty, reached the strange subterranean chamber where they had found - the mummy of the monk. They bore between them the inert body of a man, - whose head was enveloped in bandages, and whose hands, hanging limp at - arm’s length, were discolored with the grime and mold from the stony path - over which they had dragged. They threw this burden on the mediaeval bed, - and, drawing long breaths of relief, turned to light some candles in - addition to the lantern Jerry had borne, and to kindle a fire on the - hearth. - </p> - <p> - They talked in low murmurs meanwhile. The O’Mahony had told Jerry - something of what part Linsky had played in his life. Jerry, without being - informed with more than the general outlines of the story, was able - swiftly to comprehend his master’s attitude toward the man—an - attitude compounded of hatred for his treachery of to-day and gratitude of - the services which he had unconsciously performed in the past. He - understood to a nicety, too, what possibilities there were in the plan - which The O’Mahony now unfolded to him, as the fire began crackling up the - chimney. - </p> - <p> - “I can answer for his gittin’ over that crack in the head,” said The - O’Mahony, heating and stirring a tin cup full of balsam over the flame. - “Once I’ve fixed this bandage on, we can bring him to with ammonia and - whisky, an’ give him some broth. He’ll live all right—an’ he’ll live - right here, d’ye mind. Whatever else happens, he’s never to git outside, - an’ he’s never to know where he is. Nobody but you is to so much as dream - of his bein’ down here—be as mum as an oyster about it, won’t you? - You’re to have sole charge of him, d’ye see—the only human being he - ever lays eyes on.” - </p> - <p> - “Egor! I’ll improve his moind wid grand discourses on trayson and - informin’ an’ betrayin’ his oath, and the like o’ that, till he’ll be fit - to die wid shame.” - </p> - <p> - “No—I dunno—p’r’aps it’d be better not to let him know <i>we</i> - know—jest make him think we’re his friends, hidin’ him away from the - police. However, that can take care of itself. Say whatever you like to - him, only—” - </p> - <p> - “Only don’t lay a hand on him—is it that ye were thinkin’?” broke in - Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, don’t lick him,” said The O’Mahony. “He’s had about the worst bat on - the head I ever saw a a man git an’ live, to start with. No—be - decent with him, an’ give him enough to eat. Might let him have a moderate - amount o’ drink, too.” - </p> - <p> - “I suppose there’ll be a great talk about his vanishin’ out o’ sight all - at wance among the Brotherhood,” suggested Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “That don’t matter a darn,” said the other. “Jest you go ahead, an’ tend - to your own knittin’, an’ let the Brotherhood whistle. We’ve paid a good - stiff price to learn what Fenianism is worth, and we’ve learned enough. - Not any more on my plate, thankee! Jest give the boys the word that the - jig is up—that there won’t be any more drillin’ or meanderin’ round - generally. And speakin’ o’ drink—” - </p> - <p> - A noise from the curtained bed in the alcove interrupted The O’Mahony’s - remarks upon this important subject. Turning, the two men saw that Linsky - had risen on the couch to a half-sitting posture, and, with a tremulous - hand, drawing aside the felt-like draperies, was staring wildly at them - out of blood-shot eyes. - </p> - <p> - “For the love of God, what is it?” he asked, in a faint and moaning voice. - </p> - <p> - “Lay down there!—quick!” called out The O’Mahony, sternly; and - Linsky fell back prone without a protest. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony had finished melting his gum, and he spread it now salve-like - upon a cloth. Then he walked over to where the wounded man lay, with - marvel-stricken eyes wandering over the archaic vaulted ceiling. - </p> - <p> - “Is it dead I am?” he groaned, with a vacuous glance at the new-comer. - </p> - <p> - “No, you’ve been badly hurt in battle,” said the other, in curt tones. “We - can pull you through, perhaps; but you’ve got to shut up an’ lay still. - Hold your head this way a little more—that’s it.” - </p> - <p> - The injured man submitted to the operation, for the most part, with - apparently closed eyes, but his next remark showed that he had been - gathering his wits together. - </p> - <p> - “And how’s the battle gone, Captain Harrier?” he suddenly asked. “Is - Oireland free from the oppressor at last?” - </p> - <p> - “No!” said The O’Mahony, with dry brevity—“but she’ll be free from - <i>you</i> for a spell, or I miss <i>my</i> guess most consumedly.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XV—“TAKE ME WITH YOU, O’MAHONY.” - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he fair-weather - promise of the crimson sunset was not kept. The morning broke bloodshot - and threatening, with dark, jagged storm-clouds scudding angrily across - the sky, and a truculent unrest moving the waters of the bay to lash out - at the rocks, and snarl in rising murmurs among themselves. - </p> - <p> - Every soul in Muirisc came soon enough to share this disquietude with the - elements. Such evil tidings as these, that The O’Mahony was quitting the - country, seemed veritably to take to themselves wings. The village, - despite the fact that the fishing season had not yet arrived, and that - there was nothing else to do, could not lie abed on such a morning, much - less sleep. Even the tiniest children, routed out from their nests of - straw close beside the chimney by the unwonted bustle, saw that something - was the matter. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony heard the intelligence at a somewhat later hour, even - as she dallied with that second cup of coffee, which, in her own phrase, - put a tail to the breakfast. It was brought to her by a messenger from the - convent, who came to say that the Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears desired - her immediate presence upon an urgent matter. Mrs. Fergus easily enough - put two and two together, as she donned her bonnet and <i>broché</i> - shawl. It was The O’Mahony’s departure that was to be discussed, and the - nuns were right in calling <i>that</i> important. She looked critically - over the irregular walls of the castle, as she passed it on her way to the - convent. Here she had been born; here she had lived in peace and plenty, - after her brother’s death, until the heir from America came to turn her - out. Who knew? Perhaps she was to go back again, after all. Mrs. Fergus - agreed that the news was highly important. - </p> - <p> - The first glance which she threw about her, after she had been ushered in - the reception-hall, revealed to her that not even she had guessed the full - importance of what was toward. - </p> - <p> - The three nuns sat on their accustomed bench at one side of the fire, and - behind them, in his familiar chimney-corner, palsied old Father Harrington - lolled and half-dozed over the biscuit he was nibbling to stay his stomach - after mass. At the table, before a formidable array of papers, was seated - Cormac O’Daly, and at his side sat the person whose polite name seemed to - be Diarmid MacEgan, but whom Muirisc knew and delighted in as Jerry. Mrs. - Fergus made a mental note of surprise at seeing him seated in such - company, and then carried her gaze on to cover the principal personage in - the room. It was The O’Mahony, looking very grave and preoccupied, and who - stood leaning against the chimney-mantel like a proprietor, who welcomed - her with a nod and motioned her to a seat. - </p> - <p> - It was he, too, who broke the silence which solemnly enveloped the - conference. - </p> - <p> - “Cousin Maggie,” he said, in explanation, to her, “we’ve got together this - little family party so early in the mornin’ for the reason that time is - precious. I’m goin’ away—for my health—in an hour or two, an’ - there are things to be arranged before I go. I may be away for years; - maybe I sha’n’t ever come back.” - </p> - <p> - “Sure the suddenness of it’s fit to take one’s breath away!” Mrs. Fergus - exclaimed, and put her plump white hand to her bosom. “I’ve nerves that - bad, O’Mahony,” she added. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, it is a sudden sort of spurt,” he assented. - </p> - <p> - “And it’s your health, you say! Sure, I used to look on you as the mortial - picture of a grand, strong man.” - </p> - <p> - “You can’t always tell by looks,” said The O’Mahony, gravely. “But—the - point’s this. I’m leaving O’Daly and Jerry here, as sort o’ joint bosses - of the circus, during my absence. Daly is to be ringmaster, so to speak, - while Jerry’ll be in the box-office, and kind o’ keep an eye to the whole - show, generally.” - </p> - <p> - “I lamint, sir, that I’m not able to congratulate you on the felicity of - your mettyphor,” said Cor-mac O’Daly, whose swart, thin-visaged little - face wore an expression more glum than ever. - </p> - <p> - “At any rate, you git at my meaning. I have signed two powers of attorney, - drawn up by O’Daly here as a lawyer, which gives them power to run things - for me, while I’m away. Everything is set out in the papers, straight and - square. I’m leaving my will, too, with O’Daly, an’ that I wanted specially - to speak to you about. I’ve got just one heir in this whole world, an’ - that’s your little gal, Katie. P’r’aps it’ll be as well not to say - anything to her about it, but I want you all to know. An’ I want you an’ - her to move back into my house, an live there jest as you did afore I - come. I’ve spoken to Mrs. Sullivan about it—she’s as good as a - farrow cow in a family—an’ she’ll stay right along with you, an’ - look after things. An’ Jerry here, he’ll see that your wheels are kept - greased—financially, I mean—an’—I guess that’s about - all. Only lookout for that little gal o’ yours as well as you know how—that’s - all. An’ I wish—I wish you’d send her over to me, to my house, in - half an hour or so—jest to say good-bye.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony’s voice had trembled under the suspicion of a quaver at the - end. He turned now, abruptly, took up his hat from the table, and left the - room, closely followed by Jerry. O’Daly rose as if to accompany them, - hesitated for a moment, and then seated himself again. - </p> - <p> - The mother superior had heretofore preserved an absolute silence. She bent - her glance now upon Mrs. Fergus, and spoke slowly: - </p> - <p> - “Ah, thin, Margaret O’Mahony,” she said, “d’ye mind in your day of good - fortune that, since the hour you were born, ye’ve been the child of our - prayers and the object of our ceaseless intercessions?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Fergus put out her rounded lower lip a little and, rising from her - chair, walked slowly over to the little cracked mirror on the wall, to run - a correcting finger over the escalloped line of her crimps. - </p> - <p> - “Ay,” she said at last, “I mind many things bechune me and you—not - all of thim prayers either.” - </p> - <p> - While Mrs. Sullivan and Jerry were hard at work packing the scant wardrobe - and meager personal belongings of the master for his journey, and the - greater part of the population of Muirisc stood clustered on the little - quay, watching the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, bemoaning their own impending - bereavement, and canvassing the incredible good luck of Malachy, who was - to be the companion in this voyage to unknown parts—while the wind - rose outside, and the waters tumbled, and the sky grew overcast with the - sullen menace of a winter storm—The O’Mahony walked slowly, hand in - hand with little Kate, through the deserted churchyard. - </p> - <p> - The girl had been weeping, and the tears still blurred her eyes and - stained her red cheeks with woe-begone smudges. She clung to her - companion’s hand, and pressed her head ever and again against his arm, but - words she had none. The man walked with his eyes bent on the ground and - his lips tightly closed together. So the two strolled in silence till they - had passed out from the place of tombs, and, following a path which wound - its way in ascent through clumps of budding furze and miniature defiles - among the rocks, had gained the summit of the cliff-wall, under whose - shelter the hamlet of Muirisc had for ages nestled. Here they halted, - looking down upon the gray ruins of castle, church and convent, upon - thatched cottage roofs, the throng on the quay, the breakers’ line of foam - against the rocks, and the darkened expanse of white-capped waters beyond. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t take on so, sis, any more; that’s a good gal,” said The O’Mahony, - at last, drawing the child’s head to his side, and gently stroking her - black hair. “It ain’t no good, an’ it breaks me all up. One thing I’m glad - of: It’s going to be rough outside. It seems to me I couldn’t ‘a’ stood it - to up an’ sail off in smooth, sunshiny weather. The higher she rolls the - better I’ll like it. It’s the same as havin’ somethin’ to bite on, when - you’ve got the toothache.” - </p> - <p> - Kate, for answer, rubbed her head against his sleeve, but said nothing. - </p> - <p> - After a long pause, he went on: “’Tain’t as if I was goin’ to be - gone forever an’ a day. Why, I may be poppin’ in any minit, jest when you - least expect it. That’s why I want you to study your lessons right along, - every day, so ’t when I turn up you’ll be able to show off A number - one. Maybe you’re bankin’ on my not bein’ able to tell whether your book - learnin’ is ‘all wool an’ a yard wide’ or not. I didn’t get much of a show - at school, I know. ’Twas ‘root hog or die’ with me when I was a - boy. But I’m jest a terror at askin’ questions. Why, I’ve busted up whole - schools afore now, puttin’ conundrums to ’m that even the - school-ma’ams couldn’t answer. So you look out for me when I come.” The - gentle effort at cheerfulness bore fruit not after its kind. Kate’s little - breast began to heave, and she buried her face against his coat. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony looked wistfully down upon the village and the bay, patting - the child’s shoulder in silent token of sympathy. Then an idea occurred to - him. With his finger under her chin, he lifted Kate’s face till her glance - met his. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, by the way,” he said, with animation, “have you got so you can write - pritty good?” - </p> - <p> - The girl nodded her head, and looked away. - </p> - <p> - “Why, then, look here,” he exclaimed, heartily, “what’s the matter with - your writin’ me real letters, say every few weeks, tellin’ me all that’s - goin’ on, an’ keepin’ me posted right up to date? Why, that’s jest - splendid! It’ll be almost the same as if I wasn’t away at all. Eh, won’t - it, skeezucks, eh?” He playfully put his arm around her shoulder, and they - began the descent of the path. The suggestion had visibly helped to - lighten her little heart, though she had said not a word. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes,” he went on, “an’ another thing I wanted to say: It ain’t a - thing that you must ever ask about—or ought to know anything about - it—but we went out yisterday an’ made fools of ourselves, an’ if I - hadn’t had the luck of a brindled heifer, we’d all been in jail to-day. Of - course, I don’t know for certain, but I shouldn’t wonder if my luck had - something to do with a—what d’ye call it?—yes, <i>cathach</i>—that - we toted along with us. Well, I’m goin’ to turn that box over for you to - keep, when we git down to the house. I wouldn’t open if it I was you—it - ain’t a pritty sight for a little gal—just a few dead men’s bones—but - the box itself is all right, an’ it can’t do you no harm, to say the - least. An’, moreover—why, here it is in my pocket—here’s a - ring we found on his thumb—cur’ous enough—that you must keep - for me, too. That makes it like what we read about in the story-books, eh? - A ring that the beauteous damsel, with the hay-colored hair, sends to - Alonzo when she gets in trouble, eh, sis?” - </p> - <p> - The child took the ring—a quaintly shaped thin band of gold, with a - carved precious stone of golden-brownish hue—and put it in her - pocket. Still she said nothing. - </p> - <p> - At ten in the forenoon, in the presence of all Muirisc, The O’Mahony at - last gently pushed his way through the throng of keening old women and - excited younger friends, and stepped over the gunwale upon the deck, and - Jerry and O’Daly restrained those who would have followed him. He had - forced his face into a half-smile, to which he clung resolutely almost to - the end. He had offered many parting injunctions: to work hard and drink - little; to send the children to school; to keep an absolute silence to all - outsiders, whether from Skull, Goleen, Crookhaven, or elsewhere, - concerning him and his departure—and many other things. He had - shaken hands a hundred times across the narrow bar of water between the - boat and pier; and now the men in the dingey out in front had the hawser - taut, and the <i>Hen Hawk</i> was moving under its strain, when a shrill - cry raised itself above the general clamor of lamentation and farewells. - </p> - <p> - At that moment of the vessel’s stirring, little Kate O’Mahony broke from - the group in which her mother and the nuns stood dignifiedly apart, and - ran wildly to the pier’s edge, where Jerry caught and for the moment held - her, struggling, over the widening chasm between the boat and the quay. - Her power to speak had come at last. - </p> - <p> - “Take me with you, O’Mahony!” she cried, fighting like a wild thing to - free herself. “Oh, take me with you! You promised! You promised! <i>Take</i> - me with you!” - </p> - <p> - It was then that The O’Mahony’s face lost, in a flash, its perfunctory - smile. He half stretched out his hand—then swung himself on his heel - and marched to the prow of the vessel. He did not look back again upon - Muirisc. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - An hour later a police-car, bearing five armed men, halted at the point on - the mountain-road from Durrus where Muirisc comes first in view. The - constables, gazing out upon the broad expanse of Dunmanus Bay, saw on the - distant water-line a yawl-rigged coasting vessel, white against the stormy - sky. Some chance whim suggested to their minds an interest in this craft. - </p> - <p> - But when they descended into Muirisc they could not find a soul who had - the remotest notion of what a yawl-rig meant, much less of the identity of - the lugger which, even as they spoke, had passed out of sight. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XVI—THE LADY OF MUIRISC. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>n the parish of - Kilmoe—which they pronounce with a soft prolonged “moo-h,” like the - murmuring call of one of their little bright-eyed, black-coated cows—the - inhabitants are wont to say that the next parish is America. - </p> - <p> - It is an ancient and sterile and storm-beaten parish, this Kilmoe, thrust - out in expiation of some forgotten sin or other to exist beyond the pale - of human companionship. Its sons and daughters, scattered in tiny, - isolated hamlets over its barren area, hear never a stranger’s voice—and - their own speech is slow and low of tone because the real right to make a - noise there belongs to the shrieking gulls and the wild, west wind and the - towering, foam-fanged waves, which dashed themselves, in tireless rivalry - with the thunder, against its cliffs. - </p> - <p> - Slow, too, in growth and ripening are the wits of the men of Kilmoe. They - must have gray hairs before they are accounted more than boys; and when, - from sheer old age they totter into the grave, the feeling of the parish - is that they have been untimely cut off just as they were beginning to get - their brains in fair working: order. Very often these aged men, if they - dally and loiter on the way to the tomb in the hope of becoming still - wiser, are given a sharp and peremptory push forward by starvation. It - would not do for the men of Kilmoe to know too much. If they did, they - would all go somewhere else to live—and then what would become of - their landlord? - </p> - <p> - Kilmoe once had a thriving and profitable industry, whereby a larger - population than it now contains kept body and soul together in more - intimate and comfortable relations than at present exist. The outlay - involved in this industry was very small, and the returns, though not - governed by any squalid, modern law of percentages, were, on the whole, - large. - </p> - <p> - It was all very simple. Whenever a stormy, wind-swept night set in, the - men of Kilmoe tied a lighted lantern on the neck of a cow, and drove the - animal to walk along the strand underneath the sea-cliffs. This light, - rising and sinking with the movements of the cow, bore a quaint and - interesting resemblance to the undulations of an illuminated buoy or boat, - rocked on gentle waves; and strange seafaring crafts bent their course in - confidence toward it, until they were undeceived. Then the men of Kilmoe - would sally forth, riding the tumbling breakers with great bravery and - address, in their boats of withes and stretched skin, and enter into - possession of all the stranded strangers’ goods and chattels. As for such - strangers as survived the wreck, they were sometimes sold into slavery; - more often they were merely knocked on the head. Thus Kilmoe lived much - more prosperously than in these melancholy latter days of dependence upon - a precarious potato crop. - </p> - <p> - In every family devoted to industrial pursuits there is one member who is - more distinguished for attention to the business than the others, and upon - whom its chief burdens fall. This was true of the O’Mahonys, who for many - centuries controlled and carried on the lucrative occupation above - described, on their peninsula of Ivehagh. There were branches of the sept - stationed in the more inland sea-castles of Rosbrin, Ardintenant, Leamcon - and Ballydesmond on the one side, and of Dunbeacon, Dunmanus and Muirisc - on the other, who did not expend all their energies upon this, their - genuine business, but took many vacations and indefinitely extended - holiday trips, for the improvement of their minds and the gratification of - their desire to whip the neighboring O’Driscolls, O’Sullivans, O’Heas and - O’Learys out of their boots. The record of these pleasure excursions, in - which sometimes the O’Mahonys returned with great booty and the heads of - their enemies on pikes, and some other times did not come home at all, - fills all the pages of the Psalter of Rosbrin, beside occupying a good - deal of space in the Annals of Innisfallen and of the Four Masters, and - needs not be enlarged upon here. - </p> - <p> - But it is evident that that gentleman of the family who, from choice or - sense of duty, lived in Kilmoe, must, have pursued the legitimate O’Mahony - vocation very steadily, without any frivolous interruptions or the waste - of time in visiting his neighbors. The truth is that he had no neighbors, - and nothing else under the sun with which to occupy his mind but the - affairs of the sea. This the observer will readily conclude when he stands - upon the promontory marked on the maps as Three-Castle Head, with the - whole world-dividing Atlantic at his feet, and looks over at the group of - ruined and moss-grown keeps which give the place its name. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - “Oh-h! Look there now, Murphy!” cried a tall and beautiful young woman, - who stood for the first time on this lofty sea-wall, viewing the somber - line of connected castles. “Sure, <i>here</i> lived the true O’Mahony of - the Coast of White Foam! Why, man, what were we at Muirisc but poor - crab-catchers compared wid <i>him?</i>” - </p> - <p> - She spoke in a tone of awed admiration, between long breaths of - wonderment, and her big eyes of Irish gray glowed from their cover of - sweeping lashes with surprised delight. She had taken off her hat—a - black straw hat, with a dignifiedly broad brim bound in velvet, and - enriched by a plume of the same somber hue—to save it from the wind, - which blew stiffly here; and this bold sea-wind, nothing loth, frolicked - boisterously with her dark curls instead. She put her hand on her - companion’s shoulder for steadiness, and continued the rapt gaze upon this - crumbling haunt of the dead and forgotten sea-lords. - </p> - <p> - Twelve years had passed since, as a child of eight, Kate O’Mahony had - screamed out in despair after the departing <i>Hen Hawk</i>. That vessel - had never cleft the waters of Dunmanus since, and the fleeting years had - converted the memory of its master, into a kind of heroic legendary myth, - over which the elders brooded fondly, but which the youngsters thought of - as something scarcely less remote than the Firbolgs, or the builders of - the “Danes’ forts” on the furze-crowned hills about. - </p> - <p> - But these same years, though they turned the absent into shadows, had made - of Kate a very lovely and complete reality. It would be small praise to - speak of her as the most beautiful girl on the peninsula, since there is - no other section of Ireland so little favored in that respect, to begin - with, and for the additional reason that whatever maidenly comeliness - there is existent there is habitually shrouded from view by close-drawn - shawls and enveloping hoods, even on the hottest of summer noon-days. For - all the stray traveller sees of young and pretty faces in Ivehagh, he - might as well be in the heart of the vailed (sp.) Orient. - </p> - <p> - And even with Kate, potential Lady of Muirisc though she was, this fashion - of a hat was novel. It seemed only yesterday since she had emerged from - the chrysalis of girlhood—girlhood with a shawl over its head, and - Heaven only knows what abysses of ignorant shyness and stupid distrust - inside that head. And, alas! it seemed but a swiftly on-coming to-morrow - before this new freedom was to be lost again, and the hat exchanged - forever for a nun’s vail. - </p> - <p> - If Kate had known natural history better, she might have likened her lot - to that of the May-fly, which spends two years underground in its larva - state hard at work preparing to be a fly, and then, when it at last - emerges, lives only for an hour, even if it that long escapes the bill of - the swallow or the rude jaws of the trout. No such simile drawn from - stonyhearted Nature’s tragedies helped her to philosophy. She had, - perhaps, a better refuge in the health and enthusiasm of her own youth. - </p> - <p> - In the company of her ancient servitor, Murphy, she was spending the - pleasant April days in visiting the various ruins of The O’Mahony’s on - Ivehagh. Many of these she viewed now for the first time, and the delight - of this overpowered and kept down in her mind the reflection that perhaps - she was seeing them all for the last time as well. - </p> - <p> - “But how, in the name of glory, did they get up and down to their boats, - Murphy?” she asked, at last, strolling further out toward the edge to - catch the full sweep of the cliff front, which rises abruptly from the - beach below, sheer and straight, clear three hundred feet. - </p> - <p> - “There’s never a nearer landing-place, thin, than where we left our boat, - a half-mile beyant here,” said Murphy. “Faith, miss, ’tis the - belafe they went up and down be the aid of the little people. ’T is - well known that, on windy nights, there do be grand carrin’s-on - hereabouts. Sure, in the lake forninst us it was that Kian O’Mahony saw - the enchanted woman with the shape on her of a horse, and died of the - sight. Manny’s the time me own father related to me that same.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, true; that <i>would</i> be the lake of the legend,” said Kate. “Let - us go down to it, Murphy. I’ll dip me hand for wance in water that’s been - really bewitched.” - </p> - <p> - The girl ran lightly down the rolling side of the hill, and across the - rock-strewn hollows and mounds which stretched toward the castellated - cliff. The base of the third and most inland tower was washed by a placid - fresh-water pond, covering an area of several acres, and heavily fringed - at one end with rushes. As she drew near a heron suddenly rose from the - reeds, hung awkwardly for a moment with its long legs dangling in the air, - and then began a slow, heavy flight seaward. On the moment Kate saw - another even more unexpected sight—the figure of a man on the edge - of the lake, with a gun raised to his shoulder, its barrel following the - heron’s clumsy course. Involuntarily she uttered a little warning shout to - the bird, then stood still, confused and blushing. Stiff-jointed old - Murphy was far behind. - </p> - <p> - The stranger had heard her, if the heron had not. He lowered his weapon, - and for a moment gazed wonderingly across the water at this unlooked-for - apparition. Then, with his gun under his arm, he turned and walked briskly - toward her. Kate cast a searching glance backward for Murphy in vain, and - her intuitive movement to draw a shawl over her head was equally - fruitless. The old man was still somewhere behind the rocks, and she had - only this citified hat and even that not on her head. She could see that - the advancing sportsman was young and a stranger. - </p> - <p> - He came up close to where she stood, and lifted his cap for an instant in - an off-hand way. Viewed thus nearly, he was very young, with a bright, - fresh-colored face and the bearing and clothes of a gentleman, “I’m glad - you stopped me, now that I think of it,” he said, with an easy readiness - of speech. “One has no business to shoot that kind of bird; but I’d been - tying about here for hours, waiting for something better to turn up, till - I was in a mood to bang at anything that came along.” - </p> - <p> - He offered this explanation with a nonchalant half-smile, as if confident - ol its prompt acceptance. Then his face took on a more serious look, as he - glanced a second time at her own flushed countenance. - </p> - <p> - “I hope I haven’t been trespassing,” he added, under the influence of this - revised impression. - </p> - <p> - Kate was, in truth, frowning at him, and there were no means by which he - could guess that it was the effect of nervous timidity rather than - vexation. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis not my land,” she managed to say at last, and looked back - again for Murphy. - </p> - <p> - “No—I didn’t think it was anybody’s land,” he remarked, essaying - another propitiatory smile. “They told me at Goleen that I could shoot as - much as I liked. They didn’t tell me, though, that there was nothing to - shoot.” - </p> - <p> - The young man clearly expected conversation; and Kate, stealing further - flash-studies of his face, began to be conscious that his manner and talk - were not specialty different from those of any nice girl of her own age. - She tried to think of something amiable to say. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis not the sayson for annything worth shooting,” she said, and - then wondered if it was an impertinent remark. - </p> - <p> - “I know that,” he replied. “But I’ve nothing else to do, just at the - moment, and you can keep yourself walking better if you’ve got a gun, and - then, of course, in a strange country there’s always the chance that - something curious <i>may</i> turn up to shoot. Fact is, I didn’t care so - much after all whether I shot anything or not. You see, castles are new - things to me—we don’t grow ’em where I came from—and - it’s fun to me to mouse around among the stones and walls and so on. But - this is the wildest and lonesomest thing I’ve run up against yet. I give - you my word, I’d been lying here so long, watching those mildewed old - towers there and wondering what kind of folks built ’em and lived - in ’em, that when I saw you galloping down the rocks here—upon - my word, I half thought it was all a fairy story. You know the poor people - really believe in that sort of thing, here. Several of them have told me - so.” - </p> - <p> - Kate actually felt herself smiling upon the young man. “I’m afraid you - can’t always believe them,” she said. “Some of them have deludthering ways - with strangers—not that they mane anny harm by it, poor souls!” - </p> - <p> - “But a young man down below here, to-day,” continued the other—“mind - you, a <i>young-man</i>—told me solemnly that almost every night he - heard with his own ears the shindy kicked up by the ghosts on the hill - back of his house, you know, inside one of those ringed Danes’ forts, as - they call ’em. He swore to it, honest Injun.” - </p> - <p> - The girl started in spite of herself, stirred vaguely by the sound of this - curious phrase with which the young man had finished his remarks. But - nothing definite took shape in her thoughts concerning it> and she - answered him freely enough: - </p> - <p> - “Ah, well, I’ll not say he intinded desate. They’re a poetic people, sir, - living here alone among the ruins of what was wance a grand country, and - now is what you see it, and they imagine visions to thimselves. ’Tis - in the air, here. Sure, you yourself”—she smiled again as she spoke—“credited - me with being a fairy. Of course,” she added, hastily, “you had in mind - the legend of the lake, here.” - </p> - <p> - “How do you mean—legend?” asked the young man, in frank ignorance. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, here in these very waters is a woman, with the shape of a horse, - who appears to people, and when they see her, they—they die, that’s - all.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, that’s a good deal, I should think,” he responded, lightly. “No, I - hadn’t heard of that before; and, besides, you—why, you came down - the hill, there, skipping like a lamb on the mountains, not a bit like a - horse.” - </p> - <p> - The while Kate turned his comparison over in her mind to judge whether she - liked it or not, the young man shifted his gun to his shoulder, as if to - indicate that the talk had lasted long enough. Then she swiftly blamed - herself for having left this signal to him. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll not be keeping you,” she said, hurriedly. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, bless you—not at all!” he protested. “Only I was afraid I was - keeping <i>you</i>. You see, time hangs pretty heavy on my hands just now, - and I’m tickled to death to have anybody to talk to. Of course, I like to - go around looking at the castles here, because the chances are that some - of my people some time or other helped build ’em. I know my father - was born somewhere in this part of County Cork.” - </p> - <p> - Kate sniffed at him. - </p> - <p> - “Manny thousands of people have been born here,” she said, with dignity, - “but it doesn’t follow that they had annything to do with these castles.” - The young man attached less importance to the point. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, of course not,” he said, carelessly. “All I go by is the probability - that, way back somewhere, all of us O’Mahonys were related to one another. - But for that matter, so were all the Irish who—” - </p> - <p> - “And are <i>you</i> an O’Mahony, thin?” - </p> - <p> - Kate was looking at him with shining eyes—and he saw now that she - was much taller and more beautiful than he had thought before. - </p> - <p> - “That’s my name,” he said, simply. - </p> - <p> - “An O’Mahony of County Cork?” - </p> - <p> - “Well—personally I’m an O’Mahony of Houghton County, Michigan, but - my father was from around here, somewhere.” - </p> - <p> - “Do you hear that, Murphy?” she said, instinctively turning to the - faithful companion of all her out-of-door life. But there was no Murphy in - sight. - </p> - <p> - Kate stared blankly about her for an instant, before she remembered that - Murphy had never rejoined her at the lakeside. And now she thought she - could hear some vague sound of calling in the distance, rising above the - continuous crash of the breakers down below. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, something has happened to him!” she cried, and started running wildly - back again. The young man followed close enough to keep her in sight, and - at a distance of some three hundred yards came up to her, as she knelt - beside the figure of an old peasant seated with his back against a rock. - </p> - <p> - Something had happened to Murphy. His ankle had turned on a stone, and he - could not walk a step. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XVII—HOW THE OLD BOATMAN KEPT HIS VOW. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>h, what’s to be - done <i>now?</i>” asked Kate, rising to her feet and casting a puzzled - look about her. “Sure, me wits are abroad entirely.” - </p> - <p> - No answer seemed forthcoming. As far inland as the eye could stretch, even - to the gray crown of Dunkelly, no sign of human habitation was to be seen. - The jutting headland of the Three Castles on which she stood—with - the naked primeval cliffs; the roughly scattered boulders framed in - scrub-furze too stunted and frightened in the presence of the sea to - venture upon blossoms; the thin ashen-green grass blown flat to earth in - the little sheltered nooks where alone its roots might live—presented - the grimmest picture of desolation she had ever seen. An undersized sheep - had climbed the rocks to gaze upon the intruders—an animal with - fleece of such a snowy whiteness that it looked like an imitation baa-baa - from a toy-shop—and Kate found herself staring into its vacuous face - with sympathy, so helplessly empty was her own mind of suggestions. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis two Oirish miles to the nearest house,” said Murphy, in a - despondent tone. - </p> - <p> - Kate turned to the young man, and spoke wistfully: - </p> - <p> - “If you’ll stop here, I’ll go for help,” she said. - </p> - <p> - The young man from Houghton County laughed aloud. - </p> - <p> - “If there’s any going to be done, I guess you’re not the one that’ll do - it,” he answered. “But, first of all, let’s see where we stand exactly. - How did you come here, anyhow?” - </p> - <p> - “We rowed around from—from our home—a long way distant in that - direction,” pointing vaguely toward Dunmanus Bay, “and our boat was left - there at the nearest landing point, half a mile from here.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, well, <i>that’s</i> all right,” said the young man. “It would take an - hour to get anybody over here to help, and that would be clean waste of - time, because we don’t need any help. I’ll just tote him over on my back, - all by my little self.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah—you’d never try to do the likes of <i>that!</i>” deprecated the - girl. - </p> - <p> - “Why not?” he commented, cheerfully—and then, with a surprise which - checked further protest, she saw him tie his game-bag round his waist so - that it hung to the knee, get Murphy seated up on the rock against which - he had learned, and then take him bodily on his back, with the wounded - foot comfortably upheld and steadied inside the capacious leathern pouch. - </p> - <p> - “‘Why not,’ eh?” he repeated, as he straightened himself easily under the - burden; “why he’s as light as a bag of feathers. That’s one of the few - advantages of living on potatoes. Now you bring along the gun—that’s - a good girl—and we’ll fetch up at the boat in no time. You do the - steering, Murphy. Now, then, here we go!” - </p> - <p> - The somber walls of the Three Castles looked down in silence upon this - strange procession as it filed past under their shadows—and if the - gulls which wheeled above and about the moss-grown turrets described the - spectacle later to the wraiths of the dead-and-gone O’Mahonys and to the - enchanted horse-shaped woman in the lake, there must have been a general - agreement that the parish of Kilmoe had seen never such another sight - before, even in the days of the mystic Tuatha de Danaan. - </p> - <p> - The route to the boat abounded to a disheartening degree in rough and - difficult descents, and even more trying was the frequent necessity for - long <i>détours</i> to avoid impossible barriers of rock. Moreover, Murphy - turned out to be vastly heavier than he had seemed at the outset. Hence - the young man, who had freely enlivened the beginning of the journey with - affable chatter, gradually lapsed into silence; and at last, when only a - final ridge of low hills separated them from the strand, confessed that he - would like to take off his coat. He rested for a minute or two after this - had been done, and wiped his wet brow. - </p> - <p> - “Who’d think the sun could be so hot in April?” he said. “Why, where I - come from, we’ve just begun to get through sleighing.” - </p> - <p> - “What is it you’d be slaying now?” asked Kate, innocently. “We kill our - pigs in the late autumn.” - </p> - <p> - The young man laughed aloud as he took Murphy once more on his back. - </p> - <p> - “Potato-bugs, chiefly,” was his enigmatic response. - </p> - <p> - She pondered fruitlessly upon this for a brief time, as she followed on - with the gun and coat. Then her thoughts centered themselves once more - upon the young stranger himself, who seemed only a boy to look at, yet was - so stout and confident of himself, and had such a man’s way of assuming - control of things, and doing just what he wanted to do and what needed to - be done. - </p> - <p> - Muirisc did not breed that sort of young man. He could not, from his face, - be more than three or four and twenty—and at that age all the men - she had known were mere slow-witted, shy and awkward louts of boys, whom - their fathers were quite free to beat with a stick, and who never dreamed - of doing anything on their own mental initiative, except possibly to “boo” - at the police or throw stones through the windows of a boycotted shop, - Evidently there were young men in the big unknown outside world who - differed immeasurably from this local standard. - </p> - <p> - Oh, that wonderful outside world, which she was never going to see! She - knew that it was sinful and godless and pressed down and running over with - abominations, because the venerable nuns of the Hostage’s Tears had from - the beginning told her so, but she was conscious of a new and less hostile - interest in it, all the same, since it produced young men of this novel - type. Then she began to reflect that he was like Robert Emmett, who was - the most modern instance of a young man which the limits of convent - literature permitted her to know about, only his hair was cut short, and - he was fair, and he smiled a good deal, and—And lo, here they were - at the boat! She woke abruptly from her musing day-dream. - </p> - <p> - The tide had gone out somewhat, and left the dingey stranded on the - dripping sea-weed. The young man seated Murphy on a rock, untied the - game-bag and put on his coat, and then in the most matter-of-fact way - tramped over the slippery ooze to the boat, pushed it off into the water - and towed it around by the chain to the edge of a little cove, whence one - might step over its side from a shore of clean, dry sand. He then, still - as if it were all a matter of course, lifted Murphy and put him in the bow - of the boat, and asked Kate to sit in the stern and steer. - </p> - <p> - “I can talk to you, you know, now that your sitting there,” he said, with - his foot on the end of the oar-seat, after she had taken the place - indicated. “Oh—wait a minute! We were forgetting the gun and bag.” - </p> - <p> - He ran lightly back to where these things lay upon the strand, and secured - them; then, turning, he discovered that Murphy had scrambled over to the - middle seat, taken the oars, and pushed the boat off. Suspecting nothing, - he walked briskly back to the water’s edge. - </p> - <p> - “Shove her in a little,” he said, “and I’ll hold her while you get back - again into the bow. You mustn’t think of rowing, my good man.” - </p> - <p> - But Murphy showed no sign of obedience. He kept his burnt, claw-shaped - hands clasped on the motionless, dipped oars, and his eager, bird-like - eyes fastened upon the face of his young mistress. As for Kate, she - studied the bottom of the boat with intentness, and absently stirred the - water over the boat-side with her finger-tips. - </p> - <p> - “Get her in, man! Don’t you hear?” called the stranger, with a shadow of - impatience, over the six or seven feet of water which lay between him and - the boat. “Or <i>you</i> explain it to him,” he said to Kate; “perhaps he - doesn’t understand me—tell him I’m going to row!” - </p> - <p> - In response to this appeal, Kate lifted her head, and hesitatingly opened - her lips to speak—but the gaunt old boatman broke in upon her - confused silence: - </p> - <p> - “Ah, thin—I understand well enough,” he shouted, excitedly, “an’ I’m - thankful to ye, an’ the longest day I live I’ll say a prayer for ye—an’ - sure ye’re a foine grand man, every inch of ye, glory be to the Lord—an’ - it’s not manny w’u’d ’a’ done what ye did this day—and the - blessin’ of the Lord rest an ye; but—” here he suddenly dropped his - high shrill, swift-chasing tones, and added in quite another voice—“if - it’s the same to you, sir, we’ll go along home as we are.” - </p> - <p> - “What nonsense!” retorted the young man. “My time doesn’t matter in the - least—and you’re not fit to row a mile—let alone a long - distance.” - </p> - <p> - “It’s not with me fut I’ll be rowin’,” replied Murphy, rounding his back - for a sweep of the oars. - </p> - <p> - “Can’t <i>you</i> stop him, Miss—eh—young lady!” the young man - implored from the sands. - </p> - <p> - Hope flamed up in his breast at sight of the look she bent upon Murphy, as - she leaned forward to speak—and then sank into plumbless depths. - Perhaps she had said something—he could not hear, and it was - doubtful if the old boatman could have heard either—for on the - instant he had laid his strength on the oars, and the boat had shot out - into the bay like a skater over the glassy ice. - </p> - <p> - It was a score of yards away before the young man from Houghton County - caught his breath. He stood watching it—be it confessed—with - his mouth somewhat open and blank astonishment written all over his ruddy, - boyish face. Then the flush upon his pink cheeks deepened, and a sparkle - came into his eyes, for the young lady in the boat had risen and turned - toward him, and was waving her hand to him in friendly salutation. He - swung the empty game-bag wildly about his head in answer, and then the - boat darted out of view behind a jutting ridge of umber rocks, and he was - looking at an unbroken expanse of gently heaving water—all crystals - set on violet satin, under the April sun. - </p> - <p> - He sent a long-drawn sighing whistle of bewilderment after the vanished - vision. - </p> - <p> - Not a word had been exchanged between the two in the boat until after - Kate, yielding at the last moment to the temptation which had beset her - from the first, waved that unspoken farewell to her new acquaintance and - saw him a moment later abruptly cut out of the picture by the intervening - rocks. Then she sat down again and fastened a glare of metallic - disapproval, so to speak, upon Murphy. This, however, served no purpose, - since the boatman kept his head sagaciously bent over his task, and rowed - away like mad. - </p> - <p> - “I take shame for you, Murphy!” she said at last, with a voice as full of - mingled anguish and humiliation as she could manage to make it. - </p> - <p> - “Is it too free I am with complete strangers?” asked the guileful Murphy, - with the face of a trusting babe. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis the rudest and most thankless old man in all West Carbery - that ye are!” she answered, sharply. - </p> - <p> - “Luk at that now!” said Murphy, apparently addressing the handles of his - oars. “An’ me havin’ the intintion to burnin’ two candles for him this - very night!” - </p> - <p> - “Candles is it! Murphy, once for all, ’t is a bad trick ye have of - falling to talking about candles and ‘Hail Marys’ and such holy matters, - whinever ye feel yourself in a corner—and be sure the saints like it - no better than I do.” - </p> - <p> - The aged servitor rested for a moment upon his oars, and, being conscious - that evasion was of no further use, allowed an expression of frankness to - dominate his withered and weather-tanned face. - </p> - <p> - “Well, miss,” he said, “an’ this is the truth I’m tellin’ ye—<i>‘t</i> - was not fit that he should be sailin’ in the boat wid you.” - </p> - <p> - Kate tossed her head impatiently. - </p> - <p> - “And how long are you my director in—in such matters as these, - Murphy?” she asked, with irony. - </p> - <p> - The old man’s eyes glistened with the emotions which a sudden swift - thought conjured up. - </p> - <p> - “How long?” he asked, with dramatic effect. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, the likes of me c’u’d be no directhor at all—but ’tis - a dozen years since I swore to his honor, The O’Mahony himself, that I’d - watch over ye, an’ protect ye, an’ keep ye from the lightest breath of - harrum—an’ whin I meet him, whether it be the Lord’s will in this - world or the nixt, I’ll go to him an’ I’ll take off me hat, an’ I’ll say: - ‘Yer honor, what old Murphy putt his word to, that same he kep!’ An’ is it - you, Miss Katie, that remimbers him that well, that ’u’d be blamin’ - me for that same?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know if I’m so much blaming you, Murphy,” said Kate, much - softened by both the matter and the manner of this appeal, “but ’tis - different, wit’ this young man, himself an O’Mahony by name.” - </p> - <p> - “Faith, be the same token, ’tis manny thousands of O’Mahonys there - are in foreign parts, I’m tould, an’ more thousands of ’em here at - home, an’ if it’s for rowin’ ’em all on Dunmanus Bay ye’d be, on - the score of their name, ’tis grand new boats we’d want.” - </p> - <p> - Kate smiled musingly. - </p> - <p> - “Did you mind, Murphy,” she asked, after a pause, “how like the sound of - his speech was to The O’Mahony’s?” - </p> - <p> - “That I did not!” said Murphy, conclusively. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, ye’ve no ears, man! I was that flurried at the time, I couldn’t think - what it was—but now, whin it comes back to me, it was like talking - to The O’Mahony himself. There was that one word, ‘onistinjun,’ that The - O’Mahony had forever on his tongue. Surely you noticed that!” - </p> - <p> - “All Americans say that same,” Murphy explained carelessly. “’T is - well known most of ’em are discinded from the Injuns. ’Tis - that they m’ane.” It did not occur to Kate to question this bold - ethno-philological proposition. She leant back in her seat at the stern, - absent-mindedly toying with the ribbons of her hat, and watching the sky - over Murphy’s head. - </p> - <p> - “Poor, dear old O’Mahony!” she sighed at last. - </p> - <p> - “Amin to that miss!” murmured the boatman, between strokes. - </p> - <p> - “’T is a year an’ more now, Murphy, since we had the laste sign in - the world from him. Ah, wirra! I’m beginnin’ to be afraid dead ’tis - he is!” - </p> - <p> - “Keep your heart, miss; keep your heart!” crooned the old boatman, in what - had been for months a familiar phrase on his lips. “Sure no mortial man - ever stepped fut on green sod that ’ud take more killin’ than our - O’Mahony. Why, <i>coleen asthore</i>, wasn’t he foightin’ wid the French, - against the Prooshians, an’ thin wid the Turkeys against the Rooshians, - an’ bechune males, as ye’d say, didn’t he bear arms in Spain for the - Catholic king, like the thunderin’ rare old O’Mahony that he is, an’ did - ever so much as a scratch come to him—an’ him killin’ an’ destroyin’ - thim by hundreds? Ah, rest aisy about <i>him</i>, Miss Katie!” - </p> - <p> - The two had long since exhausted, in their almost daily talks, every - possible phase of this melancholy subject. It was now April of 1879, and - the last word received from the absent chief had been a hastily scrawled - note dispatched from Adrianople, on New Year’s Day of 1878—when the - Turkish army, beaten finally at Plevna and decimated in the Schipka, were - doggedly moving backward toward the Bosphorus. Since that, there had been - absolute silence—and Kate and Murphy had alike, hoping against hope, - come long since to fear the worst. Though each strove to sustain - confidence in the other, there was no secret between their hearts as to - what both felt. - </p> - <p> - “Murphy,” said Kate, rousing herself all at once from her reverie, - “there’s something I’ve been keeping from you—and I can’t hold it - anny longer. Do ye mind when Malachy wint away last winter?” - </p> - <p> - “Faith I do,” replied the boatman. (Malachy, be it explained, had followed - The O’Mahony in all his wanderings up to the autumn of 1870, when, in a - skirmish shortly after Sedan, he had lost an arm and, upon his release - from the hospital, had been sent back to Muirisc.) “I mind that he wint to - Amerriky.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin,” whispered Kate, bending forward as if the very waves had - ears, “it’s just that he didn’t do. I gave him money, and I gave him the - O’Mahony’s ring, and sint him to search the world over till he came upon - his master, or his master’s grave—and I charged him to say only - this: ‘Come back to Muirisc! ’Tis Kate O’Mahony wants you!’ And now no one - knows this but me confessor and you.” - </p> - <p> - The boatman gazed earnestly into her face. - </p> - <p> - “An’ why for did ye say: ‘Come back?’” he asked. - </p> - <p> - “Ah thin—well—‘tis O’Daly’s hard d’alin’s wid the tinants, and - the failure of the potatoes these two years and worse ahead and the birth - of me little step-brother—and—” - </p> - <p> - “Answer me now, Katie darlint?” the old man adjured her, with glowing eyes - and solemn voice. “Is it the convint ye’re afraid of for yoursilf? Is it - of your own free will you’re goin’ to take your vows?” - </p> - <p> - The girl had answered this question more than once before, and readily - enough. Now, for some reason which she could not have defined to herself, - she looked down upon the gliding water at her side, and meditatively - dipped her fingers into it, and let a succession of little waves fling - their crests up into her sleeve—and said nothing at all. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XVIII—THE GREAT O’DALY USURPATION. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he stern natural - law of mutability—of ceaseless growth, change and decay—which - the big, bustling, preoccupied outside world takes so indifferently, as a - matter of course, finds itself reduced to a bare minimum of influence in - such small, remote and out-of-the-way places as Muirisc. The lapse of - twelve years here had made the scantest and most casual of marks upon the - village and its inhabitants. Positively no one worth mentioning had died—for - even snuffy and palsied old Father Harrington, though long since replaced - at the convent <i>by</i> a younger priest, was understood to be still - living on in the shelter of some retreat for aged clergymen in Kerry or - Clare. The three old nuns were still the sole ladies of the Hostage’s - Tears, and, like the rest of Muirisc, seemed only a trifle the more - wrinkled and worn under this flight of time. - </p> - <p> - Such changes as had been wrought had come in a leisurely way, without - attracting much attention. The mines, both of copper and of pyrites, had - prospered beyond the experience of any other section of Munster, and this - had brought into the immediate district a considerable alien population. - But these intrusive strangers had fortunately preferred to settle in - another hamlet in the neighborhood, and came rarely to Muirisc. The - village was still without a hotel, and had by this time grown accustomed - to the existence within its borders of a constabulary barracks. Its - fishing went forward sedately and without much profit; the men of Muirisc - only half believed the stories they heard of the modern appliances and - wonderful hauls at Baltimore and Crook-haven—and cared even less - than they credited. The lobster-canning factory had died a natural death - years before, and the little children of Muirisc, playing about within - sight of its roofless and rotting timbers, avoided closer contact with the - building under some vague and formless notion that it was unlucky. The - very idea that there had once been a man who thought that Muirisc desired - to put up lobsters in tins seemed to them comic—and almost impious - as well. - </p> - <p> - But there was one alteration upon which the people of Muirisc bestowed a - good deal of thought—and on occasion and under their breath, not a - few bitter words. - </p> - <p> - Cormac O’Daly, whom all the elders remembered as a mere “pote” and man of - business for the O’Mahonys, had suddenly in his old age blossomed forth as - The O’Daly, and as master of Muirisc. Like many other changes which - afflict human recollection, this had all come about by reason of a woman’s - vain folly. Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, having vainly cast alluring glances upon - successive relays of mining contractors and superintendents, and of - fish-buyers from Bristol and the Isle of Man, and even, in the later - stages, upon a sergeant of police—had at last actually thrown - herself in marriage at the grizzled head of the hereditary bard. It cannot - be said that the announcement of this ill-assorted match had specially - surprised the good people of Muirisc. They had always felt that Mrs. - Fergus would ultimately triumph in her matrimonial resolutions, and the - choice of O’Daly, though obviously enough a last resort, did not shock - their placid minds. It was rather satisfactory than otherwise, when they - came to think of it, that the arrangement should not involve the - introduction of a stranger, perhaps even of an Englishman. - </p> - <p> - But now, after nearly three years of this marriage, with a young O’Daly - already big enough to walk by himself among the pigs and geese in the - square—they said to themselves that even an Englishman would have - been better, and they bracketed the connubial tendencies of Mrs. Fergus - and the upstart ambition of Cormac under a common ban of curses. - </p> - <p> - O’Daly had no sooner been installed in the castle than he had raised the - rents. Back had come the odious charge for turf-cutting, the tax on the - carrigeens and the tithe-levy upon the gathered kelp. In the best of times - these impositions would have been sorely felt; the cruel failure of the - potatoes in 1877 and ’78 had elevated them into the domain of the - tragic. - </p> - <p> - For the first time in its history Muirisc had witnessed evictions. Half - way up the cliff stood the walls of four cottages, from which the thatched - roofs had been torn by a sheriff’s posse of policeman during the bleakest - month of winter. The gloomy spectacle, familiar enough elsewhere - throughout Ireland, had still the fascination of novelty in the eyes of - Muirisc. The villagers could not keep their gaze from those gaunt, - deserted walls. Some of the evicted people—those who were too old or - too young to get off to America and yet too hardy to die—still - remained in the neighborhood, sleeping in the ditches and subsisting upon - the poor charity of the cottagers roundabout. The sight of their skulking, - half-clad forms and hunger-pinched faces filled Muirisc with wrathful - humiliation. - </p> - <p> - Almost worst still were the airs which latterly O’Daly had come to assume. - Even if the evictions and the rack-renting could have been forgiven, - Muirisc felt that his calling himself The O’Daly was unpardonable. - Everybody in Ivehagh knew that the O’Dalys had been mere bards and singers - for the McCarthys, the O’Mahonys, and other Eugenian houses, and had not - been above taking service, later on, under the hatred Carews. That any - scion of the sept should exalt himself now, in the shoes of an O’Mahony, - was simply intolerable. - </p> - <p> - In proportion as Cormac waxed in importance, his coadjutor Jerry had - diminished. There was no longer any talk heard about Diarmid MacEgan; the - very pigs in the street knew him now to be plain Jerry Higgins. Only the - most shadowy pretense of authority to intermeddle in the affairs of the - estate remained to him. Unlettered goodnature and loyalty had stood no - chance whatever against the will and powers of the educated Cormac. - Muirisc did indeed cherish a nebulous idea that some time or other the - popular discontent would find him an effective champion, but Jerry did - nothing whatever to encourage this hope. He had grown stout and red-faced - through these unoccupied years, and lived by himself in a barely habitable - nook among the ruins of the castle, overlooking the churchyard. Here he - spent a great deal of his time, behind barred doors and denying himself to - all visitors—and Muirisc had long since concluded that the companion - of his solitude was a bottle. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve a word more to whisper into your ear, Higgins,” said O’Daly, this - very evening, at the conclusion of some unimportant conversation about the - mines. - </p> - <p> - The supper had been cleared away, and a tray of glasses flanking a - decanter stood on the table at which the speaker sat with his pipe. The - buxom and rubicund Mrs. Fergus—for so Muirisc still thought and - spoke of her—dozed comfortably in her arm-chair at one side of the - bank of blazing peat on the hearth, an open novel turned down on her lap. - Opposite her mother, Kate sat and sewed in silence, the while the men - talked. It was the room in which The O’Mahony had eaten his first meal in - Muirisc, twelve years before. - </p> - <p> - “‘A word to whishper,’” repeated O’Daly, glancing at Jerry with severity - from under his beetling black brows, and speaking so loudly that even Mrs. - Sullivan in the kitchen might have heard—“times is that hard, and - work so scarce, that bechune now and midsummer I’d have ye look about for - a new place.” - </p> - <p> - Jerry stared across the table at his co-trustee in blank amazement. It was - no surprise to him to be addressed in tones of harsh dislike by O’Daly, or - to see his rightful claims to attention contemptuously ignored. But this - sweeping suggestion took his breath away. - </p> - <p> - “What place do ye mane?” he asked confusedly. “Where else in Muirisc c’u’d - I live so aisily?” - </p> - <p> - “’T is not needful ye should live in Muirisc at all,” said O’Daly, - with cold-blooded calmness. “Sure, ’t is manny years since ye were - of anny service here. A lad at two shillings the week would more than - replace ye. In these bad times, and worse cornin’, ’t is impossible - ye should stay on here as ye’ve been doin’ these twelve years. I thought - I’d tell ye in sayson, Higgins—not to take ye unawares.” - </p> - <p> - “Glory-be-to-the-world?” gasped Jerry, sitting upright in his chair, and - staring open-eyed. - </p> - <p> - “’T is a dale of other alterations I have in me mind,” O’Daly went - on, hurriedly. “Sure, things have stuck in the mire far too long, waiting - for the comin’ to life of a dead man. ’T is to stir ’em up I - will now, an’ no delay. Me step-daughter, there, takes the vail in a few - days, an’ ’t is me intintion thin to rebuild large parts of the - convint, an’ mek new rules for it whereby gerrels of me own family can be - free to enter it as well as the O’Mahonys. For, sure, ’t is now - well known an’ universally consaded that the O’Daly’s were the most - intellectual an’ intelligent family in all the two Munsters, be rayson of - which all the ignorant an’ uncultivated ruffians like the MacCarthys an’ - The O’Mahony’s used to be beseechin’ ’em to make verses and write - books an’ divert ’em wid playin’ on the harp—an ’t is - high time the O’Daly’s came into their own ag’in, the same that they’d - never lost but for their wake good-nature in consintin’ to be bards on - account of their supayrior education. Why, man,” the swart-visaged little - lawyer went on, his black eyes snapping with excitement—“what d’ ye - say to me great ancestor, Cuchonnacht O’Daly, called <i>na Sgoile</i>, or - ‘of the school,’ who died at Clonard, rest his soul, Anno Domini 1139, the - most celebrated pote of all Oireland? An’ do ye mind thim eight an’ twenty - other O’Dalys in rigular descint who achaved distinction—” - </p> - <p> - “Egor! If they were all such thieves of the earth as you are, the world’s - d———d well rid of ’em!” burst in Jerry Higgins. - </p> - <p> - He had sprung to his feet, and stood now hotfaced and with clenched fists, - glaring down upon O’Daly. - </p> - <p> - The latter pushed back his chair and instinctively raised an elbow to - guard his head. - </p> - <p> - “Have a care, Higgins!” he shouted out—“you’re in the presence of - witnesses—I’m a p’aceable man—in me own domicile, too!” - </p> - <p> - “I’ll ‘dommycille’ ye, ye blagyard!” Jerry snorted, throwing his burly - form half over the table. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, thin, Jerry! Jerry!” A clear, bell-toned voice rang in his confused - ears, and he felt the grasp of a vigorous hand upon his arm. “Is it mad ye - are, Jerry, to think of striking the likes of him?” - </p> - <p> - Kate stood at his side. The mere touch of her hand on his sleeve would - have sufficed for restraint, but she gripped his arm sharply, and turned - upon him a gaze of stern reproval. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis elsewhere ye left your manners, Jerry!” she said, in a calm - enough voice, though her bosom was heaving. “When our bards became - insolent or turned rogues, they were sent outside to be beaten. ’T - was niver done in the presence of ladies.” - </p> - <p> - Jerry’s puzzled look showed how utterly he failed to grasp her meaning. - There was no such perplexity in O’Daly’s mind. He, too, had risen, and - stood on the hearth beside his wife, who blinked vacuous inquiries - sleepily at the various members of the group in turn. - </p> - <p> - “And <i>we</i>,” he said, with nervous asperity, “when our children become - impertinent, we trounce them off to their bed.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah-h! No child of yours, O’Daly!” the girl made scornful answer, in - measured tones. - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin,” the little man snarled, vehemently, “while ye’re under my - roof, Miss O’Mahony, ye’ll heed what I say, an’ be ruled by ’t. An’ - now ye force me to ’t, mark this: I’ll have no more of your gaddin’ - about with that old bag-o’-bones of a Murphy. ’T is not dacint or - fittin’ for a young lady—more especially when she’s to be a—wanderin’ - the Lord knows where, or—” - </p> - <p> - Kate broke in upon his harangue with shrill laughter, half hysterical. - </p> - <p> - “Is it an O’Daly that I hear discoorsin’ on dacency to an O’Mahony!” she - called out, ironically incredulous. “Well, thin—while that I’m under - your roof—-” - </p> - <p> - “Egor! Who made it his roof?” demanded Jerry. “Shure, be the papers The - O’Mahony wrote out wid his own hand for us—” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t be interruptin’, Jerry!” said Kate, again with a restraining hand - on his arm. “I say this, O’Daly: The time I stop under this roof will be - just that while that it takes me to put on me hat. Not an instant longer - will I stay.” - </p> - <p> - She walked proudly erect to the chest in the corner, took up her hat and - put it on her head. - </p> - <p> - “Come now, Jerry,” she said, “I’ll walk wid you to me cousins, the Ladies - of the Hostage’s Tears. ’T will be grand news to thim that the - O’Dalys have come into <i>their own</i> ag’in!” - </p> - <p> - Cormac O’Daly instinctively moved toward the door to bar her egress. Then - a glance at Jerry’s heavy fists and angered face bred intuition of a - different kind, and he stepped back again. - </p> - <p> - “Mind, once for all! I’ll not have ye here ag’in—neither one or - other of ye!” he shouted. - </p> - <p> - Kate disdained response by even so much as a look. She moved over to the - arm-chair, and, stooping for an instant, lightly brushed with her lips the - flattened crimps which adorned the maternal forehead. Then, with head high - in air and a tread of exaggerated stateliness, she led the way for Jerry - out of the room and the house. - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Fergus heard the front door close with a resounding clang, and the - noise definitely awakened her. She put up a correcting hand, and passed it - over her front hair. Then she yawned meditatively at the fire, and, - lifting the steaming kettle from the crane, filled one of the glasses on - the tray with hot water. Then she permitted herself a drowsy halfsmile at - the disordered appearance presented by her infuriated spouse. - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin, ’tis not in Mother Agnes O’Mahony’s shoes I’m wishin’ - myself!” she said, upon reflection. “It’s right ye are to build thick new - walls to the convint. They’ll be needed, wid that girl inside!” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XIX—A BARGAIN WITH THE BURIED MAN. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>hough by daylight - there seemed to lie but a step of space between the ruined Castle of - Muirisc and the portal of the Convent of the Hostage’s Tears, it was - different under the soft, starlit sky of this April evening. The way was - long enough, at all events, for the exchange of many views between Kate - and Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis flat robbery he manes, Jerry,” the girl said, as the revolted - twain passed out together under the gateway. “With me safe in the convint, - sure he’s free to take everything for his son—me little stepbrother—an’ - thin there’s an ind to the O’Mahony’s, here where they’ve been lords of - the coast an’ the mountains an’ the castles since before St. Patrick’s - time—an’, luk ye! an O’Daly comes on! I’m fit to tear out me eyes to - keep them from the sight!” - </p> - <p> - “But, Miss Katie,” put in Jerry, eagerly, “I’ve a thought in me head—egor! - The O’Mahony himself put writin’ to paper, statin’ how every blessed thing - was to be yours, the day he sailed away. Sure ’twas meself was - witness to that same, along wid O’Daly an’ your mother an’ the nuns. - To-morrow I’ll have the law on him!” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, Jerry,” the girl sighed and shook her head; “ye’ve a good heart, but - it’s only grief ye’ll get tryin’ to match your wits against O’Daly’s. What - do <i>you</i> know about papers an’ documents, an’ the like of that, - compared wid him? Why, man, he’s an attorney himself! ’T is thim - that putts the law on other people—worse luck!” - </p> - <p> - “An’ him that usen’t to have a word for anny-thing but the praises of The - O’Mahonys!” exclaimed Jerry, lost once more in surprise at the scope of - O’Daly’s ambitions. - </p> - <p> - “I, for one, never thrusted him!” said Kate, with emphasis. “’T was - not in nature that anny man could be that humble an’ devoted to a family - that wasn’t his own, as he pretinded.” - </p> - <p> - “Weil, I dunno,” began Jerry, hesitatingly; “’t is my belafe he - mint honest enough, till that boy o’ his was born. A childless man is wan - thing, an’ a father’s another. ’T is that boy that’s turnin’ - O’Daly’s head.” - </p> - <p> - Kate’s present mood was intolerant of philosophy. “Faith, Jerry,” she - said, with sharpness, “’t is <i>my</i> belafe that if wan was to - abuse the divil in your hearin’, you’d say: ‘At anny rate, he has a fine, - grand tail.’” - </p> - <p> - Jerry’s round face beamed in the vague starlight with a momentary smile. - “Ah, thin, Miss Katie!” he said, in gentle deprecation. Then, as upon a - hasty afterthought: “Egor! I’ll talk with Father Jago.” - </p> - <p> - “Ye’ll do nothing of the kind!” Kate commanded. - </p> - <p> - “He’s a young man, an’ he’s not Muirisc born, an’ he’s O’Daly’s fri’nd, - naturally enough, an’ he’s the chaplain of the convint. Sure, with half an - eye, ye can see that O’Daly’s got the convint on his side. My taking the - vail will profit thim, as well as him. Sure, that’s the point of it all.” - </p> - <p> - “Thin why not putt yer fut down,” asked Jerry, “an’ say ye’ll tek no vail - at all?” - </p> - <p> - “I gave me word,” she answered, simply. - </p> - <p> - “But aisy enough—ye can say as Mickey Dugan did on the gallus, to - the hangman: ‘Egor!’ said he, ‘I’ve changed my mind.’” - </p> - <p> - “We don’t be changin’ <i>our</i> minds!” said Kate, with proud brevity; - and thereupon she ran up the convent steps, and, after a little space, - filled with the sound of jangling bells and the rattle of bars and chains, - disappeared. - </p> - <p> - Jerry pursued the small remnant of his homeward course in a deep, brown - study. He entered his abode by the churchyard postern, bolted the door - behind him and lighted a lamp, still in an absent-minded way. Such - flickering rays as pierced the smoky chimney cast feeble illumination upon - a sort of castellated hovel—a high, stone-walled room with arched - doorways and stately, vaulted ceiling above, but with the rude furniture - and squalid disorder of a laborer’s cottage below. - </p> - <p> - But another idea did occur to him while he sat on the side of his bed, - vacantly staring at the floor—an idea which set his shrewd, brown - eyes aglow. He rose hastily, took a lantern down from a nail on the - whitewashed wall and lighted it. Then with a key from his pocket, he - unlocked a door at the farther end of the room, behind the bed, and passed - through the open passage, with a springing step, into the darkness of a - low, stone-walled corridor. - </p> - <p> - The staircase down which we saw the guns and powder carried in secrecy, on - that February night in 1867, led Jerry to the concealed doorway in the - rounded wall which had been discovered. He applied the needful trick to - open this door; then carefully closed it behind him, and made his way, - crouching and stealthily, through the passage to the door at its end. This - he opened with another key and entered abruptly. - </p> - <p> - “God save all here!” he called out upon the threshold, in the - half-jesting, half-sincere tone of one who, using an ancient formula at - the outset by way of irony, grows to feel that he means what it says. - </p> - <p> - “God save you kindly!” was the prompt response, in a thin, strangely - vibrant voice: and on the instant the speaker came forward into firelight. - </p> - <p> - He was a slender man of middle age, with a pale, spectacled face, framed - by a veritable mane of dingy reddish hair thrown back from temples and - brow. This brow, thus bared, was broad and thoughtful besides being - wonderfully white, and, with the calm gray eyes, which shone steadily - through the glasses, seemed to constitute practically the whole face. - There were, one noted at a second glance, other portions of this face—a - weak, pointed nose, for example, and a mouth and chin hidden under - irregular outlines of straggling beard; but the brow and the eyes were - what the gaze returned to. The man wore a loose, nondescript sort of gown, - gathered at the waist with a cord. Save for a table against the wall, - littered with papers and writing materials and lighted by a lamp in a - bracket above, the chamber differed in little from its appearance on that - memorable night when the dead monk’s sleep of centuries had been so rudely - broken in upon. - </p> - <p> - “I’m glad ye’ve come down ag’in to-day,” said the man of the brow and - eyes. “Since this mornin’, I’ve traced out the idintity of Finghin—the - one wid the brain-ball I told ye of—as clear as daylight. Not a - man-jack of ’em but ’ll see it now like the nose on their - face.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, thin, that’s a mercy,” said Jerry, seating himself tentatively on a - corner of the table. “Egor! It looked at one toime there as if his - identity was gone to the divil intoirely. But l’ave you to smoke him out!” - </p> - <p> - “It can be proved that this Finghin is wan an’ the same wid the so-called - Fiachan Roe, who married the widow of the O’Dubhagain, in the elevinth - cintury.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, there ye have it!” said Jerry, shaking his head dejectedly. “He <i>wud</i> - marry a widdeh, w’u’d he? Thin, be me sowl, ’tis a marvel to grace - he had anny idint—whatever ye call it—left at all. Well, sir, - to tell ye the truth, ’tis disappointed I am in Finghin. I credited - him with more sinse than to be marryin’ widdehs. An’ I suppose ye’ll l’ave - him out of your book altogether now. Egor, an’ serve him right, too!” - </p> - <p> - The other smiled; a wan and fleeting smile of the eyes and brow. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, don’t be talkin!” he said, pleasantly, and then added, with a sigh: - “More like he’ll l’ave <i>me</i>, wid me work undone. You’ll bear me - witness, sir, that I’ve been patient, an’ thried me best to live continted - here in this cave of the earth, an’ busy me mind wid work; but no man can - master his drames. ’Tis that that’s killin’ me. Every night, the - moment I’m asleep, faith, I’m out in the meadehs, wid flowers on the - ditches an’ birds singin’, an’ me fishin’ in the brook, like I was a boy - ag’in; an’ whin I wake up, me heart’s broke intirely! I tell ye, man, if - ’t wasn’t for me book here, I’d go outside in spite of ’em - all, an’ let ’em hang me, if they like—jist for wan luk at - the sky an’ wan breath of fresh air.” - </p> - <p> - Jerry swung his legs nonchalantly, but there was a new speculation - twinkling in his eyes as he regarded his companion. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, it won’t be long now, Major Lynch,” he said, consolingly. “An’ have - ye much more to state in your book?” - </p> - <p> - “All the translatin’ was finished long since, but <i>‘t</i> is comparin’ - the various books together I am, an’ that takes a dale o’ time. There’s - the psalter o’ Timoleague Abbey, an’ the psalter o’ Sherkin, an’ the book - o’ St. Kian o’ Cape Clear, besides all the riccords of Muirisc that lay - loose in the chest. Yet I’m far from complainin’. God knows what I’d a’ - done without ’em.” - </p> - <p> - There are many marvels in Irish archaeology. Perhaps the most wonderful of - all is the controlling and consuming spell it had cast over Linksy, making - it not only possible for him to live twelve years in an underground - dungeon, fairly contented, and undoubtedly occupied, but lifting him - bodily out of his former mental state and up into an atmosphere of - scholarly absorption and exclusively intellectual exertion. He had entered - upon this long imprisonment with only an ordinary high-school education, - and no special interest in or bent toward books. By the merest chance he - happened to have learned to speak Irish, as a boy, and, later, to have - been taught the written alphabet of the language. His first days of - solitude in the subterranean chamber, after his recovery from the terrible - blow on the head, had been whiled away by glancing over the curious - parchment writings and volumes in the chest. Then, to kill time, he had - essayed to translate one of the manuscripts, and Jerry had obligingly - furnished him with paper, pens and ink. To have laboriously traced out the - doubtful thread of continuity running through the confused and legendary - pedigrees of the fierce Eugenian septs, to have lived for twelve long - years buried in ancient Munster genealogies, wearing the eyesight out in - waking hours upon archaic manuscripts, and dreaming by night of still more - undecipherable parchment chronicles, may well seem to us, who are out in - the busy noonday of the world, a colossal waste of time. No publisher - alive would have thought for a moment of printing Linsky’s compilations at - his own risk, and probably not more than twenty people would have - regretted his refusal the whole world over. But this consideration has - never operated yet to prevent archaeologists from devoting their time and - energies and fortunes to works which nobody on earth is going to read, - much less publish; Jerry was still contemplating Linsky with a grave new - interest. - </p> - <p> - “Ye’ve changed that much since—since ye came down here for your - health. ’Tis my belafe not a mother’s son of ’em ’u’d - recognize ye up above,” he said, reflectively. - </p> - <p> - Linsky spoke with eagerness: - </p> - <p> - “Man alive! I’m jist dyin’ to make the attimpt!” - </p> - <p> - “What—an’ turn yer back on all these foine riccords an’ statements - that <i>ye’ve</i> kept yer hand to so long?” - </p> - <p> - The other’s face fell. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, I c’u’d come down ag’in,” Linsky said, hesitatingly. - </p> - <p> - “We’ll see; we’ll see,” remarked Jerry. Then, in a careless manner, as if - he had not had this chiefly in mind from the beginning, he asked: “Usen’t - ye to be tellin’ me ye were a kind of an attorney, Major Lynch?” - </p> - <p> - “I was articled to an attorney, wance upon a time, but I’d no time to - sthick to it.” - </p> - <p> - “But ye’d know how to hev the law on a man, if he was yer inemy?” - </p> - <p> - “Some of it is in me mind still, maybe,” replied Linsky, not with much - confidence. - </p> - <p> - Jerry sprang lightly down from the table, walked over to the fire, and - stood with his back to it, his legs wide apart and his thumbs in his - waistcoat armholes, as he had seen The O’Mahony bear himself. - </p> - <p> - “Well, Linsky, I’ve a bargain to offer ye,” he said, bluntly. - </p> - <p> - Linsky stared in wild-eyed amazement. He had not heard the sound of this - name of his for years. - </p> - <p> - “What—what was that name ye called?” he asked, with a faltering - voice. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, it’s all right,” remarked Jerry, with assurance. “Faith, I knew ye - wor Linsky from the beginning. An’ bechune ourselves, that’s but a drop in - the bucket to the rest I know.” - </p> - <p> - Linsky’s surprise paralyzed his tongue. He could only pluck nervously at - the cord about his waist and gaze in confusion at his jailer-friend. - </p> - <p> - “You believed all this time that ye were hid away down here by your - fri’nds, to save ye from the poliss, who were scourin’ the counthry to - arrest Fenians. Am I right?” Jerry asked, with a dawning smile on his red - face. - </p> - <p> - The other nodded mechanically, still incomplete mystification. - </p> - <p> - “An’ you all the time besachin’ to go out an’ take yer chances, an’ me - forever tellin’ ye ’twould be the ruin of the whole thund’rin’ - Brotherhood if ye were caught?” Jerry continued, the smile ripening as he - went on. - </p> - <p> - Again Linsky’s answer was a puzzled nod of acquiescence. - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin, there’s no Brotherhood left at all, an’ ’t is manny - years since the poliss in these parts had so much as a drame of you or of - anny Fenian under the sun.” - </p> - <p> - “But why,” stammered Linsky, at last finding voice—“why—thin—” - </p> - <p> - “Why are ye here?” Jerry amiably asked the question for him. “Only a small - matther of discipline, as his reverence w’u’d say, when he ordered peas in - our boots. To be open an’ above-board wid ye, man, ye were caught - attimptin’ to hand over the lot of us to the sojers, that day we tried to - take the fort. ’T is the gallus we might ’a’ got by rayson - of your informin’. Do ye deny that same?” Linsky made no answer, but he - looked now at the floor instead of at Jerry. In truth, he had been so long - immured, confronted daily with the pretense that he was being hidden - beyond the reach of the castle’s myrmidons, that this sudden resurrection - of the truth about his connection with Fenianism seemed almost to refer to - somebody else. - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin,” pursued Jerry, taking instant advantage of the other’s - confusion, “egor, ’t was as a traitor ye were tried an’ condimned - an’ sintenced, while ye lay, sinseless wid that whack on the head. There - wor thim that w’u’d—uv—uv—well, not seen ye wake this - side of purgatory, or wherever else ye had yer ticket for. But there was - wan man that saved yer life from the rest—and he said: ‘No, don’t - kill him, an’ don’t bate him or lay a finger to him, an’ I’ll be at the - expinse of keepin’ him in a fine, grand place by himsilf, wid food of the - best, an’ whishky aich day, an’ books an’ writin’s to improve his - learnin’, an’ no work to do, an’ maybe, be the grace o’ God, he’ll come to - think rightly about it all, an’ be ashamed of himsilf an’ his dirty - doin’s, an be fit ag’in to come out an’ hold up his head amongst honest - min.’ That’s the m’anin’ of what he said, an’ I’m the man he said it to—an’ - that’s why I’m here now, callin’ ye by yer right name, an’ tellin’ ye the - thruth.” - </p> - <p> - Linsky hesitated for a minute or two, with downcast gaze and fingers - fidgeting at the ends of his waist-cord. Then he lifted his face, which - more than ever seemed all brow and eyes, and looked frankly at Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “What ye say is a surprise to me,” he began, choosing his words as he - went. “Ye never let on what your thoughts were concernin’ me, an’ I grew - to forget how it was I came. But now you spake of it, sure ’tis the - same to me as if I’d niver been thinkin’ of anything else. Oh, thin, tell - that man who spoke up for me, whoever he may be, that I’ve no word but - praise for him. ’T was a poor divil of a wake fool he saved the - life of.” - </p> - <p> - “Wid a mixin’ of rogue as well,” put in Jerry, by way of conscientious - parenthesis. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis the same thing—the worst fool is the rogue; but I tuk - to ’t to keep soul an’ body together. Sure, I got into throuble in - Cork, as manny another boy did before me, an’ fled to Ameriky, an’ there I - listed, an’ came in at the tail of the war, an’ was shot down an’ robbed - where I lay, an’ was in the hospital for months; an’ whin I came out divil - a thing was there for me to putt me hand to; an’ the Fenians was started, - an’ I j’ined ’em. An’ there was a man I knew who made a livin’ be - sellin’ information of what winton, an’ the same offer came to me through - him—an’ me starvin’; an’ that’s the way of it.” - </p> - <p> - “An’ a notorious bad way, at that!” said Jerry, sternly. - </p> - <p> - “I’m of that same opinion,” Linsky went on, in all meakness. “Don’t think - I’m defindin’ meself. But I declare to ye, whin I look back on it, ’t - is not like it was meself at all.” - </p> - <p> - “Ay, there ye have it!” exclaimed Jerry. “Luk now! Min do be changin’ and - alterin’ all the while. I know a man—an old man—who used to be - honest an’ fair-spoken, an’ that devoted to a certain family, egor, he’d - laid down his life for ’em; an’ now, be rayson that he’s married a - widdeh, an’ got a boy of his own, what did he but turn rogue an’ lie awake - nights schamin’ to rob that same family! ’Tis that way we are! An’ - so wid you, Linsky, ’tis my belafe that ye began badly, an’ that - ye’re minded to ind well. Ye’re not the man ye were at all. ’T is - part by rayson, I think, of your studyin’ in thim holy books, an’ part, - too,” his eyes twinkled as he added, “be rayson of enjoyin’ my society - every day.” Linsky passed the humorous suggestion by unheeded, his every - perception concentrated upon the tremendous possibility which had with - such strange suddenness opened before him. - </p> - <p> - “An’ what is it ye have in mind?” he asked breathlessly. “There was word - of a bargain.” - </p> - <p> - “’Tis this,” explained Jerry: “An old thief of the earth—him - I spoke of that married the widdeh—is for robbin’ an’ plunderin’ the - man that saved your life. There’s more to the tale than I’m tellin’ ye, - but that’s the way of it; an’ I’ll die for it but I’ll prevint him; an’ ’t - is beyant my poor wits to do that same; an’ so ’t is your help I’m - needin’. An’ there ye have it!” - </p> - <p> - The situation thus outlined did not meet the full measure of Linsky’s - expectations. His face fell. - </p> - <p> - “Sure ye might have had me advice in anny case,” he said “if that’s all it - comes to; but I thought I was goin’ out.” - </p> - <p> - “An’ why not?” answered Jerry. “Who’s stop-pin’ ye but me, an’ me needin’ - ye outside?” - </p> - <p> - Linsky’s eyes glowed radiantly through their glasses. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, but I’ll come!” he exclaimed. “An’ whatever ye bid me that I’ll do!” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, but,” Jerry shook his head dubiously, “’t is you that must be - biddin’ <i>me</i> what to do.” - </p> - <p> - “To the best of me power that I’ll do, too,” the other affirmed; and the - two men shook hands. - </p> - <p> - “On to-morrow I’ll get clothes for ye at Bantry,” Jerry said, an hour - later, at the end of the conference they had been holding, “an’ nixt day - we’ll inthroduce ye to daylight an’ to—O’Daly.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XX—NEAR THE SUMMIT OF MT. GABRIEL. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> vast sunlit - landscape under a smiling April sky—a landscape beyond the uses of - mere painters with their tubes and brushes and camp-stools, where leagues - of mountain ranges melted away into the shimmering haze of distance, and - where the myriad armlets of the blue Atlantic in view, winding themselves - about their lovers, the headlands, and placidly nursing their children, - the islands, marked as on a map the coastwise journeys of a month—stretched - itself out before the gaze of young Bernard O’Mahony, of Houghton County, - Michigan—and was scarcely thanked for its pains. - </p> - <p> - The young man had completed four-fifths of the ascent of Mount Gabriel, - from the Dunmanus side, and sat now on a moss-capped boulder, nominally - meditating upon the splendors of the panorama spread out before him, but - in truth thinking deeply of other things. He had not brought a gun, this - time, but had in his hand a small, brand-new hammer, with which, from time - to time, to point the shifting phases of his reverie, he idly tapped the - upturned sole of the foot resting on his knee. - </p> - <p> - From this coign of vantage he could make out the white walls and thatches - of at least a dozen hamlets, scattered over the space of thrice as many - miles. Such of these as stood inland he did not observe a second time. - There were others, more distant, which lay close to the bay, and these he - studied intently as he mused, his eyes roaming along the coast-line from - one to another in baffled perplexity. There was nothing obscure, about - them, so far as his vision went. Everything—the innumerable - croft-walls dividing the wretched land below him into holdings; the dark - umber patches where the bog had been cut; the serried layers of gray rock - sloping transversely down the mountain-side, each with its crown of - canary-blossomed furze; the wide stretches of desolate plain beyond, where - no human habitation could be seen, yet where he knew thousands of poor - creatures lived, all the same, in moss-hidden hovels in the nooks of the - rocks; the pale sheen on the sea still further away, as it slept in the - sunlight at the feet of the cliffs—everything was as sharp and - distinct as the picture in a telescope. - </p> - <p> - But all this did not help him to guess where the young woman in the broad, - black hat lived. - </p> - <p> - Bernard had thought a great deal about this young woman during the - forty-eight hours which had elapsed since she stood up in the boat and - waved her hand to him in farewell. In a guarded way he had made some - inquiries at Goleen, where he was for the moment domiciled, but only to - learn that people on the east side of the peninsula are conscious of no - interest whatever in the people reputed to live on the west side. They are - six or eight Irish miles apart, and there is high land between them. No - one in Goleen could tell him anything about a beautiful dark young woman - with a broad, black hat. He felt that they did not even properly imagine - to themselves what he meant. In Goleen the young women are not beautiful, - and they wear shawls on their heads, not hats. - </p> - <p> - Then he had conceived the idea of investigating the west shore for - himself. On the map in his guide-book this seemed a simple enough - undertaking, but now, as he let his gaze wander again along the vast - expanse of ragged and twisted coast-line, he saw that it would mean the - work of many days. - </p> - <p> - And then—then he saw something else—a vision which fairly took - his breath away. - </p> - <p> - Along the furze-hedge road which wound its way up the mountain-side from - Dunmanus and the south, two human figures were moving toward him, slowly, - and still at a considerable distance. One of these figures was that of a - woman, and—yes, it was a woman!—and she wore, a hat—as - like as could be to that broad-brimmed, black hat he had been dreaming of. - Bernard permitted himself no doubts. He was of the age of miracles. Of - course it was <i>she!