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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: Jim and Wally - -Author: Mary Grant Bruce - -Release Date: October 7, 2019 [EBook #60445] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK JIM AND WALLY *** - - - - -Produced by Al Haines, Cindy Beyer & the online Distributed -Proofreaders Canada team at http://www.pgdpcanada.net - - - - - - - - - - - - [Cover Illustration] - - - - -[Illustration: “‘Hold tight to the rail,’ Jim’s voice said in Nora’s -ear.” (Page 67.)] - - _Jim and Wally_] [_Frontispiece_ - - - - - JIM AND WALLY - - - - By - MARY GRANT BRUCE - Author of “Mates at Billabong,” “Norah of Billabong,” etc. - - W A R D , L O C K & C O . , L I M I T E D - LONDON, MELBOURNE AND TORONTO - 1917 - - - - - _To_ - _G. E. B.,_ - - _Cork, 1915-16_ - - - - - CONTENTS - - CHAP. PAGE - I WAR..................................... 9 - II YELLOW ENVELOPES........................ 30 - III WHEN THE BOYS COME HOME................. 43 - IV TO IRELAND.............................. 53 - V INTO DONEGAL............................ 74 - VI OF LITTLE BROWN TROUT................... 98 - VII LOUGH ANOOR............................. 113 - VIII JOHN O’NEILL............................ 131 - IX PINS AND PORK........................... 147 - X THE ROCK OF DOON........................ 161 - XI NORTHWARD............................... 183 - XII ASS-CART _VERSUS_ MOTOR................. 197 - XIII THE CAVE AMONG THE ROCKS................ 213 - XIV A FAMILY MATTER......................... 229 - XV PLANS OF CAMPAIGN....................... 242 - XVI THE FIGHT IN THE DAWN................... 248 - - - - - CHAPTER I - WAR - - - “For one the laurel, one the rose, and glory for them all, - All the gallant gentlemen who fight and laugh and fall.” - MARGERY RUTH BETTS. - -THE trench wound a sinuous way through the sodden Flanders mud. -Underfoot were boards; and then sandbags; and then more boards, added as -the mud rose up and swallowed all that was put down upon it. Some of the -last-added boards had almost disappeared, ground out of sight by the -trampling feet of hundreds of men: a new battalion had relieved, three -nights before, the men who had held that part of the line for a week, -and when a relief arrives, a trench becomes uncomfortably filled, and -the ground underfoot is churned into deep glue. It was more than time to -put down another floor; to which the only objection was that no more -flooring material was available, and had there been, no one had time to -fetch it. - -It was the second trench. Beyond it was another, occupied by British -soldiers: beyond that again, a mass of tangled barbed-wire, and then the -strip of No-Man’s Land dividing the two armies—a strip ploughed up by -shells and scarred with craters formed by the bursting of high -explosives. Here and there lay rifles, and spiked German helmets, and -khaki caps; but no living thing was visible save the cheeky Flemish -sparrows that hopped about the quiet space, chirping and twittering as -if trying to convince themselves and everybody else that War was -hundreds of miles away. The sparrows carried out this pleasant deception -every morning, abandoning the attempt as soon as the first German gun -began what the British soldiers, disagreeably interrupted in frying -bacon, termed “the breakfast hate.” Then they retreated precipitately to -the sparrow equivalent to a dug-out, to meditate in justifiable -annoyance on the curious ways of men. - -In the second trench the men were weary and heavy-eyed, and even bacon -had scant attractions for them. It was their first experience of -trench-life complicated by shell-fire, and since their arrival the enemy -had been “hating” with a vigour that seemed to argue on his part a -peculiar sourness of temper. Now, after two days of incessant artillery -din and three nights of the strenuous toil that falls upon the trenches -with darkness, the new men bore evidence of exhaustion. Casualties had -been few, considering the violent nature of the bombardment; but to -those who had never before seen Death come suddenly, an even slighter -loss would have been horrifying. The ceaseless nerve-shattering roar of -the big guns pounded in their brains long after darkness had put an end -to the bombardment; their brief snatches of sleep were haunted by the -white faces of the comrades with whom they would laugh and fight and -work no more. They were stiff and sore with crouching under the parapets -and in the narrow dug-outs; dazed with noise, sullen with the anger of -men who have been forced to endure without making any effort to hit -back. But their faces had hardened under the test. A few were shrinking, -“jumpy,” useless: but the majority had stiffened into men. When the time -for hitting back came, they would be ready. - -Dawn on the fourth morning found them weary enough, but, on the whole, -in better condition than they had been two days earlier. They were -getting used to it; and even to artillery bombardment “custom hath made -a property of easiness.” The first sense of imminent personal danger had -faded with each hour that found most of them still alive. Discipline and -routine, making each officer and man merely part of one great machine, -steadied them into familiar ways, even in that unfamiliar setting. And -above all was satisfaction that after months of slow training on -barrack-square and peaceful English fields they were at last in the -middle of the real thing—doing their bit. It had been conveyed to them -that they were considered to be shaping none too badly: a curt -testimonial, which, passing down the line, had lent energy to a hard -night of rebuilding parapets, mending barbed-wire, and cleaning up -battered sections of trench. They were almost too tired to eat. But the -morning—so far—was peaceful; the sunlight was cheery, the clean breeze -refreshing. Possibly to-day might find the Hun grown weary of hating so -noisily. There were worse things than even a trench in Flanders on a -bright April morning. - -Jim Linton sat on a small box outside his dug-out, drinking enormous -quantities of tea, and making a less enthusiastic attempt to demolish -the contents of an imperfectly heated tin of bully beef. He was -bare-headed, owing to the fact that a portion of shrapnel had removed -his cap the day before, luckily without damaging the head inside it. Mud -plastered him from neck to heels. He was a huge boy, well over six feet, -broad-shouldered and powerful; and the bronze which the sun of his -native Australia had put into his face had been proof against the trench -experiences that had whitened English cheeks, less deeply tanned. - -Another second lieutenant came hastily round a traverse and tripped over -his feet. - -“There’s an awful lot of you in a trench!” said the new-comer, -recovering himself. - -“Sorry,” said Jim. “I can’t find any other place to put them; they -_will_ stick out. Never mind, the mud will bury them soon; it swallows -them if I forget to move them every two minutes. Come and have -breakfast.” - -“I want oceans of tea,” said Wally Meadows, dragging a biscuit-tin from -the dug-out, perching it precariously on a small board island in the -mud, and seating himself with caution. He glanced with disfavour at the -beef-tin. “Is that good?” - -“Beastly,” Jim answered laconically. “Smith’s strong point is not -cookery. It’s faintly warm and exceedingly tough; and something with -moisture in it seems to have happened to the biscuits. But the tea is -topping. I told Smith to bring another supply presently. Bacon’s a bit -short, so I said we preferred bully.” - -Wally accepted a tin mug of milkless tea with gratitude. - -“That’s great,” he said, after a beatific pause, putting down the empty -mug. He pushed his cap back from his tired young face, and heaved a -great sigh of relief. “Blessings on whoever discovered tea! I don’t -think I’ll have any beef, thanks.” - -“Yes, you will,” Jim said, firmly. “I know it’s beastly, and one isn’t -hungry, but it’s a fool game not to eat. If we have any luck there may -be some work to-day; and you can’t fight if you don’t eat something. The -first mouthful is the worst.” - -His chum took the beef-tin meekly. - -“I suppose you’re right,” he said. “If we only do get a chance of -fighting, I should think we’d have enormous appetites afterwards; but -one can’t get hungry hiding in this beastly hole and letting Brother -Boche sling his tin cans at us. Wouldn’t you give something for a bath -and twelve hours’ sleep?” - -“By Jove, yes!” Jim agreed. “But I don’t mind postponing them if only we -get a smack at those gentry across the way first. Did you see -Anstruther?” - -“Yes—he’s better. He dodged the R.A.M.C. men—said he wasn’t going to -be carted back because of a knock on the head. He’s tied up freshly and -looks awfully interesting, but he declares he’s quite fit.” - -Captain Anstruther was the company commander, a veteran of -one-and-twenty, with eight months’ service. The two Australian boys, -nineteen and eighteen respectively, and fully conscious of their own -limitations, regarded him with great respect in his official capacity, -and, off duty, had clearly demonstrated their ability to dispose of him, -with the gloves on, within three rounds. They were exceedingly good -friends. Anstruther could tell stories of the Marne, of the retreat from -Mons, of the amazing tangle of the first weeks of war, which had left -him, then a second lieutenant, in sole command of the remnant of his -battalion. To the two Australians he was a mine of splendid information. -They were mildly puzzled at what he demanded in return—bush “yarns” of -their own country, stories of cattle musterings, of aboriginals, of -sheep-shearing by machinery, of bush-fire fighting; even of football as -played at their school in Melbourne. To them these things, interesting -enough in peacetime and in their own setting, were commonplace and stale -in the trenches, with Europe ablaze with battle all round them. -Anstruther, however, looked on war with an eye that saw little of -romance: willing to see it through, but with no illusions as to its -attractions. He greatly preferred to talk of bush-fires, which he had -not seen. - -Yesterday a shell which had wrecked far too much of a section of trench -to be at all comfortable had provided this disillusioned warrior with a -means of escape, had he so wished, by knocking him senseless, with a -severe scalp-wound. Counselled to seek the dressing-station at the rear, -when he had recovered his senses, however, he had flatly declined; all -his boredom lost in annoyance at his aching head, and a wild desire to -obtain enemy scalps in vengeance. Jim and Wally had administered -first-aid with field dressings, and the wounded one, declaring himself -immediately cured, had hidden himself and his bandages from any -intrusive senior who might be hard-hearted enough to insist on his -retirement. - -“It was a near thing,” Jim said reflectively. - -“So was yours,” stated his chum. - -“Oh—my old cap?—a miss is as good as a mile,” said Jim. “I’m glad it -wasn’t a bit nearer, though; it would be a bore to be put out of -business without ever having seen a German, let alone finding out which -of us could ‘get his fist in fust.’” He rose, feeling for his pipe. -“Have you eaten your whack of that stuff?” - -“I’ve done my best,” said Wally, displaying the tin, nearly empty. -“Can’t manage any more. Let’s have a walk along the trench and see -what’s happening.” - -“Well, keep your silly head down,” Jim said. “The parapet is getting -more and more uneven, and you never remember you’re six feet.” - -Wally grinned. Each of the friends suffered under the belief that he was -extremely careful and the other destined to sudden death from -unwittingly exposing himself to a German sniper. - -“If you followed your own advice, grandmother,” he said; “you being -three inches taller, and six times more careless! I always told your -father and Norah that you’d be an awful responsibility.” - -“I’ll put you under arrest if you’re not civil,” Jim threatened. “Small -boys aren’t allowed to be impertinent on active service!” - -They floundered along in the mud, ducking whenever the parapet was low: -sandbags had run short, and trench-repairing on the previous night had -been like making bricks without straw. The men were finishing breakfast, -keeping close to the dug-outs, since at any moment the first German -shell might scream overhead. The line was very thin; reinforcements, -badly enough wanted, were reported to be coming up. Meanwhile the -battalion could only hope that the shells would continue to spare them, -and that when the enemy came the numbers would be sufficiently even to -enable them to put up a good fight. - -Captain Anstruther, white-faced under a bandage that showed red stains, -nodded to them cheerily. - -“Ripping morning, isn’t it?” he said. “Hope you’ve had a pleasant night, -Linton!” - -Jim grinned, glancing at his hands, which displayed numerous long red -scars. - -“One’s nights here are first-class training for the career of a burglar -later on,” he said. “Mending barbed-wire in the dark is full of -unexpected happenings, chiefly unpleasant. I don’t mind the actual -mending so much as having to lie flat on one’s face in the mud when a -star-shell comes along.” - -“Very disorganizing to work,” said another subaltern, Blake, whose -mud-plastered uniform showed that he had had his share of lying flat. In -private life Blake had belonged to the species “nut,” and had been wont -to parade in Bond Street in beautiful raiment. Here, dirty, unshaven and -scarcely distinguishable from the muddiest of his platoon, he permitted -himself a cheerfulness that Bond Street had never seen. - -“Sit down,” Anstruther said. “There are more or less dry sandbags, and -business is slack. Why didn’t you fellows come down to mess? Have you -had any breakfast?” - -“Yes, thanks,” Jim answered. “We fed up there—our men were inclined to -give breakfast a miss, so we encouraged them to eat by feeding largely, -among them. Nothing like exciting a feeling of competition.” - -“Trenches under fire don’t breed good healthy appetites—at any rate -until you’re used to them,” Blake remarked. - -“The men are bucking up well, all the same,” said Anstruther. “I’m jolly -proud of them; it’s a tough breaking-in for fellows who aren’t much more -than recruits. They’re steadying down better than I could have hoped -they would.” - -“Doesn’t the weary old barrack-square grind stand to them now!” said -Jim. “They see it, too, themselves; only they’re very keen to put all -the bayonet-exercise into practice. Smith, my servant, was the mildest -little man you ever saw, at home; now he spends most of the day putting -a bloodthirsty edge on his bayonet, and I catch him in corners prodding -the air and looking an awful Berserk. They’re all chirping up -wonderfully this morning, bless ’em. I shouldn’t wonder if by this time -to-morrow they were regarding it all as a picnic!” - -“So it is, if you look at it the right way,” said Blake. “Lots of jokes -about, too. Did you hear what one of our airmen gave the enemy on April -the First? He flew over a crowd behind their lines, and dropped a -football. It fell slowly, and Brother Boche took to cover like a rabbit, -from all directions. Then it struck the ground and bounced wildly, -finally settling to rest: I suppose they thought it was a delay-action -fuse, for they laid low for a long time before they dared believe it was -not going to explode. So they came out from their shelters to examine -it, and found written on it ‘April fool—_Gott strafe England_!’” - -His hearers gave way to mirth. - -“Good man!” said Anstruther. “But there are lots of mad wags among the -flying people. I should think it must make ’em extraordinarily cheerful -always to be cutting about in nice clean air, where there isn’t any -barbed-wire or mud.” - -Feeling grunts came from the others. - -“Rather!” said Garrett, another veteran of eight months’ service. “There -was one poor chap who had engine-trouble when he was doing a lone -reconnaissance, and had to come down behind the German lines. He worked -furiously, and just got his machine in going order, when two enemy -officers trotted up, armed with revolvers, and took him prisoner. Then -they thought it would be a bright idea to make him take _them_ on a -reconnaissance over the Allied lines; which design they explained to him -in broken English and with a fine display of their portable artillery, -making him understand that if he didn’t obey he’d be shot forthwith.” - -“But he didn’t!” Wally burst out. - -“Just you wait, young Australia—you’re an awful fire-eater!” said the -narrator. “The airman thought it over, and came to the conclusion that -it would be a pity to waste his valuable life; so he gave in meekly, -climbed in, and took his passengers aboard. They went off very gaily, -and he gave them a first-rate view of all they wanted to see; and, of -course, carrying our colours, he could fly much lower than any German -machine could have gone in safety. It was jam for the two Boches; I -guess they felt their Iron Crosses sprouting. Their joy only ended—and -then it ended suddenly—when he looped the loop!” - -The audience jumped. - -“What happened?” - -“They very naturally fell out.” - -“And the airman?” Wally asked, ecstatically. - -“He had taken the precaution to strap himself in—unobtrusively. Didn’t -I tell you he appreciated his valuable life?” said Garrett, laughing. -“He came down neatly where he wanted to, made his report, and sent out a -party to give decent burial to two very dead amateur aviators. The force -of gravity is an excellent thing to back you up in a tight place, isn’t -it?” - -“Well, it’s something to get one’s chance—and it’s quite another to -know when to take advantage of it,” said Anstruther. “I expect an airman -has to learn to make up his mind quicker than most of us. But there’s no -doubt of the chances that come to some people. A Staff officer was here -early this morning, and he was telling me of young Goujon.” - -“Who’s he?” queried Blake, lazily. - -“He’s a French kid—just seventeen. He was one of a small party sent out -to locate some enemy machine-guns that were giving a good deal of -trouble. They found ’em, all right; but when they were wriggling their -way back a shell came along and wiped out the entire crowd—all except -this Goujon kid. He was untouched, and he hid for hours in the crater -made by the explosion of the shell. When it got dark he crept out: but -by that time he was pretty mad, and instead of getting home, he wanted -to get a bit of his own back, and what must he do but crawl to those -machine-guns and lob bombs on them!” - -“That’s some kid,” said Blake briefly. - -“Yes, he was, rather. He destroyed two of the three guns, and then was -overpowered—_that_ wouldn’t have taken long!—and made prisoner: pretty -roughly handled, too. But before he could be sent to the rear, some of -our chaps made a little night-attack on that bit of German trench, and -in the excitement Goujon got away. So he trotted home—but on the way he -stopped, and gathered up the remaining machine-gun. Staggered into his -own lines with it. They’ve given him the Military Medal.” - -“Deserved it, too,” was the comment. - -“And he’s seventeen!” said some one. “He ought to get pretty high up -before the war is over.” - -“I know a man who’s a major at nineteen,” Anstruther said, “Went out as -a second lieutenant and was promoted for gallantry at Mons; got his -captaincy and was wounded at the Aisne; recovered, and at Neuve Chapelle -was the sole officer left, except two very junior subalterns, in all his -battalion. He handled it in action, brought them out brilliantly—awful -corner it was, too,—and was in command for a fortnight after, before -they could find a senior man; there weren’t any to spare. He was -gazetted major last week.” - -“Lucky dog!” said Blake. - -“Well, I suppose he is. They say he’s a genius at soldiering, anyhow; -and, of course, he got his chance. There must be hundreds of men who -would do as well if they ever got it; only opportunity doesn’t come -their way.” - -“They say this will be a war for young men,” Garrett said. “We’re going -back to old days; I believe Wellington and Napoleon were colonels at -twenty. And that’s more than you will be, young Meadows, if you don’t -mend your ways.” - -“I never expected to be,” said Wally, thus attacked. - -“But why won’t I, anyhow, apart from obvious reasons?” - -“Because you’ll be a neat little corpse,” said Garrett. “What’s this -game of yours I hear about?