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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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