</i> - </p> - <p> - Without a moment’s hesitation he slid down off his rocky perch and seated - himself behind a clump of furze. It would be time enough to disclose his - presence—if, indeed he did at all—when she had come up to him. - </p> - <p> - No such temptation to secrecy besets us. We may freely hasten down the - mountain-side to where Kate, walking slowly and pausing from time to time - to look back upon the broadening sweep of land and sea below her, was - making the ascent of Mount Gabriel. - </p> - <p> - Poor old Murphy had been left behind, much against his will, to nurse and - bemoan his swollen ankle. The companion this time was a younger brother of - the missing Malachy, a lumpish, silent “boy” of twenty-five or six, who - slouched along a few paces behind his mistress and bore the luncheon - basket. This young man was known to all Muirisc as John Pat, which was by - way of distinguishing him from the other Johns who were not also Patricks. - As it was now well on toward nine centuries since the good Brian Boru - ordained that every Irishman should have a surname, the presumption is - that John Pat did possess such a thing, but feudal Muirisc never dreamed - of suggesting its common use. This surname had been heard at his baptism; - it might be mentioned again upon the occasion of his marriage, though his - wife would certainly be spoken of as Mrs. John Pat, and in the end, if he - died at Muirisc, the surname would be painted in white letters on the - black wooden cross set over his grave. For all the rest he was just John - Pat. - </p> - <p> - And mediaeval Muirisc, too, could never have dreamed that his age and sex - might be thought by outsiders to render him an unsuitable companion for - Miss Kate in her wanderings over the countryside. In their eyes, and in - his own, he was a mere boy, whose mission was to run errands, carry - bundles or do whatever else the people of the castle bade him do; in - return for which they, in one way or another, looked to it that he - continued to live, and even on occasion, gave him an odd shilling or two. - </p> - <p> - “Look, now, John Pat,” said Kate, halting once more to look back; “there’s - Dunbeacon and Dun-manus and Muirisc beyant, and, may be if it wasn’t so - far, we could see the Three Castles, too; and whin we’re at the top, we - should be able to see Rosbrin and the White Castle and the Black Castle - and the strand over which Ballydesmond stood, on the other side, as well. - ’Tis my belafe no other family in the world can stand and look down - on sevin of their castles at one view.” - </p> - <p> - John Pat looked dutifully along the coast-line as her gesture commanded, - and changed his basket into the other hand, but offered no comment. - </p> - <p> - “And there, across the bay,” the girl went on, “is the land that’s marked - on the Four Masters’ map for the O’Dalys. Ye were there many’ times, John - Pat, after crabs and the like. Tell me, now, did ever you or anny one else - hear of a castle built there be the O’Dalys?” - </p> - <p> - “Sorra a wan, Miss Katie.” - </p> - <p> - “There you have it! My word, the impidince of thim O’Dalys—strolling - beggars, and hedge teachers, and singers of ballads be the wayside! ’Tis - in the books, John Pat, that wance there was a king of Ireland named Hugh - Dubh—Hugh the Black—and these bards so perplexed and brothered - the soul out of him wid claims for money and fine clothes and the best - places at the table, and kept the land in such a turmoil by rayson of the - scurrilous verses they wrote about thim that gave thim less than their - demands—that Hugh, glory be to him, swore not a man of ’em - should remain in all Ireland. ‘Out ye go,’ says he. But thin they raised - such a cry, that a wake, kindly man—St. Columbkill that was to be—tuk - pity on ’em, and interceded wid the king, and so, worse luck, they - kept their place. Ah, thin, if Hugh Dugh had had his way wid ’em ’t - would be a different kind of Ireland we’d see this day!” - </p> - <p> - “Well, this Hugh Dove, as you call him”—spoke up a clear, - fresh-toned male voice, which was not John Pat’s—“even he couldn’t - have wanted a prettier Ireland than this is, right here in front of us!” - </p> - <p> - Kate, in vast surprise, turned at the very first sound of this strange - voice. A young man had risen to his feet from behind the furze hedge, - close beside her, his rosy-cheeked face wreathed in amiable smiles. She - recognized the wandering O’Ma-hony from Houghton County, Michigan, and - softened the rigid lines into which her face had been startled, as a token - of friendly recognition. - </p> - <p> - “Good morning,” the young man added, as a ceremonious afterthought. “Isn’t - it a lovely day?” - </p> - <p> - “You seem to be viewing our country hereabouts wid great complateness,” - commented Kate, with a half-smile, not wholly free from irony. There - really was no reason for suspecting the accidental character of the - encounter, save the self-conscious and confident manner in which the young - man had, on the instant, attached himself to her expedition. Even as she - spoke, he was walking along at her side. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes,” he answered, cheerfully, “I’m mixing up business and pleasure, - don’t you see, all the while I’m here—and really they get so tangled - up together every once in a while, that I can’t tell which is which. But - just at this moment—there’s no doubt about it whatever—pleasure - is right bang-up on top.” - </p> - <p> - “It <i>is</i> a fine, grand day,” said Kate, with a shade of reserve. The - frankly florid compliment of the Occident was novel to her. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, simply wonderful weather,” he pursued. “Only April, and here’s the - skin all peeling off from my nose.” - </p> - <p> - Kate could not but in courtesy look at this afflicted feature. It was a - short good-humored nose, with just the faintest and kindliest suggestion - of an upward tilt at the end. One should not be too serious with the owner - of such a nose. - </p> - <p> - “You have business here, thin?” she asked. “I thought you were looking at - castles—and shooting herons.” - </p> - <p> - He gave a little laugh, and held up his hammer as a voucher. - </p> - <p> - “I’m a mining engineer,” he explained: “I’ve been prospecting for a - company all around Cappagh and the Mizzen Head, and now I’m waiting to - hear from London what the assays are like. Oh, yes—that reminds me—I - ought to have asked before—how is the old man—the chap we had - to carry to the boat? I hope his ankle’s better.” - </p> - <p> - “It is, thank you,” she replied. - </p> - <p> - He chuckled aloud at the recollections which the subject suggested. - </p> - <p> - “He soured on me, right from the start, didn’t hee?” the young man went - on. “I’ve laughed a hundred times since, at the way he chiseled me out of - my place in the boat—that is to say, <i>some</i> of the time I’ve - laughed—but—but then lots of other times I couldn’t see any - fun in it at all. Do you know,” he continued, almost dolefully, “I’ve been - hunting all over the place for you.” - </p> - <p> - “I’ve nothing to do wid the minerals on our lands,” Kate answered. “’T - is a thrushtee attinds to all that.” - </p> - <p> - “Pshaw! I didn’t want to talk minerals to <i>you</i>.” - </p> - <p> - “And what thin?” - </p> - <p> - “Well—since you put it so straight—why—why, of course—I - wanted to ask you more about our people, about the O’Mahonys. You seemed - to be pretty well up on the thing. You see, my father died seven or eight - years ago, so that I was too young to talk to him much about where he came - from, and all that. And my mother, her people were from a different part - of Ireland, and so, you see—” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, there’s not much to tell now,” said Kate, in a saddened tone. “They - were a great family once, and now are nothing at all, wid poor me as the - last of the lot.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t call that ‘nothing at all,’ by a jugful,” protested Bernard, with - conviction. - </p> - <p> - Kate permitted herself a brief cousinly smile. - </p> - <p> - “All the same, they end with me, and afther me comes in the O’Dalys.” - </p> - <p> - Lines of thought raised themselves on the young man’s forehead and ran - down to the sunburnt nose. - </p> - <p> - “How do you mean?” he asked, dubiously. - </p> - <p> - “Are you—don’t mind my asking—are you going to marry one of - that name?” - </p> - <p> - She shrugged her shoulders, to express repugnance at the very thought. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll marry no one; laste of all an O’Daly,” she said, firmly. Then, after - a moment’s hesitation, she decided upon a further explanation. “I’m goin’ - to take me vows at the convint within the month,” she added. - </p> - <p> - Bernard stared open-eyed at her. - </p> - <p> - “I-gad!” was all he said. - </p> - <p> - The girl’s face lightened at the sound of this exclamation, bringing back - as it did a flood of welcome memories. - </p> - <p> - “I know you by that word for a true O’Mahony,—‘an American - O’Mahoney,” she said, with eager pleasure beaming in her deep-gray eyes. - She turned to her retainer: “You remimber that same word, John Pat. Who - was it used always to be saying ‘I-gad?’” - </p> - <p> - John Pat searched the landscape with a vacuous glance. - </p> - <p> - “W’u’d it be Father Harrington?” he asked. - </p> - <p> - “Huh!” sniffed Kate, in light contempt, and turned again to the young - engineer, with a backward nod toward John Pat. “He’s an honest lad,” she - said, apologetically, “but the Lord only knows what’s inside of his head. - Ah, sir, there <i>was</i> an O’Mahony here—‘tis twelve years now - since he sailed away; ah, the longest day Muirisc stands she ’ll - not see such another man—bold and fine, wid a heart in him like a - lion, and yit soft and tinder to thim he liked, and a janius for war and - commence and government that made Muirisc blossom like a rose. Ah, a grand - man was our O’Mahony!” - </p> - <p> - “So you live at Muirisc, eh?” asked the practical Bernard. - </p> - <p> - “’T was him used always to say ‘I-gad!’ whin things took him by - surprise,” remarked Kate, turning to study the vast downward view - attentively. - </p> - <p> - “Well I said it because <i>I</i> was taken by surprise,” said the young - man. “What else could a fellow say, with such a piece of news as that - dumped down on him? But say, you don’t mean it, do you—<i>you</i> - going to be a nun?” - </p> - <p> - She looked at him through luminous eyes, and nodded a grave affirmative. - </p> - <p> - Bernard walked for a little way in silence, moodily eying the hammer in - his hand. Once or twice he looked up at his companion as if to speak, then - cast down his eyes again. At last, after he had helped her to cross a low, - marshy stretch at the base of a ridge of gray rock, and to climb to the - top of the boulder—for they had left the road now and were making - their way obliquely up the barren crest—he found words to utter. - </p> - <p> - “You don’t mind my coming along with you,” he asked, “under the - circumstances?” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t see how I’m to prevint you, especially wid you armed wid a - hammer,” she said, in gentle banter. - </p> - <p> - “And I can ask you a plain question without offending you?” he went on; - and then, without waiting for an answer, put his question: “It’s just this—I’ve - only seen you twice, it’s true, but I feel as if I’d known you for years, - and, besides, we’re kind of relations—are you going to do this of - your own free will?” - </p> - <p> - Kate, for answer, lifted her hand and pointed westward toward the - pale-blue band along the distant coast-line. - </p> - <p> - “That castle you see yonder at the bridge—” she said, “’t was - there that Finghin, son of Diarmid Mor O’Mahony, bate the MacCarthys wid - great slaughter, in Anno Domini 1319.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXI—ON THE MOUNTAIN-TOP—AND AFTER. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he two young - people, with John Pat and the basket close behind, stood at last upon the - very summit of Gabriel—a wild and desolate jumble of naked rocks - piled helter-skelter about them, and at their feet a strange, little, - circular lake, which in all the ages had mirrored no tree or flowering - rush or green thing whatsoever, but knew only of the clouds and of the - lightning’s play and of the gathering of the storm-demons for descent upon - the homes of men. - </p> - <p> - A solemn place is a mountain-top. The thin, spiritualized air is all alive - with mysteries, which, down below in the sordid atmosphere, visit only the - brains of men whom we lock up as mad. The drying-up of the great - globe-floods; the slow birth of vegetation; the rank growth of uncouth - monsters; the coming of the fleet-footed, bare-skinned savage beast called - man; the primeval aeons of warfare wherein knowledge of fire, of metals, - of tanned hides and habitations was laboriously developed and the huger - reptiles were destroyed; the dawn of history through the clouds of sun and - serpent worship; the weary ages of brutish raids and massacres, of - barbaric creeds and cruel lusts—all this the mountain-tops have - stood still and watched, and, so far as in them lay, understood. - </p> - <p> - Some have comprehended more of what they saw than others. The tallest man - is not necessarily the wisest. So there are very lofty mountains which - remain stupid, despite their advantages, and there are relatively small - mountains which have come to be almost human in their understanding of and - sympathy with the world-long drama they have watched unfolding itself. The - Brocken, for example, is scarcely nipple-high to many another of its - German brethren, yet which of the rest has such rich memories, stretching - back through countless centuries of Teuton, Slav, Alemanni, Suevi, Frank - and Celt to the days when nomad strove with troglodyte, and the great - cave-bear grappled with the mammoth in the silent fastnesses of the Harz. - </p> - <p> - In Desmond, the broad-based, conical Gabriel has as unique a character of - another kind. There is nothing of the frank and homely German familiarity - in the reputation it enjoys at home. To be sure, the mountain is scarred - to the throat by bogcutters; cabins and the ruins of cabins lurk hidden in - clefts of rocks more than half-way up its gray, furze-clad sides; yet it - produces the effect of standing sternly aloof from human things. The - peasants think of it as a sacred eminence. It has its very name from the - legend of the archangel, who flying across Europe in disgust at man’s - iniquities, could not resist the temptation to descend for a moment to - touch with his foot this beautiful mountain gem in the crown of Carbery. - </p> - <p> - Kate explained this legend to her young companion from Houghton County, - and showed him the marks of the celestial visitor’s foot plainly visible - in the rock. He bestowed such critical, not to say professional, scrutiny - upon these marks that she made haste to take up another branch of the - ancient fable. - </p> - <p> - “And this little round lake here,” she went on, “they’ll all tell you ’t - was made by bodily lifting out a great cylinder of rock and carting it - miles through the air and putting it down in the sea out there, where it’s - ever since been known as Fasnet Rock. They say the measurements are - precisely the same. I forget now if ’t was the Archangel Gabriel - did that, too, or the divil.” - </p> - <p> - “The result comes to about the same thing,” commented the engineer. - “Whoever did it,” he went on, scanning the regularly rounded sides of the - pool, “made a good workmanlike job of it.” - </p> - <p> - “No one’s ever been able to touch the bottom of it,” said Kate, with - pride. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, come, now—I’ve heard that of every second lake in Ireland.” - </p> - <p> - “Well—certainly <i>I’ve</i> not tested it,” she replied, frostily, - “but ’t is well known that if you sink a bottle in this lake ’t - will be found out there in Dun-manus Bay fourteen hundred feet below us.” - </p> - <p> - “Why, the very first principle of hydrostatics,” began Bernard, with - controversial eagerness. Then he stopped short, stroked his smooth chin, - and changed the subject abruptly. “Speaking of bottles,” he said, “I see - your man there is eying that lunch basket with the expression of a - meat-axe. Wouldn’t it be a clever idea to let him unpack it?” The while - John Pat stripped the basket of its contents, and spread them upon a cloth - in the mossy shadow of an overhanging boulder, the two by a common impulse - strolled over to the eastern edge of the summit. - </p> - <p> - “Beyond Roaring Water Bay the O’Driscoll Castles begin,” said Kate. “They - tell me they’re poor trifles compared wid ours.” - </p> - <p> - “I like to hear you say ‘ours,’” the young man broke in. “I want you to - keep right on remembering all the while that I belong to the family. And—and - I wish to heaven there was something I could do to show how tickled to - death I am that I do belong to it!” - </p> - <p> - “I have never been here before,” Kate said, in a musing tone, which - carried in it a gentle apology for abstraction. “I did not know there was - anything so big and splendid in the world.” - </p> - <p> - The spell of this mighty spectacle at once enchanted and oppressed her. - She stood gazing down upon it for some minutes, holding up her hand as a - plea for silence when her companion would have spoken. Then, with a - lingering sigh, she turned away and led the slow walk back toward the - lake. - </p> - <p> - “’Twas like dreaming,” she said with gravity; “and a strange - thought came to me: ’Twas that this lovely Ireland I looked down - upon was beautiful with the beauty of death; that ’twas the corpse - of me country I was taking a last view of. Don’t laugh at me! I had just - that feeling. Ah, poor, poor Ireland!” - </p> - <p> - Bernard saw tears glistening upon her long, black lashes, and scarcely - knew his own voice when he heard it, in such depths of melancholy was it - pitched. - </p> - <p> - “Better times are coming now,” he said. “If we open up the mines we are - counting on it ought to give work to at least two hundred men.” - </p> - <p> - She turned sharply upon him. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t talk like that!” she said, in half command, half entreaty. “’T - is not trade or work or mines that keeps a nation alive when ’tis - fit to die. One can have them all, and riches untold, and still sink wid a - broken heart. ’T is nearly three hundred years since the first of - the exiled O’Mahonys sailed away yonder—from Skull and Crookhaven - they wint—to fight and die in Spain. Thin others wint—Conagher - and Domnal and the rest—to fight and die in France; and so for - centuries the stream of life has flowed away from Ireland wid every other - family the same as wid ours. What nation under the sun could stand the - drain? ’T is twelve years now since the best and finest of them all - sailed away to fight in France, and to—to die—oh, <i>wirra!</i>—who - knows where? So”—her great eyes flashed proudly through their tears—“don’t - talk of mines to me! ’T is too much like the English!” - </p> - <p> - Bernard somehow felt himself grown much taller and older as he listened to - this outburst of passionate lamentation, with its whiplash end of - defiance, and realized that this beautiful girl was confiding it all to - him. He threw back his shoulders, and laid a hand gently on her arm. - </p> - <p> - “Come, come,” he pleaded, with a soothing drawl, “<i>don’t</i> give away - like that! We’ll take a bite of something to eat, and get down again where - the grass grows. Why, you’ve no idea—the bottom of a coal-mine is - sociable and lively compared with this. I’d get the blues myself up here, - in another half-hour!” - </p> - <p> - A few steps were taken in silence, and then the young man spoke again, - with settled determination in his voice. - </p> - <p> - “You can say what you like,” he ground out between his teeth, “or, rather, - you needn’t say any more than you like; but I’ve got my own idea about - this convent business, and I don’t like it, and I don’t for a minute - believe that you like it. Mind, I’m not asking you to tell me whether you - do or not—only I want you to say just this: Count on me as your - friend—call it cousin, too, if you like; keep me in mind as a fellow - who’ll go to the whole length of the rope to help you, and break the rope - like a piece of paper twine if it’s necessary to go further. That’s all.” - </p> - <p> - It is the property of these weird mountain-tops to make realities out of - the most unlikely things. On a lower terrestrial level Kate’s mind might - have seen nothing but fantastic absurdity in this proffer of confidential - friendship and succor, from a youth whom she met twice. Here in the finer - and more eager air, lifted up to be the companion of clouds, the girl - looked with grave frankness into his eyes and gave him her hand in token - of the bond. - </p> - <p> - Without further words, they rejoined John Fat, and sat down to lunch. - </p> - <p> - Indeed, there were few further words during the afternoon which John Pat - was not privileged to hear. He sat with them during the meal, in the true - democratic spirit of the sept relation, and he kept close behind them on - their rambling, leisurely descent of the mountain-side. From the tenor of - their talk he gathered vaguely that the strange young man was some sort of - relation from America, and as relations from America present, perhaps, the - one idea most universally familiar to the Irish peasant’s mind, his - curiosity was not aroused. Their conversation, for the most part, was - about that remarkable O’Mahony who had gone away years ago and whom John - Pat only dimly remembered. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - A couple of miles from Muirisc, the homeward-bound trio—for Bernard - had tacitly made himself a party to the entire expedition and felt as if - he, too, were going home—encountered, in the late afternoon, two men - sitting by the roadside ditch. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, there’s Jerry,” said Kate to her companion—“Mr. Higgins, I mane—wan - of my trustees. I’ll inthroduce you to him.” - </p> - <p> - Jerry’s demeanor, as the group approached him, bore momentary traces of - embarrassment. He looked at the man beside him, and then cast a backward - glance at the ditch, as if wishing that they were both safely hidden - behind its mask of stone wall and furze. But this was clearly impossible; - and the two stood up at an obvious suggestion from Jerry and put as good a - face upon their presence as possible. - </p> - <p> - “This is a relation of <i>moine</i> from Ameriky, too,” said Jerry, after - some words had passed, indicating the tall, thin, shambling, spectacled - figure beside him, “Mr. Joseph Higgins, of—of—of—” - </p> - <p> - “Of Boston,” said the other, after an awkward pause. - </p> - <p> - He seemed ill at ease in his badly fitting clothes, and looked furtively - from one to another of the faces before him. - </p> - <p> - “An’ what d’ ye think, Miss Katie?” hurriedly continued Jerry. “Egor! Be - all the miracles of Moses, he’s possessed of more learnin’ about the - O’Mahonys than anny other man alive, Cormac O’Daly ’d be a fool to - him. An’, egor, he used to know <i>our</i> O’Mahony whin he was in - Ameriky, before ever he came over to us!” - </p> - <p> - “Ye’re wrong, Jerry,” said Mr. Joseph Higgins, with cautious hesitation, - “I didn’t say I knew him. I said I knew of him. I was employed to search - for him, whin he was heir to the estate, unbeknownst to himself, an’ I - wint to the town where he’d kept a cobbler’s shop—Tecumsy was the - name of it—an’ I made inquiries for Hugh O’Mahony, but—” - </p> - <p> - “What’s that you say! Hugh O’Mahony—a shoemaker in Tecumseh, New - York?” broke in young Bernard, with sharp, almost excited emphasis. - </p> - <p> - “’T is what I said,” responded the other, his pale face flushing - nervously, “only—only he’d gone to the war.” - </p> - <p> - “An’ that was <i>our</i> O’Mahony,” explained Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “Glory be to God, he learned of the search made for him, an’ he came to us - afther the war.” - </p> - <p> - Bernard was not sure that he had got the twitching muscles of his face - under control, but at least he could manage his tongue. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, he came over here, did he?” he said, with a fair affectation of - polite interest. - </p> - <p> - “You spoke as if you knew him,” put in Kate, eagerly. - </p> - <p> - “My father knew him as well—as well as he knew himself,” answered - Bernard, with evasion, and then bit his lip in fear that he had said too - much. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXII—THE INTELLIGENT YOUNG MAN. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>ithin the next few - days the people of Muirisc found themselves becoming familiar with the - spectacle of two strange figures walking about among their narrow, twisted - streets or across the open space of common between the castle and the - quay. The sight of new-comers was still unusual enough in Muirisc to - disturb the minds of the inhabitants—but since the mines had been - opened in the district the old-time seclusion had never quite come back, - and it was uneasily felt that in the lapse of years even a hotel might - come to be necessary. - </p> - <p> - One of these strangers, a rickety, spindling, weirdeyed man in spectacles, - was known to be a cousin of Jerry Higgins, from America. The story went - that he was a great scholar, peculiarly learned in ancient Irish matters. - Muirisc took this for granted all the more readily because he seemed not - to know anything else—and watched his shambling progress through the - village streets by Jerry’s side with something of the affectionate pity - which the Irish peasant finds always in his heart for the being he - describes as a “nathural”. - </p> - <p> - The other new-comer answered vastly better to Muirisc’s conceptions of - what a man from America should be like. He was young, fresh-faced and - elastic of step—with square shoulders, a lithe, vigorous frame and - eyes which looked with frank and cheerful shrewdness at all men and - things. He outdid even the most communicative of Muirisc’s old - white-capped women in polite salutations to passers-by on the highway, and - he was amiably untiring in his efforts to lure with pennies into friendly - converse the wild little girls of Muirisc, who watched him with twinkling, - squirrels’ eyes from under their shawls, and whisked off like so many - coveys of partridges, at his near approach; the little boys, with the - stronger sense of their sex, invariably took his pennies, but no more than - their sisters could they be induced to talk. - </p> - <p> - There was a delightful absence of reserve in this young man from America. - Muirisc seemed to know everything about him all at once. His name was - O’Mahony, and his father had been a County-Cork man; he was a mining - engineer, and had been brought over to Europe by a mining company as an - expert in copper-ores and the refining of barytes; he was living at - Goleen, but liked Muirisc much better, both from a miner, a logical point - of view and socially; he was reckless in the expenditure of money on the - cars from Goleen and back and on the hire of boatmen at Muirisc; he was - filled to the top and running over with funny stories, he was a good - Catholic, he took the acutest interest in all the personal narratives of - the older inhabitants, and was free with his tobacco; truly a most - admirable young man! - </p> - <p> - He had been about Muirisc and the immediate vicinity for a week or so—breaking - up an occasional rock with his hammer when he was sure people were - watching him, but more often lounging about in gossip on the main street, - or fishing in the harbor with a boatman who would talk—when he made - in a casual way the acquaintance of O’Daly. - </p> - <p> - The little old man, white-haired now, but with the blue-black shadows of - clean shaving still staining high up his jaws and sunken cheeks, had come - down the street, nodding briefly to such villagers as saluted him, and - carrying his hands clasped at the buttons on the back of his long-tailed - coat. He had heard rumors of this young miner from America, and paused now - on the outskirts of a group in front of the cobbler’s shop, whom Bernard - was entertaining with tales of giant salmon in the waters of Lake - Superior. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, this is Mr. O’Daly, I believe,” the young man had on the instant - interrupted his narrative to remark. “I’m glad to meet you, sir. I’d been - thinking of calling on you every day, but I know you’re a busy man, and - it’s only since yesterday that I’ve felt that I had real business with - you. My name’s O’Mahony, and I’m here for the South Desmond Barytes - Syndicate. Probably you know the name.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Daly found his wrinkled old paw being shaken warmly in the grasp of - this affable young man before he had had time to be astonished. - </p> - <p> - “O’Daly’s my name,” he said, hesitatingly. “And you have business with me, - you said?” - </p> - <p> - “I guess you’ll think so!” responded the other. “I’ve just got word from - my superiors in London to go ahead, and naturally you’re the first man I - want to talk with.” And then they linked arms. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” said the cobbler, as they watched the receding figures of the - pair, “my word, there’s more ways of killin’ a dog than chokin’ him wid - butter!” - </p> - <p> - An hour later, Bernard sat comfortably ensconced in the easiest chair - afforded by the living-room of the castle, with the infant O’Daly on his - knee and a trio of grown-up people listening in unaffected pleasure to his - sprightly talk. He had at the outset mistaken Mrs. O’Daly for a married - sister of Kate’s—an error which he managed on the instant to - emphasize by a gravely deliberate wink at Kate—and now held the - mother’s heart completely by his genial attentions to the babe. He had set - old O’Daly all aglow with eager interest by his eulogy of Muirisc’s - mineral wealth as against all other districts in West Carbery. And all the - time, through anecdote, business converse, exchange of theories on the - rearing and precocity of infants and bright-flowing chatter on every - subject tinder the sun, he had contrived to make Kate steadily conscious - that she was the true object of his visit. Now and again the consciousness - grew so vivid that she felt herself blushing over the embroidered - altar-cloth at which she worked, in the shadow between the windows. - </p> - <p> - “Well, sir,” said Bernard, dandling the infant tenderly as he spoke, “I - don’t know what I wouldn’t give to be able, when I go back, to tell my - father how I’d seen the O’Mahony castles here, and all that, right on the - family’s old stamping-ground.” - </p> - <p> - “Yer father died, ye say, manny years ago?” remarked O’Daly. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, ‘manny’s not the word for it,” put in Mrs. O’Daly, with a - flattering smile. “He’s but a lad yet, for all he’s seen and done.” - </p> - <p> - “Nobody could grow old in such an air as this,” said the young man, - briskly. “You, yourself, bear witness to that, Mrs. O’Daly. Yes, my father - died when I was a youngster. We moved out West after the War—I was a - little shaver then—and he didn’t live long after that.” - </p> - <p> - “And would he be in the moines, too?” asked Cormac. - </p> - <p> - “No; in the leather business,” answered Bernard, without hesitation. “To - the end of his days, he was always counting on coming back here to Ireland - and seeing the home of the O’Mahonys again. To hear him talk, you’d have - thought there wasn’t another family in Ireland worth mentioning.” - </p> - <p> - “’T was always that way wid thim O’Mahonys,” said O’Daly, throwing - a significant glance over his wife and step-daughter. “I can spake freely - to you, sir; for I’ll be bound ye favor yer mother’s side and ye were not - brought up among them; but bechune ourselves, there’s a dale o’ nonsinse - talked about thim same O’Mahonys. Did you ever hear yer father mintion an - O’Daly?” - </p> - <p> - “Well—no—I can’t say I did,” answered the young man, bending - his mind to comprehension of what the old man might be driving at. - </p> - <p> - “There ye have it!” said Cormac, bringing his hand down with emphasis on - the table. “Sir, ’t is a hard thing to say, but the ingrathitude of - thim O’Mahonys just passes belafe. Sure, ’t was we that made thim. - What were they but poyrutts and robbers of the earth, wid no since but for - raids an’ incursions, an’ burnin’ down abbeys an’ holy houses, and makin’ - war on their neighbors. An’ sure, ’t was we civilized ’em, - we O’Dalys, that they trate now as not fit to lace up their shoes. ’T - was we taught thim O’Mahonys to rade an’ write, an’ everything else they - knew in learnin’ and politeness. An’ so far as that last-mintioned - commodity goes”—this with a still more meaning, sidelong glance - toward the women—“faith, a dale of our labor was wasted intoirely.” - </p> - <p> - Even if Kate would have taken up the challenge, the young man gave her no - time. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, of course,” he broke in, “I’ve heard of the O’Dalys all my life. - Everybody knows about <i>them!</i>” - </p> - <p> - “Luk at that now!” exclaimed Cormac, in high triumph. “Sure, ’t is - Ameriky’ll set all of us right, an’ keep the old learning up. Ye’ll have - heard, sir, of Cuchonnacht O’Daly, called <i>‘na Sgoile</i>, or ‘of the - school’—” - </p> - <p> - “What, old Cocoanut!” cried Bernard, with vivacity, “I should think so!” - </p> - <p> - “’T was he was our founder,” pursued Cormac, excitedly. “An’ after - him came eight-an’-twinty descindants, all the chief bards of Ireland. An’ - in comparatively late toimes they had a school at Drumnea, in Kilcrohane, - where the sons of the kings of Spain came for their complate eddication, - an’ the princes doid there, an’ are buried there in our family vault—sure - the ruins of the college remain to this day—” - </p> - <p> - “You don’t mean to say you’re one of <i>that</i> family, Mr. O’Daly?” - asked Bernard, with eagerness. - </p> - <p> - “’T is my belafe I’m the head of it,” responded Cormac, with lofty - simplicity. “I’m an old man, sir, an’ of an humble nature, an’ I’d not be - takin’ honors on meself. But whin that bye there—that bye ye howld - on yer knee—grows up, an’ he the owner of Muirisc an’ its moines an’ - the fishin’, wid all his eddication an’ foine advantages—sure, if it - pl’ases him to asshume the dignity of <i>The</i> O’Daly, an’ putt the - grand old family wance more where it belongs, I’m thinkin’ me bones ’ll - rest the aiser in their grave.” - </p> - <p> - Bernard looked down with an abstracted air at the unpleasantly narrow - skull of the child on his knee, with its big ears and thin, plastered - ringlets that suggested a whimsical baby-caricature of the mother’s - crimps. He heard Kate rise behind him, walk across the floor and leave the - room with an emphatic closing of the door. To be frank, the impulse burned - hotly within him to cuff the infantile head of this future chief of the - O’Dalys. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve a pome on the subject, which I composed last Aister Monday,” O’Daly - went on, “which I’d be deloighted to rade to ye.” - </p> - <p> - “Unfortunately I must be hurrying along now,” said Bernard, rising on the - instant, and depositing the child on the floor. “I’m sorry, sir, but—” - </p> - <p> - “Sure, ’t is you do be droivin’ everybody from the house wid yer - pomes,” commented Mrs. O’Daly, ungenerously. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, no, I assure you!” protested the young man. “I’ve often heard of Mr. - O’Daly’s verses, and very soon now I’m coming to get him to read them all - to me. Have you got some about Cocoanut, Mr. O’Daly?” - </p> - <p> - “This particular one,” said Cormac, doggedly, “trates of a much later - period. Indeed, ’t is so late that it hasn’t happened at all yit. ’T - is laid in futurity, sir, an’ dales wid the grand career me son is to have - whin he takes his proud position as <i>The</i> O’Daly, the proide of West - Carbery.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, now, you’ve got to read me that the very first thing when I come - next time,” said Bernard. Then he added, with a smile: “For, you know, I - want you to let me come again.” - </p> - <p> - “Sir, ye can’t come too soon or stop too long,” Mrs. O’Daly assured him. - “Sure, what wid there bein’ no railway to Muirisc an’ no gintry near by, - an’ what wid the dale we hear about the O’Dalys an’ their supayriority - over the O’Mahonys, an’ thim pomes, my word, we do be starvin’ for the - soight of a new face!” - </p> - <p> - “Then I can’t be too glad that my face <i>is</i> new,” promptly put in - Bernard, wreathing the countenance in question with beaming amiability. - “And in a few days I shall want to talk business with Mr. O’Daly, too, - about the mining rights we shall need to take up.” - </p> - <p> - “Ye’ll be welcome always,” said O’Daly. - </p> - <p> - And with that comforting pledge in his ears, the young man shook hands - with the couple and made his way out of the room. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t trouble yourselves to come out,” he begged. “I feel already at home - all over the house.” - </p> - <p> - “Now that’s a young man of sinse,” said the O’Daly, after the door had - closed behind their visitor. “’T is not manny ye’ll foind nowadays - wid such intelligince insoide his head.” - </p> - <p> - “Nor so comely a face on the outside of it,” commented his wife. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <p> - At the end of the hallway this intelligent young man was not surprised to - encounter Kate, and she made no pretense of not having waited for him. - Yet, as he approached, she moved to pass by. - </p> - <p> - “’T is althered opinions you hold about the O’Mahonys and the - O’Dalys,” she said, with studied coldness and a haughty carriage of her - dark head. - </p> - <p> - He caught her sleeve as she would have passed him. - </p> - <p> - “See here,” he whispered, eagerly, “don’t you make a goose of yourself. - I’ve told more lies and acted more lies generally this afternoon for <i>you</i> - than I would for all the other women on earth boiled together. Sh-h! Just - you keep mum, and we’ll see you through this thing slick and clean.” - </p> - <p> - “I want no lies told for me, or acted either,” retorted Kate. - </p> - <p> - Her tone was proud enough still, but the lines of her face were relenting. - </p> - <p> - “No, I don’t suppose for a minute you do,” he murmured back, still holding - her sleeve, and with his other hand on the latch. “You’re too near an - angel for that. I tell you what: Suppose you just start in and do as much - praying as you can, to kind o’ balance the thing. It’ll all be needed; for - as far as I can see now, I’ve got some regular old whoppers to come yet.” - </p> - <p> - Then the young man released the sleeve, snatched up the hand at the end of - that sleeve, kissed it, and was gone before Kate could say another word. - </p> - <p> - When she had thought it all over, through hours of seclusion in her room, - she was still very much at sea as to what that word would have been had - time been afforded her in which to utter it. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXIII—THE COUNCIL OF WAR. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">H</span>aving left the - castle, Bernard walked briskly away across the open square, past the quay - and along the curling stretch of sands which led to the path under the - cliffs. He had taken the hammer from his pocket and swung it as he strode - onward, whistling as he went. - </p> - <p> - A mile or so along the strand, he turned off at a footway leading up the - rocks, and climbed this nimbly to the top, gaining which, he began to scan - closely the broad expanse of dun-colored bog-plain which dipped gradually - toward Mount Gabriel. His search was not protracted. He had made out the - figures he sought, and straightway set out over the bog, with a light, - springing step, still timed to a whistled marching tune, toward them. - </p> - <p> - “Well, I’ve treed the coon!” was his remark when he had joined Jerry and - Linsky. “It was worth waiting for a week just to catch him like that, with - his guard down. Wait a minute, then I can be sure of what I’m talking - about.” - </p> - <p> - The others had not invited this adjuration by any overt display of - impatience, and they watched the young man now take an envelope from his - pocket and work out a sum on its back with a pencil in placid if open-eyed - contentment. They both studied him, in fact, much as their grandfathers - might have gazed at the learned pig at a fair—as a being with - resources and accomplishments quite beyond the laborious necessity of - comprehension. - </p> - <p> - He finished his ciphering, and gave them, in terse summary, the benefit of - it. - </p> - <p> - “The way I figure the thing,” he said, with his eye on the envelope, “is - this: The mines were going all right when your man went away, twelve years - ago. The output then was worth, say, eight thousand pounds sterling a - year. Since then it has once or twice gone as high at twenty thousand - pounds, and once it’s been down to eleven thousand pouunds. From all I can - gather the average ought to have been, say, fourteen thousand pounds. The - mining tenants hold on the usual thirty-one-year lease, paying fifty - pounds a year to begin with, and then one-sixteenth on the gross sales. - There is a provision of a maximum surface-drainage charge of two pounds an - acre, but there’s nothing in that. On my average, the whole royalties - would be nine hundred and twenty-five pounds a year. That, in twelve - years, would be eleven thousand pounds. I think, myself, that it’s a good - deal more; but that’ll do as a starter. And you say O’Daly’s been sending - the boss two hundred pounds a year?” - </p> - <p> - “At laste for tin years—not for the last two,” said Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “Very well, then; you’ve got nine thousand pounds. The interest on that - for two years alone would make up all he sent away.” - </p> - <p> - “An’ ’t is your idea that O’Daly has putt by all that money?” - </p> - <p> - “And half as much more; and not a cent of it all belongs to him.” - </p> - <p> - “Thrue for you; ’t is Miss Katie’s money,” mourned Jerry, shaking - his curly red head and disturbing his fat breast with a prolonged sigh. - “But she’ll never lay finger to anny of it. Oh, Cormac, you’re the divil!” - </p> - <p> - The young man sniffed impatiently. - </p> - <p> - “That’s the worst of you fellows,” he said, sharply. “You take fright like - a flock of sheep. What the deuce are you afraid of? No wonder Ireland - isn’t free, with men who have got to sit down and cry every few minutes!” - Then the spectacle of pained surprise on Jerry’s fat face drove away his - mood of criticism. “Or no; I don’t mean that,” he hastened to add; “but - really, there’s no earthly reason why O’Daly shouldn’t be brought to book. - There’s law here for that sort of thing as much as there is anywhere - else.” - </p> - <p> - “’T was Miss Katie’s own words that I’d be a fool to thry to putt - the law on Cormac O’Daly, an’ him an attorney,” explained Jerry, in - defiant self-defense. - </p> - <p> - “Perhaps that’s true about <i>your</i> putting the law on him,” Bernard - permitted himself to say. “But you’re a trustee, you tell me, as much as - he is, and others can act for you and force him to give his accounts. That - can be done upon your trust-deed.” - </p> - <p> - “Me paper, is it?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, the one the boss gave you.” - </p> - <p> - “Egor! O’Daly has it. He begged me for it, to keep ’em together. If - I’d ask him for it, belike he’d refuse me. You’ve no knowledge of the - characther of that same O’Daly.” - </p> - <p> - For just a moment the young man turned away, his face clouded with the - shadows of a baffled mind. Then he looked Jerry straight in the eye. - </p> - <p> - “See here,” he said, “you trust me, don’t you? You believe that I want to - act square by you and help you in this thing?” - </p> - <p> - “I do, sir,” said Jerry, simply. - </p> - <p> - “Well, then, I tell you that O’Daly <i>can</i> be made to show up, and the - whole affair can be set straight, and the young lady—my cousin—<i>can</i> - be put into her own again. Only I can’t work in the dark. I can’t play - with a partner that ‘finesses’ against me, as a whist-player would say. - Now, who is this man here? I know he isn’t your cousin any more than he is - mine. What’s his game?” - </p> - <p> - Linsky took the words out of his puzzled companion’s mouth. - </p> - <p> - “’T is a long story, sir,” he said, “an’ you’d be no wiser if you - were told it. Some time, plase God, you’ll know it all. Just now’t is - enough that I’m bound to this man and to The O’Mahony, who’s away, an’ - perhaps dead an’ buried, an’ I’m heart an’ sowl for doin’ whatever I can - to help the young lady. Only, if you’ll not moind me sayin’ so, she’s her - own worst inemy. If she takes the bit in her mouth this way, an’ will go - into the convint, how, in the name of glory, are we to stop her or do - anything else?” - </p> - <p> - “There are more than fifteen hundred ways of working <i>that</i>” replied - the young man from Houghton County, simulating a confidence he did not - wholly feel. “But let’s get along down toward the village.” - </p> - <p> - They entered Muirisc through the ancient convent churchyard, and at his - door-way Jerry, as the visible result of much cogitation, asked the twain - in. After offering them glasses of whiskey and water and lighting a pipe, - Jerry suddenly resolved upon a further extension of confidence. To - Linsky’s astonishment, he took the lantern down from the wall, lighted it, - and opened the door at the back of the bed. - </p> - <p> - “If you’ll come along wid us, sir,” he said to Bernard, “we’ll show you - something.” - </p> - <p> - “There, here we can talk at our aise,” he remarked again, when finally the - three men were in the subterranean chamber, with the door closed behind - them. “Have you anything like <i>this</i> in Ameriky?” - </p> - <p> - Bernard was not so greatly impressed as they expected him to be. He - stolled about the vault-like room, sounding the walls with his boot, - pulling-aside the bed-curtains and investigating the drain. - </p> - <p> - “Curious old place,” he said, at last. “What’s the idea?” - </p> - <p> - “Sure, ’t is a sacret place intoirely,” explained Jerry. “Besides - us three, there’s not a man aloive who knows of it, exceptin’ The - O’Mahony, if be God’s grace he’s aloive. ’T was he discovered it. - He’d the eyes of a him-harrier for anny mark or sign in a wall. Well do I - remimber our coming here first. He lukked it all over, as you’re doing. - </p> - <p> - “‘Egor!’ says he, ‘It may come in handy for O’Daly some day.’ There was a - dead man there on the bed, that dry ye c’u’d ’a’ loighted him wid a - match.” - </p> - <p> - “’T is a part of the convint,” Linsky took up the explanation, “an’ - the chest, there, was full of deeds an’ riccorcls of the convint for manny - cinturies. ‘T was me work for years to decipher an’ thranslate thim, - unbeknownst to every soul in Muirisc. They were all in Irish.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, it’s a queer sort of hole,” said Bernard, musingly, walking over to - the table and holding up one of the ancient manuscripts to the lamplight - for investigation. “Why, this isn’t Irish, is it?” he asked, after a - moment’s scrutiny. “This is Latin.” - </p> - <p> - “’T is wan of half a dozen ye see there on the table that I - couldn’t make out,” said Linsky. “I’m no Latin scholar meself. ’T - was me intintion to foind some one outside who c’u’d thranslate thim.” - Bernard had kept his eyes on the faded parchment. - </p> - <p> - “Odd!” he said. “It’s from a bishop—Matthew O’Finn seems to be the - name—” - </p> - <p> - “He was bishop of Ross in the early part of the fourteenth cintury,” put - in Linsky. - </p> - <p> - “And this thing is a warning to the nuns here to close up their convent - and take in no more novices, because the church can’t recognize them or - their order. It’s queer old Latin, but that’s what I make it out to be.” - </p> - <p> - “’T is an illegant scholar ye are, sir!” exclaimed Jerry, in honest - admiration. - </p> - <p> - “No,” said Bernard; “only they started me in for a priest, and I got to - know Latin as well as I did English, or almost. But my godliness wasn’t - anywhere near high-water mark, and so I got switched off into engineering. - I dare say the change was a good thing all around. If it’s all the same to - you,” he added, turning to Linsky, “I’ll put this parchment in my pocket - for the time being, I want to look it over again more carefully. You shall - have it back.” - </p> - <p> - The two Irishmen assented as a matter of course. This active-minded and - capable young man, who had mining figures at his finger’s ends, and could - read Latin, and talked lightly of fifteen hundred ways to outwit O’Daly, - was obviously one to be obeyed without questions. They sat now and watched - him with rapt eyes and acquiescent nods as he, seated on the table with - foot on knee, recounted to them the more salient points of his interview - with O’Daly. - </p> - <p> - “He was a dacent ould man when I knew him first,” mused Jerry, in comment, - “an’ as full of praises for the O’Mahonys as an egg is of mate. ’T - is the money that althered him; an’ thin that brat of a bye of his! ’T - is since thin that he behaved like a nagur. An ’t is my belafe, - sir, that only for him Miss Katie’d never have dr’amed of interin’ that - thunderin’ old convint. The very last toime I was wid him, egor, he druv - us both from the house. ’T was the nuns made Miss Katie return to - him next day. ’T is just that, sir, that she’s no one else bechune - thim nuns an’ O’Daly, an’ they do be tossin’ her from wan to the other of - ’em like a blessid ball.” - </p> - <p> - “The wonder is to me she’s stood it for a minute,” said Bernard; “a proud - girl like her.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah, sir,” said Jerry, “it isn’t like in Ameriky, where every wan’s free - to do what phases him. What was the girl to do? Where was she to go if she - defied thim that was in authority over her? ’T is aisy to talk, as - manny’s the toime she’s said that same to me; but ’t is another - matther to <i>do!</i>” - </p> - <p> - “There’s the whole trouble in a nutshell,” said Bernard. “Everybody talks - and nobody does anything.” - </p> - <p> - “There’s truth in that sir,” put in Linsky; “but what are <i>you</i> - proposin’ to do? There were fifteen hundred ways, you said. What’s wan of - ’em?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, there are fifteen hundred and two now,” responded Bernard, with a - smile. “You’ve helped me to two more since I’ve been down here—or, - rather, this missing O’Mahony of yours has helped me to one, and I helped - myself to the other.” - </p> - <p> - The two stared in helpless bewilderment at the young man. - </p> - <p> - “That O’Mahony seems to have been a right smart chap,” Bernard continued. - “No wonder he made things hum here in Muirisc. And a prophet too. Why, the - very first time he ever laid eyes on this cave here, by your own telling, - he saw just what it was going to be good for.” - </p> - <p> - “I don’t folly ye,” said the puzzled Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “Why, to put O’Daly in, of course,” answered the young man, lightly. - “That’s as plain as the nose on your face.” - </p> - <p> - “Egor! ’T is a grand idea that same!” exclaimed Jerry, slapping his - thigh. “Only,” he added, with a sinking enthusiasm, “suppose he wouldn’t - come?” - </p> - <p> - Bernard laughed outright. - </p> - <p> - “That’ll be easy enough. All you have to do is to send word you want to - see him in your place up stairs; when he comes, tell him there’s a strange - discovery you’ve made. Bring him down here, let him in, and while he’s - looking around him just slip out and shut the door on him. I notice it’s - got a spring-lock from the outside. A thoughtful man, that O’Mahony! Of - course, you’ll want to bring down enough food and water to last a week or - so, first; perhaps a little whiskey, too. And I’d carry up all these - papers, moreover, and put ’em in your room above. Until the old man - got quieted down, he might feel disposed to tear things.” - </p> - <p> - “Egor! I’ll do it!” cried Jerry, with sparkling eyes and a grin on his - broad face. “Oh, the art of man!” - </p> - <p> - The pallid and near-sighted Linsky was less alive to the value of this - bold plan. - </p> - <p> - “An’ what’ll ye do nixt?” he asked, doubtfully. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve got a scheme which I’ll carry out to-morrow, by myself,” said - Bernard. “It’ll take me all day; and by the time I turn up the day after, - you must have O’Daly safely bottled up down here. Then I’ll be in a - position to read the riot act to everybody. First we’ll stand the convent - on its head, and then I’ll come down here and have a little confidential - talk with O’Daly about going to prison as a fraudulent trustee.” - </p> - <p> - “Sir, you’re well-named ‘O’Mahony,’” said Jerry, with beaming earnestness, - “I do be almost believin’ ye’re <i>his</i> son!” - </p> - <p> - Bernard chuckled as he sprang off the table to his feet. - </p> - <p> - “There might be even stranger things than that,” he said, and laughed - again. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXIV—THE VICTORY OF THE “CATHACH.” - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>ne day passed, and - then another, and the evening of the third day drew near—yet brought - no returning Bernard. It is true that on the second day a telegram—the - first Jerry had ever received in his life—came bearing the date of - Cashel, and containing only the unsigned injunction: - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - <i>“Don’t be afraid.”</i> - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <p> - It is all very well to say this, but Jerry and Linsky read over the brief - message many scores of times that day, and still felt themselves very much - afraid. - </p> - <p> - Muirisc was stirred by unwonted excitement. In all its history, the - village had never resented anything else quite so much as the - establishment of a police barrack in its principal street, a dozen years - before. The inhabitants had long since grown accustomed to the sight of - the sergeant and his four men lounging about the place, and had even - admitted them to a kind of conditional friendship, but, none the less, - their presence had continued to present itself as an affront to Muirisc. - From one year’s end to another, no suspicion of crime had darkened the - peaceful fame of the hamlet. They had heard vague stories of grim and - violent deeds in other parts of the south and west, as the failure of the - potatoes and the greed of the landlords conspired together to drive the - peasantry into revolt, but in Muirisc, though she had had her evictions - and knew what it was to be hungry, it had occurred to no one to so much as - break a window. - </p> - <p> - Yet now, all at once, here were fresh constables brought in from Bantry, - with an inspector at their head, and the amazed villagers saw these - newcomers, with rifles slung over their short capes, and little round caps - cocked to one side on their close-cropped heads, ransacking every nook and - cranny of the ancient town in quest of some mysterious thing, the while - others spread their search over the ragged rocks and moorland roundabout. - And then the astounding report flew from mouth to mouth that Father Jago - had read in a Dublin paper that O’Daly was believed to have been murdered. - </p> - <p> - Sure enough, now that they had thought of it, O’Daly had not been seen for - two or three days, but until this strange story came from without, no one - had given this a thought. He was often away, for days together, on mining - and other business, but it was said now that his wife, whom Muirisc still - thought of as Mrs. Fergus, had given the alarm, on the ground that if her - husband had been going away over night, he would have told her. There was - less liking for this lady than ever, when this report started on its - rounds. - </p> - <p> - Three or four of the wretched, unwashed and half-fed creatures, who had - fled from O’Daly’s evictions to the shelter of the furze-clad ditches - outside, had been brought in and sharply questioned at the barracks, on - this third day, but of what they had said the villagers knew nothing. And, - now, toward evening, the excited groups of gossiping neighbors at the - corners saw Jerry Higgins himself, with flushed face and apprehensive eye, - being led past with his shambling cousin toward constabulary headquarters - by a squad of armed policemen. Close upon the heels of this amazing - spectacle came the rumor—whence started, who could tell?—that - Jerry had during the day received a telegram clearly implicating him in - the crime, At this, Muirisc groaned aloud. - </p> - <p> - “’Tis wid you alone I want to spake,” said Kate, bluntly, to the - mother superior. - </p> - <p> - The April twilight was deepening the shadows in the corners of the - convent’s reception hall, and mellowing into a uniformity of ugliness the - faces of the four Misses O’Daly who sat on the long bench before the - fireless hearth. These young women were strangers to Muirisc, and had but - yesterday arrived from their country homes in Kerry or the Macroom - district to enter the convent of which their remote relation was patron. - They were plain, small-farmers’ daughters, with flat faces, high - cheek-bones and red hands. They had risen in clumsy humility when Kate - entered the room, staring in admiration at her beauty, and even more at - her hat; they had silently seated themselves again at a sign from the - mother superior, still staring in round-eyed wonder at this novel kind of - young woman; and they clung now stolidly to their bench, in the face of - Kate’s remark. Perhaps they did not comprehend it, But they understood and - obeyed the almost contemptuous gesture by which the aged nun bade them - leave the room. - </p> - <p> - “What is it thin, <i>Dubhdeasa?</i>” asked Mother Agnes, with affectionate - gravity, seating herself as she spoke. The burden of eighty years rested - lightly upon the lean figure and thin, wax-like face of the nun. Only a - close glance would have revealed the fine net-work of wrinkles covering - this pallid skin, and her shrewd observant eyes flashed still with the - keenness of youth. “Tell me, what is it?” - </p> - <p> - “I’ve a broken heart in me, that’s all!” said the girl. - </p> - <p> - She had walked to one of the two narrow little windows, and stood looking - out, yet seeing nothing for the mist of tears that might not be kept down. - Only the affectation of defiance preserved her voice from breaking. - </p> - <p> - “Here there will be rest and p’ace of mind,” intoned the other. “’T - is only a day more, Katie, and thin ye’ll be wan of us, wid all the - worriments and throubles of the world lagues behind ye.” - </p> - <p> - The girl shook her head with vehemence and paced the stone floor - restlessly. - </p> - <p> - “’T is I who’ll be opening the dure to ’em and bringing ’em - all in here, instead. No fear, Mother Agnes, they’ll folly me wherever I - go.” - </p> - <p> - The other smiled gently, and shook her vailed head in turn. - </p> - <p> - “’T is little a child like you drames of the rale throubles of me,” - she murmured. “Whin ye’re older, ye’ll bless the good day that gave ye - this holy refuge, and saved ye from thim all. Oh, Katie, darlin’, when I - see you standing be me side in your habit—’t is mesilf had it - made be the Miss Maguires in Skibbereen, the same that sews the vestmints - for the bishop himself—I can lay me down, and say me <i>nunc - dimittis</i> wid a thankful heart!” - </p> - <p> - Kate sighed deeply and turned away. It was the trusting sweetness of - affection with which old Mother Agnes had enveloped her ever since the - promise to take vows had been wrung from her reluctant tongue that rose - most effectually always to restrain her from reconsidering that promise. - It was clear enough that the venerable O’Mahony nuns found in the speedy - prospect of her joining them the one great controlling joy of their lives. - Thinking upon this now, it was natural enough for her to say: - </p> - <p> - “Can thim O’Daly girls rade and write, I wonder?” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, they’ve had schooling, all of them. ’T is not what you had - here, be anny manes, but ’t will do.” - </p> - <p> - “Just think, Mother Agnes,” Kate burst forth, “what it ‘ll be like to be - shut with such craytures as thim afther—afther you l’ave us!” - </p> - <p> - “They’re very humble,” said the nun, hesitatingly. “’T is more of - that same spirit I’d fain be seeing in yourself, Katie! And in that - they’ve small enough resimblance to Cormac O’Daly, who’s raked ’em - up from the highways and byways to make their profession here. And oh—tell - me now—old Ellen that brings the milk mintioned to Sister Blanaid - that O’Daly was gone somewhere, and that there was talk about it.” - </p> - <p> - “Talk, is it!” exclaimed Kate, whose introspective mood had driven this - subject from her mind, but who now spoke with eagerness. “That’s the word - for it, ‘talk.’ ’T is me mother, for pure want of something to say, - that putt the notion into Sergeant O’Flaherty’s thick skull, and, w’u’d ye - belave it, they’ve brought more poliss to the town, and they’re worriting - the loives out of the people wid questions and suspicions. I’m told - they’ve even gone out to the bog and arrested some of thim poor wretches - of O’Driscolls that Cormac putt out of their cottages last winter. The - idea of it!” - </p> - <p> - “Where there’s so much smoke there’s some bit of fire,” said the older - woman. “Where <i>is</i> O’Daly?” The girl shrugged her shoulders. - </p> - <p> - “’T is not my affair!” she said, curtly. “I know where he’d be, if - I’d my will.” - </p> - <p> - “Katie,” chanted the nun, in tender reproof, “what spirit d’ye call that - for a woman who’s within four-an’-twinty hours of making her profession! - Pray for yourself, child, that these worldly feelings may be taken from - ye!” - </p> - <p> - “Mother Agnes,” said the girl, “if I’m to pretind to love Cormac O’Daly, - thin, wance for all, ’t is no use!” - </p> - <p> - “We’re bidden to love all thim that despite—” The nun broke off her - quotation abruptly. A low wailing sound from the bowels of the earth - beneath them rose through the flags of the floor, and filled the chamber - with a wierd and ghostly dying away echo. Mother Agnes sprang to her feet. - </p> - <p> - “’T is the Hostage again!” she cried. “Sister Ellen vowed to me she - heard him through the night. Did <i>you</i> hear him just now?” - </p> - <p> - “I heard <i>it</i>,” said Kate, simply. - </p> - <p> - The mother superior, upon reflection, seated herself again. - </p> - <p> - “’T is a strange business,” she said, at last. Her shrewd eyes, - wandering in a meditative gaze about the chamber, avoided Katie’s face. “’T - is twelve years since last we heard him,” she mused aloud, “and that was - the night of the storm. ’T is a sign of misfortune to hear him, - they say—and the blowing down of the walls that toime was taken be - us to fulfill that same. But sure, within the week, The O’Mahoney had gone - on his thravels, and pious Cormac O’Daly had taken his place, and the - convint prospered more than ever. At laste <i>that</i> was no misfortune.” - </p> - <p> - “Hark to me, Mother Agnes,” said Kate, with emphasis. “You never used to - favor the O’Mahonys as well I remimber, but you’re a fair-minded woman and - a holy woman, and I challenge ye now to tell me honest: Wasn’t anny wan - hair on The O’Mahony’s head worth the whole carcase of Cormac O’Daly? ’T - was an evil day for Muirisc whin he sailed away. If the convint has - prospered, me word, ’t is what nothing else in Muirisc has done. - And laving aside your office as a nun, is it sp’akin well for a place to - say that three old women in it are better off, and all the rist have - suffered?” - </p> - <p> - “Katie!” admonished the other. “You’ll repint thim words a week hence! To - hearken to ye, wan would think yer heart was not in the profession ye’re - to make.” - </p> - <p> - The girl gave a scornful, little laugh. - </p> - <p> - “Did I ever pretind it was?” she demanded. - </p> - <p> - “’T is you are the contrary crayture!” sighed the mother superior. - “Here now for all these cinturies, through all the storms and wars and - confiscations, this holy house has stud firm be the old faith. There ’s - not another family in Ireland has kept the mass in its own chapel, wid its - own nuns kneeling before it, and never a break or interruption at all. - I’ll l’ave it to yer own sinse: Can ye compare the prosperity of a little - village, or a hundred of ’em, wid such a glorious and unayqualed - riccord as that? Why, girl, ’t is you should be proud beyond - measure and thankful that ye’re born and bred and selected to carry on - such a grand tradition. To be head of the convint of the O’Mahonys ’t - is more historically splindid than to be queen of England.” - </p> - <p> - “But if I come to be the head at all,” retorted Kate, “sure it will be a - convint of O’Dalys.” - </p> - <p> - The venerable woman heaved another sigh and looked at the floor in - silence. - </p> - <p> - Kate pursued her advantage eagerly. - </p> - <p> - “Sure, I’ve me full share of pride in proper things,” she said, “and no - O’Mahony of them all held his family higher in his mind than I do. And me - blood lapes to every word you say about that same. But would <i>you</i>—Agnes - O’Mahony as ye were born—would you be asking me to have pride in the - O’Dalys? And that ’s what ’t is intinded to make of the - convint now. For my part, I’d be for saying: ‘L’ave the convint doy now - wid the last of the ladies of our own family rather than keep it alive at - the expinse of giving it to the O’Dalys.’” - </p> - <p> - Mother Agnes shook her head. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve me carnal feelings no less than you,” she said, “and me family pride - to subdue. But even if the victory of humility were denied me, what c’u’d - we do? For the moment, I’ll put this holy house to wan side. What can <i>you</i> - do? How can you stand up forninst Cormac O’Daly’s determination? Remimber, - widout him ye’re but a homeless gerrel, Katie.” - </p> - <p> - “And whose fault is that, Mother Agnes?” asked Kate, with swift glance and - tone. “Will ye be telling me ’t was The O’Mahony’s? Did he l’ave me - widout a four-penny bit, depindent on others, or was it that others stole - me money and desaved me, and to-day are keeping me out of me own? Tell me - that, Mother Agnes.” - </p> - <p> - The nun’s ivory-tinted face flushed for an instant, then took on a deeper - pallor. Her gaze, lifted momentarily toward Kate, strayed beyond her to - vacancy. She rose to her full height and made a forward step, then stood, - fumbling confusedly at her beads, and with trembling, half-opened lips. - </p> - <p> - “’T is not in me power,” she stammered, slowly and with difficulty. - “There—there <i>was</i> something—I’ve not thought of it for - so long—I’m forgetting strangely—” - </p> - <p> - She broke off abruptly, threw up her withered hands in a gesture of - despair, and then, never looking at the girl, turned and with bowed head - left the room. - </p> - <p> - Kate still stood staring in mingled amazement and apprehension at the - arched casement through which Mother Agnes had vanished, when the oak door - was pushed open again, and Sister Blanaid, a smaller and younger woman, - yet bent and half-palsied under the weight of years, showed herself in the - aperture. She bore in her arms, shoving the door aside with it as she - feebly advanced, a square wooden box, dust-begrimed and covered in part - with reddish cow-skin. - </p> - <p> - “Take it away!” she mumbled. “’T is the mother-supayrior’s desire - you should take it from here. ’T is an evil day that’s on us! Go - fling this haythen box into the bay and thin pray for yourself and for - her, who’s taken that grief for ye she’s at death’s door!” - </p> - <p> - The door closed again, and Kate found herself mechanically bearing this - box in her arms and making her way out through the darkened hallways to - the outer air. Only when she stood on the steps of the porch, and set down - her burden to adjust her hat, did she recognize it. Then, with a murmuring - cry of delight, she stooped and snatched it up again. It was the <i>cathach</i> - which The O’Mahony had given her to keep. - </p> - <p> - On the instant, as she looked out across the open green upon the harbor, - the bay, the distant peninsula of Kilcrohane peacefully gathering to - itself the shadows of the falling twilight—how it all came back to - her! On the day of his departure—that memorable black-letter day in - her life—he had turned over this rude little chest to her; he had - told her it was his luck, his talisman, and now should be hers. She had - carried it, not to her mother’s home, but to the tiny school-room in the - old convent, for safekeeping. She recalled now that she had told the nuns, - or Mother Agnes, at least, what it was. But then—then there came a - blank in her memory. She could not force her mind to remember when she - ceased to think about it—when it made its way into the lumber-room - where it had apparently lain so long. - </p> - <p> - But, at all events, she had it now again. She bent her head to touch with - her lips one of the rough strips of skin nailed irregularly upon it; then, - with a shining face, bearing the box, like some sanctified shrine, against - her breast, she moved across the village-common toward the wharf and the - water. - </p> - <p> - The injunction of quavering old Blanaid to cast it into the bay drifted - uppermost in her thoughts, and she smiled to herself. She had been bidden, - also, to pray; and reflection upon this chased the smile away. Truly, - there was need for prayer. Her perplexed mind called up, one by one, in - disheartening array, the miseries of her position, and drew new - unhappiness from the confusion of right and wrong which they presented. - How could she pray to be delivered from what Mother Agnes held up as the - duties of piety? And, on the other hand, what sincerity could there be in - any other kind of spiritual petition? - </p> - <p> - She wandered along the shore-sands under the cliffs, the box tightly - clasped in her arms, her eyes musingly bent upon the brown reaches of - drenched seaweed which lay at play with the receding tide. - </p> - <p> - Her mind conjured up the image of a smiling and ruddy young face, - sun-burned and thatched with crisp, curly brown hair—the face of - that curious young O’Mahony from Houghton County. His blue eye looked at - her half quizzically, half beseeching, but Kate resolutely drove the image - away. He was only the merest trifle less mortal than the others. - </p> - <p> - So musing, she strolled onward. Suddenly she stopped, and lifted her head - triumphantly; the smile had flashed forth again upon her face, and the - dark eyes were all aglow. A thought had come to her—so convincing, - so unanswerable, so joyously uplifting, that she paused to marvel at - having been blind to it so long. Clear as noon sunlight on Mount Gabriel - was it what she should pray for. - </p> - <p> - What <i>could</i> it ever have been, this one crowning object of prayer, - but the return of The O’Mahony? - </p> - <p> - As her mental vision adapted itself to the radiance of this revelation, - the abstracted glance which she had allowed to wander over the bay was - arrested by a concrete object. Two hundred yards from the water’s edge a - strange vessel had heaved to, and was casting anchor. Kate could hear the - chain rattling out from the capstan, even as she looked. - </p> - <p> - The sight sent all prayerful thoughts scurrying out of her head. The - presence of vessels of the size of the new-comer was in itself most - unusual at Muirisc. But Kate’s practiced eye noticed a strange novelty. - The craft, though thick of beam and ungainly in line, carried the staight - running bowsprit of a cutter, and in addition to its cutter sheets had a - jigger lug-sail. The girl watched these eccentric sails as they were - dropped and reefed, with a curious sense of having seen them somewhere - before—as if in a vision or some old picture-book of childhood. - Confused memories stirred within her as she gazed, and held her mind in - daydream captivity. A figure she seemed vaguely to know, stood now at the - gunwale. - </p> - <p> - The spell was rudely broken by a wild shout from the cliff close above - her. On the instant, amid a clatter of falling stones and a veritable - landslide of sand, rocks and turf, a human figure came rolling, clambering - and tumbling down the declivity, and ran toward her, its arms stretched - and waving with frantic gestures, and emitting inarticulate cries and - groans as it came. - </p> - <p> - The astonished girl instinctively raised the box in her hands, to use it - as a missile. But, lo, it was old Murphy who, half stumbling to his knees - at her feet, fiercely clutched her skirts, and pointed in a frenzy of - excitement seaward! - </p> - <p> - “Wid yer own eyes look at it—it, Miss Katie!” he screamed. “Ye can - see it yerself! It’s not dr’aming I am!” - </p> - <p> - “It’s drunk ye are instead, thin, Murphy,” said the girl, sharply, though - in great wonderment. - </p> - <p> - “Wid joy! Wid joy I’m drunk!” the old man shouted, dancing on the sands - and slippery sea-litter like one possessed, and whirling his arms about - his head. - </p> - <p> - “Murphy, man! What ails ye? In the name of the Lord—what—” - </p> - <p> - The browned, wild-eyed, ragged old madman had started at a headlong pace - across the wet waste of weeds, and plunged now through the breakers, - wading with long strides—knee-deep, then immersed to the waist. He - turned for an instant to shout back: “I’ll swim to him if I drown for it! - ’Tis the master come back!” - </p> - <p> - The girl fell to her knees on the sand, then reverently bowed her head - till it rested upon the box before her. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXV—BERNARD’S GOOD CHEER. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>orra a wink o’ - sleep could I get the night,” groaned the wife of O’Daly—Mrs. Fergus—“what - with me man muthered, an’ me daughter drowned, an’ me nerves that - disthracted ’t was past the power of hot dhrink to abate em.” - </p> - <p> - It was early morning in the reception hall of the convent. The old nuns - sat on their bench in a row, blinking in the bright light which poured - through the casement as they gazed at their visitor, and tortured their - unworldly wits over the news she brought. The young chaplain, Father Jago, - had come in from the mass, still wearing soutane and beretta. He leaned - his burly weight against the mantel, smiling inwardly at thoughts of - breakfast, but keeping his heavy face drawn in solemn lines to fit these - grievous tidings. - </p> - <p> - The mother superior sighed despairingly, and spoke in low, quavering - tones. “Here, too, no one sleeps a wink,” she said. “Ah, thin, ’t - is too much sorrow for us! By rayson of our years we’ve no stringth to - bear it.” - </p> - <p> - “Ah—sure—’t is different wid you,” remarked Mrs. - Fergus. “You’ve no proper notion of the m’aning of sleep. Faith, all your - life you’ve been wakened bechune naps by your prayer-bell. ’T is no - throuble to you. You’re accustomed to ’t. But wid me—if I’ve - me rest broken, I’m killed entirely. ’T is me nerves!” - </p> - <p> - “Ay, them nerves of yours—did I ever hear of ’em before?” put - in Mother Agnes, with a momentary gleam of carnal delight in combat on her - waxen face. Then sadness resumed its sway. “Aye, aye, Katie! Katie!” she - moaned, slowly shaking her vailed head. “Child of our prayers, daughter of - the White Foam, pride of the O’Mahonys, darlin’ of our hearts—what - ailed ye to l’ave us?” - </p> - <p> - The mother superior’s words quavered upward into a wail as they ended. The - sound awakened the ancestral “keening” instinct in the other aged nuns, - and stirred the thin blood in their veins. They broke forth in weird - lamentations. - </p> - <p> - “Her hair was the glory of Desmond, that weighty and that fine!” chanted - Sister Ellen. “Ah, wirra, wirra!” - </p> - <p> - “She had it from me,” said Mrs. Fergus, her hand straying instinctively to - her crimps. Her voice had caught the mourning infection: “Ah-hoo! Katie - Avourneen,” she wailed in vocal sympathy. “Come back to us, darlint!” - </p> - <p> - “She’d the neck of the Swan of the Lake of Three Castles!” mumbled Sister - Blanaid. “’T was that same was said of Grace O’Sullivan—the - bride of The O’Mahony of Ballydivlin—an’ he was kilt on the strand - benayth the walls—an’ she lookin’ on wid her grand black eyes—” - </p> - <p> - “Is it floatin’ in the waves ye are, <i>ma creevin cno</i>—wid the - fishes surroundin’ ye?” sobbed Mrs. Fergus. - </p> - <p> - Sister Blanaid’s thick tongue took up the keening again. “’T was I - druv her out! ‘Go ’long wid ye,’ says I, ‘an’ t’row that haythen - box o’ yours into the bay’—an’ she went and t’rew her purty self in - instead; woe an’ prosthration to this house!—an’ may the Lord—” - </p> - <p> - Father Jago at this took his elbow from the mantel and straightened - himself. “Whisht, now, aisy!” he said, in a tone of parental authority. - “There’s modheration in all things. Sure ye haven’t a scintilla of - evidence that there’s annyone dead at all. Where’s the sinse of laminting - a loss ye’re not sure of—and that, too, on an impty stomach?” - </p> - <p> - “Nevir bite or sup more will I take till I’ve tidings of her!’ said the - mother superior. - </p> - <p> - “The more rayson why I’ll not be waiting longer for ye now,” commented the - priest; and with this he left the room. As he closed the door behind him, - a grateful odor of frying bacon momentarily spread upon the air. Mrs. - Fergus sniffed it, and half rose from her seat; but the nuns clung - resolutely to their theme, and she sank back again. - </p> - <p> - “’T is my belafe,” Sister Ellen began, “that voice we heard, ’t - is from no Hostage at all—’t is the banshee of the - O’Mahonys.” - </p> - <p> - The mother superior shook her head. - </p> - <p> - “Is it likely, thin, Ellen O’Mahony,” she queried, “that <i>our</i> - banshee would be distressed for an O’Daly? Sure the grand noise was made - whin Cormac himself disappeared.” - </p> - <p> - “His marryin’ me—’t is clear enough that putt him in the - family,” said Mrs. Fergus. “’T would be flat injustice to me to ’ve - my man go an’ never a keen raised for him. I’ll stand on me rights for - that much Agnes O’Mahony.” - </p> - <p> - “A fine confusion ye’d have of it, thin,” retorted the mother superior. - “The O’Dalys have their own banshee—she sat up her keen in - Kilcrohane these hundreds of years—and for ours to be meddlin’ - because she’s merely related by marriage—sure, ’t would not - be endured.” - </p> - <p> - The dubious problem of a family banshee’s duties has never been elucidated - beyond this point, for on the instant there came a violent ringing of the - big bell outside, the hoarse clangor of which startled the women into - excited silence. A minute later, the white-capped lame old woman-servant - threw open the door. - </p> - <p> - A young man, with a ruddy, smiling face and a carriage of boyish - confidence, entered the room. He cast an inquiring glance over the group. - Then recognizing Mrs. Fergus, he gave a little exclamation of pleasure, - and advanced toward her with outstretched hand. - </p> - <p> - “Why, how do you do, Mrs. O’Daly?” he exclaimed, cordially shaking her - hand. “Pray keep your seat. I’m just playing in luck to find <i>you</i> - here. Won’t you—eh—-be kind enough to—eh—introduce - me?” - </p> - <p> - “’T is a young gintleman from Ameriky, Mr. O’Mahony by name,” Mrs. - Fergus stammered, flushed with satisfaction in his remembrance, but - doubtful as to the attitude of the nuns. - </p> - <p> - The ladies of the Hostage’s Tears had drawn themselves into as much - dignified erectness as their age and infirmities permitted. They eyed this - amazing new-comer in mute surprise. Mother Agnes, after the first shock at - the invasion, nodded frostily in acknowledgment of his respectful bow. - </p> - <p> - “Get around an’ spake to her in her north ear,” whispered Mrs. Fergus; - “she can’t hear ye in the other.” - </p> - <p> - Bernard had been long enough in West Carbery to comprehend her meaning. In - that strange old district there is no right or left, no front or back—only - points of the compass. A gesture from Mrs. Fergus helped him now to guess - where the north might lie in matters auricular. - </p> - <p> - “I didn’t stand on ceremony,” he said, laying his hat on the table and - drawing off his gloves. “I’ve driven over post-haste from Skibbereen this - morning—the car’s outside—and I rushed in here the first - thing. I—I hope sincerely that I’m in time.” - </p> - <p> - “‘In toime?’” the superior repeated, in a tone of annoyed mystification. - “That depinds entoirely, sir, on your own intintions. I’ve no information, - sir, as to either who you are or what you’re afther doing.” - </p> - <p> - “No, of course not,” said Bernard, in affable apology. “I ought to have - thought of that. I’ll explain things, ma’am, if you’ll permit me. As I - said, I’ve just raced over this morning from Skibbereen.” - </p> - <p> - Mother Agnes made a stately inclination of her vailed head. - </p> - <p> - “You had a grand morning for your drive,” she said. - </p> - <p> - “I didn’t notice,” the young man replied, with a frank smile. “I was too - busy thinking of something else. The truth is, I spent last evening with - the bishop.” - </p> - <p> - Again the mother superior bowed slightly. - </p> - <p> - “An estimable man,” she remarked, coldly. - </p> - <p> - “Oh, yes; nothing could have been friendlier,” pursued Bernard, “than the - way he treated me. And the day before that I was at Cashel, and had a long - talk with the archbishop. He’s a splendid old gentleman, too. Not the - least sign of airs or nonsense about him.” - </p> - <p> - Mother Agnes rose. - </p> - <p> - “I’m deloighted to learn that our higher clergy prodhuce so favorable an - impression upon you,” she said, gravely; “but, if you’ll excuse us, sir, - this is a house of mourning, and our hearts are heavy wid grief, and we’re - not in precisely the mood—” - </p> - <p> - Bernard spoke in an altered tone: - </p> - <p> - “Oh! I beg a thousand pardons! Mourning, did you say? May I ask—” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Fergus answered his unspoken question. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you know it, thin? ’T is me husband, Cormac O’Daly. Sure - he’s murdhered an’ his body’s nowhere to be found, an’ the poliss are - scourin’ all the counthry roundabout, an’ there’s a long account of ’t - in the <i>Freeman</i> sint from Bantry, an’ more poliss have been dhrafted - into Muirisc, an’ they’ve arrested Jerry Higgins and that long-shanked, - shiverin’ <i>omadhaun</i> of a cousin of his. ’T is known they had - a tellgram warnin’ thim not to be afraid—” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, by George! Well, this <i>is</i> rich!” - </p> - <p> - The young man’s spontaneous exclamations brought the breathless narrative - of Mrs. Fergus to an abrupt stop. The women gazed at him in stupefaction. - His rosy and juvenile face had, at her first words, worn a wondering and - puzzled expression. Gradually, as she went on, a light of comprehension - had dawned in his eyes. Then he had broken in upon her catalogue of woes - with a broad grin on his face. - </p> - <p> - “Igad, this <i>is</i> rich!” he repeated. He put his hands in his pockets, - withdrew them, and then took a few steps up and down the room, chuckling - deeply to himself. - </p> - <p> - The power of speech came first to Mother Agnes. “If ’t is to insult - our griefs you’ve come, young sir,” she began; “if that’s your m’aning—” - </p> - <p> - “Bless your heart, madam!” Bernard protested. “I’d be the last man in the - world to dream of such a thing. I’ve too much respect. I’ve an aunt who is - a religious, myself. No, what I mean is it’s all a joke—that is, a - mistake. O’Daly isn’t dead at all.” - </p> - <p> - “What’s that you’re sayin’?” put in Mrs. Fergus, sharply. “Me man is - aloive, ye say?” - </p> - <p> - “Why, of course”—the youngster went off into a fresh fit of - chuckling—“of course, he is—alive and kicking. Yes, especially - kicking!” - </p> - <p> - “The Lord’s mercy on us!” said the mother superior. “And where would - Cormac be, thin!” - </p> - <p> - “Well, that’s another matter. I don’t know that I can tell you just now; - but, take my word for it, he’s as alive as I am, and he’s perfectly safe, - too.” - </p> - <p> - The astonished pause which followed was broken by the mumbling monologue - of poor half-palsied Sister Blanaid: - </p> - <p> - “I putt the box in her hands, an’ I says, says I: ‘Away wid ye, now, an’ - t’row it into the say!’ An’ thin she wint.” - </p> - <p> - The other women exchanged startled glances. In their excitement they had - forgotten about Kate. - </p> - <p> - Before they could speak, Bernard, with a mystified glance at the - spluttering old lady, had taken up the subject of their frightened - thoughts. - </p> - <p> - “But what I came for,” he said, looking from one to the other, “what I was - specially in a stew about, was to get here before—before Miss Kate - had taken her vows. The ceremony was set down for to-day, as I understand. - Perhaps I’m wrong; but that’s why I asked if I was in time.” - </p> - <p> - “You <i>are</i> in time,” answered Mother Agnes, solemnly. - </p> - <p> - Her sepulchral tone jarred upon the young man’s ear. Looking into the - speaker’s pallid, vail-framed face, he was troubled vaguely by a strange, - almost sinister significance in her glance. - </p> - <p> - “You’re in fine time,” the mother superior repeated, and bowed her head. - </p> - <p> - “Man alive!” Mrs. Fergus exclaimed, rising and leaning toward him. “You’ve - no sinse of what you’re saying. Me daughter’s gone, too!” - </p> - <p> - “‘Gone!’ How gone? What do you mean?” Bernard gazed in blank astonishment - into the vacuous face of Mrs. Fergus. Mechanically he strode toward her - and took her hand firmly in his. - </p> - <p> - “Where has she gone to?” he demanded, as his scattered wits came under - control again. “Do you mean that she’s run away? Can’t you speak?” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Fergus, thus stoutly adjured, began to whimper: - </p> - <p> - “They sint her from here—’t was always harsh they were wid - her—ye heard Sister Blanaid yerself say they sint her—an’ out - she wint to walk under the cliffs—some byes of Peggy Clancy saw her - go—an’ she never came back through the long night—an’ me wid - no wink o’ sleep—an’ me nerves that bad!” - </p> - <p> - Overcome by her emotions, Mrs. Fergus, her hand still in Bernard’s grasp, - bent forward till her crimps rested on the young man’s shoulder. She moved - her forehead gingerly about till it seemed certain that the ornaments were - sustaining no injury. Then she gave her maternal feelings full sway and - sobbed with fervor against the coat of the young man from Houghton County. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t cry, Mrs. O’Daly,” was all Bernard could think of to say. - </p> - <p> - The demonstration might perhaps have impressed him had he not perforce - looked over the weeping lady’s head straight into the face of the mother - superior. There he saw written such contemptuous incredulity that he - himself became conscious of skepticism. - </p> - <p> - “<i>Don’t</i> take on so!” he urged, this time less gently, and strove to - disengage himself. - </p> - <p> - But Mrs. Fergus clung to his hand and resolutely buried her face against - his collar. Sister Ellen had risen to her feet beside Mother Agnes, and he - heard the two nuns sniff indignantly. Then he realized that the situation - was ridiculous. - </p> - <p> - “What is it you suspect?” he asked of the mother superior, eager to make a - diversion of some kind. - </p> - <p> - “You can’t be imagining that harm’s come to Miss Kate—that she ’s - drowned?” - </p> - <p> - “That same <i>was</i> our belafe,” said Mother Agnes, glaring icily upon - him and his sobbing burden. - </p> - <p> - The inference clearly was that the spectacle before her affronted eyes had - been enough to overturn all previous convictions, of whatever character. - </p> - <p> - Bernard hesitated no longer. He almost wrenched his hand free and then - firmly pushed Mrs. Fergus away. - </p> - <p> - “It’s all nonsense,” he said, assuming a confidence he did not wholly - feel. “She’s no more drowned than I am.” - </p> - <p> - “Faith, I had me fears for <i>you</i>, wid such a dale of tears let loose - upon ye,” remarked Mother Agnes, dryly. - </p> - <p> - The young man looked straight into the reverend countenance of the - superior and confided to it an audacious wink. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll be back in no time,” he said, taking up his hat. “Now don’t you fret - another bit. She’s all right. I know it. And I’ll go and find her.” And - with that he was gone. - </p> - <p> - An ominous silence pervaded the reception hall. The two nuns, still - standing, stared with wrathful severity at Mrs. Fergus. She bore their - gaze with but an indifferent show of composure, patting her disordered - crimps with an awkward hand, and then moving aimlessly across the room. - </p> - <p> - “I’ll be going now, I’m thinking,” she said, at last, yet lingered in - spite of her words. - </p> - <p> - The nuns looked slowly at one another, and uttered not a word. - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin, ’t is small comfort I have, annyway, or consolation - either, from the lot of ye,” Mrs. Fergus felt impelled to remark, drawing - her shawl up on her head and walking toward the door. “An’ me wid me - throubles, an’ me nerves.” - </p> - <p> - “Is it consolation you’re afther?” retorted Mother Agnes, bitterly. “I - haven’t the proper kind of shoulder on me for <i>your</i> variety of - consolation.” - </p> - <p> - “Thrue ye have it, Agnes O’Mahony,” Mrs. Fergus came back, with her hand - on the latch. “An’ by the same token, thim shoulders were small - consolation to you yourself, till you got your nun’s vail to hide ’em!” - </p> - <p> - When she had flounced her way out, the mother superior remained standing, - her gaze bent upon the floor. - </p> - <p> - “Sister Ellen,” she said at last, “me powers are failing me. ’T is - time I laid down me burden. For the first time in me life I was unayqual - to her impiddence.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXVI—THE RESIDENT MAGISTRATE - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>hen Bernard - O’Mahony found himself outside the convent gateway, he paused to consider - matters. - </p> - <p> - The warm spring sunlight so broadly enveloped the square in which he - stood, the shining white cottages and gray old walls behind him and the - harbor and pale-blue placid bay beyond, in its grateful radiance, that it - was not in nature to think gloomy thoughts. And nothing in the young man’s - own nature tended that way, either. - </p> - <p> - Yet as he stopped short, looked about him, and even took off his hat to - the better ponder the situation, he saw that it was even more complicated - than he had thought. His plan of campaign had rested upon two bold - strategic actions. He had deemed them extremely smart, at the time of - their invention. Both had been put into execution, and, lo, the state of - affairs was worse than ever! - </p> - <p> - The problem had been to thwart and overturn O’Daly and to prevent Kate - from entering the convent. These two objects were so intimately connected - and dependent one upon the other, that it had been impossible to separate - them in procedure. He had caused O’Daly to be immured in secrecy in the - underground cell, the while he went off to secure episcopal interference - in the convent’s plans. His journey had been crowned with entire success. - It had involved a trip to Cashel, it is true, but he had obtained an order - forbidding the ladies of the Hostage’s Tears to add to their numbers. - Returning in triumph with this invincible weapon, he discovered now that - O’Daly’s disappearance had been placarded all over Ireland as a murder, - that his two allies were in custody as suspected assassins, and that—most - puzzling and disturbing feature of it all—Kate herself had vanished. - </p> - <p> - He did not attach a moment’s credence to the drowning theory. Daughters of - the Coast of White Foam did not get drowned. Nor was it likely that other - harm had befallen a girl so capable, so selfreliant, so thoroughly at home - in all the districts roundabout. Obviously she was in hiding somewhere in - the neighborhood. The question was where to look for her. Or, would it be - better to take up the other branch of the problem first? - </p> - <p> - His perplexed gaze, roaming vaguely over the broad space, was all at once - arrested by a gleam of flashing light in motion. Concentrating his - attention, he saw that it came from the polished barrel of a rifle borne - on the arm of a constable at the corner of the square. He put on his hat - and walked briskly over to this corner. The constable had gone, and - Bernard followed him up the narrow, winding little street to the barracks. - </p> - <p> - As he walked, he noted knots of villagers clustered about the cottage - doors, evidently discussing some topic of popular concern. In the roadway - before the barracks were drawn up two outside cars. A policeman in uniform - occupied the driver’s seat on each, and a half-dozen others lounged about - in the sunshine by the gate-posts, their rifles slung over their backs and - their round, visorless caps cocked aggressively over their ears. These - gentry bent upon him a general scowl as he walked past them and into the - barracks. - </p> - <p> - A dapper, dark-faced, exquisitely dressed young gentleman, wearing - slate-tinted gloves and with a flower in his button-hole, stood in the - hall-way—two burly constables assisting him meanwhile to get into a - light, silk-lined top-coat. - </p> - <p> - “Come, you fool! Hold the sleeve lower down, can’t you!” this young - gentleman cried, testily, as Bernard entered. The two constables divided - the epithet between them humbly, and perfected their task. - </p> - <p> - “I want to see the officer in charge here,” said Bernard, prepared by this - for discourtesy. - </p> - <p> - The young gentleman glanced him over, and on the instant altered his - demeanor. - </p> - <p> - “I am Major Snaffle, the resident magistrate,” he said, with great - politeness. “I’ve only a minute to spare—I’m driving over to Bantry - with some prisoners—but if you’ll come this way—” and without - further words, he led the other into a room off the hall, the door of - which the two constables rushed to obsequiously open. - </p> - <p> - “I dare say those are the prisoners I have come to talk about,” remarked - Bernard, when the door had closed behind them. He noted that this was the - first comfortably furnished room he had seen in Ireland, as he took the - seat indicated by the major’s gesture. - </p> - <p> - Major Snaffle lifted his brows slightly at this, and fastened his bright - brown eyes in a keen, searching glance upon Bernard’s face. - </p> - <p> - “Hm-m!” he said. “You are an American, I perceive.