—crawling round on No-Man’s Land at night, -and collecting little souvenirs? The souvenir you’ll certainly collect -will come from a machine-gun.” - -Wally blushed. - -“Well, there are such a jolly lot of things there,” he defended himself. -“Boche helmets—I’ve got three beauties—and belts, and buckles, and -things. People at home like ’em.” - -“Presumably people at home like you,” Anstruther said. “But they -certainly won’t have you to like if you do it, and it’s possible their -affection might even wane for a German helmet that had cost you your -scalp. _Verboten_, Meadows; that’s good German, at any rate. -Understand?” - -Wally assented meekly. Jim Linton, apparently sublimely unconscious of -the conversation, sighed with relief. His chum’s adventurous expeditions -had caused him no little anxiety, especially as they were undertaken at -a time when his own duties prevented his keeping an eye on the younger -boy—which would probably have ended in his accompanying him. From -childhood, Jim and Wally had been accustomed to do things in pairs: a -habit which had persisted even to sending them together from Australia -to join the Army, since Wally was too young for the Australian forces. -England was willing to take boys of seventeen; therefore it was -manifestly out of the question that Jim should join anywhere but in -England, despite his nineteen years. And as Jim’s father and sister were -also willing to come to England, the matter had arranged itself as a -family affair. Wally Meadows was an orphan, and the Linton family had -long included him on a permanent, if informal, basis. - -“It’s jolly to get V.C.’s and medals and other ironmongery,” Anstruther -was saying; “but I’d like to be the chap who organized the Toy Band on -the retreat from Mons. He was a Staff officer, and he found the remains -of a regiment, several hundred strong, straggling through a village, -just dead beat. The Germans were close on their heels; the British had -no officers left, and had quite given up. The Staff chap called on them -to make another effort to save themselves, but they wouldn’t—they had -been on the run for days, were half-starved, worn out: they didn’t care -what happened to them. The officer was at his wits’ end what to do, when -his eye fell on a little bit of a shop—you know the usual French -village store, with all sorts of stuff in the window: and there he saw -some toy drums and penny whistles. He darted in and bought some: came -out and induced two or three of the less exhausted men to play -them—it’s said he piped on one penny whistle himself, only he won’t -admit it now. But you know what the tap of a drum will do on a -route-march when the men are getting tired. He roused the whole regiment -with his fourpence-worth of band and brought them back to their brigade -next day—never lost a man!” - -“Jolly good work,” said Blake. - -“He won’t get anything for it, of course,” said Anstruther. “You don’t -get medals for playing tin whistles; and anyhow, there was no one to -report it. But—yes, I’d like to have been that chap.” He rose and -stretched himself, taking advantage of a section of undamaged parapet. -“Brother Boche is rather late in beginning his hate this morning, don’t -you think?” - -“Perhaps he’s given up hating as a bad job,” Wally suggested. - -“We’ll miss the dear old thing if he really means to leave us alone,” -said Anstruther. “Just as well if he does, though: our line is painfully -thin, and it’s evident to anyone that our guns are short of ammunition: -we’re giving them about one shell to twenty of theirs. And don’t they -know it! They send us enormous doses of high-explosive shells, and in -return we tickle them feebly with a little shrapnel. They must chuckle!” - -“I suppose England will wake up and make munitions for us when we’re all -wiped out,” said Garrett, scornfully. “They’re awfully cheery over -there: theatres and restaurants packed, business as usual, bull-dog -grit, and all the rest of it: Parliament yapping happily, and strikes -twice a week. And our chaps trying to fight for ’em, and dying for want -of ammunition to do it with. I suppose they think we’re rather lazy not -to make it in our spare time!” - -“I’m afraid they won’t appoint me dictator just yet,” Blake remarked. -“If they would, I’d have every striker and slacker out here: not to -fight, but to mend barbed-wire, clean up trenches, and do the general -dirty work. First-rate tonic for a disgruntled mind. And I’d send what -was left of them to the end of the world afterwards. Will you have them -in Australia, Linton?” - -“Thanks; we’ve plenty of troubles of our own,” Jim returned hastily. -“Don’t you think we were dumping-ground for your rubbish for long -enough?” - -“You were a large, empty place, and you had to be peopled,” said Blake, -grinning. “And a good many of them were very decent people, I believe.” - -“Well, they might well be,” Jim responded—“you sent them out for -stealing a sheep or a shirt or a medicine-bottle: one poor kid of six -was sent out for life for stealing jam-tarts. Many excellent men must -have begun life by stealing jam-tarts: I did, myself!” - -“If you’re a sample of the after-effects, I don’t wonder we exported the -other criminals early,” laughed Blake. - -“Well, if any of their descendants grew into the chaps that landed at -Gallipoli the other day, they were no bad asset,” said Anstruther. “By -Jove, those fellows must be fighters, Linton! I wouldn’t care to have -the job of holding them back.” - -“I knew they’d fight,” said Jim briefly. Down in his quiet soul he was -torn between utter pride in his countrymen, and woe that he had not been -with them in that stern Gallipoli landing: the latter emotion firmly -repressed. It had been the fight of his boyish dreams—wild charging, -hand to hand work, a fleeing enemy: not like this hole-and-corner trench -existence unseen by the unseen foe, with Death that could not be -combated dropping from the sky. His old school-fellows had been at -Gallipoli, and had “made good.” He ached to have been with them. - -An orderly came up hurriedly. Anstruther tore open the note he carried. - -“There’s word of an enemy attack,” he said crisply. “Get to your -places—quick!” - -The subalterns scattered along the trench, each to his platoon. They had -already inspected the men, making sure that no detail of armament had -been forgotten, and that rifles were all in order. Garrett, who -commanded the machine-gun section, fled joyfully to the emplacement, his -face like a happy child’s. The alarm ran swiftly up and down the trench: -low, sharp words of command brought every man to his place, while the -sentries, like statues, were glued to their peep-holes. Jim and Wally -fingered their revolvers, scarcely able to realize that the time for -using them had come at last. Field officers appeared, hurriedly scanning -every detail of preparation, and giving a word of advice here and there. - -“Thank ’eving, we’re going to have a look-in!” muttered a man in front -of Jim: a grizzled sergeant with the two South African ribbons on his -breast. “Steady there, young ’Awkins; don’t go meddlin’ with that -trigger of yours. You’ll get a chanst of loosin’ off pretty soon.” - -“Cawn’t come too soon for me!” said Hawkins, in a throaty whisper, -fondling his rifle lovingly. “They got me best pal yesterday.” - -“Then keep your ’ead cool till the time comes to mention wot you think -of ’em,” returned the sergeant. - -Jim and Wally found a chink in the sandbag parapet, and looked out -eagerly ahead. All was quiet. The sparrows, made bold by the -extraordinary peace of the morning, still chirped and twittered on -No-Man’s Land. No sound came from the German trenches beyond. Here and -there a faint smoke-wreath curled lazily into the air, telling of -cooking-fires and breakfast. - -“How do they know they’re coming?” Wally whispered. - -“Aeroplane reconnaissance, I suppose,” Jim answered, pointing to two or -three specks floating in the blue overhead, far out of reach of the -anti-aircraft guns. “They’ve been hovering up there all the morning. -Feeling all right, Wal?” - -“Fit as a fiddle. I suppose I’ll be in a blue funk presently, but just -now I feel as if I were going to a picnic.” - -“So do I—and the men are keen as mustard. I thought little Wilson would -be useless; you know how jumpy he’s been since we came here. But look at -him, there; he’s as steady and cool as any sergeant. They’re good boys,” -said the subaltern, who was not yet twenty. - -“Mind your ’ead, sir!” came in an agonized whisper from a corporal -below; and Jim ducked obediently under the lee of the parapet. - -“It’s quite hot,” he said, peering again through his peep-hole. “There’s -a jolly breeze springing up, though.” - -The breeze came softly over No-Man’s Land, fluttering the wings of the -cheerful sparrows. Across the scarred strip of grass a low, green cloud -wavered upwards. It grew more solid, spreading in a dense wall over the -parapet of the German trench. - -“What on earth——?” Jim began. - -The green cloud seemed to hesitate. Then the wind freshened a little, -and it suddenly blew forward across No-Man’s Land, growing denser as it -came. Before it, the sparrows fled suddenly, darting to the upper air -with shrill chirpings of alarm. But one bird, taken unawares, beat his -wings wildly for a moment, flying forward. Then he pitched downwards and -the cloud rolled over him. - -“What is it?” uttered Wally. - -Before the parapet of the British trench ahead of them the cloud stood -for a moment, and then toppled bodily into the trench. It fell as water -falls like a heavy thing. From its green depths came hoarse shouts, and -rifles suddenly went off in an irregular fusillade. Then the cloud -rolled over, leaving the trench full of vapour, and stole towards the -second British line. - -A great cry came ringing down the trench. - -“Gas! It’s their filthy gas!” - -It was a new thing, and no one was prepared for it. Across the Channel, -England was shuddering over the first reports of the asphyxiating gas -attacks, and the women of England were working night and day at the -first half-million respirators to be sent out to the troops. But to the -men in the trenches there had come only vague rumours of what the French -and Canadians had suffered: and they had been slow to believe. It was -not easy to realize, unseeing, the full horror of that most malignant -device with which Science had blackened War. A few of the officers had -respirators—dry, and comparatively useless. The men were utterly -unprotected. Like sheep waiting for the slaughter they stood rigidly at -attention, waiting for the evil green cloud that blew towards them, -already poisoning the clean air with its noxious fumes. - -“Tie your handkerchiefs round your mouths and nostrils!” Jim Linton -shouted. “Quick, Wally!” - -He caught at the younger boy’s handkerchief and knotted it swiftly. The -corporal shook his head. - -“Most of ’em ain’t got no ’ankerchers, sir,” he said grimly. “They -_will_ clean their rifles with ’em.” - -Then came another cry. - -“Look out—they’re coming!” - -Dimly, behind the cloud of gas, they could see shadowy forms clambering -over the parapet of the enemy trench; German soldiers, unreal and -horrible in their hideous respirators, with great goggle eyes of talc. -Ahead, the quick spit of machine-guns broke out spitefully; and, as if -in answer, Garrett’s Maxims opened fire. Then the gas was upon them: -falling from above over the parapet, stealing like a live thing down the -communication trench that led from the first line, where already the -Germans were swarming. Men were choking, gasping, fighting for air; -dropping their rifles as they tore at their collars, losing their heads -altogether in the horror of the silent attack. A little way down the -trench Anstruther was trying to rally them, his voice only audible for a -few yards. Jim echoed him. - -“Come on, boys! it’s better in the open. Let’s get at them!” - -He sprang up over the parapet, Wally at his side. There were bullets -whistling all round them, but the air was more free—it was Paradise -compared to the agony of suffocation in the trench. Some of the men -followed. Jim leaped back again, dragging at others; pushing, striking, -threatening; anything to get them up above, where at least they might -die fighting, not like rats in a hole. He was voiceless, inarticulate; -he could only point upwards, and force them over the parapet and into -the bullet-swept space. Wally was there—was Wally killed? Then he saw -him beside him in the trench, dragging at little Private Wilson, who had -fallen senseless. Together they lifted him and flung him out at the -rear, turning to fight with other men who had given up and were leaning -against the walls, choking. Above them Anstruther was getting the men -into some semblance of formation to meet the oncoming rush of Germans. -He called to them sharply, authoritatively. - -“Linton!—Meadows! Come out at once!” - -Jim tried to obey. Then he saw that Wally was staggering, and flung his -arm round him; but the arm was suddenly limp and helpless, and Wally -pitched forward on his face and lay still, gasping. Jim tried to drag -him up, fighting with the powerlessness that was creeping over him. -Behind him the roar of artillery grew faint in his ears and died away, -though still he seemed to hear the steady spit of Garrett’s -machine-guns. He sagged downwards. Then black, choking darkness rushed -upon him, and he fell across the body of his friend. - - - - -[Illustration: “Jim Linton sat on a small box outside his dug-out -. . .”] - - _Jim and Wally_] [_Page 11_ - - - - - CHAPTER II - YELLOW ENVELOPES - - - “London’s smoke hides all the stars from me, - Light from mine eyes and Heaven from my heart.” - DORA WILCOX. - -THE lift came gliding on its upward journey in a big London hotel, far -too slowly for the impatience of its only passenger, a tall girl of -sixteen, with a mop of brown curls, and grey eyes alight with -excitement. Ordinarily, Norah Linton was rather pale, especially in -London, where the air is largely composed of smoke, and has been -breathed in and out of a great number of people until it is nearly worn -out; but just now there was a scarlet spot on each cheek, and her mouth -broke into smiles as though it could not help itself. At Floor No. 4, a -fat old lady threatened to stop the lift, but decided at the last moment -that she preferred to walk upstairs. At No. 5, no one was in sight, and -Norah sighed with audible relief, and ejaculated, “Thank goodness!” At -No. 6, two men were seen hurrying along the corridor some distance away, -and shouting, “Lift!” But at this point the lift-boy, to whom Norah’s -impatience had communicated itself, behaved like Nelson when he applied -his telescope to his blind eye, and shot upwards, disregarding the -shouts of his would-be passengers; and, passing by No. 7 as though it -were not there, brought the lift to an abrupt halt at No. 8, flinging -the door open with a rattle and a triumphant, “There y’are, miss!” - -“Thank you!” said Norah, flashing at him a grateful smile that sent the -lift-boy earthwards in a state of mind that made him loftily oblivious -of the reproaches of neglected passengers. She was out of the lift with -a quick movement, and in the empty corridor broke into a run. Her flying -feet carried her swiftly to a sitting-room some distance away, and she -burst in like a whirlwind. “Dad! Daddy!” - -There was no one there, and with an exclamation of impatience she turned -and ran once more, far too excited now to care whether any Londoners -were there to be shocked at the spectacle of a daughter of Australia -racing along an hotel corridor. She had not far to go; a turn brought -her face to face with a tall man, lean and grizzled, who cast a glance -at her that took in the crumpled yellow envelope in her hand. - -No one with a soldier son looked calmly on telegrams in those days, and -David Linton’s face changed abruptly. “What is it, Norah?” - -“They’re coming,” said Norah, and suddenly found a huge lump in her -throat that would not go away. She put out a hand and clung to her -father’s coat. “They’re truly coming, daddy!” - -Her father’s voice was not as steady as usual. - -“They’re all right?” - -“Oh, yes, they must be. It says ‘Better—London to-morrow.’” - -“Better?” mused Mr. Linton. “I wonder if that means hospital or us, -Norah?” - -Norah’s face fell. - -“I suppose it may be hospital,” she said. “It was so lovely to think -they were coming that I nearly forgot that part of it. Can we find out, -daddy?” - -“We’ll go and try,” Mr. Linton said. - -“Now?” said Norah, and jigged on one foot. - -“I’ll get my hat,” said her father, departing with a step not so unlike -his daughter’s. Norah waited in the corridor for a few minutes, and -then, impatient beyond the possibility of further waiting in silence, -followed him to his room, there finding him endeavouring to remove -London mud-stains from a trouser-leg. - -“You might think when you’ve managed to brush it off that it had -gone—but indeed it hasn’t,” said David Linton, wrathfully regarding -gruesome stains and brushing them with a vigour that should have been -productive of better results. - -“It does cling,” remarked Norah, comprehendingly. “I’ll sponge it for -you, daddy; those stains never yield to mild measures. Daddy, do you -think they’ll be long getting better?” - -Anyone else might have been excused for thinking she meant the -mud-stains. But David Linton made no such mistake. - -“I don’t know,” he said slowly. “One hears such different stories about -that filthy German gas. It all depends on the size of the dose they got, -I fancy. Jim said it was mild; but then Jim would say a good deal to -avoid frightening us.” - -“And he was able to write. But Wally hasn’t written.” - -“No; and that doesn’t look well. He’s such a good lad—it’s quite likely -he’d write and let us know all he could about Jim. But I don’t fancy the -doctors would let them travel unless they were pretty well.” - -“I suppose not. Oh, doesn’t it seem ages until to-morrow, dad!” - -“It’ll come, if you give it time,” said her father. “However—yes, it -does seem a pretty long time, Norah.” They laughed at each other. - -“It doesn’t do a bit of good for you to put on that wise air,” Norah -said, “because I know exactly how you feel, and that’s just the same as -I do. And anyone would be the same who had two boys at the Front like -Jim and Wally.” - -“I think they would,” said her father, abandoning as untenable the -position of age and wisdom. “Thank goodness they will be back with us -to-morrow, at any rate.” He put his clothes-brush on the table and stood -up, tall and thin and a little grim. “It seems a long while since they -went away.” - -“Long!” Norah echoed, expressively. It was in reality only a month since -her brother Jim and his chum had said good-bye on the platform at -Victoria Station; and in some ways it seemed only a few minutes since -the train had moved slowly out, with the laughing boyish faces framed in -the window. But each slow day, with its dragging weight of anxiety, had -been a lifetime. To them had come what the whole world had learned to -know; the shiver of fear on opening the green envelopes from the Front; -the racking longing for the news; the sick dread at the sight of a -telegram—even at the sound of an unusual knock. David Linton had grown -silent and grim; Norah felt an old woman, and the care-free Australian -life which was all she had known seemed a world away—vanished as -completely as the Australian tan had faded from her cheeks. - -Now it was all over, and for a while, at any rate, they could forget. -Jim had so managed that no shock came to them—the cheery telegram he -had contrived to send before being taken to hospital had reached them -two days earlier than the curt War Office intimation that both boys were -suffering from gas-poisoning. Jim did not mean that they should ever -know what it had meant to send it. The cavalry subaltern who had helped -him along to the dressing-station had been very kind; he had contrived -to hear the address, even in the choked, strangling whisper, which was -all the voice the gas had left to Jim; had even suggested a wording that -would tell without alarming, and had put aside almost angrily Jim’s -struggle to find his money. “Don’t you worry,” he had said, “it’ll go. -I’ve seen other chaps gassed, and you’ll be all right soon.” He was a -cheery pink and white youngster: Jim was sorry he had not found out his -name. In the hard days and nights that followed, his face hovered round -his half-conscious dreams—curiously like a little lad who had fagged -for him at school in Melbourne. - -That was two weeks ago, and of those two weeks Mr. Linton and Norah -fortunately knew little. Wally had been the worst; Jim had been dragged -out of the gassed trench a few minutes earlier than his friend, and -possibly to the younger boy the shock had been greater. When the first -terrible paroxysms passed, he could only lie motionless, endeavouring to -conjure up a faint ghost of his old smile when Jim’s anxious face peered -at him from the next bed. Neither had any idea at all of how they had -reached the hospital at Boulogne; all their definite memories ended -abruptly when that evil-smelling green cloud had rolled like a wave -above them into the trench. - -Out of the first dark mist of choking suffering they had passed slowly -into comparative peace, broken now and then by recurring attacks, but, -by contrast, a very haven of tranquillity. They were very tired and -lazy: it was heavenly to lie there, quite still, and watch the blue -French sky through the window and the kind-faced nurses flitting -about—each doing far too much for her strength, but always cheery. They -did not want to talk—their voices had gone somewhere very far off; all -they wanted was just to be quiet; not to move, not to talk, not to -cough. Then, as the clean vigour of their youth reasserted itself, and -strength came back to them, energy woke once more, and with it their -old-time lively hatred of bed. They