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes—my name’s O’Mahony. I come from Michigan.” - </p> - <p> - At sound of this Milesian cognomen, the glance of the stipendiary grew - keener still, if possible, and the corners of his carefully trimmed little - mustache were drawn sharply down. There was less politeness in the manner - and tone of his next inquiry. - </p> - <p> - “Well—what is your business? What do you want to say about them?” - </p> - <p> - “First of all,” said Bernard, “let’s be sure we’re talking about the same - people. You’ve got two men under arrest here—Jerry Higgins of this - place, and a cousin of his from—from Boston, I think it is.” - </p> - <p> - The major nodded, and kept his sharp gaze on the other’s countenance - unabated. - </p> - <p> - “What of that?” he asked, now almost brusquety. - </p> - <p> - “Well, I only drove in this morning—I’m in the mining business, - myself—but I understand they’ve been arrested for the m—— - that is, on account of the disappearance of old Mr. O’Daly.” - </p> - <p> - The resident magistrate did not assent by so much as a word. “Well? What’s - that to you?” he queried, coldly. - </p> - <p> - “It’s this much to me,” Bernard retorted, not with entire good-temper, - “that O’Daly isn’t dead at all.” - </p> - <p> - Major Snaffle’s eyebrows went up still further, with a little jerk. He - hesitated for a moment, then said: “I hope you know the importance of what - you are saying. We don’y like to be fooled with.” - </p> - <p> - “The fooling has been done by these who started the story that he was - murdered,” remarked Bernard. - </p> - <p> - “One must always be prepared for that—at some stage of a case—among - these Irish,” said the resident magistrate. “I’ve only been in Ireland two - years, but I know their lying tricks as well as if I’d been born among - them. Service in India helps one to understand all the inferior races.” - </p> - <p> - “I haven’t been here even two months,” said the young man from Houghton - County, “but so far as I can figure it out, the Irishmen who do the bulk - of the lying wear uniforms and monkey-caps like paper-collar boxes perched - over one ear. The police, I mean.” - </p> - <p> - “We won’t discuss <i>that</i>,” put in the major, peremptorily. “Do you - know where O’Daly is?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, sir, I do,” answered Bernard. - </p> - <p> - “Where?” - </p> - <p> - “You wouldn’t know if I told you, but I’ll take you to the place—that - is, if you’ll let me talk to your prisoners first.” - </p> - <p> - Major Snaffle turned the proposition over in his mind. “Take me to the - place,” he commented at last; “that means that you’ve got him hidden - somewhere, I assume.” - </p> - <p> - Bernard looked into the shrewd, twinkling eyes with a new respect. “That’s - about the size of,” he assented. - </p> - <p> - “Hra-m! Yes. That makes a new offense of it, with <i>you</i> as an - accessory, I take it—or ought I to say principal?” - </p> - <p> - Bernard was not at all dismayed by this shift in the situation. - </p> - <p> - “Call it what you like,” he answered. “See here, major,” he went on, in a - burst of confidence, “this whole thing’s got nothing to do with politics - or the potato crop or anything else that need concern you. It’s purely a - private family matter. In a day or two, it’ll be in such shape that I can - tell you all about it. For that matter, I could now, only it’s such a - deuce of a long story.” - </p> - <p> - The major thought again. - </p> - <p> - “All right,” he said. “You can see the prisoners in my presence, and then - I’ll give you a chance to produce O’Daly. I ought to warn you, though, - that it may be all used against you, later on.” - </p> - <p> - “I’m not afraid of that,” replied Bernard. - </p> - <p> - A minute later, he was following the resident magistrate up a winding - flight of narrow stone stairs, none too clean. A constable, with a bunch - of keys jingling in his hand, preceded them, and, at the top, threw open a - heavy, iron-cased door. The solitary window of the room they entered had - been so blocked with thick bars of metal that very little light came - through. Bernard, with some difficulty, made out two figures lying in one - corner on a heap of straw and old cast-off clothing. - </p> - <p> - “Get up! Here’s some one to see you!” called out the major, in the same - tone he had used to the constables while they were helping on the - overcoat. - </p> - <p> - Bernard, as he heard it, felt himself newly informed as to the spirit in - which India was governed. Perhaps it was necessary there; but it made him - grind his teeth to think of its use in Ireland. - </p> - <p> - The two figures scrambled to their feet, and Bernard shook hands with - both. - </p> - <p> - “Egor, sir, you’re a sight for sore eyes!” exclaimed Jerry, effusively, - wringing the visitor’s fingers in his fat clasp. “Are ye come to take us - out?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, that’ll be easy enough,” said Bernard. “You got my telegram all - right?” - </p> - <p> - Major Snaffle took his tablets from a pocket, and made a minute on them - unobserved. - </p> - <p> - “I did—I did,” said Jerry, buoyantly. Then with a changed expression - he added, whispering: “An’ that same played the divil intirely. ’T - was for that they arrested us.” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t whisper!” interposed the resident magistrate, curtly. - </p> - <p> - “Egor! I’ll say nothing at all,” said Jerry, who seemed now for the first - time to consider the presence of the official. - </p> - <p> - “Yes—don’t be afraid,” Bernard urged, reassuringly. “It’s all right - now. Tell me, is O’Daly in the place we know of?” - </p> - <p> - “He is, thin! Egor, unless he’d wings on him, and dug his way up through - the sayling, like a blessed bat.” - </p> - <p> - “Did he make much fuss?” - </p> - <p> - “He did not—lastewise we didn’t stop to hear, He came down wid us - aisy as you plaze, an’ I unlocked the dure. ’T is a foine room,’ - says I. ‘’T is that,’ says he. ‘Here’s whishky,’ says I. ‘I’d be - lookin’ for that wherever you were,’ says he, ‘even to the bowels of the - earth.’ ‘An’ why not?’ says I. ‘What is it the priest read to us, that it - makes a man’s face to shine wid oil?’ ‘A grand scholar ye are, Jerry,’ - says he—” - </p> - <p> - “Cut it short, Jerry!” interposed Bernard. “The main thing is you left him - there all right?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin, we did, sir, an’ no mistake.” - </p> - <p> - “My plan is, major,”—Bernard turned to the resident magistrate—“to - take my friend here, Jerry Higgins, with us, to the place I’ve been - speaking of. We’ll leave the other man here, as the editors say in my - country, as a ‘guarantee of good faith.’ The only point is that we three - must go alone. It wouldn’t do to take any constables with us. In fact, - there’s a secret about it, and I wouldn’t feel justified in giving it away - even to you, if it didn’t seem necessary. We simply confide it to you.” - </p> - <p> - “You can’t confide anything to me,” said the resident magistrate. - “Understand clearly that I shall hold myself free to use everything I see - and learn, if the interests of justice seem to demand it.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, but that isn’t going to happen,” responded Bernard. “The interests - of justice are all the other way, as you’ll see, later on. What I mean is, - if the case isn’t taken into court at all—as it won’t be—we - can trust you not to speak about this place.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh—in my private capacity—that is a different matter.” - </p> - <p> - “And you won’t be afraid to go alone with us?—it isn’t far from - here, but, mind, it is downright lonesome.” - </p> - <p> - Major Snaffle covered the two men—the burly, stout Irishman and the - lithe, erect, close-knit young American—with a comprehensive glance. - The points of his mustache trembled momentarily upward in the beginning of - a smile. “No—not the least bit afraid,” the dapper little gentleman - replied. - </p> - <p> - The constables at the outer door stood with their big red hands to their - caps, and saw with amazement the major, Bernard and Jerry pass them and - the cars, and go down the street abreast. The villagers, gathered about - the shop and cottage doors, watched the progress of the trio with even - greater surprise. It seemed now, though, that nothing was too marvelous to - happen in Muirisc. Some of them knew that the man with the flower in his - coat was the stipendary magistrate from Bantry, and, by some obscure - connection, this came to be interpreted throughout the village as meaning - that the bodies of both O’Daly and Miss Kate had been found. The stories - which were born of this understanding flatly contradicted one another at - every point as they flew about, but they made a good enough basis for the - old women of the hamlet to start keening upon afresh. - </p> - <p> - The three men, pausing now and again to make sure they were not followed, - went at a sharp pace around through the churchyard to the door of Jerry’s - abode, and entered it. The key and the lantern were found hanging upon - their accustomed pegs. Jerry lighted the candle, pushed back the bed, and - led the descent of the narrow, musty stairs through the darkness. The - major came last of all. - </p> - <p> - “I’ve only been down here once myself,” Bernard explained to him, over his - shoulder, as they made their stumbling way downward. “It seems the place - was discovered by accident, in the old Fenian days. I suppose the convent - used it in old times—they say there was a skeleton of a monk found - in it.” - </p> - <p> - “Whisht, now!” whispered Jerry, as, having passed through the long, low - corridor leading from the staircase, he came to a halt at the doorway. - “Maybe we’ll surproise him.” - </p> - <p> - He unlocked the door and flung it open. No sound of life came from within. - </p> - <p> - “Come along out ‘o that, Cormac!” called Jerry, into the mildewed - blackness. - </p> - <p> - There was no answer. - </p> - <p> - Bernard almost pushed Jerry forward into the chamber, and, taking the - lantern from him, held it aloft as he moved about. He peered under the - table; he opened the great muniment chest; he pulled back the curtains to - scrutinize the bed. There was no sign of O’Daly anywhere. - </p> - <p> - “Saints be wid us!” gasped Jerry, crossing himself, “the divil’s flown - away wid his own!” - </p> - <p> - Bernard, from staring in astonishment into his confederate’s fat face, let - his glance wander to the major. That official had stepped over the - threshold of the chamber, and stood at one side of the open door. He held - a revolver in his gloved, right hand. - </p> - <p> - “Gentlemen,” he said, in a perfectly calm voice, “my father served in - Ireland in Fenian times, and an American-Irishman caught him in a trap, - gagged him with gun-rags, and generally made a fool of him. Such things do - not happen twice in any intelligent family. You will therefore walk - through this door, arm in arm, handing me the lantern as you pass, and you - will then go up the stairs six paces ahead of me. If either of you - attempts to do anything else, I will shoot him down like a dog.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXVII—THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>ernard had never - before had occasion to look into the small and ominously black muzzle of a - loaded revolver. An involuntary twitching seized upon his muscles as he - did so now, but his presence of mind did not desert him. - </p> - <p> - “No! Don’t shoot!” he called out. The words shook as he uttered them, and - seemed to his nervously acute hearing to be crowded parts of a single - sound. “That’s rank foolishness!” he added, hurriedly. “There’s no trick! - Nobody dreams of touching you. I give you my word I’m more astonished than - you are!” - </p> - <p> - The major seemed to be somewhat impressed by the candor of the young man’s - tone. He did not lower the weapon, but he shifted his finger away from the - trigger. - </p> - <p> - “That may or may not be the case,” he said with a studious affectation of - calm in his voice. “At all events, you will at once do as I said.” - </p> - <p> - “But see here,” urged Bernard, “there’s an explanation to everything. I’ll - swear that old O’Daly was put in here by our friend here—Jerry - Higgins. That’s straight, isn’t it, Jerry?” - </p> - <p> - “It is, sir!” said Jerry, fervently, with eye askance on the revolver. - </p> - <p> - “And it’s evident enough that he couldn’t have got out by himself.” - </p> - <p> - “That he never did, sir.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, then—let’s figure. How many people know of this place?” - </p> - <p> - “There’s yoursilf,” responded Jerry, meditatively, “an’ mesilf an’ Linsky—me - cousin, Joseph Higgins, I mane. That’s all, if ye l’ave O’Daly out. An’ - that’s what bothers me wits, who the divil <i>did</i> l’ave him out?” - </p> - <p> - “This cousin of yours, as you call him,” put in the resident magistrate—“what - did he mean by speaking of him as Linsky? No lying, now.” - </p> - <p> - “Lying, is it, your honor? ’T is aisy to see you’re a stranger in - these parts, to spake that word to me. Egor, ’t is me truth-tellin - ’s kept me the poor man I am. I remember, now, sir, wance on a time - whin I was only a shlip of a lad—” - </p> - <p> - “What did you call him Linsky for?” Major Snaffle demanded, peremptorily. - </p> - <p> - “Well, sir,” answered Jerry, unabashed, “’t is because he’s - freckles on him. ‘Linsky’ is the Irish for a ‘freckled man!’ Sure, O’Daly - would tell you the same—if yer honor could find him.” - </p> - <p> - The major did not look entirely convinced. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t doubt it,” he said, with grim sarcasm; “every man, woman and - child of you all would tell the same. Come now—we’ll get up out of - this. Link your arms together, and give me the lantern.” - </p> - <p> - “By your lave, sir,” interposed Jerry, “that trick ye told us of your - father—w’u’d that have been in a marteller tower, on the coast - beyant Kinsale? Egor, sir, I was there! ’T was me tuk the gun-rags - from your father’s mouth. Sure, ’t is in me ricolliction as if ’t - was yesterday. There stud The O’Mahony—” - </p> - <p> - At the sound of the name on his tongue, Jerry stopped short. The secret of - that expedition had been preserved so long. Was there danger in revealing - it now. - </p> - <p> - To Bernard the name suggested another thought. He turned swiftly to Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “Look here!” he said. “You forgot something. The O’Mahony knew of this - place.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin, he did, sir,” assented Jerry. “’T was him discovered - it altogether.” - </p> - <p> - “Major,” the young man exclaimed, wheeling now to again confront the - magistrate with his revolver, “there’s something queer about this whole - thing. I don’t understand it any more than you do. Perhaps if we put our - heads together we could figure it out between us. It’s foolishness to - stand like this. Let me light the candles here, and all of us sit down - like white men. That’s it,” he added as he busied himself in carrying out - his suggestion, to which the magistrate tacitly assented. “Now we can - talk. We’ll sit here in front of you, and you can keep out your pistol, if - you like.” - </p> - <p> - “Well?” said Major Snaffle, inquiringly, when he had seated himself - between the others and the door, yet sidewise, so that he might not be - taken unawares by any new-comer. - </p> - <p> - “Tell him, Jerry, who this O’Mahony of yours was,” directed Bernard. - </p> - <p> - “Ah, thin—a grand divil of a man!” said Jerry, with enthusiasm. “’T - was he was the master of all Muirisc. Sure ’t was mesilf was the - first man he gave a word to in Ireland whin he landed at the Cove of Cork. - ‘Will ye come along wid me?’ says he. ‘To the inds of the earth!’ says I. - And wid that—” - </p> - <p> - “He came from America, too, did he?” queried the major. “Was that the same - man who—who played the trick on my father? You seem to know about - that.” - </p> - <p> - “Egor, ’t was the same!” cried Jerry, slapping his fat knee and - chuckling with delight at the memory. “’T was all in the winkin’ of - an eye—an’ there he had him bound like a calf goin’ to the fair, an’ - he cartin’ him on his own back to the boat. Up wint the sails, an’ off we - pushed, an’ the breeze caught us, an’ whin the soldiers came, faith, ’t - was safe out o’ raych we were. An’ thin The O’Mahony—God save him!—came - to your honor’s father—” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I know the story,” interrupted the major. “It doesn’t amuse me as it - does you. But what has this man—this O’Mahony—got to do with - this present case?” - </p> - <p> - “It’s like this,” explained Bernard, “as I understand it: He left Ireland - after this thing Jerry’s been telling you about and went fighting in other - countries. He turned his property over to two trustees to manage for the - benefit of a little girl here—now Miss Kate O’Mahony. O’Daly was one - of the trustees. What does he do but marry the girl’s mother—a widow—and - lay pipes to put the girl in a convent and steal all the money. I told you - at the beginning that it was a family squabble. I happened to come along - this way, got interested in the thing, and took a notion to put a spoke in - O’Daly’s wheel. To manage the convent end of the business I had to go away - for two or three days. While I was gone, I thought it would be safer to - have O’Daly down here out of mischief. Now you’ve got the whole story. Or, - no, that isn’t all, for when I got back I find that the young lady herself - has disappeared; and, lo and behold, here’s O’Daly turned up missing, - too!” - </p> - <p> - “What’s that you say?” asked Major Snaffle. “The young lady gone, also?” - </p> - <p> - “Is it Miss Kate?” broke in Jerry. “Oh, thin, ’t is the divil’s - worst work! Miss Kate not to be found—is that your m’aning? ’T - is not consayvable.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh, I don’t think there’s anything serious in <i>that</i>,” said Bernard. - “She’ll turn out to be safe and snug somewhere when everything’s cleared - up. But, in the meantime, where’s O’Daly? How did he get out of here?” - </p> - <p> - The major rose and walked over to the door. He examined its fastenings and - lock with attention. - </p> - <p> - “It can only be opened from the outside,” he remarked as he returned to - his seat. - </p> - <p> - “I know that,” said Bernard. “And I’ve got a notion that there’s only one - man alive who could have come and opened it.” - </p> - <p> - “Is it Lin—me cousin, you mane?” asked Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “Egor! He was never out of me sight, daylight or dark, till they arrested - us together.” - </p> - <p> - “No,” replied Bernard. “I didn’t mean him. The man I’m thinking of is The - O’Mahony himself.” - </p> - <p> - Jerry leaped to his feet so swiftly that the major instinctively clutched - his revolver anew. But there was no menace in Jerry’s manner. He stood for - a moment, his fat face reddened in the candle’s pale glow, his gray eyes - ashine, his mouth expanding in a grin of amazed delight. Then he burst - forth in a torrent of eager questioning. - </p> - <p> - “Don’t you mane it?” he cried. “The O’Mahony come back to his own ag’in? - W’u’d he—is it—oh, thin, ‘t is too good to be thrue, sir! An’ - we sittin’ here! An’ him near by! An’ me not—ah, come along out ’o - this! An’ ye’re not desayvin’ us, sir? He’s thruly come back to us?” - </p> - <p> - “Don’t go too fast,” remonstrated Bernard “It’s only guess-work There’s - nothing sure about it at all. Only there’s no one else who <i>could</i> - have come here.” - </p> - <p> - “Thrue for ye, sir!” exclaimed Jerry, all afire now with joyous - confidence. “’T is a fine, grand intelligince ye have, sir. An’ - will we be goin’, now, major, to find him?” - </p> - <p> - Under the influence of Jerry’s great excitement, the other two had risen - to their feet as well. - </p> - <p> - The resident magistrate toyed dubiously with his revolver, casting sharp - glances of scrutiny from one to the other of the faces before him, the - while he pondered the probabilities of truth in the curious tale to which - he had listened. - </p> - <p> - The official side of him clamored for its entire rejection as a lie. Like - most of his class, with their superficial and hostile observation of an - alien race, his instincts were all against crediting anything which any - Irish peasant told him, to begin with. Furthermore, the half of this - strange story had been related by an Irish-American—a type regarded - by the official mind in Ireland with a peculiar intensity of suspicion. - Yes, he decided, it was all a falsehood. - </p> - <p> - Then he looked into the young man’s face once more, and wavered. It seemed - an honest face. If its owner had borne even the homeliest and most - plebeian of Saxon labels, the major was conscious that he should have - liked him. The Milesian name carried prejudice, it was true, but— - </p> - <p> - “Yes, we will go up,” he said, “in the manner I described. I don’t see - what your object would be in inventing this long rigmarole. Of course, you - can see that if it isn’t true, it will be so much the worse for you.” - </p> - <p> - “We ought to see it by this time,” said Bernard, with a suggestion of - weariness. “You’ve mentioned it often enough. Here, take the lantern. - We’ll go up ahead. The door locks itself. I have the key.” - </p> - <p> - The three men made their way up the dark, tortuous flight of stairs, - replaced the lantern and key on their peg in Jerry’s room, and emerged - once more into the open. They filled their lungs with long breaths of the - fresh air, and then looked rather vacuously at one another. The major had - pocketed his weapon. - </p> - <p> - “Well, what’s the programme?” asked Bernard. - </p> - <p> - Before any answer came, their attention was attracted by the figure of a - stranger, sauntering about among the ancient stones and black wooden - crosses scattered over the weed-grown expanse of the churchyard. He was - engaged in deciphering the names on the least weather-beaten of these - crosses, but only in a cursory way and with long intermittent glances over - the prospect of ivy-grown ruins and gray walls, turrets and gables beyond. - As they watched him, he seemed suddenly to become aware of their presence. - Forthwith he turned and strolled toward them. - </p> - <p> - As he advanced, they saw that he was a tall and slender man, whose - close-cut hair and short mustache and chin tuft produced an effect of - extreme whiteness against a notably tanned and sun-burnt skin. Though - evidently well along in years, he walked erect and with an elastic and - springing step. He wore black clothes of foreign, albeit genteel aspect. - The major noted on the lapel of his coat a tell-tale gleam of red ribbon—and - even before that had guessed him to be a Frenchman and a soldier. He - leaped swiftly to the further assumption that this was The O’Mahony, and - then hesitated, as Jerry showed no sign of recognition. - </p> - <p> - The stranger halted before them with a little nod and a courteous upward - wave of his forefinger. - </p> - <p> - “A fine day, gentlemen,” he remarked, with politeness. - </p> - <p> - Major Snaffle had stepped in front of his companions. - </p> - <p> - “Permit me to introduce myself,” he said, with a sudden resolution, “I am - the stipendiary magistrate of the district. Would you kindly tell me if - you are informed as to the present whereabouts of Mr. Cormac O’Daly, of - this place?” - </p> - <p> - The other showed no trace of surprise on his browned face. - </p> - <p> - “Mr. O’Daly and his step-daughter,” he replied, affably enough, “are just - now doing me the honor of being my guests, aboard my vessel in the - harbor.” - </p> - <p> - Then a twinkle brightened his gray eyes as he turned their glance upon - Jerry’s red, moon-like face. He permitted himself the briefest of dry - chuckles. - </p> - <p> - “Well, young man,” he said, “they seem to have fed you pretty well, - anyway, since I saw you last.” For another moment Jerry stared in - round-eyed bewilderment at the speaker. Then with a wild “Huroo!” he - dashed forward, seized his hand and wrung it in both of his. - </p> - <p> - “God bless ye! God bless ye!” he gasped, between little formless - ejaculations of dazed delight. “God forgive me for not knowin’ ye—you’re - that althered! But for you’re back amongst us—aloive and well—glory - be to the world!” - </p> - <p> - He kept close to The O’Mahony’s side as the group began now to move toward - the gate of the churchyard, pointing to him with his fat thumb, as if to - call all nature to witness this glorious event, and murmuring fondly to - himself: “You’re come home to us!” over and over again. - </p> - <p> - “I am much relieved to learn what you tell me, Mr.—— Or - rather, I believe you are O’Mahony without the mister,” said Major - Snaffle, as they walked out upon the green. “I dare say you know—this - has been a very bad winter all over the west and south’, and crime seems - to be increasing, instead of the reverse, as spring advances. We have had - the gravest reports about the disaffection in this district—especially - among your tenants. That’s why we gave such ready credence to the theory - of murder.” - </p> - <p> - “Murder?” queried The O’Mahony. “Oh, I see—you thought O’Daly had - been murdered?” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, we arrested your man Higgins, here, yesterday. I was just on the - point of starting with him to Bantry jail, an hour ago, when this young - gentleman—” the major made a backward gesture to indicate Bernard—“came - and said he knew where O’Daly was. He took me down to that curious - underground chamber—” - </p> - <p> - “Who took you down, did you say?” asked The O’Mahony, sharply. He turned - on his heel as he spoke, as did the major. - </p> - <p> - To their considerable surprise, Bernard was no longer one of the party. - Their dumfounded gaze ranged the expanse of common round about. He was - nowhere to be seen. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahoney looked almost sternly at Jerry. - </p> - <p> - “Who is this young man you had with you—who seems to have taken to - running things in my absence?” he demanded. - </p> - <p> - Poor Jerry, who had been staring upward at the new-comer with the dumb - admiration of an affectionate spaniel, cowered humbly under this glance - and tone. - </p> - <p> - “Well, yer honor,” he stammered, plucking at the buttons of his coat in - embarrassment, “egor, for the matter of that—I—I don’t rightly - know.” - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXVIII—A MARINE MORNING CALL. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he young man from - Houghton County, strolling along behind these three men, all so busily - occupied with one another, had, of a sudden, conceived the notion of - dropping silently out of the party. - </p> - <p> - He had put the idea into execution and was secure from observation on the - farther side of the ditch, before the question of what he should do next - shaped itself in his mind. Indeed, it was not until he had made his way to - the little old-fashioned pier and come to an enforced halt among the empty - barrels, drying nets and general marine odds and ends which littered the - landing-stage, that he knew what purpose had brought him hither. - </p> - <p> - But he perceived it now with great clearness. What other purpose, in - truth, did existence itself contain for him? - </p> - <p> - “I want to be rowed over at once to that vessel there,” he called out to - John Pat, who made one of a group of Muirisc men, in white jackets and - soft black hats, standing beneath him on the steps. As he descended and - took his seat in one of the waiting dingeys, he noted other clusters of - villagers along the shore, all concentrating an eager interest upon the - yawl-rigged craft which lay at anchor in the harbor. They pointed to it - incessant as they talked, and others could be seen running forward across - the green to join them. He had never supposed Muirisc capable of such a - display of animation. - </p> - <p> - “The people seem tickled to death to get The O’Mahony back again,” he - remarked to John Pat, as they shot out under the first long sweep of the - oars. - </p> - <p> - “They are, sir,” was the stolid response. - </p> - <p> - “Did your brother come back with him—that one-armed man who went - after him—Malachy, I think they called him?” - </p> - <p> - “He did, sur,” said Pat, simply. - </p> - <p> - “Well”—Bernard bent forward impatiently—“tell me about it! - Where did he find him? What do people say?” - </p> - <p> - “They do be saying manny things,” responded the oarsman, rounding his - shoulders to the work. - </p> - <p> - Bernard abandoned the inquiry, with a grunt of discouragement, and - contented himself perforce by watching the way in which the strange craft - waxed steadily in size as they sped toward her. In a minute or two more, - he was alongside and clambering up a rope-ladder, which dangled its ends - in the gently heaving water. - </p> - <p> - Save for a couple of obviously foreign sailors lolling in the sunshine - upon a sail in the bows, there was no one on deck. As he looked about, - however, in speculation, the apparition of a broad, black hat, with long, - curled plumes, rose above the companionway. He welcomed it with an - exclamation of delight, and ran forward with outstretched hands. - </p> - <p> - The wearer of the hat, as she stepped upon the deck and confronted this - demonstration, confessed to surprise by stopping short and lifting her - black brows in inquiry. Bernard sheepishly let his hands fall to his side - before the cool glance with which she regarded him. - </p> - <p> - “Is it viewing the vessel you are?” she asked. “Her jigger lug-sail is - unusual, I’m told.” - </p> - <p> - The young man’s blue eyes glistened in reproachful appeal. - </p> - <p> - “What do I know about lugger jig-sails, or care, either,” he asked. “I - hurried here the moment I heard, to—to see <i>you!</i>” - </p> - <p> - “’T is flattered I am, I’m sure,” said Kate, dryly, looking away - from him to the brown cliffs beyond. - </p> - <p> - “Come, be fair!” Bernard pleaded. “Tell me what the matter is. I thought I - had every reason to suppose you’d be glad to see me. It’s plain enough - that you are not; but you—you <i>might</i> tell me why. Or no,” he - went on, with a sudden change of tone, “I won’t ask you. It’s your own - affair, after all. Only you’ll excuse the way I rushed up to you. I’d had - my head full of your affairs for days past, and then your disappearance—they - thought you were drowned, you know—and I—I—” - </p> - <p> - The young man broke off with weak inconclusiveness, and turned as if to - descend the ladder again. But John Pat had rowed away with the boat, and - he looked blankly down upon the clear water instead. - </p> - <p> - Kate’s voice sounded with a mellower tone behind him. - </p> - <p> - “I wouldn’t have ye go in anger,” she said. - </p> - <p> - Bernard wheeled around in a flash. - </p> - <p> - “Anger!” he cried, with a radiant smile chasing all the shadows from his - face. “Why, how on earth <i>could</i> I be angry with <i>you?</i> No; but - I was going away most mightily down in the mouth, though—that is,” - he added, with a rueful kind of grin, “if my boat hadn’t gone off without - me. But, honestly, now, when I drove in here this morning from Skibbereen, - I felt like a victorious general coming home from the wars. I’d done - everything I wanted to do. I had the convent business blocked, and I had - O’Daly on the hip; and I said to myself, as we drove along: ‘She’ll be - glad to see me.’ I kept saying that all the while, straight from - Skibbereen to Muirisc. Well, then—you can guess for yourself—it - was like tumbling backward into seven hundred feet of ice-water!” - </p> - <p> - Kate’s face had gradually lost its implacable rigidity, and softened now - for an instant into almost a smile. - </p> - <p> - “So much else has happened since that drive of yours,” she said gently. - “And what were ye doing at Skibbereen?” - </p> - <p> - “Well, you’ll open <i>your</i> eyes!” predicted Bernard, all animation - once again; and then he related the details of his journey to Skibbereen - and Cashel, of his interviews with the prelates and of the manner in which - he had, so to speak, wound up the career of the convent of the Hostage’s - Tears. “It hadn’t had any real, rightdown legitimate title to existence, - you know,” he concluded, “these last five hundred years. All it needed was - somebody to call attention to this fact, you see, and, bang, the whole - thing collapsed like a circus-tent in a cyclone!” - </p> - <p> - The girl had moved over to the gunwale, and now leaning over the rail, - looked meditatively into the water below. - </p> - <p> - “And so,” she said, with a pensive note in her voice, “there’s an end to - the historic convent of the O’Mahonys! No other family in Ireland had one—’t - was the last glory of our poor, hunted and plundered and poverty-striken - race; and now even that must depart from us.” - </p> - <p> - “Well—hang it all!” remonstrated Bernard—“it’s better that way - than to have <i>you</i> locked up all your life. I feel a little blue - myself about closing up the old convent, but there’s something else I feel - a thousand times more strongly about still.” - </p> - <p> - “Yes—isn’t it wonderful?—the return of The O’Mahony!” said - Kate. “Oh, I hardly know still if I’m waking or not. ’T was all - like a blessid vision, and ’t <i>was</i> supernatural in its way; - I’ll never believe otherwise. There was I on the strand yonder, with the - talisman he’d given me in me arms, praying for his return—and, - behold you there was this boat of his forninst me! Oh! Never tell me the - age of miracles is past?” - </p> - <p> - “I won’t—I promise you!” said Bernard, with fervor. “I’ve seen one - myself since I’ve been here. It was at the Three Castles. I had my gun - raised to shoot a heron, when an enchanted fairy—” - </p> - <p> - “Nothing to do but he’d bring me on board,” Kate put in, hastily. “Old - Murphy swam out to him ahead of us, screaming wid delight like one - possessed. And we sat and talked for hours—he telling strange - stories of the war’s he’d been in wid the French, and thin wid Don Carlos, - and thin the Turks, and thin wid some outlandish people in a Turkish - province—until night fell, and he wint ashore. And whin he came back - he brought O’Daly wid him—where in the Lord’s name he found him - passes my understanding, and thin we up sail and beat down till we stood - off Three Castle Head. There we lay all night—O’Mahony gave up his - cabin to me—and this morning back we came again. And now—the - Lord be praised!—there’s an ind to all our throubles!” - </p> - <p> - “Well,” said Bernard, with deliberation, “I’m glad. I really <i>am</i> - glad. Although, of course, it’s plain enough to see, there’s an end to me, - too.” - </p> - <p> - A brief time of silence passed, as the two, leaning side by side on the - rail, watched the slow rise and sinking of the dull-green wavelets. - </p> - <p> - “You’re off to Ameriky, thin?” Kate finally asked, without looking up. - </p> - <p> - The young man hesitated. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t know yet,” he said, slowly. “I’ve got a curious hand dealt out to - me. I hardly know how to play it. One thing is sure, though: hearts are - trumps.” - </p> - <p> - He tried to catch her glance, but she kept her eyes resolutely bent upon - the water. - </p> - <p> - “You know what I want to say,” he went on, moving his arm upon the rail - till there was the least small fluttering suggestion of contact with hers. - “It must have said itself to you that day upon the mountain-top, or, for - that matter, why, that very first time I saw you I went away head over - heels in love. I tell you, candidly, I haven’t thought or dreamed for a - minute of anything else from that blessed day. It’s all been fairyland to - me ever since. I’ve been so happy! May I stay in fairyland, Kate?” - </p> - <p> - She made no answer. Bernard felt her arm tremble against his for an - instant before it was withdrawn. He noted, too, the bright carmine flush - spring to her cheek, overmantle her dark face and then fade away before an - advancing pallor. A tear glittered among her downcast lashes. - </p> - <p> - “You mustn’t deny me <i>my</i> age of miracles!” he murmuringly pleaded. - “It <i>was</i> a miracle that we should have met as we did; that I should - have found you afterward as I did; that I should have turned up just when - you needed help the most; that the stray discovery of an old mediæval - parchment should have given me the hint what to do. Oh, don’t <i>you</i> - feel it, Kate? Don’t <i>you</i> realize, too, dear, that there was fate in - it all? That we belonged from the beginning to each other?” - </p> - <p> - Very white-faced and grave, Kate lifted herself erect and looked at him. - It was with an obvious effort that she forced herself to speak, but her - words were firm enough and her glance did not waver. - </p> - <p> - “Unfortunately,” she said, “<i>your</i> miracle has a trick in it. Even if - ’t would have pleased me to believe in it, how can I, whin ’t - is founded on desate.” - </p> - <p> - Bernard stared at her in round-eyed wonderment. - </p> - <p> - “How ‘deceit’?” he stammered. “How do you mean? Is it about kidnapping - O’Daly? We only did that—” - </p> - <p> - “No, ’t is <i>this</i>,” said Kate—“we ‘ll be open with each - other, and it’s a grief to me to say it to you, whom I have liked so much, - but you ‘re no O’Ma-hony at all.” - </p> - <p> - The young man with difficulty grasped her meaning. - </p> - <p> - “Well, if you remember, I never said I knew my father was one of <i>the</i> - O’Mahonys, you know. All I said was that he came from somewhere in County - Cork. Surely, there was no deceit in that.” - </p> - <p> - She shook her head. - </p> - <p> - “No; what ye said was that your name was O’Mahony.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, so it is. Good heavens! <i>That</i> isn’t disputed, is it?” - </p> - <p> - “And you said, moreover,” she continued, gravely, “that your father knew - <i>our</i> O’Mahony as well almost as he knew himsilf.” - </p> - <p> - “Oh-h!” exclaimed Bernard, and fell thereupon into confused rumination - upon many thoughts which till then had been curiously subordinated in his - mind. - </p> - <p> - “And, now,” Kate went on, with a sigh, “whin I mintion this to The - O’Mahony himself, he says he never in his life knew any one of your - father’s name. O’Daly was witness to it as well.” - </p> - <p> - Bernard had his elbows once more on the rail. He pushed his chin hard - against his upturned palms and stared at the skyline, thinking as he had - never been forced to think before. - </p> - <p> - “Surely there was no need for the—the misstatement,” said Kate, in - mournful recognition of what she took to be his dumb self-reproach. “See - now how useless it was—and a thousand times worse than useless! See - how it prevints me now from respecting you and being properly grateful to - you for what you’ve done on me behalf, and—and—” - </p> - <p> - She broke off suddenly. To her consternation she had discovered that the - young man, so far from being stricken speechless in contrition, was - grinning gayly at the distant landscape. - </p> - <p> - Turning with abruptness she walked indignantly aft. Cormac O’Daly had come - up from below, and stood wistfully gazing landward over the taffrail. She - joined him, and stood at his side flushed and wrathful. - </p> - <p> - Bernard was not wholly able to chase the smile from his face as he rose - and sauntered over toward her. She turned her back as he approached and - tapped the deck nervously with her foot. Nothing dismayed, he addressed - himself to O’Daly, who seemed unable to decide whether also to look the - other way or not. - </p> - <p> - “Good morning, sir,” he said affably. “You’re quite a stranger, Mr. - O’Daly.” - </p> - <p> - Kate, at his first word, had walked briskly away up the deck. Cormac’s - little black eyes snapped viciously at the intruder. - </p> - <p> - “At laste I’m not such a stranger,” he retorted, “but that me thrue name - is known, an’ I’m here be the invitation of the owner.” - </p> - <p> - “I’m sorry you take things so hard, Mr. O’Daly,” said Bernard. “An easy - disposition would come very handy to you, seeing the troubles you ’ve - got to go through with yet.” - </p> - <p> - The small man gazed apprehensively at his tormentor. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t folly ye,” he stammered. - </p> - <p> - “I’m going to propose that you <i>shall</i> follow me, sir,” replied the - young man in an authoritative tone. “I understand that in conversation - last night between your step-daughter and you and <i>The</i>—the - owner of this vessel, the question of my name was brought up, and that it - was decided that I was a fraud. Now, I’m not much given to making a fuss, - but there are some things, especially at certain times, that I can’t stand—not - for one little minute. This is one of ’em. Now I’m going to suggest - that we hail one of those boats there and go ashore at once—you and - Miss Kate and I—and clear this matter up without delay.” - </p> - <p> - “We’ll remain here till The O’Mahony returns!” said O’Daly, stiffly. “’T - was his request. ’T is no interest of mine to clear the matther up, - as you call it.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, it was no interest of mine, Mr. O’Daly,” remarked Bernard, - placidly, “to go over the mining contracts you’ve made as trustee during - the past dozen years and figure out all the various items of the estate’s - income; but I’ve done it. It makes a very curious little balance-sheet. I - had intended to fetch it down with me to-day and go over it with you in - your underground retreat.” - </p> - <p> - “In the devil’s name, who are you?” snarled Cormac, with livid face and - frightened eyes. “That’s just what I proposed we should go right and - settle. If you object, why, I shall go alone. But in that case, it may - happen that I shall have to discuss with the gentleman who has just - arrived the peculiarities of that balance-sheet I spoke of. What do you - think, eh?” - </p> - <p> - O’Daly did not hesitate. - </p> - <p> - “Sur, I’ll go wid you,” he said. “The O’Mahony has no head for figures. ’T - would be flat injustice to bother him wid ’em, and he only newly - landed.” Bernard walked lightly across the deck, humming a little tune to - himself as he advanced, and baiting a short foot from where Kate stood. - </p> - <p> - “O’Daly’s going ashore with me,” he remarked. “He dare not!” she answered, - over her shoulder. “The O’Mahony bade him stop here.” - </p> - <p> - “Well, this is more or less of a free country, and he’s changed his mind. - He’s going with me. I—I want you to come, too.” - </p> - <p> - “’Tis loikely!” she said, with a derisive sniff. - </p> - <p> - “Kate,” he said, drawing nearer to her by a step and speaking in low, - earnest tones, “I hate to plead this sort of thing; but you have nothing - but candid and straightforward friendship from me. I’ve done a trifle of - lying <i>for</i> you, perhaps, but none <i>to</i> you. I’ve worked for you - as I never worked for myself. I’ve run risks for you which nothing else - under the sun would have tempted me into. All that doesn’t matter. Leave - that out of the question. I did it because I love you. And for that - selfsame reason I come now and ask this favor of you. You can send me away - afterward, if you like; but you <i>can’t</i> bear to stop here now, - thinking these things of me, and refusing to come out and learn for - yourself whether they are true or false, for that would be unfair, and - it’s not in your blood—in <i>our</i> blood—to be that.” - </p> - <p> - The girl neither turned to him nor spoke, but he could see the outline of - her face as she bowed her head and gazed in silence at the murmuring - water; and something in this sight seemed to answer him. - </p> - <p> - He strode swiftly to the other side of the vessel, and exultantly waved - his handkerchief in signal to the boatmen on the shore. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXIX—DIAMOND CUT PASTE. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he O’Mahony sat - once more in the living-room of his castle—sat very much at his - ease, with a cigar between his teeth, and his feet comfortably stretched - out toward the blazing bank of turf on the stone hearth. - </p> - <p> - A great heap of papers lay upon the table at his elbow—the contents - of O’Daly’s strong-box, the key to which he had brought with him from the - vessel—but not a single band of red tape had been untied. The - O’Mahony’s mood for investigation had exhausted itself in the work of - getting the documents out. His hands were plunged deep into his trousers’ - pockets now, and he gazed into the glowing peat. - </p> - <p> - His home-coming had been a thing to warm the most frigid heart. His own - beat delightedly still at the thought of it. From time to time there - reached his ears from the square without a vague braying noise, the sound - of which curled his lips into the semblance of a grin. It seemed so droll - to him that Muirisc should have a band—a fervent half-dozen of - amateurs, with ancient and battered instruments which successive - generations of regimental musicians bad pawned at Skibbereen or Bantry, - and on which they played now, neither by note nor by ear, but solely by - main strength. - </p> - <p> - The tumult of discord which they produced was dreadful, but The O’Mahony - liked it. He had been pleasurably touched, too, by the wild enthusiasm of - greeting with which Muirisc had met him when he disclosed himself on the - main street, walking up to the police-station with Major Snaffle and - Jerry. All the older inhabitants he knew, and shook hands with. The sight - of younger people among them whom he did not know alone kept alive the - recollection that he had been absent twelve long years. Old and young - alike, and preceded by the hurriedly summoned band, they had followed him - in triumphal procession when he came down the street again, with the - liberated Jerry and Linsky at his heels. They were still outside, cheering - and madly bawling their delight whenever the bandsmen stopped to take - breath. Jerry, Linsky and the one-armed Malachy were out among them, - broaching a cask of porter from the castle cellar; Mrs. Fergus and Mrs. - Sullivan were in the kitchen cutting up bread and meat to go with the - drink. - </p> - <p> - No wonder there were cheers! Small matter for marvel was it, either, that - The O’Mahony smiled as he settled down still more lazily in his arm-chair - and pushed his feet further toward the fire. - </p> - <p> - Presently he must go and fetch O’Daly and Kate from the vessel—or - no, when Jerry came in he would send him on that errand. After his long - journey The O’Mahony was tired and sleepy—all the more as he had sat - up most of the night, out on deck, talking with O’Daly. What a journey it - had been! Post-haste from far away, barbarous Armenia, where the faithful - Malachy had found him in command of a Turkish battalion, resting after the - task of suppressing a provincial rebellion. Home they had wended their - tireless way by Constantinople and Malta and mistral-swept Marseilles, and - thence by land across to Havre. Here, oddly enough, he had fallen in with - the French merchant to whom he had sold the <i>Hen Hawk</i> twelve years - before—the merchant’s son had served with him in the Army of the - Loire three years later, and was his friend—and he had been able to - gratify the sudden fantastic whim of returning as he had departed in the - quaint, flush-decked, yawl-rigged old craft. It all seemed like a dream! - </p> - <p> - “If your honor plazes, there’s a young gintleman at the dure—a - Misther O’Mahony, from America—w’u’d be afther having a word wid - ye.” - </p> - <p> - It was the soft voice of good old Mrs. Sullivan that spoke. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony woke with a start from his complacent day-dream. He drew his - feet in, sat upright, and bit hard on his cigar for a minute in scowling - reflection. - </p> - <p> - “Show him in,” he said, at last, and then straightened himself truculently - to receive this meddling new-comer. He fastened a stern and hostile gaze - upon the door. - </p> - <p> - Bernard seemed to miss entirely the frosty element in his reception. He - advanced with a light step, hat in hand, to the side of the hearth, and - held one hand with familiar nonchalance over the blaze, while he nodded - amiably at his frowning host. - </p> - <p> - “I skipped off rather suddenly this morning,” he said, with a pleasant - half-smile, “because I didn’t seem altogether needful to the party for the - minute, and I had something else to do. I’ve dropped in now to say that - I’m as glad as anybody here to see you back again. I’ve only been about - Muirisc a few weeks, but I already feel as if I’d been born and brought up - here. And so I’ve come around to do my share of the welcoming.” - </p> - <p> - “You <i>seem</i> to have made yourself pretty much at home, sir,” - commented The O’Mahony, icily. - </p> - <p> - “You mean putting O’Daly down in the family vault?” queried the young man. - “Yes, perhaps it was making a little free, but, you see, time pressed. I - couldn’t be in two places at once, now, could I? And while I went off to - settle the convent business, there was no telling what O’Daly mightn’t be - up to if we left him loose; so I thought it was best to take the liberty - of shutting him up. You found him there, I judge, and took him out.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony nodded curtly, and eyed his visitor with cool disfavor. - </p> - <p> - “As long as you’re here, sir, you might as well take a seat,” he said, - after a minute’s pause. “That ’s it. Now, sir, first of all, - perhaps you wouldn’t mind telling me who you are and what the devil you - mean, sir, by coming here and meddling in this way with other people’s - private affairs.” - </p> - <p> - “Curious, isn’t it,” remarked the young man from Houghton County, blandly, - “how we Americans lug in the word ‘sir’ every other breath? They tell me - no Englishman ever uses it at all.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony stirred in his chair. - </p> - <p> - “I’m not as easy-going a man or as good-natured as I used to be, my young - friend,” he said, with an affectation of calm, through which ran a - threatening note. - </p> - <p> - “I shouldn’t have thought it,” protested Bernard. “You seemed the pink of - politeness out there in the graveyard this morning. But I suppose years of - campaigning—” - </p> - <p> - “See here!” the other interposed abruptly. “Don’t fool with me. It’s a - risky game! Unless you want trouble, stop monkeying and answer my question - straight: Who are you?” - </p> - <p> - The young man had ceased smiling. His face had all at once become very - grave, and he was staring at The O’Mahony with wide-open, bewildered eyes. - </p> - <p> - “True enough!” he gasped, after his gaze had been so protracted that the - other half rose from his seat in impatient anger. “Why—yes, sir! - I’ll swear to it—well—this <i>does</i> beat all!” - </p> - <p> - “Your <i>cheek</i> beats all!” broke in The O’Mahony, springing to his - feet in a gust of choleric heat. - </p> - <p> - Bernard stretched forth a restraining hand. - </p> - <p> - “Wait a minute,” he said, in evidently sincere anxiety not to be - misunderstood, and picking his words slowly as he went along, “hold on—I’m - not fooling! Please sit down again. I’ve got something important, and - mighty queer, too, to say to you.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony, with a grunt of reluctant acquiescing, sat down once more. - The two men looked at each other with troubled glances, the one vaguely - suspicious, the other still round-eyed with surprise. - </p> - <p> - “You ask who I am,” Bernard began. “I’ll tell you. I was a little shaver—oh, - six or seven years old—just at the beginning of the War. My father - enlisted when they began raising troops. The recruiting tent in our town - was in the old hay-market by the canal bridge. It seems to me, now, that - they must have kept my father there for weeks alter he ’d put his - uniform on. I used to go there every day, I know, with my mother to see - him. But there was another soldier there—this is the queer thing - about a boy’s memory—I remember him ever so much better than I do my - own father. It’s—let’s see—eighteen years now, but I’d know - him to this day, wherever I met him. He carried a gun, and he walked all - day long up and down in front of the tent, like a polar bear in his cage. - We boys thought he was the most important man in the whole army. Some of - them knew him—he belonged to our section originally, it seems—and - they said he’d been in lots of wars before. I can see him now, as plainly - as—as I see you. His name was Tisdale—Zeb, I think it was—no, - Zeke Tisdale.” - </p> - <p> - Perhaps The O’Mahony changed color. He sat with his back to the window, - and the ruddy glow from the peat blaze made it impossible to tell. But he - did not take his sharp gray eye off Bernard’s face, and it never so much - as winked. - </p> - <p> - “Very interesting,” he said, “but it doesn’t go very far toward explaining - who you are. If I’m not mistaken, <i>that</i> was the question.” - </p> - <p> - “Me?” answered Bernard, “Oh, yes, I forgot that. Well, sir, I am the only - surviving son of one Hugh O’Mahony, who was a shoemaker in Tecumseh, who - served in the same regiment, perhaps the same company, with this Zeke - Tisdale I’ve told you about, and who, after the War, moved out to Michigan - where he died.” - </p> - <p> - An oppressive silence settled upon the room. The O’Mahony still looked his - companion straight in the face, but it was with a lack-luster eye and with - the effect of having lost the physical power to look elsewhere. He drummed - with his fingers in a mechanical way on the arms of the chair, as he kept - up this abstracted and meaningless gaze. - </p> - <p> - There fell suddenly upon this long-continued silence the reverberation of - an exceptionally violent outburst of uproar from the square. - </p> - <p> - “Cheers for The O’Mahony!” came from one of the lustiest of the now - well-lubricated throats; and then followed a scattering volley of wild - hurroos and echoing yells. - </p> - <p> - As these died away, a shrill voice lifted itself, screaming: - </p> - <p> - “Come out, O’Mahony, an’ spake to us! We’re dyin’ for a sight of you!” - </p> - <p> - The elder man had lifted his head and listened. Then he squinted and - blinked his eyelids convulsively and turned his head away, but not before - Bernard had caught the glint of moisture in his eyes. - </p> - <p> - The young man had not been conscious of being specially moved by what was - happening. All at once he could feel his pulses vibrating like the strings - of a harp. His heart had come up into his throat. Nothing was visible to - him but the stormy affection which Muirisc bore for this war-born, - weather-beaten old impostor. And, clearly enough, <i>he</i> himself was - thinking of only that. - </p> - <p> - Bernard rose and stepped to the hearth, instinctively holding one of his - hands backward over the fire, though the room was uncomfortably hot. - </p> - <p> - “They’re calling for you outside, sir,” he said, almost deferentially. - </p> - <p> - The remark seemed stupid after he had made it, but nothing else had come - to his tongue. - </p> - <p> - The lurking softness in his tone caught the other’s ear, and he turned - about fiercely. - </p> - <p> - “See here!” he said, between his teeth. “How much more of this is there - going to be? I’ll fight you where you stand—here!—now!—old - as I am—or I’ll—I’ll do something else—anything else—but - d——m me if I’ll take any slack or soft-soap from <i>you!</i>” - </p> - <p> - This unexpected resentment of his sympathetic mood impressed Bernard - curiously. Without hesitation, he stretched forth his hand. No responsive - gesture was offered, but he went on, not heeding this. . - </p> - <p> - “My dear sir,” he said, “they are calling for you, as I said. They are - hollering for ‘The O’Mahony of Muirisc.’ You are The O’Mahony of Muirisc, - and will be till you die. You hear <i>me!</i>” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony gazed for a puzzled minute into his young companion’s face. - </p> - <p> - “Yes—I hear you,” he said, hesitatingly. - </p> - <p> - “<i>You</i>—are The—O’Mahony—of—Muirisc!” repeated - Bernard, with a deliberation and emphasis; “and I’ll whip any man out of - his boots who says you’re not, or so much as looks as if he doubted it!” - </p> - <p> - The old soldier had put his hands in his pockets and began walking slowly - up and down the chamber. After a time he looked up. - </p> - <p> - “I s’pose you can prove all this that you’ve been saying?” he asked, in a - musing way. - </p> - <p> - “No—prove nothing! Don’t want to prove anything!” rejoined Bernard, - stoutly. - </p> - <p> - Another pause. The elder man halted once more in his meditative pacing to - and fro. - </p> - <p> - “And you say I <i>am</i> The—The O’Mahony of Muirisc?” he remarked. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I said it; I mean it!” - </p> - <p> - “Well, but—” - </p> - <p> - “There’s no ‘but’ about it, sir!” - </p> - <p> - “Yes, there is,” insisted The O’Mahony, drawing near and tentatively - surrendering his hand to the other’s prompt and cordial clasp. “Supposing - it all goes as you say—supposing I <i>am</i> The O’Mahony—what - are <i>you</i> going to be?” - </p> - <p> - The young man’s eyes glistened and a happy change—half-smile, - half-blush—blossomed all over his face. - </p> - <p> - “Well,” he said, still holding the other’s hand in his, “I don’t know just - how to tell you—because I am not posted on the exact relationships; - but I’ll put it this way: If it was your daughter that you ’d left - on the vessel there with O’Daly, I’d say that what I propose to be was - your son-in-law. See?” - </p> - <p> - It was only too clear that The O’Mahony did see. He had frowned at the - first adumbration of the idea. He pulled his hand away now, and pushed the - young man from him. - </p> - <p> - “No, you don’t!” he cried, angrily. “No, sirree! You can’t make any such - bargain as that with <i>me!</i> Why—I’d ’a’ thought you’d ’a’ - known me better! <i>Me</i>, going into a deal, with little Katie to be - traded off? Why, man, you’re a fool!” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony turned on his heel contemptuously and strode up and down the - room, with indignant sniffs at every step. All at once he stopped short. - </p> - <p> - “Yes,” he said, as if in answer to an argument with himself, “I’ll tell - you to get out of this! You can go and do what you like—just - whatever you may please—but I’m boss here yet, at all events, and I - don’t want anybody around me who could propose that sort of thing. <i>Me</i> - make Kate marry you in order to feather my own nest! There’s the door, - young man!” - </p> - <p> - Bernard looked obdurately past the outstretched forefinger into the - other’s face. - </p> - <p> - “Who said anything about your <i>making</i> her marry me?” he demanded. - “And who talked about a deal? Why, look here, colonel”—the random - title caught the ear of neither speaker nor impatient listener—“look - at it this way: They all love you here in Muirisc; they’re just boiling - over with joy because they’ve got you here. That sort of thing doesn’t - happen so often between landlords and tenants that one can afford to bust - it up when it does occur. And I—well—a man would be a brute to - have tried to come between you and these people. Well, then, it’s just the - same with me and Katie. We love each other—we are glad when we’re - together; we’re unhappy when we’re apart. And so I say in this case as I - said in the other, a mane between you and these people. Well, then, it’s - just the same with me and Katie. We love each other—we are glad when - we’re together; we’re unhappy when we’re apart. And so I say in this case - as I said in the other, a man would be a brute—” - </p> - <p> - “Do you mean to tell me—” The O’Mahony broke in, and then was - himself cut short. - </p> - <p> - “Yes, I <i>do</i> mean to tell you,” interrupted Bernard; “and, what’s - more, she means to tell you, too, if you put on your hat and walk over to - the convent.” Noting the other’s puzzled glance, he hastened on to - explain: “I rowed over to your sloop, or ship, or whatever you call it, - after I left you this morning, and I brought her and O’Daly back with me - on purpose <i>to</i> tell you.” - </p> - <p> - Before The O’Mahony had mastered this confusing piece of information, much - less prepared verbal comment upon it, the door was thrust open; and, - ushered in, as it were, by the sharply resounding clamor of the crowd - outside, the burly figure of Jerry Higgins appeared. - </p> - <p> - “For the love o’ God, yer honor,” he exclaimed, in a high fever of - excitement, “come along out to ‘em! Sure they’re that mad to lay eyes on - ye, they’re ’ating each other like starved lobsters in a pot! Ould - Barney Driscoll’s the divil wid the dhrink in him, an’ there he is ragin’ - up an’ down, wid his big brass horn for a weapon, crackin’ skulls right - an’ left; an’ black Clancy’s asleep in his drum—‘t was Sheehan putt - him into it neck an’ crop—an’ ’t is three constables work to - howld the boys from rollin’ him round in it, an—an—” - </p> - <p> - “All right, Jerry,” said The O’Mahony; “I’ll come right along.” - </p> - <p> - He put on his hat and relighted his cigar, in slow and silent - deliberation. He tarried thereafter for a moment or two with an irresolute - air, looking at the smoke-rings abstractedly as he blew them into the air. - </p> - <p> - Then, with a sudden decision, he walked over and linked Bernard’s arm in - his own. They went out together without a word. In fact, there was no need - for words. - </p> - <p> - <br /><br /> - </p> - <hr /> - <p> - <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030"> </a> - </p> - <div style="height: 4em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - <h2> - CHAPTER XXX—A FAREWELL FEAST. - </h2> - <p class="pfirst"> - <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>e enter the - crumbling portals of the ancient convent of the O’Mahonys for a final - visit. The reddened sun, with its promise of a kindly morrow, hangs low in - the western heavens and pushes the long shadow of the gateway onward to - the very steps of the building. We have no call to set the harsh-toned - jangling old bell in motion. The door is open and the hall is swept for - guests. - </p> - <p> - This hour of waning day marked a unique occurrence in the annals of the - House of the Hostage’s Tears. Its nuns were too aged and infirm to go to - the castle to offer welcome to the newly returned head of the family. So - The O’Mahony came to them instead. He came like the fine old chieftain of - a sept, bringing his train of followers with him. For the first time - within the recollection of man, a long table had been spread in the - reception-hall, and about it were gathered the baker’s dozen of people we - have come to know in Muirisc. Even Mrs. Sullivan, flushed scarlet from her - labor in the ill-appointed convent kitchen, and visibly disheartened at - its meagre results, had her seat at the board beside Father Jago. But they - were saved from the perils of a party of thirteen because the one-armed - Malachy, dour-faced and silent, but secretly bursting with pride and joy, - stood at his old post behind his master’s chair. - </p> - <p> - There had not been much to eat, and the festival stood thus early at the - stage of the steaming kettle and the glasses so piping hot that fingers - shrank from contact, though the spirit beckoned. And there was not one - less than twelve of these scorching tumblers—for in remote Muirisc - the fame of Father Mathew remained a vague and colorless thing like that - of Mahomet or Sir Isaac Newton—and, moreover, was not The O’Mahony - come home? - </p> - <p> - “Yes, sir,” The O’Mahony said from his place at the right hand of Mother - Agnes, venturing an experimental thumb against his glass and sharply - withdrawing it, “wherever I went, in France or Spain or among the Turks, I - found there had been a soldier O’Mahony there before me. Why, a French - general told me that right at one time—quite a spell back, I should - judge—there were fourteen O’Mahonys holding commissions in the - French army. Yes, I remember, it was in the time of Louis XIX.” - </p> - <p> - “You’re wrong, O’Mahony,” interrupted Kate, with the smile of a spoiled, - favorite child, “’t was nineteen O’Mahonys in the reign of Louis - XIV.” - </p> - <p> - “Same thing,” he replied, pleasantly. “It’s as broad as it is long. There - the O’Mahony’s were, anyway, and every man of ’em a fighter. It set - me to figuring that before they went away—when they were all cooped - up here together on this little neck of land—things must have been - kept pretty well up to boiling point all the year round.” - </p> - <p> - “An’ who was it ever had the power to coop ’em up here?” demanded - Cormac O’Daly, with enthusiasm. “Heaven be their bed! ’T was not in - thim O’Mahonys to endure it! Forth they wint in all directions, wid bowld - raids an’ incursions, b’ating the O’Heas an’ def’ating the Coffeys wid - slaughter, an’ as for the O’Driscolls—huh!—just tearing ’em - up bodily be the roots! Sir, <i>t</i> was a proud day whin an O’Daly first - attached himself to the house of the O’Mahonys—such grand min as - they, were, so magnanimous, so pious, so intelligent, so ferocious an’ - terrifying—sir, me old blood warms at thought of ’em!” - </p> - <p> - The caloric in Cormac’s veins impelled him at this juncture to rise to - this feet. He took a sip from his glass, then adjusted his spectacles, and - produced the back of an envelope from his pocket. - </p> - <p> - “O’Mahony,” he said, with a voice full of emotion, “I’ve a slight pome - here, just stated down hurriedly that I’ll take the liberty to rade to the - company assimbled. ’T is this way it runs: - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - ‘Hark to thim joyous sounds that rise. - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - Making the face of Muirisc to be glad! - </p> - <p class="indent20"> - ’T is the devil’s job to believe one’s eyes—‘” - </p> - <p> - <br /> - </p> - <p> - “Well, thin, don’t be trying!” brusquely interrupted Mrs. Fergus. As the - poet paused and strove to cow his spouse with a sufficiently indignant - glance, she leaned over the table and addressed him in a stage whisper, - almost audible to the deaf old nuns themselves. - </p> - <p> - “Sit down, me man!” she adjured him. “’T is laughing at ye they - are! Sure, doesn’t his honor know how different a chune ye raised while he - was away! ’T is your part to sing small, now, an’ keep the ditch - betwixt you an’ observation.” - </p> - <p> - Cormac sat down at once, and submissively put the paper back in his - pocket. It was a humble and wistful glance which he bent through his - spectacles at the chieftain, as that worthy resumed his remarks. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony did not pretend to have missed the adjuration of Mrs. Fergus. - </p> - <p> - “That started off well enough, O’Daly,” he said; “but you’re getting too - old to have to hustle around and turn out poetry to order, as you used to. - I’ve decided to allow you to retire—to sort of knock off your shoes - and let you run in the pasture. You can move into one of the smaller - houses and just take things easy.” - </p> - <p> - “But, sir—me secretarial juties—” put in O’Daly, with - quavering voice. - </p> - <p> - “There’ll be no manner of trouble about that,” said the O’Mahony, - reassuringly. “My friend, here, Joseph Higgins, of Boston, he will look - out for that. I don’t know that you’re aware of it, but I took a good deal - of interest in him many years ago—before I went away—and I - foresaw a future for him. It hasn’t turned out jest as I expected, but I’m - satisfied, all the same. Before I left, I arranged that he should pursue - his studies during my absence.” A grimly quizzical smile played around the - white corners of his mustache as he added: “I understand that he jest - stuck to them studies night and day—never left ’em once for - so much as to go out and take a walk for the whole twelve years.” - </p> - <p> - “Surely, sir,” interposed Father Jago, “that’s most remarkable! I never - heard tell of such studiosity in Maynooth itself!” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony looked gravely across the table at Jerry, whose broad, - shining face was lobster-red with the exertion of keeping itself straight. - </p> - <p> - “I believe there’s hardly another case on record,” he said. “Well, as I - was remarking, it’s only natural, now, that I should make him my secretary - and bookkeeper. I’ve had a long talk with him about it—and about - other things, too—and I guess there ain’t much doubt about our - getting along together all right.” - </p> - <p> - “And is it your honor’s intintion—Will—will he take over my - functions as bard as well?” Cormac ventured to inquire. He added in - deprecating tones: “Sure, they’ve always been considered hereditary.” - </p> - <p> - “No; I think we’ll let the bard business slide for the time being,” - answered The O’Mahony. “You see, I’ve been going along now a good many - years without any poet, so I’ve got used to it. There was one fellow out - at Plevna—an English newspaper man—who did compose some verses - about me—he seemed to think they were quite funny—but I shot - off one of his knee-pans, and that sort of put a damper on poetry, so far - as I was concerned. However, we’ll see how your boy turns out. Maybe, if - he takes a shine to that sort of thing—” - </p> - <p> - “Then you’re to stay with us?” inquired Mother Agnes. “So grand ye are wid - your decorations an’ your foreign titles—sure, they tell me you’re - Chevalier an’ O’Mahony Bey both at wance—’t will be dull as - ditch-water for you here.” - </p> - <p> - “No, I reckon not,” replied The O’Mahony. “I’ve had enough of it. It’s - nigh on to forty years since I first tagged along in the wake of a drum - with a musket on my shoulder. I don’t know why I didn’t come back years - ago. I was too shiftless to make up my mind, I suppose. No, I’m going to - stay here—going to die here—right among these good Muirisc - folks, who are thumping each other to pieces outside on the green. Talk - about its being dull here—why, Mother Agnes, ’t would have - done your heart good to see old Barney Driscoll laying about him with that - overgrown, double-barreled trumpet of his. I haven’t seen anything better - since we butted our heads up against Schipka Pass.” - </p> - <p> - “’T will be grand tidings for the people—that same,” - interposed Kate, with happiness in glance and tone. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony looked tenderly at her. - </p> - <p> - “That reminds me,” he said, and then turned to the nuns, lifting his voice - in token that he especially addressed them. “There was some talk, I - understand, about little Katie here—” - </p> - <p> - “Little, is it!” laughed the girl. “Sure, to pl’ase you I’d begin growing - again, but that there’d be no house in Muirisc to hold me.” - </p> - <p> - “Some talk about big Kate here, then,” pursued the O’Mahony, “going into - the convent. Well, of course, that’s all over with now.” He hesitated for - a moment, and decided to withhold all that cruel information about - episcopal interference. “And I’ve been thinking it over,” he resumed, “and - have come to the conclusion that we’d better not try to bolster up the - convent with new girls from outside. It’s always been kept strictly inside - the family. Now that that can’t be done, it’s better to let it end with - dignity. And that it can’t help doing, because as long as it’s remembered, - men will say that its last nuns were its best nuns.” - </p> - <p> - He closed with a little bow to the Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears. Mother - Agnes acknowledged the salutation and the compliment with a silent - inclination of her vailed head. If her heart took grief, she did not say - so. - </p> - <p> - “And your new secretary—” put in Cormac, diffidently yet with - persistence, “has he that acquaintance an’ familiarity wid mining - technicalities and conthracts that would fit him to dale wid ’em - satisfactorily?” - </p> - <p> - A trace of asperity, under which O’Daly definitely wilted, came into The - O’Mahony’s tone. - </p> - <p> - “There is such a thing as being too smart about mining contracts,” he said - with meaning. Then, with a new light in his eyes he went on: “The luckiest - thing that ever happened on this footstool, I take it, has occurred right - here. The young man who sits opposite me is a born O’Mahony, the only son - of the man who, if I hadn’t turned up, would have had rightful possession - of all these estates. You have seen him about here for some weeks. I - understand that you all like him. Indeed, it’s been described to me that - Mrs. Fergus here has quite an affection for him—motherly, I - presume.” - </p> - <p> - Mrs. Fergus raised her hand to her hair, and preened her head. - </p> - <p> - “An’ not so old, nayther, O’Mahony,” she said, defiantly. “Wasn’t I - married first whin I was a mere shlip of a girl?” - </p> - <p> - Sister Ellen looked at Mother Agnes, and lifted up both her hands. The - O’Mahony proceeded, undisturbed: - </p> - <p> - “As I’ve said, you all like him. I like him too, for his own sake, and—and - his father’s sake—and—But that can wait for a minute. It’s a - part of the general good luck which has brought him here that he turns out - to be a trained mining engineer—just the sort of a man, of all - others, that Muirisc needs. He tells me that we’ve only scratched the - surface of things roundabout here yet. He promises to get more wealth for - us and for Muirisc out of an acre than we’ve been getting out of a - townland. Malachy, go out and look for old Murphy, and if he can walk, - bring him in here.” - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony composedly busied himself in filling his glass afresh, the - while Malachy was absent on his quest. The others, turning their attention - to the boyish-faced, blushing young man whom the speaker had eulogized so - highly, noted that he sat next, and perhaps unnecessarily close, to Kate, - and that she, also betrayed a suspicious warmth of countenance. Vague - comprehension of what was coming began to stir in their minds as Malachy - reappeared. Behind him came Murphy, who leaned against the wall by the - door, hat in hand, and clung with a piercing, hawk-like gaze to the - lightest movement on the master’s face. - </p> - <p> - The O’Mahony rose to his feet, glass in hand. - </p> - <p> - “Murphy,” he said, “I gave her to you to look after—to take care of—the - Lady of Muirisc.” - </p> - <p> - “You did, sir!” shouted the withered and grimy old water-rat, - straightening himself against the wall. - </p> - <p> - “You’ve done it well, sir,” declared The O’Mahony. “I’m obliged to you. - And I wanted you in particular to hear what I’m going to say. Malachy, get - a glass for yourself and give one to Murphy.” - </p> - <p> - The one-armed servitor leaned gravely forward and whispered in The - O’Mahony’s ear. - </p> - <p> - “I don’t care a button,” the other protested. “You can see him home. This - is as much his funeral as it is anybody else’s on earth. That’s it. Are - you all filled? Now, then, ladies and gentlemen, I am getting along in - years. I am a childless man. You’ve all been telling me how much I’ve - changed these last twelve years. There’s one thing I haven’t changed a bit - in. I used to think that the cutest, cunningest, all-fired loveliest - little girl on earth was Katie here. Well, I think just the same now. If I - was her father, mother, sister, hired girl and dog under the wagon, all in - one, I couldn’t be fonder of her than I am. She was the apple of my eye - then; she is now. I’d always calculated that she should be my heir. Well, - now, there turns up this young man, who is as much an O’Mahony of the real - stock as Kate is. There’s a providence in these things. They love each - other. They will marry. They will live in the castle, where they’ve - promised to give me board and lodging, and when I am gone, they will come - after me. I’m going to have you all get up and drink the health of my - young—nephew—Bernard, and of his bride, our Kate, here, and—and - of the line of O’Mahonys to come.” - </p> - <p> - When the clatter of exclamations and clinking glasses had died down, it - was Kate who made response—Kate, with her blushing, smiling face - held proudly up and a glow of joyous affection in her eyes. . - </p> - <p> - “If that same line of O’Mahonys to come stretched from here to the top of - Mount Gabriel,” she said, in a clear voice, “there’d not be amongst thim - all the ayqual to <i>our</i> O’Mahony.” - </p> - <h3> - THE END. - </h3> - <div style="height: 6em;"> - <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> - </div> - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of Project Gutenberg's The Return of The O'Mahony, by Harold Frederic - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY *** - -***** This file should be named 54900-h.htm or 54900-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/4/9/0/54900/ - -Produced by David Widger from page images generously -provided by the Internet Archive - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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- <head>
- <title>The Return of The O'Mahony, by Harold Frederic</title>
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-The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Return of The O'Mahony, by Harold Frederic
-
-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
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-to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
-
-
-
-Title: The Return of The O'Mahony
- A Novel
-
-Author: Harold Frederic
-
-Illustrator: Warren B. Davis
-
-Release Date: June 13, 2017 [EBook #54900]
-
-Language: English
-
-Character set encoding: UTF-8
-
-*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY ***
-
-
-
-
-Produced by David Widger from page images generously
-provided by the Internet Archive
-
-
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-
-
-</pre>
-
- <div style="height: 8em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h1>
- THE RETURN OF THE O'MAHONY
- </h1>
- <h3>
- <i>A Novel</i>
- </h3>
- <h2>
- By Harold Frederic
- </h2>
- <h4>
- Author Of “The Lawton Girl” “Seth’s Brother’s Wife” Etc.
- </h4>
- <h2>
- With Illustrations By Warren B. Davis.
- </h2>
- <h4>
- New York: G. W. Dillingham Co., Publishers,
- </h4>
- <h3>
- 1892
- </h3>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0001" id="linkimage-0001"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0010.jpg" alt="0010 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0010.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0002" id="linkimage-0002"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0011.jpg" alt="0011 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0011.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- <b>CONTENTS</b>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY</b> </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I.—THE FATHER OF COMPANY F. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II—THE VIDETTE POST. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III—LINSKY’S BRIEF MILITARY CAREER.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV.—THE O’MAHONY ON ERIN’S SOIL.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V.—THE INSTALLATION OF JERRY. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI—THE HEREDITARY BARD. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII—THE O’MAHONY’S HOME-WELCOME.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII—TWO MEN IN A BOAT. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX—THE VOICE OF THE HOSTAGE. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X—HOW THE “HEN HAWK” WAS BROUGHT
- IN. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI—A FACE FROM OUT THE
- WINDING-SHEET. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII—A TALISMAN AND A TRAITOR </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII—THE RETREAT WITH THE PRISONERS
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV.—THE REINTERMENT OF LINSKY.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER XV—“TAKE ME WITH YOU, O’MAHONY.”
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI—THE LADY OF MUIRISC. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII—HOW THE OLD BOATMAN KEPT HIS
- VOW. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII—THE GREAT O’DALY USURPATION.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX—A BARGAIN WITH THE BURIED MAN.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX—NEAR THE SUMMIT OF MT. GABRIEL.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI—ON THE MOUNTAIN-TOP—AND
- AFTER. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII—THE INTELLIGENT YOUNG MAN.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER XXIII—THE COUNCIL OF WAR. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV—THE VICTORY OF THE “CATHACH.”
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0025"> CHAPTER XXV—BERNARD’S GOOD CHEER. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0026"> CHAPTER XXVI—THE RESIDENT MAGISTRATE </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0027"> CHAPTER XXVII—THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY.
- </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0028"> CHAPTER XXVIII—A MARINE MORNING CALL. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0029"> CHAPTER XXIX—DIAMOND CUT PASTE. </a>
- </p>
- <p class="toc">
- <a href="#link2HCH0030"> CHAPTER XXX—A FAREWELL FEAST. </a>
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h1>
- THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY
- </h1>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER I.—THE FATHER OF COMPANY F.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">Z</span>EKE TISDALE was
- the father of Company F. Not that this title had ever been formally
- conferred upon him, or even recognized in terms, but everybody understood
- about it. Sometimes Company F was for whole days together exceedingly
- proud of the relation—but alas! more often it viewed its parent with
- impatient levity, not to say contempt. In either case, it seemed all the
- same to Zeke.
- </p>
- <p>
- He was by no means the oldest man in the company, at least as appearances
- went. Some there were gathered about the camp-fire, this last night in
- March of ‘65, who looked almost old enough to be <i>his</i> father—gray,
- gaunt, stiff-jointed old fighters, whose hard service stretched back
- across four years of warfare to Lincoln’s first call for troops, and who
- laughed now grimly over the joke that they had come out to suppress the
- Rebellion within ninety days, and had the job still unfinished on their
- hands at the end of fourteen hundred.
- </p>
- <p>
- But Zeke, though his mud-colored hair and beard bore scarcely a trace of
- gray, and neither his placid, unwrinkled face nor his lithe, elastic form
- suggested age, somehow produced an impression of seniority upon all his
- comrades, young and old alike. He had been in the company from the
- beginning, for one thing; but that was not all. It was certain that he had
- been out in Utah at the time of Albert Sidney Johnston’s expedition—perhaps
- had fought under him. It seemed pretty well established that before this
- Mormon episode he had been with Walker in Nicaragua. Over the mellowing
- canteen he had given stray hints of even other campaigns which his skill
- had illumined and his valor adorned. Nobody ever felt quite sure how much
- of this was true—for Zeke had a child’s disregard for any mere
- veracity which might mar the immediate effects of his narratives—but
- enough passed undoubted to make him the veteran of the company. And <i>that</i>
- was not all.
- </p>
- <p>
- For cold-blooded intrepidity in battle, for calm, clear-headed rashness on
- the skirmish-line, Zeke had a fame extending beyond even his regiment and
- the division to which it belonged. Men in regiments from distant States,
- who met with no closer bond than that they all wore the badge of the same
- army corps, talked on occasion of the fellow in the —th New York,
- who had done this, that or the other dare-devil feat, and yet never got
- his shoulder-straps. It was when Company F men heard this talk that they
- were most proud of Zeke—proud sometimes even to the point of keeping
- silence about his failure to win promotion.
- </p>
- <p>
- But among themselves there was no secret about this failure. Once the
- experiment had been made of lifting Zeke to the grade of corporal—and
- the less said about its outcome the better. Still, the truth may as well
- be told. Brave as any lion, or whatever beast should best typify absolute
- fearlessness in the teeth of deadly peril, Zeke in times of even temporary
- peace left a deal to be desired. His personal habits, or better, perhaps,
- the absence of them, made even the roughest of his fellows unwilling to be
- his tent-mate. As they saw him lounging about the idle camp, he was
- shiftless, insubordinate, taciturn and unsociable when sober, wearisomely
- garrulous when drunk—the last man out of four-score whom the company
- liked to think of as its father.
- </p>
- <p>
- And Company F had had nothing to do, now, for a good while. Through the
- winter it had lain in its place on the great, steel-clad intrenched line
- which waited, jaws open, for the fall of Petersburg. The ready-made
- railroad from City Point was at its back, and food was plenty. But now, as
- spring came on—the wet, warm Virginian spring, with every meadow a
- swamp, every road a morass, every piece of bright-green woodland an
- impassable tangle—the strategy of the closing act in the dread drama
- sent Company F away to the South and West, into the desolate backwoods
- country where no roads existed, and no foraging, be it never so vigilant,
- promised food. The movement really reflected Grant’s fear lest, before the
- final blow was struck, Lee should retreat into the interior. But Company F
- did not know what it meant, and disliked it accordingly, and, by the end
- of the third day in its quarters, was both hungry and quarrelsome.
- </p>
- <p>
- Evening fell upon a gloomy, rain-soaked day, which the men had miserably
- spent in efforts to avoid getting drenched to the skin, and in devices to
- preserve dry spots upon which to sleep at night. Permission to build a
- fire, which had been withheld ever since their arrival, had only come from
- division headquarters an hour ago; and as they warmed themselves now over
- the blaze, biting the savorless hard-tack, and sipping the greasy fluid of
- beans and chicory from their tin cups, they still looked sulkily upon the
- line of lights which began to dot the ridge on which they lay, and noted
- the fact that their division had grown into an army corps, almost as if it
- had been a grievance. Distant firing had been heard all day, but it seemed
- a part of their evil luck that it <i>should</i> be distant.
- </p>
- <p>
- They stared, too, with a sullen indifference at the spectacle of a
- sergeant who entered their camp escorting a half-dozen recruits, and, with
- stiff salutation, turned them over to the captain at the door of his tent.
- The men of Company F might have studied these bounty-men, as they stood in
- file waiting for the company’s clerk to fill out his receipt, with more
- interest, had it been realized that they were probably the very last men
- to be enrolled by the Republic for the Civil War. But nobody knew that,
- and the arrival of recruits was an old story in the —th New York,
- which had been thrust into every available hellpit, it seemed to the men,
- since that first cruel corner at Bull Run. So they scowled at the
- newcomers in their fresh, clean uniforms, as these straggled doubtfully
- toward the fire, and gave them no welcome whatever.
- </p>
- <p>
- Hours passed under the black sky, into which the hissing, spluttering fire
- of green wood was too despondent to hurl a single spark. The men stood or
- squatted about the smoke-ringed pile on rails and fence-boards which they
- had laid to save them from the soft mud—in silence broken only by
- fitful words. From time to time the monotonous call of the sentries out in
- the darkness came to them like the hooting of an owl. Sharp shadows on the
- canvas walls of the captain’s tent and the sound of voices from within
- told them that the officers were playing poker. Once or twice some moody
- suggestion of a “game” fell upon the smoky air outside, but died away
- unanswered. It was too wet and muddy and generally depressing. The low
- west wind which had risen since nightfall carried the threat of more rain.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Grant ain’t no good, nor any other dry-land general, in this dripping old
- swamp of a country,” growled a grizzled corporal, whose mud-laden heels
- had slipped off his rail. “The man we want here is Noah. This is his job,
- and nobody else’s.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’d be one comfort in that, anyway,” said another, well read in the
- Bible. “When the rain was all over, he set up drinks.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you make any mistake,” put in a third. “He shut himself up in his
- tent, and played his booze solitaire. He didn’t even ask in the officers
- of the ark and propose a game.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I—I ‘ve got a small flask with me,” one of the recruits diffidently
- began. “I was able to get it to-day at Dinwiddie Court House. Paid more
- for it I suppose, than—”
- </p>
- <p>
- In the friendly excitement created by the recruit’s announcement, and his
- production of a flat, brown bottle, further explanation was lost. Nobody
- cared how much he had paid. Two dozen of his neighbors took a lively
- interest in what he had bought. The flask made its tour of only a segment
- of the circle, amid a chorus of admonitions to drink fair, and came back
- flatter than ever and wholly empty. But its ameliorating effect became
- visible at once. One of the recruits was emboldened to tell a story he had
- heard at City Point, and the veterans consented to laugh at it.
- Conversation sprang up as the fire began to crackle under a shift of wind,
- and the newcomers disclosed that they all had clean blankets, and that
- several had an excess of chewing tobacco. At this last, all reserve was
- cleared away. Veterans and recruits spat into the fire now from a common
- ground of liking, and there was even some rivalry to secure such
- thoughtful strangers as tent-mates.
- </p>
- <p>
- Only one of the newcomers stood alone in the muddiest spot of the circle,
- before a part of the fire which would not burn. He seemed to have no share
- in the confidences of his fellow-recruits. None of their stories or
- reminiscences referred to him, and neither they nor any veteran had
- offered him a word during the evening.
- </p>
- <p>
- He was obviously an Irishman, and it was equally apparent that he had just
- landed. There was an indefinable something in the way he stood, in his
- manner of looking at people, in the very awkwardness with which his
- ill-fitting uniform hung upon him, which spoke loudly of recent
- importation. This in itself would have gone some way toward prejudicing
- Company F against him, for Castle Garden recruits were rarely popular,
- even in the newest regiments. But there was a much stronger reason for the
- cold shoulder turned upon him.