begged to be allowed to get up; and -as their places were badly needed for men worse than they, the doctors -granted their prayer—after which they would have been extremely glad to -get back again, only that pride forbade their admitting it. - -Moreover, there was London; and London, with all that it meant to them, -was worth a struggle. Two months earlier it had bored them exceedingly, -and nothing had seemed worth while, with the call in their blood to be -out in the trenches. Now, after actual experience of the trenches, their -ideas had undergone a violent change. The romance of war had faded -utterly. The Flying Corps might retain it still—those plucky fighting -men who soared and circled overhead, bright specks in the clouds and the -blue sky; but to the men who grubbed underground amid discomfort, -smells, and dirt, to which actual fighting came as a blessed relief, war -had lost all its glamour. They wanted to see the job through. But London -was coming first, and it had blossomed suddenly into a paradise. - -Some of which Jim had tried to put into his shaky pencilled notes; and -the certainty of their boys’ gladness to get back lay warm at the hearts -of Norah and her father as they walked along Piccadilly. Spring was in -the air: the Park had been full of people, the Row crowded with happy -children, scurrying up and down the tan on their ponies, with decorous -grooms endeavouring to keep them in sight. The window-boxes in the clubs -were gay with daffodils and hyacinths: the busy, knowing London sparrows -twittered noisily in the budding trees, making hurried arrangements for -setting up housekeeping in the summer. Even though war raged so close to -England, and its shadow lay on every hearth, nothing could quite dim the -gladness of London’s awakening to the Spring. - -“Those fellows all look so happy,” said Mr. Linton, indicating a -motor-car crammed with wounded men in their blue hospital suits and -scarlet ties. “One never sees a discontented face among them. I hope our -boys will look as happy, Norah.” - -“If there is any chance of looking happy, Jim and Wally will take it!” -said Norah, firmly. - -“I think they will,” said her father, laughing. “The difficulty is to -imagine them ill.” - -“Yes, isn’t it? Do you remember when those horrid Zulus battered them -about so badly in Durban, how extraordinary it was to see them both in -bed, looking pale?” - -“Well, I think it was the first time it had occurred to either of them,” -said Mr. Linton. - -“I suppose one could never realize the awful effects of the gas unless -one actually saw it,” Norah said. “But I can’t help feeling glad, if -they had to be hurt, that it was that: not wounds or—crippling.” Her -voice fell on the last word. “I just couldn’t bear the thought of Jim or -Wally being crippled.” - -“Don’t!” said her father, sharply. “Please God, they’ll come out of it -without that. And as for the gas—Jim assured us they would be all -right, but I’ll be glad when I talk to a doctor about them myself.” - -Inquiries proved disappointing. It was certain that the boys would not -be allowed to return directly to them. They would travel in hospital -trains and a hospital ship; it was difficult to say where men would be -taken, when so many, broken and helpless, were being brought to England -every day. The Victorian Agent-General was sympathetic and helpful; he -promised to find out all that could be found from the overworked -authorities, and to let them know at the earliest possible moment. - -“But I fancy that long son of yours will find a way of letting you know -himself, Mr. Linton,” he said. “I’ll do my best—but I wouldn’t mind -betting he gets ahead of me.” - -They came out of the building that is a kind of oasis in London to all -homesick Victorians, pausing, as they always did, to look at the -exhibits in the outer office—wool and wheat and timber, big model gold -nuggets, and the shining fruits that spoke of the orchards on the -hillsides at home; with pictures of wide pastures where sleek cattle -stood in the knee-high grass, or reapers and binders whirred through -splendid crops. It was a little patch of Australia, planted in the very -heart of London; hard to realize that just outside the swinging glass -doors the grey city—history suddenly become a live thing—stretched -away eastward, and, to the west, the roaring Strand carried its mighty -burden of traffic. - -“I’ll always be glad I had the chance of seeing London,” said Norah. -“But whenever I come here I know how glad I’ll be to go back!” - -“I know that without coming here,” said her father, drily. “It would be -jolly if we could take those boys home to get strong, Norah.” - -“To Billabong?” said Norah, wistfully. “Oh-h! But we’ll do it some day, -daddy.” - -“I trust so. Won’t there be a scene when we get back!” - -“Oh, I dream about it!” said Norah. “And I wake up all homesick. Can’t -you picture Brownie, dad!—she’ll have cooked everything any of us ever -liked, and the house will be shining from top to bottom, and there won’t -be a thing different—I know she dusts your old pipes and Jim’s -stockwhips herself every day! And Murty will have the horses jumping out -of their skins with fitness, and Lee Wing’s garden will be something -marvellous.” - -“And Billy,” said David Linton, laughing. “Can’t you see his black -face—and his grin!” - -“Oh, and the great wide paddocks—the view from the verandah, across the -lagoon and looking right over the plains! I don’t seem to have looked at -anything far away since we came off the ship,” said Norah; “all the -views are shut in by houses, and the air is so thick one couldn’t see -far, in any case!” - -“They tell me there’s clear air in Ireland,” said her father. - -“Then I want to go there,” responded his daughter, promptly. - -“Well—we might do worse than that. I’ve been thinking a good deal, -Norah; if the boys don’t get well quickly—and I believe few of the -gassed men do—we shall have to take them away somewhere for a change.” - -“Certainly,” agreed Norah. “We couldn’t keep them in London.” - -“No, of course not. Country air and not too many people; that is the -kind of tonic our boys will want. What would you think of going to -Ireland?” - -Norah drew a long breath of delight. - -“Oh-h!” she said. “You do make the most beautiful plans, daddy! We’ve -always wanted to go there more than anywhere: and war wouldn’t seem so -near to us there, and we could try to make the boys forget gas and -trenches and shells and all sorts of horrors.” - -“That’s just it,” said her father. “The wisest doctor I ever knew used -to say that change of environment was worth far more than change of air; -we might try to manage both for them, Norah. Donegal was your mother’s -country: I’ve been meaning to go there. She loved it till the day she -died.” - -In the tumult of the Strand Norah slipped a hand into her father’s. Very -seldom did he speak of the one who was always in his memory: the little -mother who had grown tired, and had slipped out of life when Norah was a -baby. - -“Let’s go there, daddy,” she begged. - -“We’ll consult the boys,” said Mr. Linton. “Eh, but it’s good to think -we shall have them to consult with to-morrow! You know, Norah, since Jim -left school, I’ve become so used to consulting him on all points, that I -feel a lost old man without him.” - -“You’ll never be old!” said his daughter, indignantly. “But Jim just -loves you to talk to him the way you do,—I know he does, only, of -course, he’s quite unable to say so.” - -“Jim has lots of sense,” said Jim’s father. “So has Wally, for that -matter: there is plenty of shrewdness hidden somewhere in that -feather-pate of his. They’re very reliable boys. I was ‘thinking back’ -the other night, and I don’t remember ever having been really angry with -Jim in my life.” - -“I should think not!” said Norah, regarding him with wide eyes of -amazement. “Why would you be angry with him?” - -“Why, I don’t know,” said her father rather helplessly. “Jim never was a -pattern sort of boy.” - -“No, but he had sense,” said Norah. She began to laugh. “Oh, I don’t -know how it is,” she said. “We’ve all been mates always: and mates don’t -get angry with each other, or they wouldn’t be mates.” - -“I suppose that’s it,” Mr. Linton said, accepting this comprehensive -description of a bush family standpoint. “There’s a ’bus that will go -our way, Norah: I’ve had enough of elbowing my way through this crowd.” - -They climbed on top of the motor-’bus, and found the front seat empty; -and when Norah was on the front seat of a ’bus she always felt that it -was her own private equipage and that she owned London. To their left -was the huge yard of Charing Cross Station, crowded with taxis and cabs -and private motors, with streams of foot passengers pouring in and out -of the gateways. At Charing Cross one may see in five minutes more -foreigners than one meets in many hours in other parts of London, and -this was especially the case since the outbreak of war. Homesick Belgian -refugees were wont to stray there, to watch the stream of passengers -from the incoming Continental trains, hoping against hope that they -might see some familiar face. There were soldiers of many nations; -unfamiliar uniforms were dotted throughout the crowd, besides the khaki -that coloured every London street. Even from the ’bus-top could be heard -snatches of talk in many languages—save only one often heard in former -days: German. A string of recruits, each wearing the King’s ribbon, -swung into the station under a smart recruiting sergeant: a cheery -little band, apparently relieved that the plunge had at last been taken, -and that they were about to shoulder their share of the nation’s work. - -“Not a straight pair of shoulders among the lot,” remarked Mr. Linton, -surveying them critically. “It’s pleasant to think that very soon they -will be almost as well set up as that fellow in the lead. War is going -to do a big work in straightening English shoulders—morally and -physically.” - -The ’bus gave a violent jerk, after the manner of ’buses in starting, -and moved on through the crowded street, threading its way in and out of -the traffic in the most amazing fashion—finding room to squeeze its -huge bulk through chinks that looked small for a donkey-cart to pass, -and showing an agility in dodging that would have done credit to a hare. -It rocked on its triumphal way westward: past the crouching stone lions -in Trafalgar Square, where the plinth of the Nelson Column blazed with -recruiting posters; past the “Orient” offices, with their big pictures -of Australian-going steamers—which made Norah sigh; and so up to -Piccadilly Circus, where they found themselves packed into a jam of -traffic so tight that it seemed that it could never disentangle. But -presently it melted away, and they went on round the stately curve of -Regent Street, with its glittering shops; and so home to the -hotel—where they had lived so long that it really seemed almost -home—and to their own sitting-room, gay with daffodils and primroses, -and littered with work. Norah’s knitting—khaki socks and mufflers—lay -here and there, and there was a pile of finished articles awaiting -dispatch to the Red Cross headquarters in the morning. Under the window, -a big, workmanlike deal table was littered with scraps of wood, -curiously fashioned, with tools in a neat rack. It was David Linton’s -workshop; all the time he could spare from helping with wounded soldiers -went to the fashioning of splints and crutches for the hospitals, where -so many were needed every day. - -A yellow envelope was on the table now, lying across a splint. - -“Duke of Clarence Hospital,” it said; “to-morrow afternoon.—JIM.” - - - - -[Illustration: “She put out a hand and clung to her father’s coat.”] - - _Jim and Wally_] [_Page 31_ - - - - - CHAPTER III - WHEN THE BOYS COME HOME - - - “Oh! the spring is here again, and all the ways are fair. - The wattle-blossom’s out again, and do you know it there?” - MARGERY RUTH BETTS. - -‟THEY’RE doing quite well,” the doctor said, patting Norah benevolently -on the shoulder. He was a plump little man, always busy, always in a -hurry; but David Linton and his daughter had been regular visitors to -the hospital for some time, and he had a regard for them. (“Sensible -people,” he was wont to say, approvingly: “they don’t talk too much to -patients, and they don’t fuss!”) Now he knew that war had hit them -personally, and he gave them two of his few spare minutes. “They’re -tired, of course; and you must expect to see them looking queer. Gas -isn’t a beautifier. But they’ll be all right. Don’t stay too long. Don’t -talk war, if you can keep them off it. And above all, don’t speak about -gas.” He smiled at them both. “Buck them up, Miss Norah—buck them up!” -Some one called him hurriedly, and he fled. The khaki ambulances had -delivered a heavy load at the hospital that day. - -In a little room off a quiet corridor, the scent of golden wattle flung -a breath of Australia to greet them, as it had greeted the tired boys -when the orderlies had carried them in hours before. Jim and Wally -smiled at them from their pillows. No one seemed able to say anything. -Afterwards, Norah had a dim idea that she had kissed Wally as well as -Jim. It did not appear to matter greatly. - -They were white-faced boys, with black shadows under their eyes; but the -old merriment was there. A great wave of relief swept over Norah and her -father. They had feared they knew not what from this evil choking enemy: -it was sudden happiness to see that their boys were not so unlike their -old selves. - -“We had visions of being up to meet you,” said Jim, keeping a hand on -Norah’s, as she perched on his bed. “But the doctor thought otherwise. -Doctors are awful tyrants.” - -“You had a good crossing?” David Linton found words hard—they stuck in -his throat as he looked at his son. - -“Oh yes. We didn’t know much about it. The hospital train runs you -almost on to the ship, and the orderlies have you in a swinging cot -before you know where you are. Same at the other side: those fellows do -know their job,” Jim said, admiringly. “Of course, you get a little -tired of being handled, towards the finish, and this room—and -bed—seemed awfully good.” - -“And the wattle was ripping,” said Wally. “However did you manage to get -it?” - -“It comes from the South of France,” Norah answered. “There’s quite a -lot of it in London; only they stare at you if you ask for ‘wattle’, and -you have to learn to say ‘mimosa.’ One gets broken into anything. I’ve -learned to say ‘field’ quite naturally when I’m talking of a paddock.” - -“I wish Murty could hear you,” said Wally solemnly. Murty O’Toole was -head stockman on Billabong, the home in Australia. He was a very great -friend. - -“Can’t you picture his face!” Norah uttered. “It would be interesting to -watch Murty’s expression if dad told him to bring in the cattle from the -field when he wanted the bullocks mustered in the home-paddock!” - -“He’d give me notice,” said Mr. Linton, firmly. “Neither long service -nor affection would keep him!” - -“Well, Murty was born in Ireland, though he did come out to Australia -when he was a small boy,” Norah said. “So he ought not to feel -astonished. But the person I do want to import to England is black -Billy. It’s part of Billy’s principles not to show amazement at -anything, but I don’t think they’d be proof against a block of traffic -in Piccadilly!” - -“He’d only say, ‘Plenty!’” said Jim, laughing—“that is, if he had any -speech left. Poor old Billy, he hates everything but horses, and any -motor is a ‘devil-wagon’ to him. A fleet of big red and yellow ’buses -would give him nervous prostration.” - -“There’s one thing that would scare him more,” Mr. Linton said. “Do you -remember the day last winter when we took Norah to Hampton Court, and -you chucked a stone at the Round Pond?” He laughed, and every one -followed his example. - -“And the stone ran along tinkling over the top of the water,” said -Norah, recovering. “I never was so taken aback in my life. And all the -small children and their nursemaids laughed at me. How was I to know -water turned to ice like that? The only frozen thing I had ever seen was -ice-cream in Melbourne!” - -“Billy never saw ice in his life,” said her father. “He would have -thought it very bad magic.” - -“He’d have taken to his heels and made for the bush,” said Wally, -grinning. “Probably he’d have made himself a boomerang and turned into -an up-to-date black Robin Hood, living on those tame old Bushy Park -deer.” - -“With his headquarters in the Hampton Court Maze!” added Jim. “Wouldn’t -it have been an enormous attraction—the halfpenny papers would have -called it ‘Wild Life in Quiet Places,’ and London would have run special -motor-bus trips to see our Billy!” - -His laugh ended in a fit of coughing, which left him trembling. Norah -patted him anxiously, watching him with troubled eyes. - -“Don’t you talk too much, or we’ll get sent away,” she warned him. -“We’ll do the talking—dad and I. We’ve heaps to tell you: and such -jolly plans.” - -“You have to make haste and get better,” said Mr. Linton, looking from -one white face to the other. “Then we’re going to take possession of -you.” - -“Kitchener will do that, I guess,” said Wally. - -“No, Kitchener won—not until you’re quite fit. You’ll be handed over to -us, and it will be our job to get you thoroughly well. And Norah and I -have agreed that it can’t be done in London.” - -“So we’re all going to Ireland,” said Norah, happily. - -“Ireland!” Jim uttered. - -“Yes. You’re sure to get leave, so that you can be thoroughly repaired. -We’re going to find some jolly place in Donegal, where it’s quiet and -peaceful, and we’re all going to buy rods and find out how to catch -trout. Brown trout,” said Norah, learnedly. “We know all about it, -because we bought ever so many guide-books and studied them all last -night.” - -“I say!” ejaculated both patients as one man. - -“It sounds rather like Heaven,” said Jim, drawing a long breath. “Do you -really think it can be managed, dad?” - -“I don’t see why not,” said his father. - -“We must get back to our job as soon as we can.” - -“Certainly you must. But there’s no sense in your going back until you -are perfectly fit. They wouldn’t want you. And though you were not as -badly gassed as many—thank goodness!—and your recovery won’t be such a -trying matter as if you had had a bigger dose, every one agrees that gas -takes its time.” - -“I shouldn’t wonder,” Jim said, grimly. - -“That being so, London does not strike me as a good place for -convalescents,” said Mr. Linton. “Pure air is what you’ll need; and that -is not the fine, solid, grey variety of atmosphere you get here. And -Zeppelins will be happening along freely, once they feel at home on the -track to England. I don’t believe they will limit their raids to London. -The big manufacturing towns will come in for a share of their attention -sooner or later; and they won’t spare the country places over which they -fly.” - -“Not they!” said Wally. - -“So, all things considered, I think you would be better in Ireland. I -believe it’s peaceful there, if you don’t talk politics. We don’t want -any adventures.” - -“We’ve had quite enough since we left Billabong,” said Norah. - -“Hear, hear!” said Wally. “I guess the calm peace of a bog in Ireland is -just about our form until we’re ready to go back and take our turn at -strafing.” - -“Then that’s settled—if the doctors will back me up,” Mr. Linton said. -“Just as soon as they will let you we’ll pack up the fewest possible -clothes and set out for a sleepy holiday in Ireland: trout-fishing, old -ruins, bogs, heather, and no adventures at all.” - -Later on, they were to recall this peaceful forecast with amazement. At -present it seemed a dream of everything the heart could desire; they -fell into a happy discussion of ways and means, of the best places to -buy fishing-tackle, of the clothes demanded by bogs and heathery -mountains; until a nurse arrived with tea, and a warning word that the -patients had talked nearly enough. At which the patients waxed -indignant, declaring that their visitors had only been with them about -ten minutes. - -“Ten minutes!” said the nurse, round-eyed. “Over an hour—and doctor’s -orders were——” - -“Never you mind the doctor’s orders,” Jim said solemnly. “Doctors don’t -know everything. Why, in Boulogne——” He broke off, assuming an air of -meek unconsciousness of debate as the doctor himself appeared suddenly. - -“I beg your pardon,” said the doctor, transfixing patients with an eagle -glance, while the nurse made an unobtrusive escape. “You were saying -something about doctors, I think?” - -“Nothing, I assure you, sir,” said Jim, grinning widely. - -“Doctors—and Boulogne,” repeated the new-comer, firmly. “Don’t let me -interrupt you.” - -“No, sir. Certainly not,” said Jim. “The doctors in Boulogne are very -hard-worked.” - -“H’m!” said his medical attendant, receiving this piece of information -with the suspicion it merited. “Quite so. We’re all hard-worked, these -times, chiefly with looking after bad boys who ought to be back at -school, getting swished. It’s an awful fate for a respectable M.D.” He -gazed severely at the cheerful faces on the pillows. “You ought to be -asleep; and of course you are not. Is this a hospital ward, or an -Australian picnic?” - -“Both,” said Wally, laughing. “Don’t be rough on us, doctor; it isn’t -every day we kill a pig!” - -The doctor stared. - -“You put things pleasantly!” he said. “It seems to me that the pigs were -trying to kill you: but you’re all extraordinarily cheerful about it. -Now, where’s Miss Norah gone? I never saw such a girl—she moves like -quicksilver!” - -Norah returned, bearing a spare cup. - -“Do have some tea, doctor,” she begged. - -“I haven’t time, but I will,” said the doctor, abandoning professional -cares, and sitting down. “One’s life is all topsy-turvy nowadays. A year -ago I would not have dreamed of having tea in a patient’s bedroom—let -alone two patients—but then, a year ago I was practising in Harley -Street, developing a sweet, bedside manner and the figure of an -alderman. Today I’m a semi-military hack, with no manner at all, and my -patients chaff me—actually chaff me, Miss Norah! It’s very distressing -to one’s inherited notions.” - -“It must be,” said Norah, deeply sympathetic. “The cake is quite good, -doctor.” - -“It is,” agreed the doctor, accepting some. “Occasionally I find a -pompous old colonel or brigadier among my patients, and we exchange -soothing confidences about the terrible future of the medical profession -and the Army. That helps; but then I come back to the long procession of -the foolish subalterns who go out to Flanders without ever having -learned to dodge!” His eye twinkled as he glared at Jim and Wally. -Norah, whose visits to wounded soldiers during many weeks had taught her -something beyond his reputation as the most skilful and most merciful of -surgeons, listened unmoved and offered him more tea. - -“It’s no good trying to impress you!” said the doctor, surrendering his -cup. “Thank you, I will have some more—in pure kindness of heart -towards you, Miss Norah, since, when I leave this room, all visitors go -with me!” - -“Oh!” said Norah. “I’ll get some fresh tea, doctor!” - -“You will not,” said the doctor, severely. “The picnic is nearly at an -end: you can have another to-morrow, if you’re good.” - -“When can we remove the patients, doctor?” asked Mr. Linton, who had -been sitting in amused silence. A great contentment had settled on his -face: already the lines of anxiety were smoothed away. He did not want -to talk; it was sufficient to sit and watch Jim, occasionally meeting -his eyes with a half-smile. - -“Remove the patients—Good gracious!” ejaculated the doctor. “Why -they’ve only just been removed once! Can’t you let them settle down a -little?” - -“We want to take them to Ireland,” said Norah, eagerly. “Can we, -doctor?” - -“H’m,” said the doctor, reflectively. “There might be worse plans. We’ll -see. Ireland: that’s the place where the motto is, ‘When you see a head, -hit it!’ isn’t it?” - -“I don’t think it’s universal,” said Mr. Linton mildly. “It’s really -much more peaceful than English legends would lead you to believe.” - -“Between you and me, what the average Englishmen knows of Ireland might, -I believe, he put into one’s eye without inconvenience,” affirmed the -doctor. “I’m a Scot, and I don’t mind admitting I don’t know anything. -But no Englishman tells an Irish story without making his speakers say -‘Bedad!’ and ‘Begorra!’ in turn: and I’ve known a heap of Irishmen, and -their conversation was singularly free from those remarks. I have an -inward conviction that the English-made Irishman doesn’t exist; only I -never have time to verify any of my inward convictions. And perhaps -that’s as well, because then they never lose weight! Have I drunk all -the tea, Miss Norah?” - -“I’m afraid so,” said Norah, tilting the teapot regretfully and without -success. “Do let me get you some more. I know quite well where they make -it.” - -“Go to!” said the doctor, rising. “Don’t tempt an honest man from the -path of duty. I’m off—and I give you three minutes. Then the patients -are to compose themselves to slumber.” - -“And Ireland, doctor?” - -“Ireland?” said the doctor, pausing in the doorway. “Oh, there’s lots of -time to think about that distressful country.” He relented a little, -looking at the eager faces. “Very possibly. We’ll re-open the discussion -this day week. Three minutes, mind. Good-bye.” His quick steps died away -along the corridor. - -Half an hour later Wally wriggled on his pillow. - -“Asleep, Jim?” - -“No—not quite.” - -“D’you know something? Your people were here quite a while. And they -never said one word about gas or war or any silly rot like that!” - -“No,” said Jim, drowsily. “Bricks, weren’t they? Go to sleep.” - - - - - CHAPTER IV - TO IRELAND - - - “Be it granted me to behold you again in dying, - Hills of home.” - R. L. STEVENSON. - -HOLYHEAD pier was in the state of wild turmoil that seethes between the -arrival of the mail and its transhipping to the Dublin boat. Passengers -ran hither and thither, distractedly seeking luggage, while stolid -English porters lent a deaf ear to their complainings or assured them -absent-mindedly that everything would be all right on the other side; an -assurance always given light-heartedly by the porter who is comfortably -certain of the fact that, whatever happens on the other side, he will -not be there. First and third class passengers mingled inextricably in -the luggage-hunt, with equal lack of success, and divided into two -streams when the whistle blew an impatient summons, seeking their -respective gangways under the guiding shouts of officials on the upper -deck. Through the crowd ploughed the mail trollies, regarding first and -third class travellers alike as mere obstructors of His Majesty’s -business, and asserting their right-of-way by sheer weight and impetus. -Overhead, a grey sky hung darkly, and was reflected in a grey, -white-flecked sea. - -It was not the usual Ireland-bound crowd of early summer. Comparatively -few women were travelling, and except for a few elderly men, there was -an entire absence of the knickerbocker-suited, tweed-capped travellers, -with golf-clubs and rod-boxes, who make a yearly pilgrimage across the -Irish Sea. Most of them were in Flanders or Gallipoli now, and khaki had -replaced the rough tweeds; many would never come again. In their stead, -khaki sprinkled the crowd thickly. A big detachment of soldiers -returning after furlough, crowded the boat for’ard. Officers in heavy -great-coats were everywhere; one chubby subaltern in charge of a -regimental band, which had been assisting in a recruiting tour in Wales. -A small group surrounded a tall old general, whose great-coat showed the -crossed sword and baton, while his gold-laced and red-banded cap made -him the object of awed glances from junior officers, who forthwith put -as much of the ship as possible between themselves and his eagle eye. - -Jim Linton and Wally Meadows were among the first out of the train. It -was Jim’s way to let a crowd disperse a little before he attempted to -reach a given point. “You get there just as quickly, and it saves an -awful lot of pushing and shoving,” he said. But Wally’s impatience never -brooked any such delay; at all times he found it difficult to sit still, -and once movement was permitted him, he was wont, as Jim further said, -“to run three ways at once.” Therefore, Jim being too peaceably inclined -to argue the matter, they made a hurried descent to the platform, -collected hand-luggage hastily, discovered a porter, assisted Mr. Linton -and Norah to alight, and had marshalled their forces on the upper deck -of the steamer while yet the main body of the passengers strove -agonizedly to find their belongings. Then Jim made a leisurely -inspection, discovered their heavy luggage in perfect safety, duly -embarked: and rejoined his party with the calm certainty of all being -right with the world. - -People were disposing themselves after the varied fashion of -’cross-Channel passengers. Apprehensive ladies and a few men cast a -despondent look at the grey sea and the white horses tumbling off-shore, -and prudently sought the shelter of the cabins, hoping, by prompt lying -down, to cheat the demon of sea-sickness. More seasoned travellers -selected chairs on the main decks, pitched them where any gleams of sun -might reach them, and settled down, rolled in rugs, to read through the -boredom of the passage. On the railings, small boys perched themselves -with the fell determination of small boys all the world over, while -anxious mothers rent the air with fruitless appeals for them to come -down, and wrathful fathers emphasized the commands with blows, or else -smoked stolidly in the conviction that a small boy who was meant to fall -in the sea would certainly fall there, in spite of his parents. Babies -wailed dismally, until borne off to the cabin by mothers and nurses; -sirens rent the air with hoarse shrieks; cranes, loading luggage, -rattled and banged, and above their din rose the shouts of newsboys -hawking London and Dublin papers. Every hand on the ship was working -furiously, for the mail has no time to spare, and nothing matters to it -but the time-table. - -They were off presently, slipping away almost imperceptibly from the -wharf, and nosing out to sea through the grey waves. The ship thrust her -bow into them doggedly. The mail-boat’s line is a straight line, and she -takes no account of the foaming billows and the anguish of passengers, -thrusting through everything from port to port. Several people who had -settled down on deck more in hope than certainty cast sad glances on the -sea, and disappeared hurriedly below. - -Jim and Wally turned up their coat-collars as the breeze freshened, and -stood swaying easily to the motion of the ship. They still bore traces -of the ordeal they had undergone in the trenches; each was unnaturally -pale and heavy-eyed, and recurring attacks of throat-trouble had kept -them from regaining full strength. Wally’s eyes, too, were weak: he was -under orders to rest them altogether, and was therefore openly jubilant -because he could not read war news—which, as he said, was one of the -most wearying occupations, only you couldn’t cease doing it without a -decent excuse. “Vetted” by a Medical Board, the pair had been given six -weeks’ leave, at the end of which time they were to report progress. - -Of the nerve-disorder which so frequently follows in the track of -gas-poisoning they were fortunately entirely free. Possibly their dose -had not been large enough: or their clean youth and perfect health had -helped them to throw off the effects felt heavily by older men. They -could joke about it now, and their longing to get “some of their own -back” was so keen as almost to discount an Irish holiday. Still, war was -likely to last long enough to give them all the fighting they needed: -there was, after all, no immediate hurry. And it was glorious to feel -strength returning: and the new fishing-rods and tackle bore fascinating -promise, while Ireland itself was a country of their dreams. - -As for Mr. Linton and Norah, they looked after the boys unceasingly, fed -them at alarmingly short intervals, and in general manifested so -subservient a desire to run all their errands that the victims revolted, -declaring they were patients no longer, and threatening severe measures -if they were not restored to independence. Norah and her father -submitted unwillingly. To nurse trench-worn warriors had the double -effect of being in itself comforting, while, so long as the nursing -lasted, the warriors could not possibly consider returning to the -trenches. - -They looked about them as the swift steamer raced westward. Soldiers, -soldiers everywhere; every likely youngster was in uniform, and there -were many older men whose keen, quiet faces bore the ineffaceable stamp -of the regular officer of the old Army—the old Army that was gone for -ever, only a fragment left after the first fierce onslaught of war. The -men for’ard were laughing and singing, just as they laughed and sang in -the trenches; a cornet-player belonging to the band had found his -instrument and was leading the tune. Near Norah, three or four nuns, -sweet-faced and grave, were seated, evidently enjoying the keen wind -that swept into their faces. There was the usual sprinkling of -passengers, some mere heaps of rugs in deck-chairs, others walking -briskly up and down. Somewhat apart, a tall old priest stood by the -rail, looking ahead: a gaunt old man with burning, dark eyes, that -searched the grey sea and sky wistfully, as if looking for the land to -which they were hastening. Jim, strolling backwards and forwards, came -presently to a standstill near him, and asked a question. - -“Do you know what time we get in, sir?” - -“’Tis about three hours, I believe—that or less,” said the old man, -courteously. He turned a steady glance on Jim, and apparently approved -of him, for he smiled. “Do you not know Ireland, then?” - -Jim shook his head. “It’s my first visit.” - -“So?” The old eyes looked ahead once more. “They take under three hours -now to cross; ’twas many more last time I came away—the bitter day!” he -added, half under his breath. “And that’s three-and-forty years ago, my -son!” - -“What! and you’ve never been back, sir?” - -“Never. I’ve been in America. A good country; but it never lets you go, -and it never gets to be home. All that three-and-forty years I’ve been -thinking of the day I’d be going back again.” - -“And it’s come,” said Jim, his smile suddenly lighting his grey eyes. -The old man smiled back - -“If you weren’t so young I’d say you knew what it was to be homesick,” -said he. - -“I come from Australia,” said Jim, briefly. - -“Well, well, well!” the priest said. “There’s another great -country—only so far away. There’s many a good Irishman there, they tell -me.” - -“Any number of them,” said Jim. “We’ve got one of the best on our -place—Murty O’Toole. He taught me to ride.” - -“Did he so? There were O’Tooles in Wicklow when I was a boy; but sure -and they’re all over the world. You’ll be glad to go back, when the time -comes?” - -“Glad!” said Jim, explosively. He laughed. “It’s very jolly, of course, -to visit other places. But home’s home, isn’t it, sir?” - -“Aye,” said the old man. He looked ahead, his eyes misty. -“Three-and-forty years I’ve dreamed of it; and now I’m waiting to see -the hills of Ireland coming out of the sea, and this last hour seems -longer than all the years. Well, well; and they’re all dead, all the -people I knew; and I going home to die, like a wornout old dog.” - -“You’ll live in Ireland many a year yet, sir,” Jim told him, quickly. - -“No, no; I’m done. ’Tis my heart, and it finished—sure, wouldn’t forty -years of work in New York finish any heart!” said the old man, laughing. -“But I’m lucky to be getting back to Ireland to die. Did you ever hear, -now, of the Sons of Tuireann?” - -Jim shook his head. “I’m afraid not, sir.” - -“They were great fighting men, and they had great hardship,” said the -priest: “and at the end of all things they were on the sea coming home, -dying. And one of them cried out that he saw the hills of home. And the -others said, ‘Raise up our heads on your breast till we see Ireland -again: and life or death will be the same to us after that.’ So they -died. That was a good ending. A man wouldn’t ask better. ’Tis a hard -thing, dying in a strange country, but you’d go very easy, once you got -home.” He spoke half to himself, so low that the boy hardly caught the -words. They stood silently for awhile, looking ahead across the tumbling -sea. - -“I had no right to be talking to you about dying,” the old priest said -presently, turning to Jim with a smile that made his face -extraordinarily child-like. “Old men get foolish; and my heart’s too big -for my body this day, and I getting home. Tell me now—are ye Irish, at -all?” - -“My mother was Irish,” Jim answered. - -“I’d have said so. What part might she have come from?—and is she with -you?” - -“She died when I was a kiddie,” Jim answered. “She came from Donegal. -Father says she always loved it.” - -“Well, well! Wherever you’re born, you love that place. But I think the -love for Ireland is beyond most things. The people leave it because -there’s no room for them and no money; but no matter where they go they -leave the half of their hearts behind. And they put something of the -love into their children no matter where they’re born, so that they -always want to come and see Ireland: and when they come, ’tis no strange -place to them; they feel they’ve come home. You’ll feel it—for all that -you love that big young country of yours, and want to get back to her. -But every old ruin, and every bit of brown bog and heathery mountain, -and every little stony field, will say something to you that you will -not be able to put into words: and when you go back you will not forget. -There, there! I’m talking again!” said the old man; “and to a boy with -business of his own. Tell me, now, have you been out across yonder yet?” -He nodded in the direction of Flanders. - -They talked of war, the priest nodding vehemently and punctuating Jim’s -brief sentences with exclamations of “Well, well!” The wistfulness -dropped from him suddenly; he was a fighting man, a Crusader—with a -young man’s burning desire to be out in the trenches, and a young man’s -keenness to hear details of battle. “There’s fifty thousand French -priests fighting for France,” he said, enviously: “none the worse -soldiers for being priests, I’ll vow, and they’ll be all the better -priests afterwards for having been soldiers! If I were young! if I were -young!” He laughed at his own vehemence. “It’s your day,” he said; “a -great world just now for young men. And they tell me there’s any number -of them out of khaki yet—standing behind counters and selling lace and -ribbons; and some of them doing women’s hair! More shame for the women -that let them!” - -“If a man wants to stay out of the game and do women’s work, well that’s -all he’s fit for,” said Jim, slowly. “He’s not wanted where there’s work -going. But he ought to have some sort of a brand put on him, so that -people will be able to tell him from a man in future!” - -The priest chuckled appreciatively. - -“Petticoats are the brand he wants,” said he. “And an extra tax put on -him, to support the widows and children of the men who were men—who -went and fought to save his worthless hide. ’Tis a shame, now, they -wouldn’t make him pay some way. Well, they wouldn’t have me in the -trenches—and it’s good sense they have; but for all I’m a broken-down -old ruin I’m going fighting—fighting with my tongue against the boys -that stay at home. Perhaps they don’t realize—the young ones: they -might listen to an old man that was a priest. Just a few days to rest -and feel I’m home at last, and I’m going to do my bit as a recruiting -sergeant!” - -“Good luck!” Jim said, heartily. “Only don’t get knocked up, sir.” - -The old man laughed. - -“’Tis only once a man can die,” he said, cheerfully. “I’d die easier -knowing I’d done my bit, as you boys say. But I’m in dread I’ll lose my -temper with them, especially if I meet the lads that dress heads of -hair! They wash them too, I’m told. Well, well, it’s a queer world!” - -Wally came up, faintly indignant at Jim’s lengthy absence, and joined in -the talk: and presently Mr. Linton and Norah followed, and made friends -with the old man. He was such a simple, cheery old man: it was easy to -be friends with him. They grew merry over queer stories from many -countries, and often the priest’s laugh rang out like a boy’s, while his -own stories brought peals of mirth from his new friends. But through it -all his dark eyes kept searching ahead: ever looking, looking till the -hills of Ireland should lift from the sea. - -“They tell me you have big trees in that Australia of yours,” he said. -“Tell me now, are they as big as the Califorian redwoods?” - -“I don’t know the redwoods,” Wally answered solemnly. “But ours are big. -There’s a story of twelve men who started with axes and cross-cut saws -to get a gum-tree down. They worked on one side for nine months and then -they got bored with that, and they packed up and made a journey round to -the other side. And there they found a party of fifteen men who’d been -working at that side for a year, and they were very surprised——” -Laughter overcame him suddenly at the sight of the priest’s amazed face. - -“You young rascal!” said he, joining in the laugh against himself. “And -I taking it all in so meekly!” - -“I might go on, if you liked, sir, and tell you the story of the man who -was out in the bush bringing home some calves,” said Wally. - -“Don’t spare me,” begged his hearer. - -“Well, he found his way blocked by a fallen tree, too big to get the -calves over. So he started to drive them along it, to get round. When he -didn’t come home they came to the conclusion that he had stolen the -calves; and so they had to apologize to him, later on, when he turned up -with a nice lot of bullocks. He said proudly that he hadn’t lost one, -only they had grown up while they were on the journey!” - -“That was a long tree!” said the priest, between chuckles. “Well, well, -it must be a great country that will grow such timber—and such stories, -and the boys to tell them!” - -Wally laughed. - -“I ought to beg your pardon, sir,” he said. “Only no good Australian can -resist telling tall stories about