- </p>
- <p>
- This young man who stood alone in the mud—he could hardly have got
- half through the twenties—had a repellent, low-browed face, covered
- with freckles and an irregular stubble of reddish beard, and a furtive
- squint in his pale, greenish-blue eyes. The whites of these eyes showed
- bloodshot, even in the false light of the fire, and the swollen lines
- about them spoke plainly of a prolonged carouse. They were not Puritans,
- these men of Company F, but with one accord they left Andrew Linsky—the
- name the roster gave him—to himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- Time came, after the change of guard, when those who were entitled to
- sleep must think of bed. The orderly-sergeant strolled up to the fire, and
- dropped a saturnine hint to the effect that it would be best to sleep with
- one eye open; signs pointed to a battle next day, and the long roll might
- come before morning broke. Their brigade was on the right of a line into
- which two corps had been dumped during the day, and apparently this
- portended the hottest kind of a fight; moreover, it was said Sheridan was
- on the other side of the ridge. Everybody knew what that meant.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We ought to be used to hot corners by this time,” said the grizzled
- corporal, in comment, “but it’s the deuce to go into ’em on empty
- stomachs. We’ve been on half-rations two days.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’ll be the more to go round among them that’s left,” said the
- sergeant, grimly, and turned on his heel.
- </p>
- <p>
- The Irishman, pulling his feet with difficulty out of the ooze into which
- they had settled, suddenly left his place and walked over to the corporal,
- lifting his hand in a sidelong, clumsy salute.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wud ye moind tellin me, sur, where I’m to sleep?” he asked, saluting
- again.
- </p>
- <p>
- The corporal looked at his questioner, spat meditatively into the embers,
- then looked again, and answered, briefly:
- </p>
- <p>
- “On the ground.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky cast a glance of pained bewilderment, first down at the mud into
- which he was again sinking, then across the fire into the black,
- wind-swept night.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God forgive me for a fool,” he groaned aloud, “to lave a counthry where
- even the pigs have straw to drame on.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where did you expect to sleep—in a balloon?” asked the corporal,
- with curt sarcasm. Then the look of utter hopelessness on the other’s ugly
- face prompted him to add, in a softer tone; “You must hunt up a tent-mate
- for yourself—make friends with some fellow who’ll take you in.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sorra a wan’ll be friends wid me,” said the despondent recruit. “I’m
- waitin’ yet, the furst dacent wurrud from anny of ’em.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The corporal’s face showed that he did not specially blame them for their
- exclusiveness, but his words were kindly enough.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps I can fix you out,” he said, and sent a comprehensive glance
- round the group which still huddled over the waning fire, on the other
- side.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hughie, here’s a countryman of yours,” he called out to a lean, tall,
- gray-bearded private who, seated on a rail, had taken off his wet boots
- and was scraping the mud from them with a bayonet; “can you take him in?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have some one already,” the other growled, not even troubling to lift
- his eyes from his task.
- </p>
- <p>
- It happened that this was a lie, and that the corporal knew it to be one.
- He hesitated for a moment, dallying with the impulse to speak sharply.
- Then, reflecting that Hugh O’Mahony was a quarrelsome and unsociable
- creature with whom a dispute was always a vexation to the spirit, he
- decided to say nothing.
- </p>
- <p>
- How curiously inscrutable a thing is chance! Upon that one decision turned
- every human interest in this tale, and most of all, the destiny of the
- sulky man who sat scraping his boots. The Wheel of Fortune, in this little
- moment of silence, held him poised within the hair’s breadth of a
- discovery which would have altered his career in an amazing way, and
- changed the story of a dozen lives. But the corporal bit his lip and said
- nothing. O’Mahony bent doggedly over his work—and the wheel rolled
- on.
- </p>
- <p>
- The corporal’s eye, roaming about the circle, fell upon the figure of a
- man who had just approached the fire and stood in the full glare of the
- red light, thrusting one foot close to the blaze, while he balanced
- himself on the other. His ragged hair and unkempt beard were of the color
- of the miry clay at his feet. His shoulders, rounded at best, were
- unnaturally drawn forward by the exertion of keeping his hands in his
- pockets, the while he maintained his balance. His face, of which snub nose
- and grey eyes alone were visible in the frame of straggling hair and under
- the shadow of the battered foragecap visor, wore a pleased, almost merry,
- look in the flickering, ruddy light. He was humming a droning sort of tune
- to himself as he watched the steam rise from the wet leather.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Zeke’s happy to-night; that means fight tomorrow, sure as God made little
- fishes,” said the corporal to nobody in particular. Then he lifted his
- voice:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Have you got a place in your diggin’s for a recruit, Zeke—say just
- for to-night?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- Zeke looked up, and sauntered forward to where they stood, hands still in
- pockets.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well—I don’t know,” he drawled. “Guess so—if he don’t snore
- too bad.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He glanced Linsky over with indolent gravity. It was plain that he didn’t
- think much of him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Got a blanket?” he asked, abruptly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have that,” the Irishman replied.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Anything to drink?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky produced from his jacket pocket a flat, brown bottle, twin brother
- to that which had been passed about the camp-fire circle earlier in the
- evening, and held it up to the light.
- </p>
- <p>
- “They called it whiskey,” he said, in apology; “an’ be the price I paid
- fur it, it moight a’ been doimonds dissolved in angel’s tears; but the
- furst sup I tuk of it, faith, I thought it ’ud tear th’ t’roat from
- me!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Zeke had already linked Linsky’s arm within his own, and he reached forth
- now and took the bottle.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s p’zen to a man that ain’t used to it,” he said, with a grave wink to
- the corporal. “Come along with me, Irish; mebbe if you watch me close you
- can pick up points about gittin’ the stuff down without injurin’ your
- throat.”
- </p>
- <p>
- And, with another wink, Zeke led his new-found friend away from the fire,
- picking his steps through the soft mud, past dozens of little tents
- propped up with rails and boughs, walking unconsciously toward a strange,
- new, dazzling future.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER II—THE VIDETTE POST.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">Z</span>eke’s tent—a
- low and lop-sided patchwork of old blankets, strips of wagon-covering and
- stray pieces of cast-off clothing—was pitched on the high ground
- nearest to the regimental sentry line. At its back one could discern, by
- the dim light of the camp-fires, the lowering shadows of a forest. To the
- west a broad open slope descended gradually, its perspective marked to the
- vision this night by red points of light, diminishing in size as they
- receded toward the opposite hill’s dead wall of blackness. Upon the crown
- of this wall, nearly two miles distant, Zeke’s sharp eyes now discovered
- still other lights which had not been visible before.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Caught sight of any Rebs yet since you been here, Irish?” he asked, as
- the two stood halted before his tent.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I saw some prisoners at what they call City Point, th’ day before
- yesterday—the most starved and miserable divils ever I laid eyes on.
- That’s what I thought thin, but I know betther now. Sure they were princes
- compared wid me this noight.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, it’s dollars to doughnuts them are their lights over yonder on the
- ridge,” said Zeke.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ll see enough of ’em to-morrow to last a lifetime.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linksy looked with interest upon the row of dim sparks which now crowned
- the whole long crest. He had brought his blanket, knapsack and rifle from
- the stacks outside company headquarters, and stood holding them as he
- gazed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Faith,” he said at last, “if they’re no more desirous of seeing me than I
- am thim, there’s been a dale of throuble wasted in coming so far for both
- of us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Zeke, for answer, chuckled audibly, and the sound of this was succeeded by
- a low, soft gurgling noise, as he lifted the flask to his mouth and threw
- back his head. Then, after a satisfied “A-h!” he said:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, we’d better be turning in now,” and kicked aside the door-flap of
- his tent.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And is it here we’re to sleep?” asked Linsky, making out with difficulty
- the outlines of the little hut-like tent.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess there won’t be much sleep about it, but this is our shebang. Wait
- a minute.” He disappeared momentarily within the tent, entering it on
- all-fours, and emerged with an armful of sticks and paper. “Now you can
- dump your things inside there. I’ll have a fire out here in the jerk of a
- lamb’s tail.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The Irishman crawled in in turn, and presently, by the light of the blaze
- his companion had started outside, was able to spread out his blanket in
- some sort, and even to roll himself up in it, without tumbling the whole
- edifice down. There was a scant scattering of straw upon which to lie, but
- underneath this he could feel the chill of the damp earth. He managed to
- drag his knapsack under his head to serve as a pillow, and then,
- shivering, resigned himself to fate.
- </p>
- <p>
- The fire at his feet burned so briskly that soon he began to be pleasantly
- conscious of its warmth stealing through the soles of his thick, wet
- soles.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m thinkin’ I’ll take off me boots,” he called out. “Me feet are just
- perished wid the cold.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No. You couldn’t get ’em on again, p’r’aps, when we’re called, and
- I don’t want any such foolishness as that. When we get out, it’ll have to
- be at the drop of the hat—double quick. How many rounds of
- cartridges you got?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “This bag of mine they gave me is that filled wid ’em the weight of
- it would tip an outside car.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can you shoot?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know if I can. I haven’t tried that same yet.”
- </p>
- <p>
- A long silence ensued, Zeke squatting on a cracker-box beside the fire,
- flask in hand, Linsky concentrating his attention upon the warmth at the
- soles of his feet, and drowsily mixing up the Galtee Mountains with the
- fire-crowned hills of a strange, new world, upon one of which he lay. Then
- all at once he was conscious that Zeke had crept into the tent, and was
- lying curled close beside him, and that the fire outside had sunk to a
- mass of sparkless embers. He half rose from his recumbent posture before
- these things displaced his dreams; then, as he sank back again, and closed
- his eyes to settle once more into sleep, Zeke spoke:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t do that again! You got to lie still here, or you’ll bust the hull
- combination. If you want to turn over, tell me, and we’ll flop together—otherwise
- you’ll have the thing down on our heads.” There came another pause, and
- Linsky almost believed himself to be asleep again. But Zeke was wakeful.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Say, Irish,” he began, “that country of yourn must be a pretty tough
- place, if this kind of thing strikes you fellows as an improvement on it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sur,” said Linsky, with sleepy dignity, “ther’s no other counthry on
- earth fit to buckle Ireland’s shoe’s—no offence to you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, you always give us that; but if it’s so fine a place, why in ———
- don’t you stay there? What do you all pile over here for?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I came to America on business,” replied Linsky, stiffly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Business of luggin’ bricks up a ladder!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sur, I’m a solicitor’s clark.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you mean—‘Clark?’ Thought your name was Linsky?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s what you call ‘clurk’—a lawyer’s clurk—and I’ll be a
- lawyer mesilf, in toime.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s worse still. There’s seven hundred times as many lawyers here
- already as anybody wants.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I had no intintion of stoppin’. My business was to foind a certain man,
- the heir to a great estate in Ireland, and thin to returrun; but I didn’t
- foind my man—and—sure, it’s plain enough I didn’t returrun,
- ayether; and I’ll go to sleep now, I’m thinkin’.” Zeke paid no attention
- to the hint.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Go on,” he said. “Why didn’t you go back, Irish?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s aisy enough,” Linsky replied, with a sigh. “Tin long weeks was I
- scurryin’ from wan ind of the land to the other, lukkin’ for this
- invisible divil of a Hugh O’Mahony”—Zeke stretched out his feet here
- with a sudden movement, unnoted by the other—“makin’ inquiries here,
- foindin’ traces there, gettin’ laughed at somewhere else, till me heart
- was broke entoirely. ‘He’s in the army,’ says they. ‘Whereabouts?’ says I.
- Here, there, everwhere they sint me on a fool’s errand. Plintv of places I
- came upon where he had been, but divil a wan where he was; and thin I gave
- it up and wint to New York to sail, and there I made some fri’nds, and
- wint out wid ’em and they spoke fair, and I drank wid ’em,
- and, faith, whin I woke I was a soldier, wid brass buttons on me and a
- gun; and that’s the truth of it—worse luck! And <i>now</i> I’ll
- sleep!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And this Hugh What-d’ye-call-him—the fellow you was huntin’ after—where
- did he live before the war?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Twas up in New York State—a place they call Tecumsy—he’d
- been a shoemaker there for years. I have here among me papers all they
- know about him and his family there. It wan’t much, but it makes his
- identity plain, and that’s the great thing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And what d’ye reckon has become of him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “If ye ask me in me capacity as solicitor’s clark, I’d say that, for
- purposes of law, he’d be aloive till midsummer day next, and thin doy be
- process of statutory neglict, and niver know it as long as he lives; but
- if you ask me proivate opinion, he’s as dead as a mackerel; and, if he
- isn’t, he will be in good toime, and divil a ha’porth of shoe-leather will
- I waste more on him. And now good-noight to ye, sur!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky fell to snoring before any reply came. Zeke had meant to tell him
- that they were to rise at three and set out upon a venturesome
- vidette-post expedition together. He wondered now what it was that had
- prompted him to select this raw and undrilled Irishman as his comrade in
- the enterprise which lay before him. Without finding an answer, his mind
- wandered drowsily to another question—Ought O’Mahony to be told of
- the search for him or not? That vindictive and sullen Hughie should be
- heir to anything seemed an injustice to all good fellows; but heir to what
- Linsky called a great estate!—that was ridiculous! What would an
- ignorant cobbler like him do with an estate?
- </p>
- <p>
- Zeke was not quite clear in his mind as to what an “estate” was, but
- obviously it must be something much too good for O’Mahony. And why, sure
- enough! Only a fortnight before, while they were still at Fort Davis, this
- O’Mahony had refused to mend his boot for him, even though his
- frost-bitten toes had pushed their way to the daylight between the sole
- and upper. Zeke could feel the toes ache perceptibly as he thought on this
- affront. Sleepy as he was, it grew apparent to him that O’Mahony would
- probably never hear of that inheritance; and then he went off bodily into
- dream-land, and was the heir himself, and violently resisted O’Mahony’s
- attempts to dispossess him, and—and then it was three o’clock, and
- the sentry was rolling him to and fro on the ground with his foot to wake
- him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sh-h! Keep as still as you can,” Zeke admonished the bewildered Linsky,
- when he, too, had been roused to consciousness. “We mustn’t stir up the
- camp.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it desertin’ ye are?” asked the Irishman, rubbing his eyes and sitting
- upright.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sh-h! you fool—no! Feel around for your gun and knapsack and cap,
- and bring ’em out,” whispered Zeke from the door of the tent.
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky obeyed mechanically, groping in the utter darkness for what seemed
- to him an age, and then crawling awkwardly forth. As he rose to his feet,
- he could hardly distinguish his companion standing beside him. Only faint,
- dusky pillars of smoke, reddish at the base, gray above, rising like
- slenderest palms to fade in the obscurity overhead, showed where the fires
- in camp had been. The clouded sky was black as ink.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Fill your pockets with cartridges,” he heard Zeke whisper. “We’ll prob’ly
- have to scoot for our lives. We don’t want no extra load of knapsacks.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It strained Linsky’s other perceptions even more than it did his sight to
- follow his comrade in the tramp which now began. He stumbled over roots
- and bushes, sank knee-deep in swampy holes, ran full tilt into trees and
- fences, until it seemed to him they must have traveled miles, and he could
- hardly drag one foot after the other. The first shadowy glimmer of dawn
- fell upon them after they had accomplished a short but difficult descent
- from the ridge and stood at its foot, on the edge of a tiny, alder-fringed
- brook. The Irishman sat down on a fallen log for a minute to rest; the
- while Zeke, as fresh and cool as the morning itself, glanced critically
- about him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, here we are,” he said as last. “We can strike through here, get up
- the side hill, and sneak across by the hedge into the house afore it’s
- square daylight. Come on, and no noise now!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky took up his gun and followed once more in the other’s footsteps as
- well as might be. The growing light from the dull-gray east made it a
- simpler matter now to get along, but he still stumbled so often that Zeke
- cast warning looks backward upon him more than once. At last they reached
- the top of the low hill which had confronted them.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was near enough to daylight for Linsky to see, at the distance of an
- eighth of a mile, a small, red farm-house, flanked by a larger barn. A
- tolerably straight line of thick hedge ran from close by where they stood,
- to within a stone’s throw of the house. All else was open pasture and
- meadow land.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now bend your back,” said Zeke. “We’ve got to crawl along up this side of
- the fence till we git opposite that house, and then, somehow or other,
- work across to it without bein’ seen.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who is it that would see us?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, you blamed fool, them woods there”—pointing to a long strip of
- undergrowth woodland beyond the house—“are as thick with Johnnies as
- a dog is with fleas.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thin that house is no place for any dacent man to be in,” said Linsky;
- but despite this conviction he crouched down close behind Zeke and
- followed him in the stealthy advance along the hedge. It was back-breaking
- work, but Linsky had stalked partridges behind the ditch-walls of his
- native land, and was able to keep up with his guide without losing breath.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Faith, it’s loike walking down burrds,” he whispered ahead; “only that
- it’s two-legged partridges we’re after this toime.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How many legs have they got in Ireland?” Zeke muttered back over his
- shoulder.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Arrah, it’s milking-stools I had in moind,” returned Linsky, readily,
- with a smile.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sh-h! Don’t talk. We’re close now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Sure enough, the low roof and the top of the big square chimney of stone
- built outside the red clapboard end of the farmhouse were visible near at
- hand, across the hedge. Zeke bade Linsky sit down, and opening the big
- blade of a huge jackknife, began to cut a hole through the thorns. Before
- this aperture had grown large enough to permit the passage of a man’s
- body, full daylight came. It was not a very brilliant affair, this full
- daylight, for the morning was overcast and gloomy, and the woods beyond
- the house, distant some two hundred yards, were half lost in mist. But
- there was light enough for Linsky, idly peering through the bushes, to
- discern a grey-coated sentry pacing slowly along the edge of the woodland.
- He nudged Zeke, and indicated the discovery by a gesture.
- </p>
- <p>
- Zeke nodded, after barely lifting his eyes, and then pursued his
- whittling.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I saw him when we first come,” he said, calmly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And is it through this hole we’re goin’ out to be kilt?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You ask too many questions, Irish,” responded Zeke. He had finished his
- work and put away the knife. He rolled over now to a half-recumbent
- posture, folded his hands under his head, and asked:
- </p>
- <p>
- “How much bounty did you git?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it me? Faith, I was merely a disbursing agent in the thransaction.
- They gave me a roll of paper notes, they said, but divil a wan could I
- foind when I come to mesilf and found mesilf a soldier. It’s thim new
- fri’nds o’ moine that got the bounty.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “So you didn’t enlist to git the money?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sorra a word did I know about enlistin’, or bounty, or anything else, for
- four-and-twenty hours afther the mischief was done. Is it money that ’ud
- recompinse a man for sittin’ here in the mud, waitin’ to be blown to bits
- by a whole plantation full of soldiers, as I am here, God help me? Is it
- money you say? Faith, I’ve enough to take me back to Cork twice over. What
- more do I want? And I offered the half of it to the captain, or gineral,
- or whatever he was, to lave me go, when I found what I’d done; but he
- wouldn’t hearken to me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Zeke rolled over to take a glance through the hedge.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Tell me some more about that fellow you were tryin’ to find,” he said,
- with his gaze fixed on the distant sentry. “What’ll happen now that you
- haven’t found him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “If he remains unknown until midsummer-day next, the estate goes to some
- distant cousins who live convanient to it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And he can’t touch it after that, s’posin’ he should turn up?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The law of adverse possession is twinty years, and only five of ’em
- have passed. No; he’d have a claim these fifteen years yet. But rest aisy.
- He’ll never be heard of.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And you wrote and told ’em in Ireland that he couldn’t be found?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That I did—or—Wait now! What I wrote was that he was in the
- army, and I was afther searching for him there. Sure, whin I got to New
- York, what with the fri’nds and the drink and—and this foine
- soldiering of moine, I niver wrote at all. It’s God’s mercy I didn’t lose
- me papers on top of it all, or it would be if I was likely ever to git out
- of this aloive.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Zeke lay silent and motionless for a time, watching the prospect through
- this hole in the hedge.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hungry, Irish?” he asked at last, with laconic abruptness.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve a twist on me like the County Kerry in a famine year.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then, double yourself up and follow me when I give the word. I’ll
- bet there’s something to eat in that house. Give me your gun. We’ll put
- them through first. That’s it. Now, then, when that fellow’s on t’other
- side of the house. <i>Now!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- With lizard-like swiftness, Zeke made his way through the aperture, and,
- bending almost double, darted across the wet sward toward the house.
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky followed him, doubting not that the adventure led to certain death,
- but hoping that there would be breakfast first.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER III—LINSKY’S BRIEF MILITARY CAREER.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">Z</span>eke, though
- gliding over the slippery ground with all the speed at his command, had
- kept a watch on the further corner of the house. He straightened himself
- now against the angle of the projecting, weather-beaten chimney, and drew
- a long breath.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He didn’t see us,” he whispered reassuringly to Linsky, who had also
- drawn up as flatly as possible against the side of the house.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Glory be to God!” the recruit ejaculated.
- </p>
- <p>
- After a brief breathing spell, Zeke ventured out a few feet, and looked
- the house over. There was a single window on his side, opening upon the
- ground floor. Beckoning to Linsky to follow, lie stole over to the window,
- and standing his gun against the clapboards, cautiously tested the sash.
- It moved, and Zeke with infinite pains lifted it to the top, and stuck his
- knife in to hold it up. Then, with a bound, he raised himself on his arms,
- and crawled in over the sill.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was at this moment, as Linsky for the first time stood alone, that a
- clamorous outburst of artillery-fire made the earth quiver under his feet.
- The crash of noises reverberated with so many echoes from hill to hill
- that he had no notion whence they had proceeded, or from what distance.
- The whole broad vailey before him, with its sodden meadows and wet,
- mist-wrapped forests showed no sign of life or motion. But from the crest
- of the ridge which they had quitted before daybreak there rose now, and
- whitened the gray of the overhanging clouds, a faint film of smoke—while
- suddenly the air above him was filled with a strange confusion of
- unfamiliar sounds, like nothing so much as the hoarse screams of a flock
- of giant wild-fowl; and then this affrighting babel ceased as swiftly as
- it had arisen, and he heard the thud and swish of splintered tree-tops and
- trunks falling in the woodland at the back of the house. The Irishman
- reasoned it out that they were firing from the hill he had left, over at
- the hill upon which he now stood, and was not comforted by the discovery.
- </p>
- <p>
- While he stared at the ascending smoke and listened to the din of the
- cannonade, he felt himself sharply poked on the shoulder, and started
- nervously, turning swiftly, gun in hand. It was Zeke, who stood at the
- window, and had playfully attracted his attention with one of the long
- sides of bacon which the army knew as “sow-bellies.” He had secured two of
- these, which he now handed out to Linsky; then came a ham and a bag of
- meal; and lastly, a twelve-quart pan of sorghum molasses. When the
- Irishman had lifted down the last of these spoils, Zeke vaulted lightly
- out.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Guess we’ll have a whack at the ham,” he said cheerfully. “It’s good
- raw.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two gnawed greedily at the smoked slices cut from the thick of the
- ham, as became men who had been on short rations. Zeke listened to the
- firing, and was visibly interested in noting all that was to be seen and
- guessed of its effects and purpose, meanwhile, but the ham was an
- effectual bar to conversation.
- </p>
- <p>
- Suddenly the men paused, their mouths full, their senses alert. The sound
- of voices rose distinctly, and close by, from the other side of the house.
- Zeke took up his gun, cocked it, and crept noiselessly forward to the
- corner. After a moment’s attentive listening here, and one swift, cautious
- peep, he tiptoed back again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Take half the things,” he whispered, pointing to the provisions, “and
- we’ll get back again to the fence. There’s too many of ’em for us
- to try and hold the house. They’d burn us alive in there!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The pan of sorghum fell to Linsky’s care, and Zeke, with both guns and all
- the rest in some mysterious manner bestowed about him, made his way,
- crouching and with long strides, toward the hedge. He got through the hole
- undiscovered, dragging his burden after him. Then he took the pan over the
- hedge, while Linsky should in turn crawl through. But the burlier Irishman
- caught in the thorns, slipped, and clutched Zeke’s arm, with the result
- that the whole contents of the pan were emptied upon Linsky’s head.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then Zeke did an unwise thing. He cast a single glance at the spectacle
- his comrade presented—with the thick, dark molasses covering his cap
- like an oilskin, soaking into his hair, and streaming down his bewildered
- face in streaks like an Indian’s war-paint—and then burst forth in a
- resounding peal of laughter.
- </p>
- <p>
- On the instant two men in gray, with battered slouch hats and guns,
- appeared at the corner of the house, looking eagerly up and down the hedge
- for some sign of a hostile presence. Zeke had dropped to his knees in time
- to prevent discovery. It seemed to be with a part of the same swift
- movement that he lifted his gun, sighted it as it ran through the thorns,
- and fired. While the smoke still curled among the branches and spiked
- twigs, he had snatched up Linsky’s gun and fire a second shot. The two men
- in gray lay sprawling and clutching at the wet grass, one on top of the
- other.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0003" id="linkimage-0003"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0039.jpg" alt="0039 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0039.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- “Quick, Irish! We must make a break!” Zeke hissed at Linsky. “Grab what
- you can and run!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky, his eyes and mouth full of molasses, and understanding nothing at
- all of what had happened, found himself a moment later careering blindly
- and in hot haste down the open slope, the ham and the bag of meal under
- one arm, his gun in the other hand. A dozen minie-bullets sang through the
- damp air about him as he tore along after Zeke, and he heard vague volleys
- of cheering arise from the meadow to his right; but neither stopped his
- course.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was barely three minutes—though to Linsky, at least, it seemed an
- interminable while—before the two came to a halt by a clump of trees
- on the edge of the ravine. In the shelter of these broad hemlock trunks
- they stood still, panting for breath. Then Zeke looked at Linsky again,
- and roared with laughter till he choked and went into a fit of coughing.
- </p>
- <p>
- The Irishman had thrown down his provisions and gun, and seated himself on
- the roots of his tree. He ruefully combed the sticky fluid from his hair
- and stubble beard with his fingers now, and strove to clean his face on
- his sleeve. Between the native temptation to join in the other’s merriment
- and the strain of the last few minutes’ deadly peril, he could only blink
- at Zeke, and gasp for breath.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Tight squeak—eh, Irish?” said Zeke at last, between dying-away
- chuckles.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And tell me, now,” Linsky began, still panting heavily, his besmeared
- face red with the heat of the chase, “fwat the divil were we doin’ up
- there, anny-way? No Linsky or Lynch—’tis the same name—was
- ever called coward yet—but goin’ out and defoyin’ whole armies
- single-handed is no fit worrk for solicitors’ clarks. Spacheless and
- sinseless though I was with the dhrink, sure, if they told me I was to
- putt down the Rebellion be meself, I’d a’ had the wit to decloine.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That was a vidette post we were on,” explained Zeke.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s a shorter name for it—God save us both from goin’ there.
- But fwat was the intintion? ’Tis that that bothers me entoirely.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look there!” was Zeke’s response. He waved his hand comprehensively over
- the field they had just quitted, and the Irishman rose to his feet and
- stepped aside from his tree to see.
- </p>
- <p>
- The little red farm-house was half hidden in a vail of smoke. Dim shadows
- of men could be seen flitting about its sides, and from these shadows shot
- forth tongues of momentary flame. The upper end of the meadow was covered
- thick with smoke, and through this were visible dark masses of men and the
- same spark-like flashing of fiery streaks. Along the line of the hedge,
- closer to the house, still another wall of smoke arose, and Linsky could
- discern a fringe of blue-coated men lying flat under the cover of the
- thorn-bushes, whom he guessed to be sharp-shooters.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s what we went up there for—to start that thing a-goin’,” said
- Zeke, not without pride. “See the guide—that little flag there by
- the bushes? That’s our regiment. They was comin’ up as we skedaddled out.
- Didn’t yeh hear ’em cheer? They was cheerin’ for us, Irish—that
- is, some for us and a good deal for the sow-bellies and ham.”
- </p>
- <p>
- No answer came, and Zeke stood for a moment longer, taking in with his
- practiced gaze the details of the fight that was raging before him.
- Half-spent bullets were singing all about him, but he seemed to give them
- no more thought than in his old Adirondack home he had wasted on
- mosquitoes. The din and deafening rattle of this musketry war had kindled
- a sparkle in his gray eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There they go, Irish! Gad! we’ve got ’em on the run! We kin scoot
- across now and jine our men.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Still no answer. Zeke turned, and, to his amazement, saw no Linsky at his
- side. Puzzled, he looked vaguely about among the trees for an instant.
- Then his wandering glance fell, and the gleam of battle died out of his
- eyes as he saw the Irishman lying prone at his very feet, his face flat in
- the wet moss and rotting leaves, an arm and leg bent under the prostrate
- body. So wrapt had Zeke’s senses been in the noisy struggle outside, he
- had not heard his comrade’s fall.
- </p>
- <p>
- The veteran knelt, and gently turned Linsky over on his back. A wandering
- ball had struck him in the throat. The lips were already colorless, and
- from their corners a thin line of bright blood had oozed to mingle
- grotesquely with the molasses on the unshaven jaw. To Zeke’s skilled
- glance it was apparent that the man was mortally wounded—perhaps
- already dead, for no trace of pulse or heartbeat could be found. He softly
- closed the Irishman’s eyes, and put the sorghum-stained cap over his face.
- </p>
- <p>
- Zeke rose and looked forth again upon the scene of battle. His regiment
- had crossed the fence and gained possession of the farm-house, from which
- they were firing into the woods beyond. Further to the left, through the
- mist of smoke which hung upon the meadow, he could see that large masses
- of troops in blue were being pushed forward. He thought he would go and
- join his company. He would tell the fellows how well Linsky had behaved.
- Perhaps, after the fight was all over, he would lick Hugh O’Mahony for
- having spoken so churlishly to him.
- </p>
- <p>
- He turned at this and looked down again upon the insensible Linsky.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, Irish, you had sand in your gizzard, anyway,” he said, aloud. “I’ll
- whale the head off ’m O’Mahony, jest on your account.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then, musing upon some new ideas which these words seem to have suggested,
- he knelt once more, and, unbuttoning Linsky’s jacket, felt through his
- pockets.
- </p>
- <p>
- He drew forth a leather wallet and a long linen-lined envelope containing
- many papers. The wallet had in it a comfortable looking roll of green,
- backs, but Zeke’s attention was bestowed rather upon the papers.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So these would give O’Mahony an estate, eh?” he pondered, half aloud,
- turning them over. “It ’ud be a tolerable good bet that he never
- lays eyes on ’em. We’ll fix that right now, for fear of accidents.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He began to kick about in the leaves, as he rose a second time, thinking
- hard upon the problem of what to do with the papers. He had no matches. He
- might cut down a cartridge, and get a fire by percussion—but that
- would take time. So, for that matter, would digging a hole to bury the
- papers.
- </p>
- <p>
- All at once his abstracted face lost its lines of labor, and brightened
- radiantly. He thrust wallet and envelope into his own pocket, and
- smilingly stepped forward once more to see what the field of battle was
- like. The farm-house had become the headquarters of a general and his
- staff, and the noise of fighting had passed away to the furthest confines
- of the woods.
- </p>
- <p>
- “This darned old campaign won’t last up’ard of another week,” he said, in
- satisfied reverie. “I reckon I’ve done my share in it, and somethin’ to
- lap over on the next. Nobody ’ll be a cent the wuss off if I turn
- up missin’ now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Gathering up the provisions and his gun, Zeke turned abruptly, and made
- his way down the steep side-hill into the forest, each long stride bearing
- him further from Company F’s headquarters.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER IV.—THE O’MAHONY ON ERIN’S SOIL.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>t became known
- among the passengers on the <i>Moldavian</i>, an hour or so before bedtime
- on Sunday evening, April 23, 1865, that the lights to be seen in the
- larboard distance were really on the Irish coast. The intelligence ran
- swiftly through all quarters of the vessel. Its truth could not be
- doubted; the man on the bridge said that it truly was Ireland; and if he
- had not said so, the ship’s barber had.
- </p>
- <p>
- Excitement over the news reached its highest point in the steerage,
- two-thirds of the inmates of which hung now lovingly upon the port rail of
- the forward deck, to gaze with eager eyes at the far-off points of
- radiance glowing through the soft northern spring night.
- </p>
- <p>
- Farther down the rail, from the obscurity of the jostling throng, a stout
- male voice sent up the opening bars of the dear familiar song, “The Cove
- of Cork.” The ballad trembled upon the air as it progressed, then broke
- into something like sobs, and ceased.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, Barney,” a sympathetic voice cried out, “’tis no longer the
- Cove; ’tis Queenstown they’re after calling it now. Small wandher
- the song won’t listen to itself be sung!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But they haven’t taken the Cove away—God bless it!” the other
- rejoined, bitterly. “’Tis there, beyant the lights, waitin’ for its
- honest name to come back to it when—when things are set right once
- more.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it the Cove you think you see yonder?” queried another, captiously.
- “Thim’s the Fastnet and Cape Clear lights. We’re fifty miles and more from
- Cork.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thin if ’twas daylight,” croaked an old man between coughs, “we’d
- be in sight of The O’Mahony’s castles, or what bloody Cromwell left of
- them.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s mad ye are, Martin,” remonstrated a female voice. “The’re laygues
- beyant on Dunmanus Bay. Wasn’t I born mesilf at Durrus?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The O’Mahony of Murrisk is on board,” whispered some one else, “returnin’
- to his estates. I had it this day from the cook’s helper. The quantity of
- mate that same O’Mahony’s been ’atin’! An’ dhrink, is it? Faith,
- there’s no English nobleman could touch him!”
- </p>
- <p>
- On the saloon deck, aft, the interest excited by these distant lights was
- less volubly eager, but it had sufficed to break up the card-games in the
- smoking-room, and even to tempt some malingering passengers from the
- cabins below. Such talk as passed among the group lounging along the rail,
- here in the politer quarter, bore, for the most part, upon the record of
- the <i>Moldavian</i> on this and past voyages, as contrasted with the
- achievements of other steamships. No one confessed to reverential
- sensations in looking at the lights, and no one lamented the change of
- name which sixteen years before, had befallen the Cove of Cork; but there
- was the liveliest speculation upon the probabilities of the <i>Bahama</i>,
- which had sailed from New York the same day, having beaten them into the
- south harbor of Cape Clear, where, in those exciting war times, before the
- cable was laid, every ocean steamer halted long enough to hurl overboard
- its rubber-encased budget of American news, to be scuffled for in the
- swell by the rival oarsmen of the cape, and borne by the successful boat
- to the island, where relays of telegraph clerks then waited day and night
- to serve Europe with tidings of the republic’s fight for life.
- </p>
- <p>
- This concentration of thought upon steamer runs and records, to the
- exclusion of interest in mere Europe, has descended like a mantle upon the
- first-cabin passengers of our own later generation. But the voyagers in
- the <i>Moldavian</i> had a peculiar warrant for their concern. They had
- left America on Saturday, April 15, bearing with them the terrible news of
- Lincoln’s assassination in Ford’s Theatre, the previous evening, and it
- meant life-long distinction—in one’s own eyes at least—to be
- the first to deliver these tidings to an astounded Old World. Eight days’
- musing on this chance of greatness had brought them to a point where they
- were prepared to learn with equanimity that the rival <i>Bahama</i> had
- struck a rock outside, somewhere. One of their number, a little Jew
- diamond merchant, now made himself quite popular by relating his personal
- recollections of the calamity which befel her sister ship, the <i>Anglia</i>,
- eighteen months ago, when she ran upon Blackrock in Galway harbor.
- </p>
- <p>
- One of these first-cabin passengers, standing for a time irresolutely upon
- the outskirts of this gossiping group, turned abruptly when the
- under-sized Hebrew addressed a part of his narrative to him, and walked
- off alone into the shadows of the stern. He went to the very end, and
- leaned over the taff-rail, looking down upon the boiling, phosphorescent
- foam of the vessel’s wake. He did not care a button about being able to
- tell Europe of the murder of Lincoln and Seward—for when they left
- the secretary was supposed, also, to have been mortally wounded. His
- anxieties were of a wholly different sort.
- </p>
- <p>
- He, The O’Mahony of Muirisc, was plainly but warmly clad, with a new,
- shaggy black overcoat buttoned to the chin, and a black slouch hat drawn
- over his eyes. His face was clean shaven, and remarkably free from lines
- of care and age about the mouth and nostrils, though the eyes were set in
- wrinkles. The upper part of the face was darker and more weather-beaten,
- too, than the lower, from which a shrewd observer might have guessed that
- until very recently he had always worn a beard.
- </p>
- <p>
- There were half a dozen shrewd observers on board the <i>Moldavian</i>
- among its cabin passengers—men of obvious Irish nationality, whose
- manner with one another had a certain effect of furtiveness, and who were
- described on the ship’s list by distinctively English names, like Potter,
- Cooper and Smith; and they had watched the O’Mahony of Muirisc very
- closely during the whole voyage, but none of them had had doubts about the
- beard, much less about the man’s identity. In truth, they looked from day
- to day for him to give some sign, be it never so slight, that his errand
- to Ireland was a political one. They were all Fenians—among the
- advance guard of that host of Irishmen who returned from exile at the
- close of the American War—and they took it for granted that the
- solitary and silent O’Mahony was a member of the Brotherhood. The more
- taciturn he grew, the more he held aloof, the firmer became their
- conviction that his rank in the society was exalted and his mission
- important. The very fact that he would not be drawn into conversation and
- avoided their company was proof conclusive. They left him alone, but
- watched him with lynx-like scrutiny.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony had been conscious of this ceaseless observation, and he
- mused upon it now as he watched the white whirl of churned waters below.
- The time was close at hand when he should know whether it had meant
- anything or not; there was comfort in that, at all events. He was less a
- coward than any other man he knew, but, all the same, this unending
- espionage had worn upon his nerve. Doubtless, that was in part because
- sea-voyaging was a novelty to him. He had not been ill for a moment. In
- fact, he could not remember to have ever eaten and drunk more in any eight
- days of his life. If it had not been for the confounded watchfulness of
- the Irishmen, he would have enjoyed the whole experience immensely. But it
- was evident that they were all in collusion—“in cahoots,” he phrased
- it in his mind—and had a common interest in noting all his
- movements. What could it mean? Strange as it may seem, The O’Mahony had
- never so much as heard of the Fenian Brotherhood.
- </p>
- <p>
- He rose from his lounging meditation presently, and sauntered forward
- again along the port deck. The lights from the coast were growing more
- distinct in the distance, and, as he paused to look, he fancied he could
- discern a dark line of shore below them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I suppose your ancistral estates are lyin’ further west, sir,” spoke a
- voice at his side. The O’Mahony cast a swift half-glance around, and
- recognized one of the suspected spies.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, a good deal west,” he growled, curtly.
- </p>
- <p>
- The other took no offense.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure,” he went on, pleasantly, “the O’Mahonys and the O’Driscolls, not to
- mintion the McCarthys, chased each other around that counthry yonder at
- such a divil of a pace it’s hard tellin’ now which belonged to who.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, we did hustle round considerable,” assented The O’Mahony, with
- frigidity.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re manny years away from Ireland, sir?” pursued the man.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I notice you say ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ It takes a long absence to tache an
- Irishman that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve been away nearly all my life,” said The O’Mahony, sharply—“ever
- since I was a little boy and turning on his heel, he walked to the
- companionway and disappeared down the stairs.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Faith, I’m bettin’ it’s the gineral himself!” said the other, looking
- after him.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- To have one’s waking vision greeted, on a soft, warm April morning, by the
- sight of the Head of Kinsale in the sunlight—with the dark rocks
- capped in tenderest verdure and washed below by milkwhite breakers; with
- the smooth water mirroring the blue of the sky upon its bosom, yet
- revealing as well the marbled greens of its own crystalline depths; with
- the balmy scents of fresh blossoms meeting and mingling in the languorous
- air of the Gulf Stream’s bringing—can there be a fairer finish to
- any voyage over the waters of the whole terrestrial ball!
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony had been up on deck before any of his fellow-passengers,
- scanning the novel details of the scene before him. The vessel barely kept
- itself in motion through the calm waters. The soft land breeze just
- availed to turn the black column of smoke rising from the funnel into a
- sort of carboniferous leaning tower. The pilot had been taken on the
- previous evening. They waited now for the tug, which could be seen passing
- Roche’s Point with a prodigious spluttering and splashing of side-paddles.
- Before its arrival, the <i>Moldavian</i> lay at rest within full view of
- the wonderful harbor—her deck thronged with passengers dressed now
- in fine shore apparel and bearing bags and rugs, who bade each other
- good-bye with an enthusiasm which nobody believed in, and edged along as
- near as possible where the gang-plank would be.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony walked alone down the plank, rebuffing the porters who sought
- to relieve him of his heavy bags. He stood alone at the prow of the tug,
- as it waddled and puffed on its rolling way back again, watching the
- superb amphitheatre of terraced stone houses, walls, groves and gardens
- toward which he had voyaged these nine long days, with an anxious, almost
- gloomy face. The Fenians, still closely observing him, grew nervous with
- fear that this depression forboded a discovery of contra-brand arms in his
- baggage.
- </p>
- <p>
- But no scandal arose. The custom officers searched fruitlessly through the
- long platforms covered with luggage, with a half perfunctory and wholly
- whimsical air, as if they knew perfectly well that the revolvers they
- pretended to be looking for were really in the pockets of the passengers.
- Then other good-byes, distinctly less enthusiastic, were exchanged, and
- the last bonds of comradeship which life on the <i>Moldavian</i> had
- enforced snapped lightly as the gates were opened.
- </p>
- <p>
- Everybody else seemed to know where to go. The O’Mahony stood for so long
- a time just outside the gates, with his two big valises at his feet and
- helpless hesitation written all over his face, that even some of the swarm
- of beggars surrounding him could not wait any longer, and went away giving
- him up. To the importunities of the others, who buzzed about him like
- blue-bottles on a sunny window-pane, he paid no heed; but he finally
- beckoned to the driver of the solitary remaining outside car, who had been
- flicking his broker, whip invitingly at him, and who now turned his
- vehicle abruptly round and drove it, with wild shouts of factitious
- warning, straight through the group of mendicants, overbearing their loud
- cries of remonstrance with his superior voice, and cracking his whip like
- mad. He drew up in front of the bags with the air of a lord mayor’s
- coachman, and took off his shapeless hat in salutation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want to go to the law office of White & Carmody,” The O’Mahony
- said, brusquely.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0004" id="linkimage-0004"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0055.jpg" alt="0055 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0055.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- “Right, your honor,” the carman answered, dismounting and lifting the
- luggage to the well of the car, and then officiously helping his patron to
- mount to his sidelong seat. He sprang up on the other side, screamed “Now
- thin, Maggie!” to his poor old horse, flipped his whip derisively at the
- beggars, and started off at a little dog-trot, clucking loudly as he went.
- </p>
- <p>
- He drove through all the long ascending streets of Queenstown at this
- shambling pace, traversing each time the whole length of the town, until
- finally they gained the terraced pleasure-road at the top. Here the driver
- drew rein, and waved his whip to indicate the splendid scope of the view
- below—the gray roof of the houses embowered in trees, the river’s
- crowded shipping, the castellated shore opposite, the broad, island-dotted
- harbor beyond.
- </p>
- <p>
- “L’uk there, now!” he said, proudly. “Have yez annything like that in
- Ameriky?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony cast only an indifferent glance upon the prospect,
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes—but where’s White & Carmody’s office?” he asked. “That’s
- what I want.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Right, your honor,” was the reply; and with renewed clucking and cracking
- of the dismantled whip, the journey was resumed. That is to say, they
- wound their way back again down the hill, through all the streets, until
- at last the car stopped in front of the Queen’s Hotel.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it thrue what they tell me, sir, that the Prisidint is murdhered?” the
- jarvey asked, as they came to a halt.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes—but where the devil is that law-office?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, your honor, there’s no such names here at all,” the carman replied,
- pleasantly. “Here’s the hotel where gintleman stop, an’ I’ve shown ye the
- view from the top, an’ it’s plased I am ye had such a clear day for it—and
- wud ye like to see Smith-Barry’s place, after lunch?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The stranger turned round on his seat to the better comment upon this
- amazing impudence, beginning a question harsh of purpose and profane in
- form.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then the spectacle of the ragged driver’s placidly amiable face and
- roguish eye; of the funny old horse, like nothing so much in all the world
- as an ancient hair-trunk with legs at the corners, yet which was driven
- with the noise and ostentation of a six-horse team; of the harness tied up
- with ropes; the tumble-down car; the broken whip; the beggars—all
- this, by a happy chance, suddenly struck The O’Mahony in a humorous light.
- Even as his angered words were on the air he smiled in spite of himself.
- It was a gaunt, reluctant smile, the merest curling of the lips at their
- corners; but it sufficed in a twinkling to surround him with beaming
- faces. He laughed aloud at this, and on the instant driver and beggars
- were convulsed with merriment.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony jumped off the car.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll run into the hotel and find out where I want to go,” he said. “Wait
- here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Two minutes passed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “These lawyers live in Cork,” he explained on his return. “It seems this
- is only Queenstown. I want you to go to Cork with me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Right, your honor,” said the driver, snapping his whip in preparation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But I don’t want to drive; it’s too much like a funeral. We ain’t
- a-buryin’ anybody.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it Maggie your honor manes? Sure, there’s no finer quality of a mare
- in County Cork, if she only gets dacent encouragement.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes; but we ain’t got time to encourage her. Go and put her out, and
- hustle back here as quick as you can. I’ll pay you a good day’s wages.
- Hurry, now; we’ll go by train.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony distributed small silver among the beggars the while he
- waited in front of the hotel.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That laugh was worth a hundred dollars to me,” he said, more to himself
- than to the beggars. “I hain’t laughed before since Linsky spilt the
- molasses over his head.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER V.—THE INSTALLATION OF JERRY.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he visit to White
- & Carmody’s law-office had weighed heavily upon the mind of The
- O’Mahony during the whole voyage across the Atlantic, and it still was the
- burden of his thoughts as he sat beside Jerry Higgins—this he
- learned to be the car-driver’s name—in the train which rushed up the
- side of the Lea toward Cork. The first-class compartment to which Jerry
- had led the way was crowded with people who had arrived by the <i>Moldavian</i>,
- and who scowled at their late fellow-passenger for having imposed upon
- them the unsavory presence of the carman. The O’Mahony was too deeply
- occupied with his own business to observe this. Jerry smiled blandly into
- the hostile faces, and hummed a “come-all-ye” to himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- When, an hour or so after their arrival, The O’Mahony emerged from the
- lawyers’ office the waiting Jerry scarcely knew him for the same man. The
- black felt hat, which had been pulled down over his brows, rested with
- easy confidence now well back on his head; his gray eyes twinkled with a
- pleasant light; the long face had lost its drawn lines and saturnine
- expression, and reflected content instead.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come along somewhere where we can get a drink,” he said to Jerry; but
- stopped before they had taken a dozen steps, attracted by the sign and
- street-show of a second-hand clothing shop. “Or no,” he said, “come in
- here first, and I’ll kind o’ spruce you up a bit so’t you can pass muster
- in society.”
- </p>
- <p>
- When they came upon the street again, it was Jerry who was even more
- strikingly metamorphosed. The captious eye of one whose soul is in clothes
- might have discerned that the garments he now wore had not been originally
- designed for Jerry. The sleeves of the coat were a trifle long; the legs
- of the trousers just a suspicion short. But the smile with which he
- surveyed the passing reflections of his improved image in the shop-windows
- was all his own. He strode along jauntily, carrying the heavy bags as if
- they had been mere featherweight parcels.
- </p>
- <p>
- The two made their way to a small tavern near the quays, which Jerry knew
- of, and where The O’Mahony ordered a room, with a fire in it, and a
- comfortable meal to be laid therein at once.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, it’s not becomin’ that I should ate along wid your honor,” Jerry
- remonstrated, when they had been left alone in the dingy little chamber,
- overlooking the street and the docks beyond.
- </p>
- <p>
- At this protest The O’Mahony lifted his brows in unaffected surprise.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s the matter with <i>you?</i>” he asked, half-derisively; and no
- more was said on the subject.
- </p>
- <p>
- No more was said on any subject, for that matter, until fish had succeeded
- soup, and the waiter was making ready for a third course. Then the founder
- of the feast said to this menial:
- </p>
- <p>
- “See here, you, don’t play this on me! Jest tote in whatever more you’ve
- got, an’ put er down, an’ git out. We don’t want you bobbin’ in here every
- second minute, all the afternoon.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The waiter, with an aggrieved air, brought in presently a tray loaded with
- dishes, which he plumped down all over The O’Mahony’s half of the table.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s somethin’ like it,” said that gentleman, approvingly; “you’ll get
- the hang of your business in time, young man,” as the servant left the
- room. Then he heaped up Jerry’s plate and his own, ruminated over a
- mouthful or two, with his eyes searching the other’s face—and began
- to speak.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you know what made me take a shine to you?” he asked, and then made
- answer: “’Twas on account of your dodrotted infernal cheek. It made
- me laugh—an’ I’d got so it seemed as if I wasn’t never goin’ to
- laugh any more. That’s why I cottoned to you—an’ got a notion you
- was jest the kind o’ fellow I wanted. D’ye know who I am?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry’s quizzical eyes studied his companion’s face in turn, first
- doubtingly, then with an air of reassurance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I do not, your honor,” he said at last, visibly restraining the impulse
- to say a great deal more.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m the O’Mahony of Murrisk, an’ I’m returnin’ to my estates.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry did prolonged but successful battle once more with his sense of
- humor and loquacious instincts.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right, your honor,” he said, with humility.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Maybe I don’t look like an Irishman or talk like one,” the other went on,
- “but that’s because I was taken to America when I was a little shaver,
- knee-high to a grasshopper, an’ my folks didn’t keep up no connection with
- Irishmen. That’s how I lost my grip on the hull Ireland business, don’t
- you see?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, your honor, it’s as clear as Spike Island in the sunshine.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, that’s how it was. And now my relations over here have died off—that
- is, all that stood in front of me—and so the estates come to me, and
- I’m The O’Mahony.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ it’s proud ivery mother’s son of your tin-ints ‘ll be at that same,
- your honor.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “At first, of course, I didn’t know but the lawyers ’ud make a kick
- when I turned up and claimed the thing. Generally you have to go to law,
- an’ take your oath, an’ fight everybody. But, pshaw! why they jest
- swallered me slick’n clean, as if I’d had my ears pinned back an’ be’n
- greased all over. Never asked ‘ah,’ ‘yes,’ or ‘no.’ Didn’t raise a single
- question. I guess there ain’t no White in the business now. I didn’t see
- him or hear anything about him. But Carmody’s a reg’lar old brick. They
- wasn’t nothin’ too good for me after he learnt who I was. But what fetched
- him most was that I’d seen Abe Lincoln, close to, dozens o’ times. He was
- crazy to know all about him, an’ the assassination, an’ what I thought ’ud
- be the next move; so’t we hardly talked about The O’Mahony business at
- all. An’ it seems ther’s been a lot o’ shenanigan about it, too. The
- fellow that came out to America to—to find me—Linsky his name
- was—why, darn my buttons, if he hadn’t run away from Cork, an’ stole
- my papers along with a lot of others, countin’ on peddlin’ ’em over
- there an’ collarin’ the money.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, the thief of the earth!” said Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, he got killed there, in about the last battle there was in the war;
- an’ ’twas by the finding of the papers on him that—that I
- came by my rights.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Glory be to God!” commented Jerry, as he buried his jowl afresh in the
- tankard of stout.
- </p>
- <p>
- A term of silence ensued, during which what remained of the food was
- disposed of. Then The O’Mahony spoke again:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you a man of family?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, your honor, I’ve never rightly, come by the truth of it, but there
- are thim that says I’m descinded from the O’Higginses of Westmeath. I’d
- not venture to take me Bible oath on it, but—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, I don’t mean that. Have you got a wife an’ children?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it me, your honor? Arrah, what girl that wasn’t blind an’ crippled an’
- deminted wid fits wud take up wid the likes of me?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, what is your job down at Queenstown like? Can you leave it right
- off, not to go back any more?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s no job at all. Sure, I jist take out Mikey Doolan’s car, wid that
- thund’rin’ old Maggie, givin’ warnin’ to fall to pieces on the road in
- front of me, for friendship—to exercise ’em like. It’s not
- till every other horse and ass in Queenstown’s ingaged that anny mortial
- sow ’ll ride on my car. An’ whin I gets a fare, why, I do be after
- that long waitin’ that—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That you drive ’em up on top of the hill whether they want to go
- or not, eh?” asked The O’Mahony, with a grin.
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry took the liberty of winking at his patron in response.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! that’s the way of it, your honor,” he said, pleasantly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So you don’t have to go back there at all?” pursued the other.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Divila rayson have I for ever settin’ fut in the Cove ag’in, if your
- honor has work for me elsewhere.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess I can fix that,” said The O’Mahony, speaking more slowly, and
- studying his man as he spoke. “You see, I ain’t got a man in this hull
- Ireland that I can call a friend. I don’t know nothin’ about your ways, no
- more’n a babe unborn. It took me jest about two minutes, after I got out
- through the Custom House, to figger out that I was goin’ to need some one
- to sort o’ steer me—and need him powerful bad, too. Why, I can’t
- even reckon in your blamed money, over here. You call a shillin’ what we’d
- call two shillin’s, an’ there ain’t no such thing as a dollar. Now, I’m
- goin’ out to my estates, where I don’t know a livin’ soul, an’ prob’ly
- they’d jest rob me out o’ my eye-teeth, if I hadn’t got some one to look
- after me—some one that knew his way around. D’ye see?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The car-driver’s eyes sparkled, but he shook his curly red head with
- doubt, upon reflection.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ve been fair wid me, sir,” he said, after a pause, “an’ I’ll not be
- behind you in honesty. You don’t know me at all. What the divil, man!—why,
- I might be the most rebellious rogue in all County Cork.” He scratched his
- head with added dubiety, as he went on; “An’, for the matter of that,
- faith, if you did know me, it’s some one else you’d take. There’s no one
- in the Cove that ’ud give me a character.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re right,” observed The O’Mahony. “I don’t know you from a side o’
- soleleather. But that’s my style. I like a fellow, or I don’t like him,
- and I do it on my own hook, follerin’ my own notions, and just to suit
- myself. I’ve been siz’in’ you up, all around, an’ I like the cut o’ your
- gib. You might be washed up a trifle more, p’r’aps, and have your hair
- cropped; but them’s details. The main point is, that I believe you’ll act
- fair and square with me, an see to it that I git a straight deal!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, I’ll go to the end of the earth for you,” said Jerry. He rose, and
- by an instinctive movement, the two men shook hands across the table.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s right,” said The O’Mahony, referring more to the clasping of hands
- than to the vow of fealty. “That’s the way I want ’er to stand.
- Don’t call me ‘yer honor,’ or any o’ that sort o’ palaver. I’ve been a
- poor man all my life. I ain’t used to bossin’ niggers around, or playin’
- off that I’m better’n other folks. Now that I’m returnin’ to my estates,
- prob’ly I’ll have to stomach more or less of that sort o’ nonsense. That’s
- one of the things I’ll want you to steer me in.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ might I be askin’, where are these estates, sir?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “So far’s I can make out, they’re near where we come in sight of Ireland
- first; it can’t be very far from here. They’re on the seashore—I
- know that much. We go to Dunmanway, wherever that is, by the railroad
- to-morrow, and there the lawyers have telegraphed to have the agent meet
- us. From there on, we’ve got to stage it. The place itself is Murrisk,
- beyond Skull—nice, comfortable, soothin’ sort o’ names you Irish
- have for your towns, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And what time’ll we be startin’ to-morrow?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The train leaves at noon—that is, for Dunmanway.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thank God for that,” said Jerry, with a sigh of relief.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony turned upon him with such an obviously questioning glance
- that he made haste to explain:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll be bound your honor hasn’t been to mass since—since ye were
- like that grasshopper ye spoke about.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mass—no—how d’ye mean? What is it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Luk at that, now!” exclaimed Jerry, triumphantly. “See what ’d ’a’
- come to ye if ye’d gone to your estates without knowing the first word of
- your Christian obligations! We’ll rise early to-morrow, and I’ll get ye
- through all the masses there are in Cork, betune thin an’ midday.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gad! I’d clean forgotten that,” said The O’Mahony. “An’ now let’s git out
- an’ see the town.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER VI—THE HEREDITARY BARD.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>wo hours and more
- of the afternoon were spent before The O’Mahony and his new companion next
- day reached Dunmanway.
- </p>
- <p>
- The morning had been devoted, for the most part, to church-going, and The
- O’Mahony’s mind was still confused with a bewildering jumble of candles,
- bells and embroidered gowns; of boys in frocks swinging little kettles of
- smoke by long chains; of books printed on one side in English and on the
- other in an unknown tongue; of strange necessities for standing, kneeling,
- sitting all together, at different times, for no apparent reason which he
- could discover, and at no word of command whatever. He meditated upon it
- all now, as the slow train bumped its wandering way into the west, as upon
- some novel kind of drill, which it was obviously going to take him a long
- time to master. He had his moments of despondency at the prospect, until
- he reflected that if the poorest, least intelligent, hod-carrying Irishman
- alive knew it all, he ought surely to be able to learn it. This hopeful
- view gaining predominance at last in his thoughts, he had leisure to look
- out of the window.
- </p>
- <p>
- The country through which they passed was for a long distance fairly
- level, with broad stretches of fair grass-fields and strips of ploughed
- land, the soil of which seemed richness, itself. The O’Mahony noted this,
- but was still more interested in the fact that stone was the only building
- material anywhere in sight. The few large houses, the multitude of cabins,
- the high fences surrounding residences, the low fences limiting farm
- lands, even the very gateposts—all were of gray stone, and all as
- identical in color and aspect as if Ireland contained but a single quarry.
- </p>
- <p>
- The stone had come to be a very prominent feature in the natural landscape
- as well, before their journey by rail ended—a cold, wild,
- hard-featured landscape, with scant brown grass barely masking the black
- of the bog lands, and dying of! at the fringes of gaunt layers of rock
- which thrust their heads everywhere upon the vision. The O’Mahony observed
- with curiosity that as the land grew poorer, the population, housed all in
- wretched hovels, seemed to increase, and the burning fire-yellow of the
- furze blossoms all about made lurid mockery of the absence of crops.
- </p>
- <p>
- Dunmanway was then the terminus of the line, which has since been pushed
- onward to Bantry. The two travellers got out here and stood almost alone
- on the stone platform with their luggage. They were, indeed, the only
- first-class passengers in the train.
- </p>
- <p>
- As they glanced about them, they were approached by a diminutive man, past
- middle age, dressed in a costume which The O’Mahony had seen once or twice
- on the stage, but never before in every-day life. He was a clean-shaven,
- swarthy-faced little man, lean as a withered bean-pod, and clad in a
- long-tailed coat with brass buttons, a long waist-coat, drab corduroy
- knee-breeches and gray worsted stockings. On his head he wore a high silk
- hat of antique pattern, dulled and rusty with extreme age. He took this
- off as he advanced, and looked from one to the other of the twain
- doubtingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it The O’Mahony of Muirisc that I have the honor to see before me?” he
- asked, his little ferret eyes dividing their glances in hesitation between
- the two.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m your huckleberry,” said The O’Mahony, and held out his hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- The small man bent his shriveled form double in salutation, and took the
- proffered hand with ceremonious formality.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, you’re kindly welcome back to your ancesthral domain,” he said, with
- an emotional quaver in his thin, high voice. “All your people are waitin’
- with anxiety and pleasure for the sight of your face.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I hope they’ve got us somethin’ to eat,” said The O’Mahony. “We had
- breakfast at daybreak this morning, so’s to work the churches, and I’m—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “His honor,” hastily interposed Jerry, “is that pious he can’t sleep of a
- mornin’ for pinin’ to hear mass.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The little man’s dark face softened at the information. He guessed Jerry’s
- status by it, as well, and nodded at him while he bowed once more before
- The O’Mahony.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I took the liberty to order some slight refresh-mints at the hotel, sir,
- against your coming,” he said. “If you’ll do me the condescinsion to
- follow me, I will conduct you thither without delay.”
- </p>
- <p>
- They followed their guide, as he, bearing himself very proudly and
- swinging his shoulders in rhythm with his gait, picked his way across the
- square, through the mud of the pig-market, and down a narrow street of
- ancient, evil-smelling rookeries, to the chief tavern of the town—a
- cramped and dismal little hostelry, with unwashed children playing with a
- dog in the doorway, and a shock-headed stable-boy standing over them to do
- with low bows the honors of the house.
- </p>
- <p>
- The room into which they were shown, though no whit cleaner than the rest,
- had a comfortable fire upon the grate, and a plentiful meal, of cold meat
- and steaming potatoes boiled in their jackets, laid on the table. Jerry
- put down the bags here, and disappeared before The O’Mahony could speak.
- The O’Mahony promptly sent the waiter after him, and upon his return spoke
- with some sharpness:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Jerry, don’t give me any more of this,” he said. “You can chore it
- around, and make yourself useful to me, as you’ve always done; but you git
- your meals with me, d’ ye hear? Right alongside of me, every time.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Thus the table was laid for three, and the O’Mahony made his companions
- acquainted with each other.
- </p>
- <p>
- “This is Jerry Higgins,” he explained to the wondering, swart-visaged
- little man. “He’s sort o’ chief cook and bottle-washer to the
- establishment, but he’s so bashful afore strangers, I have to talk sharp
- to him now an’ then. And let’s see—I don’t think the lawyer told me
- your name.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am Cormac O’Daly,” said the other, bowing with proud humility. “An
- O’Mahony has had an O’Daly to chronicle his deeds of valor and daring, to
- sing his praises of person and prowess, since ages before Kian fought at
- Clontarf and married the daughter of the great Brian Boru. Oppression and
- poverty, sir, have diminished the position of the bard in most parts of
- Ireland, I’m informed. All the O’Dalys that informer times were bards to
- The O’Neill in Ulster, The O’Reilly of Brefny, The MacCarthy in Desmond
- and The O’Farrell of Annaly—faith, they’ve disappeared from the face
- of the earth. But in Muirisc—glory be to the Lord!—. there’s
- still an O’Daly to welcome the O’Mahony back and sing the celebration of
- his achievements.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sort o’ song-and-dance man, then, eh?” said The O’Mahony. “Well, after
- dinner we’ll push the table back an’ give you a show. But let’s eat
- first.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The little man for the moment turned upon the speaker a glance of
- surprise, which seemed to have in it the elements of pain. Then he spoke,
- as if reassured:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, sir, in America, where I’m told the Irish are once more a rich and
- powerful people, our ancient nobility would have their bards, with rale
- harps and voices for singing. But in this poor country it’s only a
- mettyphorical existence a bard can have. Whin I spoke the word ‘song,’ my
- intintion was allegorical. Sure, ’tis drivin’ you from the house
- I’d be after doing, were I to sing in the ginuine maning of the word. But
- I have here some small verses which I composed this day, while I was
- waitin’ in the pig-market, that you might not be indisposed to listen to,
- and to accept.”
- </p>
- <p>
- O’Daly drew from his waistcoat pocket a sheet of soiled and crumpled paper
- forthwith, on which some lines had been scrawled in pencil. Smoothing this
- out upon the table, he donned a pair of big, hornrimmed spectacles, and
- proceeded to decipher and slowly read out the following, the while the
- others ate and, marveling much, listened:
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <h3>
- I.
- </h3>
- <p class="indent10">
- “What do the gulls scream as they wheel
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- Along Dunmanus’ broken shore?
- </p>
- <p class="indent10">
- What do the west winds, keening shrill,
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- Call to each othir for evermore?
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- From Muirisc’s reeds, from Goleen’s weeds,
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- From Gabriel’s summit, Skull’s low lawn,
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- The echoes answer, through their tears,
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- ‘O’Mahony’s gone! O’Mahony’s gone!’
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <h3>
- II.
- </h3>
- <p class="indent10">
- “But now the sunburst brightens all,
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- The clouds are lifted, waters gleam,
- </p>
- <p class="indent10">
- Long pain forgotten, glad tears fall,
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- At waking from this evil dream.
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- The cawing rooks, the singing brooks,
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- The zephyr’s sighs, the bee’s soft hum,
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- All tell the tale of our delight—
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- O’Mahony’s come! O’Mahony’s come!
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <h3>
- III.
- </h3>
- <p class="indent10">
- “O’Mahony of the white-foamed coast,
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- Of Kinalmeaky’s nut-brown plains,
- </p>
- <p class="indent10">
- Lord of Rosbrin, proud Raithlean’s boast,
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- Who over the waves and the sea-mist reigns.
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- Let Clancy quake! O’Driscoll shake!
- </p>
- <p class="indent30">
- The O’Casey hide his head in fear!
- </p>
- <p class="indent15">
- While Saxons flee across the sea—
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- O’Mahony’s here! O’Mahony’s here!”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <p>
- The bard finished his reading with a trembling voice, and looked at his
- auditors earnestly through moistened eyes. The excitement had brought a
- dim flush of color upon his leathery cheeks where the blue-black line of
- close shaving ended.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s to be sung to the chune of ‘The West’s Awake!’” he said at last,
- with diffidence.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You did that all with your own jack-knife, eh?” remarked the The
- O’Mahony, nodding in approbation. “Well, sir, it’s darned good!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Then you’re plased with it, sir?” asked the poet.
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Pleased!’ Why, man, if I’d known they felt that way about it, I’d have
- come years ago. ‘Pleased?’ Why it’s downright po’try.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, that it is, sir,” put in Jerry, sympathetically. “And to think of it
- that he did it all in the pig-market whiles he waited for us! Egor! ’twould
- take me the best part of a week to conthrive as much!”
- </p>
- <p>
- O’Daly glanced at him with severity.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Maybe more yet,” he said, tersely, and resumed his long-interrupted meal.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And you’re goin’ to be around all the while, eh, ready to turn these
- poems out on short notice?” the O’Mahony asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, an O’Daly’s poor talents are day and night at the command of the
- O’Mahony of Muirisc,” the bard replied. Then, scanning Jerry, he put a
- question:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is Mr. Higgins long with you, sir?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes; a long while,” answered The O’Mahony, without a moment’s
- hesitation. “Yes—I wouldn’t know how to get along without him—he’s
- been one of the family so long, now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The near-sighted poet failed to observe the wink which was exchanged
- across the table.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The name Higgins,” he remarked, “is properly MacEgan. It is a very
- honorable name. They were hereditary Brehons or judges, in both Desmond
- and Ormond, and, later, in Connaught, too. The name is also called
- O’Higgins and O’Hagan. If you would permit me to suggest, sir,” he went
- on, “it would be betther at Muirisc if Mr. Higgins were to resume his
- ancestral appellation, and consint to be known as MacEgan. The children
- there are that well grounded in Irish history, the name would secure for
- him additional respect in their eyes. And moreover, sir, saving Mr.
- Higgins’s feelings, I observed that you called him ‘Jerry.’ Now ‘Jerry’ is
- appropriate when among intimate friends or relations, or bechune master
- and man—and its more ceremonious form, Jeremiah, is greatly used in
- the less educated parts of this country. But, sir, Jeremiah is, strictly
- speaking, no name for an Irishman at all, but only the cognomen of a
- Hebrew bard who followed the Israelites into captivity, like Owen Ward did
- the O’Neils into exile. It’s a base and vulgar invintion of the Saxons—this
- new Irish Jeremiah—for why? because their thick tongues could not
- pronounce the beautiful old Irish name Diarmid or Dermot. Manny poor
- people for want of understanding, forgets this now. But in Muirisc the
- laste intelligent child knows betther. Therefore, I would suggest that
- when we arrive at your ancesthral abode, sir, Mr. Higgins’s name be given
- as Diarmid MacEgan.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ a foine bould name it is, too!” said Jerry. “Egor! if I’m called
- that, and called rigular to me males as well, I’ll put whole inches to my
- stature.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, O’Daly,” said The O’Mahony, “you just run that part of the show to
- suit yourself. If you hear of anything that wants changin’ any time, or
- whittlin’ down or bein’ spelt different, you can interfere right then an’
- there without sayin’ anything to me. What I want is to have things done
- correct, even if we’re out o’ pocket by it. You’re the agent of the
- estate, ain’t you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am that, sir; and likewise the postmaster, the physician, the
- precepthor, the tax-collector, the clerk of the parish, the poor law
- guardian and the attorney; not to mintion the proud hereditary post to
- which I’ve already adverted, that of bard and historian to The O’Mahony.
- But, sir, I see that your family carriage is at the dure. We’ll be
- startin’ now, if it’s your pleazure. It’s a long journey we’ve before us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- When the bill had been called for and paid by O’Daly, and they had reached
- the street, The O’Mahony surveyed with a lively interest the strange
- vehicle drawn up at the curb before him. In principle it was like the
- outside cars he had yesterday seen for the first time, but much lower,
- narrower and longer. The seats upon which occupants were expected to place
- themselves back to back, were close together, and cushioned only with worn
- old pieces of cow-skin. Between the shafts was a shaggy and unkempt little
- beast, which was engaged in showing its teeth viciously at the children
- and the dog. The whole equipage looked a century old at the least.
- </p>
- <p>
- At the end of four hours the rough-coated pony was still scurrying along
- the stony road at a rattling pace. It had galloped up the hills and raced
- down into the valleys with no break of speed from the beginning. The
- O’Mahony, grown accustomed now to maintaining his seat, thought he had
- never seen such a horse before, and said so to O’Daly, who sat beside him,
- Jerry and the bag being disposed on the opposite side, and the driver, a
- silent, round-shouldered, undersized young man sitting in front with his
- feet on the shafts.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, sir, our bastes are like our people hereabouts,” replied the bard—“not
- much to look at, but with hearts of goold. They’ll run till they fall.
- But, sir—halt, now, Malachy!—yonder you can see Muirisc.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The jaunting-car stopped. The April twilight was gathering in the clear
- sky above them, and shadows were rising from the brown bases of the
- mountains to their right. The whole journey had been through a bleak and
- desolate moor and bog land, broken here and there by a lonely glen, in the
- shelter of which a score of stone hovels were clustered, and to which all
- attempts at tillage were confined.
- </p>
- <p>
- Now, as The O’Mahony looked, he saw stretched before him, some hundred
- feet below, a great, level plain, from which, in the distance, a solitary
- mountain ridge rose abruptly. This plain was wedgeshaped, and its outlines
- were sharply defined by the glow of evening light upon the waters
- surrounding it—waters which dashed in white-breakers against the
- rocky coast nearest by, but seemed to lie in placid quiescence on the
- remote farther shore.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was toward this latter dark line of coast, half-obscured now as they
- gazed by rising sea-mists, that O’Daly pointed; and The O’Mahony, scanning
- the broad, dusky landscape, made out at last some flickering sparks of
- reddish light close to where the waters met the land.
- </p>
- <p>
- “See, O’Mahoney, see!” the little man cried, his claw-like hand trembling
- as he pointed. “Those lights burned there for Kian when he never returned
- from Clontarf, eight hundred years ago; they are burning there now for
- you!”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER VII—THE O’MAHONY’S HOME-WELCOME.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he road from the
- brow of the hill down to the plain wound in such devious courses through
- rock-lined defiles and bog-paths shrouded with stunted tangles of
- scrub-trees, that an hour elapsed before The O’Mahony again saw the fires
- which had been lighted to greet his return. This hour’s drive went in
- silence, for the way was too rough for talk. Darkness fell, and then the
- full moon rose and wrapped the wild landscape in strange, misty lights and
- weird shadows.
- </p>
- <p>
- All at once the car emerged from the obscurity of overhanging trees and
- bowlders, and the travellers found themselves in the very heart of the
- hamlet of Muirisc. The road they had been traversing seemed to have come
- suddenly to an end in a great barn-yard, in the center of which a bonfire
- was blazing, and around which, in the reddish flickering half-lights, a
- lot of curiously shaped stone buildings, little and big, old and new, were
- jumbled in sprawling picturesqueness.
- </p>
- <p>
- About the fire a considerable crowd of persons were gathered—thin,
- little men in long coats and knee-breeches; old, white-capped women with
- large, black hooded cloaks; younger women with crimson petticoats and bare
- feet and ankles, children of all sizes and ages clustering about their
- skirts—perhaps a hundred souls in all. Though The O’Mahony had very
- little poetic imagination or pictorial sensibility, he was conscious that
- the spectacle was a curious one.
- </p>
- <p>
- As the car came to a stop, O’Daly leaped lightly to the ground, and ran
- over to the throng by the bonfire.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now thin!” he called out, with vehemence, “have ye swallowed ye’re
- tongues? Follow me now! Cheers for The O’Mahony! Now thin! One—two—”
- </p>
- <p>
- The little man waved his arms, and at the signal, led by his piping voice,
- the assembled villagers sent up a concerted shout, which filled the
- shadowed rookeries round about with rival echoes of “hurrahs” and
- “hurroos,” and then broke, like an exploding rocket, into a shower of high
- pitched, unintelligible ejaculations.
- </p>
- <p>
- Amidst this welcoming chorus of remarks, which he could not understand,
- The O’Mahony alighted, and walked toward the fire, closely followed by
- Jerry, and by Malachy, the driver, bearing the bags.
- </p>
- <p>
- For a moment he almost feared to be overthrown by the spontaneous rush
- which the black-cloaked old women made upon him, clutching at his arms and
- shoulders and deafening his ears with a babel of outlandish sounds. But
- O’Daly came instantly to his rescue, pushing back the eager crones with
- vigorous roughness, and scolding them in two languages in sharp peremptory
- tones.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Back there wid ye, Biddy Quinn! Now thin, ould deludherer, will ye hould
- yer pace! Come along out o’ that, Pether’s Mag! Lave his honor a free
- path, will ye!” Thus, with stern remonstrance, backed by cuffs and pushes,
- O’Daly cleared the way, and The O’Mahony found himself half-forced,
- half-guided away from the fire and toward a tall and sculptured archway,
- which stood, alone, quite independent of any adjoining wall, upon the
- nearest edge of what he took to be the barnyard.
- </p>
- <p>
- Passing under this impressive mediæval gateway, he confronted a strange
- pile of buildings, gray and hoar in the moonlight where their surface was
- not covered thick with ivy. There were high pinnacles thrusting their
- jagged points into the sky line, which might be either chimneys or
- watch-towers; there were lofty gabled walls, from which the roofs had
- fallen; there were arched window-holes, through which vines twisted their
- umbrageous growth unmolested; and side by side with these signs of bygone
- ruin, there were puzzling tokens of present occupation.
- </p>
- <p>
- A stout, elderly woman, in the white, frilled cap of her district, with a
- shawl about her shoulders and a bright-red skirt, stood upon the steps of
- what seemed the doorway of a church, bowing to the new-comer. Behind her,
- in the hall, glowed the light of a hospitable, homelike fire.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is his honor come back to his own, Mrs. Sullivan,” the stranger heard
- O’Daly’s voice call out.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And it’s kindly welcome ye are, sir,” said the woman, bowing again. “Yer
- honor doen’t remimber me, perhaps. I was Nora O’Mara, thin, in the day
- whin ye were a wee bit of a lad, before your father and mother—God
- rest their sowls!—crossed the say.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m afraid I doen’t jest place you,” said The O’Mahony. “I’m the worst
- hand in the world at rememberin’ faces.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The woman smiled.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Molare! It’s not be me face that anny boy of thirty years back ’ud
- recognize me now,” she said, as she led the way for the party into the
- house. “There were thim that had a dale of soft-sawderin’ words to spake
- about it thin; but they’ve left off this manny years ago.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s your cooking and your fine housekeeping that we do be praising now
- with every breath, Mrs. Sullivan; and sure that’s far more complimintary
- to you than mere eulojums on skin-deep beauty, that’s here to-day and gone
- to-morrow, and that was none o’ your choosing at best,” said O’Daly, as
- they entered the room at the end of the passage.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thrue for you, Cormac O’Daly,” the housekeeper responded, with twinkling
- eyes; “and I’m thinkin’, if we’d all of us the choosin’ of new faces, what
- an altered appearance you’d presint, without delay.”
- </p>
- <p>
- A bright, glowing bank of peat on the hearth filled the room with cozy
- comfort.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was a small, square chamber, roofed with blackened oak beams, and
- having arched doors and windows. Its walls, partly of stone, partly of
- plaster roughly scratched, were whitewashed. The sanded floor was bare,
- save for a cowskin mat spread before the fire. A high, black-wood
- sideboard at one end of the room, a half-dozen stiffbacked, uncompromising
- looking chairs, and a table in the center, heaped with food, but without a
- cloth, completed the inventory of visible furniture.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. O’Sullivan bustled out of the room, leaving the men together. The
- O’Mahony sent a final inquisitive glance from ceiling to uncarpeted floor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So this is my ranch, eh?” he said, taking off his hat.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, you’re welcome to the ancesthral abode of the O’Mahony’s of
- Muirisc,” answered O’Daly, gravely. “The room we stand in often enough
- sheltered stout Conagher O’Mahony, before confiscation dhrove him forth,
- and the ruffian Boyle came in. ’Tis far oldher, sir, than
- Ballydesmond or even Dunmanus.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “So old, the paper seems to have all come off’n the walls,” said The
- O’Mahony. “Well, we’ll git in a rocking-chair or so and a rag-carpet and
- new paper, an’ spruce her up generally. I s’pose there’s lots o’ more room
- in the house.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, sir, rightly spakin’, there is a dale more, but it’s mostly not
- used, by rayson of there being no roof overhead. There’s this part of the
- castle that’s inhabitable, and there’s a part of the convent forninst the
- porch where the nuns live, but there’s more of both, not to mintion the
- church, that’s ruined entirely. Whatever your taste in ruins may plase to
- be, there’ll be something here to delight you. We have thim that’s a
- thousand years old, and thim that’s fallen into disuse since only last
- winter. Anny kind you like: Early Irish, pray-Norman, posht-Norman,
- Elizabethan, Georgian, or very late Victorian—here the ruins are for
- you, the natest and most complate and convanient altogether to be found in
- Munster.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The eyes of the antiquarian bard sparkled with enthusiasm as he recounted
- the architectural glories of Muirisc. There was no answering glow in the
- glance of The O’Mahony.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll have a look round first thing in the morning,” he said, after the
- men had seated themselves at the table.
- </p>
- <p>
- A bright-faced, neatly clad girl divided with Mrs. O’Sullivan the task of
- bringing the supper from the kitchen beyond into the room; but it was
- Malachy, wearing now a curiously shapeless long black coat, instead of his
- driver’s jacket, who placed the dishes on the table, and for the rest
- stood in silence behind his new master’s chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony grew speedily restless under the consciousness of Malachy’s
- presence close at his back.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We can git along without him, can’t we?” he asked O’Daly, with a curt
- backward nod.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, no, sir,” pleaded the other. “The boy ’ud be heart-broken if
- ye sint him away. ’Twas his grandfather waited on your
- great-uncle’s cousin, The O’Mahony of the Double Teeth; and his father
- always served your cousins four times removed, who aich in his turn held
- the title; and the old man sorrowed himsilf to death whin the last of ’em
- desaysed, and your honor couldn’t be found, and there was no more an
- O’Mahony to wait upon. The grief of that good man wud ’a’ brought
- tears to your eyes. There was no keeping him from the dhrink day or night,
- sir, till he made an ind to him-silf. And young Malachy, sir, he’s
- composed of the same determined matarial.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, of course, if he’s so much sot on it as all that,” said The
- O’Mahony, relenting. “But I wanted to feel free to talk over affairs with
- you—money matters and so on; and—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, sir, no fear about Malachy. Not a word of what we do be saying does
- he comprehind.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Deef and dumb, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Not at all; but he has only the Irish.” In answer to O’Mahony’s puzzled
- look, O’Daly added in explanation: “It’s the glory of Muirisc, sir, that
- we hould fast be our ancient thraditions and tongue. In all the place
- there’s not rising a dozen that could spake to you in English. And—I
- suppose your honor forgets the Irish entoirely? Or perhaps your parents
- neglected to tache it to you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said The O’Mahony; “they never taught me any Irish at all;
- leastways, not that I remember.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Luk at that now!” exclaimed O’Daly, sadly, as he took more fish upon his
- plate.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s goin’ to be pritty rough sleddin’ for me to git around if nobody
- understands what I say, ain’t it?” asked The O’Mahony, doubtfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, not at all,” O’Daly made brisk reply. “It’s part of my hereditary
- duty to accompany you on all your travels and explorations and incursions,
- to keep a record of the same, and properly celebrate thim in song and
- history. The last two O’Mahonys betwixt ourselves, did nothing but dhrink
- at the pig-market at Dunmanway once a week, and dhrink at Mike Leary’s
- shebeen over at Ballydivlin the remainding days of the week, and dhrink
- here at home on Sundays. To say the laste, this provided only indifferent
- opportunities for a bard. But plase the Lord bether times have come, now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Malachy had cleared the dishes from the board, and now brought forward a
- big square decanter, a sugar-bowl, a lemon fresh cut in slices, three
- large glasses and one small one. O’Daly at this lifted a steaming copper
- kettle from the crane over the fire, and began in a formally ceremonious
- and deliberate manner the brewing of the punch. The O’Mahony watched the
- operation with vigilance. Then clay pipes and tobacco were produced, and
- Malachy left the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What I wanted to ask about,” said The O’Mahony, after a pause, and
- between sips from his fragrant glass, “was this: That lawyer, Carmody,
- didn’t seem to know much about what the estate was worth, or how the money
- came in, or anything else. All he had to do, he said, was to snoop around
- and find out where I was. All the rest was in your hands. What I want to
- know is jest where I stand.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, sir, that’s not hard to demonsthrate. You’re The O’Mahony of
- Muirisc. You own in freehold the best part of this barony—some nine
- thousand acres. You have eight-and-thirty tinants by lasehold, at a total
- rintal of close upon four hundred pounds; turbary rights bring in rising
- twinty pounds; the royalty on the carrigeens bring ten pounds; your own
- farms, with the pigs, the barley, the grazing and the butter, produce
- annually two hundred pounds—a total of six hundred and thirty
- pounds, if I’m not mistaken.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How much is that in dollars?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “About three thousand one hundred and fifty dollars, sir.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And that comes in each year?” said The O’Mahony, straightening himself in
- his chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It does that,” said O’Daly; then, after a pause, he added dryly: “and
- goes out again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How d’ye mean?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, the O’Mahonys are a proud and high-minded race, and must live
- accordingly. And aich of your ancestors, to keep up his dignity, borrowed
- as much money on the blessed land as ever he could raise, till the
- inthrest now ates up the greater half of the income. If you net two
- hundred pounds a year—that is to say, one thousand dollars—you’re
- doing very well indeed. In the mornin’ I’ll be happy to show you all me
- books and Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who’s she?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The sister of the last of The O’Mahonys before you, sir, who married
- another of the name only distantly related, and has been a widow these
- five years, and would be owner of the estate if her brother had broken the
- entail as he always intinded, and never did by rayson that there was so
- much dhrinking and sleeping and playing ‘forty-five’ at Mike Leary’s to be
- done, he’d no time for lawyers. Mrs. Fergus has been having the use of the
- property since his death, sir, being the nearest visible heir.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And so my comin’ threw her out, eh? Did she take it pritty hard?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, loyalty to The O’Mahony is so imbedded in the brest of every sowl in
- Muirisc, that if she made a sign to resist your pretinsions, her own
- frinds would have hooted her. She may have some riservations deep down in
- her heart, but she’s too thrue an O’Mahony to revale thim.”