his tall trees. But I can tell you a -true one of a tree I knew where seven men camped in the hollow butt. -They had bunks built inside, all round it, and a table in the middle, -and of course, space for a doorway. That tree was over fifty-five feet -inside, and goodness only knows what it was outside, buttresses and -all.” - -“And it’s true, I suppose, that you could drive a coach-and-four through -a tree?” the priest asked. - -“Driving a coach-and-four through the hollowed-out stump of a tree used -to be common enough with us,” said Jim. “Not that the four horses -mattered: you might as well say ‘and twelve’; it was the width high -enough up to take the top of the coach that meant a really big tree. It -was easier to make a hollow shell fit for the passage of the coach than -to get the whole tree cut down.” - -“Quite so—quite so,” said the priest. “And I’ve read of church services -being held in a hollow tree, in your country. - -“Rather. We know one that held twenty-two people. It was in a wild part -of the bush, and whatever clergyman came along used to use it—Roman -Catholic, Protestant, Presbyterian or Baptist; it didn’t matter. Every -one used to roll up, for it wasn’t often there was a chance of a church -service. There were lots of jobs for the travelling parson, too: all the -accumulated weddings and christenings.” - -“Do you tell me!” said the priest. - -“My mother had three children before ever a chance came of a baptism,” -said Mr. Linton. “Then the three were done together. I was the eldest, -and I remember being extremely indignant about it—I was four years old, -and it was winter, and the water was cold! It was a standing joke -against me afterwards that I had behaved so much worse than my small -brother and sister.” He laughed, and then grew grave. “Poor bush -mothers! they didn’t have an easy time. Two of my mother’s babies died -without ever having seen a clergyman; to the end of her life she worried -about the little souls that had gone out unbaptized.” - -“It was themselves needed great hearts—those pioneer women,” said the -priest. - -“They did; and mostly they had great hearts. But then I think most women -have, if the need really comes,” Mr. Linton said. “Thousands of them -were delicate, tenderly-reared women, with no experience of bush -conditions in a new country; but they made good. Women have a curious -way of finding themselves able to tackle any conditions with which they -are actually faced. My mother never was strong, and she had no training -for work; I expect she was something of a butterfly until she married my -father and went off into the Never-Never. She ended by being a kind of -oracle for fifty miles round; people used to send for her at all hours -of the day or night, in sickness, and she developed a business capacity -better than my father’s. I remember her as a little, merry thing: always -tired, but never too tired to work for other people. She was only one of -thousands of women doing the same thing.” - -“But the process of learning must have been hard,” said the old priest, -pityingly. - -“Yes. It must have been a tough apprenticeship. My mother told me she -used to sit down and cry often at the loneliness and strangeness of it -all—in the long days when all the men were miles away from the -homestead, and she was alone, with the chance of bush fires and -bushrangers and wild blacks. That was until the babies came. After that -there was no time to cry—which, she said, was a very good thing for -her. Poor little mother!” - -He sighed; and in the silence that followed a slight commotion was -audible on the bridge. The priest glanced up sharply. - -“Nothing—but that cruel business of the _Lusitania_ makes everyone -suspicious at sea, nowadays,” he said. “Still, the Germans may be active -enough in the south, but I don’t fancy they’ll come into these -landlocked waters. Too much risk from our destroyers.” - -Norah was leaning over the rail. - -“What’s that thing?” she said, slowly. - -Their eyes followed the direction of her pointing finger. Nearly astern, -a slender grey object bobbed among the waves: so small a thing that an -idle glance might easily have passed it by unnoticed. A shadowy, grey -bar, bearing aloft what looked like a nut. - -Jim uttered a shout. - -“By Jove, it’s a submarine!” - -Even as he shouted, a long grey shadow came into view under the bar. -Simultaneously, the engine-telegraph clanged from the bridge, and -following the signal, the steamer altered her course with a jerk that -sent most of the standing passengers headlong to the deck. They picked -themselves up, unconscious of bruises, rushing again to the rail. - -The submarine was well in view—a slender, vicious, grey boat, with a -little cluster of men visible on her tiny deck, round the shaft of the -periscope. She was terribly near. Suddenly a volume of black smoke -gushed from the steamer’s funnels; the firemen were flinging themselves -at their work below, since on speed alone hung their slender hope of -safety. Again she altered her course. Sharp orders came from the bridge; -sailors were running to and fro, and an officer was serving out -life-belts frantically. - -Something shot from the submarine—something that made a long, -glistening streak across the water, coming straight towards them like a -flash; and David Linton flung his arm round Norah muttering, “My God!” A -strained, high voice cried, “A torpedo!” and then silence fell upon the -ship, broken only by the smothered gasps of women. Straight and swift -the streak came; unimaginably swift, and yet the watching seemed a -lifetime. - -“Hold tight to the rail,” Jim’s voice said in Norah’s ear. She gripped -mechanically; and as she did so, the steamer jerked again, plunging to -one side like a frightened horse that sees danger. It was just in time. -The torpedo shot past, missing the bow by a fraction—a space so small -that it was almost impossible to believe that it had indeed missed. Then -came relief, finding vent in an irrepressible shout. - -“It’s too soon to shout,” some one said. “She’ll make better shooting -next time.” - -Stewards and sailors were hurrying round, distributing life-belts; it -was no easy matter to put them on, for the ship was zigzagging wildly, -dodging in a desperate effort to elude her pursuer, and balance was -impossible without a firm hold on some fixed object. - -“Sit on the deck—it’s safest,” said Mr. Linton. He fastened Norah’s -life-belt, while Jim performed a similar office for him, and Wally put -one on the old priest, who was so wild with excitement as to be quite -oblivious of any such precaution. His face was deadly white, his dark -eyes blazing. In his first fall he had lost his black felt hat, and his -silver hair waved in the wind. - -“The murdering villains—the assassins!” he said. “Yerra, if I could -fight!” - -An officer called for helpers to bring the women and children from -below. Jim and Wally sprang in answer, and a crowd of soldiers came -tumbling up from for’ard, elbowing their officers in mad excitement and -the rush to be first. Quick and strong hands were needed on the -companion ladders with their burdens, as the ship plunged hither and -thither, racing in zig-zags at top speed. Many of the women were -helpless between fear and the aftermath of sea-sickness; but they came -without outcry, with set white faces, determined, if this were indeed -Death, to die decently. The babies howled with a lusty disregard of the -world common to babies, while the soldiers patted them with far more -concern than they showed for the submarine. In a very few minutes not a -soul was left below. - -“Why do we zigzag?” Norah asked, clinging to the rail as a fresh jerk -shook the ship. - -“It’s our only chance,” Jim answered. “I don’t think the submarines can -beat these boats for speed, or else she’d just come up and sink us at -her leisure; and she can’t take aim accurately if we’re dodging. Of -course we cut down our speed by not going straight; but we can’t afford -the risk of letting her train her torpedo-tube carefully on us. Jove, -can’t the skipper handle this ship! She answers the helm like a -motor-car.” - -“And can’t she go!” uttered Wally. - -“Oh, the mail-boats are built for speed and not much else—thank -goodness!” Jim said. “Look!—she’s firing again!” - -Again the streak shot from the pursuing submarine and darted towards -them. They held their breath. - -It was a very close shave—only a lightning swerve saved the mail-boat. -The old priest uttered a sudden shout of triumph. “Whirroo!” he -cried—for a moment just the boy who had left Wicklow more than forty -years ago. He shook as he gripped the rail, laughing at the racing grey -shadow that followed them. - -Jim Linton’s eyes were on his little sister: and Norah, feeling them, -slipped a hand into his. - -“If it hadn’t been for us you wouldn’t be in this,” he said, miserably. - -Norah opened her eyes in amazement. - -“But that just makes it not matter so much,” she said. “Just fancy if we -weren’t all together! Don’t you worry, Jimmy.” She smiled at him very -cheerfully. - -“If she hits us and we begin to sink, don’t wait for the ship to go -over,” Mr. Linton said. “Half the boats on the _Lusitania_ were -death-traps. Let us all jump in and keep together if we can; we would -have more chance of being picked up, and less of being taken down in the -suction as she sank. Can you swim, Father?”—to the priest. - -“I can. But it’s years since I tried, and I don’t know would I keep -afloat at all,” said the old man, with unimpaired cheerfulness. “Let you -take your own course, and not trouble about me. I’m too old to try -jumping, and there’ll be some poor souls I could maybe help. And we’re -not beaten yet.” He gave a quick laugh, his grey head well up. “We’re -running away, but it’s a good fight we’re putting up, all the same: -something to see, after forty years in a New York slum!” - -“I believe he likes it!” said Wally, under his breath. But the old man -caught the words. - -“Like it! I used to dream of adventures when I was a boy, and it was all -the sea—clean winds and waves, and ships that were always magic to me. -And it ended in a slum: forty years of it, doing my work in the midst of -filth and wretchedness. Well, every man has his work, and mine lay -there. And now, at the end, this! I always knew ’twas luck I’d have if I -got back to Ireland!” - -They had raced away in a straight course after the second torpedo, -increasing the distance from their pursuer. Now, however, a shot hummed -past them, and the captain dared no longer risk a hit—again the ship -swerved from side to side, in short, irregular tacks, and the submarine -drew nearer once more. On and on—leaping like a hare when the greyhound -is behind her: engines throbbing, smoke blackening the sky in her wake. -Some of the firemen had staggered up, exhausted, their places taken by -volunteers. Ahead, a dim line lay upon the sea: the Irish coast, where -lay safety. Would they ever reach it? - -Then, from the north, came rescue: a patrol-boat, racing down upon them -with threatening guns ready to speak in their defence. She came out of a -light haze, which, blowing away, revealed her dogged grey shape, with -the white water churning and parting at her bow. Presently one of her -guns spoke, and a shell buried itself in the sea not far from the -submarine. - -“So long, Brother Boche!” said an officer; and suddenly, as if in -answer, the submarine disappeared, submerging to the safety of the -underworld. The mail-boat ceased to zigzag, running a straight course -until near the destroyer, as a child runs to a protector. - -The tension relaxed. Voices broke out in quick clamour: and then cheer -after cheer came from the pent-up passengers, redoubling as the -captain’s face showed over the railings of the bridge. The captain -grinned, saluted, and looked at his watch all at once: the danger was -over, and now the pressing business of his ordinary life reasserted -itself—the landing in time at Kingstown Pier of His Majesty’s mails. - -People were laughing and talking nervously, keeping an anxious look-out -towards the spot where the submarine had disappeared; scarcely realizing -that their peril was past, and that the grey hunter would not again -reveal itself, hurrying upon their track. The destroyer shot past them, -seeking the enemy, with signal flags talking busily to the mail-boat. A -comforting sense of security was in her wake. - -“Well!” said Jim. “We left England to find peace and quiet; but if this -is a specimen of what Ireland means to give us——” - -“We’d better get back to the peaceful marshes of Flanders,” finished -Wally. - -“I used to think when I was at home—at Billabong—that excitement would -be nice,” said Norah. “But it isn’t—not a bit: or else I’ve had an -overdose. At any rate, I don’t want any more as long as I live.” - -A little sigh came from behind her, and her father made a sudden -movement, springing to the side of the priest. The old man was swaying -backwards and forwards. They caught him, and laid him gently on the -deck. His lips parted, and he tried to speak, but no sound came. - -“Go and look for a doctor,” said Mr. Linton to Wally. “Quick!” - -He tore at the old man’s collar, while Norah rubbed his hands -desperately. It seemed the only thing she could do. A little life came -into the white face, and his voice came faintly. - -“’Tis the finish for me—don’t worry . . . my heart.” He smiled at them. -“And the doctor after telling me not to get excited.” - -“Don’t talk,” Norah begged. - -“It can’t hurt me. Don’t mind, little one.” He saw the tears in her -eyes, and tightened his hand on her fingers. “’Tis a good ending. I -wouldn’t ask for a better.” - -Wally came back, a young man in uniform, with the R.A.M.C. badge on his -collar, at his heels. The doctor bent over the old priest. Presently he -rose, shaking his head as he met David Linton’s eyes. - -“There’s nothing to be done,” he said, softly. - -The old man’s hearing was no less acute. - -“’Tis myself could have told you that,” he said. “I knew . . . next time -it came. And . . . when a man’s ready . . .” - -His voice became almost inaudible, murmuring broken words of prayer. -Behind them Jim had formed a line of soldiers, keeping off the curious -crowd. Presently he spoke again. - -“It’s easy, dying. Only it would be easier if I’d seen it again . . . -Ireland.” - -“We’re very near,” Norah told him, pityingly. - -“Near! And not to see it!” He tried to rise, helplessly. “Ah, but let me -look—let me look!” - -David Linton’s eyes met the doctor’s. - -“It can’t hurt him,” whispered the doctor. “Nothing can do that now.” - -They lifted him, very gently. Ahead, the hills of Wicklow were green and -near. The grey sky had broken, and a little shaft of sunlight stole out -and lay upon the coast. It was as though Ireland smiled to welcome back -her son. - -The dark eyes looked long and wistfully. Once he smiled at Norah; and -then looked back quickly, as though to lose no instant of home. -Presently his lips parted in broken words. - -“Till we see . . . till we see Ireland again; and life or death will be -the same to us after that.” Then no more words came. But when the doctor -signed to them to lay him down he was still smiling. - - - - - CHAPTER V - INTO DONEGAL - - -“A homely-looking folk they are, these people of my kin; -Their hands are hard as horse-shoes, but their hearts come through the - skin. -Old Michael Clancy said to me (his age is eighty-seven), -‘There’s no place like Australia—barring Ireland and Heaven!’” -V. J. DALEY. - -‟WE ought to be nearly there,” said Jim. - -“‘Ought’ seems to be the last argument that counts on this railway -line,” his father answered. “What grounds have you for your fond -belief?” - -“It’s not time-tables,” his son admitted. “They wore out long ago; I -scrapped them when they got to the stage when reading them only led to -despair. Partly I’m hoping that the guard wasn’t merely trying to keep -up my spirits when he told me we’d get to Killard at three o’clock if -Jamesy Doyle wasn’t late with his milk-cans at Ballymoe; only he added -that ’twas the bad little ass Jamesy had, and if it lay down in the cart -how would the poor man be in time?” - -“And will they wait for Jamesy and his cans?” queried Wally. - -“Most certainly, I should think. Passengers are just odd happenings, to -the guard; but Jamesy is married to a woman that’s the cousin of his -wife’s aunt, and the guard evidently has a strong family sense. This -train exists as much to carry Jamesy’s cans as anything else. However, -there’s Ballymoe, and the gentleman on the platform looks as if he might -be Jamesy. And there’s the ass in the cart outside, standing up. I -expect it’s all right.” - -The little train drew slowly into the wayside station, and the guard, -descending, wrung the hand of the somnolent gentleman enthroned upon the -milk-cans. Together they proceeded to load them into the van, but being -overcome by argument in the middle of the operation, relinquished work, -sat down on the cans, and gave themselves up to the delights of -conversation. The Linton family got out, and walked along the platform. -They had been travelling from early morning into the wilds of Donegal, -and, since leaving the main line for a succession of local trains, had -grown well accustomed to these sociable delays. Presently the -engine-driver and his fireman left their engine and joined the -discussion on the milk-cans. Norah strolled to the road and scratched -the ass gently, a proceeding accepted by the ass without resentment, but -without enthusiasm. Time went by. - -The gathering on the platform dissolved itself after a while, the first -move being made by Mr. Jamesy Doyle, who remarked that his wife’d be -tearing the hair off of him, and she waiting for him for dinner. - -“She’ll not wait long on ye; I know that one!” said the guard. - -“She will, then; sure, haven’t I it bought in the little cart yonder?” -said Jamesy, with the calmness of certainty. He assisted to place the -remainder of his property in the van, and the guard, addressing Norah -with enormous politeness, mentioned that when she was quite ready the -train would go on. “Let you not be hurrying yourself—sure we’re that -late already as makes no difference,” he added, pleasantly. They climbed -in, and the little train clanged and rattled on its way. - -At the next station two energetic men in tweed suits descended hurriedly -from the one first-class smoking-carriage and demanded their bicycles, -which had been put in an empty truck—the train being of the type known -as a “mixed goods.” Thereafter arose sounds of wrath and vituperation. - -“Something’s up; I’m going to see,” said Wally. - -They all went to see. The two cyclists, visions of helpless rage, -confronted a scene of desolation. The truck, being opened, disclosed -upon the floor a mingled heap of scrap-iron and twisted metal, which had -once been two fair bicycles: in the midst of which, firmly caught among -the battered spokes, a couple of fat wethers stood and bleated a woe -almost equal to that of the cyclists. A dozen more sheep, most of them -bearing traces of conflict with the defunct machines, in the shape of -scarred legs, pressed about the doorway, while the guard, distraught to -incoherence, endeavoured to restrain them from escaping while attempting -to justify himself before the outraged owners. Totally unsuccessful in -the second endeavour, he was only partially fortunate in the first: a -black-faced sheep, bearing a mudguard wedged upon his horns, made a dash -for freedom and fled wildly down the platform, apparently maddened by -his unfamiliar adornment. - -“And I after putting them in at one end of the truck!” lamented the -guard—“and them bikes standing against the other end! Wasn’t there room -for them all—how would I know they’d mix up on me! Get back there, bad -luck to ye, ye vilyun!”