- </p>
- <p>
- More punch was mixed, and The O’Mahony was about to ask further questions
- concerning the widow he had dispossessed, when the door opened and a novel
- procession entered the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- Three venerable women, all of about the same height, and all clad in a
- strange costume of black gowns and sweeping black vails, their foreheads
- and chins covered with stiff bands of white linen, and long chains of
- beads ending in a big silver-gilt cross swinging from their girdles,
- advanced in single file toward the table—then halted, and bowed
- slightly.
- </p>
- <p>
- O’Daly and Jerry had risen to their feet upon the instant of this curious
- apparition, but the The O’Mahony kept his seat, and nodded with
- amiability.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How d’ do?” he said, lightly. “It’s mighty neighborly of you to run in
- like this, without knockin’, or standin’ on ceremony. Won’t you sit down,
- ladies? I guess you can find chairs.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “These are the Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears, your honor,” O’Daly hastened
- to explain, at the same time energetically winking and motioning to him to
- stand.
- </p>
- <p>
- But The O’Mahony did not budge.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m glad to see you,” he assured the nuns once more. “Take a seat, won’t
- you? O’Daly here’ll mix you up one o’ these drinks o’ his’n, I’m sure, if
- you’ll give the word.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We thank you, O’Mahony,” said the foremost of the aged women, in a deep,
- solemn voice, but paying no heed to the chairs which O’Daly and Jerry had
- dragged forward. “We come solely to do obeisance to you as the heir and
- successor of our pious founder, Diarmid of the Fine Steeds, and to presint
- to you your kinswoman—our present pupil, and the solitary hope of
- our once renowned order.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony gathered nothing of her meaning from this lugubrious wail of
- words, and glanced over the speaker’s equally aged companions in vain for
- any sign of hopefulness, solitary or otherwise. Then he saw that the
- hindmost of the nuns had produced, as if from the huge folds of her black
- gown, a little girl of six or seven, clad in the same gloomy tint, whom
- she was pushing forward.
- </p>
- <p>
- The child advanced timidly under pressure, gazing wonderingly at The
- O’Mahony, out of big, heavily fringed hazel eyes. Her pale face was made
- almost chalk-like by contrast with a thick tangle of black hair, and wore
- an expression of apprehensive shyness almost painful to behold.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony stretched out his hands and smiled, but the child hung back,
- and looked not in the least reassured. He asked her name with an effort at
- jovialty.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0005" id="linkimage-0005"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0089.jpg" alt="0089 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0089.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- “Kate O’Mahony, sir,” she said, in a low voice, bending her little knees
- in a formal bob of courtesy.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And are you goin’ to rig yourself out in those long gowns and vails, too,
- when you grow up, eh, siss?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The daughters of The O’Mahonys of Muirisc, with only here and there a
- thrifling exception, have been Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears since the
- order was founded here in the year of Our Lord 1191,” said the foremost
- nun, stiffly. “After long years, in which it seemed as if the order must
- perish, our prayers were answered, and this child of The O’Mahonys was
- sent to us, to continue the vows and obligations of the convent, and
- restore it, if it be the saints’ will, to its former glory.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Middlin’ big job they’ve cut out for you, eh, siss?” commented The
- O’Mahony, smilingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- The pleasant twinkle in his eye seemed to attract the child. Her face lost
- something of its scared look, and she of her own volition moved a step
- nearer to his outstretched hands. Then he caught her up and seated her on
- his knee.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So you’re goin’ to sail in, eh, an’ jest make the old convent hum again?
- Strikes me that’s a pritty chilly kind o’ look-out for a little gal like
- you. Wouldn’t you now, honest Injun, rather be whoopin’ round barefoot,
- with a nanny-goat, say, an’ some rag dolls, an’—an’—climbin’
- trees an’ huntin’ after eggs in the hay-mow—than go into partnership
- with grandma, here, in the nun business?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony had trotted the child gently up and down, the while he
- propounded his query. Perhaps it was its obscure phraseology which
- prompted her to hang her head, and obstinately refuse to lift it even when
- he playfully put his finger under her chin. She continued to gaze in
- silence at the floor; but if the nuns could have seen her face they would
- have noted that presently its expression lightened and its big eyes
- flashed, as The O’Mahony whispered something into her ear. The good women
- would have been shocked indeed could they also have heard that something.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now don’t you fret your gizzard, siss,” he had whispered—“you
- needn’t be a nun for one solitary darned minute, if you don’t want to be.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER VIII—TWO MEN IN A BOAT.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> fishing-boat lay
- at anchor in a cove of Dun-manus Bay, a hundred rods from shore, softly
- rising and sinking with the swell of the tide which stirred the blue
- waters with all gentleness on this peaceful June morning. Two men sat in
- lounging attitudes at opposite ends of the little craft, yawning lazily in
- the sunshine. They held lines in their hands, but their listless and
- wandering glances made it evident that nothing was further from their
- thoughts than the catching of fish.
- </p>
- <p>
- The warm summer air was so clear that the hamlet of Muirisc, whose gray
- walls, embroidered with glossy vines, and tiny cottages white with
- lime-wash were crowded together on the very edge of the shore, seemed
- close beside them, and every grunt and squawk from sty or barn-yard came
- over the lapping waters to them as from a sounding-board. The village,
- engirdled by steep, sheltering cliffs, and glistening in the sunlight,
- made a picture which artists would have blessed their stars for. The two
- men in the boat looked at it wearily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor, it’s my belafe,” said the fisher at the bow, after what seemed an
- age of idle silence, “that the fishes have all follied the byes an’
- gerrels, an’ betaken thimselves to Ameriky.” He pulled in his line, and
- gazed with disgust at the intact bait. “Luk at that, now!” he continued.
- “There’s a male fit for the holy Salmon of Knowledge himsilf, that taught
- Fin MacCool the spache of animals, and divil a bite has the manest shiner
- condiscinded to make at it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, darn the fish!” replied the other, with a long sigh. “I don’t care
- whether we catch’ any or not. It’s worth while to come out here even if we
- never get a nibble and baked ourselves into bricks, jest to get rid of
- that infernal O’Daly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was The O’Mahony who spake, and he invested the concluding portion of
- his remark with an almost tearful earnestness. During the pause which
- ensued he chewed vigorously upon the tobacco in his mouth, and spat into
- the sea with a stern expression of countenance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I tell you what, Jerry,” he broke out with at last—“I can’t stand
- much more of that fellow. He’s jest breakin’ me up piecemeal. I begin to
- feel like Jeff Davis—that it ’ud have bin ten dollars in my
- pocket if I’d never bin born.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, sure, your honor,” said Jerry, “ye’ll git used to it in time. He
- manes for the best.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s jest what makes me tired,” rejoined The O’Mahony; “that’s what
- they always said about a fellow when he makes a confounded nuisance of
- himself. I hate fellows that mean for the best. I’d much rather he meant
- as bad as he knew how. P’raps then he’d shut up and mind his own business,
- and leave me alone part of the time. It’s bad enough to have your estate
- mortgaged up to the eyebrows, but to have a bard piled on top o’ the
- mortgages—egad, it’s more’n flesh and blood can stand! I don’t
- wonder them other O’Mahonys took to drink.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s a dale to be said for the dhrink, your honor,” commented the
- other, tentatively.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There can be as much said as you like,” said The O’Mahony, with firmness,
- “but <i>doin</i>’ is a hoss of another color. I’m goin’ to stick to the
- four drinks a day an’ two at night; an’ what’s good enough for me’s good
- enough for you. That bat of ours the first week we come settled the thing.
- I said to myself: ‘There’s goin’ to be one O’Mahony that dies sober, or
- I’ll know the reason why!’”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor, Saint Pether won’t recognize ye, thin,” chuckled Jerry; and the
- other grinned grimly in spite of himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you know I’ve bin fig’rin’ to myself on that convent business,” The
- O’Mahony mused aloud, after a time, “an’ I guess I’ve pritty well sized it
- up. The O’Mahonys started that thing, accordin’ to my notion, jest to coop
- up their sisters in, where board and lodgin’ ’ud come cheap, an’
- one suit o’ clothes ’ud last a lifetime, in order to leave more
- money for themselves for whisky. I ain’t sayin’ the scheme ain’t got some
- points about it. You bar out all that nonsense about bonnets an’ silk
- dresses an’ beads an’ fixin’s right from the word go, and you’ve got ’em
- safe under lock an’ key, so ’t they can’t go gallivantin’ round an’
- gittin’ into scrapes. But I’ll be dodrotted if I’m goin’ to set still an’
- see ’em capture that little gal Katie agin her will. You hear <i>me!</i>
- An’ another thing, I’m goin’ to put my foot down about goin’ to church
- every mornin’. Once a week’s goin’ to be my ticket right from now. An’ you
- needn’t show up any oftener yourself if you don’t want to. It’s high time
- we had it out whether it’s me or O’Daly that’s runnin’ this show.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, rightly spakin’, your honor’s own sowl wouldn’t want no more than a
- mass aich Sunday,” expounded Jerry, concentrating his thoughts upon the
- whole vast problem of dogmatic theology. “But this is the throuble of it,
- you see, sir: there’s the sowls of all thim other O’Mahonys that’s gone
- before, that the nuns do be prayin’ for to git out of purgatory, an’—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s all right,” broke in The O’Mahony, “but my motto is: let every
- fellow hustle for himself. They’re on the spot, wherever it is, an’
- they’re the best judges of what they want; an’ if they ain’t got sand
- enough to sail in an’ git it, I don’t see why I should be routed up out of
- bed every mornin’ at seven o’clock to help ’em. To tell the truth,
- Jerry, I’m gittin’ all-fired sick of these O’Mahonys. This havin’ dead men
- slung at you from mornin’ to night, day in an’ day out, rain or shine,
- would have busted up Job himself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m thinking, sir,” said Jerry, with a merry twinkle in his eyes,
- “there’s no havin’ annything in this worruld without payin’ for that same.
- ’Tis the pinalty of belongin’ to a great family. Egor, since O’Daly
- thranslated me into a MacEgan I’ve had no pace of me life, by rayson of
- the necessity to demane mesilf accordin’.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, darn it all, man,” pursued the other, “I can’t do a solitary thing,
- any time of day, without O’Daly luggin’ up what some old rooster did a
- thousand years ago. He follows me round like my shadow, blatherin’ about
- what Dermid of the Bucking Horses did, an’ what Conn of the Army Mules
- thought of doin’ and didn’t, and what Finn of the Wall-eyed Pikes would
- have done if he could, till I git sick at my stomach. He won’t let me lift
- my ‘finger to do anything, because The O’Mahony mustn’t sile his hands
- with work, and I have to stand round and watch a lot of bungling cusses
- pretend to do it, when they don’t know any more about the work than a
- yellow dog.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Faith, ye’ll not get much sympathy from the gintry of Ireland on <i>that</i>
- score,” said Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ then that Malachy—he gives me a cramp! he ain’t got a grin in
- his whole carcass, an’ he can’t understand a word that I say, so that
- O’Daly has that for another excuse to hang around all the while. Take my
- steer, Jerry; if anybody leaves you an estate, you jest inquire if there’s
- a bard and a hereditary dumb waiter that go with it; an’ if there is, you
- jest sashay off somewhere else.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, sir, but an estate’s a great thing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes—to tell about. But now jest look at the thing as she stands.
- I’m the O’Mahony an’ all that, an’ I own more land than you can shake a
- stick at; but what does it all come to? Why, when the int’rest is paid, I
- am left so poor that if churches was sellin’ at two cents apiece, I
- couldn’t buy the hinge on a contribution box. An’ then it’s downright
- mortifyin’ to me to have to git a livin’ by takin’ things away from these
- poverty-stricken devils here. I’m ashamed to look ’em in the face,
- knowin’ as I do how O’Daly makes ’em whack up pigs, an’ geese, an’
- chickens, an’ vegetables, an’ fish, not to mention all the money they can
- scrape together, just to keep me in idleness. It ain’t fair. Every time
- one of ’em comes in, to bring me a peck o’ peas, or a pail o’
- butter, or a shillin’ that he’s managed to earn somewhere, I say to
- myself: ‘Ole hoss, if you was that fellow, and he was loafin’ round as The
- O’Mahony, you’d jest lay for him and kick the whole top of his head off,
- and serve him darned well right, too.’”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry looked at his master now with a prolonged and serious scrutiny,
- greatly differing from his customary quizzical glance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Throo for your honor,” he said at last, in a hesitating way, as if his
- remark disclosed only half his thought.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, sirree, I’m sourin’ fast on the hull thing,” The O’Mahony exclaimed.
- “To do nothin’ all day long but to listen to O’Daly’s yarns, an’ make
- signs at Malachy, an’ think how long it is between drinks—that ain’t
- no sort o’ life for a white man. Egad! if there was any fightin’ goin’ on
- anywhere in the world, darn me if I would not pull up stakes an’ light out
- for it. Another six months o’ this, an’ my blood’ll all be turned to
- butter-milk.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The distant apparition of a sailing-vessel hung upon the outer horizon,
- the noon sun causing the white squares of canvas to glow like jewels upon
- the satin sheen of the sea. Jerry stole a swift glance at his companion,
- and then bent a tong meditative gaze upon the passing vessel, humming
- softly to himself as he looked. At last he turned to his companion with an
- air of decision.
- </p>
- <p>
- “O’Mahony,” he said, using the name thus for the first time, “I’m resolved
- in me mind to disclose something to ye. It’s a sacret I’m goin’ to tell
- you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He spoke with impressive solemnity, and the other looked up with interest
- awakened.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Go ahead,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, sir, your remarks this day, and what I’ve seen wid me own eyes of
- your demaynor, makes it plane that you’re a frind of Ireland. Now there’s
- just wan way in the worruld for a frind of Ireland to demonsthrate his
- affection—and that’s be enrollin’ himsilf among thim that’ll fight
- for her rights. Sir, I’ll thrust ye wid me sacret. I’m a Fenian.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony’s attentive face showed no light of comprehension. The word
- which Jerry had uttered with such mystery conveyed no meaning to him at
- all at first; then he vaguely recalled it as a sort of slang description
- of Irishmen in general, akin to “Mick” and “bogtrotter.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, what of it?” he asked, wonderingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry’s quick perception sounded at once the depth of his ignorance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The Fenians, sir,” he explained, “are a great and sacret society, wid
- tins of thousands of min enlisted here, an’ in Ameriky, an’ among the
- Irish in England, wid intint to rise up as wan man whin the time comes,
- an’ free Ireland. It’s a regular army, sir, that we’re raisin’, to conquer
- back our liberties, and dhrive the bloody Saxon foriver away from Erin’s
- green shores.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony let his puzzled gaze wander along the beetling coast-line of
- naked rocks.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So far’s I can see, they ain’t green,” he said; “they’re black and drab.
- An’ who’s this fellow you call Saxon? I notice O’Daly lugs him into about
- every other piece o’ po’try he nails me with, evenin’s.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, it’s our term for the Englishman, who oppreases us, an’ dhrives us
- to despair, an’ prevints our holdin’ our hieads up amongst the nations of
- the earth. Sure, sir, wasn’t all this counthry roundabout for a three
- days’ journey belongin’ to your ancesthors, till the English stole it and
- sold it to Boyle, that thief of the earth—and his tomb, be the same
- token, I’ve seen many a time at Youghal, where I was born. But—awh,
- sir, what’s the use o’ talkin’? Sure, the blood o’ the O’Mahonys ought to
- stir in your veins at the mere suspicion of an opporchunity to sthrike a
- blow for your counthry.” The O’Mahony yawned and stretched his long arms
- lazily in the sunshine.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nary a stir,” he said, with an idle half-grin. “But what the deuce is it
- you’re drivin’ at anyway?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, I’ve towld ye we’re raisin’ an army—a great, thund’rin’ secret
- army—and whin it’s raised an’ our min all dhrilled an’ our guns an’
- pikes all handy—sure, thin we’ll rise and fight. An’ it’s much
- mistaken I am in you, O’Mahony, if you’d be contint to lave this fun go on
- undher your nose, an’ you to have no hand in it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course I want to be in it,” said The O’Mahony, evincing more interest.
- “Only I couldn’t make head or tail of what you was talkin’ about. An’ I
- don’t know as I see yet jest what the scheme is. But you can count me in
- on anything that’s got gunpowder in it, an’ that’ll give me somethin’ to
- do besides list’nin’ to O’Daly’s yawp.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’ll go to Cork to-morrow, thin, if it’s convanient to you,” said Jerry,
- eagerly. “I’ll spake to my ‘B,’ or captain, that is, an’ inthroduce ye,
- through him, to the chief organizer of Munster, and sure, they’ll mak’ ye
- an’ ‘A,’ the same as a colonel, an’ I’ll get promotion undher ye—an’,
- Egor! we’ll raise a rigiment to oursilves entirely—an’ Muirisc’s the
- very darlin’ of a place to land guns an’ pikes an’ powdher for all Ireland—an’
- ’tis we’ll get the credit of it, an’ get more promotion still,
- till, faith, there’ll be nothin’ too fine for our askin’, an’ we’ll carry
- the whole blessed Irish republic around in our waistcoat pocket. What the
- divil, man! We’ll make ye presidint, an’ I’ll have a place in the poliss.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right,” said The O’Mahony, “we’ll git all the fun there is out of it;
- but there’s one thing, mind, that I’m jest dead set about.” ..
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ye’ve only to name it, sir, an’ they’ll be de-loighted to plase ye.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, it’s this: O’Daly’s got to be ruled out o’ the thing. I’m goin’ to
- have one deal without any hereditary bard in it, or I don’t play.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER IX—THE VOICE OF THE HOSTAGE.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>e turn over now a
- score of those fateful pages on which Father Time keeps his monthly
- accounts with mankind, passing from sunlit June, with its hazy radiance
- lying softly upon smooth waters, to bleak and shrill February—the
- memorable February of 1867.
- </p>
- <p>
- A gale had been blowing outside beyond the headlands all day, and by
- nightfall the minor waters of Dunmanus Bay had suffered such prolonged
- pulling and hauling and buffeting from their big Atlantic neighbors that
- they were up in full revolt, hurling themselves with thunderous roars of
- rage against the cliffs of their coast line, and drenching the darkness
- with scattered spray. The little hamlet of Muirisc, which hung to its low,
- nestling nook under the rocks in the very teeth of this blast, shivered,
- soaked to the skin, and crossed itself prayerfully as the wind shrieked
- like a banshee about its roofless gables and tower-walls and tore at the
- thatches of its clustered cabins.
- </p>
- <p>
- The three nuns of the Hostage’s Tears, listening to the storm without,
- felt that it afforded an additional justification for the infraction of
- their rules which they were for this evening, by no means for the first
- time, permitting themselves. Religion itself rebelled against solitude on
- such a night.
- </p>
- <p>
- Time had been when this convent, enlarged though it was by the piety of
- successive generations of early lords of Muirisc, still needed more room
- than it had to accommodate in comfort its host of inmates. But that time,
- alas! was now a musty tradition of bygone ages. Even before the great
- sectarian upheaval of the mid-Tudor period, the ancient family order of
- the Hostage’s Tears had begun to decline. I can’t pretend to give the
- reason. Perhaps the supply of The O’Mahony’s daughters fell off; possibly
- some obscure shift of fashion rendered marriage more attractive in their
- eyes. Only this I know, that when the Commissioners of Elizabeth, gleaning
- in the monastic stubble which the scythe of Henry had laid bare, came upon
- the nuns at Muirisc, whom the first sweep of the blade had missed, they
- found them no longer so numerous as they once had been. Ever since then
- the order had dwindled visibly. The three remaining ladies had, in their
- own extended cloistral career, seen the last habitable section of the
- convent fall into disuse and decay, until now only their own gaunt,
- stone-walled trio of cells, the school-room, the tiny chapel, and a
- chamber still known by the dignified title of the “reception hall,” were
- available for use.
- </p>
- <p>
- Here it was that a great mound of peat sparkled and glowed on the hearth,
- under a capricious draught which now sucked upward with a whistling swoop
- whole clods of blazing turf—now, by a contradictory freak,
- half-filled the room with choking bog-smoke. Still, even when eyes were
- tingling and nostrils aflame, it was better to be here than outside, and
- better to have company than be alone.
- </p>
- <p>
- Both propositions were shiningly clear to the mind of Corinac O’Daly, as
- he mixed a second round of punch, and, peering through the steam from his
- glass at the audience gathered by the hearth, began talking again. The
- three aged nuns, who had heard him talk ever since he was born, sat
- decorously together on a bench and watched him, and listened as
- attentively as if his presence were a complete novelty. Their chaplain, a
- snuffy, half-palsied little old man, Father Harrington to wit, dozed and
- blinked and coughed at the smoke in his chair by the fire as harmlessly as
- a house-cat on the rug. Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, a plump and buxom widow in
- the late twenties, with a comely, stupid face, framed in little waves of
- black, crimped hair pasted flat to the skin, sat opposite the priest,
- glass in hand. Whenever the temptation to yawn became too strong, she
- repressed it by sipping at the punch.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Anny student of the ancient Irish, or I might say Milesian charachter,”
- said O’Daly, with high, disputatious voice, “might discern in our present
- chief a remarkable proof of what the learned call a reversion of toypes.
- It’s thrue what you say, Mother Agnes, that he’s unlike and teetotally
- different from anny other O’Mahony of our knowledge in modhern times. But
- thin I ask mesilf, what’s the maning of this? Clearly, that he harks back
- on the ancesthral tree, and resimbles some O’Mahony we <i>don’t</i> know
- about! And this I’ve been to the labor of thracing out. Now attind to me!
- ’Tis in your riccords, that four ginerations afther your foundher,
- Diarmid of the Fine Steeds, there came an O’Mahony of Muirisc called
- Teige, a turbulent and timpistuous man, as his name in the chronicles,
- Teige Goarbh, would indicate. ’Tis well known that he viewed holy
- things with contimpt. ’Twas he that wint on to the very althar at
- Rosscarbery, in the chapel of St. Fachnau Mougah, or the hairy, and
- cudgeled wan of the daycons out of the place for the rayson that he
- stammered in his spache. ’Twas he that hung his bard, my ancestor
- of that period, up by the heels on a willow-tree, merely because he fell
- asleep over his punch, afther dinner, and let the rival O’Dugan bard stale
- his new harp from him, and lave a broken and disthressful old insthrumint
- in its place. Now there’s the rale ancestor of our O’Mahony. ’Tis
- as plain as the nose on your face. And—now I remimber—sure ’twas
- this same divil of a Teige Goarbh who was possessed to marry his own
- cousin wance removed, who’d taken vows here in this blessed house. ‘Marry
- me now,’ says he. ‘I’m wedded to the Lord,’ says she. ‘Come along out o’
- that now,’ says he. ‘Not a step,’ says she. And thin, faith, what did the
- rebellious ruffian do but gather all the straw and weeds and wet turf
- round about, and pile ’em undernayth, and smoke the nuns out like a
- swarm o’ bees. Sure, that’s as like our O’Mahony now as two pays in a
- pod.”
- </p>
- <p>
- As the little man finished, a shifty gust blew down the flue, and sent a
- darkling wave of smoke over the good people seated before the fire. They
- were too used to the sensation to do more than cough and rub their eyes.
- The mother-superior even smiled sternly through the smoke.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is your maning that O’Mahony is at present on the roof, striving to smoke
- us out?” she asked, with iron clad sarcasm.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Awh, get along wid ye, Mother Agnes,” wheezed the little priest, from his
- carboniferous corner.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who would he be afther demanding in marriage here?”
- </p>
- <p>
- O’Daly and the nuns looked at their aged and shaky spiritual director with
- dulled apprehension. He spoke so rarely, and had a mind so far removed
- from the mere vanities and trickeries of decorative. conversation, that
- his remark puzzled them. Then, as if through a single pair of eyes, they
- saw that Mrs. Fergus had straightened herself in her chair, and was
- simpering and preening her head weakly, like a conceited parrot.
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother-superior spoke sharply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And do you flatther yoursilf, Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, that the head of our
- house is blowing smoke down through the chimney for <i>you?</i>” she
- asked. “Sure, if he was, thin, ’twould be a lamint-able waste of
- breath. Wan puff from a short poipe would serve to captivate <i>you!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- Cormac O’Daly made haste to bury his nose in his glass. Long acquaintance
- with the attitude of the convent toward the marital tendencies of Mrs.
- Fergus had taught him wisdom. It was safe to sympathize with either side
- of the long-standing dispute when the other side was unrepresented. But
- when the nuns and Mrs. Fergus discussed it together, he sagaciously held
- his peace.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it sour grapes you’re tasting, Agnes O’Mahony?” put in Mrs. Fergus,
- briskly. In new matters, hers could not be described as an alert mind. But
- in this venerable quarrel she knew by heart every retort, innuendo and
- affront which could be used as weapons, and every weak point in the
- other’s armor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sour grapes! <i>me!</i>” exclaimed the mother-superior, with as lively an
- effect of indignation as if this rejoinder had not been flung in her face
- every month or so for the past dozen years. “D’ye harken to that, Sister
- Blanaid and Sister Ann! It’s <i>me</i>, after me wan-and-fifty years of
- life in religion, that has this ojus imputation put on me! Whisht now!
- don’t demane yourselves by replyin’! We’ll lave her to the condimnation of
- her own conscience.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two nuns had made no sign of breaking their silence before this
- admonition came, and they gazed now at the peat fire placidly. But the
- angered mother-superior ostentatiously took up her beads, and began
- whispering to herself, as if her thoughts were already millions of miles
- away from her antagonist with the crimped hair and the vacuous smile.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s persecuting me she’s been these long years back,” Mrs. Fergus said
- to the company at large, but never taking her eyes from the
- mother-superior’s flushed face; “and all because I married me poor
- desaysed husband, instead of taking me vows under her.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, that poor desaysed husband!” Mother Agnes put in, with an ironical
- drawl in the words. “Sure, whin he was aloive, me ears were just worn out
- with listening to complaints about him! Ah, thin! ’Tis whin we’re
- dead that we’re appreciated!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All because I married,” pursued Mrs. Fergus, doggedly, “and wouldn’t come
- and lock mesilf up here, like a toad in the turf, and lave me brothers
- free to spind the money in riot and luxurious livin’. May be, if God’s
- will had putt a squint on me, or given me shoulders a twist like Danny at
- the fair, or otherwise disfigured me faytures, I’d have been glad to take
- vows. Mortial plainness is a great injucement to religion.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two nuns scuffled their feet on the stone floor and scowled at the
- fire. Mother Agnes put down her beads, and threw a martyr-like glance
- upward at the blackened oak roof.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Praise be to the saints,” she said, solemnly, “that denied us the snare
- of mere beauty without sinse, or piety, or respect for old age, or
- humility, or politeness, or gratitude, or—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very well, thin, Agnes O’Mahony,” broke in Mrs. Fergus, promptly. “If
- ye’ve that opinion of me, it’s not becomin’ that I should lave me daughter
- wid ye anny longer. I’ll take her meself to Kenmare next week—the
- ride over the mountains will do me nervous system a power o’ good—and
- <i>there</i> she’ll learn to be a lady.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Cormac O’Daly lifted his head and set down his glass. He knew perfectly
- well that with this familiar threat the dispute always came to an end.
- Indeed, all the parties to the recent contention now of their own accord
- looked at him, and resettled themselves in their seats, as if to notify
- him that his turn had come round again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m far from denying,” he said, as if there had been no interruption at
- all, “that our O’Mahony is possessed of qualities which commind him to the
- vulgar multichude. It’s thrue that he rejewced rints all over the estate,
- and made turbary rights and the carrigeens as free as wather, and yet more
- than recouped himself by opening the copper mines beyant Ardmahon, and
- laysing thim to a company for a foine royalty. It’s thrue he’s the first
- O’Mahony for manny a gineration who’s paid expinses, let alone putting
- money by in the bank.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And what more would ye ask?” said Mrs. Fergus. “Sure, whin he’s done all
- this, and made fast frinds with every man, women and child roundabout into
- the bargain, what more would ye want?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, what’s money, Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony,” remonstrated O’Daly, “and what’s
- popularity wid the mere thoughtless peasanthry, if ye’ve no ancesthral
- proide, no love and reverence for ancient family thraditions, no devout
- desoire to walk in the paths your forefathers trod?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Faith, thim same forefathers trod thim with a highly unsteady step, thin,
- bechune oursilves,” commented Mrs. Fergus.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But their souls were filled with blessid piety,” said Mother Agnes,
- gravely. “If they gave small thought to the matter of money, and loike
- carnal disthractions, they had open hands always for the needs of the
- church, and of the convint here, and they made holy indings, every soul of
- ’em.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And they respected the hereditary functions of their bards,” put in
- O’Daly, with a conclusive air.
- </p>
- <p>
- At the moment, as there came a sudden lull in the tumult of the storm
- outside, those within the reception-room heard a distinct noise of
- knocking, which proceeded from beneath the stone-flags at their feet.
- Three blows were struck, with a deadened thud as upon wet wood, and then
- the astounded listeners heard a low, muffled sound, strangely like a human
- voice, from the same depths.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tempest’s furious screaming rose again without, even as they listened.
- All six crossed themselves mechanically, and gazed at one another with
- blanched faces.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is the Hostage,” whispered the mother-superior, glancing impressively
- around, and striving to dissemble the tremor which forced itself upon her
- lips. “For wan-and-fifty years I’ve been waiting to hear the sound of him.
- My praydecessor, Mother Ellen, rest her sowl, heard him wance, and nixt
- day the roof of the church fell in. Be the same token, some new disasther
- is on fut for us, now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Cormac O’Daly was as frightened as the rest, but, as an antiquarian, he
- could not combat the temptation to talk.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis now just six hundred and seventy years,” he began, in a husky
- voice, “since Diarmid of the Fine Steeds founded this convint, in
- expiation of his wrong to young Donal, Prince of Connaught. ’Twas
- the custom thin for the kings and great princes in Ireland to sind their
- sons as hostages to the palaces of their rivals, to live there as
- security, so to spake, for their fathers’ good behavior and peaceable
- intintions. ’Twas in this capacity that young Donal O’Connor came
- here, but Diarmid thrated him badly—not like his father’s son at all—and
- immured him in a dungeon convanient in the rocks. His mother’s milk was in
- the lad, and he wept for being parted from her till his tears filled the
- earth, and a living well sprung from thim the day he died. So thin Diarmid
- repinted and built a convint; and the well bubbled forth healing wathers
- so that all the people roundabout made pilgrimages to it, and with their
- offerings the O’Mahonys built new edifices till ’twas wan of the
- grandest convints in Desmond; and none but fay-males of the O’Mahony blood
- saying prayers for the sowl of the Hostage.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The nuns were busy with their beads, and even Mrs. Fergus bent her head.
- At last it was Mother Agnes who spoke, letting her rosary drop.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Twas whin they allowed the holy well to be choked up and lost
- sight of among fallen stones that throuble first come to the O’Mahonys,”
- she said solemnly. “’Tis mesilf will beg The O’Mahony, on binded
- knees, to dig it open again. Worse luck, he’s away to Cork or Waterford
- with his boat, and this storm’ll keep him from returning, till, perhaps,
- the final disasther falls on us and our house, and he still absinting
- himsilf. Wirra! What’s that?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother-superior had been forced to lift her voice, in concluding, to
- make it distinct above the hoarse roar of the elements outside. Even as
- she spoke, a loud crackling noise was heard, followed by a crash of
- masonry which deafened the listeners’ ears and shook the walls of the room
- they sat in.
- </p>
- <p>
- With a despairing groan, the three nuns fell to their knees and bowed
- their vailed heads over their beads.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER X—HOW THE “HEN HAWK” WAS BROUGHT IN.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he good people of
- Muirisc had shut themselves up in their cabins, on this inclement evening
- of which I have spoken, almost before the twilight faded from the
- storm-wrapt outlines of the opposite coast. If any adventurous spirit of
- them all had braved the blast, and stood out on the cliff to see night
- fall in earnest upon the scene, perhaps between wild sweeps of drenching
- and blinding spray, he might have caught sight of a little vessel, with
- only its jib set, plunging and laboring in the trough of the Atlantic
- outside. And if the spectacle had met his eyes, unquestionably his first
- instinct would have been to mutter a prayer for the souls of the doomed
- men upon this fated craft.
- </p>
- <p>
- On board the <i>Hen Hawk</i> a good many prayers had already been said.
- The small coaster seemed, to its terrified crew, to have shrunk to the
- size of a walnut shell, so wholly was it the plaything of the giant waters
- which heaved and tumbled about it, and shook the air with the riotous
- tumult of their sport. There were moments when the vessel hung poised and
- quivering upon the very ridge of a huge mountain of sea, like an Alpine
- climber who shudders to find himself balanced upon a crumbling foot of
- rock between two awful depths of precipice; then would come the breathless
- downward swoop into howling space and the fierce buffeting of ton-weight
- blows as the boat staggered blindly at the bottom of the abyss; then again
- the helpless upward sweep, borne upon the shoulders of titan waves which
- reared their vast bulk into the sky, the dizzy trembling upon the summit,
- and the hideous plunge—a veritable nightmare of torture and despair.
- </p>
- <p>
- Five men lay or knelt on deck huddled about the mainmast, clinging to its
- hoops and ropes for safety. Now and again, when the vessel was lifted to
- the top of the green walls of water, they caught vague glimpses of the
- distant rocks, darkling through the night mists, which sheltered Muirisc,
- their home—and knew in their souls that they were never to reach
- that home alive. The time for praying was past. Drenched to the skin,
- choked with the salt spray, nearly frozen in the bitter winter cold, they
- clung numbly to their hold, and awaited the end.
- </p>
- <p>
- One of them strove to gild the calamity with cheerfulness, by humming and
- groaning the air of a “come-all-ye” ditty, the croon of which rose with
- quaint persistency after the crash of each engulfing wave had passed. The
- others were, perhaps, silently grateful to him—but they felt that if
- Jerry had been a born Muirisc man, he could not have done it.
- </p>
- <p>
- At the helm, soaked and gaunt as a water-rat, with his feet braced against
- the waist-rails, and the rudder-bar jammed under his arm and shoulder, was
- a sixth man—the master and owner of the <i>Hen Hawk</i>. The strain
- upon his physical strength, in thus by main force holding the tiller
- right, had for hours been unceasing—and one could see by his
- dripping face that he was deeply wearied. But sign of fear there was none.
- </p>
- <p>
- Only a man brought up in the interior of a country, and who had come to
- the sea late in life, would have dared bring this tiny cockle-shell of a
- coaster into such waters upon such a coast. The O’Ma-hony might himself
- have been frightened had he known enough about navigation to understand
- his present danger. As it was, all his weariness could nor destroy the
- keen sense of pleasurable excitement he had in the tremendous experience.
- He forgot crew and cargo and vessel itself in the splendid zest of this
- mad fight with the sea and the storm. He clung to the tiller determinedly,
- bowing his head to the rush of the broken waves when they fell, and
- bending knees and body this way and that to answer the wild tossings and
- sidelong plung-ings of the craft—always with a light as of battle in
- his gray eyes. It was ever so much better than fighting with mere men.
- </p>
- <p>
- The gloom of twilight ripened into pitchy darkness, broken only by
- momentary gleams of that strange, weird half-light which the rushing waves
- generate in their own crests of foam. The wind rose in violence when the
- night closed in, and the vessel’s timbers creaked in added travail as huge
- seas lifted and hurled her onward through the black chaos toward the
- rocks. The men by the mast could every few minutes discern the red lights
- from the cottage windows of Muirisc, and shuddered anew as the glimmering
- sparks grew nearer.
- </p>
- <p>
- Four of these five unhappy men were Muirisc born, and knew the sea as they
- knew their own mothers. The marvel was that they had not revolted against
- this wanton sacrifice of their lives to the whim or perverse obstinacy of
- an ignorant landsman, who a year ago had scarcely known a rudder from a
- jib-boom. They themselves dimly wondered at it now, as they strained their
- eyes for a glimpse of the fatal crags ahead. They had indeed ventured upon
- some mild remonstrance, earlier in the day, while it had still been
- possible to set the mainsail, and by long tacks turn the vessel’s course.
- But The O’Mahony had received their suggestion with such short temper and
- so stern a refusal, that there had been nothing more to be said—bound
- to him as Muirisc men to their chief, and as Fenians to their leader, as
- they were. And soon thereafter it became too late to do aught but scud
- bare-poled before the gale; and now there was nothing left but to die.
- </p>
- <p>
- They could hear at last, above the shrill clamor of wind and rolling
- waves, the sullen roar of breakers smashing against the cliffs. They
- braced themselves for the great final crash, and muttered fragments of the
- Litany of the Saints between clenched teeth.
- </p>
- <p>
- A prodigious sea grasped the vessel and lifted it to a towering height,
- where for an instant it hung trembling. Then with a leap it made a
- sickening dive down, down, till it was fairly engulfed in the whirling
- floods which caught it and swept wildly over its decks. A sinister thrill
- ran through the stout craft’s timbers, and upon the instant came the harsh
- grinding sound of its keel against the rocks. The men shut their eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- A dreadful second—and lo! the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, shaking herself
- buoyantly like a fisher-fowl emerging after a plunge, floated upon gently
- rocking waters—with the hoarse tumult of storm and breakers
- comfortably behind her, and at her sides only the sighing-harp music of
- the wind in the sea-reeds.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hustle now, an’ git out your anchor!” called out the cheerful voice of
- The O’Mahony, from the tiller.
- </p>
- <p>
- The men scrambled from their knees as in a dream. They ran out the chain,
- reefed the jib, and then made their way over the flush deck aft, slapping
- their arms for warmth, still only vaguely realizing that they were
- actually moored in safety, inside the sheltered salt-water marsh, or <i>muirisc</i>,
- which gave their home its name.
- </p>
- <p>
- This so-called swamp was at high tide, in truth, a very respectable inlet,
- which lay between the tongue of arable land on which the hamlet was built
- and the high jutting cliffs of the coast to the south. Its entrance, a
- stretch of water some forty yards in width, was over a bar of rock which
- at low tide could only be passed by row-boats. At its greatest daily
- depth, there was not much water to spare under the forty-five tons of the
- Hen Hawk. She had been steered now in utter darkness, with only the
- scattered and confusing lights of the houses to the left for guidance,
- unerringly upon the bar, and then literally lifted and tossed over it by
- the great rolling wall of breakers. She lay now tossing languidly on the
- choppy waters of the marsh, as if breathing hard after undue exertion—secure
- at last behind the cliffs.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony slapped <i>his</i> arms in turn, and looked about him. He was
- not in the least conscious of having performed a feat which any yachtsman
- in British waters would regard as incredible.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now, Jerry,” he said, calmly, “you git ashore and bring out the boat. You
- other fellows open the hatchway, an’ be gittin’ the things out. Be careful
- about your candle down-stairs. You know why. It won’t do to have a light
- up here on deck. Some of the women might happen to come out-doors an see
- us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Without a word, the crew, even yet dazed at their miraculous escape,
- proceeded to carry out his orders. The O’Mahony bit from his plug a fresh
- mouthful of tobacco, and munched it meditatively, walking up and down the
- deck in the darkness, and listening to the high wind howling overhead.
- </p>
- <p>
- The <i>Hen Hawk</i> had really been built at Barnstable, a dozen years
- before, for the Devon fisheries, but she did not look unlike those
- unwieldy Dutch boats which curious summer visitors watch with unfailing
- interest from the soft sands of Scheveningen.
- </p>
- <p>
- Her full-flushed deck had been an afterthought, dating back to the time
- when her activities were diverted from the fishing to the carrying
- industry. The O’Mahony had bought her at Cork, ostensibly for use in the
- lobster-canning enterprise which he had founded at Muirisc. Duck-breasted,
- squat and thick-lined, she looked the part to perfection.
- </p>
- <p>
- The men were busy now getting out from the hold below a score of small
- kegs, each wrapped in oil skin swathings, and, after these, more than a
- score of long, narrow wooden cases, which, as they were passed up the
- little gangway from the glow of candlelight into the darkness, bore a
- gloomy resemblance to coffins. An hour passed before the empty boat
- returned from shore, having landed its finishing load, and the six men,
- stiff and chilled, clumsily swung themselves over the side of the vessel
- into it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, it’s a new layse of life, I’m beginnin’,” murmured one of them,
- Dominic by name, as he clambered out upon the stone landing-place. “It’s
- dead I was intoirely—an’ restricted agin, glory be to the Lord!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sh-h! You shall have some whisky to make a fresh start on when we’re
- through,” said The O’Mahony. “Jerry, you run ahead an’ open the side door.
- Don’t make any noise. Mrs. Sullivan’s got ears that can hear grass
- growin’. We’ll follow on with the things.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The carrying of the kegs and boxes across the village common to the
- castle, in which the master bore his full share of work, consumed nearly
- another hour. Some of the cottage lights ceased to burn. Not a soul
- stirred out of doors.
- </p>
- <p>
- The entrance opened by Jerry was a little postern door, access to which
- was gained through the deserted and weed-grown church-yard, and the
- possible use of which was entirely unsuspected by even the housekeeper,
- let alone the villagers at large. The men bore their burdens through this,
- traversing a long, low-arched passage-way, built entirely of stone and
- smelling like an ancient tomb. Thence their course was down a precipitous,
- narrow stairway, winding like the corkscrew stairs of a tower, until, at a
- depth of thirty feet or more, they reached a small square chamber, the air
- of which was mustiness itself. Here a candle was fastened in a bracket,
- and the men put down their loads. Here, too, it was that Jerry, when the
- last journey had been made, produced a bottle and glasses and dispensed
- his master’s hospitality in raw spirits, which the men gulped down without
- a whisper about water.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mind!—day after to-morrow; five o’clock in the morning, sharp!”
- said The O’Mahony, in admonitory tones. Then he added, more softly: “Jest
- take it easy to-morrow; loaf around to suit yourselves, so long’s you keep
- sober. You’ve had a pritty tough day of it Good-night. Jerry’n me’ll do
- the rest. Jest pull the door to when you go out.”
- </p>
- <p>
- With answering “Good nights,” and a formal hand-shake all around, the four
- villagers left the room. Their tired footsteps were heard with diminishing
- distinctness as they went up the stairs.
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry turned and surveyed his master from head to foot by the light of the
- candle on the wall.
- </p>
- <p>
- “O’Mahony,” he said, impressively, “you’re a divil, an’ no mistake!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The other put the bottle to his mouth first. Then he licked his lips and
- chuckled grimly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Them fellows was scared out of their boots, wasn’t they? An’ you, too,
- eh?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, sir, you know it as well as I, the lives of the lot of us would
- have been high-priced at a thruppenny-bit.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Pshaw, man! You fellows don’t know what fun is. Why, she was safe as a
- house every minute. An’ here I was, goin’ to compliment you on gittin’
- through the hull voyage without bein’ sick once—thought, at last, I
- was really goin’ to make a sailor of you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor, afther to-day I’ll believe I’ve the makin’ of annything under the
- sun in me—or on top of it, ayther. But, sure, sir, you’ll not deny
- ’twas timptin’ providence saints’ good-will to come in head over
- heels under wather, the way we did?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We <i>had</i> to be here—that’s all,” said The O’Mahony, briefly.
- “I’ve got to meet a man tomorrow, at a place some distance from here, sure
- pop; and then there’s the big job on next day.” Jerry said no more, and
- The O’Mahony took the candle down from the iron ring in the wall.
- </p>
- <p>
- “D’ye know, I noticed somethin’ cur’ous in the wall out on the staircase
- here as we come down?” he said, bearing the light before him as he moved
- to the door. “It’s about a dozen steps up. Here it is! What d’ye guess
- that might a-been?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony held the candle close to the curved wall, and indicated with
- his free hand a couple of regular and vertical seams in the masonry, about
- two feet apart, and nearly a man’s height in length.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s a door there, or I’m a Dutchman,” he said, lifting and lowering
- the light in his scrutiny.
- </p>
- <p>
- The mediæval builders could have imagined no sight more weird than that of
- the high, fantastic shadows thrown upon the winding, well-like walls by
- this drenched and saturnine figure, clad in oilskins instead of armor, and
- peering into their handiwork with the curiosity of a man nurtured in a
- log-cabin.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor, would it be a dure?” exclaimed the wondering Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- His companion handed the candle to him, and took from his pocket a big
- jack-knife—larger, if anything, than the weapon which had been left
- under the window of the little farm-house at Five Forks. He ran the large
- blade up and down the two long, straight cracks, tapping the stonework
- here and there with the butt of the handle afterward. Finally, after
- numerous experiments, he found the trick—a bolt to be pushed down by
- a blade inserted not straight but obliquely—and a thick, iron-bound
- door, faced with masonry, but with an oaken lining, swung open, heavily
- and unevenly, upon some concealed pivots.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony took the light once more, thrust it forward to make sure of
- his footing, and then stepped over the newly-discovered threshold, Jerry
- close at his heels. They pushed their way along a narrow and evil-smelling
- passage, so low that they were forced to bend almost double. Suddenly,
- after traversing this for a long distance, their path was blocked by
- another door, somewhat smaller than the other. This gave forth a hollow
- sound when tested by blows.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It ain’t very thick,” said The O’Mahony. “I’ll put my shoulder against
- it. I guess I can bust her open.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The resistance was even less than he had anticipated. One energetic shove
- sufficed; the door flew back with a swift splintering of rotten wood. The
- O’Mahony went stumbling sidelong into the darkness as the door gave way.
- At the moment a strange, rumbling sound was heard at some remote height
- above them, and then a crash nearer at hand, the thundering reverberation
- of which rang with loud echoes through the vault-like passage. The
- concussion almost put out the candle, and Jerry noted that the hand which
- he instinctively put out to shield the flame was trembling.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Show a light in here, can’t ye?” called out The O’Mahony from the black
- obscurity beyond the broken door. “Sounds as if the hull darned castle ’d
- been blown down over our heads.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry timorously advanced, candle well out in front of him. Its small
- radiance served dimly to disclose what seemed to be a large chamber, or
- even hall, high-roofed and spacious. Its floor of stone flags was covered
- with dry mold. The walls were smoothed over with a gray coat of
- plastering, whole patches of which had here and there fallen, and more of
- which tumbled even now as they looked. They saw that this plastering had
- been decorated by zigzag, saw-toothed lines in three or four colors, now
- dulled and in places scarcely discernible. The room was irregularly
- shaped. At its narrower end was a big, roughly built fireplace, on the
- hearth of which lay ashes and some charred bits of wood, covered, like the
- stone itself, by a dry film of mold. The O’Mahony held the candle under
- the flue. The way in which the flame swayed and pointed itself showed that
- the chimney was open.
- </p>
- <p>
- Cooking utensils, some of metal, some of pottery, but all alike of strange
- form, were bestowed on the floor on either side of the hearth. There was a
- single wooden chair, with a high, pointed back, standing against the wall,
- and in front of this lay a rug of cowskin, the reddish hair of which came
- off at the touch. Beside this chair was a low, oblong wooden chest, with a
- lifting-lid curiously carved, and apparently containing nothing but rolls
- of parchment and leather-bound volumes.
- </p>
- <p>
- At the other and wider end of the room was an archway built in the stone,
- and curtained by hangings of thick, mildewed cloth. The O’Mahony drew
- these aside, and Jerry advanced with the light.
- </p>
- <p>
- In a little recess, and reaching from side to side of the arched walls,
- was built a bed of oaken beams, its top the height of a man’s middle.
- Withered and faded straw lay piled on the wood, and above this both thick
- cloth similar to the curtains and finer fabrics which looked like silk.
- The candle shook in Jerry’s hand, and came near to falling, at the
- discovery which followed.
- </p>
- <p>
- On the bed lay stretched the body of a bearded and tonsured man, clad in a
- long, heavy, dark woolen gown, girt at the waist with a leathern thong—as
- strangely dried and mummified as are the dead preserved in St. Michan’s
- vaults at Dublin or in the Bleikeller of the Dom at Bremen. The shriveled,
- tan-colored face bore a weird resemblance to that of the hereditary bard.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony looked wonderingly down upon this grim spectacle, the while
- Jerry crossed himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Guess there won’t be much use of callin’ a doctor for <i>him</i>,” said
- the master, at last.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he backed away, to let the curtains fall, and yawned.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m about tuckered out,” he said, stretching his arms. “Let’s go up now
- an’ take somethin’ warm, and git to bed. We’ll keep mum about this place.
- P’rhaps—I shouldn’t wonder—it might come in handy for O’Daly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XI—A FACE FROM OUT THE WINDING-SHEET.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he sun was shining
- brightly in a clear sky next morning, when the people of Muirisc finally
- got up out of bed, and, still rubbing their eyes, strolled forth to note
- the ravages of last night’s storm, and talk with one another about it.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was much to marvel at and discuss at length in garrulous groups
- before the cottage doors. One whole wing of the ancient convent structure—that
- which tradition ascribed to the pious building fervor of Cathal <i>an
- Diomuis</i>, or “the Haughty”—had been thrown down during the night,
- and lay now a tumbled mass of stones and timber piled in wild disorder
- upon the <i>débris</i> of previous ruins. But inasmuch as the fallen
- building had long been roofless and disused, and its collapse meant only
- another added layer of chaos in the deserted convent-yard, Muirisc did not
- worry its head much about it, and even yawned in Cormac O’Daly’s face as
- he wandered from one knot of gossips to another, relating legends about
- Cathal the Proud.
- </p>
- <p>
- What interested them considerably more was the report, confirmed now by
- O’Daly himself, that just before the crash came, six people in the
- reception hall of the convent had distinctly heard the voice of the
- Hostage from the depths below the cloistral building. Everybody in Muirisc
- knew all about the Hostage. They had been, so to speak, brought up with
- him. Prolonged familiarity with the pathetic story of his death in exile,
- here at Muirisc, and constant contact with his name as perpetuated in the
- title of their unique convent, made him a sort of oldest inhabitant of the
- place. Their lively imaginations now quickly built up and established the
- belief that he was heard to complain, somewhere under the convent, once
- every fifty years. Old Ellen Dumphy was able to fix the period with
- exactness because when the mysterious sound was last heard she was a young
- woman, and had her face bound up, and was almost “disthracted wid the sore
- teeth.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But most interesting of all was the fact that there, before their eyes,
- riding easily upon the waters of the Muirisc, lay the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, as
- peacefully and safely at anchor as if no gale had ever thundered upon the
- cliffs outside. The four men of her crew, when they made their belated
- appearance in the morning sunlight out-of-doors, were eagerly questioned,
- and they told with great readiness and a flowering wealth of adjectives
- the marvelous story of how The O’Mahony aimed her in pitch darkness at the
- bar, and hurled her over it at precisely the psychological moment, with
- just the merest scraping of her keel. To the seafaring senses of those who
- stood now gazing at the vessel there was more witchcraft in this than in
- the subterranean voice of the Hostage even.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, thin, ’tis our O’Mahony’s the grand divil of a man!” they
- murmured, admiringly.
- </p>
- <p>
- No work was to be expected, clearly, on the day after such an achievement
- as this. The villagers stood about, and looked at the squat coaster,
- snugly raising and sinking with the lazy movement of the tide, and watched
- for the master of Muirisc to show himself. They had never before been
- conscious of such perfect pride in and affection for this strange
- Americanized chieftain of theirs. By an unerring factional instinct, they
- felt that this apotheosis of The O’Mahony in their hearts involved the
- discomfiture of O’Daly and the nuns, and they let the hereditary bard feel
- it, too.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, now, Cormac O’Daly,” one of the women called out to the poet, as he
- hung, black-visaged and dejected, upon the skirts of the group, “tell me
- man, was it anny of yer owld Diarmids and Cathals ye do be perplexin’ us
- wid that wud a-steered that boat beyond over the bar at black midnight,
- wid a gale outside fit to blow mountains into the say? Sure, it’s not
- botherin’ his head wid books, or delutherin’ his moind wid ancestral
- mummeries, or wearyin’ the bones an’ marrow out of the saints wid
- attendin’ their business instead of his own, that <i>our</i> O’Mahony do
- be after practicin’.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The bard opened his lips to reply. Then the gleam of enjoyment in the
- woman’s words which shone from all the faces roundabout, dismayed him. He
- shook his head, and walked away in silence. Meanwhile The O’Mahony, after
- a comfortable breakfast, and a brief consultation with Jerry, had put on
- his hat and strolled out through the pretentious arched doorway of his
- tumble-down abode. From the outer gate he saw the clustered villagers upon
- the wharf, and guessed what they were saying and thinking about him and
- his boat. He smiled contentedly to himself, and lighted a cigar. Then,
- sucking this with gravity, hands in pockets and hat well back on head, he
- turned and sauntered across the turreted corner of his castle into the
- ancient church-yard, which lay between it and the convent. The place was
- one crowded area of mortuary wreckage—flat tombstones sunken deep
- into the earth; monumental tablets, once erect, now tipping at every crazy
- angle; pre-historic, weather-beaten runic crosses lying broken and prone;
- more modern and ambitious sarcophagi of brick and stone, from which sides
- or ends had fallen away, revealing to every eye their ghostly contents;
- the ground covered thickly with nettles and umbrageous weeds, under which
- the unguided foot continually encountered old skulls and human bones—a
- grave-yard such as can be seen nowhere in the world save in western
- Ireland.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony picked his way across this village Golgotha, past the ruins
- of the ancient church, and into the grounds to the rear of the convent
- buildings, clambering as he went over whole series of tumbled masonry
- heaped in weed-grown ridges, until he stood upon the edge of the havoc
- wrought by this latest storm.
- </p>
- <p>
- No rapt antiquary ever gazed with more eagerness upon the remains of a
- pre-Aryan habitation than The O’Mahony now displayed in his scrutiny of
- the destruction worked by last night’s storm, and of the group of
- buildings its fury had left unscathed. He took a paper from his pocket,
- and compared a rude drawing upon it with various points in the
- architecture about him which he indicated with nods of the head. People
- watching him might have differed as to whether he was a student of
- antiquities, a builder or an insurance agent. Probably none would have
- guessed that he was striving to identify some one of the numerous
- chimneys-before him with a certain fireplace which he knew of,
- five-and-twenty feet underground.
- </p>
- <p>
- As he stood thus, absorbed in calculation, he felt a little hand steal
- into his big palm, and nestle there confidingly. His face put on a pleased
- smile, even before he bent it toward the intruder.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hello, Skeezucks, is that you?” he said, gently. “Well, they’ve gone an’
- busted your ole convent up the back, here, in great shape, ain’t they?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Every one of the score of months that had passed since these two first
- met, seemed to have added something to the stature of little Kate
- O’Mahony. She had grown, in truth, to be a tall girl for her age—and
- an erect girl, holding her head well in air, into the bargain. Her face
- had lost its old shy, scared look—at least in this particular
- company. It was filling out into the likeness of a pretty face, with a
- pleasant glow of health upon the cheeks, and a happy twinkle in the big,
- dark eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- For answer, the child lifted and swung his hand, and playfully butted her
- head sidewise against his waist.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis I that wouldn’t mind if it all came down,” she said, in the
- softest West Carbery brogue the ear could wish.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What!” exclaimed the other, in mock consternation. “Well, I never! Why,
- here’s a gal that don’t want to go to school, or learn now to read an’
- cipher or nothin’! P’r’aps you’d ruther work in the lobster fact’ry?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, I’d sail in the boat with you,” said Kate, promptly and with
- confidence.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony laughed aloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess you’d a got your fill of it yisterday, sis,” he remarked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s that I’d have liked best of all,” she pursued. “Ah! take me with
- you, O’Mahony, whin next the waves are up and the wind’s tearin’ fit to
- bust itsilf. I’ll not die till I’ve been out in the thick of it, wance for
- all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, gal alive, you’d a-be’n smashed into sausage-meat!” chuckled the
- man. “Still, you’re right, though. They ain’t nothin’ else in the world
- fit to hold a candle to it. Egad! Some time I <i>will</i> take you, sis!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The child spoke more seriously:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, we’re the O’Mahonys of the Coast of White Foam, according to
- O’Heerin’s old verse, and it’s in my blood as well as yours.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Right you are, sis!” he responded, smiling, as he added under his breath:
- “an’ mebbe a trifle more.” Then, after a moment’s pause, he changed the
- subject.
- </p>
- <p>
- “See here; you’re up on these things—in fact, they don’t seem to
- learn you anything else—hain’t I heerd O’Daly tell about the old
- O’Mahonys luggin’ round a box full o’ saints’ bones when they went on a
- rampage, to sort o’ give ’em luck! I got to thinkin’ about it last
- night after I went to bed, but I couldn’t jest git it straight in my
- head.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s the <i>cathach</i>” (she pronounced it <i>caha</i>) “you mane,” Kate
- answered. “Sometimes it contained bones, but more often ’twas a
- crozieror a holy book from the saint’s own pen, or a part of his
- vest-mints.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No; I like the bones notion best," said The O’Mahony. “There’s something
- substantial an’ solid about bones. If you’ve got a genuine saint’s bones,
- it’s a thing he’s bound to take an interest in, an’ see through; whereas,
- them other things—his books an’ his clo’se an’ so on—why, he
- may a-been sick an’ tired of ’em years ’fore he died.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was the girl’s turn to laugh.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s a strange new fit of piety ye’ve on yeh, O’Mahony,” she said, with
- the familiarity of a spoiled pet. “Sure, when I tell the nuns, they’ll be
- lookin’ to see you build up a whole foine new convint for ‘em without
- delay.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No; I’m savin’ that till you git to be the boss nun,” said The O’Mahony,
- dryly, and with a grin.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis older than Methusalem ye’ll be thin!” asked the child,
- laughingly. And with that she seized his hand once more and dragged him
- forward to a closer inspection of the ruins.
- </p>
- <p>
- Some hours later, having been driven across country to Dunmanway by
- Malachy, and thence taken the local train onward, The O’Mahony found
- himself in the station at Ballineen, with barely time enough to hurry
- across the tracks and leap into the train which was already starting
- westward. In this he was borne back over the road he had just traversed,
- until a stop was made at Manch station. The O’Mahony alighted here, much
- pleased with the strategy which made him appear to have come from the
- east. He took an outside car, and was driven some two miles into the
- bleak, mountainous country beyond Toome, to a wayside inn known as
- Kearney’s Retreat. Here he dismounted, bidding the carman solace himself
- with drink, and wait.
- </p>
- <p>
- Entering the tavern, he paused at the bar and asked for two small bottles
- of porter to be poured in one glass. Two or three men were loitering about
- the room, and he spoke just loud enough to make sure that all might hear
- him. Then, having drained the glass, and stood idly conversing for a
- minute or two with the woman at the bar, he made his way through a side
- door into the adjoining ball alley, where some young fellows of the
- neighborhood chanced to be engaged in a game.
- </p>
- <p>
- He stood apart, watching their play, for only a few moments. Then one of
- the men whom he had seen but not looked closely at in the bar, came up to
- him, and said from behind, in an interrogative whisper:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Captain Harrier, I believe?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” said The O’Mahony, “Captain Harrier—” with a vague notion of
- having heard that voice before.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he turned, and in the straggling roof-light of the alley beheld the
- other’s face. It taxed to the utmost every element of self-possession in
- him to choke down the exclamation which sprang to his lips.
- </p>
- <p>
- The man before him was Linsky!—Linsky risen from the dead, with the
- scarred gash visible on his throat, and the shifty blue-green eyes still
- bloodshot, and set with reddened eyelids in a freckled face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes—Captain—Harrier,” he repeated, lingering upon each word,
- as his brain fiercely strove to assert mastery over amazement,
- apprehension and perplexity.
- </p>
- <p>
- The new-comer looked full into the The O’Mahony’s face without any sign
- whatever of recognition.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thin I’m to place mesilf at your disposal,” he said, briefly. “You know
- more of what’s in the air than I do, no doubt. Everything is arranged, I
- hear, for rising in both Cork an’ Tralee to-morrow, an’ in manny places in
- both counties besides. Officially, however, I know nothing of this—an’
- have no right to know. I’m just to put mysilf at your command, and deliver
- anny messages you desire to sind to other cinters in your district. Here’s
- me papers.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony barely glanced at the inclosures of the envelope handed him.
- They took the familiar form of a business letter of introduction, and a
- commercial contract, signed by a firm-name which to the uninitiated bore
- no significance. He noted that the name given was “Major Lynch.” He
- observed also, with satisfaction, that his hand, as it held the papers,
- was entirely steady. “Everybody’s been notified,” he said, after a time,
- instinctively assuming a slight hoarseness of speech. “I’ve been all over
- the ground, myself. You can meet me—let’s see—say at the
- bottom of the black rock jest overlookin’ the marteller tower at——at
- eleven o’clock, sharp, to-morrow forenoon. The rocks behind the tower,
- mind—t’other side of the coast-guard houses. You’ll see me land from
- my boat.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll not fail,” said the other. “I can bring a gun—moryah, I’m
- shooting at say-gulls.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They ain’t much need of that,” responded The O’Mahony. “You might git
- stopped an’ questioned. There’ll be guns enough. Of course, the takin’ of
- the tower’ll be as easy as rollin’ off a log. The thing’ll be to hold it
- afterward.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’ll howld whatever we take, sir, all Ireland over,” said Major Lynch,
- with enthusiasm.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I hope so! Good-bye. Mind, eleven sharp,” was the response, and the two
- men separated.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony did not wait for the finish of the game of ball, but
- sauntered out of the alley through the end door, walked to his car, and
- set off direct for Toome. At this place he decided to drive on to
- Dunmanway station. Dismissing the carman at the door, and watching his
- departure, he walked over to the hotel, joined the waiting Malachy, and
- soon was well on his jolting way back to Muirisc.
- </p>
- <p>
- Curiously enough, the bearing of Linsky’s return upon his own personal
- fortunes and safety bore a very small part in The O’Mahony’s meditations,
- as he clung to his seat over the rough homeward road. All that might take
- care of itself, and he pushed it almost contemptuously aside in his mind.
- What he did ponder upon unceasingly, and with growing distrust, was the
- suspicion with which the manner of the man’s offer to deliver messages had
- inspired him.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XII—A TALISMAN AND A TRAITOR
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span>t five o’clock on
- this February morning it was still dark. For more than half an hour a
- light had been from time to time visible, flitting about in the inhabited
- parts of the castle. There was no answering gleams from any of the cottage
- windows, along the other side of the village green; but all the same,
- solitary figures began to emerge from the cabins, until eighteen men had
- crossed the open space and were gathered upon the little stone pier at the
- edge of the <i>muirisc</i>. They stood silently together, with only now
- and again a whispered word, waiting for they knew not what.
- </p>
- <p>
- Presently, by the faint semblance of light which was creeping up behind
- the eastern hills, they saw Jerry, Malachy and Dominic approaching, each
- bearing a burden on his back. These were two of the long coffin-like boxes
- and two kegs, one prodigiously heavy, the other by comparison light. They
- were deposited on the wharf without a word, and the two first went back
- again, while Dominic silently led the others in the task of bestowing what
- all present knew to be guns, lead and powder, on board the <i>Hen Hawk</i>.
- This had been done, and the men had again waited for some minutes before
- The O’Mahony made his appearanee.
- </p>
- <p>
- He advanced through the obscure morning twilight with a brisk step,
- whistling softly as he came. The men noted that he wore shooting-clothes,
- with gaiters to the knee, and a wide-brimmed, soft, black hat, even then
- known in Ireland as the American hat, just as the Americans had previously
- called it the Kossuth.
- </p>
- <p>
- Half-way, but within full view of the waiting group, he stopped, and
- looked critically at the sky. Then he stepped aside from the path, and
- took off this hat of his. The men wondered what it meant.
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry was coming along again from the castle, his arms half filled with
- parcels. He stopped beside the chief, and stood facing the path, removing
- his cap as well.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then the puzzled observers saw Malachy looming out of the misty shadows,
- also bare-headed, and carrying at arms length before him a square case,
- about in bulk like a hat-box. As he passed The O’Mahony and Jerry they
- bowed, and then fell in behind him, and marched, still uncovered, toward
- the landing-place.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tide was at its flood, and the <i>Hen Hawk</i> had been hauled by
- ropes up close to the wharf. Malachy, with stolid face and solemn mien,
- strode in fine military style over the gunwale and along the flush deck to
- the bow. Here he deposited his mysterious burden, bowed to it, and then
- put on the hat he had been carrying under his arm.
- </p>
- <p>
- The men crowded on board at this—all save two, who now rowed forward
- in a small boat, and began pulling the <i>Hen Hawk</i> out over the bar
- with a hawser. As the unwieldy craft slowly moved, The O’Mahony turned a
- long, ruminative gaze upon the sleeping hamlet they were leaving behind.
- The whole eastern sky was awake now with light—light which lay in
- brilliant bars of lemon hue upon the hill-tops, and mellowed upward
- through opal and pearl into fleecy ashen tints. The two in the boat
- dropped behind, fastened their tiny craft to the stern, and clambered on
- board.
- </p>
- <p>
- A fresh, chill breeze caught and filled the jib once they had passed the
- bar, and the crew laid their hands upon the ropes, expecting orders to
- hoist the mainsail and mizzen-sheets. But The O’Mahony gave no sign, and
- lounged in silence against the tiller, spitting over the taffrail into the
- water, until the vessel had rounded the point and stood well off the
- cliffs, out of sight of Muirisc, plunging softly along through the swell.
- Then he beckoned Dominic to the helm, and walked over toward the mast,
- with a gesture which summoned the whole score of men about him. To them he
- began the first speech he had ever made in his life:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now, boys,” he said, “prob’ly you’ve noticed that the name’s been painted
- off the starn of this ere vessel, over night. You must ’a’ figured
- it out from that, that we’re out on the loose, so to speak. Thay’s only a
- few of ye that have ever known me as a Fenian. It was agin the rules that
- you should know me, but I’ve known you all, an’ I’ve be’n watchin’ you
- drill, night after night, unbeknown to you. In fact, it come to the same
- thing as my drillin’ you myself—because, until I taught your center,
- Jerry, he knew about as much about it as a pig knows about ironin’ a
- shirt. Well, now you all see me. I’m your boss Fenian in these parts.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Huroo!” cried the men, waving their hats.
- </p>
- <p>
- I don’t really suppose this intelligence surprised them in the least, but
- they fell gracefully in with The O’Mahony’s wish that it should seem to do
- so, as is the polite wont of their race.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” he continued, colloquially, “here we are! We’ve been waitin’ and
- workin’ for a deuce of a long time. Now, at last, they’s somethin’ for us
- to do. It ain’t my fault that it didn’t come months and months ago. But
- that don’t matter now. What I want to know is: are you game to follow me?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We are, O’Mahony!” they called out, as one man.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s right. I guess you know me well enough by this time to know I
- don’t ask no man to go where I’m afeared to go myself. There’s goin’ to be
- some fightin’, though, an’ you fellows are new to that sort of thing. Now,
- I’ve b’en a soldier, on an’ off, a good share of my life. I ain’t a bit
- braver than you are, only I know more about what it’s like than you do.
- An’ besides, I should be all-fired sorry to have any of ye git hurt.
- You’ve all b’en as good to me as your skins could hold, an’ I’ll do my
- best to see you through this thing, safe an’ sound.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Cheers for The O’Mahony!” some one cried out, excitedly; but he held up a
- warning hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Better not holler till you git out o’ the woods,” he said, and then went
- on: “Seein’ that you’ve never, any of you, be’n under fire, I’ve thought
- of somethin’ that’ll help you to keep a stiff upper-lip, when the time
- comes to need it. A good many of you are O’Mahonys born; all of you come
- from men who have followed The O’Mahony of their time in battle. Well, in
- them old days, you know, they used to carry their <i>cathach</i> with
- them, to bring ’em luck, same as American boys spit on their bait
- when they’re fishin’. So I’ve had Malachy, here, bring along a box,
- specially made for the purpose, an’ it’s chuck full of the bones of a
- family saint of mine. We found him—me an’ Jerry—after the wind
- had blown part of the convent down, layin’ just where he was put when he
- died, with the crucifix in his hands, and a monk’s gown on. I ain’t a very
- good man, an’ p’r’aps you fellows have noticed that I ain’t much of a hand
- for church, or that sort of thing; but I says to myself, when I found this
- dead an’ dried body of an O’Mahony who <i>was</i> pious an’ good an’ all
- that: ‘You shall come along with us, friend, an’ see our tussle through.’
- He was an Irishman in the days when Irishmen run their own country in
- their own way, an’ I thought he’d be glad to come along with us now, an’
- see whether we was fit to call ourselves Irishmen, too. An’ I reckon
- you’ll be glad, too, to have him with us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Stirred by a solitary impulse, the men looked toward the box at the bow—a
- rudely built little chest, with strips of worn leather nailed to its sides
- and top—and took off their hats.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We are, O’Mahony!” they cried.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Up with your sails, then!” The O’Mahony shouted, with a sudden change to
- eager animation. And in a twinkling the <i>Hen Hawk</i> had ceased dal
- lying, and, with stiffly bowed canvas and a buoyant, forward careen, was
- kicking the spray behind her into the receding picture of the Dunmanus
- cliffs.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- Nearly five hours later, a little council, or, one might better say,
- dialogue of war, was held at the stern of the speeding vessel. The rifles
- had long since been taken out and put together, and the cartridges which
- Jerry had already made up distributed. The men were gathered forward,
- ready for whatever adventure their chief had in mind.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m goin’ to lay to in a minute or two,” confided The O’Mahony to Jerry,
- in an undertone.
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry looked inquiringly up and down the deserted stretch of brown
- headlands before them. Not a sign of habitation was in view.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it <i>this</i> we’ve come to besayge and capture?” he asked, with
- incredulity.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No. Right round that corner, though, lays the marteller tower we’re
- after. Up to yesterday my plan was jest to sail bang up to her an’ walk
- in. But somethin ’s happened to change my notions. They’ve sent a
- fellow—an American Irishman—to be what they call my ‘cojutor.’
- I don’t jest know what it means; but, whatever it is, I don’t think much
- of it. He’s waitin’ over there for me to land. Well, now, I’m goin’ to
- land here instid, an’ take five of the men with me, an’ kind o’ santer
- down toward the tower from the land side, keepin’ behind the hedges.
- You’ll stay on board here, with Dominic at the helm under your orders, and
- only the jib and mizzen-top up, and jest mosey along into the cove toward
- the tower, keepin’ your men out o’ sight and watchin’ for me. If there’s a
- nigger in the fence, I’ll smoke him out that way.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Some further directions in detail followed, and then the bulk of the
- canvas was struck, and the vessel hove to. The small boat was drawn to the
- side, and the landing party descended to it. One of their own number took
- the oars, for it was intended to keep the boat in waiting on the beach.
- Their guns lay in the bottom, and they were conscious of a novel weight of
- ammunition in their pockets. They waved their hands in salution to the
- friends and neighbors they were leaving, and then, with a vigorous sweep
- of the oars, the boat went tossing on her course to the barren, rocky
- shore.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony, curled up on the seat at the bow, scanned the wide prospect
- with a roving scrutiny. No sail was visible on the whole horizon. A drab,
- hazy stain over the distant sky-line told only that the track of the great
- Atlantic steamers lay outward many miles. On the land side—where
- rough, blackened boulders rose in ugly points from the lapping water, as
- outposts to serried ranks of lichened rocks which, in their turn,
- straggled backward in slanting ascent to the summit, masked by shaggy
- growths of furze—no token of human life was visible.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0006" id="linkimage-0006"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0143.jpg" alt="0143 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0143.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- A landing-place was found, and the boat securely drawm up on shore beyond
- highwater mark. Then The O’Mahony led the way, gun in hand, across the
- slippery reach of wet sea-weed, and thence, by winding courses, obliquely
- up the hillside. He climbed from crag to crag with the agility of a goat,
- but the practiced Muirisc men kept close at his heels.
- </p>
- <p>
- Arrived at the top, he paused in the shelter of the furze bushes to study
- the situation.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was a great and beautiful panorama upon which he looked meditatively
- down. The broad bay lay proudly in the arms of an encircling wall of
- cliffs, whose terraced heights rose and spread with the dignity of some
- amphitheatre of the giants. At their base, the blue waters broke in a
- caressing ripple of cream-like foam; afar off, the sunshine crowned their
- purple heads with a golden haze. Through the center of this noble sweep of
- sheltering hills cleft the wooded gorge of a river, whose mouth kissed the
- strand in the screening shadow of a huge mound, reared precipitously above
- the sea-front, but linked by level stretches of sward to the mainland
- behind. On the summit of this mound, overlooking the bay, was one of those
- curious old martello towers with which England marked the low comedy stage
- of her panic about Bonaparte’s invasion.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tower—a squat, circular stone fort, with a basement for magazine
- purposes, and an upper story for defensive operations—kept its
- look-out for Corsican ghosts in solitude. Considerably to this side, on
- the edge of the cliff, was a white cluster of coast-guard houses, in the
- yard of which two or three elderly men in sailor attire could be seen
- sunning themselves. Away in the distance, on the farther bend of the bay,
- the roofs and walls of a cluster of cottages were visible, and above
- these, among the trees, scattered glimpses of wealthier residences.
- </p>
- <p>
- Of all this vast spectacle The O’Mahony saw nothing but the martello
- tower, and the several approaches to it past the coast-guard houses. He
- chose the best of these, and led the way, crouching low behind the line of
- hedges, until the whole party halted in the cover of a clump of young
- sycamores, upon the edge of the open space leading to the mound. A hundred
- feet away from them, at the base of a jagged bowlder of black slatish
- substance, stood a man, his face turned toward the tower and the sea. It
- was Linsky.
- </p>
- <p>
- After a time he lifted his hand, as if in signal to some one beyond.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony, from his shelter behind, could see that the <i>Hen Hawk</i>
- had rounded the point, and was lazily rocking her way along across the
- bay, shoreward toward the tower. For a moment he assumed that Linsky’s
- sign was intended for the vessel.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then some transitory movement on the surface of the tower itself caught
- his wandering glance, and in the instant he had mastered every detail of a
- most striking incident. A man in a red coat had suddenly appeared at the
- landward window of the martello tower, made a signal to Linskey, and
- vanished like a flash.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony thoughtfully raised his rifle, and fastened his attention
- upon that portion of Linsky’s breast and torso which showed above the
- black, unshaken sight at the end of its barrel.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XIII—THE RETREAT WITH THE PRISONERS
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he Hen Hawk was
- idly drifting into the cove toward the little fishing-smack pier of stone
- and piles which ran out like a tongue from the lower end of the mound.
- Only two of her men were visible on deck. A group of gulls wheeled and
- floated about the thick little craft as she crawled landward.
- </p>
- <p>
- These things The O’Mahony vaguely noted as a background to the figure of
- the traitor by the rock, which he studied now with a hard-lined face and
- stony glance over the shining rifle-barrel.
- </p>
- <p>
- He hesitated, let the weapon sink, raised it again—then once for all
- put it down. He would not shoot Linsky.
- </p>
- <p>
- But the problem what to do instead pressed all the more urgently for
- solution.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony pondered it gravely, with an alert gaze scanning the whole
- field of the rock, the towered mound and the waters beyond for helping
- hints. All at once his face brightened in token of a plan resolved upon.
- He whispered some hurried directions to his companions, and then, gun in
- hand, quitted his ambush. Bending low, with long, stealthy strides, he
- stole along the line of yew hedge to the rear of the rock which sheltered
- Linsky. He reached it without discovery, and, still noiselessly, half
- slipped, half leaped down the earthern bank beside it. At this instant his
- shadow betrayed him. Linsky turned, his lips opened to speak. Then,
- without a word, he reeled and fell like a log under a terrific sidelong
- blow on jaw and skull from the stock of The O’Mahony’s clubbed gun.
- </p>
- <p>
- The excited watchers from the sycamore shield behind saw him fall, and saw
- their leader spring upon his sinking form and drag it backward out of
- sight of the martello tower. Linsky was wearing a noticeable russet-brown
- short coat. They saw The O’Mahony strip this off the other’s prostrate
- body and exchange it for his own. Then he put on Linsky’s hat—a
- drab, low-crowned felt, pulled well over his eyes—and stood out
- boldly in the noon sunlight, courting observation from the tower. He took
- a handkerchief from his pocket and spread it out upon the black surface of
- the rock, and began pacing up and down before it with his eyes on the
- tower.
- </p>
- <p>
- Presently the same red-coated apparition was momentarily visible at the
- land-side window. The O’Mahony held up his hand and went through a
- complicated gesture which should signify that he was coming over to the
- tower, and desired the other to come down and talk with him. This other
- gave a sign of comprehension and assent, and disappeared.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony walked, unarmed, and with a light, springing step, across the
- sloping sward to the tower. He paused at the side of its gray wall for an
- instant, to note that the <i>Hen Hawk</i> lay only a few feet distant from
- the pier-end. Then he entered the open ground-door of the tower, and found
- himself in a circular, low, stone room, which, though whitewashed, seemed
- dark, after the bright sunlight outside. Some barrels stood in a row
- against the wall, and one of these was filled with soiled cotton-waste
- which had been used for cleaning guns. The newcomer helped himself to a
- large handful of this, and took from his pocket a compact coil of stout
- packing-cord. Then he moved toward the little iron staircase at the other
- end of the chamber, and, leaning with his back against it, waited.
- </p>
- <p>
- The next minute the door above opened, and the clatter of spurred boots
- rang out on the metal steps. The O’Mahony’s sidelong glance saw two legs,
- clad in blue regimental trowsers with a red stripe, descend past his head,
- and then the flaring vision of a scarlet jacket.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, they’re landing, it seems,” said the officer, as his foot was on
- the bottom step.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony turned like a leopard, and sprang forward, flinging his arm
- around the other’s neck, and jamming him backward against the steps and
- wall, while, with his free hand, he thrust the greasy, noxious rags into
- his mouth and face. The struggle between the two strong men was fierce for
- a moment. Then the officer, blinded and choking under the gag, felt
- himself being helplessly bound, as if with wires, so tightly were the
- merciless ligatures drawn round arms and legs and head—and then
- hoisted into mid-air, and ignominiously jolted forward through space, with
- the effect of riding pickaback on a giant kangaroo.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony emerged from the tower, bent almost double under the burden
- of the stalwart captive, who still kept up a vain, writhing attempt at
- resistance. The whole episode had lasted scarcely two minutes, and no one
- above seemed to have heard the few muffled sounds of the conflict.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br /><a name="linkimage-0007" id="linkimage-0007"> </a>
- </p>
- <div class="fig" style="width:50%;">
- <img src="images/0151.jpg" alt="0151 " width="100%" /><br />
- </div>
- <h5>
- <a href="images/0151.jpg"><img src="images/enlarge.jpg" alt="" /> </a>
- </h5>
- <p>
- With a single glance toward the companions he had left in hiding among the
- sycamores, he began a hasty, staggering course diagonally down the side of
- the mound toward the water-front. He did not even stop to learn whether
- pursuit was on foot, or if his orders had been obeyed concerning Linsky.
- </p>
- <p>
- At the foot of the hill he had to force his way through a thick thorn
- hedge to gain the roadway leading to the pier. Weighted as he was, the
- task was a difficult one, and when it was at last triumphantly
- accomplished, his clothes hung in tatters about him, and he was covered
- with scratches. He doggedly made his way onward, however, with bowed, bare
- head and set teeth, stumbling along the quay to the vessel’s edge. The <i>Hen
- Hawk</i> had been brought up to the pier-corner, and The O’Mahony,
- staggering over the gunwale, let his burden fall, none too gently, upon
- the deck.
- </p>
- <p>
- A score of yards to the rear, came, at a loping dog-trot, the five men he
- had left behind him among the trees. One of them bore an armful of guns
- and his master’s discarded coat and hat. Each of the others grasped either
- a leg or an arm of the still insensible Linsky, and, as they in turn leapt
- upon the vessel, they slung him, face downward and supinely limp,
- sprawling beside the officer.
- </p>
- <p>
- With all swiftness, sails were rattled up, and the weight of half-a-dozen
- brawny shoulders laid against pike-poles to push the vessel off.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tower had suddenly taken the alarm! The reverberating “boom-m-m” of a
- cannon sent its echoes from cliff to cliff, and the casement windows under
- the machicolated eaves were bristling with gun-barrels flashing in the
- noon-day sun.
- </p>
- <p>
- For one anxious minute—even as the red-coats began to issue, like a
- file of wasps, from the doorway at the bottom of the tower—the sails
- hung slack. Then a shifting land-breeze caught and filled the sheets, the
- <i>Hen Hawk</i> shook herself, dipped her beak in the sunny waters—and
- glided serenely forward.
- </p>
- <p>
- She was standing out to sea, a fair hundred yards from land, when the
- score of soldiers came to the finish of their chase on the pier-end, and
- gazed, with hot faces and short breath, upon her receding hull. She was
- still within range, and they instinctively half-poised their guns to
- shoot. But here was the difficulty: The O’Mahony had lifted the
- grotesquely bound and gagged figure of their commanding officer, and held
- it upright beside him at the helm.
- </p>
- <p>
- For this reason they forbore to shoot, and contented themselves with a
- verbal volley of curses and shouts of rage, which may have startled the
- circling gulls, but raised only a staid momentary smile on the gaunt face
- of The O’Mahony. He shrilled back a prompt rejoinder in the teeth of the
- breeze, which belongs to polite literature no more than did the cries to
- which it was a response.