—to another black-faced aspirant for liberty. - -Helpers, divided in their sympathies, but with the preponderance of -feeling on the side of the guard, appeared mysteriously from an -apparently empty landscape and disentangled the sheep from the ruins. -The engine-driver, cutting the Gordian knot of debate, discovered that -the time-table demanded that the train should proceed forthwith; and the -cyclists were left foaming over a twisted heap on the platform, -threatening immediate telegrams to headquarters, and, if necessary, -murder. As the train slid away from the sound of their lamentations, the -fugitive sheep could be descried standing on a bank, his black visage -melancholy beneath the mudguard. - -At the next station, the guard, with a chastened face, appeared at the -window. - -“Killard, sir,” he stated. “And Patsy Burke, he have the outside car and -an ass-cart for ye.” - -Mr. Linton and his party obeyed the summons gladly. They found -themselves on a grass-grown platform, boasting very rudimentary -station-buildings. Beyond, a road ran east and west, bordered by high -banks, while on either side were small fields and wide, flat stretches -of bog. A long, thin man advanced to meet them. No one else had left the -train, and he accepted them, without introduction, as his -responsibility. - -“The car is below in the road,” he said. “The little horse, he have an -objection to the train; he’d lep a ditch sooner than face it. I’ll throw -the luggage on the ass-cart, sir, before I take you up.” - -The guard, still subdued in spirit, was diligently hauling out boxes -from his van. A suit-case and the rod-box, failing to appear, were made -the objects of fevered search, despaired of, promised by the next train, -and finally discovered in an empty third class carriage, all within the -space of five minutes. The ass-cart, drawn by a dispirited donkey -without energy to disapprove of trains, was backed on to the platform, -and the luggage piled upon it in a tottery heap, secured—more or -less—by an assortment of knotted string and old rope. Then the guard -and engine-driver, both of whom had assisted enthusiastically, bade an -affectionate farewell, and the train disappeared slowly, while the -Australians followed Patsy Burke meekly to the outside car. - -Dublin had already introduced them to the jaunting-car of Ireland, and -they had fallen instant victims to the fascination of that most -irresponsible vehicle. English tourists are wont to regard it with fear -and trembling until familiar with its ways: to hold on desperately, to -sit stiffly, and, very frequently, to fall off when rounding corners. -That the Linton party did none of these things was not due to any -superior intelligence on their parts, but merely to the fact that the -back-to-back position on the open-air cars of the Melbourne tramways -proved an excellent introduction to the Irish vehicle—insomuch that the -force of habit was so strong in Wally that the Melbourne gripman’s -habitual ejaculation, “Hold _tight_ round the curve!” sprang unbidden to -his lips every time the jarveys took a corner on one wheel. The Dublin -jarveys had liked the cheery Australians, who paid well and frankly -averred that there was never any conveyance like the jingling cars with -their merry little bells, and their good horses; and the jarveys of -Dublin are a critical race, with quick tongues and quicker wits. They -had confided to them their woes, which centred round the introduction of -motor-cars and the complete indifference of pedestrians to the rule of -the road—an indifference universal throughout Ireland, where the -unseasoned traveller is perpetually a-shiver with dread at threatened -street tragedies, perpetually averted by good luck that amounts to a -miracle. - -“I never seen the equal of these people,” one of their drivers had said, -emitting a roar like a bull of Bashan, which barely saved an elderly -woman from what looked like deliberate suicide under his horse’s hoofs. -“Yerra, ma’am, is it owning the road you are?”—to the lady, who pursued -her leisurely way with the calmness born of many such episodes. “Young -or old, ’tis all the same; they do be strolling the streets for all the -world as if they was picking mushrooms, and taking no notice of you till -you’d be knocking them down—and then they do be annoyed! There’s only -one way, and that is to let a roar out of you at them—and then the look -they give you is worse than a curse!” - -“I suppose you get into trouble if you kill more than six a day,” Wally -had said. - -The jarvey grinned. - -“Trouble, is it? Sure, some of them makes a trade of it; there’s them -old wasters in this town that’d ask nothing better than that you’d knock -’em down—not to kill them, but to knock a small piece off them, the way -you’d have to support them afterwards. There’s one man I but tipped with -the end of a shaft, and he strolling at his aise in a crowd. Crawling at -a slow walk I was; and what did he do but rowl on the ground before me, -letting on that he was kilt. There was none of the polis about, so I -left him rowling and calling murder!” - -“Did you hear any more of him?” - -“I did. Didn’t he come to me that evening and say he had his witnesses -ready, and he’d be making a polis-court matter of it if I didn’t give -him five pounds? ‘I do be making twenty-eight shillings a week,’ says -he, ‘in me health,’ says he, and now ’tis the way I cannot lift me hand -to me head,’ he says. Him, that never earned five shillings in a week in -his life, and not that, if he could steal it! I towld him to bring his -polis-court and his dirty witnesses, and that if he did, I’d pay the -five pounds for the pleasure I’d have in belting the life out of him.” - -“And did he bring it?” - -“He did not. I seen him a week after that, and he cleaning steps. ‘I’m -glad to see you looking so well and hearty, me poor man!’ says I to him; -and he thrun a look at me fit to kill. Sure I knew that one’d be more -anxious to keep out of the way of the polis than to be dandhering about -them with his cases!” - -The Dublin cars had been smart affairs, spick-and-span with bright paint -and clean upholstering, every buckle on their harness polished brightly. -Their rubber tyres strove to soften the asperities of cobbled streets. -But the car to which Patsy Burke led the Australians was of a different -aspect: small and forbidding, with straight up-and-down seats whereon -reposed cushions from which the stuffing had chiefly escaped, the -insignificant remnant remaining in hard knobs in the corners. The -original wood peeped out through faint streaks of the original paint, -while here and there patches of deal and hoop-iron lent variety to the -exterior. Many different sets had contributed towards the composition of -the harness, wherein nothing matched except in age and decrepitude. A -tattered urchin stood at the head of the little horse which had an -objection to trains. The horse was asleep. - -“If I were asked,” murmured Norah, surveying him, “I would say he had an -objection to moving at all.” - -“He looks as if he would like to lean up against a tree and dream,” said -Wally, “and good gracious! is he going to drag the lot of us!” - -“Why wouldn’t he?” asked Mr. Burke, with some asperity. “Git along with -ye to the ass, John Conolly,”—to the boy—“and lend a hand to the big -thrunk when the road does be rough, or it will fall off on ye. Will ye -get up, miss?” - -“Is it far?” asked Norah, regarding the somnolent horse with troubled -eyes. - -“’Tis five Irish miles, miss.” - -“But can he take us all? There’s—there’s so much of us,” said Norah, -her glance roving over her tall menfolk, and dwelling finally on Mr. -Burke, who was not less tall. - -“Him!” said Mr. Burke. “But isn’t the luggage on the ass-cart? Sure -it’ll only be a luxury for him—many’s the time I’ve known that one with -seven or eight behind him, going to a funeral, and he that full of -courage, I’d me own throubles to keep him from bolting? Let ye get up, -and ’tis little he’ll be making of ye.” - -They got up, unhappily, and Mr. Burke hopped into the driver’s -seat—which is occupied only in time of stress, the jarvey greatly -preferring to drive from the side. He said, “G’wan, now!” to the little -horse, and that animal awoke and took the road gallantly, while a -cracked bell on his collar rattled a discordant accompaniment to his -hoof-beats. - -They jogged on between the high banks. The scent of the whitethorn that -made snow upon their crests flooded the air, and mingled with deep wafts -of odour from clumps of furze lying golden in the fields. There were -other flowers starring the hedges; honeysuckle, waving long arms of -sweetness, and, nestling closely in the grass-grown banks, clusters of -wild violets, starry celandines and even a few late primroses. There -were many houses in sight; little whitewashed cabins scattered over the -hills, approached by narrow boreens or tiny lanes, so narrow that it -seemed that even an ass-cart could scarcely manage to squeeze in between -their towering banks. - -“Did you ever see such little paddocks—fields, I ought to say?” uttered -Wally. “And the great fat banks and hedges between them! Why, they must -cover as much ground as there is in many of the fields!” - -“We’d put wire-fences, in Australia,” said Mr. Linton, laughing. “It’s -queer, when you come to think of it: we’re supposed to have land to -spare, but we put the narrowest fences that can be made; and here, there -isn’t enough to go round, and they cover up ever so much of it with -their banks.” - -“Oh, but aren’t you glad they don’t make wire-fences!” Norah broke out. -“They’re so hideous: and these hedges are just exquisite.” - -“Not being a landholder, I am, indeed,” said her father. “The idea of -this landscape given up to wire-fences is depressing—long may they -stick to their banks! And their shelter must be valuable in this -country; they don’t seem to have many trees.” His eye ran over the bare -little fields. “Don’t you grow trees, in Donegal?” he asked of the back -of Mr. Burke. - -That gentleman, feeling himself addressed, swung round. - -“There do be plenty in the woods and in gentlemen’s grounds, sir. I -never seen any in the fields. They do say there was any amount in the -ould ancient days, or how would the bogs be there? Forests, no less; and -quare beasts in them. I’ve seen ould heads of deer with horns that wide -you’d never get them up a boreen. There were no fields and no fences in -those days, and people lived by hunting—great hunting those big deer -would give them, to be sure. If you’d kill a rabbit nowadays it’d be as -much as you’d do to ate it before the polis had you!” - -“If killing rabbits is what you care for, you might come to Australia,” -said Jim, laughing. “You would certainly be welcome there. Only after a -little while, you wouldn’t eat any.” - -“There was a lad I knew in Derry went out to them parts,” said Mr. -Burke, “and he sent home letters with such tales of his doings you -wouldn’t believe them. He said there were beasts that hopped on their -tails faster than a horse ’ud gallop, and rabbits that had the face ate -off the country. Like a carpet on the floor, he says. But sure he was -always the boy that’d spin you a yarn.” - -“It was a true yarn, anyhow,” Jim remarked. - -“Do ye tell me, now?” The long face of Patsy Burke was respectful, but -incredulous, “And another thing he said, that a man couldn’t believe: -that the genthry’d go out and poison foxes!” - -“They would,” said Mr. Linton. “Gladly.” - -“But——” Words failed Mr. Burke. He gaped at his passengers. The horse -dropped to a walk, unheeded. - -“Poison them, or shoot them, or get rid of them in any way possible,” -said Jim, enjoying the mounting agony of Mr. Burke. “We can’t do much -hunting, you see, when we live on big places, with the nearest neighbour -perhaps twenty miles off; and often the hills are so steep and rough, -and so thick with fallen timber, that horses and hounds would want wings -to hunt through them. But a man may have thousands of sheep on hills -like that.” - -“Do ye tell me? Thousands, is it?” - -“Rather. And the foxes breed like rabbits in those hills, and there’s -nothing they like so well as young lambs. You can go out in the morning -and find forty or fifty dead lambs—the cruel brutes of foxes just eat -their noses and go on to the next. When you see that number of little -lambs killed, in that fashion, you’re ready to start poisoning foxes.” - -“Ye would so,” said Mr. Burke, explosively. “And no one interferes with -ye?” - -“Why, you get paid for it,” Jim said. To which Mr. Burke replied by a -gasp of “God help us!” and relieved his feelings by lashing the horse -with a shout of “G’wan, now!” The horse broke into a surprised canter, -and they rocked down a little hill. At its foot a wide expanse of bog -stretched westward, looking like a great grassy plain. Here and there, -near the road, men were working at cutting turf, armed with the loy or -narrow, sharp spade, which takes out a sod of turf, the size of a brick, -to be stacked to dry in the sun. A great corner had already been cut -away, and lay bleak and desolate. Above its level the wall of turf rose -three or four feet, a dark-brown glutinous-looking mass, smoothly marked -with the scars of the loy. There were deep pools of water here and -there: the brown bog-water that scares the English tourists who finds it -in a bedroom jug in a hotel, and gives foundation for future scathing -comments on the dirty ways of Ireland: the fact being that if its -exquisite velvet-softness could be taken to London, most of the Bond -Street complexion specialists would go out of business for lack of -customers. - -“So that’s turf,” commented Wally, looking curiously at the rough stacks -of sods, which the sun was drying to a lighter colour than the deep -brown of the bog-face. “It doesn’t look the sort of stuff you’d make -fires of—wherein I expect I show my hideous ignorance.” - -Mr. Burke had begun with a snort at the first part of this remark, but -checked it in its birth at the frank avowal of the conclusion. - -“Wait till ye see it burn, sir,” he said. “Ye’d not want a better fire, -barring ye could get a bit of bog-wood to mix with it. Then ye’d not get -its aiqual if ye were walking the world all your life.” - -“Are those pools deep?” Norah asked, looking at the still brown water, -fringed with reeds and sedges. - -“Some of ’em’s no depth at all; and there’s some that deep that no man -knows the bottom of ’em. They’d take anyone and swallow him entirely, -the way he’d never be heard of again; and they do say the bog keeps ’em -fresh as if they’d just fallen in, only I dunno would it be true: I -never seen anybody that had come out. It’s one of the old stories that -do be going in the country.” - -“When _we_ talk about a bog, we mean something that looks—well, boggy,” -Norah said. “I never thought an Irish bog looked so pretty; all grass -and rushes, like a big plain. Why do they call it a bog?” - -“You’d know if you got into it,” said Mr. Burke, bearing patiently with -the ignorance of the foreigner. “There’s parts of it firm enough to -gallop a horse over; but you’d want to know where you were going, it’s -that treacherous—it’d let you down as deep as your waist in a second, -and it looking safe as a street. Some of the mosses that do be growing -on it ’ud warn you: there’s one or two kinds that only grow where it’s -deep and quaking. As for pretty—it’s airly yet for flowers; but you’d -see it like a garden, in the autumn, with meadowsweet and loosestrife -and canavan, that they call the bog-cotton, like snow lying on it. -There’s no end to the quare things that do be growing in a bog.” - -They passed ass-carts, built up with basket work to form creels, piled -high with turf,—generally in the charge of a barefooted urchin, -dark-eyed and graceful in his rags, who would fling a cheery “Good-day” -at the car rattling by, touching his cap to “the genthry.” - -“’Tis a great year for saving turf,” Mr. Burke told them. “There’s no -knowing what the war’ll be doing with prices; they say the poor -people’ll be hard put to it to go on living at all. So everyone’s -getting turf; sure, it’s easier to be hungry if you’re warm. I dunno, at -all, why would they make a war: didn’t we have enough and too much to -pay for tea and tobacco as it was without the ould Kaiser poking in his -nose?” Thus adjusting satisfactorily the responsibility for his -financial troubles, Mr. Burke addressed the horse angrily, and drove on -in silence. - -They came to a little river, brawling merrily under a bridge of grey -stone. A turn in the road brought trees in view, fringing a lough that -lay tranquil in the sunlight; a placid sheet of blue water broken here -and there by tiny islands. Towards the end that was nearest, the trees -were thickly planted. Between them they caught glimpses of an old stone -house nestling in a wilderness of a garden that ran down almost to the -edge of the lough. - -Patsy Burke swung the little horse in through a gateway, the iron gates -of which stood invitingly open. They jogged up a winding avenue, -overhung with lofty beech-trees. It ended suddenly in front of the -house. Through a wide doorway they could see a dim hall, where a -bewildering collection of old guns and blunderbusses was ranged over a -massive mahogany table, the legs of which ended in claw-feet that would -have drawn a connoisseur like a magnet. Honeysuckle and roses climbed -together up the old walls, framing the doorway in blossom. - -“Are ye there, ma’am?” bawled Patsy. - -A pleasant-faced woman came through the hall quickly. - -“I’d have given up expecting you, if that old train was ever in time,” -she said, giving a hand to Norah as that damsel hopped from the car. -“Aren’t you all tired out, and you travelling since early morning? Come -in then—there’s hot water waiting in your rooms, and tea will be ready -in ten minutes. Is the luggage coming, Patsy?” - -“It is, ma’am,” responded Mr. Burke. “Lasteways, if that image of a John -Conolly doesn’t play any of his thricks with the ass.” - -“Perhaps, now, you’d be better going back to meet him when you have the -horse stabled,” suggested his mistress. “I wouldn’t have the luggage -delayed.” - -“Ah, sure, it will be all right,” said Mr. Burke, hastily, “John -Conolly’s not that bad; he’ll get it here sometime, but where’d be the -use of hurrying the ass? Well, I’ll throw a look down the road when I’m -after putting the car by, ma’am.” - -“And that makes sure of me poor Brownie getting a good grooming,” -murmured the landlady, ushering her guests into the house as the car -jogged stablewards. “Patsy’s not that fond of a walk that he’d scamp his -job to be travelling the road after John Conolly. Are you there, -Bridget?” - -“I am, ma’am,” said a pretty girl, appearing from the back of the hall -with such swiftness as to compel the belief that she had been -surreptitiously observing the new-comers. - -“Take the gentlemen to their rooms,” commanded the landlady. “Will you -come with me, Miss Linton?” - -Norah followed her up the broad staircase. A wide corridor led through -mouldering archways, whence passages branched off to right and left. The -walls bore signs of decorations of a bygone day, now faint and faded -with age. The landlady threw open the door of a large room, with two -windows looking over the lough. A huge bed occupied an alcove: bare -acreages of floor intervened between isolated pieces of furniture, with -rugs lying, like islands, on the stained boards. - -“I took up the carpet—’twas old and there were holes in it you’d fall -through,” said the landlady. “But I could put you in a smaller room if -you’d rather have a carpet.” - -“I like this,” Norah said, looking round the clean bareness of the room. -“But can’t I have the windows open?” - -“You’ll have to fight Bridget over them,” replied the landlady, flinging -both windows wide. “I opened them twice this morning, but she shut them -again; and the second time she was so anxious about all the deaths you’d -be dying with the dint of the cold blast sweeping in, that I let them -stay.” - -“I didn’t think there was any cold blast,” Norah said laughing. - -“There wasn’t; but Bridget thinks that any air that comes in through an -open window is a blast, even if it’s the middle of summer. Have you -everything you want, Miss Linton? I’m sure you’ll all be famished for -your tea, and I’ll run and see to it.” - -“I think this is a jolly place,” Norah said, as they gathered, ten -minutes later, round a table that might certainly have groaned under its -load of good things, had it not been made of exceedingly solid old -mahogany. “It’s not a bit like a boarding-house, is it? There’s such a -home-y feel about it.” - -“There’s a home-y look about this table,” Jim averred. “I haven’t seen -anything like it since we left Billabong.” - -There were crusty loaves of Irish soda-bread, which is better than -anything else except the home-made bread of Australia, heaps of brown, -crisp scones, buttered hot-cakes, and glass dishes with ruby-coloured -jams. A bowl of cream was in the middle, and a dish of rich dark honey -in the comb—not like the anæmic honey one buys in London, which is made -by fat and lazy bees out of dishes of sugar and water, and tastes like -it. The Irish bees had worked over miles of heathery moorland, and their -honey held something of the heather’s fresh sweetness. - -“Think of the trenches—and bully beef!” ejaculated Wally. “I say, -what’s this?” - -He had uncovered a smoking plateful of a queer flat substance, on which -attention was immediately focussed. - -“Does one eat it?” Norah queried. - -“Blessed if I know,” Jim answered. “It looks a bit queer.” - -Light suddenly illumined Mr. Linton. - -“Bless us, that’s potato-cake!” he exclaimed. “I haven’t tasted it for -many a year, and it’s one of the best things going. It ought to be eaten -so hot that it burns the mouth, so I advise you not to lose time.’ He -helped himself, declaring that no considerations of etiquette were to -stand in the way of the proper temperature of a potato-cake, and the -others somewhat doubtfully followed his example. In a very short time -the plate was empty. - -“_That’s_ a recipe I’ll take back to Brownie!” was Norah’s significant -comment. “Do you think Mrs. Moroney would let me have a lesson on it in -the kitchen?” - -“Mrs. Moroney seems inclined to eat from one’s hand,” said Mr. Linton. -“She’s desperately anxious for us to be comfortable. You know, we were -told in London that she had only begun this business since the war—her -husband is at the front—so time hasn’t soured her as it sours most -landladies. We’re lucky in catching her in the fluid state: later on -she’ll solidify into the adamantine condition that is truly -landladylike.” - -“Meanwhile, she’s rather an old duck,” said Wally. “Hallo, who’s that?” - -A small rosy face, crowned with a tangle of yellow curls, was peeping -round the doorway. Finding itself observed, it hastily disappeared. -Norah snatched a sponge-cake and went in swift pursuit, returning, a -moment later, with a very small boy clad in a blue shirt and -ridiculously diminutive knickerbockers, who greeted the company with a -friendly smile somewhat complicated by a large mouthful of cake. - -“Well, you’re a cheerful person,” Jim said. “What’s your name?” - -“Timsy,” said the new-comer. “And I’m eight.” - -“I call that genius,” said Wally. “He knew you’d ask him that next, so -he saved you the trouble. Do you live here, Timsy?” - -The small boy nodded vigorously. - -“Me daddy’s gorn,” he volunteered. - -“Where?” - -“Fightin’ the Gair-mins. They’s bad—they’s after hurtin’ him in the -laig.” - -“Did they?” said Wally, sympathetically. “Poor daddy! Is he better?” - -“He is. He’s goin’ to shoot me some.” - -“Is he, now? Will he bring them home?” - -“I dunno will he. I asked the postman, an’ he said daddy couldn’t post -’em.” - -“That wasn’t nice of the postman,” said Jim. “What would you do with -them if you got them?” - -“Frow fings at ’em,” said Timsy, valiantly. - -“Good man!” said Jim. “We’ll have you in the trenches before the war’s -over, I expect. Another cake, old chap?” - -Timsy accepted the cake graciously, digging his white teeth into it with -appreciation. - -“I’m after having me tea,” he confided. “An’ Bridget said there wasn’t -any cake. But there’s lots.” His eye swept the table. - -“There is, indeed,” said Jim, guiltily. “Just you have as much as you -feel like.” - -“Are you a soldier?” demanded Timsy, his eyes on Jim’s uniform. - -The boy nodded. - -“Like me daddy?” - -“Not as good, I expect,” said Jim. - -“Me daddy’s the finest soldier ever went out of Ireland—old Nanny told -me he was. And she said if once he met that old Kaiser he’d be sorry he -ever got borned. An’ he would, too, if me daddy cot him. An he’s a -sergeant, ’cause he’s got free stripes on his arm. Why hasn’t you got -any?” - -“I don’t know as much as your daddy,” said Jim, probably with perfect -truth. “When I get bigger they may give me some.” - -“You’re bigger than me daddy, now,” said Timsy, surveying him. “Only you -haven’t got any whiskers. I ’spect you have to have whiskers before you -get free stripes.” - -“I expect so,” Jim agreed. “I’ll grow some the first minute I get time. -What have you done with your legs, Timsy?” - -“Scratched ’em, I ’spect,” said Timsy, indifferently, casting a fleeting -glance at his bare brown legs, which bore many marks of warfare. “They’s -bwambles in the wood. Why is your buttons dif-runt to me daddy’s?” - -“What are your daddy’s like?” - -Timsy fished laboriously in the pocket of his shirt. - -“I got one here,” he said. “It came uncottoned, an’ fell off, an’ daddy -said I could have it. Look—it’s nicer than yours.” - -“Of course it is—isn’t your daddy a sergeant?” said Jim, gravely. Timsy -looked up sharply, and was seized with compunction. - -“Don’t you mind,” he said, hastily putting away his cherished button, -lest dangling it before the eyes of his new friend should excite vain -longings in his soul. He slipped a grimy little paw into Jim’s. “’Twill -not be long at all before they make a sergeant of you. Can you hurry up -an’ grow whiskers?” - -“I’ll do my best,” returned Jim, laughing. “You’re a good old sportsman, -Timsy. Have another cake.” - -Timsy’s head was bent over the dish in the tremendous effort of -selection, when a slight commotion was heard in the hall. - -“I was without in the scullery,” said a high-pitched voice, “and I after -giving him his tea. ‘Let you sit quiet there till I have a minute to put -a decent appearance on you,’ says I. ‘’Tis not in them ould rags you’d -be having the genthry see you,’ I says. With that I wint back, an’ the -kitchen was as bare as the palm of me hand. I’ve called him till me -throat’s cracking——” - -“Is that you, Timsy?” whispered Norah. The dancing eyes of the culprit -were sufficient answer. - -“Blessed Hour!” said the voice of Mrs. Moroney, torn between relief and -wrath. Her good-natured face hung in the doorway, presently followed by -her ample form. “Is it you, then, Timsy Moroney, disgracing me and -annoying the gentleman! Why would you have him on your knee, sir, and he -the ragamuffin of the world? I’d not have you troubled with him.” - -“He’s not troubling me at all, Mrs. Moroney,” Jim assured her. “He’s an -awfully friendly little chap. Does it matter if he has cakes?” - -The question savoured of shutting the stable-door after the stealing of -the steed. Timsy ate his cake hurriedly, lest disaster await him in the -answer. - -“There’s nothing he doesn’t eat,” said his mother resignedly. “But I’d -not let him annoy you, sir.” - -“There was no cake in the kitchen!” said Timsy, fixing reproachful eyes -on his parent. “How would I have me tea, an’ no cake?” - -“Cock you up with cake!” returned Mrs. Moroney, spiritedly. “Well able -to go without it you are, for once in a while.” She relented before her -son’s appealing gaze. “Come away, then, and let Bridget wash you: sure, -she’s screaming all over the place after you.” - -Timsy hesitated, regarding Jim with affection. - -“Can I come back some time?” he demanded. - -“Of course you can,” said Jim. - -The small boy climbed down slowly. - -“I’m destroyed with washin’,” he complained. “’Tis only at dinner-time -she had me all soaped. An’ I _hate_ shoes . . .” The voice of his -lamentations died away as his mother swept him from the room. - -“Nice kid,” said Jim, getting up. “Let’s go out and reconnoitre.” - -The shadows were lengthening across the strip of tree-fringed grass -leading to the gate. Near the house, the garden was a wilderness of -colour and fragrance. Roses and sweet-peas, stocks and asters, -nasturtiums and clematis, in a bewildering tangle, jostled each other in -the untidy beds and on the old stone walls. Here and there was a -mouldering summer-house, its entrance almost blocked with hanging -creepers, while in shady nooks in the winding walks were seats with an -appearance of old age that suggested prudence in sitting down. - -Presently they came upon a path leading abruptly down-hill to the lough. -They followed it, passing out of the garden into a little field where -small black Kerry cattle looked inquisitively at them, and through a -rickety gate on to the shore, where grey pebbles made a rough beach. A -disconsolate donkey, attached to a windlass, walked round and round in a -weary circle, pumping water up to the house—a spectacle which promptly -set Norah to hunting for a thistle for him, which the donkey received -coldly. - -“It would take more than a thistle to sweeten that job,” said Wally. -“Come and look at the boat.” - -Mr. Patsy Burke was rather feverishly busy with the boat—it had -apparently occurred to him that since the new-comers would assuredly -want her it might be as well to make certain that she was sound. She was -not sound—to rectify which obvious condition Mr. Burke laboured -mightily. - -“She’s seen better days,” remarked Mr. Linton, looking at the ancient -vessel with critical eyes. Already she had been extensively patched: her -paint was merely a memory, and she bore “a general flavour of mild -decay.” The oars, which lay near, had also been mended many times. They -did not match: a fact which the Australians were to discover later. - -“Ah, sure, she’s a good boat,” said Mr. Burke. “’Tis only the thrifle of -a leak she have in her. You wouldn’t ask an aisier or a kinder boat to -pull than that one—begob, she’s the best boat to be found on any lough -hereabouts.” This assertion also was to be verified by time. “In the -ould times, when the family was here, many’s the day I’ve seen her, full -of red cushions and fine ladies, and she tearing up the lough like a -racehorse!” The poetic nature of Mr. Burke’s memories moved him to a -sigh. - -“Who was the family?” queried Mr. Linton. - -“The O’Donnells, to be sure,” answered Mr. Burke, his long face -expressing faint surprise at ignorance so vast. “They owned all this -country, from the ould ancient times—but there’s none of them left now. -Me gran’father, and his gran’father before him, was tenants under them. -I’m told they were kings, one time. But there’s nothing left of any of -the ould stock now—all their houses is sold, or falling to pieces, an’ -they at the ends of the earth, seeking their fortune.” - -“The house is very old, isn’t it?” Norah asked. - -“’Tis ould, and ’tis falling to decay—it ’ud take a power of money to -put it right. Ah, the good days is gone from Ireland—what with the land -war and the famine, all the money was swept from her.” Mr. Burke stopped -abruptly. He pulled his battered felt hat over his eyes and hammered -vigorously at the old boat. - -They went up through the fragrant garden, now heavy with evening -shadows. Above them the gaunt old house towered, bosomed in its trees, -dim with the night mist from the lough. Lights were beginning to twinkle -from the windows, and the faint acrid smell of turf fires stole upon the -still air. To Norah’s fancy the silent garden was peopled with shadowy -forms—tall gallants and exquisite ladies of a bygone day, and little -children who ran, laughing, along paths that had no tangle of neglected -growth. It was theirs; the dream visions made her feel an interloper as -she crossed the threshold into the lit hall. - - - - - CHAPTER VI - OF LITTLE BROWN TROUT - - - “Loughareema! Loughareema! - Lies so high among the heather, - A little lough, a dark lough, - The wather’s black an’ deep: - Ould herons go a-fishing there, - An’ sea-gulls all together - Float roun’ the one green island - On the fairy lough asleep.” - MOIRA O’NEIL. - -A WEEK went by with the mysterious swiftness of holiday weeks, -especially in Ireland. No one quite knew what became of the long June -days; they dawned in light mists that lay on the surface of Lough -Aniller, reddened with the sunrise, only to vanish as the sun mounted; -they widened to warm brightness, with clear blue skies flecked with the -tiniest cloudlets; and sank to long, delicious twilights, with just -enough chill in the air to make light coats necessary. No one was -inclined for strenuous exertion. Jim and Wally, under orders to take -life very easily for the present, were content to lie about in the -fragrant grass, to go for short walks along the borders of the lough, or -to let Patsy Burke row them slowly up its placid waters, where scarcely -a ripple marked the rising of a trout. To Norah and her father it was -sufficient happiness to watch their boys gradually winning back -strength. Each day that went by and brought no recurrence of -throat-trouble was something achieved; and the long, golden days -smoothed the weary lines from the boyish faces, and brought something of -the old tan into their cheeks. There was no doubt that as a sanatorium -Donegal merited all that had been claimed of her. - -They were the only guests in the old stone house. Later on, Mrs. Moroney -told them, people were coming from Dublin and Belfast: but the war had -temporarily killed the tourist traffic from England, and Irish fishing -was having a much-needed rest. - -“But for the fowl I have, indeed, I’d be hard put to it,” said Mrs. -Moroney. She reared innumerable ducks and chickens, and carried on a -thriving trade, sending them ready dressed to England—aided by a -parcels post system which, unlike that of Australia, does not appear to -regard the senders and receivers of parcels as wealthy eccentrics, to be -heavily charged, but otherwise unworthy of consideration. At all times -Mrs. Moroney was to be found plucking and dressing her wares—keeping, -nevertheless, an eagle eye upon her household, and always ready to take -interest in the doings of her guests. Good nature beamed from her -countenance, and chicken-fluff always ornamented her hair. - -Timsy had constituted himself Jim’s shadow, and courier-in-chief to the -party. He knew all the country with a boy’s knowledge, had an -acquaintance with the ways of trout which seemed miraculous in one of -his years, and cherished a feud of long standing with John Conolly, -whose treatment of the little ass did not come up to the standard -instilled into Timsy by the sergeant, now in France. All these matters -he placed at the absolute disposal of Jim. The rest of the party he -treated politely: they were well enough. But the big boy in khaki was -somehow different, and Timsy gave him all his warm little heart. - -It was a shock to him that Jim and Wally appeared in rough tweeds on the -morning after their arrival. - -“Where’s you uny-forms?” demanded Timsy, hopping on one foot on the -mossy path, rather like an impertinent sparrow. - -“Upstairs,” Jim said, solemnly. - -“Why for don’t you put ’em on?” - -“Didn’t want to.” - -Timsy surveyed him with a pained air. - -“Me daddy says uny-form had a right to be wore all the time,” he said. -“He didn’t have no uvver clothes when _he_ came home.” - -Jim relented at the small, worried face. - -“Tell you how it is, old man,” he said. “The old Germans laid us out; -and we’re going to get better as quick as we can, to go and lick them.” - -“Yes?” said Timsy, digging his heel into the earth, in bloodthirsty -ecstasy. “That’s what me daddy’s after doing.” - -“Of course he is. Well, we’ll get better quicker if we haven’t got to -wear heavy uniforms all the time, don’t you see? So we asked leave; and -a big general said we could put on other clothes. He was a very big -general, so it’s all right, isn’t it?” - -“Was he very big?” - -“Enormous,” said Jim, gravely. - -“If he was very ’normous, I ’spect it’s all right,” Timsy said, -relinquishing his point with reluctance. “Only I likes you best in -uny-forms.” His eye suddenly lit with new hope. “Do you think you’d wear -’em on Sunday, an’ you goin’ to church?” - -“I would,” Jim said. “There, it’s a bargain, Timsy.” So Timsy accepted -the tweed knickerbockers as necessary evils, and peace reigned. - -As for the trout, they had remained in peace. Patsy Burke had given the -Australians a few lessons in throwing a fly, a gentle art to which they -did not take very kindly, though they proved apt enough pupils. But the -trout were not rising, and they found it dull. Their previous experience -had been either the primitive method of a stick, a string, and a worm, -in the creeks at home, or a deep-sea hand-line with a substantial bait -and a heavy sinker. They liked these peaceful ways, and to them the -incessant business of casting seemed, in the Australian phrase, “too -much like hard work.” They endeavoured, however, to keep this view from -the scandalized Mr. Burke, whose scorn at the mere mention of a -hand-line was almost painful to witness. - -In defence of their apathy, it must be admitted that the sport was poor. -The weather had been unfavourable, and the brown trout declined to rise; -but even in the best of years Lough Aniller, the big lough by the house, -was not a good fishing lake. A few rises came to them, which they -missed: and they had the poor satisfaction of beholding Mr. Burke land a -specimen which weighed not quite a quarter of a pound. It did not seem, -to untutored eyes quite worth the candle. - -“’Tis a poor lake, anyways,” Mr. Burke said. They were paddling home in -the setting sun, the water full of bright reflections. “I dunno why the -trout wouldn’t be in it: it’s the biggest hereabouts, but they don’t -seem wishful for it at all. There’s Lough Nacurra and Lough -Anoor—they’re little enough, but you’d get finer fishing in them in a -day than in a week of Lough Aniller.” - -“Why don’t we go there?” spoke Wally, lazily. - -“There’s no reason in the world why you shouldn’t. Sure, they’re no -distance, and the fishing belongs to the house; there’ll not be a rod on -them, barring your own.” - -“What do they mean, Patsy?” Norah asked. Mr. Burke was her instructor in -the Irish language, and she thirsted for translations of each unknown -word. - -“Lough Anoor’s the lough of the gold, miss, and Lough Nacurra’s the -lough of the Champions. I dunno why they have those names on them; -there’s a lot of ould stories goin’. Whatever reason anybody was to -give, no one could say it was wrong.” - -“Well, Lough Aniller means the lough of the Eagle, you said, Patsy, but -there don’t seem any eagles about.” - -“Thrue for ye,” agreed Mr. Burke; “they do not. But I wouldn’t wonder if -there was any amount of them here in the ould ancient times.” He scanned -the placid waters with disfavour. “There’s one thing they couldn’t call -it, and that’s Nabrack—the lough of the Trout!” - -“They certainly couldn’t—whoever ‘they’ may be,” said Wally, laughing. -“There are just about as many trout in this lough as there are in the -front garden, I believe. Who’ll come to one of the others -to-morrow?—I’ll have to learn their names before I say them in public. -I vote for the one that belongs to the Champions!” - -“Lough Nacurra—ye might do worse,” said Patsy. “’Tis a good little -lough, and there’s a small little island in it, that ’ud be a good place -for you to be taking your dinners. The boat’s no great thing at all—but -she’s better than the one on Lough Anoor.” - -“What!” exclaimed Mr. Linton. “Is she worse than this one?” The boat on -Lough Aniller had not struck the party as an up-to-date craft. - -“She is,” said Mr. Burke. “But there’s no distance to be pulling her: -sure, the lough’s not big enough to go any ways far. If ’twas Lough -Anoor, now, there’d be no good in me comin’ with you, for five couldn’t -sit in her. Four’ll be all she’ll hold.” - -“Is she safe?” asked Mr. Linton. - -“Is it safe? Sure, you wouldn’t sink that one, not if you danced in -her,” said Patsy. - -They had drifted almost to the end of the lough. Above them the high -road crossed the stone bridge. The whir of a motor hummed across it, -and, looking up, they saw a grey runabout car, driven by a man of whose -face little could be seen, since goggles hid his eyes and his cap was -pulled low. Patsy touched his cap hastily as the car vanished in its own -dust. - -“’Tis the young masther,” he said; and added, as if in further -explanation, “Sir John, I mean—Sir John O’Neill.” - -“Does he live here?” Norah asked. - -“He do, miss. But a lot of his time he’s somewhere else—London or -foreign parts.” - -“I thought every landowner about here had gone to the war,” Mr. Linton -said. - -“Begob, Sir John ’ud give the two eyes out of his head to be gone, too,” -said Patsy, shortly. “But they won’t take him. ’Tis—’tis weakly he is. -He have the spirit of ten men in him; them ould German’s ’ud find their -hands full, and they to be tackling him in a tight place. Well, -well—some people don’t get much luck.” He stopped short, and rowed -violently for some time. - -“Do you get many salmon here?” Jim asked, idly. It was evident that Mr. -Burke did not wish to pursue the subject of Sir John O’Neill. - -“In the river—but only a few,” replied the boatman. “’Twouldn’t be -worth your while getting a licence, sir. Sure it’s them ’ud give you a -different idea of fishing. I got one in Lough Illion, in Kerry, one time -when I was staying in them parts. That was the fish! He tuk me four and -a half hours to kill.” - -“Whew—w!” said Jim, respectfully. “He must have been a big fellow.” - -“Well, he was not that big at all; but he tuk the fly as if he meant it, -and down he went to the bottom like a shtone. An’ there he lay, and I -going round and round him in the boat, trying any ways to shift him, and -he sulking in the weeds. Banging my rod I was, and pelting at him all -the bits of rock I had in the boat, and I couldn’t shtir him. I was -famished out, for it was pegging hailshtones and sleet. At last he come -up; and then he thought better of it, when he saw the sky above him, and -he was going down again, and I let a dhrive at him with the gaff, and -got him just near the tail—great luck I had with him, to be sure.” - -“It was about time you did have some luck,” Jim remarked. - -“There’s not many of them ’ud sulk like that,” said Patsy. “Generally -they’d be tiring themselves with the runs they’s take at the first. And -if they thrun a lep or two—’tis the lep takes most out of them: it -breaks their courage. There’s nothing like a salmon, to my way of -thinking, though there’s a lot of the gentry do be sticking to the -little brown trout. Will ye be for Lough Nacurra in the morning, sir?” - -“We will—if you’ll promise us fish,” Jim responded. - -“It ’ud be a bold man to promise anything this weather,” said Patsy, -looking with disfavour at the clear sky and the placid lough. -“Still-an’-all, ’tis a good lough; if they’re rising anywhere it’ll be -on Nacurra.” - -Morning came with a haze lying on the blue hills, and a fitful breeze: -the best fishing day yet, Patsy pronounced it, as he shouldered a -gigantic luncheon-basket and led the way down the avenue and along the -dusty high road. They struck across the bog presently, following a path -that led through a tangle of the sweet bog-myrtle; and, in a little -harbour of smooth grey stones at the western end of Lough Nacurra, came -upon their boat, half-concealed among the rushes fringing the water’s -edge. The lough was a long narrow sheet of water, widening a little at -the