- </p>
- <p>
- Thus the <i>Hen Hawk</i> ploughed her steady way out to open sea—until
- the red-coats which had been dodging about on the heights above were lost
- to sight through even the strongest glass, and the brown headlands of the
- coast had become only dim shadows of blue haze on the sky line.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky had been borne below, to have his head washed and bandaged, and
- then to sleep his swoon off, if so be that he was to recover sensibility
- at all during what remained to him of terrestrial existence. The British
- officer had even before that been relieved of the odious gun-rag gag, and
- some of the more uncomfortable of his bonds. He had been given a seat,
- too, on a coil of rope beside the capstan—against which he leaned in
- obdurate silence, with his brows bent in a prolonged scowl of disgust and
- wrath. More than one of the crew, and of the non-maritime Muirisc men as
- well, had asked him if he wanted anything, and got not so much as a shake
- of the head in reply.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony paced up and down the forward deck, for a long time, watching
- this captive of his, and vaguely revolving in his thoughts the problem of
- what to do with him. The taking of prisoners had been no part of his
- original scheme. Indeed, for that matter, nothing of this original scheme
- seemed to be left. He had had, he realized now, a distinct foreboding of
- Linsky’s treachery. Yet its discovery had as completely altered everything
- as if it had come upon him entirely unawares. He had done none of the
- things which he had planned to do. The <i>cathach</i> had been brought for
- nothing. Not a shot had been fired. The martello tower remained untaken.
- </p>
- <p>
- When he ruminated upon these things he ground his teeth and pressed his
- thin lips together. It was all Linsky’s doing. He had Linsky safe below,
- however. It would be strange indeed if this fact did not turn out to have
- interesting consequences; but there would be time enough later on to deal
- with that.
- </p>
- <p>
- The presence of the British officer was of more immediate importance. The
- O’Mahony walked again past the capstan, and looked his prisoner over
- askance. He was a tall man, well on in the thirties, slender, yet with
- athletic shoulders; his close-cropped hair and short moustache were of the
- color of flax; his face and neck were weather-beaten and browned. The face
- was a good one, with shapely features and a straightforward expression,
- albeit, seen now at its worst, under a scowl and the smear of the rags.
- After much hesitation The O’Mahony finally made up his mind to speak, and
- walked around to confront the officer with an amiable nod.
- </p>
- <p>
- “S’pose you’re jest mad through an’ through at bein’ grabbed that <i>way</i>
- an’ tied up like a calf goin’ to market, an’ run out in that sort o’
- style,” he said, in a cheerfully confidential tone. “I know <i>I’d</i> be
- jest bilin’! But I hope you don’t bear no malice. It <i>had</i> to be
- done, an’ done that way, too! You kin see that yourself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The Englishman looked up with surly brevity of glance at the speaker, and
- then contemptuously turned his face away. He said never a word.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony continued, affably:
- </p>
- <p>
- “One thing I’m sorry for: It <i>was</i> pritty rough to have your mouth
- stuffed with gun-wipers; but, really, there wasn’t anything else handy,
- and time was pressin’. Now what d’ye say to havin’ a drink—jest to
- rense the taste out o’ your mouth?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The officer kept his eyes fixed on the distant horizon. His lips twitched
- under the mustache with a movement that might signify temptation, but more
- probably reflected an impulse to tell his questioner to go to the devil.
- Whichever it was he said nothing.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony spoke again, with the least suspicion of acerbity in his
- tone.
- </p>
- <p>
- “See here,” he said; “don’t flatter yourself that I’m worryin’ much
- whether you take a drink or not; an’ I’m not a man that’s much given to
- takin’ slack from anybody, whether they wear shoulder-straps or not.
- You’re my pris’ner. I took you—took you myself, an’ let you have a
- good lively rassle for your money. It wasn’t jest open an’ aboveboard,
- p’r’aps, but then you was layin’ there with your men hid, dependin’ on a
- sneak an’ a traitor to deliver me an’ my fellows into your hands. So it’s
- as broad as ’tis long. Only I don’t want to make it especially
- rough for you, an’ I thought I’d offer you a drink, an’ have a talk with
- you about what’s to be done next. But if you’re too mad to talk or drink,
- either, why, I kin wait till you cool down.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Once more the officer looked up, and this time, after some hesitation, he
- spoke, stiffly; “I <i>should</i> like some whisky and water, if you have
- it—and will be good enough,” he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony brought the beverage from below with his own hand. Then, as
- on a sudden thought, he took out his knife, knelt down and cut all the
- cords which still bound the other’s limbs.
- </p>
- <p>
- The officer got gingerly up on his feet, kicked his legs out straight and
- stretched his arms.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wish you had done that before,” he said, taking the glass and eagerly
- drinking off the contents.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I dunno why I didn’t think of it,” said The O’Mahony, with genuine
- regret. “Fact is, I had so many other things on my mind. This findin’
- yourself sold out by a fellow that you trusted with your life is enough to
- kerflummux any man.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That ought not to surprise any Irishman, I should think,” said the other,
- curtly. “However much Irish conspiracies may differ in other respects,
- they’re invariably alike in one thing. There’s always an Irishman who
- sells the secret to the government.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony made no immediate answer. The bitter remark had suddenly
- suggested to him the possibility that all the other movements in Cork and
- Kerry, planned for that day, had also been betrayed! He had been too
- gravely occupied with his own concerns to give this a thought before. As
- he turned the notion over now in his mind, it assumed the form of a
- settled conviction of universal treachery.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s a darned sight o’ truth in what you say,” he assented, seriously,
- after a pause.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tone of the reply took the English officer by surprise. He looked up
- with more interest, and the expression of cold sulkiness faded from his
- face. “You got off with great luck,” he said. “If they had many more like
- you, perhaps they might do something worth while. You’re an
- Irish-American, I fancy? And you have seen military service?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony answered both questions with an affirmative nod.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Then I’m astonished,” the officer went on, “that you and men like you,
- who know what war is really like, should come over here, and spend your
- money and risk your lives and liberty, without the hope of doing anything
- more than cause us a certain amount of bother. As a soldier, you must know
- that you have no earthly chance of success. The odds are ten thousand to
- one against you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony’s eyes permitted themselves a momentary twinkle. “Well, now,
- mister,” he said, carelessly; “I dunno so much about that. Take you an’
- me, now, f’r instance, jest as we stand: I don’t reckon that bettin’ men
- ’u’d precisely tumble over one another in the rush to put their
- money on <i>you</i>. Maybe I’m no judge, but that’s the way it looks to
- me. What do you think yourself, now—honest Injun?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The Englishman was not responsive to this light view of the situation. He
- frowned again, and pettishly shrugged his shoulders.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of course, I did not refer to <i>that!</i>” he said. “My misadventure is
- ridiculous and—ah—personally inconvenient—but it—ah—isn’t
- war. You take nothing by it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes—I’ve taken a good deal—too much, in fact,” said The
- O’Mahony, going off into a brown study over the burden of his acquisitions
- which his words conjured up. He paced up and down beside his prisoner for
- a minute or two. Then he halted, and turned to him for counsel.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What do you think, yourself, would be the best thing for me to do with
- you, now’t I’ve got you?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh—really!—really, I must decline to advise with you upon the
- subject,” the other replied, frostily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “On the one hand,” mused The O’Mahony, aloud, “you got scooped in afore
- you had time to fire a shot, or do any mischief at all—so ’t
- we don’t owe you no grudge, so to speak. Well, that’s in your favor. And
- then there’s your mouth rammed full of gun-waste—that ought to count
- some on your side, too.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The Englishman looked at him, curiosity struggling with dislike in his
- glance, but said nothing.
- </p>
- <p>
- “On ’t’ other hand,” pursued The O’Mahony, “you ain’t quite a
- prisoner of war, because you was openly dealin’ with a traitor and spy,
- and playin’ to come the gouge game over me an’ my men. That’s a good deal
- ag’in’ you. For sake of argument, let’s say the thing is a saw-off, so far
- as what’s happened already is concerned. The big question is: What’s goin’
- to happen?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Really—” the officer began again, and then closed his lips
- abruptly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” the other went on, “that’s where the shoe pinches. I s’pose now, if
- I was to land you on the coast yonder, anywhere, you wouldn’t give your
- word to not start an alarm for forty-eight hours, would you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Certainly not!” said the Englishman, with prompt decision.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, I thought not. Of course, the alarm’s been given hours ago, but your
- men didn’t see me, or git enough of a notion of my outfit to make their
- description dangerous. It’s different with you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The officer nodded his head to indicate that he was becoming interested in
- the situation, and saw the point.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So that really the most sensible thing I could do, for myself and my men,
- ’u’d be to lash you to a keg of lead and drop you overboard—wouldn’t
- it, now?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The Englishman kept his eyes fixed on the middle distance of gently,
- heaving waters, and did not answer the question. The O’Mahony, watching
- his unmoved countenance with respect, made pretense of waiting for a
- reply, and leaned idly against the capstan to fill his pipe. After a long
- pause he was forced to break the silence.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It sounds rough,” he said; “but it’s the safest way out of the thing. Got
- a wife an’ family?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The officer turned for the fraction of an instant to scrowl indignantly,
- the while he snapped out:
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s none of your d——d business!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Whistling softly to himself, with brows a trifle lifted to express
- surprise, The O’Mahony walked the whole length of the deck and back,
- pondering this reply:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve made up my mind,” he announced at last, upon his return. “We’ll land
- you in an hour or so—or at least give you the dingey and some food
- and drink, and let you row yourself in, say, six or seven miles. You can
- manage it all right before nightfall—an’ I’ll take my chances on
- your startin’ the hue-an’-cry.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Understand, I promise nothing!” interposed the other.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, that’s all right,” said The O’Mahony. “Mind, if I thought there was
- any way by which you was likely to get these men o’ mine into trouble, I’d
- have no more scruple about jumpin’ you into the water there than I would
- about pullin’ a fish out of it. But, as I figure it out, they don’t stand
- in any danger. As for me—well, as I said, I’ll take my chances.
- It’ll make me a heap o’ trouble, I dare say, but I deserve that. This trip
- o’ mine’s been a fool-performance from the word ‘go,’ and it’s only fair I
- should pay for it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The Englishman looked up at the yawl rigging, taut under the strain of
- filled sails; at the men huddled together forward; last of all at his
- captor. His eyes softened.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re not half a bad sort,” he said, “in—ah—spite of the
- gun-waste. I should think it likely that your men would never be troubled,
- if they go home, and—ah—behave sensibly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony nodded as if a pledge had been given.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s what I want,” he said. “They are simply good fellows who jest went
- into this thing on my account.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But in all human probability,” the officer went on, “<i>you</i> will be
- caught and punished. It will be a miracle if you escape.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony blew smoke from his pipe with an incredulous grin, and the
- other went on:
- </p>
- <p>
- “It does not rest alone with me, I assure you. A minute detailed
- description of your person, Captain Harrier, has been in our possession
- for two days.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I-gad! that reminds me,” broke in The O’Mahony, his face darkening as he
- spoke—“the man who gave you that name and that description is lyin’
- down-stairs with a cracked skull.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know that it is any part of my duty,” said the officer; “to
- interest myself in that person, or—ah—what befalls him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said The O’Mahony, “I guess not! I guess not!”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XIV.—THE REINTERMENT OF LINSKY.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he red winter sun
- sank to hide itself below the waste of Atlantic waters as the <i>Hen Hawk</i>,
- still held snugly in the grasp of the breeze, beat round the grim cliffs
- of Three-Castle Head, and entered Dun-manus Bay. The Englishman had been
- set adrift hours before, and by this time, no doubt, the telegraph had
- spread to every remotest point on the Southern and Western coast warning
- descriptions of the vessel and its master. Perhaps even now their winged
- flight into the west was being followed from Cape Clear, which lay behind
- them in the misty and darkening distance. Still the <i>Hen Hawk’s</i>
- course was confidently shaped homeward, for many miles of bog and moorland
- separated Muirisc from any electric current.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony had hung in meditative solitude over the tiller for hours,
- watching the squatting groups of retainers playing silently at
- “spoil-five” on the forward deck, and revolving in his mind the thousand
- and one confused and clashing thoughts which this queer new situation
- suggested. As the sun went down he called to Jerry, and the two, standing
- together at the stern, looked upon the great ball of fire descending
- behind the gray expanse of trackless waters, without a word. Rude and
- untutored as they were, both were conscious, in some vague way, that when
- this sun should rise again their world would be a different thing.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, pard,” said the master, when only a bar of flaming orange marked
- where the day had gone, “it’ll be a considerable spell, I reckon, afore I
- see that sort o’ thing in these waters again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it l’avin’ the country we are, thin?” asked Jerry, in a sympathetic
- voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, not exactly. You’ll stay here. But <i>I</i> cut sticks to-morrow.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, then, it’s not alone ye’ll be goin’. Egor! man, didn’t I take me
- Bible-oath niver to l’ave yeh, the longest day ye lived? Ah—now,
- don’t be talkin’!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s all right, Jerry—but it’s got to be that way,” replied The
- O’Mahony, in low regretful tones. “I’ve figured it all out. It’ll be
- mighty tough to go off by myself without you, pard, but I can’t leave the
- thing without somebody to run it for me, and you are the only one that
- fills the bill. Now don’t kick about it, or make a fuss, or think I’m
- using you bad. Jest say to yourself—‘Now he’s my friend, an’ I’m
- his’n, and if he says I can be of most use to him here, why that settles
- it.’ Take the helm for a minute, Jerry. I want to go for’ard an’ say a
- word to the men.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony looked down upon the unintelligible game being played with
- cards so dirty that he could not tell them apart, and worn by years of use
- to the shape of an egg, and waited with a musing smile on his face till
- the deal was exhausted. The players and onlookers formed a compact group
- at his knees, and they still sat or knelt or lounged on the deck as they
- listened to his words.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Boys,” he said, in the gravely gentle tone which somehow he had learned
- in speaking to these men of Muirisc, “I’ve been tellin’ Jerry somethin’
- that you’ve got a right to know, too. I’m goin’ to light out to-morrow—that
- is, quit Ireland for a spell. It may be for a good while—maybe not.
- That depends. I hate like the very devil to go—but it’s better for
- me to skip than to be lugged off to jail, and then to state’s prison—better
- for me an’ better for you. If I get out, the rest of you won’t be
- bothered. Now—hold on a minute till I git through!—now between
- us we’ve fixed up Muirisc so that it’s a good deal easier to live there
- than it used to be. There’ll be more mines opened up soon, an’ the lobster
- fact’ry an’ the fishin’ are on a good footin’ now. I’m goin’ to leave
- Jerry to keep track o’ things, along with O’Daly, an’ they’ll let me know
- regular how matters are workin’, so you won’t suffer by my not bein’
- here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah—thin—it’s our hearts ’ll be broken entirely wid the
- grief,” wailed Dominic, and the others, seizing this note of woe as their
- key, broke forth in a chorus of lamentation.
- </p>
- <p>
- They scrambled to their feet with uncovered heads, and clustered about
- him, jostling one another for possession of his hands, and affectionately
- patting his shoulders and stroking his sleeves, the while they strove to
- express in their own tongue, or in the poetic phrases they had fashioned
- for themselves out of a practical foreign language, the sincerity of their
- sorrow. But the Irish peasant has been schooled through many generations
- to face the necessity of exile, and to view the breaking of households,
- the separation of kinsmen, the recurring miseries attendant upon an
- endless exodus across the seas, with the philosophy of the inevitable.
- None of these men dreamed of attempting to dissuade The O’Mahony from his
- purpose, and they listened with melancholy nods of comprehension when he
- had secured silence, and spoke again:
- </p>
- <p>
- “You can all see that it’s <i>got</i> to be,” he said, in conclusion. “And
- now I want you to promise me this: I don’t expect you’ll have trouble with
- the police. They won’t get over from Balleydehob for another day or two—and
- by that time I shall be gone, and the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, too—an’ if
- they bring over the dingey I gave the Englishman to land in, why, of
- course there won’t be a man, woman or child in Muirisc that ever laid eyes
- on it before.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, Heaven ’u’d blast the eyes that ’u’d recognize that
- same boat,” said one, and the others murmured their confidence in the
- hypothetical miracle.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then, what I want you to promise is this: That you’ll go on as you
- have been doin’, workin’ hard, keepin’ sober, an’ behavin’ yourselves, an’
- that you’ll mind what Jerry says, same as if I said it myself. An’ more
- than that—an’ now this is a thing I’m specially sot on—that
- you’ll look upon that little gal, Kate O’Mahony, as if she was a daughter
- of mine, an’ watch over her, an’ make things pleasant for her, an’—an’
- treat her like the apple of your eye.”
- </p>
- <p>
- If there was an apple in The O’Mahony’s eye, it was for the moment hidden
- in a vail of moisture. The faces of the men and their words alike
- responded to his emotion.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then one of them, a lean and unkempt old mariner, who even in this keen
- February air kept his hairy breast and corded, sunburnt throat exposed,
- and whose hawk-like eyes had flashed through fifty years of taciturnity
- over heaven knows what wild and fantastic dreams born of the sea, spoke
- up:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, by your l’ave, I’ll mesilf be her bodyguard and her servant, and
- tache her the wather as befits her blood, and keep the very sole of her
- fut from harrum.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Right you are, Murphy,” said The O’Mahony. “Make that your job.”
- </p>
- <p>
- No one remembered ever having heard Murphy speak so much at one time
- before. To the surprise of the group, he had still more to say.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And, sir—I’m not askin’ it be way of ricompinse,” the fierce-faced
- old boatman went on—“but w’u’d your honor grant us wan requist?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ve only got to spit ’er out,” was the hearty response.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thin, sir, give us over the man ye ’ve got down stairs.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony’s face changed its expression. He thought for a moment; then
- asked:
- </p>
- <p>
- “What to do?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “To dale wid this night!” said Murphy, solemnly.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was a pause of silence, and then the clamor of a dozen eager voices
- clashing one against the other in the cold wintry twilight:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Give him over, O’Mahony!” “L’ave him to us!” “Don’t be soilin’ yer own
- hands wid the likes of him!” “Oh, l’ave him to us!” these voices pleaded.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony hesitated for a minute, then slowly shook his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, boys, don’t ask it,” he said. “I’d like to oblige you, but I can’t.
- He’s <i>my</i> meat—I can’t give him up!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “W’u’d yer honor be for sparin’ him, thin?” asked one, with incredulity
- and surprise.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony of Muirisc looked over the excited group which surrounded
- him, dimly recognizing the strangeness of the weirdly interwoven qualities
- which run in the blood of Heber—the soft tenderness of nature which
- through tears would swear loyalty unto death to a little child, shifting
- on the instant to the ferocity of the wolf-hound burying its jowl in the
- throat of its quarry. Beyond them were gathering the sea mists, as by
- enchantment they had gathered ages before with vain intent to baffle the
- sons of Milesius, and faintly in the halflight lowered the beetling cliffs
- whereon The O’Mahonys, true sons of those sea-rovers, had crouched
- watching for their prey this thousand of years. He could almost feel the
- ancestral taste of blood in his mouth as he looked, and thought upon his
- answer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, don’t worry about his gitting off,” he said, at last. “I ’ll
- take care of that. You’ll never see him again—no one on top of this
- earth ’ll ever lay eyes on him again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- With visible reluctance the men forced themselves to accept this
- compromise. The <i>Hen Hawk</i> plunged doggedly along up the bay.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- Three hours later, The O’Mahony and Jerry, not without much stumbling and
- difficulty, reached the strange subterranean chamber where they had found
- the mummy of the monk. They bore between them the inert body of a man,
- whose head was enveloped in bandages, and whose hands, hanging limp at
- arm’s length, were discolored with the grime and mold from the stony path
- over which they had dragged. They threw this burden on the mediaeval bed,
- and, drawing long breaths of relief, turned to light some candles in
- addition to the lantern Jerry had borne, and to kindle a fire on the
- hearth.
- </p>
- <p>
- They talked in low murmurs meanwhile. The O’Mahony had told Jerry
- something of what part Linsky had played in his life. Jerry, without being
- informed with more than the general outlines of the story, was able
- swiftly to comprehend his master’s attitude toward the man—an
- attitude compounded of hatred for his treachery of to-day and gratitude of
- the services which he had unconsciously performed in the past. He
- understood to a nicety, too, what possibilities there were in the plan
- which The O’Mahony now unfolded to him, as the fire began crackling up the
- chimney.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can answer for his gittin’ over that crack in the head,” said The
- O’Mahony, heating and stirring a tin cup full of balsam over the flame.
- “Once I’ve fixed this bandage on, we can bring him to with ammonia and
- whisky, an’ give him some broth. He’ll live all right—an’ he’ll live
- right here, d’ye mind. Whatever else happens, he’s never to git outside,
- an’ he’s never to know where he is. Nobody but you is to so much as dream
- of his bein’ down here—be as mum as an oyster about it, won’t you?
- You’re to have sole charge of him, d’ye see—the only human being he
- ever lays eyes on.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! I’ll improve his moind wid grand discourses on trayson and
- informin’ an’ betrayin’ his oath, and the like o’ that, till he’ll be fit
- to die wid shame.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No—I dunno—p’r’aps it’d be better not to let him know <i>we</i>
- know—jest make him think we’re his friends, hidin’ him away from the
- police. However, that can take care of itself. Say whatever you like to
- him, only—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Only don’t lay a hand on him—is it that ye were thinkin’?” broke in
- Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, don’t lick him,” said The O’Mahony. “He’s had about the worst bat on
- the head I ever saw a a man git an’ live, to start with. No—be
- decent with him, an’ give him enough to eat. Might let him have a moderate
- amount o’ drink, too.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I suppose there’ll be a great talk about his vanishin’ out o’ sight all
- at wance among the Brotherhood,” suggested Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That don’t matter a darn,” said the other. “Jest you go ahead, an’ tend
- to your own knittin’, an’ let the Brotherhood whistle. We’ve paid a good
- stiff price to learn what Fenianism is worth, and we’ve learned enough.
- Not any more on my plate, thankee! Jest give the boys the word that the
- jig is up—that there won’t be any more drillin’ or meanderin’ round
- generally. And speakin’ o’ drink—”
- </p>
- <p>
- A noise from the curtained bed in the alcove interrupted The O’Mahony’s
- remarks upon this important subject. Turning, the two men saw that Linsky
- had risen on the couch to a half-sitting posture, and, with a tremulous
- hand, drawing aside the felt-like draperies, was staring wildly at them
- out of blood-shot eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “For the love of God, what is it?” he asked, in a faint and moaning voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Lay down there!—quick!” called out The O’Mahony, sternly; and
- Linsky fell back prone without a protest.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony had finished melting his gum, and he spread it now salve-like
- upon a cloth. Then he walked over to where the wounded man lay, with
- marvel-stricken eyes wandering over the archaic vaulted ceiling.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it dead I am?” he groaned, with a vacuous glance at the new-comer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, you’ve been badly hurt in battle,” said the other, in curt tones. “We
- can pull you through, perhaps; but you’ve got to shut up an’ lay still.
- Hold your head this way a little more—that’s it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The injured man submitted to the operation, for the most part, with
- apparently closed eyes, but his next remark showed that he had been
- gathering his wits together.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And how’s the battle gone, Captain Harrier?” he suddenly asked. “Is
- Oireland free from the oppressor at last?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No!” said The O’Mahony, with dry brevity—“but she’ll be free from
- <i>you</i> for a spell, or I miss <i>my</i> guess most consumedly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XV—“TAKE ME WITH YOU, O’MAHONY.”
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he fair-weather
- promise of the crimson sunset was not kept. The morning broke bloodshot
- and threatening, with dark, jagged storm-clouds scudding angrily across
- the sky, and a truculent unrest moving the waters of the bay to lash out
- at the rocks, and snarl in rising murmurs among themselves.
- </p>
- <p>
- Every soul in Muirisc came soon enough to share this disquietude with the
- elements. Such evil tidings as these, that The O’Mahony was quitting the
- country, seemed veritably to take to themselves wings. The village,
- despite the fact that the fishing season had not yet arrived, and that
- there was nothing else to do, could not lie abed on such a morning, much
- less sleep. Even the tiniest children, routed out from their nests of
- straw close beside the chimney by the unwonted bustle, saw that something
- was the matter.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony heard the intelligence at a somewhat later hour, even
- as she dallied with that second cup of coffee, which, in her own phrase,
- put a tail to the breakfast. It was brought to her by a messenger from the
- convent, who came to say that the Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears desired
- her immediate presence upon an urgent matter. Mrs. Fergus easily enough
- put two and two together, as she donned her bonnet and <i>broché</i>
- shawl. It was The O’Mahony’s departure that was to be discussed, and the
- nuns were right in calling <i>that</i> important. She looked critically
- over the irregular walls of the castle, as she passed it on her way to the
- convent. Here she had been born; here she had lived in peace and plenty,
- after her brother’s death, until the heir from America came to turn her
- out. Who knew? Perhaps she was to go back again, after all. Mrs. Fergus
- agreed that the news was highly important.
- </p>
- <p>
- The first glance which she threw about her, after she had been ushered in
- the reception-hall, revealed to her that not even she had guessed the full
- importance of what was toward.
- </p>
- <p>
- The three nuns sat on their accustomed bench at one side of the fire, and
- behind them, in his familiar chimney-corner, palsied old Father Harrington
- lolled and half-dozed over the biscuit he was nibbling to stay his stomach
- after mass. At the table, before a formidable array of papers, was seated
- Cormac O’Daly, and at his side sat the person whose polite name seemed to
- be Diarmid MacEgan, but whom Muirisc knew and delighted in as Jerry. Mrs.
- Fergus made a mental note of surprise at seeing him seated in such
- company, and then carried her gaze on to cover the principal personage in
- the room. It was The O’Mahony, looking very grave and preoccupied, and who
- stood leaning against the chimney-mantel like a proprietor, who welcomed
- her with a nod and motioned her to a seat.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was he, too, who broke the silence which solemnly enveloped the
- conference.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Cousin Maggie,” he said, in explanation, to her, “we’ve got together this
- little family party so early in the mornin’ for the reason that time is
- precious. I’m goin’ away—for my health—in an hour or two, an’
- there are things to be arranged before I go. I may be away for years;
- maybe I sha’n’t ever come back.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure the suddenness of it’s fit to take one’s breath away!” Mrs. Fergus
- exclaimed, and put her plump white hand to her bosom. “I’ve nerves that
- bad, O’Mahony,” she added.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, it is a sudden sort of spurt,” he assented.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And it’s your health, you say! Sure, I used to look on you as the mortial
- picture of a grand, strong man.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You can’t always tell by looks,” said The O’Mahony, gravely. “But—the
- point’s this. I’m leaving O’Daly and Jerry here, as sort o’ joint bosses
- of the circus, during my absence. Daly is to be ringmaster, so to speak,
- while Jerry’ll be in the box-office, and kind o’ keep an eye to the whole
- show, generally.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I lamint, sir, that I’m not able to congratulate you on the felicity of
- your mettyphor,” said Cor-mac O’Daly, whose swart, thin-visaged little
- face wore an expression more glum than ever.
- </p>
- <p>
- “At any rate, you git at my meaning. I have signed two powers of attorney,
- drawn up by O’Daly here as a lawyer, which gives them power to run things
- for me, while I’m away. Everything is set out in the papers, straight and
- square. I’m leaving my will, too, with O’Daly, an’ that I wanted specially
- to speak to you about. I’ve got just one heir in this whole world, an’
- that’s your little gal, Katie. P’r’aps it’ll be as well not to say
- anything to her about it, but I want you all to know. An’ I want you an’
- her to move back into my house, an live there jest as you did afore I
- come. I’ve spoken to Mrs. Sullivan about it—she’s as good as a
- farrow cow in a family—an’ she’ll stay right along with you, an’
- look after things. An’ Jerry here, he’ll see that your wheels are kept
- greased—financially, I mean—an’—I guess that’s about
- all. Only lookout for that little gal o’ yours as well as you know how—that’s
- all. An’ I wish—I wish you’d send her over to me, to my house, in
- half an hour or so—jest to say good-bye.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony’s voice had trembled under the suspicion of a quaver at the
- end. He turned now, abruptly, took up his hat from the table, and left the
- room, closely followed by Jerry. O’Daly rose as if to accompany them,
- hesitated for a moment, and then seated himself again.
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother superior had heretofore preserved an absolute silence. She bent
- her glance now upon Mrs. Fergus, and spoke slowly:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, thin, Margaret O’Mahony,” she said, “d’ye mind in your day of good
- fortune that, since the hour you were born, ye’ve been the child of our
- prayers and the object of our ceaseless intercessions?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Fergus put out her rounded lower lip a little and, rising from her
- chair, walked slowly over to the little cracked mirror on the wall, to run
- a correcting finger over the escalloped line of her crimps.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ay,” she said at last, “I mind many things bechune me and you—not
- all of thim prayers either.”
- </p>
- <p>
- While Mrs. Sullivan and Jerry were hard at work packing the scant wardrobe
- and meager personal belongings of the master for his journey, and the
- greater part of the population of Muirisc stood clustered on the little
- quay, watching the <i>Hen Hawk</i>, bemoaning their own impending
- bereavement, and canvassing the incredible good luck of Malachy, who was
- to be the companion in this voyage to unknown parts—while the wind
- rose outside, and the waters tumbled, and the sky grew overcast with the
- sullen menace of a winter storm—The O’Mahony walked slowly, hand in
- hand with little Kate, through the deserted churchyard.
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl had been weeping, and the tears still blurred her eyes and
- stained her red cheeks with woe-begone smudges. She clung to her
- companion’s hand, and pressed her head ever and again against his arm, but
- words she had none. The man walked with his eyes bent on the ground and
- his lips tightly closed together. So the two strolled in silence till they
- had passed out from the place of tombs, and, following a path which wound
- its way in ascent through clumps of budding furze and miniature defiles
- among the rocks, had gained the summit of the cliff-wall, under whose
- shelter the hamlet of Muirisc had for ages nestled. Here they halted,
- looking down upon the gray ruins of castle, church and convent, upon
- thatched cottage roofs, the throng on the quay, the breakers’ line of foam
- against the rocks, and the darkened expanse of white-capped waters beyond.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t take on so, sis, any more; that’s a good gal,” said The O’Mahony,
- at last, drawing the child’s head to his side, and gently stroking her
- black hair. “It ain’t no good, an’ it breaks me all up. One thing I’m glad
- of: It’s going to be rough outside. It seems to me I couldn’t ‘a’ stood it
- to up an’ sail off in smooth, sunshiny weather. The higher she rolls the
- better I’ll like it. It’s the same as havin’ somethin’ to bite on, when
- you’ve got the toothache.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate, for answer, rubbed her head against his sleeve, but said nothing.
- </p>
- <p>
- After a long pause, he went on: “’Tain’t as if I was goin’ to be
- gone forever an’ a day. Why, I may be poppin’ in any minit, jest when you
- least expect it. That’s why I want you to study your lessons right along,
- every day, so ’t when I turn up you’ll be able to show off A number
- one. Maybe you’re bankin’ on my not bein’ able to tell whether your book
- learnin’ is ‘all wool an’ a yard wide’ or not. I didn’t get much of a show
- at school, I know. ’Twas ‘root hog or die’ with me when I was a
- boy. But I’m jest a terror at askin’ questions. Why, I’ve busted up whole
- schools afore now, puttin’ conundrums to ’m that even the
- school-ma’ams couldn’t answer. So you look out for me when I come.” The
- gentle effort at cheerfulness bore fruit not after its kind. Kate’s little
- breast began to heave, and she buried her face against his coat.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony looked wistfully down upon the village and the bay, patting
- the child’s shoulder in silent token of sympathy. Then an idea occurred to
- him. With his finger under her chin, he lifted Kate’s face till her glance
- met his.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, by the way,” he said, with animation, “have you got so you can write
- pritty good?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl nodded her head, and looked away.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, then, look here,” he exclaimed, heartily, “what’s the matter with
- your writin’ me real letters, say every few weeks, tellin’ me all that’s
- goin’ on, an’ keepin’ me posted right up to date? Why, that’s jest
- splendid! It’ll be almost the same as if I wasn’t away at all. Eh, won’t
- it, skeezucks, eh?” He playfully put his arm around her shoulder, and they
- began the descent of the path. The suggestion had visibly helped to
- lighten her little heart, though she had said not a word.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes,” he went on, “an’ another thing I wanted to say: It ain’t a
- thing that you must ever ask about—or ought to know anything about
- it—but we went out yisterday an’ made fools of ourselves, an’ if I
- hadn’t had the luck of a brindled heifer, we’d all been in jail to-day. Of
- course, I don’t know for certain, but I shouldn’t wonder if my luck had
- something to do with a—what d’ye call it?—yes, <i>cathach</i>—that
- we toted along with us. Well, I’m goin’ to turn that box over for you to
- keep, when we git down to the house. I wouldn’t open if it I was you—it
- ain’t a pritty sight for a little gal—just a few dead men’s bones—but
- the box itself is all right, an’ it can’t do you no harm, to say the
- least. An’, moreover—why, here it is in my pocket—here’s a
- ring we found on his thumb—cur’ous enough—that you must keep
- for me, too. That makes it like what we read about in the story-books, eh?
- A ring that the beauteous damsel, with the hay-colored hair, sends to
- Alonzo when she gets in trouble, eh, sis?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The child took the ring—a quaintly shaped thin band of gold, with a
- carved precious stone of golden-brownish hue—and put it in her
- pocket. Still she said nothing.
- </p>
- <p>
- At ten in the forenoon, in the presence of all Muirisc, The O’Mahony at
- last gently pushed his way through the throng of keening old women and
- excited younger friends, and stepped over the gunwale upon the deck, and
- Jerry and O’Daly restrained those who would have followed him. He had
- forced his face into a half-smile, to which he clung resolutely almost to
- the end. He had offered many parting injunctions: to work hard and drink
- little; to send the children to school; to keep an absolute silence to all
- outsiders, whether from Skull, Goleen, Crookhaven, or elsewhere,
- concerning him and his departure—and many other things. He had
- shaken hands a hundred times across the narrow bar of water between the
- boat and pier; and now the men in the dingey out in front had the hawser
- taut, and the <i>Hen Hawk</i> was moving under its strain, when a shrill
- cry raised itself above the general clamor of lamentation and farewells.
- </p>
- <p>
- At that moment of the vessel’s stirring, little Kate O’Mahony broke from
- the group in which her mother and the nuns stood dignifiedly apart, and
- ran wildly to the pier’s edge, where Jerry caught and for the moment held
- her, struggling, over the widening chasm between the boat and the quay.
- Her power to speak had come at last.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Take me with you, O’Mahony!” she cried, fighting like a wild thing to
- free herself. “Oh, take me with you! You promised! You promised! <i>Take</i>
- me with you!”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was then that The O’Mahony’s face lost, in a flash, its perfunctory
- smile. He half stretched out his hand—then swung himself on his heel
- and marched to the prow of the vessel. He did not look back again upon
- Muirisc.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- An hour later a police-car, bearing five armed men, halted at the point on
- the mountain-road from Durrus where Muirisc comes first in view. The
- constables, gazing out upon the broad expanse of Dunmanus Bay, saw on the
- distant water-line a yawl-rigged coasting vessel, white against the stormy
- sky. Some chance whim suggested to their minds an interest in this craft.
- </p>
- <p>
- But when they descended into Muirisc they could not find a soul who had
- the remotest notion of what a yawl-rig meant, much less of the identity of
- the lugger which, even as they spoke, had passed out of sight.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XVI—THE LADY OF MUIRISC.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">I</span>n the parish of
- Kilmoe—which they pronounce with a soft prolonged “moo-h,” like the
- murmuring call of one of their little bright-eyed, black-coated cows—the
- inhabitants are wont to say that the next parish is America.
- </p>
- <p>
- It is an ancient and sterile and storm-beaten parish, this Kilmoe, thrust
- out in expiation of some forgotten sin or other to exist beyond the pale
- of human companionship. Its sons and daughters, scattered in tiny,
- isolated hamlets over its barren area, hear never a stranger’s voice—and
- their own speech is slow and low of tone because the real right to make a
- noise there belongs to the shrieking gulls and the wild, west wind and the
- towering, foam-fanged waves, which dashed themselves, in tireless rivalry
- with the thunder, against its cliffs.
- </p>
- <p>
- Slow, too, in growth and ripening are the wits of the men of Kilmoe. They
- must have gray hairs before they are accounted more than boys; and when,
- from sheer old age they totter into the grave, the feeling of the parish
- is that they have been untimely cut off just as they were beginning to get
- their brains in fair working: order. Very often these aged men, if they
- dally and loiter on the way to the tomb in the hope of becoming still
- wiser, are given a sharp and peremptory push forward by starvation. It
- would not do for the men of Kilmoe to know too much. If they did, they
- would all go somewhere else to live—and then what would become of
- their landlord?
- </p>
- <p>
- Kilmoe once had a thriving and profitable industry, whereby a larger
- population than it now contains kept body and soul together in more
- intimate and comfortable relations than at present exist. The outlay
- involved in this industry was very small, and the returns, though not
- governed by any squalid, modern law of percentages, were, on the whole,
- large.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was all very simple. Whenever a stormy, wind-swept night set in, the
- men of Kilmoe tied a lighted lantern on the neck of a cow, and drove the
- animal to walk along the strand underneath the sea-cliffs. This light,
- rising and sinking with the movements of the cow, bore a quaint and
- interesting resemblance to the undulations of an illuminated buoy or boat,
- rocked on gentle waves; and strange seafaring crafts bent their course in
- confidence toward it, until they were undeceived. Then the men of Kilmoe
- would sally forth, riding the tumbling breakers with great bravery and
- address, in their boats of withes and stretched skin, and enter into
- possession of all the stranded strangers’ goods and chattels. As for such
- strangers as survived the wreck, they were sometimes sold into slavery;
- more often they were merely knocked on the head. Thus Kilmoe lived much
- more prosperously than in these melancholy latter days of dependence upon
- a precarious potato crop.
- </p>
- <p>
- In every family devoted to industrial pursuits there is one member who is
- more distinguished for attention to the business than the others, and upon
- whom its chief burdens fall. This was true of the O’Mahonys, who for many
- centuries controlled and carried on the lucrative occupation above
- described, on their peninsula of Ivehagh. There were branches of the sept
- stationed in the more inland sea-castles of Rosbrin, Ardintenant, Leamcon
- and Ballydesmond on the one side, and of Dunbeacon, Dunmanus and Muirisc
- on the other, who did not expend all their energies upon this, their
- genuine business, but took many vacations and indefinitely extended
- holiday trips, for the improvement of their minds and the gratification of
- their desire to whip the neighboring O’Driscolls, O’Sullivans, O’Heas and
- O’Learys out of their boots. The record of these pleasure excursions, in
- which sometimes the O’Mahonys returned with great booty and the heads of
- their enemies on pikes, and some other times did not come home at all,
- fills all the pages of the Psalter of Rosbrin, beside occupying a good
- deal of space in the Annals of Innisfallen and of the Four Masters, and
- needs not be enlarged upon here.
- </p>
- <p>
- But it is evident that that gentleman of the family who, from choice or
- sense of duty, lived in Kilmoe, must, have pursued the legitimate O’Mahony
- vocation very steadily, without any frivolous interruptions or the waste
- of time in visiting his neighbors. The truth is that he had no neighbors,
- and nothing else under the sun with which to occupy his mind but the
- affairs of the sea. This the observer will readily conclude when he stands
- upon the promontory marked on the maps as Three-Castle Head, with the
- whole world-dividing Atlantic at his feet, and looks over at the group of
- ruined and moss-grown keeps which give the place its name.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh-h! Look there now, Murphy!” cried a tall and beautiful young woman,
- who stood for the first time on this lofty sea-wall, viewing the somber
- line of connected castles. “Sure, <i>here</i> lived the true O’Mahony of
- the Coast of White Foam! Why, man, what were we at Muirisc but poor
- crab-catchers compared wid <i>him?</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- She spoke in a tone of awed admiration, between long breaths of
- wonderment, and her big eyes of Irish gray glowed from their cover of
- sweeping lashes with surprised delight. She had taken off her hat—a
- black straw hat, with a dignifiedly broad brim bound in velvet, and
- enriched by a plume of the same somber hue—to save it from the wind,
- which blew stiffly here; and this bold sea-wind, nothing loth, frolicked
- boisterously with her dark curls instead. She put her hand on her
- companion’s shoulder for steadiness, and continued the rapt gaze upon this
- crumbling haunt of the dead and forgotten sea-lords.
- </p>
- <p>
- Twelve years had passed since, as a child of eight, Kate O’Mahony had
- screamed out in despair after the departing <i>Hen Hawk</i>. That vessel
- had never cleft the waters of Dunmanus since, and the fleeting years had
- converted the memory of its master, into a kind of heroic legendary myth,
- over which the elders brooded fondly, but which the youngsters thought of
- as something scarcely less remote than the Firbolgs, or the builders of
- the “Danes’ forts” on the furze-crowned hills about.
- </p>
- <p>
- But these same years, though they turned the absent into shadows, had made
- of Kate a very lovely and complete reality. It would be small praise to
- speak of her as the most beautiful girl on the peninsula, since there is
- no other section of Ireland so little favored in that respect, to begin
- with, and for the additional reason that whatever maidenly comeliness
- there is existent there is habitually shrouded from view by close-drawn
- shawls and enveloping hoods, even on the hottest of summer noon-days. For
- all the stray traveller sees of young and pretty faces in Ivehagh, he
- might as well be in the heart of the vailed (sp.) Orient.
- </p>
- <p>
- And even with Kate, potential Lady of Muirisc though she was, this fashion
- of a hat was novel. It seemed only yesterday since she had emerged from
- the chrysalis of girlhood—girlhood with a shawl over its head, and
- Heaven only knows what abysses of ignorant shyness and stupid distrust
- inside that head. And, alas! it seemed but a swiftly on-coming to-morrow
- before this new freedom was to be lost again, and the hat exchanged
- forever for a nun’s vail.
- </p>
- <p>
- If Kate had known natural history better, she might have likened her lot
- to that of the May-fly, which spends two years underground in its larva
- state hard at work preparing to be a fly, and then, when it at last
- emerges, lives only for an hour, even if it that long escapes the bill of
- the swallow or the rude jaws of the trout. No such simile drawn from
- stonyhearted Nature’s tragedies helped her to philosophy. She had,
- perhaps, a better refuge in the health and enthusiasm of her own youth.
- </p>
- <p>
- In the company of her ancient servitor, Murphy, she was spending the
- pleasant April days in visiting the various ruins of The O’Mahony’s on
- Ivehagh. Many of these she viewed now for the first time, and the delight
- of this overpowered and kept down in her mind the reflection that perhaps
- she was seeing them all for the last time as well.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But how, in the name of glory, did they get up and down to their boats,
- Murphy?” she asked, at last, strolling further out toward the edge to
- catch the full sweep of the cliff front, which rises abruptly from the
- beach below, sheer and straight, clear three hundred feet.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s never a nearer landing-place, thin, than where we left our boat,
- a half-mile beyant here,” said Murphy. “Faith, miss, ’tis the
- belafe they went up and down be the aid of the little people. ’T is
- well known that, on windy nights, there do be grand carrin’s-on
- hereabouts. Sure, in the lake forninst us it was that Kian O’Mahony saw
- the enchanted woman with the shape on her of a horse, and died of the
- sight. Manny’s the time me own father related to me that same.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, true; that <i>would</i> be the lake of the legend,” said Kate. “Let
- us go down to it, Murphy. I’ll dip me hand for wance in water that’s been
- really bewitched.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl ran lightly down the rolling side of the hill, and across the
- rock-strewn hollows and mounds which stretched toward the castellated
- cliff. The base of the third and most inland tower was washed by a placid
- fresh-water pond, covering an area of several acres, and heavily fringed
- at one end with rushes. As she drew near a heron suddenly rose from the
- reeds, hung awkwardly for a moment with its long legs dangling in the air,
- and then began a slow, heavy flight seaward. On the moment Kate saw
- another even more unexpected sight—the figure of a man on the edge
- of the lake, with a gun raised to his shoulder, its barrel following the
- heron’s clumsy course. Involuntarily she uttered a little warning shout to
- the bird, then stood still, confused and blushing. Stiff-jointed old
- Murphy was far behind.
- </p>
- <p>
- The stranger had heard her, if the heron had not. He lowered his weapon,
- and for a moment gazed wonderingly across the water at this unlooked-for
- apparition. Then, with his gun under his arm, he turned and walked briskly
- toward her. Kate cast a searching glance backward for Murphy in vain, and
- her intuitive movement to draw a shawl over her head was equally
- fruitless. The old man was still somewhere behind the rocks, and she had
- only this citified hat and even that not on her head. She could see that
- the advancing sportsman was young and a stranger.
- </p>
- <p>
- He came up close to where she stood, and lifted his cap for an instant in
- an off-hand way. Viewed thus nearly, he was very young, with a bright,
- fresh-colored face and the bearing and clothes of a gentleman, “I’m glad
- you stopped me, now that I think of it,” he said, with an easy readiness
- of speech. “One has no business to shoot that kind of bird; but I’d been
- tying about here for hours, waiting for something better to turn up, till
- I was in a mood to bang at anything that came along.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He offered this explanation with a nonchalant half-smile, as if confident
- ol its prompt acceptance. Then his face took on a more serious look, as he
- glanced a second time at her own flushed countenance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I hope I haven’t been trespassing,” he added, under the influence of this
- revised impression.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate was, in truth, frowning at him, and there were no means by which he
- could guess that it was the effect of nervous timidity rather than
- vexation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis not my land,” she managed to say at last, and looked back
- again for Murphy.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No—I didn’t think it was anybody’s land,” he remarked, essaying
- another propitiatory smile. “They told me at Goleen that I could shoot as
- much as I liked. They didn’t tell me, though, that there was nothing to
- shoot.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man clearly expected conversation; and Kate, stealing further
- flash-studies of his face, began to be conscious that his manner and talk
- were not specialty different from those of any nice girl of her own age.
- She tried to think of something amiable to say.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis not the sayson for annything worth shooting,” she said, and
- then wondered if it was an impertinent remark.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I know that,” he replied. “But I’ve nothing else to do, just at the
- moment, and you can keep yourself walking better if you’ve got a gun, and
- then, of course, in a strange country there’s always the chance that
- something curious <i>may</i> turn up to shoot. Fact is, I didn’t care so
- much after all whether I shot anything or not. You see, castles are new
- things to me—we don’t grow ’em where I came from—and
- it’s fun to me to mouse around among the stones and walls and so on. But
- this is the wildest and lonesomest thing I’ve run up against yet. I give
- you my word, I’d been lying here so long, watching those mildewed old
- towers there and wondering what kind of folks built ’em and lived
- in ’em, that when I saw you galloping down the rocks here—upon
- my word, I half thought it was all a fairy story. You know the poor people
- really believe in that sort of thing, here. Several of them have told me
- so.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate actually felt herself smiling upon the young man. “I’m afraid you
- can’t always believe them,” she said. “Some of them have deludthering ways
- with strangers—not that they mane anny harm by it, poor souls!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But a young man down below here, to-day,” continued the other—“mind
- you, a <i>young-man</i>—told me solemnly that almost every night he
- heard with his own ears the shindy kicked up by the ghosts on the hill
- back of his house, you know, inside one of those ringed Danes’ forts, as
- they call ’em. He swore to it, honest Injun.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl started in spite of herself, stirred vaguely by the sound of this
- curious phrase with which the young man had finished his remarks. But
- nothing definite took shape in her thoughts concerning it> and she
- answered him freely enough:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, well, I’ll not say he intinded desate. They’re a poetic people, sir,
- living here alone among the ruins of what was wance a grand country, and
- now is what you see it, and they imagine visions to thimselves. ’Tis
- in the air, here. Sure, you yourself”—she smiled again as she spoke—“credited
- me with being a fairy. Of course,” she added, hastily, “you had in mind
- the legend of the lake, here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you mean—legend?” asked the young man, in frank ignorance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, here in these very waters is a woman, with the shape of a horse,
- who appears to people, and when they see her, they—they die, that’s
- all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, that’s a good deal, I should think,” he responded, lightly. “No, I
- hadn’t heard of that before; and, besides, you—why, you came down
- the hill, there, skipping like a lamb on the mountains, not a bit like a
- horse.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The while Kate turned his comparison over in her mind to judge whether she
- liked it or not, the young man shifted his gun to his shoulder, as if to
- indicate that the talk had lasted long enough. Then she swiftly blamed
- herself for having left this signal to him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll not be keeping you,” she said, hurriedly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, bless you—not at all!” he protested. “Only I was afraid I was
- keeping <i>you</i>. You see, time hangs pretty heavy on my hands just now,
- and I’m tickled to death to have anybody to talk to. Of course, I like to
- go around looking at the castles here, because the chances are that some
- of my people some time or other helped build ’em. I know my father
- was born somewhere in this part of County Cork.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate sniffed at him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Manny thousands of people have been born here,” she said, with dignity,
- “but it doesn’t follow that they had annything to do with these castles.”
- The young man attached less importance to the point.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, of course not,” he said, carelessly. “All I go by is the probability
- that, way back somewhere, all of us O’Mahonys were related to one another.
- But for that matter, so were all the Irish who—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And are <i>you</i> an O’Mahony, thin?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate was looking at him with shining eyes—and he saw now that she
- was much taller and more beautiful than he had thought before.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s my name,” he said, simply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An O’Mahony of County Cork?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well—personally I’m an O’Mahony of Houghton County, Michigan, but
- my father was from around here, somewhere.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you hear that, Murphy?” she said, instinctively turning to the
- faithful companion of all her out-of-door life. But there was no Murphy in
- sight.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate stared blankly about her for an instant, before she remembered that
- Murphy had never rejoined her at the lakeside. And now she thought she
- could hear some vague sound of calling in the distance, rising above the
- continuous crash of the breakers down below.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, something has happened to him!” she cried, and started running wildly
- back again. The young man followed close enough to keep her in sight, and
- at a distance of some three hundred yards came up to her, as she knelt
- beside the figure of an old peasant seated with his back against a rock.
- </p>
- <p>
- Something had happened to Murphy. His ankle had turned on a stone, and he
- could not walk a step.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XVII—HOW THE OLD BOATMAN KEPT HIS VOW.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>h, what’s to be
- done <i>now?</i>” asked Kate, rising to her feet and casting a puzzled
- look about her. “Sure, me wits are abroad entirely.”
- </p>
- <p>
- No answer seemed forthcoming. As far inland as the eye could stretch, even
- to the gray crown of Dunkelly, no sign of human habitation was to be seen.
- The jutting headland of the Three Castles on which she stood—with
- the naked primeval cliffs; the roughly scattered boulders framed in
- scrub-furze too stunted and frightened in the presence of the sea to
- venture upon blossoms; the thin ashen-green grass blown flat to earth in
- the little sheltered nooks where alone its roots might live—presented
- the grimmest picture of desolation she had ever seen. An undersized sheep
- had climbed the rocks to gaze upon the intruders—an animal with
- fleece of such a snowy whiteness that it looked like an imitation baa-baa
- from a toy-shop—and Kate found herself staring into its vacuous face
- with sympathy, so helplessly empty was her own mind of suggestions.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis two Oirish miles to the nearest house,” said Murphy, in a
- despondent tone.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate turned to the young man, and spoke wistfully:
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you’ll stop here, I’ll go for help,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man from Houghton County laughed aloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If there’s any going to be done, I guess you’re not the one that’ll do
- it,” he answered. “But, first of all, let’s see where we stand exactly.
- How did you come here, anyhow?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We rowed around from—from our home—a long way distant in that
- direction,” pointing vaguely toward Dunmanus Bay, “and our boat was left
- there at the nearest landing point, half a mile from here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, well, <i>that’s</i> all right,” said the young man. “It would take an
- hour to get anybody over here to help, and that would be clean waste of
- time, because we don’t need any help. I’ll just tote him over on my back,
- all by my little self.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah—you’d never try to do the likes of <i>that!</i>” deprecated the
- girl.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why not?” he commented, cheerfully—and then, with a surprise which
- checked further protest, she saw him tie his game-bag round his waist so
- that it hung to the knee, get Murphy seated up on the rock against which
- he had learned, and then take him bodily on his back, with the wounded
- foot comfortably upheld and steadied inside the capacious leathern pouch.
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Why not,’ eh?” he repeated, as he straightened himself easily under the
- burden; “why he’s as light as a bag of feathers. That’s one of the few
- advantages of living on potatoes. Now you bring along the gun—that’s
- a good girl—and we’ll fetch up at the boat in no time. You do the
- steering, Murphy. Now, then, here we go!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The somber walls of the Three Castles looked down in silence upon this
- strange procession as it filed past under their shadows—and if the
- gulls which wheeled above and about the moss-grown turrets described the
- spectacle later to the wraiths of the dead-and-gone O’Mahonys and to the
- enchanted horse-shaped woman in the lake, there must have been a general
- agreement that the parish of Kilmoe had seen never such another sight
- before, even in the days of the mystic Tuatha de Danaan.
- </p>
- <p>
- The route to the boat abounded to a disheartening degree in rough and
- difficult descents, and even more trying was the frequent necessity for
- long <i>détours</i> to avoid impossible barriers of rock. Moreover, Murphy
- turned out to be vastly heavier than he had seemed at the outset. Hence
- the young man, who had freely enlivened the beginning of the journey with
- affable chatter, gradually lapsed into silence; and at last, when only a
- final ridge of low hills separated them from the strand, confessed that he
- would like to take off his coat. He rested for a minute or two after this
- had been done, and wiped his wet brow.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who’d think the sun could be so hot in April?” he said. “Why, where I
- come from, we’ve just begun to get through sleighing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What is it you’d be slaying now?” asked Kate, innocently. “We kill our
- pigs in the late autumn.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man laughed aloud as he took Murphy once more on his back.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Potato-bugs, chiefly,” was his enigmatic response.
- </p>
- <p>
- She pondered fruitlessly upon this for a brief time, as she followed on
- with the gun and coat. Then her thoughts centered themselves once more
- upon the young stranger himself, who seemed only a boy to look at, yet was
- so stout and confident of himself, and had such a man’s way of assuming
- control of things, and doing just what he wanted to do and what needed to
- be done.
- </p>
- <p>
- Muirisc did not breed that sort of young man. He could not, from his face,
- be more than three or four and twenty—and at that age all the men
- she had known were mere slow-witted, shy and awkward louts of boys, whom
- their fathers were quite free to beat with a stick, and who never dreamed
- of doing anything on their own mental initiative, except possibly to “boo”
- at the police or throw stones through the windows of a boycotted shop,
- Evidently there were young men in the big unknown outside world who
- differed immeasurably from this local standard.
- </p>
- <p>
- Oh, that wonderful outside world, which she was never going to see! She
- knew that it was sinful and godless and pressed down and running over with
- abominations, because the venerable nuns of the Hostage’s Tears had from
- the beginning told her so, but she was conscious of a new and less hostile
- interest in it, all the same, since it produced young men of this novel
- type. Then she began to reflect that he was like Robert Emmett, who was
- the most modern instance of a young man which the limits of convent
- literature permitted her to know about, only his hair was cut short, and
- he was fair, and he smiled a good deal, and—And lo, here they were
- at the boat! She woke abruptly from her musing day-dream.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tide had gone out somewhat, and left the dingey stranded on the
- dripping sea-weed. The young man seated Murphy on a rock, untied the
- game-bag and put on his coat, and then in the most matter-of-fact way
- tramped over the slippery ooze to the boat, pushed it off into the water
- and towed it around by the chain to the edge of a little cove, whence one
- might step over its side from a shore of clean, dry sand. He then, still
- as if it were all a matter of course, lifted Murphy and put him in the bow
- of the boat, and asked Kate to sit in the stern and steer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I can talk to you, you know, now that your sitting there,” he said, with
- his foot on the end of the oar-seat, after she had taken the place
- indicated. “Oh—wait a minute! We were forgetting the gun and bag.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He ran lightly back to where these things lay upon the strand, and secured
- them; then, turning, he discovered that Murphy had scrambled over to the
- middle seat, taken the oars, and pushed the boat off. Suspecting nothing,
- he walked briskly back to the water’s edge.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Shove her in a little,” he said, “and I’ll hold her while you get back
- again into the bow. You mustn’t think of rowing, my good man.”
- </p>
- <p>
- But Murphy showed no sign of obedience. He kept his burnt, claw-shaped
- hands clasped on the motionless, dipped oars, and his eager, bird-like
- eyes fastened upon the face of his young mistress. As for Kate, she
- studied the bottom of the boat with intentness, and absently stirred the
- water over the boat-side with her finger-tips.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Get her in, man! Don’t you hear?” called the stranger, with a shadow of
- impatience, over the six or seven feet of water which lay between him and
- the boat. “Or <i>you</i> explain it to him,” he said to Kate; “perhaps he
- doesn’t understand me—tell him I’m going to row!”
- </p>
- <p>
- In response to this appeal, Kate lifted her head, and hesitatingly opened
- her lips to speak—but the gaunt old boatman broke in upon her
- confused silence:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, thin—I understand well enough,” he shouted, excitedly, “an’ I’m
- thankful to ye, an’ the longest day I live I’ll say a prayer for ye—an’
- sure ye’re a foine grand man, every inch of ye, glory be to the Lord—an’
- it’s not manny w’u’d ’a’ done what ye did this day—and the
- blessin’ of the Lord rest an ye; but—” here he suddenly dropped his
- high shrill, swift-chasing tones, and added in quite another voice—“if
- it’s the same to you, sir, we’ll go along home as we are.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What nonsense!” retorted the young man. “My time doesn’t matter in the
- least—and you’re not fit to row a mile—let alone a long
- distance.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s not with me fut I’ll be rowin’,” replied Murphy, rounding his back
- for a sweep of the oars.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can’t <i>you</i> stop him, Miss—eh—young lady!” the young man
- implored from the sands.
- </p>
- <p>
- Hope flamed up in his breast at sight of the look she bent upon Murphy, as
- she leaned forward to speak—and then sank into plumbless depths.
- Perhaps she had said something—he could not hear, and it was
- doubtful if the old boatman could have heard either—for on the
- instant he had laid his strength on the oars, and the boat had shot out
- into the bay like a skater over the glassy ice.
- </p>
- <p>
- It was a score of yards away before the young man from Houghton County
- caught his breath. He stood watching it—be it confessed—with
- his mouth somewhat open and blank astonishment written all over his ruddy,
- boyish face. Then the flush upon his pink cheeks deepened, and a sparkle
- came into his eyes, for the young lady in the boat had risen and turned
- toward him, and was waving her hand to him in friendly salutation. He
- swung the empty game-bag wildly about his head in answer, and then the
- boat darted out of view behind a jutting ridge of umber rocks, and he was
- looking at an unbroken expanse of gently heaving water—all crystals
- set on violet satin, under the April sun.
- </p>
- <p>
- He sent a long-drawn sighing whistle of bewilderment after the vanished
- vision.
- </p>
- <p>
- Not a word had been exchanged between the two in the boat until after
- Kate, yielding at the last moment to the temptation which had beset her
- from the first, waved that unspoken farewell to her new acquaintance and
- saw him a moment later abruptly cut out of the picture by the intervening
- rocks. Then she sat down again and fastened a glare of metallic
- disapproval, so to speak, upon Murphy. This, however, served no purpose,
- since the boatman kept his head sagaciously bent over his task, and rowed
- away like mad.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I take shame for you, Murphy!” she said at last, with a voice as full of
- mingled anguish and humiliation as she could manage to make it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it too free I am with complete strangers?” asked the guileful Murphy,
- with the face of a trusting babe.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis the rudest and most thankless old man in all West Carbery
- that ye are!” she answered, sharply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Luk at that now!” said Murphy, apparently addressing the handles of his
- oars. “An’ me havin’ the intintion to burnin’ two candles for him this
- very night!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Candles is it! Murphy, once for all, ’t is a bad trick ye have of
- falling to talking about candles and ‘Hail Marys’ and such holy matters,
- whinever ye feel yourself in a corner—and be sure the saints like it
- no better than I do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The aged servitor rested for a moment upon his oars, and, being conscious
- that evasion was of no further use, allowed an expression of frankness to
- dominate his withered and weather-tanned face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, miss,” he said, “an’ this is the truth I’m tellin’ ye—<i>‘t</i>
- was not fit that he should be sailin’ in the boat wid you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate tossed her head impatiently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And how long are you my director in—in such matters as these,
- Murphy?” she asked, with irony.
- </p>
- <p>
- The old man’s eyes glistened with the emotions which a sudden swift
- thought conjured up.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How long?” he asked, with dramatic effect.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, the likes of me c’u’d be no directhor at all—but ’tis
- a dozen years since I swore to his honor, The O’Mahony himself, that I’d
- watch over ye, an’ protect ye, an’ keep ye from the lightest breath of
- harrum—an’ whin I meet him, whether it be the Lord’s will in this
- world or the nixt, I’ll go to him an’ I’ll take off me hat, an’ I’ll say:
- ‘Yer honor, what old Murphy putt his word to, that same he kep!’ An’ is it
- you, Miss Katie, that remimbers him that well, that ’u’d be blamin’
- me for that same?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know if I’m so much blaming you, Murphy,” said Kate, much
- softened by both the matter and the manner of this appeal, “but ’tis
- different, wit’ this young man, himself an O’Mahony by name.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Faith, be the same token, ’tis manny thousands of O’Mahonys there
- are in foreign parts, I’m tould, an’ more thousands of ’em here at
- home, an’ if it’s for rowin’ ’em all on Dunmanus Bay ye’d be, on
- the score of their name, ’tis grand new boats we’d want.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate smiled musingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did you mind, Murphy,” she asked, after a pause, “how like the sound of
- his speech was to The O’Mahony’s?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That I did not!” said Murphy, conclusively.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, ye’ve no ears, man! I was that flurried at the time, I couldn’t think
- what it was—but now, whin it comes back to me, it was like talking
- to The O’Mahony himself. There was that one word, ‘onistinjun,’ that The
- O’Mahony had forever on his tongue. Surely you noticed that!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All Americans say that same,” Murphy explained carelessly. “’T is
- well known most of ’em are discinded from the Injuns. ’Tis
- that they m’ane.” It did not occur to Kate to question this bold
- ethno-philological proposition. She leant back in her seat at the stern,
- absent-mindedly toying with the ribbons of her hat, and watching the sky
- over Murphy’s head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Poor, dear old O’Mahony!” she sighed at last.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Amin to that miss!” murmured the boatman, between strokes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is a year an’ more now, Murphy, since we had the laste sign in
- the world from him. Ah, wirra! I’m beginnin’ to be afraid dead ’tis
- he is!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Keep your heart, miss; keep your heart!” crooned the old boatman, in what
- had been for months a familiar phrase on his lips. “Sure no mortial man
- ever stepped fut on green sod that ’ud take more killin’ than our
- O’Mahony. Why, <i>coleen asthore</i>, wasn’t he foightin’ wid the French,
- against the Prooshians, an’ thin wid the Turkeys against the Rooshians,
- an’ bechune males, as ye’d say, didn’t he bear arms in Spain for the
- Catholic king, like the thunderin’ rare old O’Mahony that he is, an’ did
- ever so much as a scratch come to him—an’ him killin’ an’ destroyin’
- thim by hundreds? Ah, rest aisy about <i>him</i>, Miss Katie!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two had long since exhausted, in their almost daily talks, every
- possible phase of this melancholy subject. It was now April of 1879, and
- the last word received from the absent chief had been a hastily scrawled
- note dispatched from Adrianople, on New Year’s Day of 1878—when the
- Turkish army, beaten finally at Plevna and decimated in the Schipka, were
- doggedly moving backward toward the Bosphorus. Since that, there had been
- absolute silence—and Kate and Murphy had alike, hoping against hope,
- come long since to fear the worst. Though each strove to sustain
- confidence in the other, there was no secret between their hearts as to
- what both felt.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Murphy,” said Kate, rousing herself all at once from her reverie,
- “there’s something I’ve been keeping from you—and I can’t hold it
- anny longer. Do ye mind when Malachy wint away last winter?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Faith I do,” replied the boatman. (Malachy, be it explained, had followed
- The O’Mahony in all his wanderings up to the autumn of 1870, when, in a
- skirmish shortly after Sedan, he had lost an arm and, upon his release
- from the hospital, had been sent back to Muirisc.) “I mind that he wint to
- Amerriky.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin,” whispered Kate, bending forward as if the very waves had
- ears, “it’s just that he didn’t do. I gave him money, and I gave him the
- O’Mahony’s ring, and sint him to search the world over till he came upon
- his master, or his master’s grave—and I charged him to say only
- this: ‘Come back to Muirisc! ’Tis Kate O’Mahony wants you!’ And now no one
- knows this but me confessor and you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The boatman gazed earnestly into her face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ why for did ye say: ‘Come back?’” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah thin—well—‘tis O’Daly’s hard d’alin’s wid the tinants, and
- the failure of the potatoes these two years and worse ahead and the birth
- of me little step-brother—and—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Answer me now, Katie darlint?” the old man adjured her, with glowing eyes
- and solemn voice. “Is it the convint ye’re afraid of for yoursilf? Is it
- of your own free will you’re goin’ to take your vows?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl had answered this question more than once before, and readily
- enough. Now, for some reason which she could not have defined to herself,
- she looked down upon the gliding water at her side, and meditatively
- dipped her fingers into it, and let a succession of little waves fling
- their crests up into her sleeve—and said nothing at all.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XVIII—THE GREAT O’DALY USURPATION.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he stern natural
- law of mutability—of ceaseless growth, change and decay—which
- the big, bustling, preoccupied outside world takes so indifferently, as a
- matter of course, finds itself reduced to a bare minimum of influence in
- such small, remote and out-of-the-way places as Muirisc. The lapse of
- twelve years here had made the scantest and most casual of marks upon the
- village and its inhabitants. Positively no one worth mentioning had died—for
- even snuffy and palsied old Father Harrington, though long since replaced
- at the convent <i>by</i> a younger priest, was understood to be still
- living on in the shelter of some retreat for aged clergymen in Kerry or
- Clare. The three old nuns were still the sole ladies of the Hostage’s
- Tears, and, like the rest of Muirisc, seemed only a trifle the more
- wrinkled and worn under this flight of time.
- </p>
- <p>
- Such changes as had been wrought had come in a leisurely way, without
- attracting much attention. The mines, both of copper and of pyrites, had
- prospered beyond the experience of any other section of Munster, and this
- had brought into the immediate district a considerable alien population.
- But these intrusive strangers had fortunately preferred to settle in
- another hamlet in the neighborhood, and came rarely to Muirisc. The
- village was still without a hotel, and had by this time grown accustomed
- to the existence within its borders of a constabulary barracks. Its
- fishing went forward sedately and without much profit; the men of Muirisc
- only half believed the stories they heard of the modern appliances and
- wonderful hauls at Baltimore and Crook-haven—and cared even less
- than they credited. The lobster-canning factory had died a natural death
- years before, and the little children of Muirisc, playing about within
- sight of its roofless and rotting timbers, avoided closer contact with the
- building under some vague and formless notion that it was unlucky. The
- very idea that there had once been a man who thought that Muirisc desired
- to put up lobsters in tins seemed to them comic—and almost impious
- as well.
- </p>
- <p>
- But there was one alteration upon which the people of Muirisc bestowed a
- good deal of thought—and on occasion and under their breath, not a
- few bitter words.
- </p>
- <p>
- Cormac O’Daly, whom all the elders remembered as a mere “pote” and man of
- business for the O’Mahonys, had suddenly in his old age blossomed forth as
- The O’Daly, and as master of Muirisc. Like many other changes which
- afflict human recollection, this had all come about by reason of a woman’s
- vain folly. Mrs. Fergus O’Mahony, having vainly cast alluring glances upon
- successive relays of mining contractors and superintendents, and of
- fish-buyers from Bristol and the Isle of Man, and even, in the later
- stages, upon a sergeant of police—had at last actually thrown
- herself in marriage at the grizzled head of the hereditary bard. It cannot
- be said that the announcement of this ill-assorted match had specially
- surprised the good people of Muirisc. They had always felt that Mrs.
- Fergus would ultimately triumph in her matrimonial resolutions, and the
- choice of O’Daly, though obviously enough a last resort, did not shock
- their placid minds. It was rather satisfactory than otherwise, when they
- came to think of it, that the arrangement should not involve the
- introduction of a stranger, perhaps even of an Englishman.
- </p>
- <p>
- But now, after nearly three years of this marriage, with a young O’Daly
- already big enough to walk by himself among the pigs and geese in the
- square—they said to themselves that even an Englishman would have
- been better, and they bracketed the connubial tendencies of Mrs. Fergus
- and the upstart ambition of Cormac under a common ban of curses.
- </p>
- <p>
- O’Daly had no sooner been installed in the castle than he had raised the
- rents. Back had come the odious charge for turf-cutting, the tax on the
- carrigeens and the tithe-levy upon the gathered kelp. In the best of times
- these impositions would have been sorely felt; the cruel failure of the
- potatoes in 1877 and ’78 had elevated them into the domain of the
- tragic.
- </p>
- <p>
- For the first time in its history Muirisc had witnessed evictions. Half
- way up the cliff stood the walls of four cottages, from which the thatched
- roofs had been torn by a sheriff’s posse of policeman during the bleakest
- month of winter. The gloomy spectacle, familiar enough elsewhere
- throughout Ireland, had still the fascination of novelty in the eyes of
- Muirisc. The villagers could not keep their gaze from those gaunt,
- deserted walls. Some of the evicted people—those who were too old or
- too young to get off to America and yet too hardy to die—still
- remained in the neighborhood, sleeping in the ditches and subsisting upon
- the poor charity of the cottagers roundabout. The sight of their skulking,
- half-clad forms and hunger-pinched faces filled Muirisc with wrathful
- humiliation.
- </p>
- <p>
- Almost worst still were the airs which latterly O’Daly had come to assume.
- Even if the evictions and the rack-renting could have been forgiven,
- Muirisc felt that his calling himself The O’Daly was unpardonable.
- Everybody in Ivehagh knew that the O’Dalys had been mere bards and singers
- for the McCarthys, the O’Mahonys, and other Eugenian houses, and had not
- been above taking service, later on, under the hatred Carews. That any
- scion of the sept should exalt himself now, in the shoes of an O’Mahony,
- was simply intolerable.
- </p>
- <p>
- In proportion as Cormac waxed in importance, his coadjutor Jerry had
- diminished. There was no longer any talk heard about Diarmid MacEgan; the
- very pigs in the street knew him now to be plain Jerry Higgins. Only the
- most shadowy pretense of authority to intermeddle in the affairs of the
- estate remained to him. Unlettered goodnature and loyalty had stood no
- chance whatever against the will and powers of the educated Cormac.
- Muirisc did indeed cherish a nebulous idea that some time or other the
- popular discontent would find him an effective champion, but Jerry did
- nothing whatever to encourage this hope. He had grown stout and red-faced
- through these unoccupied years, and lived by himself in a barely habitable
- nook among the ruins of the castle, overlooking the churchyard. Here he
- spent a great deal of his time, behind barred doors and denying himself to
- all visitors—and Muirisc had long since concluded that the companion
- of his solitude was a bottle.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve a word more to whisper into your ear, Higgins,” said O’Daly, this
- very evening, at the conclusion of some unimportant conversation about the
- mines.
- </p>
- <p>
- The supper had been cleared away, and a tray of glasses flanking a
- decanter stood on the table at which the speaker sat with his pipe. The
- buxom and rubicund Mrs. Fergus—for so Muirisc still thought and
- spoke of her—dozed comfortably in her arm-chair at one side of the
- bank of blazing peat on the hearth, an open novel turned down on her lap.
- Opposite her mother, Kate sat and sewed in silence, the while the men
- talked. It was the room in which The O’Mahony had eaten his first meal in
- Muirisc, twelve years before.
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘A word to whishper,’” repeated O’Daly, glancing at Jerry with severity
- from under his beetling black brows, and speaking so loudly that even Mrs.
- Sullivan in the kitchen might have heard—“times is that hard, and
- work so scarce, that bechune now and midsummer I’d have ye look about for
- a new place.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry stared across the table at his co-trustee in blank amazement. It was
- no surprise to him to be addressed in tones of harsh dislike by O’Daly, or
- to see his rightful claims to attention contemptuously ignored. But this
- sweeping suggestion took his breath away.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What place do ye mane?” he asked confusedly. “Where else in Muirisc c’u’d
- I live so aisily?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is not needful ye should live in Muirisc at all,” said O’Daly,
- with cold-blooded calmness. “Sure, ’t is manny years since ye were
- of anny service here. A lad at two shillings the week would more than
- replace ye. In these bad times, and worse cornin’, ’t is impossible
- ye should stay on here as ye’ve been doin’ these twelve years. I thought
- I’d tell ye in sayson, Higgins—not to take ye unawares.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Glory-be-to-the-world?” gasped Jerry, sitting upright in his chair, and
- staring open-eyed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is a dale of other alterations I have in me mind,” O’Daly went
- on, hurriedly. “Sure, things have stuck in the mire far too long, waiting
- for the comin’ to life of a dead man. ’T is to stir ’em up I
- will now, an’ no delay. Me step-daughter, there, takes the vail in a few
- days, an’ ’t is me intintion thin to rebuild large parts of the
- convint, an’ mek new rules for it whereby gerrels of me own family can be
- free to enter it as well as the O’Mahonys. For, sure, ’t is now
- well known an’ universally consaded that the O’Daly’s were the most
- intellectual an’ intelligent family in all the two Munsters, be rayson of
- which all the ignorant an’ uncultivated ruffians like the MacCarthys an’
- The O’Mahony’s used to be beseechin’ ’em to make verses and write
- books an’ divert ’em wid playin’ on the harp—an ’t is
- high time the O’Daly’s came into their own ag’in, the same that they’d
- never lost but for their wake good-nature in consintin’ to be bards on
- account of their supayrior education. Why, man,” the swart-visaged little
- lawyer went on, his black eyes snapping with excitement—“what d’ ye
- say to me great ancestor, Cuchonnacht O’Daly, called <i>na Sgoile</i>, or
- ‘of the school,’ who died at Clonard, rest his soul, Anno Domini 1139, the
- most celebrated pote of all Oireland? An’ do ye mind thim eight an’ twenty
- other O’Dalys in rigular descint who achaved distinction—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! If they were all such thieves of the earth as you are, the world’s
- d———d well rid of ’em!” burst in Jerry Higgins.
- </p>
- <p>
- He had sprung to his feet, and stood now hotfaced and with clenched fists,
- glaring down upon O’Daly.
- </p>
- <p>
- The latter pushed back his chair and instinctively raised an elbow to
- guard his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Have a care, Higgins!” he shouted out—“you’re in the presence of
- witnesses—I’m a p’aceable man—in me own domicile, too!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll ‘dommycille’ ye, ye blagyard!” Jerry snorted, throwing his burly
- form half over the table.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, thin, Jerry! Jerry!” A clear, bell-toned voice rang in his confused
- ears, and he felt the grasp of a vigorous hand upon his arm. “Is it mad ye
- are, Jerry, to think of striking the likes of him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate stood at his side. The mere touch of her hand on his sleeve would
- have sufficed for restraint, but she gripped his arm sharply, and turned
- upon him a gaze of stern reproval.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis elsewhere ye left your manners, Jerry!” she said, in a calm
- enough voice, though her bosom was heaving. “When our bards became
- insolent or turned rogues, they were sent outside to be beaten. ’T
- was niver done in the presence of ladies.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry’s puzzled look showed how utterly he failed to grasp her meaning.
- There was no such perplexity in O’Daly’s mind. He, too, had risen, and
- stood on the hearth beside his wife, who blinked vacuous inquiries
- sleepily at the various members of the group in turn.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And <i>we</i>,” he said, with nervous asperity, “when our children become
- impertinent, we trounce them off to their bed.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah-h! No child of yours, O’Daly!” the girl made scornful answer, in
- measured tones.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin,” the little man snarled, vehemently, “while ye’re under my
- roof, Miss O’Mahony, ye’ll heed what I say, an’ be ruled by ’t. An’
- now ye force me to ’t, mark this: I’ll have no more of your gaddin’
- about with that old bag-o’-bones of a Murphy. ’T is not dacint or
- fittin’ for a young lady—more especially when she’s to be a—wanderin’
- the Lord knows where, or—”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate broke in upon his harangue with shrill laughter, half hysterical.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it an O’Daly that I hear discoorsin’ on dacency to an O’Mahony!” she
- called out, ironically incredulous. “Well, thin—while that I’m under
- your roof—-”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! Who made it his roof?” demanded Jerry. “Shure, be the papers The
- O’Mahony wrote out wid his own hand for us—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t be interruptin’, Jerry!” said Kate, again with a restraining hand
- on his arm. “I say this, O’Daly: The time I stop under this roof will be
- just that while that it takes me to put on me hat. Not an instant longer
- will I stay.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She walked proudly erect to the chest in the corner, took up her hat and
- put it on her head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come now, Jerry,” she said, “I’ll walk wid you to me cousins, the Ladies
- of the Hostage’s Tears. ’T will be grand news to thim that the
- O’Dalys have come into <i>their own</i> ag’in!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Cormac O’Daly instinctively moved toward the door to bar her egress. Then
- a glance at Jerry’s heavy fists and angered face bred intuition of a
- different kind, and he stepped back again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mind, once for all! I’ll not have ye here ag’in—neither one or
- other of ye!” he shouted.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate disdained response by even so much as a look. She moved over to the
- arm-chair, and, stooping for an instant, lightly brushed with her lips the
- flattened crimps which adorned the maternal forehead. Then, with head high
- in air and a tread of exaggerated stateliness, she led the way for Jerry
- out of the room and the house.
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Fergus heard the front door close with a resounding clang, and the
- noise definitely awakened her. She put up a correcting hand, and passed it
- over her front hair. Then she yawned meditatively at the fire, and,
- lifting the steaming kettle from the crane, filled one of the glasses on
- the tray with hot water. Then she permitted herself a drowsy halfsmile at
- the disordered appearance presented by her infuriated spouse.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin, ’tis not in Mother Agnes O’Mahony’s shoes I’m wishin’
- myself!” she said, upon reflection. “It’s right ye are to build thick new
- walls to the convint. They’ll be needed, wid that girl inside!”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XIX—A BARGAIN WITH THE BURIED MAN.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>hough by daylight
- there seemed to lie but a step of space between the ruined Castle of
- Muirisc and the portal of the Convent of the Hostage’s Tears, it was
- different under the soft, starlit sky of this April evening. The way was
- long enough, at all events, for the exchange of many views between Kate
- and Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis flat robbery he manes, Jerry,” the girl said, as the revolted
- twain passed out together under the gateway. “With me safe in the convint,
- sure he’s free to take everything for his son—me little stepbrother—an’
- thin there’s an ind to the O’Mahony’s, here where they’ve been lords of
- the coast an’ the mountains an’ the castles since before St. Patrick’s
- time—an’, luk ye! an O’Daly comes on! I’m fit to tear out me eyes to
- keep them from the sight!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But, Miss Katie,” put in Jerry, eagerly, “I’ve a thought in me head—egor!
- The O’Mahony himself put writin’ to paper, statin’ how every blessed thing
- was to be yours, the day he sailed away. Sure ’twas meself was
- witness to that same, along wid O’Daly an’ your mother an’ the nuns.
- To-morrow I’ll have the law on him!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, Jerry,” the girl sighed and shook her head; “ye’ve a good heart, but
- it’s only grief ye’ll get tryin’ to match your wits against O’Daly’s. What
- do <i>you</i> know about papers an’ documents, an’ the like of that,
- compared wid him? Why, man, he’s an attorney himself! ’T is thim
- that putts the law on other people—worse luck!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ him that usen’t to have a word for anny-thing but the praises of The
- O’Mahonys!” exclaimed Jerry, lost once more in surprise at the scope of
- O’Daly’s ambitions.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I, for one, never thrusted him!” said Kate, with emphasis. “’T was
- not in nature that anny man could be that humble an’ devoted to a family
- that wasn’t his own, as he pretinded.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Weil, I dunno,” began Jerry, hesitatingly; “’t is my belafe he
- mint honest enough, till that boy o’ his was born. A childless man is wan
- thing, an’ a father’s another. ’T is that boy that’s turnin’
- O’Daly’s head.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate’s present mood was intolerant of philosophy. “Faith, Jerry,” she
- said, with sharpness, “’t is <i>my</i> belafe that if wan was to
- abuse the divil in your hearin’, you’d say: ‘At anny rate, he has a fine,
- grand tail.’”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry’s round face beamed in the vague starlight with a momentary smile.
- “Ah, thin, Miss Katie!” he said, in gentle deprecation. Then, as upon a
- hasty afterthought: “Egor! I’ll talk with Father Jago.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ye’ll do nothing of the kind!” Kate commanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He’s a young man, an’ he’s not Muirisc born, an’ he’s O’Daly’s fri’nd,
- naturally enough, an’ he’s the chaplain of the convint. Sure, with half an
- eye, ye can see that O’Daly’s got the convint on his side. My taking the
- vail will profit thim, as well as him. Sure, that’s the point of it all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thin why not putt yer fut down,” asked Jerry, “an’ say ye’ll tek no vail
- at all?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I gave me word,” she answered, simply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But aisy enough—ye can say as Mickey Dugan did on the gallus, to
- the hangman: ‘Egor!’ said he, ‘I’ve changed my mind.’”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We don’t be changin’ <i>our</i> minds!” said Kate, with proud brevity;
- and thereupon she ran up the convent steps, and, after a little space,
- filled with the sound of jangling bells and the rattle of bars and chains,
- disappeared.
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry pursued the small remnant of his homeward course in a deep, brown
- study. He entered his abode by the churchyard postern, bolted the door
- behind him and lighted a lamp, still in an absent-minded way. Such
- flickering rays as pierced the smoky chimney cast feeble illumination upon
- a sort of castellated hovel—a high, stone-walled room with arched
- doorways and stately, vaulted ceiling above, but with the rude furniture
- and squalid disorder of a laborer’s cottage below.
- </p>
- <p>
- But another idea did occur to him while he sat on the side of his bed,
- vacantly staring at the floor—an idea which set his shrewd, brown
- eyes aglow. He rose hastily, took a lantern down from a nail on the
- whitewashed wall and lighted it. Then with a key from his pocket, he
- unlocked a door at the farther end of the room, behind the bed, and passed
- through the open passage, with a springing step, into the darkness of a
- low, stone-walled corridor.
- </p>
- <p>
- The staircase down which we saw the guns and powder carried in secrecy, on
- that February night in 1867, led Jerry to the concealed doorway in the
- rounded wall which had been discovered. He applied the needful trick to
- open this door; then carefully closed it behind him, and made his way,
- crouching and stealthily, through the passage to the door at its end. This
- he opened with another key and entered abruptly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God save all here!” he called out upon the threshold, in the
- half-jesting, half-sincere tone of one who, using an ancient formula at
- the outset by way of irony, grows to feel that he means what it says.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God save you kindly!” was the prompt response, in a thin, strangely
- vibrant voice: and on the instant the speaker came forward into firelight.
- </p>
- <p>
- He was a slender man of middle age, with a pale, spectacled face, framed
- by a veritable mane of dingy reddish hair thrown back from temples and
- brow. This brow, thus bared, was broad and thoughtful besides being
- wonderfully white, and, with the calm gray eyes, which shone steadily
- through the glasses, seemed to constitute practically the whole face.
- There were, one noted at a second glance, other portions of this face—a
- weak, pointed nose, for example, and a mouth and chin hidden under
- irregular outlines of straggling beard; but the brow and the eyes were
- what the gaze returned to. The man wore a loose, nondescript sort of gown,
- gathered at the waist with a cord. Save for a table against the wall,
- littered with papers and writing materials and lighted by a lamp in a
- bracket above, the chamber differed in little from its appearance on that
- memorable night when the dead monk’s sleep of centuries had been so rudely
- broken in upon.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m glad ye’ve come down ag’in to-day,” said the man of the brow and
- eyes. “Since this mornin’, I’ve traced out the idintity of Finghin—the
- one wid the brain-ball I told ye of—as clear as daylight. Not a
- man-jack of ’em but ’ll see it now like the nose on their
- face.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, thin, that’s a mercy,” said Jerry, seating himself tentatively on a
- corner of the table. “Egor! It looked at one toime there as if his
- identity was gone to the divil intoirely. But l’ave you to smoke him out!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It can be proved that this Finghin is wan an’ the same wid the so-called
- Fiachan Roe, who married the widow of the O’Dubhagain, in the elevinth
- cintury.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, there ye have it!” said Jerry, shaking his head dejectedly. “He <i>wud</i>
- marry a widdeh, w’u’d he? Thin, be me sowl, ’tis a marvel to grace
- he had anny idint—whatever ye call it—left at all. Well, sir,
- to tell ye the truth, ’tis disappointed I am in Finghin. I credited
- him with more sinse than to be marryin’ widdehs. An’ I suppose ye’ll l’ave
- him out of your book altogether now. Egor, an’ serve him right, too!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The other smiled; a wan and fleeting smile of the eyes and brow.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, don’t be talkin!” he said, pleasantly, and then added, with a sigh:
- “More like he’ll l’ave <i>me</i>, wid me work undone. You’ll bear me
- witness, sir, that I’ve been patient, an’ thried me best to live continted
- here in this cave of the earth, an’ busy me mind wid work; but no man can
- master his drames. ’Tis that that’s killin’ me. Every night, the
- moment I’m asleep, faith, I’m out in the meadehs, wid flowers on the
- ditches an’ birds singin’, an’ me fishin’ in the brook, like I was a boy
- ag’in; an’ whin I wake up, me heart’s broke intirely! I tell ye, man, if
- ’t wasn’t for me book here, I’d go outside in spite of ’em
- all, an’ let ’em hang me, if they like—jist for wan luk at
- the sky an’ wan breath of fresh air.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry swung his legs nonchalantly, but there was a new speculation
- twinkling in his eyes as he regarded his companion.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, it won’t be long now, Major Lynch,” he said, consolingly. “An’ have
- ye much more to state in your book?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All the translatin’ was finished long since, but <i>‘t</i> is comparin’
- the various books together I am, an’ that takes a dale o’ time. There’s
- the psalter o’ Timoleague Abbey, an’ the psalter o’ Sherkin, an’ the book
- o’ St. Kian o’ Cape Clear, besides all the riccords of Muirisc that lay
- loose in the chest. Yet I’m far from complainin’. God knows what I’d a’
- done without ’em.”
- </p>
- <p>
- There are many marvels in Irish archaeology. Perhaps the most wonderful of
- all is the controlling and consuming spell it had cast over Linksy, making
- it not only possible for him to live twelve years in an underground
- dungeon, fairly contented, and undoubtedly occupied, but lifting him
- bodily out of his former mental state and up into an atmosphere of
- scholarly absorption and exclusively intellectual exertion. He had entered
- upon this long imprisonment with only an ordinary high-school education,
- and no special interest in or bent toward books. By the merest chance he
- happened to have learned to speak Irish, as a boy, and, later, to have
- been taught the written alphabet of the language. His first days of
- solitude in the subterranean chamber, after his recovery from the terrible
- blow on the head, had been whiled away by glancing over the curious
- parchment writings and volumes in the chest. Then, to kill time, he had
- essayed to translate one of the manuscripts, and Jerry had obligingly
- furnished him with paper, pens and ink. To have laboriously traced out the
- doubtful thread of continuity running through the confused and legendary
- pedigrees of the fierce Eugenian septs, to have lived for twelve long
- years buried in ancient Munster genealogies, wearing the eyesight out in
- waking hours upon archaic manuscripts, and dreaming by night of still more
- undecipherable parchment chronicles, may well seem to us, who are out in
- the busy noonday of the world, a colossal waste of time. No publisher
- alive would have thought for a moment of printing Linsky’s compilations at
- his own risk, and probably not more than twenty people would have
- regretted his refusal the whole world over. But this consideration has
- never operated yet to prevent archaeologists from devoting their time and
- energies and fortunes to works which nobody on earth is going to read,
- much less publish; Jerry was still contemplating Linsky with a grave new
- interest.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ye’ve changed that much since—since ye came down here for your
- health. ’Tis my belafe not a mother’s son of ’em ’u’d
- recognize ye up above,” he said, reflectively.
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky spoke with eagerness:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Man alive! I’m jist dyin’ to make the attimpt!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What—an’ turn yer back on all these foine riccords an’ statements
- that <i>ye’ve</i> kept yer hand to so long?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The other’s face fell.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, I c’u’d come down ag’in,” Linsky said, hesitatingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’ll see; we’ll see,” remarked Jerry. Then, in a careless manner, as if
- he had not had this chiefly in mind from the beginning, he asked: “Usen’t
- ye to be tellin’ me ye were a kind of an attorney, Major Lynch?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I was articled to an attorney, wance upon a time, but I’d no time to
- sthick to it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But ye’d know how to hev the law on a man, if he was yer inemy?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Some of it is in me mind still, maybe,” replied Linsky, not with much
- confidence.
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry sprang lightly down from the table, walked over to the fire, and
- stood with his back to it, his legs wide apart and his thumbs in his
- waistcoat armholes, as he had seen The O’Mahony bear himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, Linsky, I’ve a bargain to offer ye,” he said, bluntly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky stared in wild-eyed amazement. He had not heard the sound of this
- name of his for years.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What—what was that name ye called?” he asked, with a faltering
- voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, it’s all right,” remarked Jerry, with assurance. “Faith, I knew ye
- wor Linsky from the beginning. An’ bechune ourselves, that’s but a drop in
- the bucket to the rest I know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky’s surprise paralyzed his tongue. He could only pluck nervously at
- the cord about his waist and gaze in confusion at his jailer-friend.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You believed all this time that ye were hid away down here by your
- fri’nds, to save ye from the poliss, who were scourin’ the counthry to
- arrest Fenians. Am I right?” Jerry asked, with a dawning smile on his red
- face.
- </p>
- <p>
- The other nodded mechanically, still incomplete mystification.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ you all the time besachin’ to go out an’ take yer chances, an’ me
- forever tellin’ ye ’twould be the ruin of the whole thund’rin’
- Brotherhood if ye were caught?” Jerry continued, the smile ripening as he
- went on.
- </p>
- <p>
- Again Linsky’s answer was a puzzled nod of acquiescence.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin, there’s no Brotherhood left at all, an’ ’t is manny
- years since the poliss in these parts had so much as a drame of you or of
- anny Fenian under the sun.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But why,” stammered Linsky, at last finding voice—“why—thin—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why are ye here?” Jerry amiably asked the question for him. “Only a small
- matther of discipline, as his reverence w’u’d say, when he ordered peas in
- our boots. To be open an’ above-board wid ye, man, ye were caught
- attimptin’ to hand over the lot of us to the sojers, that day we tried to
- take the fort. ’T is the gallus we might ’a’ got by rayson
- of your informin’. Do ye deny that same?” Linsky made no answer, but he
- looked now at the floor instead of at Jerry. In truth, he had been so long
- immured, confronted daily with the pretense that he was being hidden
- beyond the reach of the castle’s myrmidons, that this sudden resurrection
- of the truth about his connection with Fenianism seemed almost to refer to
- somebody else.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin,” pursued Jerry, taking instant advantage of the other’s
- confusion, “egor, ’t was as a traitor ye were tried an’ condimned
- an’ sintenced, while ye lay, sinseless wid that whack on the head. There
- wor thim that w’u’d—uv—uv—well, not seen ye wake this
- side of purgatory, or wherever else ye had yer ticket for. But there was
- wan man that saved yer life from the rest—and he said: ‘No, don’t
- kill him, an’ don’t bate him or lay a finger to him, an’ I’ll be at the
- expinse of keepin’ him in a fine, grand place by himsilf, wid food of the
- best, an’ whishky aich day, an’ books an’ writin’s to improve his
- learnin’, an’ no work to do, an’ maybe, be the grace o’ God, he’ll come to
- think rightly about it all, an’ be ashamed of himsilf an’ his dirty
- doin’s, an be fit ag’in to come out an’ hold up his head amongst honest
- min.’ That’s the m’anin’ of what he said, an’ I’m the man he said it to—an’
- that’s why I’m here now, callin’ ye by yer right name, an’ tellin’ ye the
- thruth.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky hesitated for a minute or two, with downcast gaze and fingers
- fidgeting at the ends of his waist-cord. Then he lifted his face, which
- more than ever seemed all brow and eyes, and looked frankly at Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What ye say is a surprise to me,” he began, choosing his words as he
- went. “Ye never let on what your thoughts were concernin’ me, an’ I grew
- to forget how it was I came. But now you spake of it, sure ’tis the
- same to me as if I’d niver been thinkin’ of anything else. Oh, thin, tell
- that man who spoke up for me, whoever he may be, that I’ve no word but
- praise for him. ’T was a poor divil of a wake fool he saved the
- life of.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wid a mixin’ of rogue as well,” put in Jerry, by way of conscientious
- parenthesis.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis the same thing—the worst fool is the rogue; but I tuk
- to ’t to keep soul an’ body together. Sure, I got into throuble in
- Cork, as manny another boy did before me, an’ fled to Ameriky, an’ there I
- listed, an’ came in at the tail of the war, an’ was shot down an’ robbed
- where I lay, an’ was in the hospital for months; an’ whin I came out divil
- a thing was there for me to putt me hand to; an’ the Fenians was started,
- an’ I j’ined ’em. An’ there was a man I knew who made a livin’ be
- sellin’ information of what winton, an’ the same offer came to me through
- him—an’ me starvin’; an’ that’s the way of it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ a notorious bad way, at that!” said Jerry, sternly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m of that same opinion,” Linsky went on, in all meakness. “Don’t think
- I’m defindin’ meself. But I declare to ye, whin I look back on it, ’t
- is not like it was meself at all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ay, there ye have it!” exclaimed Jerry. “Luk now! Min do be changin’ and
- alterin’ all the while. I know a man—an old man—who used to be
- honest an’ fair-spoken, an’ that devoted to a certain family, egor, he’d
- laid down his life for ’em; an’ now, be rayson that he’s married a
- widdeh, an’ got a boy of his own, what did he but turn rogue an’ lie awake
- nights schamin’ to rob that same family! ’Tis that way we are! An’
- so wid you, Linsky, ’tis my belafe that ye began badly, an’ that
- ye’re minded to ind well. Ye’re not the man ye were at all. ’T is
- part by rayson, I think, of your studyin’ in thim holy books, an’ part,
- too,” his eyes twinkled as he added, “be rayson of enjoyin’ my society
- every day.” Linsky passed the humorous suggestion by unheeded, his every
- perception concentrated upon the tremendous possibility which had with
- such strange suddenness opened before him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ what is it ye have in mind?” he asked breathlessly. “There was word
- of a bargain.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis this,” explained Jerry: “An old thief of the earth—him
- I spoke of that married the widdeh—is for robbin’ an’ plunderin’ the
- man that saved your life. There’s more to the tale than I’m tellin’ ye,
- but that’s the way of it; an’ I’ll die for it but I’ll prevint him; an’ ’t
- is beyant my poor wits to do that same; an’ so ’t is your help I’m
- needin’. An’ there ye have it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The situation thus outlined did not meet the full measure of Linsky’s
- expectations. His face fell.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure ye might have had me advice in anny case,” he said “if that’s all it
- comes to; but I thought I was goin’ out.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ why not?” answered Jerry. “Who’s stop-pin’ ye but me, an’ me needin’
- ye outside?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky’s eyes glowed radiantly through their glasses.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, but I’ll come!” he exclaimed. “An’ whatever ye bid me that I’ll do!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, but,” Jerry shook his head dubiously, “’t is you that must be
- biddin’ <i>me</i> what to do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “To the best of me power that I’ll do, too,” the other affirmed; and the
- two men shook hands.
- </p>
- <p>
- “On to-morrow I’ll get clothes for ye at Bantry,” Jerry said, an hour
- later, at the end of the conference they had been holding, “an’ nixt day
- we’ll inthroduce ye to daylight an’ to—O’Daly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XX—NEAR THE SUMMIT OF MT. GABRIEL.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">A</span> vast sunlit
- landscape under a smiling April sky—a landscape beyond the uses of
- mere painters with their tubes and brushes and camp-stools, where leagues
- of mountain ranges melted away into the shimmering haze of distance, and
- where the myriad armlets of the blue Atlantic in view, winding themselves
- about their lovers, the headlands, and placidly nursing their children,
- the islands, marked as on a map the coastwise journeys of a month—stretched
- itself out before the gaze of young Bernard O’Mahony, of Houghton County,
- Michigan—and was scarcely thanked for its pains.
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man had completed four-fifths of the ascent of Mount Gabriel,
- from the Dunmanus side, and sat now on a moss-capped boulder, nominally
- meditating upon the splendors of the panorama spread out before him, but
- in truth thinking deeply of other things. He had not brought a gun, this
- time, but had in his hand a small, brand-new hammer, with which, from time
- to time, to point the shifting phases of his reverie, he idly tapped the
- upturned sole of the foot resting on his knee.
- </p>
- <p>
- From this coign of vantage he could make out the white walls and thatches
- of at least a dozen hamlets, scattered over the space of thrice as many
- miles. Such of these as stood inland he did not observe a second time.
- There were others, more distant, which lay close to the bay, and these he
- studied intently as he mused, his eyes roaming along the coast-line from
- one to another in baffled perplexity. There was nothing obscure, about
- them, so far as his vision went. Everything—the innumerable
- croft-walls dividing the wretched land below him into holdings; the dark
- umber patches where the bog had been cut; the serried layers of gray rock
- sloping transversely down the mountain-side, each with its crown of
- canary-blossomed furze; the wide stretches of desolate plain beyond, where
- no human habitation could be seen, yet where he knew thousands of poor
- creatures lived, all the same, in moss-hidden hovels in the nooks of the
- rocks; the pale sheen on the sea still further away, as it slept in the
- sunlight at the feet of the cliffs—everything was as sharp and
- distinct as the picture in a telescope.
- </p>
- <p>
- But all this did not help him to guess where the young woman in the broad,
- black hat lived.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard had thought a great deal about this young woman during the
- forty-eight hours which had elapsed since she stood up in the boat and
- waved her hand to him in farewell. In a guarded way he had made some
- inquiries at Goleen, where he was for the moment domiciled, but only to
- learn that people on the east side of the peninsula are conscious of no
- interest whatever in the people reputed to live on the west side. They are
- six or eight Irish miles apart, and there is high land between them. No
- one in Goleen could tell him anything about a beautiful dark young woman
- with a broad, black hat. He felt that they did not even properly imagine
- to themselves what he meant. In Goleen the young women are not beautiful,
- and they wear shawls on their heads, not hats.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he had conceived the idea of investigating the west shore for
- himself. On the map in his guide-book this seemed a simple enough
- undertaking, but now, as he let his gaze wander again along the vast
- expanse of ragged and twisted coast-line, he saw that it would mean the
- work of many days.
- </p>
- <p>
- And then—then he saw something else—a vision which fairly took
- his breath away.
- </p>
- <p>
- Along the furze-hedge road which wound its way up the mountain-side from
- Dunmanus and the south, two human figures were moving toward him, slowly,
- and still at a considerable distance. One of these figures was that of a
- woman, and—yes, it was a woman!—and she wore, a hat—as
- like as could be to that broad-brimmed, black hat he had been dreaming of.
- Bernard permitted himself no doubts. He was of the age of miracles. Of
- course it was <i>she!</i>
- </p>
- <p>
- Without a moment’s hesitation he slid down off his rocky perch and seated
- himself behind a clump of furze. It would be time enough to disclose his
- presence—if, indeed he did at all—when she had come up to him.
- </p>
- <p>
- No such temptation to secrecy besets us. We may freely hasten down the
- mountain-side to where Kate, walking slowly and pausing from time to time
- to look back upon the broadening sweep of land and sea below her, was
- making the ascent of Mount Gabriel.
- </p>
- <p>
- Poor old Murphy had been left behind, much against his will, to nurse and
- bemoan his swollen ankle. The companion this time was a younger brother of
- the missing Malachy, a lumpish, silent “boy” of twenty-five or six, who
- slouched along a few paces behind his mistress and bore the luncheon
- basket. This young man was known to all Muirisc as John Pat, which was by
- way of distinguishing him from the other Johns who were not also Patricks.
- As it was now well on toward nine centuries since the good Brian Boru
- ordained that every Irishman should have a surname, the presumption is
- that John Pat did possess such a thing, but feudal Muirisc never dreamed
- of suggesting its common use. This surname had been heard at his baptism;
- it might be mentioned again upon the occasion of his marriage, though his
- wife would certainly be spoken of as Mrs. John Pat, and in the end, if he
- died at Muirisc, the surname would be painted in white letters on the
- black wooden cross set over his grave. For all the rest he was just John
- Pat.
- </p>
- <p>
- And mediaeval Muirisc, too, could never have dreamed that his age and sex
- might be thought by outsiders to render him an unsuitable companion for
- Miss Kate in her wanderings over the countryside. In their eyes, and in
- his own, he was a mere boy, whose mission was to run errands, carry
- bundles or do whatever else the people of the castle bade him do; in
- return for which they, in one way or another, looked to it that he
- continued to live, and even on occasion, gave him an odd shilling or two.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look, now, John Pat,” said Kate, halting once more to look back; “there’s
- Dunbeacon and Dun-manus and Muirisc beyant, and, may be if it wasn’t so
- far, we could see the Three Castles, too; and whin we’re at the top, we
- should be able to see Rosbrin and the White Castle and the Black Castle
- and the strand over which Ballydesmond stood, on the other side, as well.
- ’Tis my belafe no other family in the world can stand and look down
- on sevin of their castles at one view.”
- </p>
- <p>
- John Pat looked dutifully along the coast-line as her gesture commanded,
- and changed his basket into the other hand, but offered no comment.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And there, across the bay,” the girl went on, “is the land that’s marked
- on the Four Masters’ map for the O’Dalys. Ye were there many’ times, John
- Pat, after crabs and the like. Tell me, now, did ever you or anny one else
- hear of a castle built there be the O’Dalys?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sorra a wan, Miss Katie.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There you have it! My word, the impidince of thim O’Dalys—strolling
- beggars, and hedge teachers, and singers of ballads be the wayside! ’Tis
- in the books, John Pat, that wance there was a king of Ireland named Hugh
- Dubh—Hugh the Black—and these bards so perplexed and brothered
- the soul out of him wid claims for money and fine clothes and the best
- places at the table, and kept the land in such a turmoil by rayson of the
- scurrilous verses they wrote about thim that gave thim less than their
- demands—that Hugh, glory be to him, swore not a man of ’em
- should remain in all Ireland. ‘Out ye go,’ says he. But thin they raised
- such a cry, that a wake, kindly man—St. Columbkill that was to be—tuk
- pity on ’em, and interceded wid the king, and so, worse luck, they
- kept their place. Ah, thin, if Hugh Dugh had had his way wid ’em ’t
- would be a different kind of Ireland we’d see this day!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, this Hugh Dove, as you call him”—spoke up a clear,
- fresh-toned male voice, which was not John Pat’s—“even he couldn’t
- have wanted a prettier Ireland than this is, right here in front of us!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate, in vast surprise, turned at the very first sound of this strange
- voice. A young man had risen to his feet from behind the furze hedge,
- close beside her, his rosy-cheeked face wreathed in amiable smiles. She
- recognized the wandering O’Ma-hony from Houghton County, Michigan, and
- softened the rigid lines into which her face had been startled, as a token
- of friendly recognition.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good morning,” the young man added, as a ceremonious afterthought. “Isn’t
- it a lovely day?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You seem to be viewing our country hereabouts wid great complateness,”
- commented Kate, with a half-smile, not wholly free from irony. There
- really was no reason for suspecting the accidental character of the
- encounter, save the self-conscious and confident manner in which the young
- man had, on the instant, attached himself to her expedition. Even as she
- spoke, he was walking along at her side.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes,” he answered, cheerfully, “I’m mixing up business and pleasure,
- don’t you see, all the while I’m here—and really they get so tangled
- up together every once in a while, that I can’t tell which is which. But
- just at this moment—there’s no doubt about it whatever—pleasure
- is right bang-up on top.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It <i>is</i> a fine, grand day,” said Kate, with a shade of reserve. The
- frankly florid compliment of the Occident was novel to her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, simply wonderful weather,” he pursued. “Only April, and here’s the
- skin all peeling off from my nose.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate could not but in courtesy look at this afflicted feature. It was a
- short good-humored nose, with just the faintest and kindliest suggestion
- of an upward tilt at the end. One should not be too serious with the owner
- of such a nose.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You have business here, thin?” she asked. “I thought you were looking at
- castles—and shooting herons.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He gave a little laugh, and held up his hammer as a voucher.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m a mining engineer,” he explained: “I’ve been prospecting for a
- company all around Cappagh and the Mizzen Head, and now I’m waiting to
- hear from London what the assays are like. Oh, yes—that reminds me—I
- ought to have asked before—how is the old man—the chap we had
- to carry to the boat? I hope his ankle’s better.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is, thank you,” she replied.
- </p>
- <p>
- He chuckled aloud at the recollections which the subject suggested.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He soured on me, right from the start, didn’t hee?” the young man went
- on. “I’ve laughed a hundred times since, at the way he chiseled me out of
- my place in the boat—that is to say, <i>some</i> of the time I’ve
- laughed—but—but then lots of other times I couldn’t see any
- fun in it at all. Do you know,” he continued, almost dolefully, “I’ve been
- hunting all over the place for you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve nothing to do wid the minerals on our lands,” Kate answered. “’T
- is a thrushtee attinds to all that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Pshaw! I didn’t want to talk minerals to <i>you</i>.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And what thin?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well—since you put it so straight—why—why, of course—I
- wanted to ask you more about our people, about the O’Mahonys. You seemed
- to be pretty well up on the thing. You see, my father died seven or eight
- years ago, so that I was too young to talk to him much about where he came
- from, and all that. And my mother, her people were from a different part
- of Ireland, and so, you see—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, there’s not much to tell now,” said Kate, in a saddened tone. “They
- were a great family once, and now are nothing at all, wid poor me as the
- last of the lot.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t call that ‘nothing at all,’ by a jugful,” protested Bernard, with
- conviction.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate permitted herself a brief cousinly smile.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All the same, they end with me, and afther me comes in the O’Dalys.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Lines of thought raised themselves on the young man’s forehead and ran
- down to the sunburnt nose.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How do you mean?” he asked, dubiously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Are you—don’t mind my asking—are you going to marry one of
- that name?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She shrugged her shoulders, to express repugnance at the very thought.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll marry no one; laste of all an O’Daly,” she said, firmly. Then, after
- a moment’s hesitation, she decided upon a further explanation. “I’m goin’
- to take me vows at the convint within the month,” she added.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard stared open-eyed at her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I-gad!” was all he said.
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl’s face lightened at the sound of this exclamation, bringing back
- as it did a flood of welcome memories.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I know you by that word for a true O’Mahony,—‘an American
- O’Mahoney,” she said, with eager pleasure beaming in her deep-gray eyes.
- She turned to her retainer: “You remimber that same word, John Pat. Who
- was it used always to be saying ‘I-gad?’”
- </p>
- <p>
- John Pat searched the landscape with a vacuous glance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “W’u’d it be Father Harrington?” he asked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Huh!” sniffed Kate, in light contempt, and turned again to the young
- engineer, with a backward nod toward John Pat. “He’s an honest lad,” she
- said, apologetically, “but the Lord only knows what’s inside of his head.
- Ah, sir, there <i>was</i> an O’Mahony here—‘tis twelve years now
- since he sailed away; ah, the longest day Muirisc stands she ’ll
- not see such another man—bold and fine, wid a heart in him like a
- lion, and yit soft and tinder to thim he liked, and a janius for war and
- commence and government that made Muirisc blossom like a rose. Ah, a grand
- man was our O’Mahony!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “So you live at Muirisc, eh?” asked the practical Bernard.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T was him used always to say ‘I-gad!’ whin things took him by
- surprise,” remarked Kate, turning to study the vast downward view
- attentively.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well I said it because <i>I</i> was taken by surprise,” said the young
- man. “What else could a fellow say, with such a piece of news as that
- dumped down on him? But say, you don’t mean it, do you—<i>you</i>
- going to be a nun?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She looked at him through luminous eyes, and nodded a grave affirmative.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard walked for a little way in silence, moodily eying the hammer in
- his hand. Once or twice he looked up at his companion as if to speak, then
- cast down his eyes again. At last, after he had helped her to cross a low,
- marshy stretch at the base of a ridge of gray rock, and to climb to the
- top of the boulder—for they had left the road now and were making
- their way obliquely up the barren crest—he found words to utter.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You don’t mind my coming along with you,” he asked, “under the
- circumstances?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t see how I’m to prevint you, especially wid you armed wid a
- hammer,” she said, in gentle banter.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And I can ask you a plain question without offending you?” he went on;
- and then, without waiting for an answer, put his question: “It’s just this—I’ve
- only seen you twice, it’s true, but I feel as if I’d known you for years,
- and, besides, we’re kind of relations—are you going to do this of
- your own free will?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate, for answer, lifted her hand and pointed westward toward the
- pale-blue band along the distant coast-line.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That castle you see yonder at the bridge—” she said, “’t was
- there that Finghin, son of Diarmid Mor O’Mahony, bate the MacCarthys wid
- great slaughter, in Anno Domini 1319.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXI—ON THE MOUNTAIN-TOP—AND AFTER.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he two young
- people, with John Pat and the basket close behind, stood at last upon the
- very summit of Gabriel—a wild and desolate jumble of naked rocks
- piled helter-skelter about them, and at their feet a strange, little,
- circular lake, which in all the ages had mirrored no tree or flowering
- rush or green thing whatsoever, but knew only of the clouds and of the
- lightning’s play and of the gathering of the storm-demons for descent upon
- the homes of men.
- </p>
- <p>
- A solemn place is a mountain-top. The thin, spiritualized air is all alive
- with mysteries, which, down below in the sordid atmosphere, visit only the
- brains of men whom we lock up as mad. The drying-up of the great
- globe-floods; the slow birth of vegetation; the rank growth of uncouth
- monsters; the coming of the fleet-footed, bare-skinned savage beast called
- man; the primeval aeons of warfare wherein knowledge of fire, of metals,
- of tanned hides and habitations was laboriously developed and the huger
- reptiles were destroyed; the dawn of history through the clouds of sun and
- serpent worship; the weary ages of brutish raids and massacres, of
- barbaric creeds and cruel lusts—all this the mountain-tops have
- stood still and watched, and, so far as in them lay, understood.
- </p>
- <p>
- Some have comprehended more of what they saw than others. The tallest man
- is not necessarily the wisest. So there are very lofty mountains which
- remain stupid, despite their advantages, and there are relatively small
- mountains which have come to be almost human in their understanding of and
- sympathy with the world-long drama they have watched unfolding itself. The
- Brocken, for example, is scarcely nipple-high to many another of its
- German brethren, yet which of the rest has such rich memories, stretching
- back through countless centuries of Teuton, Slav, Alemanni, Suevi, Frank
- and Celt to the days when nomad strove with troglodyte, and the great
- cave-bear grappled with the mammoth in the silent fastnesses of the Harz.
- </p>
- <p>
- In Desmond, the broad-based, conical Gabriel has as unique a character of
- another kind. There is nothing of the frank and homely German familiarity
- in the reputation it enjoys at home. To be sure, the mountain is scarred
- to the throat by bogcutters; cabins and the ruins of cabins lurk hidden in
- clefts of rocks more than half-way up its gray, furze-clad sides; yet it
- produces the effect of standing sternly aloof from human things. The
- peasants think of it as a sacred eminence. It has its very name from the
- legend of the archangel, who flying across Europe in disgust at man’s
- iniquities, could not resist the temptation to descend for a moment to
- touch with his foot this beautiful mountain gem in the crown of Carbery.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate explained this legend to her young companion from Houghton County,
- and showed him the marks of the celestial visitor’s foot plainly visible
- in the rock. He bestowed such critical, not to say professional, scrutiny
- upon these marks that she made haste to take up another branch of the
- ancient fable.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And this little round lake here,” she went on, “they’ll all tell you ’t
- was made by bodily lifting out a great cylinder of rock and carting it
- miles through the air and putting it down in the sea out there, where it’s
- ever since been known as Fasnet Rock. They say the measurements are
- precisely the same. I forget now if ’t was the Archangel Gabriel
- did that, too, or the divil.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The result comes to about the same thing,” commented the engineer.
- “Whoever did it,” he went on, scanning the regularly rounded sides of the
- pool, “made a good workmanlike job of it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No one’s ever been able to touch the bottom of it,” said Kate, with
- pride.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, come, now—I’ve heard that of every second lake in Ireland.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well—certainly <i>I’ve</i> not tested it,” she replied, frostily,
- “but ’t is well known that if you sink a bottle in this lake ’t
- will be found out there in Dun-manus Bay fourteen hundred feet below us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, the very first principle of hydrostatics,” began Bernard, with
- controversial eagerness. Then he stopped short, stroked his smooth chin,
- and changed the subject abruptly. “Speaking of bottles,” he said, “I see
- your man there is eying that lunch basket with the expression of a
- meat-axe. Wouldn’t it be a clever idea to let him unpack it?” The while
- John Pat stripped the basket of its contents, and spread them upon a cloth
- in the mossy shadow of an overhanging boulder, the two by a common impulse
- strolled over to the eastern edge of the summit.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Beyond Roaring Water Bay the O’Driscoll Castles begin,” said Kate. “They
- tell me they’re poor trifles compared wid ours.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I like to hear you say ‘ours,’” the young man broke in. “I want you to
- keep right on remembering all the while that I belong to the family. And—and
- I wish to heaven there was something I could do to show how tickled to
- death I am that I do belong to it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I have never been here before,” Kate said, in a musing tone, which
- carried in it a gentle apology for abstraction. “I did not know there was
- anything so big and splendid in the world.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The spell of this mighty spectacle at once enchanted and oppressed her.
- She stood gazing down upon it for some minutes, holding up her hand as a
- plea for silence when her companion would have spoken. Then, with a
- lingering sigh, she turned away and led the slow walk back toward the
- lake.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Twas like dreaming,” she said with gravity; “and a strange
- thought came to me: ’Twas that this lovely Ireland I looked down
- upon was beautiful with the beauty of death; that ’twas the corpse
- of me country I was taking a last view of. Don’t laugh at me! I had just
- that feeling. Ah, poor, poor Ireland!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard saw tears glistening upon her long, black lashes, and scarcely
- knew his own voice when he heard it, in such depths of melancholy was it
- pitched.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Better times are coming now,” he said. “If we open up the mines we are
- counting on it ought to give work to at least two hundred men.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She turned sharply upon him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t talk like that!” she said, in half command, half entreaty. “’T
- is not trade or work or mines that keeps a nation alive when ’tis
- fit to die. One can have them all, and riches untold, and still sink wid a
- broken heart. ’T is nearly three hundred years since the first of
- the exiled O’Mahonys sailed away yonder—from Skull and Crookhaven
- they wint—to fight and die in Spain. Thin others wint—Conagher
- and Domnal and the rest—to fight and die in France; and so for
- centuries the stream of life has flowed away from Ireland wid every other
- family the same as wid ours. What nation under the sun could stand the
- drain? ’T is twelve years now since the best and finest of them all
- sailed away to fight in France, and to—to die—oh, <i>wirra!</i>—who
- knows where? So”—her great eyes flashed proudly through their tears—“don’t
- talk of mines to me! ’T is too much like the English!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard somehow felt himself grown much taller and older as he listened to
- this outburst of passionate lamentation, with its whiplash end of
- defiance, and realized that this beautiful girl was confiding it all to
- him. He threw back his shoulders, and laid a hand gently on her arm.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come, come,” he pleaded, with a soothing drawl, “<i>don’t</i> give away
- like that! We’ll take a bite of something to eat, and get down again where
- the grass grows. Why, you’ve no idea—the bottom of a coal-mine is
- sociable and lively compared with this. I’d get the blues myself up here,
- in another half-hour!”
- </p>
- <p>
- A few steps were taken in silence, and then the young man spoke again,
- with settled determination in his voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You can say what you like,” he ground out between his teeth, “or, rather,
- you needn’t say any more than you like; but I’ve got my own idea about
- this convent business, and I don’t like it, and I don’t for a minute
- believe that you like it. Mind, I’m not asking you to tell me whether you
- do or not—only I want you to say just this: Count on me as your
- friend—call it cousin, too, if you like; keep me in mind as a fellow
- who’ll go to the whole length of the rope to help you, and break the rope
- like a piece of paper twine if it’s necessary to go further. That’s all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It is the property of these weird mountain-tops to make realities out of
- the most unlikely things. On a lower terrestrial level Kate’s mind might
- have seen nothing but fantastic absurdity in this proffer of confidential
- friendship and succor, from a youth whom she met twice. Here in the finer
- and more eager air, lifted up to be the companion of clouds, the girl
- looked with grave frankness into his eyes and gave him her hand in token
- of the bond.
- </p>
- <p>
- Without further words, they rejoined John Fat, and sat down to lunch.
- </p>
- <p>
- Indeed, there were few further words during the afternoon which John Pat
- was not privileged to hear. He sat with them during the meal, in the true
- democratic spirit of the sept relation, and he kept close behind them on
- their rambling, leisurely descent of the mountain-side. From the tenor of
- their talk he gathered vaguely that the strange young man was some sort of
- relation from America, and as relations from America present, perhaps, the
- one idea most universally familiar to the Irish peasant’s mind, his
- curiosity was not aroused. Their conversation, for the most part, was
- about that remarkable O’Mahony who had gone away years ago and whom John
- Pat only dimly remembered.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- A couple of miles from Muirisc, the homeward-bound trio—for Bernard
- had tacitly made himself a party to the entire expedition and felt as if
- he, too, were going home—encountered, in the late afternoon, two men
- sitting by the roadside ditch.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, there’s Jerry,” said Kate to her companion—“Mr. Higgins, I mane—wan
- of my trustees. I’ll inthroduce you to him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry’s demeanor, as the group approached him, bore momentary traces of
- embarrassment. He looked at the man beside him, and then cast a backward
- glance at the ditch, as if wishing that they were both safely hidden
- behind its mask of stone wall and furze. But this was clearly impossible;
- and the two stood up at an obvious suggestion from Jerry and put as good a
- face upon their presence as possible.
- </p>
- <p>
- “This is a relation of <i>moine</i> from Ameriky, too,” said Jerry, after
- some words had passed, indicating the tall, thin, shambling, spectacled
- figure beside him, “Mr. Joseph Higgins, of—of—of—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Of Boston,” said the other, after an awkward pause.
- </p>
- <p>
- He seemed ill at ease in his badly fitting clothes, and looked furtively
- from one to another of the faces before him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ what d’ ye think, Miss Katie?” hurriedly continued Jerry. “Egor! Be
- all the miracles of Moses, he’s possessed of more learnin’ about the
- O’Mahonys than anny other man alive, Cormac O’Daly ’d be a fool to
- him. An’, egor, he used to know <i>our</i> O’Mahony whin he was in
- Ameriky, before ever he came over to us!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ye’re wrong, Jerry,” said Mr. Joseph Higgins, with cautious hesitation,
- “I didn’t say I knew him. I said I knew of him. I was employed to search
- for him, whin he was heir to the estate, unbeknownst to himself, an’ I
- wint to the town where he’d kept a cobbler’s shop—Tecumsy was the
- name of it—an’ I made inquiries for Hugh O’Mahony, but—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s that you say! Hugh O’Mahony—a shoemaker in Tecumseh, New
- York?” broke in young Bernard, with sharp, almost excited emphasis.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is what I said,” responded the other, his pale face flushing
- nervously, “only—only he’d gone to the war.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ that was <i>our</i> O’Mahony,” explained Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Glory be to God, he learned of the search made for him, an’ he came to us
- afther the war.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard was not sure that he had got the twitching muscles of his face
- under control, but at least he could manage his tongue.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, he came over here, did he?” he said, with a fair affectation of
- polite interest.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You spoke as if you knew him,” put in Kate, eagerly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “My father knew him as well—as well as he knew himself,” answered
- Bernard, with evasion, and then bit his lip in fear that he had said too
- much.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXII—THE INTELLIGENT YOUNG MAN.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>ithin the next few
- days the people of Muirisc found themselves becoming familiar with the
- spectacle of two strange figures walking about among their narrow, twisted
- streets or across the open space of common between the castle and the
- quay. The sight of new-comers was still unusual enough in Muirisc to
- disturb the minds of the inhabitants—but since the mines had been
- opened in the district the old-time seclusion had never quite come back,
- and it was uneasily felt that in the lapse of years even a hotel might
- come to be necessary.
- </p>
- <p>
- One of these strangers, a rickety, spindling, weirdeyed man in spectacles,
- was known to be a cousin of Jerry Higgins, from America. The story went
- that he was a great scholar, peculiarly learned in ancient Irish matters.
- Muirisc took this for granted all the more readily because he seemed not
- to know anything else—and watched his shambling progress through the
- village streets by Jerry’s side with something of the affectionate pity
- which the Irish peasant finds always in his heart for the being he
- describes as a “nathural”.
- </p>
- <p>
- The other new-comer answered vastly better to Muirisc’s conceptions of
- what a man from America should be like. He was young, fresh-faced and
- elastic of step—with square shoulders, a lithe, vigorous frame and
- eyes which looked with frank and cheerful shrewdness at all men and
- things. He outdid even the most communicative of Muirisc’s old
- white-capped women in polite salutations to passers-by on the highway, and
- he was amiably untiring in his efforts to lure with pennies into friendly
- converse the wild little girls of Muirisc, who watched him with twinkling,
- squirrels’ eyes from under their shawls, and whisked off like so many
- coveys of partridges, at his near approach; the little boys, with the
- stronger sense of their sex, invariably took his pennies, but no more than
- their sisters could they be induced to talk.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was a delightful absence of reserve in this young man from America.
- Muirisc seemed to know everything about him all at once. His name was
- O’Mahony, and his father had been a County-Cork man; he was a mining
- engineer, and had been brought over to Europe by a mining company as an
- expert in copper-ores and the refining of barytes; he was living at
- Goleen, but liked Muirisc much better, both from a miner, a logical point
- of view and socially; he was reckless in the expenditure of money on the
- cars from Goleen and back and on the hire of boatmen at Muirisc; he was
- filled to the top and running over with funny stories, he was a good
- Catholic, he took the acutest interest in all the personal narratives of
- the older inhabitants, and was free with his tobacco; truly a most
- admirable young man!
- </p>
- <p>
- He had been about Muirisc and the immediate vicinity for a week or so—breaking
- up an occasional rock with his hammer when he was sure people were
- watching him, but more often lounging about in gossip on the main street,
- or fishing in the harbor with a boatman who would talk—when he made
- in a casual way the acquaintance of O’Daly.
- </p>
- <p>
- The little old man, white-haired now, but with the blue-black shadows of
- clean shaving still staining high up his jaws and sunken cheeks, had come
- down the street, nodding briefly to such villagers as saluted him, and
- carrying his hands clasped at the buttons on the back of his long-tailed
- coat. He had heard rumors of this young miner from America, and paused now
- on the outskirts of a group in front of the cobbler’s shop, whom Bernard
- was entertaining with tales of giant salmon in the waters of Lake
- Superior.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, this is Mr. O’Daly, I believe,” the young man had on the instant
- interrupted his narrative to remark. “I’m glad to meet you, sir. I’d been
- thinking of calling on you every day, but I know you’re a busy man, and
- it’s only since yesterday that I’ve felt that I had real business with
- you. My name’s O’Mahony, and I’m here for the South Desmond Barytes
- Syndicate. Probably you know the name.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Daly found his wrinkled old paw being shaken warmly in the grasp of
- this affable young man before he had had time to be astonished.
- </p>
- <p>
- “O’Daly’s my name,” he said, hesitatingly. “And you have business with me,
- you said?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I guess you’ll think so!” responded the other. “I’ve just got word from
- my superiors in London to go ahead, and naturally you’re the first man I
- want to talk with.” And then they linked arms.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” said the cobbler, as they watched the receding figures of the
- pair, “my word, there’s more ways of killin’ a dog than chokin’ him wid
- butter!”
- </p>
- <p>
- An hour later, Bernard sat comfortably ensconced in the easiest chair
- afforded by the living-room of the castle, with the infant O’Daly on his
- knee and a trio of grown-up people listening in unaffected pleasure to his
- sprightly talk. He had at the outset mistaken Mrs. O’Daly for a married
- sister of Kate’s—an error which he managed on the instant to
- emphasize by a gravely deliberate wink at Kate—and now held the
- mother’s heart completely by his genial attentions to the babe. He had set
- old O’Daly all aglow with eager interest by his eulogy of Muirisc’s
- mineral wealth as against all other districts in West Carbery. And all the
- time, through anecdote, business converse, exchange of theories on the
- rearing and precocity of infants and bright-flowing chatter on every
- subject tinder the sun, he had contrived to make Kate steadily conscious
- that she was the true object of his visit. Now and again the consciousness
- grew so vivid that she felt herself blushing over the embroidered
- altar-cloth at which she worked, in the shadow between the windows.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, sir,” said Bernard, dandling the infant tenderly as he spoke, “I
- don’t know what I wouldn’t give to be able, when I go back, to tell my
- father how I’d seen the O’Mahony castles here, and all that, right on the
- family’s old stamping-ground.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yer father died, ye say, manny years ago?” remarked O’Daly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, ‘manny’s not the word for it,” put in Mrs. O’Daly, with a
- flattering smile. “He’s but a lad yet, for all he’s seen and done.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nobody could grow old in such an air as this,” said the young man,
- briskly. “You, yourself, bear witness to that, Mrs. O’Daly. Yes, my father
- died when I was a youngster. We moved out West after the War—I was a
- little shaver then—and he didn’t live long after that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And would he be in the moines, too?” asked Cormac.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No; in the leather business,” answered Bernard, without hesitation. “To
- the end of his days, he was always counting on coming back here to Ireland
- and seeing the home of the O’Mahonys again. To hear him talk, you’d have
- thought there wasn’t another family in Ireland worth mentioning.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T was always that way wid thim O’Mahonys,” said O’Daly, throwing
- a significant glance over his wife and step-daughter. “I can spake freely
- to you, sir; for I’ll be bound ye favor yer mother’s side and ye were not
- brought up among them; but bechune ourselves, there’s a dale o’ nonsinse
- talked about thim same O’Mahonys. Did you ever hear yer father mintion an
- O’Daly?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well—no—I can’t say I did,” answered the young man, bending
- his mind to comprehension of what the old man might be driving at.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There ye have it!” said Cormac, bringing his hand down with emphasis on
- the table. “Sir, ’t is a hard thing to say, but the ingrathitude of
- thim O’Mahonys just passes belafe. Sure, ’t was we that made thim.
- What were they but poyrutts and robbers of the earth, wid no since but for
- raids an’ incursions, an’ burnin’ down abbeys an’ holy houses, and makin’
- war on their neighbors. An’ sure, ’t was we civilized ’em,
- we O’Dalys, that they trate now as not fit to lace up their shoes. ’T
- was we taught thim O’Mahonys to rade an’ write, an’ everything else they
- knew in learnin’ and politeness. An’ so far as that last-mintioned
- commodity goes”—this with a still more meaning, sidelong glance
- toward the women—“faith, a dale of our labor was wasted intoirely.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Even if Kate would have taken up the challenge, the young man gave her no
- time.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, of course,” he broke in, “I’ve heard of the O’Dalys all my life.
- Everybody knows about <i>them!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Luk at that now!” exclaimed Cormac, in high triumph. “Sure, ’t is
- Ameriky’ll set all of us right, an’ keep the old learning up. Ye’ll have
- heard, sir, of Cuchonnacht O’Daly, called <i>‘na Sgoile</i>, or ‘of the
- school’—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What, old Cocoanut!” cried Bernard, with vivacity, “I should think so!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T was he was our founder,” pursued Cormac, excitedly. “An’ after
- him came eight-an’-twinty descindants, all the chief bards of Ireland. An’
- in comparatively late toimes they had a school at Drumnea, in Kilcrohane,
- where the sons of the kings of Spain came for their complate eddication,
- an’ the princes doid there, an’ are buried there in our family vault—sure
- the ruins of the college remain to this day—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You don’t mean to say you’re one of <i>that</i> family, Mr. O’Daly?”
- asked Bernard, with eagerness.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is my belafe I’m the head of it,” responded Cormac, with lofty
- simplicity. “I’m an old man, sir, an’ of an humble nature, an’ I’d not be
- takin’ honors on meself. But whin that bye there—that bye ye howld
- on yer knee—grows up, an’ he the owner of Muirisc an’ its moines an’
- the fishin’, wid all his eddication an’ foine advantages—sure, if it
- pl’ases him to asshume the dignity of <i>The</i> O’Daly, an’ putt the
- grand old family wance more where it belongs, I’m thinkin’ me bones ’ll
- rest the aiser in their grave.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard looked down with an abstracted air at the unpleasantly narrow
- skull of the child on his knee, with its big ears and thin, plastered
- ringlets that suggested a whimsical baby-caricature of the mother’s
- crimps. He heard Kate rise behind him, walk across the floor and leave the
- room with an emphatic closing of the door. To be frank, the impulse burned
- hotly within him to cuff the infantile head of this future chief of the
- O’Dalys.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve a pome on the subject, which I composed last Aister Monday,” O’Daly
- went on, “which I’d be deloighted to rade to ye.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Unfortunately I must be hurrying along now,” said Bernard, rising on the
- instant, and depositing the child on the floor. “I’m sorry, sir, but—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, ’t is you do be droivin’ everybody from the house wid yer
- pomes,” commented Mrs. O’Daly, ungenerously.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, no, I assure you!” protested the young man. “I’ve often heard of Mr.
- O’Daly’s verses, and very soon now I’m coming to get him to read them all
- to me. Have you got some about Cocoanut, Mr. O’Daly?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “This particular one,” said Cormac, doggedly, “trates of a much later
- period. Indeed, ’t is so late that it hasn’t happened at all yit. ’T
- is laid in futurity, sir, an’ dales wid the grand career me son is to have
- whin he takes his proud position as <i>The</i> O’Daly, the proide of West
- Carbery.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, now, you’ve got to read me that the very first thing when I come
- next time,” said Bernard. Then he added, with a smile: “For, you know, I
- want you to let me come again.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, ye can’t come too soon or stop too long,” Mrs. O’Daly assured him.
- “Sure, what wid there bein’ no railway to Muirisc an’ no gintry near by,
- an’ what wid the dale we hear about the O’Dalys an’ their supayriority
- over the O’Mahonys, an’ thim pomes, my word, we do be starvin’ for the
- soight of a new face!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Then I can’t be too glad that my face <i>is</i> new,” promptly put in
- Bernard, wreathing the countenance in question with beaming amiability.
- “And in a few days I shall want to talk business with Mr. O’Daly, too,
- about the mining rights we shall need to take up.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ye’ll be welcome always,” said O’Daly.
- </p>
- <p>
- And with that comforting pledge in his ears, the young man shook hands
- with the couple and made his way out of the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t trouble yourselves to come out,” he begged. “I feel already at home
- all over the house.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Now that’s a young man of sinse,” said the O’Daly, after the door had
- closed behind their visitor. “’T is not manny ye’ll foind nowadays
- wid such intelligince insoide his head.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nor so comely a face on the outside of it,” commented his wife.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <p>
- At the end of the hallway this intelligent young man was not surprised to
- encounter Kate, and she made no pretense of not having waited for him.
- Yet, as he approached, she moved to pass by.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is althered opinions you hold about the O’Mahonys and the
- O’Dalys,” she said, with studied coldness and a haughty carriage of her
- dark head.
- </p>
- <p>
- He caught her sleeve as she would have passed him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “See here,” he whispered, eagerly, “don’t you make a goose of yourself.
- I’ve told more lies and acted more lies generally this afternoon for <i>you</i>
- than I would for all the other women on earth boiled together. Sh-h! Just
- you keep mum, and we’ll see you through this thing slick and clean.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want no lies told for me, or acted either,” retorted Kate.
- </p>
- <p>
- Her tone was proud enough still, but the lines of her face were relenting.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, I don’t suppose for a minute you do,” he murmured back, still holding
- her sleeve, and with his other hand on the latch. “You’re too near an
- angel for that. I tell you what: Suppose you just start in and do as much
- praying as you can, to kind o’ balance the thing. It’ll all be needed; for
- as far as I can see now, I’ve got some regular old whoppers to come yet.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then the young man released the sleeve, snatched up the hand at the end of
- that sleeve, kissed it, and was gone before Kate could say another word.
- </p>
- <p>
- When she had thought it all over, through hours of seclusion in her room,
- she was still very much at sea as to what that word would have been had
- time been afforded her in which to utter it.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXIII—THE COUNCIL OF WAR.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">H</span>aving left the
- castle, Bernard walked briskly away across the open square, past the quay
- and along the curling stretch of sands which led to the path under the
- cliffs. He had taken the hammer from his pocket and swung it as he strode
- onward, whistling as he went.
- </p>
- <p>
- A mile or so along the strand, he turned off at a footway leading up the
- rocks, and climbed this nimbly to the top, gaining which, he began to scan
- closely the broad expanse of dun-colored bog-plain which dipped gradually
- toward Mount Gabriel. His search was not protracted. He had made out the
- figures he sought, and straightway set out over the bog, with a light,
- springing step, still timed to a whistled marching tune, toward them.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, I’ve treed the coon!” was his remark when he had joined Jerry and
- Linsky. “It was worth waiting for a week just to catch him like that, with
- his guard down. Wait a minute, then I can be sure of what I’m talking
- about.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The others had not invited this adjuration by any overt display of
- impatience, and they watched the young man now take an envelope from his
- pocket and work out a sum on its back with a pencil in placid if open-eyed
- contentment. They both studied him, in fact, much as their grandfathers
- might have gazed at the learned pig at a fair—as a being with
- resources and accomplishments quite beyond the laborious necessity of
- comprehension.
- </p>
- <p>
- He finished his ciphering, and gave them, in terse summary, the benefit of
- it.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The way I figure the thing,” he said, with his eye on the envelope, “is
- this: The mines were going all right when your man went away, twelve years
- ago. The output then was worth, say, eight thousand pounds sterling a
- year. Since then it has once or twice gone as high at twenty thousand
- pounds, and once it’s been down to eleven thousand pouunds. From all I can
- gather the average ought to have been, say, fourteen thousand pounds. The
- mining tenants hold on the usual thirty-one-year lease, paying fifty
- pounds a year to begin with, and then one-sixteenth on the gross sales.
- There is a provision of a maximum surface-drainage charge of two pounds an
- acre, but there’s nothing in that. On my average, the whole royalties
- would be nine hundred and twenty-five pounds a year. That, in twelve
- years, would be eleven thousand pounds. I think, myself, that it’s a good
- deal more; but that’ll do as a starter. And you say O’Daly’s been sending
- the boss two hundred pounds a year?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “At laste for tin years—not for the last two,” said Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very well, then; you’ve got nine thousand pounds. The interest on that
- for two years alone would make up all he sent away.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ ’t is your idea that O’Daly has putt by all that money?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And half as much more; and not a cent of it all belongs to him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thrue for you; ’t is Miss Katie’s money,” mourned Jerry, shaking
- his curly red head and disturbing his fat breast with a prolonged sigh.
- “But she’ll never lay finger to anny of it. Oh, Cormac, you’re the divil!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man sniffed impatiently.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’s the worst of you fellows,” he said, sharply. “You take fright like
- a flock of sheep. What the deuce are you afraid of? No wonder Ireland
- isn’t free, with men who have got to sit down and cry every few minutes!”
- Then the spectacle of pained surprise on Jerry’s fat face drove away his
- mood of criticism. “Or no; I don’t mean that,” he hastened to add; “but
- really, there’s no earthly reason why O’Daly shouldn’t be brought to book.
- There’s law here for that sort of thing as much as there is anywhere
- else.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T was Miss Katie’s own words that I’d be a fool to thry to putt
- the law on Cormac O’Daly, an’ him an attorney,” explained Jerry, in
- defiant self-defense.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Perhaps that’s true about <i>your</i> putting the law on him,” Bernard
- permitted himself to say. “But you’re a trustee, you tell me, as much as
- he is, and others can act for you and force him to give his accounts. That
- can be done upon your trust-deed.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Me paper, is it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, the one the boss gave you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! O’Daly has it. He begged me for it, to keep ’em together. If
- I’d ask him for it, belike he’d refuse me. You’ve no knowledge of the
- characther of that same O’Daly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- For just a moment the young man turned away, his face clouded with the
- shadows of a baffled mind. Then he looked Jerry straight in the eye.
- </p>
- <p>
- “See here,” he said, “you trust me, don’t you? You believe that I want to
- act square by you and help you in this thing?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I do, sir,” said Jerry, simply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then, I tell you that O’Daly <i>can</i> be made to show up, and the
- whole affair can be set straight, and the young lady—my cousin—<i>can</i>
- be put into her own again. Only I can’t work in the dark. I can’t play
- with a partner that ‘finesses’ against me, as a whist-player would say.
- Now, who is this man here? I know he isn’t your cousin any more than he is
- mine. What’s his game?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Linsky took the words out of his puzzled companion’s mouth.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is a long story, sir,” he said, “an’ you’d be no wiser if you
- were told it. Some time, plase God, you’ll know it all. Just now’t is
- enough that I’m bound to this man and to The O’Mahony, who’s away, an’
- perhaps dead an’ buried, an’ I’m heart an’ sowl for doin’ whatever I can
- to help the young lady. Only, if you’ll not moind me sayin’ so, she’s her
- own worst inemy. If she takes the bit in her mouth this way, an’ will go
- into the convint, how, in the name of glory, are we to stop her or do
- anything else?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There are more than fifteen hundred ways of working <i>that</i>” replied
- the young man from Houghton County, simulating a confidence he did not
- wholly feel. “But let’s get along down toward the village.”
- </p>
- <p>
- They entered Muirisc through the ancient convent churchyard, and at his
- door-way Jerry, as the visible result of much cogitation, asked the twain
- in. After offering them glasses of whiskey and water and lighting a pipe,
- Jerry suddenly resolved upon a further extension of confidence. To
- Linsky’s astonishment, he took the lantern down from the wall, lighted it,
- and opened the door at the back of the bed.
- </p>
- <p>
- “If you’ll come along wid us, sir,” he said to Bernard, “we’ll show you
- something.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There, here we can talk at our aise,” he remarked again, when finally the
- three men were in the subterranean chamber, with the door closed behind
- them. “Have you anything like <i>this</i> in Ameriky?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard was not so greatly impressed as they expected him to be. He
- stolled about the vault-like room, sounding the walls with his boot,
- pulling-aside the bed-curtains and investigating the drain.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Curious old place,” he said, at last. “What’s the idea?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, ’t is a sacret place intoirely,” explained Jerry. “Besides
- us three, there’s not a man aloive who knows of it, exceptin’ The
- O’Mahony, if be God’s grace he’s aloive. ’T was he discovered it.
- He’d the eyes of a him-harrier for anny mark or sign in a wall. Well do I
- remimber our coming here first. He lukked it all over, as you’re doing.
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Egor!’ says he, ‘It may come in handy for O’Daly some day.’ There was a
- dead man there on the bed, that dry ye c’u’d ’a’ loighted him wid a
- match.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is a part of the convint,” Linsky took up the explanation, “an’
- the chest, there, was full of deeds an’ riccorcls of the convint for manny
- cinturies. ‘T was me work for years to decipher an’ thranslate thim,
- unbeknownst to every soul in Muirisc. They were all in Irish.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, it’s a queer sort of hole,” said Bernard, musingly, walking over to
- the table and holding up one of the ancient manuscripts to the lamplight
- for investigation. “Why, this isn’t Irish, is it?” he asked, after a
- moment’s scrutiny. “This is Latin.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is wan of half a dozen ye see there on the table that I
- couldn’t make out,” said Linsky. “I’m no Latin scholar meself. ’T
- was me intintion to foind some one outside who c’u’d thranslate thim.”
- Bernard had kept his eyes on the faded parchment.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Odd!” he said. “It’s from a bishop—Matthew O’Finn seems to be the
- name—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He was bishop of Ross in the early part of the fourteenth cintury,” put
- in Linsky.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And this thing is a warning to the nuns here to close up their convent
- and take in no more novices, because the church can’t recognize them or
- their order. It’s queer old Latin, but that’s what I make it out to be.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is an illegant scholar ye are, sir!” exclaimed Jerry, in honest
- admiration.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” said Bernard; “only they started me in for a priest, and I got to
- know Latin as well as I did English, or almost. But my godliness wasn’t
- anywhere near high-water mark, and so I got switched off into engineering.
- I dare say the change was a good thing all around. If it’s all the same to
- you,” he added, turning to Linsky, “I’ll put this parchment in my pocket
- for the time being, I want to look it over again more carefully. You shall
- have it back.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two Irishmen assented as a matter of course. This active-minded and
- capable young man, who had mining figures at his finger’s ends, and could
- read Latin, and talked lightly of fifteen hundred ways to outwit O’Daly,
- was obviously one to be obeyed without questions. They sat now and watched
- him with rapt eyes and acquiescent nods as he, seated on the table with
- foot on knee, recounted to them the more salient points of his interview
- with O’Daly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “He was a dacent ould man when I knew him first,” mused Jerry, in comment,
- “an’ as full of praises for the O’Mahonys as an egg is of mate. ’T
- is the money that althered him; an’ thin that brat of a bye of his! ’T
- is since thin that he behaved like a nagur. An ’t is my belafe,
- sir, that only for him Miss Katie’d never have dr’amed of interin’ that
- thunderin’ old convint. The very last toime I was wid him, egor, he druv
- us both from the house. ’T was the nuns made Miss Katie return to
- him next day. ’T is just that, sir, that she’s no one else bechune
- thim nuns an’ O’Daly, an’ they do be tossin’ her from wan to the other of
- ’em like a blessid ball.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The wonder is to me she’s stood it for a minute,” said Bernard; “a proud
- girl like her.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, sir,” said Jerry, “it isn’t like in Ameriky, where every wan’s free
- to do what phases him. What was the girl to do? Where was she to go if she
- defied thim that was in authority over her? ’T is aisy to talk, as
- manny’s the toime she’s said that same to me; but ’t is another
- matther to <i>do!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s the whole trouble in a nutshell,” said Bernard. “Everybody talks
- and nobody does anything.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s truth in that sir,” put in Linsky; “but what are <i>you</i>
- proposin’ to do? There were fifteen hundred ways, you said. What’s wan of
- ’em?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, there are fifteen hundred and two now,” responded Bernard, with a
- smile. “You’ve helped me to two more since I’ve been down here—or,
- rather, this missing O’Mahony of yours has helped me to one, and I helped
- myself to the other.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The two stared in helpless bewilderment at the young man.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That O’Mahony seems to have been a right smart chap,” Bernard continued.
- “No wonder he made things hum here in Muirisc. And a prophet too. Why, the
- very first time he ever laid eyes on this cave here, by your own telling,
- he saw just what it was going to be good for.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t folly ye,” said the puzzled Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, to put O’Daly in, of course,” answered the young man, lightly.
- “That’s as plain as the nose on your face.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! ’T is a grand idea that same!” exclaimed Jerry, slapping his
- thigh. “Only,” he added, with a sinking enthusiasm, “suppose he wouldn’t
- come?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard laughed outright.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That’ll be easy enough. All you have to do is to send word you want to
- see him in your place up stairs; when he comes, tell him there’s a strange
- discovery you’ve made. Bring him down here, let him in, and while he’s
- looking around him just slip out and shut the door on him. I notice it’s
- got a spring-lock from the outside. A thoughtful man, that O’Mahony! Of
- course, you’ll want to bring down enough food and water to last a week or
- so, first; perhaps a little whiskey, too. And I’d carry up all these
- papers, moreover, and put ’em in your room above. Until the old man
- got quieted down, he might feel disposed to tear things.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! I’ll do it!” cried Jerry, with sparkling eyes and a grin on his
- broad face. “Oh, the art of man!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The pallid and near-sighted Linsky was less alive to the value of this
- bold plan.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ what’ll ye do nixt?” he asked, doubtfully.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve got a scheme which I’ll carry out to-morrow, by myself,” said
- Bernard. “It’ll take me all day; and by the time I turn up the day after,
- you must have O’Daly safely bottled up down here. Then I’ll be in a
- position to read the riot act to everybody. First we’ll stand the convent
- on its head, and then I’ll come down here and have a little confidential
- talk with O’Daly about going to prison as a fraudulent trustee.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sir, you’re well-named ‘O’Mahony,’” said Jerry, with beaming earnestness,
- “I do be almost believin’ ye’re <i>his</i> son!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard chuckled as he sprang off the table to his feet.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There might be even stranger things than that,” he said, and laughed
- again.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXIV—THE VICTORY OF THE “CATHACH.”
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">O</span>ne day passed, and
- then another, and the evening of the third day drew near—yet brought
- no returning Bernard. It is true that on the second day a telegram—the
- first Jerry had ever received in his life—came bearing the date of
- Cashel, and containing only the unsigned injunction:
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- <i>“Don’t be afraid.”</i>
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <p>
- It is all very well to say this, but Jerry and Linsky read over the brief
- message many scores of times that day, and still felt themselves very much
- afraid.
- </p>
- <p>
- Muirisc was stirred by unwonted excitement. In all its history, the
- village had never resented anything else quite so much as the
- establishment of a police barrack in its principal street, a dozen years
- before. The inhabitants had long since grown accustomed to the sight of
- the sergeant and his four men lounging about the place, and had even
- admitted them to a kind of conditional friendship, but, none the less,
- their presence had continued to present itself as an affront to Muirisc.
- From one year’s end to another, no suspicion of crime had darkened the
- peaceful fame of the hamlet. They had heard vague stories of grim and
- violent deeds in other parts of the south and west, as the failure of the
- potatoes and the greed of the landlords conspired together to drive the
- peasantry into revolt, but in Muirisc, though she had had her evictions
- and knew what it was to be hungry, it had occurred to no one to so much as
- break a window.
- </p>
- <p>
- Yet now, all at once, here were fresh constables brought in from Bantry,
- with an inspector at their head, and the amazed villagers saw these
- newcomers, with rifles slung over their short capes, and little round caps
- cocked to one side on their close-cropped heads, ransacking every nook and
- cranny of the ancient town in quest of some mysterious thing, the while
- others spread their search over the ragged rocks and moorland roundabout.
- And then the astounding report flew from mouth to mouth that Father Jago
- had read in a Dublin paper that O’Daly was believed to have been murdered.
- </p>
- <p>
- Sure enough, now that they had thought of it, O’Daly had not been seen for
- two or three days, but until this strange story came from without, no one
- had given this a thought. He was often away, for days together, on mining
- and other business, but it was said now that his wife, whom Muirisc still
- thought of as Mrs. Fergus, had given the alarm, on the ground that if her
- husband had been going away over night, he would have told her. There was
- less liking for this lady than ever, when this report started on its
- rounds.
- </p>
- <p>
- Three or four of the wretched, unwashed and half-fed creatures, who had
- fled from O’Daly’s evictions to the shelter of the furze-clad ditches
- outside, had been brought in and sharply questioned at the barracks, on
- this third day, but of what they had said the villagers knew nothing. And,
- now, toward evening, the excited groups of gossiping neighbors at the
- corners saw Jerry Higgins himself, with flushed face and apprehensive eye,
- being led past with his shambling cousin toward constabulary headquarters
- by a squad of armed policemen. Close upon the heels of this amazing
- spectacle came the rumor—whence started, who could tell?—that
- Jerry had during the day received a telegram clearly implicating him in
- the crime, At this, Muirisc groaned aloud.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis wid you alone I want to spake,” said Kate, bluntly, to the
- mother superior.
- </p>
- <p>
- The April twilight was deepening the shadows in the corners of the
- convent’s reception hall, and mellowing into a uniformity of ugliness the
- faces of the four Misses O’Daly who sat on the long bench before the
- fireless hearth. These young women were strangers to Muirisc, and had but
- yesterday arrived from their country homes in Kerry or the Macroom
- district to enter the convent of which their remote relation was patron.
- They were plain, small-farmers’ daughters, with flat faces, high
- cheek-bones and red hands. They had risen in clumsy humility when Kate
- entered the room, staring in admiration at her beauty, and even more at
- her hat; they had silently seated themselves again at a sign from the
- mother superior, still staring in round-eyed wonder at this novel kind of
- young woman; and they clung now stolidly to their bench, in the face of
- Kate’s remark. Perhaps they did not comprehend it, But they understood and
- obeyed the almost contemptuous gesture by which the aged nun bade them
- leave the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What is it thin, <i>Dubhdeasa?</i>” asked Mother Agnes, with affectionate
- gravity, seating herself as she spoke. The burden of eighty years rested
- lightly upon the lean figure and thin, wax-like face of the nun. Only a
- close glance would have revealed the fine net-work of wrinkles covering
- this pallid skin, and her shrewd observant eyes flashed still with the
- keenness of youth. “Tell me, what is it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve a broken heart in me, that’s all!” said the girl.
- </p>
- <p>
- She had walked to one of the two narrow little windows, and stood looking
- out, yet seeing nothing for the mist of tears that might not be kept down.
- Only the affectation of defiance preserved her voice from breaking.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Here there will be rest and p’ace of mind,” intoned the other. “’T
- is only a day more, Katie, and thin ye’ll be wan of us, wid all the
- worriments and throubles of the world lagues behind ye.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl shook her head with vehemence and paced the stone floor
- restlessly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is I who’ll be opening the dure to ’em and bringing ’em
- all in here, instead. No fear, Mother Agnes, they’ll folly me wherever I
- go.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The other smiled gently, and shook her vailed head in turn.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is little a child like you drames of the rale throubles of me,”
- she murmured. “Whin ye’re older, ye’ll bless the good day that gave ye
- this holy refuge, and saved ye from thim all. Oh, Katie, darlin’, when I
- see you standing be me side in your habit—’t is mesilf had it
- made be the Miss Maguires in Skibbereen, the same that sews the vestmints
- for the bishop himself—I can lay me down, and say me <i>nunc
- dimittis</i> wid a thankful heart!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate sighed deeply and turned away. It was the trusting sweetness of
- affection with which old Mother Agnes had enveloped her ever since the
- promise to take vows had been wrung from her reluctant tongue that rose
- most effectually always to restrain her from reconsidering that promise.
- It was clear enough that the venerable O’Mahony nuns found in the speedy
- prospect of her joining them the one great controlling joy of their lives.
- Thinking upon this now, it was natural enough for her to say:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Can thim O’Daly girls rade and write, I wonder?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, they’ve had schooling, all of them. ’T is not what you had
- here, be anny manes, but ’t will do.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Just think, Mother Agnes,” Kate burst forth, “what it ‘ll be like to be
- shut with such craytures as thim afther—afther you l’ave us!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They’re very humble,” said the nun, hesitatingly. “’T is more of
- that same spirit I’d fain be seeing in yourself, Katie! And in that
- they’ve small enough resimblance to Cormac O’Daly, who’s raked ’em
- up from the highways and byways to make their profession here. And oh—tell
- me now—old Ellen that brings the milk mintioned to Sister Blanaid
- that O’Daly was gone somewhere, and that there was talk about it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Talk, is it!” exclaimed Kate, whose introspective mood had driven this
- subject from her mind, but who now spoke with eagerness. “That’s the word
- for it, ‘talk.’ ’T is me mother, for pure want of something to say,
- that putt the notion into Sergeant O’Flaherty’s thick skull, and, w’u’d ye
- belave it, they’ve brought more poliss to the town, and they’re worriting
- the loives out of the people wid questions and suspicions. I’m told
- they’ve even gone out to the bog and arrested some of thim poor wretches
- of O’Driscolls that Cormac putt out of their cottages last winter. The
- idea of it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where there’s so much smoke there’s some bit of fire,” said the older
- woman. “Where <i>is</i> O’Daly?” The girl shrugged her shoulders.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is not my affair!” she said, curtly. “I know where he’d be, if
- I’d my will.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Katie,” chanted the nun, in tender reproof, “what spirit d’ye call that
- for a woman who’s within four-an’-twinty hours of making her profession!
- Pray for yourself, child, that these worldly feelings may be taken from
- ye!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mother Agnes,” said the girl, “if I’m to pretind to love Cormac O’Daly,
- thin, wance for all, ’t is no use!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’re bidden to love all thim that despite—” The nun broke off her
- quotation abruptly. A low wailing sound from the bowels of the earth
- beneath them rose through the flags of the floor, and filled the chamber
- with a wierd and ghostly dying away echo. Mother Agnes sprang to her feet.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is the Hostage again!” she cried. “Sister Ellen vowed to me she
- heard him through the night. Did <i>you</i> hear him just now?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I heard <i>it</i>,” said Kate, simply.
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother superior, upon reflection, seated herself again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is a strange business,” she said, at last. Her shrewd eyes,
- wandering in a meditative gaze about the chamber, avoided Katie’s face. “’T
- is twelve years since last we heard him,” she mused aloud, “and that was
- the night of the storm. ’T is a sign of misfortune to hear him,
- they say—and the blowing down of the walls that toime was taken be
- us to fulfill that same. But sure, within the week, The O’Mahoney had gone
- on his thravels, and pious Cormac O’Daly had taken his place, and the
- convint prospered more than ever. At laste <i>that</i> was no misfortune.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hark to me, Mother Agnes,” said Kate, with emphasis. “You never used to
- favor the O’Mahonys as well I remimber, but you’re a fair-minded woman and
- a holy woman, and I challenge ye now to tell me honest: Wasn’t anny wan
- hair on The O’Mahony’s head worth the whole carcase of Cormac O’Daly? ’T
- was an evil day for Muirisc whin he sailed away. If the convint has
- prospered, me word, ’t is what nothing else in Muirisc has done.
- And laving aside your office as a nun, is it sp’akin well for a place to
- say that three old women in it are better off, and all the rist have
- suffered?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Katie!” admonished the other. “You’ll repint thim words a week hence! To
- hearken to ye, wan would think yer heart was not in the profession ye’re
- to make.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl gave a scornful, little laugh.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did I ever pretind it was?” she demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is you are the contrary crayture!” sighed the mother superior.
- “Here now for all these cinturies, through all the storms and wars and
- confiscations, this holy house has stud firm be the old faith. There ’s
- not another family in Ireland has kept the mass in its own chapel, wid its
- own nuns kneeling before it, and never a break or interruption at all.
- I’ll l’ave it to yer own sinse: Can ye compare the prosperity of a little
- village, or a hundred of ’em, wid such a glorious and unayqualed
- riccord as that? Why, girl, ’t is you should be proud beyond
- measure and thankful that ye’re born and bred and selected to carry on
- such a grand tradition. To be head of the convint of the O’Mahonys ’t
- is more historically splindid than to be queen of England.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But if I come to be the head at all,” retorted Kate, “sure it will be a
- convint of O’Dalys.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The venerable woman heaved another sigh and looked at the floor in
- silence.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate pursued her advantage eagerly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sure, I’ve me full share of pride in proper things,” she said, “and no
- O’Mahony of them all held his family higher in his mind than I do. And me
- blood lapes to every word you say about that same. But would <i>you</i>—Agnes
- O’Mahony as ye were born—would you be asking me to have pride in the
- O’Dalys? And that ’s what ’t is intinded to make of the
- convint now. For my part, I’d be for saying: ‘L’ave the convint doy now
- wid the last of the ladies of our own family rather than keep it alive at
- the expinse of giving it to the O’Dalys.’”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mother Agnes shook her head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve me carnal feelings no less than you,” she said, “and me family pride
- to subdue. But even if the victory of humility were denied me, what c’u’d
- we do? For the moment, I’ll put this holy house to wan side. What can <i>you</i>
- do? How can you stand up forninst Cormac O’Daly’s determination? Remimber,
- widout him ye’re but a homeless gerrel, Katie.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And whose fault is that, Mother Agnes?” asked Kate, with swift glance and
- tone. “Will ye be telling me ’t was The O’Mahony’s? Did he l’ave me
- widout a four-penny bit, depindent on others, or was it that others stole
- me money and desaved me, and to-day are keeping me out of me own? Tell me
- that, Mother Agnes.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The nun’s ivory-tinted face flushed for an instant, then took on a deeper
- pallor. Her gaze, lifted momentarily toward Kate, strayed beyond her to
- vacancy. She rose to her full height and made a forward step, then stood,
- fumbling confusedly at her beads, and with trembling, half-opened lips.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is not in me power,” she stammered, slowly and with difficulty.
- “There—there <i>was</i> something—I’ve not thought of it for
- so long—I’m forgetting strangely—”
- </p>
- <p>
- She broke off abruptly, threw up her withered hands in a gesture of
- despair, and then, never looking at the girl, turned and with bowed head
- left the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate still stood staring in mingled amazement and apprehension at the
- arched casement through which Mother Agnes had vanished, when the oak door
- was pushed open again, and Sister Blanaid, a smaller and younger woman,
- yet bent and half-palsied under the weight of years, showed herself in the
- aperture. She bore in her arms, shoving the door aside with it as she
- feebly advanced, a square wooden box, dust-begrimed and covered in part
- with reddish cow-skin.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Take it away!” she mumbled. “’T is the mother-supayrior’s desire
- you should take it from here. ’T is an evil day that’s on us! Go
- fling this haythen box into the bay and thin pray for yourself and for
- her, who’s taken that grief for ye she’s at death’s door!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The door closed again, and Kate found herself mechanically bearing this
- box in her arms and making her way out through the darkened hallways to
- the outer air. Only when she stood on the steps of the porch, and set down
- her burden to adjust her hat, did she recognize it. Then, with a murmuring
- cry of delight, she stooped and snatched it up again. It was the <i>cathach</i>
- which The O’Mahony had given her to keep.
- </p>
- <p>
- On the instant, as she looked out across the open green upon the harbor,
- the bay, the distant peninsula of Kilcrohane peacefully gathering to
- itself the shadows of the falling twilight—how it all came back to
- her! On the day of his departure—that memorable black-letter day in
- her life—he had turned over this rude little chest to her; he had
- told her it was his luck, his talisman, and now should be hers. She had
- carried it, not to her mother’s home, but to the tiny school-room in the
- old convent, for safekeeping. She recalled now that she had told the nuns,
- or Mother Agnes, at least, what it was. But then—then there came a
- blank in her memory. She could not force her mind to remember when she
- ceased to think about it—when it made its way into the lumber-room
- where it had apparently lain so long.
- </p>
- <p>
- But, at all events, she had it now again. She bent her head to touch with
- her lips one of the rough strips of skin nailed irregularly upon it; then,
- with a shining face, bearing the box, like some sanctified shrine, against
- her breast, she moved across the village-common toward the wharf and the
- water.
- </p>
- <p>
- The injunction of quavering old Blanaid to cast it into the bay drifted
- uppermost in her thoughts, and she smiled to herself. She had been bidden,
- also, to pray; and reflection upon this chased the smile away. Truly,
- there was need for prayer. Her perplexed mind called up, one by one, in
- disheartening array, the miseries of her position, and drew new
- unhappiness from the confusion of right and wrong which they presented.
- How could she pray to be delivered from what Mother Agnes held up as the
- duties of piety? And, on the other hand, what sincerity could there be in
- any other kind of spiritual petition?
- </p>
- <p>
- She wandered along the shore-sands under the cliffs, the box tightly
- clasped in her arms, her eyes musingly bent upon the brown reaches of
- drenched seaweed which lay at play with the receding tide.
- </p>
- <p>
- Her mind conjured up the image of a smiling and ruddy young face,
- sun-burned and thatched with crisp, curly brown hair—the face of
- that curious young O’Mahony from Houghton County. His blue eye looked at
- her half quizzically, half beseeching, but Kate resolutely drove the image
- away. He was only the merest trifle less mortal than the others.
- </p>
- <p>
- So musing, she strolled onward. Suddenly she stopped, and lifted her head
- triumphantly; the smile had flashed forth again upon her face, and the
- dark eyes were all aglow. A thought had come to her—so convincing,
- so unanswerable, so joyously uplifting, that she paused to marvel at
- having been blind to it so long. Clear as noon sunlight on Mount Gabriel
- was it what she should pray for.
- </p>
- <p>
- What <i>could</i> it ever have been, this one crowning object of prayer,
- but the return of The O’Mahony?
- </p>
- <p>
- As her mental vision adapted itself to the radiance of this revelation,
- the abstracted glance which she had allowed to wander over the bay was
- arrested by a concrete object. Two hundred yards from the water’s edge a
- strange vessel had heaved to, and was casting anchor. Kate could hear the
- chain rattling out from the capstan, even as she looked.
- </p>
- <p>
- The sight sent all prayerful thoughts scurrying out of her head. The
- presence of vessels of the size of the new-comer was in itself most
- unusual at Muirisc. But Kate’s practiced eye noticed a strange novelty.
- The craft, though thick of beam and ungainly in line, carried the staight
- running bowsprit of a cutter, and in addition to its cutter sheets had a
- jigger lug-sail. The girl watched these eccentric sails as they were
- dropped and reefed, with a curious sense of having seen them somewhere
- before—as if in a vision or some old picture-book of childhood.
- Confused memories stirred within her as she gazed, and held her mind in
- daydream captivity. A figure she seemed vaguely to know, stood now at the
- gunwale.
- </p>
- <p>
- The spell was rudely broken by a wild shout from the cliff close above
- her. On the instant, amid a clatter of falling stones and a veritable
- landslide of sand, rocks and turf, a human figure came rolling, clambering
- and tumbling down the declivity, and ran toward her, its arms stretched
- and waving with frantic gestures, and emitting inarticulate cries and
- groans as it came.
- </p>
- <p>
- The astonished girl instinctively raised the box in her hands, to use it
- as a missile. But, lo, it was old Murphy who, half stumbling to his knees
- at her feet, fiercely clutched her skirts, and pointed in a frenzy of
- excitement seaward!
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wid yer own eyes look at it—it, Miss Katie!” he screamed. “Ye can
- see it yerself! It’s not dr’aming I am!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s drunk ye are instead, thin, Murphy,” said the girl, sharply, though
- in great wonderment.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wid joy! Wid joy I’m drunk!” the old man shouted, dancing on the sands
- and slippery sea-litter like one possessed, and whirling his arms about
- his head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Murphy, man! What ails ye? In the name of the Lord—what—”
- </p>
- <p>
- The browned, wild-eyed, ragged old madman had started at a headlong pace
- across the wet waste of weeds, and plunged now through the breakers,
- wading with long strides—knee-deep, then immersed to the waist. He
- turned for an instant to shout back: “I’ll swim to him if I drown for it!
- ’Tis the master come back!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl fell to her knees on the sand, then reverently bowed her head
- till it rested upon the box before her.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXV—BERNARD’S GOOD CHEER.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">S</span>orra a wink o’
- sleep could I get the night,” groaned the wife of O’Daly—Mrs. Fergus—“what
- with me man muthered, an’ me daughter drowned, an’ me nerves that
- disthracted ’t was past the power of hot dhrink to abate em.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was early morning in the reception hall of the convent. The old nuns
- sat on their bench in a row, blinking in the bright light which poured
- through the casement as they gazed at their visitor, and tortured their
- unworldly wits over the news she brought. The young chaplain, Father Jago,
- had come in from the mass, still wearing soutane and beretta. He leaned
- his burly weight against the mantel, smiling inwardly at thoughts of
- breakfast, but keeping his heavy face drawn in solemn lines to fit these
- grievous tidings.
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother superior sighed despairingly, and spoke in low, quavering
- tones. “Here, too, no one sleeps a wink,” she said. “Ah, thin, ’t
- is too much sorrow for us! By rayson of our years we’ve no stringth to
- bear it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah—sure—’t is different wid you,” remarked Mrs.
- Fergus. “You’ve no proper notion of the m’aning of sleep. Faith, all your
- life you’ve been wakened bechune naps by your prayer-bell. ’T is no
- throuble to you. You’re accustomed to ’t. But wid me—if I’ve
- me rest broken, I’m killed entirely. ’T is me nerves!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ay, them nerves of yours—did I ever hear of ’em before?” put
- in Mother Agnes, with a momentary gleam of carnal delight in combat on her
- waxen face. Then sadness resumed its sway. “Aye, aye, Katie! Katie!” she
- moaned, slowly shaking her vailed head. “Child of our prayers, daughter of
- the White Foam, pride of the O’Mahonys, darlin’ of our hearts—what
- ailed ye to l’ave us?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother superior’s words quavered upward into a wail as they ended. The
- sound awakened the ancestral “keening” instinct in the other aged nuns,
- and stirred the thin blood in their veins. They broke forth in weird
- lamentations.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Her hair was the glory of Desmond, that weighty and that fine!” chanted
- Sister Ellen. “Ah, wirra, wirra!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She had it from me,” said Mrs. Fergus, her hand straying instinctively to
- her crimps. Her voice had caught the mourning infection: “Ah-hoo! Katie
- Avourneen,” she wailed in vocal sympathy. “Come back to us, darlint!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “She’d the neck of the Swan of the Lake of Three Castles!” mumbled Sister
- Blanaid. “’T was that same was said of Grace O’Sullivan—the
- bride of The O’Mahony of Ballydivlin—an’ he was kilt on the strand
- benayth the walls—an’ she lookin’ on wid her grand black eyes—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it floatin’ in the waves ye are, <i>ma creevin cno</i>—wid the
- fishes surroundin’ ye?” sobbed Mrs. Fergus.
- </p>
- <p>
- Sister Blanaid’s thick tongue took up the keening again. “’T was I
- druv her out! ‘Go ’long wid ye,’ says I, ‘an’ t’row that haythen
- box o’ yours into the bay’—an’ she went and t’rew her purty self in
- instead; woe an’ prosthration to this house!—an’ may the Lord—”
- </p>
- <p>
- Father Jago at this took his elbow from the mantel and straightened
- himself. “Whisht, now, aisy!” he said, in a tone of parental authority.
- “There’s modheration in all things. Sure ye haven’t a scintilla of
- evidence that there’s annyone dead at all. Where’s the sinse of laminting
- a loss ye’re not sure of—and that, too, on an impty stomach?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nevir bite or sup more will I take till I’ve tidings of her!’ said the
- mother superior.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The more rayson why I’ll not be waiting longer for ye now,” commented the
- priest; and with this he left the room. As he closed the door behind him,
- a grateful odor of frying bacon momentarily spread upon the air. Mrs.
- Fergus sniffed it, and half rose from her seat; but the nuns clung
- resolutely to their theme, and she sank back again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is my belafe,” Sister Ellen began, “that voice we heard, ’t
- is from no Hostage at all—’t is the banshee of the
- O’Mahonys.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The mother superior shook her head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it likely, thin, Ellen O’Mahony,” she queried, “that <i>our</i>
- banshee would be distressed for an O’Daly? Sure the grand noise was made
- whin Cormac himself disappeared.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “His marryin’ me—’t is clear enough that putt him in the
- family,” said Mrs. Fergus. “’T would be flat injustice to me to ’ve
- my man go an’ never a keen raised for him. I’ll stand on me rights for
- that much Agnes O’Mahony.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “A fine confusion ye’d have of it, thin,” retorted the mother superior.
- “The O’Dalys have their own banshee—she sat up her keen in
- Kilcrohane these hundreds of years—and for ours to be meddlin’
- because she’s merely related by marriage—sure, ’t would not
- be endured.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The dubious problem of a family banshee’s duties has never been elucidated
- beyond this point, for on the instant there came a violent ringing of the
- big bell outside, the hoarse clangor of which startled the women into
- excited silence. A minute later, the white-capped lame old woman-servant
- threw open the door.
- </p>
- <p>
- A young man, with a ruddy, smiling face and a carriage of boyish
- confidence, entered the room. He cast an inquiring glance over the group.
- Then recognizing Mrs. Fergus, he gave a little exclamation of pleasure,
- and advanced toward her with outstretched hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, how do you do, Mrs. O’Daly?” he exclaimed, cordially shaking her
- hand. “Pray keep your seat. I’m just playing in luck to find <i>you</i>
- here. Won’t you—eh—-be kind enough to—eh—introduce
- me?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is a young gintleman from Ameriky, Mr. O’Mahony by name,” Mrs.
- Fergus stammered, flushed with satisfaction in his remembrance, but
- doubtful as to the attitude of the nuns.
- </p>
- <p>
- The ladies of the Hostage’s Tears had drawn themselves into as much
- dignified erectness as their age and infirmities permitted. They eyed this
- amazing new-comer in mute surprise. Mother Agnes, after the first shock at
- the invasion, nodded frostily in acknowledgment of his respectful bow.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Get around an’ spake to her in her north ear,” whispered Mrs. Fergus;
- “she can’t hear ye in the other.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard had been long enough in West Carbery to comprehend her meaning. In
- that strange old district there is no right or left, no front or back—only
- points of the compass. A gesture from Mrs. Fergus helped him now to guess
- where the north might lie in matters auricular.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I didn’t stand on ceremony,” he said, laying his hat on the table and
- drawing off his gloves. “I’ve driven over post-haste from Skibbereen this
- morning—the car’s outside—and I rushed in here the first
- thing. I—I hope sincerely that I’m in time.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘In toime?’” the superior repeated, in a tone of annoyed mystification.
- “That depinds entoirely, sir, on your own intintions. I’ve no information,
- sir, as to either who you are or what you’re afther doing.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, of course not,” said Bernard, in affable apology. “I ought to have
- thought of that. I’ll explain things, ma’am, if you’ll permit me. As I
- said, I’ve just raced over this morning from Skibbereen.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mother Agnes made a stately inclination of her vailed head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You had a grand morning for your drive,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I didn’t notice,” the young man replied, with a frank smile. “I was too
- busy thinking of something else. The truth is, I spent last evening with
- the bishop.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Again the mother superior bowed slightly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An estimable man,” she remarked, coldly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, yes; nothing could have been friendlier,” pursued Bernard, “than the
- way he treated me. And the day before that I was at Cashel, and had a long
- talk with the archbishop. He’s a splendid old gentleman, too. Not the
- least sign of airs or nonsense about him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mother Agnes rose.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m deloighted to learn that our higher clergy prodhuce so favorable an
- impression upon you,” she said, gravely; “but, if you’ll excuse us, sir,
- this is a house of mourning, and our hearts are heavy wid grief, and we’re
- not in precisely the mood—”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard spoke in an altered tone:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh! I beg a thousand pardons! Mourning, did you say? May I ask—”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Fergus answered his unspoken question.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you know it, thin? ’T is me husband, Cormac O’Daly. Sure
- he’s murdhered an’ his body’s nowhere to be found, an’ the poliss are
- scourin’ all the counthry roundabout, an’ there’s a long account of ’t
- in the <i>Freeman</i> sint from Bantry, an’ more poliss have been dhrafted
- into Muirisc, an’ they’ve arrested Jerry Higgins and that long-shanked,
- shiverin’ <i>omadhaun</i> of a cousin of his. ’T is known they had
- a tellgram warnin’ thim not to be afraid—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, by George! Well, this <i>is</i> rich!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man’s spontaneous exclamations brought the breathless narrative
- of Mrs. Fergus to an abrupt stop. The women gazed at him in stupefaction.
- His rosy and juvenile face had, at her first words, worn a wondering and
- puzzled expression. Gradually, as she went on, a light of comprehension
- had dawned in his eyes. Then he had broken in upon her catalogue of woes
- with a broad grin on his face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Igad, this <i>is</i> rich!” he repeated. He put his hands in his pockets,
- withdrew them, and then took a few steps up and down the room, chuckling
- deeply to himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- The power of speech came first to Mother Agnes. “If ’t is to insult
- our griefs you’ve come, young sir,” she began; “if that’s your m’aning—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Bless your heart, madam!” Bernard protested. “I’d be the last man in the
- world to dream of such a thing. I’ve too much respect. I’ve an aunt who is
- a religious, myself. No, what I mean is it’s all a joke—that is, a
- mistake. O’Daly isn’t dead at all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s that you’re sayin’?” put in Mrs. Fergus, sharply. “Me man is
- aloive, ye say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Why, of course”—the youngster went off into a fresh fit of
- chuckling—“of course, he is—alive and kicking. Yes, especially
- kicking!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The Lord’s mercy on us!” said the mother superior. “And where would
- Cormac be, thin!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, that’s another matter. I don’t know that I can tell you just now;
- but, take my word for it, he’s as alive as I am, and he’s perfectly safe,
- too.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The astonished pause which followed was broken by the mumbling monologue
- of poor half-palsied Sister Blanaid:
- </p>
- <p>
- “I putt the box in her hands, an’ I says, says I: ‘Away wid ye, now, an’
- t’row it into the say!’ An’ thin she wint.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The other women exchanged startled glances. In their excitement they had
- forgotten about Kate.
- </p>
- <p>
- Before they could speak, Bernard, with a mystified glance at the
- spluttering old lady, had taken up the subject of their frightened
- thoughts.
- </p>
- <p>
- “But what I came for,” he said, looking from one to the other, “what I was
- specially in a stew about, was to get here before—before Miss Kate
- had taken her vows. The ceremony was set down for to-day, as I understand.
- Perhaps I’m wrong; but that’s why I asked if I was in time.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You <i>are</i> in time,” answered Mother Agnes, solemnly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Her sepulchral tone jarred upon the young man’s ear. Looking into the
- speaker’s pallid, vail-framed face, he was troubled vaguely by a strange,
- almost sinister significance in her glance.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re in fine time,” the mother superior repeated, and bowed her head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Man alive!” Mrs. Fergus exclaimed, rising and leaning toward him. “You’ve
- no sinse of what you’re saying. Me daughter’s gone, too!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “‘Gone!’ How gone? What do you mean?” Bernard gazed in blank astonishment
- into the vacuous face of Mrs. Fergus. Mechanically he strode toward her
- and took her hand firmly in his.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where has she gone to?” he demanded, as his scattered wits came under
- control again. “Do you mean that she’s run away? Can’t you speak?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Fergus, thus stoutly adjured, began to whimper:
- </p>
- <p>
- “They sint her from here—’t was always harsh they were wid
- her—ye heard Sister Blanaid yerself say they sint her—an’ out
- she wint to walk under the cliffs—some byes of Peggy Clancy saw her
- go—an’ she never came back through the long night—an’ me wid
- no wink o’ sleep—an’ me nerves that bad!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Overcome by her emotions, Mrs. Fergus, her hand still in Bernard’s grasp,
- bent forward till her crimps rested on the young man’s shoulder. She moved
- her forehead gingerly about till it seemed certain that the ornaments were
- sustaining no injury. Then she gave her maternal feelings full sway and
- sobbed with fervor against the coat of the young man from Houghton County.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t cry, Mrs. O’Daly,” was all Bernard could think of to say.
- </p>
- <p>
- The demonstration might perhaps have impressed him had he not perforce
- looked over the weeping lady’s head straight into the face of the mother
- superior. There he saw written such contemptuous incredulity that he
- himself became conscious of skepticism.
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>Don’t</i> take on so!” he urged, this time less gently, and strove to
- disengage himself.
- </p>
- <p>
- But Mrs. Fergus clung to his hand and resolutely buried her face against
- his collar. Sister Ellen had risen to her feet beside Mother Agnes, and he
- heard the two nuns sniff indignantly. Then he realized that the situation
- was ridiculous.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What is it you suspect?” he asked of the mother superior, eager to make a
- diversion of some kind.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You can’t be imagining that harm’s come to Miss Kate—that she ’s
- drowned?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That same <i>was</i> our belafe,” said Mother Agnes, glaring icily upon
- him and his sobbing burden.
- </p>
- <p>
- The inference clearly was that the spectacle before her affronted eyes had
- been enough to overturn all previous convictions, of whatever character.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard hesitated no longer. He almost wrenched his hand free and then
- firmly pushed Mrs. Fergus away.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s all nonsense,” he said, assuming a confidence he did not wholly
- feel. “She’s no more drowned than I am.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Faith, I had me fears for <i>you</i>, wid such a dale of tears let loose
- upon ye,” remarked Mother Agnes, dryly.
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man looked straight into the reverend countenance of the
- superior and confided to it an audacious wink.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll be back in no time,” he said, taking up his hat. “Now don’t you fret
- another bit. She’s all right. I know it. And I’ll go and find her.” And
- with that he was gone.
- </p>
- <p>
- An ominous silence pervaded the reception hall. The two nuns, still
- standing, stared with wrathful severity at Mrs. Fergus. She bore their
- gaze with but an indifferent show of composure, patting her disordered
- crimps with an awkward hand, and then moving aimlessly across the room.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ll be going now, I’m thinking,” she said, at last, yet lingered in
- spite of her words.
- </p>
- <p>
- The nuns looked slowly at one another, and uttered not a word.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin, ’t is small comfort I have, annyway, or consolation
- either, from the lot of ye,” Mrs. Fergus felt impelled to remark, drawing
- her shawl up on her head and walking toward the door. “An’ me wid me
- throubles, an’ me nerves.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it consolation you’re afther?” retorted Mother Agnes, bitterly. “I
- haven’t the proper kind of shoulder on me for <i>your</i> variety of
- consolation.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thrue ye have it, Agnes O’Mahony,” Mrs. Fergus came back, with her hand
- on the latch. “An’ by the same token, thim shoulders were small
- consolation to you yourself, till you got your nun’s vail to hide ’em!”
- </p>
- <p>
- When she had flounced her way out, the mother superior remained standing,
- her gaze bent upon the floor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sister Ellen,” she said at last, “me powers are failing me. ’T is
- time I laid down me burden. For the first time in me life I was unayqual
- to her impiddence.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXVI—THE RESIDENT MAGISTRATE
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>hen Bernard
- O’Mahony found himself outside the convent gateway, he paused to consider
- matters.
- </p>
- <p>
- The warm spring sunlight so broadly enveloped the square in which he
- stood, the shining white cottages and gray old walls behind him and the
- harbor and pale-blue placid bay beyond, in its grateful radiance, that it
- was not in nature to think gloomy thoughts. And nothing in the young man’s
- own nature tended that way, either.
- </p>
- <p>
- Yet as he stopped short, looked about him, and even took off his hat to
- the better ponder the situation, he saw that it was even more complicated
- than he had thought. His plan of campaign had rested upon two bold
- strategic actions. He had deemed them extremely smart, at the time of
- their invention. Both had been put into execution, and, lo, the state of
- affairs was worse than ever!
- </p>
- <p>
- The problem had been to thwart and overturn O’Daly and to prevent Kate
- from entering the convent. These two objects were so intimately connected
- and dependent one upon the other, that it had been impossible to separate
- them in procedure. He had caused O’Daly to be immured in secrecy in the
- underground cell, the while he went off to secure episcopal interference
- in the convent’s plans. His journey had been crowned with entire success.
- It had involved a trip to Cashel, it is true, but he had obtained an order
- forbidding the ladies of the Hostage’s Tears to add to their numbers.
- Returning in triumph with this invincible weapon, he discovered now that
- O’Daly’s disappearance had been placarded all over Ireland as a murder,
- that his two allies were in custody as suspected assassins, and that—most
- puzzling and disturbing feature of it all—Kate herself had vanished.
- </p>
- <p>
- He did not attach a moment’s credence to the drowning theory. Daughters of
- the Coast of White Foam did not get drowned. Nor was it likely that other
- harm had befallen a girl so capable, so selfreliant, so thoroughly at home
- in all the districts roundabout. Obviously she was in hiding somewhere in
- the neighborhood. The question was where to look for her. Or, would it be
- better to take up the other branch of the problem first?
- </p>
- <p>
- His perplexed gaze, roaming vaguely over the broad space, was all at once
- arrested by a gleam of flashing light in motion. Concentrating his
- attention, he saw that it came from the polished barrel of a rifle borne
- on the arm of a constable at the corner of the square. He put on his hat
- and walked briskly over to this corner. The constable had gone, and
- Bernard followed him up the narrow, winding little street to the barracks.
- </p>
- <p>
- As he walked, he noted knots of villagers clustered about the cottage
- doors, evidently discussing some topic of popular concern. In the roadway
- before the barracks were drawn up two outside cars. A policeman in uniform
- occupied the driver’s seat on each, and a half-dozen others lounged about
- in the sunshine by the gate-posts, their rifles slung over their backs and
- their round, visorless caps cocked aggressively over their ears. These
- gentry bent upon him a general scowl as he walked past them and into the
- barracks.
- </p>
- <p>
- A dapper, dark-faced, exquisitely dressed young gentleman, wearing
- slate-tinted gloves and with a flower in his button-hole, stood in the
- hall-way—two burly constables assisting him meanwhile to get into a
- light, silk-lined top-coat.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come, you fool! Hold the sleeve lower down, can’t you!” this young
- gentleman cried, testily, as Bernard entered. The two constables divided
- the epithet between them humbly, and perfected their task.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want to see the officer in charge here,” said Bernard, prepared by this
- for discourtesy.
- </p>
- <p>
- The young gentleman glanced him over, and on the instant altered his
- demeanor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am Major Snaffle, the resident magistrate,” he said, with great
- politeness. “I’ve only a minute to spare—I’m driving over to Bantry
- with some prisoners—but if you’ll come this way—” and without
- further words, he led the other into a room off the hall, the door of
- which the two constables rushed to obsequiously open.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I dare say those are the prisoners I have come to talk about,” remarked
- Bernard, when the door had closed behind them. He noted that this was the
- first comfortably furnished room he had seen in Ireland, as he took the
- seat indicated by the major’s gesture.
- </p>
- <p>
- Major Snaffle lifted his brows slightly at this, and fastened his bright
- brown eyes in a keen, searching glance upon Bernard’s face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hm-m!” he said. “You are an American, I perceive.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes—my name’s O’Mahony. I come from Michigan.”
- </p>
- <p>
- At sound of this Milesian cognomen, the glance of the stipendiary grew
- keener still, if possible, and the corners of his carefully trimmed little
- mustache were drawn sharply down. There was less politeness in the manner
- and tone of his next inquiry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well—what is your business? What do you want to say about them?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “First of all,” said Bernard, “let’s be sure we’re talking about the same
- people. You’ve got two men under arrest here—Jerry Higgins of this
- place, and a cousin of his from—from Boston, I think it is.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The major nodded, and kept his sharp gaze on the other’s countenance
- unabated.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What of that?” he asked, now almost brusquety.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, I only drove in this morning—I’m in the mining business,
- myself—but I understand they’ve been arrested for the m——
- that is, on account of the disappearance of old Mr. O’Daly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The resident magistrate did not assent by so much as a word. “Well? What’s
- that to you?” he queried, coldly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s this much to me,” Bernard retorted, not with entire good-temper,
- “that O’Daly isn’t dead at all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Major Snaffle’s eyebrows went up still further, with a little jerk. He
- hesitated for a moment, then said: “I hope you know the importance of what
- you are saying. We don’y like to be fooled with.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “The fooling has been done by these who started the story that he was
- murdered,” remarked Bernard.
- </p>
- <p>
- “One must always be prepared for that—at some stage of a case—among
- these Irish,” said the resident magistrate. “I’ve only been in Ireland two
- years, but I know their lying tricks as well as if I’d been born among
- them. Service in India helps one to understand all the inferior races.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I haven’t been here even two months,” said the young man from Houghton
- County, “but so far as I can figure it out, the Irishmen who do the bulk
- of the lying wear uniforms and monkey-caps like paper-collar boxes perched
- over one ear. The police, I mean.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We won’t discuss <i>that</i>,” put in the major, peremptorily. “Do you
- know where O’Daly is?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, sir, I do,” answered Bernard.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Where?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You wouldn’t know if I told you, but I’ll take you to the place—that
- is, if you’ll let me talk to your prisoners first.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Major Snaffle turned the proposition over in his mind. “Take me to the
- place,” he commented at last; “that means that you’ve got him hidden
- somewhere, I assume.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard looked into the shrewd, twinkling eyes with a new respect. “That’s
- about the size of,” he assented.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Hra-m! Yes. That makes a new offense of it, with <i>you</i> as an
- accessory, I take it—or ought I to say principal?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard was not at all dismayed by this shift in the situation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Call it what you like,” he answered. “See here, major,” he went on, in a
- burst of confidence, “this whole thing’s got nothing to do with politics
- or the potato crop or anything else that need concern you. It’s purely a
- private family matter. In a day or two, it’ll be in such shape that I can
- tell you all about it. For that matter, I could now, only it’s such a
- deuce of a long story.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The major thought again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right,” he said. “You can see the prisoners in my presence, and then
- I’ll give you a chance to produce O’Daly. I ought to warn you, though,
- that it may be all used against you, later on.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m not afraid of that,” replied Bernard.
- </p>
- <p>
- A minute later, he was following the resident magistrate up a winding
- flight of narrow stone stairs, none too clean. A constable, with a bunch
- of keys jingling in his hand, preceded them, and, at the top, threw open a
- heavy, iron-cased door. The solitary window of the room they entered had
- been so blocked with thick bars of metal that very little light came
- through. Bernard, with some difficulty, made out two figures lying in one
- corner on a heap of straw and old cast-off clothing.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Get up! Here’s some one to see you!” called out the major, in the same
- tone he had used to the constables while they were helping on the
- overcoat.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard, as he heard it, felt himself newly informed as to the spirit in
- which India was governed. Perhaps it was necessary there; but it made him
- grind his teeth to think of its use in Ireland.
- </p>
- <p>
- The two figures scrambled to their feet, and Bernard shook hands with
- both.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor, sir, you’re a sight for sore eyes!” exclaimed Jerry, effusively,
- wringing the visitor’s fingers in his fat clasp. “Are ye come to take us
- out?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, that’ll be easy enough,” said Bernard. “You got my telegram all
- right?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Major Snaffle took his tablets from a pocket, and made a minute on them
- unobserved.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I did—I did,” said Jerry, buoyantly. Then with a changed expression
- he added, whispering: “An’ that same played the divil intirely. ’T
- was for that they arrested us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t whisper!” interposed the resident magistrate, curtly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! I’ll say nothing at all,” said Jerry, who seemed now for the first
- time to consider the presence of the official.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes—don’t be afraid,” Bernard urged, reassuringly. “It’s all right
- now. Tell me, is O’Daly in the place we know of?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He is, thin! Egor, unless he’d wings on him, and dug his way up through
- the sayling, like a blessed bat.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did he make much fuss?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He did not—lastewise we didn’t stop to hear, He came down wid us
- aisy as you plaze, an’ I unlocked the dure. ’T is a foine room,’
- says I. ‘’T is that,’ says he. ‘Here’s whishky,’ says I. ‘I’d be
- lookin’ for that wherever you were,’ says he, ‘even to the bowels of the
- earth.’ ‘An’ why not?’ says I. ‘What is it the priest read to us, that it
- makes a man’s face to shine wid oil?’ ‘A grand scholar ye are, Jerry,’
- says he—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Cut it short, Jerry!” interposed Bernard. “The main thing is you left him
- there all right?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin, we did, sir, an’ no mistake.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “My plan is, major,”—Bernard turned to the resident magistrate—“to
- take my friend here, Jerry Higgins, with us, to the place I’ve been
- speaking of. We’ll leave the other man here, as the editors say in my
- country, as a ‘guarantee of good faith.’ The only point is that we three
- must go alone. It wouldn’t do to take any constables with us. In fact,
- there’s a secret about it, and I wouldn’t feel justified in giving it away
- even to you, if it didn’t seem necessary. We simply confide it to you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You can’t confide anything to me,” said the resident magistrate.
- “Understand clearly that I shall hold myself free to use everything I see
- and learn, if the interests of justice seem to demand it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, but that isn’t going to happen,” responded Bernard. “The interests
- of justice are all the other way, as you’ll see, later on. What I mean is,
- if the case isn’t taken into court at all—as it won’t be—we
- can trust you not to speak about this place.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh—in my private capacity—that is a different matter.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And you won’t be afraid to go alone with us?—it isn’t far from
- here, but, mind, it is downright lonesome.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Major Snaffle covered the two men—the burly, stout Irishman and the
- lithe, erect, close-knit young American—with a comprehensive glance.
- The points of his mustache trembled momentarily upward in the beginning of
- a smile. “No—not the least bit afraid,” the dapper little gentleman
- replied.
- </p>
- <p>
- The constables at the outer door stood with their big red hands to their
- caps, and saw with amazement the major, Bernard and Jerry pass them and
- the cars, and go down the street abreast. The villagers, gathered about
- the shop and cottage doors, watched the progress of the trio with even
- greater surprise. It seemed now, though, that nothing was too marvelous to
- happen in Muirisc. Some of them knew that the man with the flower in his
- coat was the stipendary magistrate from Bantry, and, by some obscure
- connection, this came to be interpreted throughout the village as meaning
- that the bodies of both O’Daly and Miss Kate had been found. The stories
- which were born of this understanding flatly contradicted one another at
- every point as they flew about, but they made a good enough basis for the
- old women of the hamlet to start keening upon afresh.
- </p>
- <p>
- The three men, pausing now and again to make sure they were not followed,
- went at a sharp pace around through the churchyard to the door of Jerry’s
- abode, and entered it. The key and the lantern were found hanging upon
- their accustomed pegs. Jerry lighted the candle, pushed back the bed, and
- led the descent of the narrow, musty stairs through the darkness. The
- major came last of all.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’ve only been down here once myself,” Bernard explained to him, over his
- shoulder, as they made their stumbling way downward. “It seems the place
- was discovered by accident, in the old Fenian days. I suppose the convent
- used it in old times—they say there was a skeleton of a monk found
- in it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Whisht, now!” whispered Jerry, as, having passed through the long, low
- corridor leading from the staircase, he came to a halt at the doorway.
- “Maybe we’ll surproise him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He unlocked the door and flung it open. No sound of life came from within.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come along out ‘o that, Cormac!” called Jerry, into the mildewed
- blackness.
- </p>
- <p>
- There was no answer.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard almost pushed Jerry forward into the chamber, and, taking the
- lantern from him, held it aloft as he moved about. He peered under the
- table; he opened the great muniment chest; he pulled back the curtains to
- scrutinize the bed. There was no sign of O’Daly anywhere.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Saints be wid us!” gasped Jerry, crossing himself, “the divil’s flown
- away wid his own!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard, from staring in astonishment into his confederate’s fat face, let
- his glance wander to the major. That official had stepped over the
- threshold of the chamber, and stood at one side of the open door. He held
- a revolver in his gloved, right hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Gentlemen,” he said, in a perfectly calm voice, “my father served in
- Ireland in Fenian times, and an American-Irishman caught him in a trap,
- gagged him with gun-rags, and generally made a fool of him. Such things do
- not happen twice in any intelligent family. You will therefore walk
- through this door, arm in arm, handing me the lantern as you pass, and you
- will then go up the stairs six paces ahead of me. If either of you
- attempts to do anything else, I will shoot him down like a dog.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXVII—THE RETURN OF THE O’MAHONY.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">B</span>ernard had never
- before had occasion to look into the small and ominously black muzzle of a
- loaded revolver. An involuntary twitching seized upon his muscles as he
- did so now, but his presence of mind did not desert him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No! Don’t shoot!” he called out. The words shook as he uttered them, and
- seemed to his nervously acute hearing to be crowded parts of a single
- sound. “That’s rank foolishness!” he added, hurriedly. “There’s no trick!
- Nobody dreams of touching you. I give you my word I’m more astonished than
- you are!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The major seemed to be somewhat impressed by the candor of the young man’s
- tone. He did not lower the weapon, but he shifted his finger away from the
- trigger.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That may or may not be the case,” he said with a studious affectation of
- calm in his voice. “At all events, you will at once do as I said.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But see here,” urged Bernard, “there’s an explanation to everything. I’ll
- swear that old O’Daly was put in here by our friend here—Jerry
- Higgins. That’s straight, isn’t it, Jerry?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It is, sir!” said Jerry, fervently, with eye askance on the revolver.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And it’s evident enough that he couldn’t have got out by himself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “That he never did, sir.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, then—let’s figure. How many people know of this place?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s yoursilf,” responded Jerry, meditatively, “an’ mesilf an’ Linsky—me
- cousin, Joseph Higgins, I mane. That’s all, if ye l’ave O’Daly out. An’
- that’s what bothers me wits, who the divil <i>did</i> l’ave him out?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “This cousin of yours, as you call him,” put in the resident magistrate—“what
- did he mean by speaking of him as Linsky? No lying, now.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Lying, is it, your honor? ’T is aisy to see you’re a stranger in
- these parts, to spake that word to me. Egor, ’t is me truth-tellin
- ’s kept me the poor man I am. I remember, now, sir, wance on a time
- whin I was only a shlip of a lad—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What did you call him Linsky for?” Major Snaffle demanded, peremptorily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, sir,” answered Jerry, unabashed, “’t is because he’s
- freckles on him. ‘Linsky’ is the Irish for a ‘freckled man!’ Sure, O’Daly
- would tell you the same—if yer honor could find him.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The major did not look entirely convinced.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t doubt it,” he said, with grim sarcasm; “every man, woman and
- child of you all would tell the same. Come now—we’ll get up out of
- this. Link your arms together, and give me the lantern.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “By your lave, sir,” interposed Jerry, “that trick ye told us of your
- father—w’u’d that have been in a marteller tower, on the coast
- beyant Kinsale? Egor, sir, I was there! ’T was me tuk the gun-rags
- from your father’s mouth. Sure, ’t is in me ricolliction as if ’t
- was yesterday. There stud The O’Mahony—”
- </p>
- <p>
- At the sound of the name on his tongue, Jerry stopped short. The secret of
- that expedition had been preserved so long. Was there danger in revealing
- it now.
- </p>
- <p>
- To Bernard the name suggested another thought. He turned swiftly to Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Look here!” he said. “You forgot something. The O’Mahony knew of this
- place.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin, he did, sir,” assented Jerry. “’T was him discovered
- it altogether.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Major,” the young man exclaimed, wheeling now to again confront the
- magistrate with his revolver, “there’s something queer about this whole
- thing. I don’t understand it any more than you do. Perhaps if we put our
- heads together we could figure it out between us. It’s foolishness to
- stand like this. Let me light the candles here, and all of us sit down
- like white men. That’s it,” he added as he busied himself in carrying out
- his suggestion, to which the magistrate tacitly assented. “Now we can
- talk. We’ll sit here in front of you, and you can keep out your pistol, if
- you like.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well?” said Major Snaffle, inquiringly, when he had seated himself
- between the others and the door, yet sidewise, so that he might not be
- taken unawares by any new-comer.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Tell him, Jerry, who this O’Mahony of yours was,” directed Bernard.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Ah, thin—a grand divil of a man!” said Jerry, with enthusiasm. “’T
- was he was the master of all Muirisc. Sure ’t was mesilf was the
- first man he gave a word to in Ireland whin he landed at the Cove of Cork.
- ‘Will ye come along wid me?’ says he. ‘To the inds of the earth!’ says I.
- And wid that—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He came from America, too, did he?” queried the major. “Was that the same
- man who—who played the trick on my father? You seem to know about
- that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor, ’t was the same!” cried Jerry, slapping his fat knee and
- chuckling with delight at the memory. “’T was all in the winkin’ of
- an eye—an’ there he had him bound like a calf goin’ to the fair, an’
- he cartin’ him on his own back to the boat. Up wint the sails, an’ off we
- pushed, an’ the breeze caught us, an’ whin the soldiers came, faith, ’t
- was safe out o’ raych we were. An’ thin The O’Mahony—God save him!—came
- to your honor’s father—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I know the story,” interrupted the major. “It doesn’t amuse me as it
- does you. But what has this man—this O’Mahony—got to do with
- this present case?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “It’s like this,” explained Bernard, “as I understand it: He left Ireland
- after this thing Jerry’s been telling you about and went fighting in other
- countries. He turned his property over to two trustees to manage for the
- benefit of a little girl here—now Miss Kate O’Mahony. O’Daly was one
- of the trustees. What does he do but marry the girl’s mother—a widow—and
- lay pipes to put the girl in a convent and steal all the money. I told you
- at the beginning that it was a family squabble. I happened to come along
- this way, got interested in the thing, and took a notion to put a spoke in
- O’Daly’s wheel. To manage the convent end of the business I had to go away
- for two or three days. While I was gone, I thought it would be safer to
- have O’Daly down here out of mischief. Now you’ve got the whole story. Or,
- no, that isn’t all, for when I got back I find that the young lady herself
- has disappeared; and, lo and behold, here’s O’Daly turned up missing,
- too!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “What’s that you say?” asked Major Snaffle. “The young lady gone, also?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it Miss Kate?” broke in Jerry. “Oh, thin, ’t is the divil’s
- worst work! Miss Kate not to be found—is that your m’aning? ’T
- is not consayvable.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh, I don’t think there’s anything serious in <i>that</i>,” said Bernard.
- “She’ll turn out to be safe and snug somewhere when everything’s cleared
- up. But, in the meantime, where’s O’Daly? How did he get out of here?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The major rose and walked over to the door. He examined its fastenings and
- lock with attention.
- </p>
- <p>
- “It can only be opened from the outside,” he remarked as he returned to
- his seat.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I know that,” said Bernard. “And I’ve got a notion that there’s only one
- man alive who could have come and opened it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it Lin—me cousin, you mane?” asked Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Egor! He was never out of me sight, daylight or dark, till they arrested
- us together.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No,” replied Bernard. “I didn’t mean him. The man I’m thinking of is The
- O’Mahony himself.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Jerry leaped to his feet so swiftly that the major instinctively clutched
- his revolver anew. But there was no menace in Jerry’s manner. He stood for
- a moment, his fat face reddened in the candle’s pale glow, his gray eyes
- ashine, his mouth expanding in a grin of amazed delight. Then he burst
- forth in a torrent of eager questioning.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t you mane it?” he cried. “The O’Mahony come back to his own ag’in?
- W’u’d he—is it—oh, thin, ‘t is too good to be thrue, sir! An’
- we sittin’ here! An’ him near by! An’ me not—ah, come along out ’o
- this! An’ ye’re not desayvin’ us, sir? He’s thruly come back to us?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Don’t go too fast,” remonstrated Bernard “It’s only guess-work There’s
- nothing sure about it at all. Only there’s no one else who <i>could</i>
- have come here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Thrue for ye, sir!” exclaimed Jerry, all afire now with joyous
- confidence. “’T is a fine, grand intelligince ye have, sir. An’
- will we be goin’, now, major, to find him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Under the influence of Jerry’s great excitement, the other two had risen
- to their feet as well.
- </p>
- <p>
- The resident magistrate toyed dubiously with his revolver, casting sharp
- glances of scrutiny from one to the other of the faces before him, the
- while he pondered the probabilities of truth in the curious tale to which
- he had listened.
- </p>
- <p>
- The official side of him clamored for its entire rejection as a lie. Like
- most of his class, with their superficial and hostile observation of an
- alien race, his instincts were all against crediting anything which any
- Irish peasant told him, to begin with. Furthermore, the half of this
- strange story had been related by an Irish-American—a type regarded
- by the official mind in Ireland with a peculiar intensity of suspicion.
- Yes, he decided, it was all a falsehood.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then he looked into the young man’s face once more, and wavered. It seemed
- an honest face. If its owner had borne even the homeliest and most
- plebeian of Saxon labels, the major was conscious that he should have
- liked him. The Milesian name carried prejudice, it was true, but—
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, we will go up,” he said, “in the manner I described. I don’t see
- what your object would be in inventing this long rigmarole. Of course, you
- can see that if it isn’t true, it will be so much the worse for you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We ought to see it by this time,” said Bernard, with a suggestion of
- weariness. “You’ve mentioned it often enough. Here, take the lantern.
- We’ll go up ahead. The door locks itself. I have the key.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The three men made their way up the dark, tortuous flight of stairs,
- replaced the lantern and key on their peg in Jerry’s room, and emerged
- once more into the open. They filled their lungs with long breaths of the
- fresh air, and then looked rather vacuously at one another. The major had
- pocketed his weapon.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, what’s the programme?” asked Bernard.
- </p>
- <p>
- Before any answer came, their attention was attracted by the figure of a
- stranger, sauntering about among the ancient stones and black wooden
- crosses scattered over the weed-grown expanse of the churchyard. He was
- engaged in deciphering the names on the least weather-beaten of these
- crosses, but only in a cursory way and with long intermittent glances over
- the prospect of ivy-grown ruins and gray walls, turrets and gables beyond.
- As they watched him, he seemed suddenly to become aware of their presence.
- Forthwith he turned and strolled toward them.
- </p>
- <p>
- As he advanced, they saw that he was a tall and slender man, whose
- close-cut hair and short mustache and chin tuft produced an effect of
- extreme whiteness against a notably tanned and sun-burnt skin. Though
- evidently well along in years, he walked erect and with an elastic and
- springing step. He wore black clothes of foreign, albeit genteel aspect.
- The major noted on the lapel of his coat a tell-tale gleam of red ribbon—and
- even before that had guessed him to be a Frenchman and a soldier. He
- leaped swiftly to the further assumption that this was The O’Mahony, and
- then hesitated, as Jerry showed no sign of recognition.
- </p>
- <p>
- The stranger halted before them with a little nod and a courteous upward
- wave of his forefinger.
- </p>
- <p>
- “A fine day, gentlemen,” he remarked, with politeness.
- </p>
- <p>
- Major Snaffle had stepped in front of his companions.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Permit me to introduce myself,” he said, with a sudden resolution, “I am
- the stipendiary magistrate of the district. Would you kindly tell me if
- you are informed as to the present whereabouts of Mr. Cormac O’Daly, of
- this place?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The other showed no trace of surprise on his browned face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Mr. O’Daly and his step-daughter,” he replied, affably enough, “are just
- now doing me the honor of being my guests, aboard my vessel in the
- harbor.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Then a twinkle brightened his gray eyes as he turned their glance upon
- Jerry’s red, moon-like face. He permitted himself the briefest of dry
- chuckles.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, young man,” he said, “they seem to have fed you pretty well,
- anyway, since I saw you last.” For another moment Jerry stared in
- round-eyed bewilderment at the speaker. Then with a wild “Huroo!” he
- dashed forward, seized his hand and wrung it in both of his.
- </p>
- <p>
- “God bless ye! God bless ye!” he gasped, between little formless
- ejaculations of dazed delight. “God forgive me for not knowin’ ye—you’re
- that althered! But for you’re back amongst us—aloive and well—glory
- be to the world!”
- </p>
- <p>
- He kept close to The O’Mahony’s side as the group began now to move toward
- the gate of the churchyard, pointing to him with his fat thumb, as if to
- call all nature to witness this glorious event, and murmuring fondly to
- himself: “You’re come home to us!” over and over again.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I am much relieved to learn what you tell me, Mr.—— Or
- rather, I believe you are O’Mahony without the mister,” said Major
- Snaffle, as they walked out upon the green. “I dare say you know—this
- has been a very bad winter all over the west and south’, and crime seems
- to be increasing, instead of the reverse, as spring advances. We have had
- the gravest reports about the disaffection in this district—especially
- among your tenants. That’s why we gave such ready credence to the theory
- of murder.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Murder?” queried The O’Mahony. “Oh, I see—you thought O’Daly had
- been murdered?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, we arrested your man Higgins, here, yesterday. I was just on the
- point of starting with him to Bantry jail, an hour ago, when this young
- gentleman—” the major made a backward gesture to indicate Bernard—“came
- and said he knew where O’Daly was. He took me down to that curious
- underground chamber—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who took you down, did you say?” asked The O’Mahony, sharply. He turned
- on his heel as he spoke, as did the major.
- </p>
- <p>
- To their considerable surprise, Bernard was no longer one of the party.
- Their dumfounded gaze ranged the expanse of common round about. He was
- nowhere to be seen.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahoney looked almost sternly at Jerry.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who is this young man you had with you—who seems to have taken to
- running things in my absence?” he demanded.
- </p>
- <p>
- Poor Jerry, who had been staring upward at the new-comer with the dumb
- admiration of an affectionate spaniel, cowered humbly under this glance
- and tone.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, yer honor,” he stammered, plucking at the buttons of his coat in
- embarrassment, “egor, for the matter of that—I—I don’t rightly
- know.”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXVIII—A MARINE MORNING CALL.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he young man from
- Houghton County, strolling along behind these three men, all so busily
- occupied with one another, had, of a sudden, conceived the notion of
- dropping silently out of the party.
- </p>
- <p>
- He had put the idea into execution and was secure from observation on the
- farther side of the ditch, before the question of what he should do next
- shaped itself in his mind. Indeed, it was not until he had made his way to
- the little old-fashioned pier and come to an enforced halt among the empty
- barrels, drying nets and general marine odds and ends which littered the
- landing-stage, that he knew what purpose had brought him hither.
- </p>
- <p>
- But he perceived it now with great clearness. What other purpose, in
- truth, did existence itself contain for him?
- </p>
- <p>
- “I want to be rowed over at once to that vessel there,” he called out to
- John Pat, who made one of a group of Muirisc men, in white jackets and
- soft black hats, standing beneath him on the steps. As he descended and
- took his seat in one of the waiting dingeys, he noted other clusters of
- villagers along the shore, all concentrating an eager interest upon the
- yawl-rigged craft which lay at anchor in the harbor. They pointed to it
- incessant as they talked, and others could be seen running forward across
- the green to join them. He had never supposed Muirisc capable of such a
- display of animation.
- </p>
- <p>
- “The people seem tickled to death to get The O’Mahony back again,” he
- remarked to John Pat, as they shot out under the first long sweep of the
- oars.
- </p>
- <p>
- “They are, sir,” was the stolid response.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Did your brother come back with him—that one-armed man who went
- after him—Malachy, I think they called him?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “He did, sur,” said Pat, simply.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well”—Bernard bent forward impatiently—“tell me about it!
- Where did he find him? What do people say?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “They do be saying manny things,” responded the oarsman, rounding his
- shoulders to the work.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard abandoned the inquiry, with a grunt of discouragement, and
- contented himself perforce by watching the way in which the strange craft
- waxed steadily in size as they sped toward her. In a minute or two more,
- he was alongside and clambering up a rope-ladder, which dangled its ends
- in the gently heaving water.
- </p>
- <p>
- Save for a couple of obviously foreign sailors lolling in the sunshine
- upon a sail in the bows, there was no one on deck. As he looked about,
- however, in speculation, the apparition of a broad, black hat, with long,
- curled plumes, rose above the companionway. He welcomed it with an
- exclamation of delight, and ran forward with outstretched hands.
- </p>
- <p>
- The wearer of the hat, as she stepped upon the deck and confronted this
- demonstration, confessed to surprise by stopping short and lifting her
- black brows in inquiry. Bernard sheepishly let his hands fall to his side
- before the cool glance with which she regarded him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Is it viewing the vessel you are?” she asked. “Her jigger lug-sail is
- unusual, I’m told.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man’s blue eyes glistened in reproachful appeal.
- </p>
- <p>
- “What do I know about lugger jig-sails, or care, either,” he asked. “I
- hurried here the moment I heard, to—to see <i>you!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T is flattered I am, I’m sure,” said Kate, dryly, looking away
- from him to the brown cliffs beyond.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come, be fair!” Bernard pleaded. “Tell me what the matter is. I thought I
- had every reason to suppose you’d be glad to see me. It’s plain enough
- that you are not; but you—you <i>might</i> tell me why. Or no,” he
- went on, with a sudden change of tone, “I won’t ask you. It’s your own
- affair, after all. Only you’ll excuse the way I rushed up to you. I’d had
- my head full of your affairs for days past, and then your disappearance—they
- thought you were drowned, you know—and I—I—”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man broke off with weak inconclusiveness, and turned as if to
- descend the ladder again. But John Pat had rowed away with the boat, and
- he looked blankly down upon the clear water instead.
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate’s voice sounded with a mellower tone behind him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I wouldn’t have ye go in anger,” she said.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard wheeled around in a flash.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Anger!” he cried, with a radiant smile chasing all the shadows from his
- face. “Why, how on earth <i>could</i> I be angry with <i>you?</i> No; but
- I was going away most mightily down in the mouth, though—that is,”
- he added, with a rueful kind of grin, “if my boat hadn’t gone off without
- me. But, honestly, now, when I drove in here this morning from Skibbereen,
- I felt like a victorious general coming home from the wars. I’d done
- everything I wanted to do. I had the convent business blocked, and I had
- O’Daly on the hip; and I said to myself, as we drove along: ‘She’ll be
- glad to see me.’ I kept saying that all the while, straight from
- Skibbereen to Muirisc. Well, then—you can guess for yourself—it
- was like tumbling backward into seven hundred feet of ice-water!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate’s face had gradually lost its implacable rigidity, and softened now
- for an instant into almost a smile.
- </p>
- <p>
- “So much else has happened since that drive of yours,” she said gently.
- “And what were ye doing at Skibbereen?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, you’ll open <i>your</i> eyes!” predicted Bernard, all animation
- once again; and then he related the details of his journey to Skibbereen
- and Cashel, of his interviews with the prelates and of the manner in which
- he had, so to speak, wound up the career of the convent of the Hostage’s
- Tears. “It hadn’t had any real, rightdown legitimate title to existence,
- you know,” he concluded, “these last five hundred years. All it needed was
- somebody to call attention to this fact, you see, and, bang, the whole
- thing collapsed like a circus-tent in a cyclone!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl had moved over to the gunwale, and now leaning over the rail,
- looked meditatively into the water below.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And so,” she said, with a pensive note in her voice, “there’s an end to
- the historic convent of the O’Mahonys! No other family in Ireland had one—’t
- was the last glory of our poor, hunted and plundered and poverty-striken
- race; and now even that must depart from us.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well—hang it all!” remonstrated Bernard—“it’s better that way
- than to have <i>you</i> locked up all your life. I feel a little blue
- myself about closing up the old convent, but there’s something else I feel
- a thousand times more strongly about still.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes—isn’t it wonderful?—the return of The O’Mahony!” said
- Kate. “Oh, I hardly know still if I’m waking or not. ’T was all
- like a blessid vision, and ’t <i>was</i> supernatural in its way;
- I’ll never believe otherwise. There was I on the strand yonder, with the
- talisman he’d given me in me arms, praying for his return—and,
- behold you there was this boat of his forninst me! Oh! Never tell me the
- age of miracles is past?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I won’t—I promise you!” said Bernard, with fervor. “I’ve seen one
- myself since I’ve been here. It was at the Three Castles. I had my gun
- raised to shoot a heron, when an enchanted fairy—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Nothing to do but he’d bring me on board,” Kate put in, hastily. “Old
- Murphy swam out to him ahead of us, screaming wid delight like one
- possessed. And we sat and talked for hours—he telling strange
- stories of the war’s he’d been in wid the French, and thin wid Don Carlos,
- and thin the Turks, and thin wid some outlandish people in a Turkish
- province—until night fell, and he wint ashore. And whin he came back
- he brought O’Daly wid him—where in the Lord’s name he found him
- passes my understanding, and thin we up sail and beat down till we stood
- off Three Castle Head. There we lay all night—O’Mahony gave up his
- cabin to me—and this morning back we came again. And now—the
- Lord be praised!—there’s an ind to all our throubles!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” said Bernard, with deliberation, “I’m glad. I really <i>am</i>
- glad. Although, of course, it’s plain enough to see, there’s an end to me,
- too.”
- </p>
- <p>
- A brief time of silence passed, as the two, leaning side by side on the
- rail, watched the slow rise and sinking of the dull-green wavelets.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re off to Ameriky, thin?” Kate finally asked, without looking up.
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man hesitated.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t know yet,” he said, slowly. “I’ve got a curious hand dealt out to
- me. I hardly know how to play it. One thing is sure, though: hearts are
- trumps.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He tried to catch her glance, but she kept her eyes resolutely bent upon
- the water.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You know what I want to say,” he went on, moving his arm upon the rail
- till there was the least small fluttering suggestion of contact with hers.
- “It must have said itself to you that day upon the mountain-top, or, for
- that matter, why, that very first time I saw you I went away head over
- heels in love. I tell you, candidly, I haven’t thought or dreamed for a
- minute of anything else from that blessed day. It’s all been fairyland to
- me ever since. I’ve been so happy! May I stay in fairyland, Kate?”
- </p>
- <p>
- She made no answer. Bernard felt her arm tremble against his for an
- instant before it was withdrawn. He noted, too, the bright carmine flush
- spring to her cheek, overmantle her dark face and then fade away before an
- advancing pallor. A tear glittered among her downcast lashes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You mustn’t deny me <i>my</i> age of miracles!” he murmuringly pleaded.
- “It <i>was</i> a miracle that we should have met as we did; that I should
- have found you afterward as I did; that I should have turned up just when
- you needed help the most; that the stray discovery of an old mediæval
- parchment should have given me the hint what to do. Oh, don’t <i>you</i>
- feel it, Kate? Don’t <i>you</i> realize, too, dear, that there was fate in
- it all? That we belonged from the beginning to each other?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Very white-faced and grave, Kate lifted herself erect and looked at him.
- It was with an obvious effort that she forced herself to speak, but her
- words were firm enough and her glance did not waver.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Unfortunately,” she said, “<i>your</i> miracle has a trick in it. Even if
- ’t would have pleased me to believe in it, how can I, whin ’t
- is founded on desate.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard stared at her in round-eyed wonderment.
- </p>
- <p>
- “How ‘deceit’?” he stammered. “How do you mean? Is it about kidnapping
- O’Daly? We only did that—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, ’t is <i>this</i>,” said Kate—“we ‘ll be open with each
- other, and it’s a grief to me to say it to you, whom I have liked so much,
- but you ‘re no O’Ma-hony at all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man with difficulty grasped her meaning.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, if you remember, I never said I knew my father was one of <i>the</i>
- O’Mahonys, you know. All I said was that he came from somewhere in County
- Cork. Surely, there was no deceit in that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- She shook her head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No; what ye said was that your name was O’Mahony.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, so it is. Good heavens! <i>That</i> isn’t disputed, is it?”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And you said, moreover,” she continued, gravely, “that your father knew
- <i>our</i> O’Mahony as well almost as he knew himsilf.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Oh-h!” exclaimed Bernard, and fell thereupon into confused rumination
- upon many thoughts which till then had been curiously subordinated in his
- mind.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And, now,” Kate went on, with a sigh, “whin I mintion this to The
- O’Mahony himself, he says he never in his life knew any one of your
- father’s name. O’Daly was witness to it as well.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard had his elbows once more on the rail. He pushed his chin hard
- against his upturned palms and stared at the skyline, thinking as he had
- never been forced to think before.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Surely there was no need for the—the misstatement,” said Kate, in
- mournful recognition of what she took to be his dumb self-reproach. “See
- now how useless it was—and a thousand times worse than useless! See
- how it prevints me now from respecting you and being properly grateful to
- you for what you’ve done on me behalf, and—and—”
- </p>
- <p>
- She broke off suddenly. To her consternation she had discovered that the
- young man, so far from being stricken speechless in contrition, was
- grinning gayly at the distant landscape.
- </p>
- <p>
- Turning with abruptness she walked indignantly aft. Cormac O’Daly had come
- up from below, and stood wistfully gazing landward over the taffrail. She
- joined him, and stood at his side flushed and wrathful.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard was not wholly able to chase the smile from his face as he rose
- and sauntered over toward her. She turned her back as he approached and
- tapped the deck nervously with her foot. Nothing dismayed, he addressed
- himself to O’Daly, who seemed unable to decide whether also to look the
- other way or not.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Good morning, sir,” he said affably. “You’re quite a stranger, Mr.
- O’Daly.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Kate, at his first word, had walked briskly away up the deck. Cormac’s
- little black eyes snapped viciously at the intruder.
- </p>
- <p>
- “At laste I’m not such a stranger,” he retorted, “but that me thrue name
- is known, an’ I’m here be the invitation of the owner.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m sorry you take things so hard, Mr. O’Daly,” said Bernard. “An easy
- disposition would come very handy to you, seeing the troubles you ’ve
- got to go through with yet.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The small man gazed apprehensively at his tormentor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t folly ye,” he stammered.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m going to propose that you <i>shall</i> follow me, sir,” replied the
- young man in an authoritative tone. “I understand that in conversation
- last night between your step-daughter and you and <i>The</i>—the
- owner of this vessel, the question of my name was brought up, and that it
- was decided that I was a fraud. Now, I’m not much given to making a fuss,
- but there are some things, especially at certain times, that I can’t stand—not
- for one little minute. This is one of ’em. Now I’m going to suggest
- that we hail one of those boats there and go ashore at once—you and
- Miss Kate and I—and clear this matter up without delay.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “We’ll remain here till The O’Mahony returns!” said O’Daly, stiffly. “’T
- was his request. ’T is no interest of mine to clear the matther up,
- as you call it.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, it was no interest of mine, Mr. O’Daly,” remarked Bernard,
- placidly, “to go over the mining contracts you’ve made as trustee during
- the past dozen years and figure out all the various items of the estate’s
- income; but I’ve done it. It makes a very curious little balance-sheet. I
- had intended to fetch it down with me to-day and go over it with you in
- your underground retreat.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “In the devil’s name, who are you?” snarled Cormac, with livid face and
- frightened eyes. “That’s just what I proposed we should go right and
- settle. If you object, why, I shall go alone. But in that case, it may
- happen that I shall have to discuss with the gentleman who has just
- arrived the peculiarities of that balance-sheet I spoke of. What do you
- think, eh?”
- </p>
- <p>
- O’Daly did not hesitate.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sur, I’ll go wid you,” he said. “The O’Mahony has no head for figures. ’T
- would be flat injustice to bother him wid ’em, and he only newly
- landed.” Bernard walked lightly across the deck, humming a little tune to
- himself as he advanced, and baiting a short foot from where Kate stood.
- </p>
- <p>
- “O’Daly’s going ashore with me,” he remarked. “He dare not!” she answered,
- over her shoulder. “The O’Mahony bade him stop here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, this is more or less of a free country, and he’s changed his mind.
- He’s going with me. I—I want you to come, too.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’Tis loikely!” she said, with a derisive sniff.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Kate,” he said, drawing nearer to her by a step and speaking in low,
- earnest tones, “I hate to plead this sort of thing; but you have nothing
- but candid and straightforward friendship from me. I’ve done a trifle of
- lying <i>for</i> you, perhaps, but none <i>to</i> you. I’ve worked for you
- as I never worked for myself. I’ve run risks for you which nothing else
- under the sun would have tempted me into. All that doesn’t matter. Leave
- that out of the question. I did it because I love you. And for that
- selfsame reason I come now and ask this favor of you. You can send me away
- afterward, if you like; but you <i>can’t</i> bear to stop here now,
- thinking these things of me, and refusing to come out and learn for
- yourself whether they are true or false, for that would be unfair, and
- it’s not in your blood—in <i>our</i> blood—to be that.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The girl neither turned to him nor spoke, but he could see the outline of
- her face as she bowed her head and gazed in silence at the murmuring
- water; and something in this sight seemed to answer him.
- </p>
- <p>
- He strode swiftly to the other side of the vessel, and exultantly waved
- his handkerchief in signal to the boatmen on the shore.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXIX—DIAMOND CUT PASTE.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">T</span>he O’Mahony sat
- once more in the living-room of his castle—sat very much at his
- ease, with a cigar between his teeth, and his feet comfortably stretched
- out toward the blazing bank of turf on the stone hearth.
- </p>
- <p>
- A great heap of papers lay upon the table at his elbow—the contents
- of O’Daly’s strong-box, the key to which he had brought with him from the
- vessel—but not a single band of red tape had been untied. The
- O’Mahony’s mood for investigation had exhausted itself in the work of
- getting the documents out. His hands were plunged deep into his trousers’
- pockets now, and he gazed into the glowing peat.
- </p>
- <p>
- His home-coming had been a thing to warm the most frigid heart. His own
- beat delightedly still at the thought of it. From time to time there
- reached his ears from the square without a vague braying noise, the sound
- of which curled his lips into the semblance of a grin. It seemed so droll
- to him that Muirisc should have a band—a fervent half-dozen of
- amateurs, with ancient and battered instruments which successive
- generations of regimental musicians bad pawned at Skibbereen or Bantry,
- and on which they played now, neither by note nor by ear, but solely by
- main strength.
- </p>
- <p>
- The tumult of discord which they produced was dreadful, but The O’Mahony
- liked it. He had been pleasurably touched, too, by the wild enthusiasm of
- greeting with which Muirisc had met him when he disclosed himself on the
- main street, walking up to the police-station with Major Snaffle and
- Jerry. All the older inhabitants he knew, and shook hands with. The sight
- of younger people among them whom he did not know alone kept alive the
- recollection that he had been absent twelve long years. Old and young
- alike, and preceded by the hurriedly summoned band, they had followed him
- in triumphal procession when he came down the street again, with the
- liberated Jerry and Linsky at his heels. They were still outside, cheering
- and madly bawling their delight whenever the bandsmen stopped to take
- breath. Jerry, Linsky and the one-armed Malachy were out among them,
- broaching a cask of porter from the castle cellar; Mrs. Fergus and Mrs.
- Sullivan were in the kitchen cutting up bread and meat to go with the
- drink.
- </p>
- <p>
- No wonder there were cheers! Small matter for marvel was it, either, that
- The O’Mahony smiled as he settled down still more lazily in his arm-chair
- and pushed his feet further toward the fire.
- </p>
- <p>
- Presently he must go and fetch O’Daly and Kate from the vessel—or
- no, when Jerry came in he would send him on that errand. After his long
- journey The O’Mahony was tired and sleepy—all the more as he had sat
- up most of the night, out on deck, talking with O’Daly. What a journey it
- had been! Post-haste from far away, barbarous Armenia, where the faithful
- Malachy had found him in command of a Turkish battalion, resting after the
- task of suppressing a provincial rebellion. Home they had wended their
- tireless way by Constantinople and Malta and mistral-swept Marseilles, and
- thence by land across to Havre. Here, oddly enough, he had fallen in with
- the French merchant to whom he had sold the <i>Hen Hawk</i> twelve years
- before—the merchant’s son had served with him in the Army of the
- Loire three years later, and was his friend—and he had been able to
- gratify the sudden fantastic whim of returning as he had departed in the
- quaint, flush-decked, yawl-rigged old craft. It all seemed like a dream!
- </p>
- <p>
- “If your honor plazes, there’s a young gintleman at the dure—a
- Misther O’Mahony, from America—w’u’d be afther having a word wid
- ye.”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was the soft voice of good old Mrs. Sullivan that spoke.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony woke with a start from his complacent day-dream. He drew his
- feet in, sat upright, and bit hard on his cigar for a minute in scowling
- reflection.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Show him in,” he said, at last, and then straightened himself truculently
- to receive this meddling new-comer. He fastened a stern and hostile gaze
- upon the door.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard seemed to miss entirely the frosty element in his reception. He
- advanced with a light step, hat in hand, to the side of the hearth, and
- held one hand with familiar nonchalance over the blaze, while he nodded
- amiably at his frowning host.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I skipped off rather suddenly this morning,” he said, with a pleasant
- half-smile, “because I didn’t seem altogether needful to the party for the
- minute, and I had something else to do. I’ve dropped in now to say that
- I’m as glad as anybody here to see you back again. I’ve only been about
- Muirisc a few weeks, but I already feel as if I’d been born and brought up
- here. And so I’ve come around to do my share of the welcoming.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You <i>seem</i> to have made yourself pretty much at home, sir,”
- commented The O’Mahony, icily.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You mean putting O’Daly down in the family vault?” queried the young man.
- “Yes, perhaps it was making a little free, but, you see, time pressed. I
- couldn’t be in two places at once, now, could I? And while I went off to
- settle the convent business, there was no telling what O’Daly mightn’t be
- up to if we left him loose; so I thought it was best to take the liberty
- of shutting him up. You found him there, I judge, and took him out.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony nodded curtly, and eyed his visitor with cool disfavor.
- </p>
- <p>
- “As long as you’re here, sir, you might as well take a seat,” he said,
- after a minute’s pause. “That ’s it. Now, sir, first of all,
- perhaps you wouldn’t mind telling me who you are and what the devil you
- mean, sir, by coming here and meddling in this way with other people’s
- private affairs.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Curious, isn’t it,” remarked the young man from Houghton County, blandly,
- “how we Americans lug in the word ‘sir’ every other breath? They tell me
- no Englishman ever uses it at all.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony stirred in his chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I’m not as easy-going a man or as good-natured as I used to be, my young
- friend,” he said, with an affectation of calm, through which ran a
- threatening note.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I shouldn’t have thought it,” protested Bernard. “You seemed the pink of
- politeness out there in the graveyard this morning. But I suppose years of
- campaigning—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “See here!” the other interposed abruptly. “Don’t fool with me. It’s a
- risky game! Unless you want trouble, stop monkeying and answer my question
- straight: Who are you?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man had ceased smiling. His face had all at once become very
- grave, and he was staring at The O’Mahony with wide-open, bewildered eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- “True enough!” he gasped, after his gaze had been so protracted that the
- other half rose from his seat in impatient anger. “Why—yes, sir!
- I’ll swear to it—well—this <i>does</i> beat all!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Your <i>cheek</i> beats all!” broke in The O’Mahony, springing to his
- feet in a gust of choleric heat.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard stretched forth a restraining hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Wait a minute,” he said, in evidently sincere anxiety not to be
- misunderstood, and picking his words slowly as he went along, “hold on—I’m
- not fooling! Please sit down again. I’ve got something important, and
- mighty queer, too, to say to you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony, with a grunt of reluctant acquiescing, sat down once more.
- The two men looked at each other with troubled glances, the one vaguely
- suspicious, the other still round-eyed with surprise.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You ask who I am,” Bernard began. “I’ll tell you. I was a little shaver—oh,
- six or seven years old—just at the beginning of the War. My father
- enlisted when they began raising troops. The recruiting tent in our town
- was in the old hay-market by the canal bridge. It seems to me, now, that
- they must have kept my father there for weeks alter he ’d put his
- uniform on. I used to go there every day, I know, with my mother to see
- him. But there was another soldier there—this is the queer thing
- about a boy’s memory—I remember him ever so much better than I do my
- own father. It’s—let’s see—eighteen years now, but I’d know
- him to this day, wherever I met him. He carried a gun, and he walked all
- day long up and down in front of the tent, like a polar bear in his cage.
- We boys thought he was the most important man in the whole army. Some of
- them knew him—he belonged to our section originally, it seems—and
- they said he’d been in lots of wars before. I can see him now, as plainly
- as—as I see you. His name was Tisdale—Zeb, I think it was—no,
- Zeke Tisdale.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Perhaps The O’Mahony changed color. He sat with his back to the window,
- and the ruddy glow from the peat blaze made it impossible to tell. But he
- did not take his sharp gray eye off Bernard’s face, and it never so much
- as winked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Very interesting,” he said, “but it doesn’t go very far toward explaining
- who you are. If I’m not mistaken, <i>that</i> was the question.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Me?” answered Bernard, “Oh, yes, I forgot that. Well, sir, I am the only
- surviving son of one Hugh O’Mahony, who was a shoemaker in Tecumseh, who
- served in the same regiment, perhaps the same company, with this Zeke
- Tisdale I’ve told you about, and who, after the War, moved out to Michigan
- where he died.”
- </p>
- <p>
- An oppressive silence settled upon the room. The O’Mahony still looked his
- companion straight in the face, but it was with a lack-luster eye and with
- the effect of having lost the physical power to look elsewhere. He drummed
- with his fingers in a mechanical way on the arms of the chair, as he kept
- up this abstracted and meaningless gaze.
- </p>
- <p>
- There fell suddenly upon this long-continued silence the reverberation of
- an exceptionally violent outburst of uproar from the square.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Cheers for The O’Mahony!” came from one of the lustiest of the now
- well-lubricated throats; and then followed a scattering volley of wild
- hurroos and echoing yells.
- </p>
- <p>
- As these died away, a shrill voice lifted itself, screaming:
- </p>
- <p>
- “Come out, O’Mahony, an’ spake to us! We’re dyin’ for a sight of you!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The elder man had lifted his head and listened. Then he squinted and
- blinked his eyelids convulsively and turned his head away, but not before
- Bernard had caught the glint of moisture in his eyes.
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man had not been conscious of being specially moved by what was
- happening. All at once he could feel his pulses vibrating like the strings
- of a harp. His heart had come up into his throat. Nothing was visible to
- him but the stormy affection which Muirisc bore for this war-born,
- weather-beaten old impostor. And, clearly enough, <i>he</i> himself was
- thinking of only that.
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard rose and stepped to the hearth, instinctively holding one of his
- hands backward over the fire, though the room was uncomfortably hot.
- </p>
- <p>
- “They’re calling for you outside, sir,” he said, almost deferentially.
- </p>
- <p>
- The remark seemed stupid after he had made it, but nothing else had come
- to his tongue.
- </p>
- <p>
- The lurking softness in his tone caught the other’s ear, and he turned
- about fiercely.
- </p>
- <p>
- “See here!” he said, between his teeth. “How much more of this is there
- going to be? I’ll fight you where you stand—here!—now!—old
- as I am—or I’ll—I’ll do something else—anything else—but
- d——m me if I’ll take any slack or soft-soap from <i>you!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- This unexpected resentment of his sympathetic mood impressed Bernard
- curiously. Without hesitation, he stretched forth his hand. No responsive
- gesture was offered, but he went on, not heeding this. .
- </p>
- <p>
- “My dear sir,” he said, “they are calling for you, as I said. They are
- hollering for ‘The O’Mahony of Muirisc.’ You are The O’Mahony of Muirisc,
- and will be till you die. You hear <i>me!</i>”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony gazed for a puzzled minute into his young companion’s face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes—I hear you,” he said, hesitatingly.
- </p>
- <p>
- “<i>You</i>—are The—O’Mahony—of—Muirisc!” repeated
- Bernard, with a deliberation and emphasis; “and I’ll whip any man out of
- his boots who says you’re not, or so much as looks as if he doubted it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The old soldier had put his hands in his pockets and began walking slowly
- up and down the chamber. After a time he looked up.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I s’pose you can prove all this that you’ve been saying?” he asked, in a
- musing way.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No—prove nothing! Don’t want to prove anything!” rejoined Bernard,
- stoutly.
- </p>
- <p>
- Another pause. The elder man halted once more in his meditative pacing to
- and fro.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And you say I <i>am</i> The—The O’Mahony of Muirisc?” he remarked.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I said it; I mean it!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, but—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’s no ‘but’ about it, sir!”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, there is,” insisted The O’Mahony, drawing near and tentatively
- surrendering his hand to the other’s prompt and cordial clasp. “Supposing
- it all goes as you say—supposing I <i>am</i> The O’Mahony—what
- are <i>you</i> going to be?”
- </p>
- <p>
- The young man’s eyes glistened and a happy change—half-smile,
- half-blush—blossomed all over his face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well,” he said, still holding the other’s hand in his, “I don’t know just
- how to tell you—because I am not posted on the exact relationships;
- but I’ll put it this way: If it was your daughter that you ’d left
- on the vessel there with O’Daly, I’d say that what I propose to be was
- your son-in-law. See?”
- </p>
- <p>
- It was only too clear that The O’Mahony did see. He had frowned at the
- first adumbration of the idea. He pulled his hand away now, and pushed the
- young man from him.
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, you don’t!” he cried, angrily. “No, sirree! You can’t make any such
- bargain as that with <i>me!</i> Why—I’d ’a’ thought you’d ’a’
- known me better! <i>Me</i>, going into a deal, with little Katie to be
- traded off? Why, man, you’re a fool!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony turned on his heel contemptuously and strode up and down the
- room, with indignant sniffs at every step. All at once he stopped short.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes,” he said, as if in answer to an argument with himself, “I’ll tell
- you to get out of this! You can go and do what you like—just
- whatever you may please—but I’m boss here yet, at all events, and I
- don’t want anybody around me who could propose that sort of thing. <i>Me</i>
- make Kate marry you in order to feather my own nest! There’s the door,
- young man!”
- </p>
- <p>
- Bernard looked obdurately past the outstretched forefinger into the
- other’s face.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Who said anything about your <i>making</i> her marry me?” he demanded.
- “And who talked about a deal? Why, look here, colonel”—the random
- title caught the ear of neither speaker nor impatient listener—“look
- at it this way: They all love you here in Muirisc; they’re just boiling
- over with joy because they’ve got you here. That sort of thing doesn’t
- happen so often between landlords and tenants that one can afford to bust
- it up when it does occur. And I—well—a man would be a brute to
- have tried to come between you and these people. Well, then, it’s just the
- same with me and Katie. We love each other—we are glad when we’re
- together; we’re unhappy when we’re apart. And so I say in this case as I
- said in the other, a mane between you and these people. Well, then, it’s
- just the same with me and Katie. We love each other—we are glad when
- we’re together; we’re unhappy when we’re apart. And so I say in this case
- as I said in the other, a man would be a brute—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Do you mean to tell me—” The O’Mahony broke in, and then was
- himself cut short.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, I <i>do</i> mean to tell you,” interrupted Bernard; “and, what’s
- more, she means to tell you, too, if you put on your hat and walk over to
- the convent.” Noting the other’s puzzled glance, he hastened on to
- explain: “I rowed over to your sloop, or ship, or whatever you call it,
- after I left you this morning, and I brought her and O’Daly back with me
- on purpose <i>to</i> tell you.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Before The O’Mahony had mastered this confusing piece of information, much
- less prepared verbal comment upon it, the door was thrust open; and,
- ushered in, as it were, by the sharply resounding clamor of the crowd
- outside, the burly figure of Jerry Higgins appeared.
- </p>
- <p>
- “For the love o’ God, yer honor,” he exclaimed, in a high fever of
- excitement, “come along out to ‘em! Sure they’re that mad to lay eyes on
- ye, they’re ’ating each other like starved lobsters in a pot! Ould
- Barney Driscoll’s the divil wid the dhrink in him, an’ there he is ragin’
- up an’ down, wid his big brass horn for a weapon, crackin’ skulls right
- an’ left; an’ black Clancy’s asleep in his drum—‘t was Sheehan putt
- him into it neck an’ crop—an’ ’t is three constables work to
- howld the boys from rollin’ him round in it, an—an—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “All right, Jerry,” said The O’Mahony; “I’ll come right along.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He put on his hat and relighted his cigar, in slow and silent
- deliberation. He tarried thereafter for a moment or two with an irresolute
- air, looking at the smoke-rings abstractedly as he blew them into the air.
- </p>
- <p>
- Then, with a sudden decision, he walked over and linked Bernard’s arm in
- his own. They went out together without a word. In fact, there was no need
- for words.
- </p>
- <p>
- <br /><br />
- </p>
- <hr />
- <p>
- <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030"> </a>
- </p>
- <div style="height: 4em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
- <h2>
- CHAPTER XXX—A FAREWELL FEAST.
- </h2>
- <p class="pfirst">
- <span class="dropcap" style="font-size: 4.00em">W</span>e enter the
- crumbling portals of the ancient convent of the O’Mahonys for a final
- visit. The reddened sun, with its promise of a kindly morrow, hangs low in
- the western heavens and pushes the long shadow of the gateway onward to
- the very steps of the building. We have no call to set the harsh-toned
- jangling old bell in motion. The door is open and the hall is swept for
- guests.
- </p>
- <p>
- This hour of waning day marked a unique occurrence in the annals of the
- House of the Hostage’s Tears. Its nuns were too aged and infirm to go to
- the castle to offer welcome to the newly returned head of the family. So
- The O’Mahony came to them instead. He came like the fine old chieftain of
- a sept, bringing his train of followers with him. For the first time
- within the recollection of man, a long table had been spread in the
- reception-hall, and about it were gathered the baker’s dozen of people we
- have come to know in Muirisc. Even Mrs. Sullivan, flushed scarlet from her
- labor in the ill-appointed convent kitchen, and visibly disheartened at
- its meagre results, had her seat at the board beside Father Jago. But they
- were saved from the perils of a party of thirteen because the one-armed
- Malachy, dour-faced and silent, but secretly bursting with pride and joy,
- stood at his old post behind his master’s chair.
- </p>
- <p>
- There had not been much to eat, and the festival stood thus early at the
- stage of the steaming kettle and the glasses so piping hot that fingers
- shrank from contact, though the spirit beckoned. And there was not one
- less than twelve of these scorching tumblers—for in remote Muirisc
- the fame of Father Mathew remained a vague and colorless thing like that
- of Mahomet or Sir Isaac Newton—and, moreover, was not The O’Mahony
- come home?
- </p>
- <p>
- “Yes, sir,” The O’Mahony said from his place at the right hand of Mother
- Agnes, venturing an experimental thumb against his glass and sharply
- withdrawing it, “wherever I went, in France or Spain or among the Turks, I
- found there had been a soldier O’Mahony there before me. Why, a French
- general told me that right at one time—quite a spell back, I should
- judge—there were fourteen O’Mahonys holding commissions in the
- French army. Yes, I remember, it was in the time of Louis XIX.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’re wrong, O’Mahony,” interrupted Kate, with the smile of a spoiled,
- favorite child, “’t was nineteen O’Mahonys in the reign of Louis
- XIV.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Same thing,” he replied, pleasantly. “It’s as broad as it is long. There
- the O’Mahony’s were, anyway, and every man of ’em a fighter. It set
- me to figuring that before they went away—when they were all cooped
- up here together on this little neck of land—things must have been
- kept pretty well up to boiling point all the year round.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ who was it ever had the power to coop ’em up here?” demanded
- Cormac O’Daly, with enthusiasm. “Heaven be their bed! ’T was not in
- thim O’Mahonys to endure it! Forth they wint in all directions, wid bowld
- raids an’ incursions, b’ating the O’Heas an’ def’ating the Coffeys wid
- slaughter, an’ as for the O’Driscolls—huh!—just tearing ’em
- up bodily be the roots! Sir, <i>t</i> was a proud day whin an O’Daly first
- attached himself to the house of the O’Mahonys—such grand min as
- they, were, so magnanimous, so pious, so intelligent, so ferocious an’
- terrifying—sir, me old blood warms at thought of ’em!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The caloric in Cormac’s veins impelled him at this juncture to rise to
- this feet. He took a sip from his glass, then adjusted his spectacles, and
- produced the back of an envelope from his pocket.
- </p>
- <p>
- “O’Mahony,” he said, with a voice full of emotion, “I’ve a slight pome
- here, just stated down hurriedly that I’ll take the liberty to rade to the
- company assimbled. ’T is this way it runs:
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- ‘Hark to thim joyous sounds that rise.
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- Making the face of Muirisc to be glad!
- </p>
- <p class="indent20">
- ’T is the devil’s job to believe one’s eyes—‘”
- </p>
- <p>
- <br />
- </p>
- <p>
- “Well, thin, don’t be trying!” brusquely interrupted Mrs. Fergus. As the
- poet paused and strove to cow his spouse with a sufficiently indignant
- glance, she leaned over the table and addressed him in a stage whisper,
- almost audible to the deaf old nuns themselves.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Sit down, me man!” she adjured him. “’T is laughing at ye they
- are! Sure, doesn’t his honor know how different a chune ye raised while he
- was away! ’T is your part to sing small, now, an’ keep the ditch
- betwixt you an’ observation.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Cormac sat down at once, and submissively put the paper back in his
- pocket. It was a humble and wistful glance which he bent through his
- spectacles at the chieftain, as that worthy resumed his remarks.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony did not pretend to have missed the adjuration of Mrs. Fergus.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That started off well enough, O’Daly,” he said; “but you’re getting too
- old to have to hustle around and turn out poetry to order, as you used to.
- I’ve decided to allow you to retire—to sort of knock off your shoes
- and let you run in the pasture. You can move into one of the smaller
- houses and just take things easy.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “But, sir—me secretarial juties—” put in O’Daly, with
- quavering voice.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There’ll be no manner of trouble about that,” said the O’Mahony,
- reassuringly. “My friend, here, Joseph Higgins, of Boston, he will look
- out for that. I don’t know that you’re aware of it, but I took a good deal
- of interest in him many years ago—before I went away—and I
- foresaw a future for him. It hasn’t turned out jest as I expected, but I’m
- satisfied, all the same. Before I left, I arranged that he should pursue
- his studies during my absence.” A grimly quizzical smile played around the
- white corners of his mustache as he added: “I understand that he jest
- stuck to them studies night and day—never left ’em once for
- so much as to go out and take a walk for the whole twelve years.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Surely, sir,” interposed Father Jago, “that’s most remarkable! I never
- heard tell of such studiosity in Maynooth itself!”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony looked gravely across the table at Jerry, whose broad,
- shining face was lobster-red with the exertion of keeping itself straight.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I believe there’s hardly another case on record,” he said. “Well, as I
- was remarking, it’s only natural, now, that I should make him my secretary
- and bookkeeper. I’ve had a long talk with him about it—and about
- other things, too—and I guess there ain’t much doubt about our
- getting along together all right.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “And is it your honor’s intintion—Will—will he take over my
- functions as bard as well?” Cormac ventured to inquire. He added in
- deprecating tones: “Sure, they’ve always been considered hereditary.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No; I think we’ll let the bard business slide for the time being,”
- answered The O’Mahony. “You see, I’ve been going along now a good many
- years without any poet, so I’ve got used to it. There was one fellow out
- at Plevna—an English newspaper man—who did compose some verses
- about me—he seemed to think they were quite funny—but I shot
- off one of his knee-pans, and that sort of put a damper on poetry, so far
- as I was concerned. However, we’ll see how your boy turns out. Maybe, if
- he takes a shine to that sort of thing—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Then you’re to stay with us?” inquired Mother Agnes. “So grand ye are wid
- your decorations an’ your foreign titles—sure, they tell me you’re
- Chevalier an’ O’Mahony Bey both at wance—’t will be dull as
- ditch-water for you here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “No, I reckon not,” replied The O’Mahony. “I’ve had enough of it. It’s
- nigh on to forty years since I first tagged along in the wake of a drum
- with a musket on my shoulder. I don’t know why I didn’t come back years
- ago. I was too shiftless to make up my mind, I suppose. No, I’m going to
- stay here—going to die here—right among these good Muirisc
- folks, who are thumping each other to pieces outside on the green. Talk
- about its being dull here—why, Mother Agnes, ’t would have
- done your heart good to see old Barney Driscoll laying about him with that
- overgrown, double-barreled trumpet of his. I haven’t seen anything better
- since we butted our heads up against Schipka Pass.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “’T will be grand tidings for the people—that same,”
- interposed Kate, with happiness in glance and tone.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony looked tenderly at her.
- </p>
- <p>
- “That reminds me,” he said, and then turned to the nuns, lifting his voice
- in token that he especially addressed them. “There was some talk, I
- understand, about little Katie here—”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Little, is it!” laughed the girl. “Sure, to pl’ase you I’d begin growing
- again, but that there’d be no house in Muirisc to hold me.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “Some talk about big Kate here, then,” pursued the O’Mahony, “going into
- the convent. Well, of course, that’s all over with now.” He hesitated for
- a moment, and decided to withhold all that cruel information about
- episcopal interference. “And I’ve been thinking it over,” he resumed, “and
- have come to the conclusion that we’d better not try to bolster up the
- convent with new girls from outside. It’s always been kept strictly inside
- the family. Now that that can’t be done, it’s better to let it end with
- dignity. And that it can’t help doing, because as long as it’s remembered,
- men will say that its last nuns were its best nuns.”
- </p>
- <p>
- He closed with a little bow to the Ladies of the Hostage’s Tears. Mother
- Agnes acknowledged the salutation and the compliment with a silent
- inclination of her vailed head. If her heart took grief, she did not say
- so.
- </p>
- <p>
- “And your new secretary—” put in Cormac, diffidently yet with
- persistence, “has he that acquaintance an’ familiarity wid mining
- technicalities and conthracts that would fit him to dale wid ’em
- satisfactorily?”
- </p>
- <p>
- A trace of asperity, under which O’Daly definitely wilted, came into The
- O’Mahony’s tone.
- </p>
- <p>
- “There is such a thing as being too smart about mining contracts,” he said
- with meaning. Then, with a new light in his eyes he went on: “The luckiest
- thing that ever happened on this footstool, I take it, has occurred right
- here. The young man who sits opposite me is a born O’Mahony, the only son
- of the man who, if I hadn’t turned up, would have had rightful possession
- of all these estates. You have seen him about here for some weeks. I
- understand that you all like him. Indeed, it’s been described to me that
- Mrs. Fergus here has quite an affection for him—motherly, I
- presume.”
- </p>
- <p>
- Mrs. Fergus raised her hand to her hair, and preened her head.
- </p>
- <p>
- “An’ not so old, nayther, O’Mahony,” she said, defiantly. “Wasn’t I
- married first whin I was a mere shlip of a girl?”
- </p>
- <p>
- Sister Ellen looked at Mother Agnes, and lifted up both her hands. The
- O’Mahony proceeded, undisturbed:
- </p>
- <p>
- “As I’ve said, you all like him. I like him too, for his own sake, and—and
- his father’s sake—and—But that can wait for a minute. It’s a
- part of the general good luck which has brought him here that he turns out
- to be a trained mining engineer—just the sort of a man, of all
- others, that Muirisc needs. He tells me that we’ve only scratched the
- surface of things roundabout here yet. He promises to get more wealth for
- us and for Muirisc out of an acre than we’ve been getting out of a
- townland. Malachy, go out and look for old Murphy, and if he can walk,
- bring him in here.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony composedly busied himself in filling his glass afresh, the
- while Malachy was absent on his quest. The others, turning their attention
- to the boyish-faced, blushing young man whom the speaker had eulogized so
- highly, noted that he sat next, and perhaps unnecessarily close, to Kate,
- and that she, also betrayed a suspicious warmth of countenance. Vague
- comprehension of what was coming began to stir in their minds as Malachy
- reappeared. Behind him came Murphy, who leaned against the wall by the
- door, hat in hand, and clung with a piercing, hawk-like gaze to the
- lightest movement on the master’s face.
- </p>
- <p>
- The O’Mahony rose to his feet, glass in hand.
- </p>
- <p>
- “Murphy,” he said, “I gave her to you to look after—to take care of—the
- Lady of Muirisc.”
- </p>
- <p>
- “You did, sir!” shouted the withered and grimy old water-rat,
- straightening himself against the wall.
- </p>
- <p>
- “You’ve done it well, sir,” declared The O’Mahony. “I’m obliged to you.
- And I wanted you in particular to hear what I’m going to say. Malachy, get
- a glass for yourself and give one to Murphy.”
- </p>
- <p>
- The one-armed servitor leaned gravely forward and whispered in The
- O’Mahony’s ear.
- </p>
- <p>
- “I don’t care a button,” the other protested. “You can see him home. This
- is as much his funeral as it is anybody else’s on earth. That’s it. Are
- you all filled? Now, then, ladies and gentlemen, I am getting along in
- years. I am a childless man. You’ve all been telling me how much I’ve
- changed these last twelve years. There’s one thing I haven’t changed a bit
- in. I used to think that the cutest, cunningest, all-fired loveliest
- little girl on earth was Katie here. Well, I think just the same now. If I
- was her father, mother, sister, hired girl and dog under the wagon, all in
- one, I couldn’t be fonder of her than I am. She was the apple of my eye
- then; she is now. I’d always calculated that she should be my heir. Well,
- now, there turns up this young man, who is as much an O’Mahony of the real
- stock as Kate is. There’s a providence in these things. They love each
- other. They will marry. They will live in the castle, where they’ve
- promised to give me board and lodging, and when I am gone, they will come
- after me. I’m going to have you all get up and drink the health of my
- young—nephew—Bernard, and of his bride, our Kate, here, and—and
- of the line of O’Mahonys to come.”
- </p>
- <p>
- When the clatter of exclamations and clinking glasses had died down, it
- was Kate who made response—Kate, with her blushing, smiling face
- held proudly up and a glow of joyous affection in her eyes. .
- </p>
- <p>
- “If that same line of O’Mahonys to come stretched from here to the top of
- Mount Gabriel,” she said, in a clear voice, “there’d not be amongst thim
- all the ayqual to <i>our</i> O’Mahony.”
- </p>
- <h3>
- THE END.
- </h3>
- <div style="height: 6em;">
- <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
- </div>
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-<pre>
-
-
-
-
-
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