far end, where a thickly-wooded island showed dimly through the -haze. - -“Have you been storing water in the boat?” Jim inquired, gravely, -surveying the ancient craft among the rushes. Its bottom timbers bore -evidence of long soaking. - -“Tis a thrifle of dampness she have in her,” admitted Mr. Burke, -stepping in carefully and getting to work with a baling-tin. “I’m after -sending John Conolly up only this morning to bale her out, but he’s the -champion at scamping a job. Ah, she’ll dry out beautifully in the sun, -sir, once I have her emptied. There now—let you get in gently, sir.” - -“I will,” said Mr. Linton, placing his feet with extreme caution, and -coming to rest thankfully in the stern. “I don’t want to begin the day -with a ducking, and those bottom boards look as if they would crumble -under my weight. Take care, Wally—this is a craft to be treated with -respect.” - -“Have you drowned many in this one?” queried Jim. - -Mr. Burke emitted a deep chuckle. - -“Yerra, you will have your joke, sir!” he said, making hasty repairs to -a rowlock that chiefly consisted of rusty wire, of which more than one -strand had broken away. “There’s many a good fish killed in worse boats -than this. A lick of paint, now, and you wouldn’t know her.” - -“I wouldn’t call her a boat at all,” retorted Jim, disposing his long -legs so as to avoid, as far as possible, the steadily increasing -dampness in the bottom. “She’s a hoary antique, and she ought to be in a -museum; but if you say she’ll stay afloat, Patsy, we’re game. Lend me -that baling-tin while you’re rowing, and I’ll try to discourage the -lough from entering.” - -Mr. Linton declined to fish, remarking that he preferred to be ready to -swim when necessary, and would meanwhile officiate as baler as soon as -Jim was ready to get to work with his rod. Patsy pulled out gently, -until they were clear of rushes. A light wind rippled the water, sending -tiny wavelets lapping against the sides of the boat; overhead, clouds -drifted across a soft blue sky and now and then blotted out the sun. The -hills sloping down to the lough on three sides were half shrouded in -haze. - -“’Tis a perfect fishing-day,” Patsy pronounced, shipping his oars and -letting the boat drift gently. “If there was a little more wind itself -ye’d soon have a tremenjious basket of fish.” - -Patsy’s predictions were by this time well known to the Australians. He -suffered, as Wally said, from enthusiasms, and all his geese were swans; -so that his cheerful forecast raised no throb of hope in their hearts. -He had been as cheerful on other mornings, when they had fished in vain. - -“I don’t quite see the fascination of it,” Wally commented, after ten -minutes of steady whipping the water. “It’s so continuous; and you get -nothing for it.” - -“Give me a good sinker and a plump slab of clam for a bait—and the -schnapper on the bite,” Jim responded. “I don’t believe these trout know -how to bite at all.” - -“You don’t say bite—it’s ‘rise,’” said Norah, gloomily. - -“Why?” - -“I don’t know. Perhaps because they don’t bite. They certainly don’t.” - -“They do not,” Wally agreed. “Perhaps they rise and saunter past this -queer collection of sham insects that we dangle on the face of the -waters: and if you have luck you hook them as they go by. Only we don’t -have luck.” - -They fished on, sadly, casting with a precision that won commendation -from Mr. Burke, and to which long practice with a stock whip had -probably contributed. Nothing occurred, except the end of the lough: -whereupon Patsy resumed the oars, rowed to the end whence they had -started, and began up drift again. - -“Do people do this all day—for weeks?” Norah demanded. - -“Yerra, they do, miss.” - -“Well, what do they do it _for_?” Norah said, desperately. “I don’t see -any fun at all. I’m going to take the oars presently, Patsy, and you can -have my rod.” - -“If ever I put hard-earned pay into contraptions like this again!” Jim -uttered, gazing despondently on the dainty ten feet green-heart rods, -new and workmanlike with their fresh tackle. “They looked just top-hole -in the shop, and they do still; but that’s all there is about them. I -vote we go and scramble over a heathery mountain or two, and stop -whipping this old lough.” - -“Hear, hear!” said Wally. “Let’s get Patsy to put us ashore at the lower -end, and we’ll leave the trout to some one else. I’m blessed if I fish -again until we get back to the creek at Billabong—with a worm and a -sinker, and a nice little cork bobbing on the top of the water. No -science, but you get fish. These old Irish trout—my aunt!” - -His reel whirred suddenly under his hand, and his rod bent double. There -was a swirl in the water. The line ran out sharply, and something that -was living gold in the sunlight leaped, flashed for an instant, and was -gone again. Patsy uttered a howl. - -“Leave him run, sir!—give and take! Reel in when the strain is off him. -Aisy now, sir!” - -“Off him!” gasped Wally. “Why, he pulls like a working bullock! Won’t -the rod break?” - -“It will not,” said Patsy. “Drop the point, sir, if he leps. Yerra, sure -that’s a fine grand trout ye have—did ye see the great splashing rise -he made to ye? Howld him, sir—he’ll get off on ye if ye slacken too -much. Wind in when ye get a chanst, and bring him nice and aisy to the -boat—I have the net ready.” - -“Bring him to the boat!—it’s himself that’s doing all the bringing!” -uttered Wally. “Tell me if I’m messing it up, Patsy.” - -“Begob, you’re doing fine!” said Patsy—“ye’re playing him beautiful. -Give and take, and his head’ll come up presently—don’t be afraid if he -do run from ye. Oh, murder, there’s the little mistress got one too!” - -Norah’s reel sang suddenly, and a fish went off astern. The owner of the -rod made a wild effort to play him sitting down, and then stood up, her -rod describing erratic circles while Mr. Linton grasped her skirt in a -desperate effort to steady her. - -“I’m all right, daddy!” she gasped. “Oh, such a beauty—I know he weighs -a ton!” - -“Let him go, miss!” shouted Patsy, rendered desperate by the -hopelessness of coaching two novices at once. “Give him his head—he’ll -come back to ye. There y’are, sir—did ye see his head come up?—wind -him in! No, not you, miss—let him have his run: sure that one won’t be -tired this long while, by the looks of him. Oh, murder, sir, is he gone -from you?”—as the trout made a fresh dash for freedom and fled under -the boat. “No,—howld on to the vilyun an’ he’ll be back. Kape a nice, -steady strain on him, miss—give and take.” He hovered over the side, -feverishly grasping the handle of the landing-net. “Ye have him bet, -sir—here he comes. Nice and aisy does it—don’t hurry him—kape your -point up. Back a little—ah, I have him!” - -The net slipped under Wally’s fish deftly. Simultaneously, Norah’s trout -executed a wild leap, and Norah reeled him, quite involuntarily, near -the boat. Patsy, responding gallantly to her cry for help, dropped the -first trout hastily, and turned just in time to net the second, by sheer -good luck. The excitement of the moment overcame him, and Norah’s fish, -falling upon Wally’s, entangled both casts and lines by a few frantic -leaps, before Patsy could collect himself sufficiently to pounce upon -them. The boat rocked with enthusiasm. Jim had prudently reeled in, to -be out of the way of possible happenings, and stood, beaming, while the -victorious anglers looked at each other with parted lips and shining -eyes, and Mr. Burke wailed and triumphed alternately. - -“Wirra, but them lines is destroyed on us! Oh, the grand fish, -entirely!—would ye get as good now, sir, with your sinkers and your big -lump of bait! An’ you played ’em fine, both of ye! Lave off flopping, -will ye, and let me get a howlt of the fly—begob, he have it ate, no -less!” Norah’s trout was put out of its misery by a quick blow on a -thwart, and the fly rescued. “There you are, miss, and he well over a -pound if he’s an ounce!” - -“Oh, daddy, isn’t he a beauty!” - -“He is, indeed,” Mr. Linton said, looking at the golden-brown fish, with -his splendid spots. “I never saw a handsomer fellow. Is yours as good -Wally?” - -“Betther, I believe,” boomed Patsy, a vision of triumph. “They might be -mates—but Mr. Wally’s is bigger. Have ye the little spring-balance, -sir? Ye’d ought to weigh them.” - -“I have it,” Wally said. “Eighteen ounces, Nor,—and mine’s a pound and -a half. Well-l!” He drew a long breath. “If ever I say a word against my -little rod again!” - -“Oh, wasn’t it glorious!” Norah uttered. “Will those lines ever come -clear, Patsy?” - -“Yerra, they will. Have patience, miss, and I’ll get them undone in no -time. Cast away now, Mr. Jim—and heaven send he do not land his on the -top of this tangle!” added Mr. Burke, in pious hope. - -“Hurry up, Jim—it’s the best fun since we went bombing!” said Wally. -“Gives you a feeling like nothing on earth, and the little rod’s just a -live thing in your hands. Glory! there’s one at you—ah, the brute!” as -a big trout rose at Jim’s fly, missed, and went down, giving a full view -of his beautiful speckled side. - -“Cast over him again, Mr. Jim—that one’ll come back,” Patsy whispered. -“Gently—ah, that’s the lovely throw!” The flies settled gently on the -water, but the trout failed to respond. “Thry him again, sir—that’s it; -dhraw them back quiet, now. Begob, he have him—howld him, sir! Hark at -the little wheel singing: isn’t that the fine run he made! Wind him -in—don’t check him sudden.” Mr. Burke babbled on happily until the -third big trout lay gasping in the landing-net. - -“Didn’t I tell you there’d be trout in Lough Nacurra?” he demanded. “Oh, -the beauties! them’s the grand fish, entirely, no matter where you’d be -fishing. Let ye cast out again, sir. Aisy, Miss Norah, let be—sure I’ll -have it for ye quicker than ye would yourself. There’s the terrible -tangle now; ye’d not get it in a knot like that, not if ye tried for a -week. And is it in Australia you’d get them like that, with a stick and -a sinker and a lump of bait? and play them too, same as ye did them -there? Well, well, that must be the fine country!” - -Mr. Linton laughed. - -“Oh there’s plenty of good trout-fishing in Australia, Patsy, and plenty -of people who use the proper tackle. But it doesn’t happen to be in our -part of the country.” - -“Ye’ll not beat Irish trout, anywheres in the world,” said Mr. Burke, -shortly. “Them new countries is all very well in their way, but give me -the ould places I’m after knowing all my life.” He drew a long breath. -“There—I have them untwisted at last: and more by token, here we are at -the end of the lough.” He fixed Wally with an inquiring gaze. “It was -here you wanted to be landed, sir, wasn’t it? Will I take down the rod -and put you ashore?” - -Wally grinned in appreciation. - -“It’s your game, Patsy,” he admitted, cheerfully. “I take it all back. -If you’ll just hand me that rod again, you won’t get me off this lough -before dark!” - - - - - CHAPTER VII - LOUGH ANOOR - - - “A capital ship for an ocean trip - Was the Walloping Window-Blind.” - _Students’ Song._ - -FROM that day the spell of the little brown trout laid itself upon the -Australians. The basket of fish which they carried home with pride in -the evening, and which caused Mrs. Moroney to call upon the saints to -protect her, was the forerunner of many, since the weather was kind and -Lough Nacurra had profited by its war-time rest to become the happiest -of hunting grounds. Day after day, with and without Mr. Burke, whose -multifarious duties often called him elsewhere, they visited the little -lough in the bog, until they knew all its best spots as well as Patsy -himself, and were familiar with every inch of the wooded island where -they generally landed for lunch. With the fever of fishing came to them -the patience which—curiously enough—accompanies it, making them -content to sit hour after hour if rewarded with an occasional rise: -since no lough on this side of Paradise could be expected to live up to -the first spectacular minutes in which Lough Nacurra had claimed them -for its own. Nevertheless, the little lough held well; and trout figured -largely on the table for breakfast and dinner, insomuch that Mrs. -Moroney confided to Bridget that ’twas the grand guests they were to be -keeping down the expense—a remark retailed to Jim by Timsy, in such -innocent certainty that his friend would be pleased, that Jim could not -find it in his heart to rebuke him for repeating what he was not meant -to hear. - -Day by day the air of moorland and mountain worked the boys’ cure. -Strength came back to them quickly, with long days in the open and long -nights of quiet sleep. War seemed very far away. Papers came -irregularly, and the younger members of the party were very willing to -let Mr. Linton read them and tell them anything startling, without -troubling about details. Little by little, the horror of the gas faded; -they ceased to dream about it, a nightly torment which had kept them -back for the first weeks. The regiment was having a much-needed rest in -billets: Anstruther, Garrett, and their other chums were fit and well, -and longing for another chance of coming to grips with the enemy. Much -of the horror of Gallipoli Mr. Linton succeeded in keeping from them: -too many of their school-fellows lay dead upon that most cruel of -battlefields, and he suppressed the papers that gave details of the -losses. The fog of war always hangs closely: it was easy to make it hide -from his boys details of the news that had plunged Australia alike into -mourning and into deeper resolve to see the thing through. - -For Norah and her father the time was an oasis of peace in a desert of -anxiety. Too soon they must send Jim and Wally back, and themselves -return to work and wait in London. Now, nothing mattered greatly, and -they could try to forget. It was not the least of David Linton’s -happiness that each day brought back light to Norah’s eyes and colour to -her cheeks. - -So they played about Ireland as they had played all their lives in -Australia. The Irish blood that was in them made them curiously at home; -they liked the simple, kindly country-folk, and found a ready welcome in -the scattered cottages, where already Norah had made friends with at -least half a dozen babies. Her education developed on new lines: she -picked up a good deal of Irish, and became steeped in the innumerable -legends of the country, not in the least realizing that in being told -the “ould ancient” stories she was being paid a compliment for which the -average tourist might sigh in vain,—for the Irish peasant is jealous of -his folk-stories, and seldom tells them to anyone not of the country. In -the great stone kitchen Mrs. Moroney gave her lessons in the manufacture -of potato-cakes, colcannon, soda-bread, and other national delicacies, -and, with old Nanny the cook, listened to stories of Australia with -frequent ejaculations of “God help us!” while Jim and Wally talked much -to Patsy Burke and John Conolly, and to the men in the villages, doing a -little recruiting work as occasion offered. They also talked of -Australia, since they could not help it, and became at times slightly -confused as to the number of men for whom they had promised to find work -after the war, on Billabong, if possible. However, as Jim said -resignedly if Billabong overflowed with men, there were other -places—Australia was large and empty. They could all come. - -“Are you there, Norah? Coo-ee!” - -An answering “Coo-ee!” came from one of the mouldering summer-houses in -the garden, and Wally plunged down the overgrown walk in its direction. -Norah was not in the summer-house, which she described as an insecty -place, but cross-legged on a sunny patch of grass behind it, surrounded -by innumerable letters. The Australian mail had arrived that morning; -and, since mails in war time were apt to be “hung up” until a ship could -be found to take them, letters were wont to accumulate in alarming -quantities. - -“Good gracious, are you still reading?” inquired Wally. “I finished all -mine ages ago: not that I ever get such awful bundles as you do. Jim and -your father are plunged in business letters, and I’m like Mary’s little -lamb, or Bo-Peep’s sheep, or whichever mutton it was that got lost.” - -“Poor old thing!” said Norah, absently. “Never mind; sit down and read -dear old Brownie’s letter. It takes one straight back to Billabong.” - -“Well, that’s no bad thing—though I’d like to see a little more of -Ireland,” said Wally, subsiding upon grass. “Poor old Brownie! can’t you -see her, Nor, struggling over this in the kitchen at home. She’d be so -much happier over tackling a day’s baking.” - -“She would, indeed,” Norah assented, her eyes a little misty. She -touched the scrawled pages of the old nurse-housekeeper’s letter, her -hand resting on it as though it were a living thing. Brownie had been -all the mother she had known, and the bond between them was very close. -The ill-written sheets brought vividly to her the kind old face, beaming -with love as she had always known it. - -“Dear Miss Norah,” began Brownie, with due formality. Then the formality -slumped. - - “My dearie, the place is lost without you all everyone arsks me - as soon as the male comes wots in the letters and are you coming - back soon the hot whether is over thang goodness and we have had - good rain and the place is lookin splendid all the horses are in - great condishun and Murty says to tell you Bosun is fit to jump - out of his skin Murty won’t let anyone but himself ride him or - Garyowin or Monnuk or the chesnet colt and it keeps him pretty - busy keepin them all exercised. Black Billy is no better than he - was he is a limb and no mistake it will be a mersy when Mr. Jim - comes back to keep that boy in order and your Pa too he will not - take no notice of anyone else. We are always wonderin and hopin - about the war will it soon be over and that old Kyser hung and - how are Mr. Jim and Mr. Wally we all know they will fight as - well as any Englishman or any two Germans. But the best of all - will be when the old war is over and you all come home to - Billabong tell Mr. Wally I have not forgot to make pikelits like - he likes they will be waiting for him we got their photergrafs - in uniform and dont they look beautiful only so grown up I keep - thinking of them just little boys ridin the ponies like they - always was in short pants and socks and plenty of darnin they - give me to do which it was always a pleasure I’m sure do they - look after you well in that old London i hope they feed you - proply in that big hotel im told their sheets is always damp do - be careful dearie. We try to look after everything the way the - master and Mr. Jim would like it juring their absence Murty is - sendin word about the stock so i will leave that part of it - aloan the garden is lookin grand the ortum roses all out just - blazin along the walls and fences there are other flowers but - its no good i cant spell them not being no hand with the pen but - you will know them all without me tellin the dogs are well but - they miss you like all the rest of us also the Wallerby and so - my dearie no more at present only come back soon we all send our - love and hoppin you are well - - “BROWNIE.” - -Wally put down the letter, after folding it slowly. Norah, who had read -it again over his shoulder, put out her hand for it and tucked it into -the pocket of her coat. Neither spoke for awhile. Ireland had faded -away: they saw only a long low house with a garden blazing with roses—a -kitchen, spotless and shining, where an old woman laboured mightily with -the pen. She was a fat old woman, plain and unromantic and very -practical; but the thought of her brought home-sickness sharply to the -boy and girl sitting on the green slope of Irish turf. - -“She’s an old brick,” said Wally, presently. “By Jove, Nor, won’t it be -jolly to go back when all this show is over! It makes one feel sort of -jumpy to think of driving up to Billabong again!” - -“’M,” assented Norah, lucidly. Speech was a little difficult just then. -Presently she laughed. - -“Australian mail-days are lovely, but they always hurt a bit, too. Never -mind, we’ll all go home together some day, and Billabong will go quite -mad, and it will be worth having been away. What do we do this morning, -Mr. Second-Lieutenant Meadows?” - -“Well, I don’t know,” Wally answered. “I think you’d better choose your -own amusement, Miss Linton-of-Billabong, and I’ll fall in with it -meekly. Jim and your father have shut themselves up with piles of -business letters and stock reports and things like that, and can’t come -out before lunch.” - -“Bother the old business!” said Norah, inelegantly, wrinkling her nose, -as was her way in deep thought. “Wally, why shouldn’t we try Lough -Anoor?” - -“That’s rather an idea—especially as Patsy’s engaged to-day, and can’t -act as boatman. We could paddle round and try Lough Anoor by ourselves. -It won’t do Lough Nacurra any harm to have a rest.” - -“No; we’ve fished it pretty steadily lately,” Norah agreed. “It would be -rather fun to try a new place. I’d like to take Timsy, if you don’t -mind, Wally. He’s such a jolly little chap, and it would be a tremendous -treat for him.” - -“Good idea!” agreed Wally. “Great man, Timsy; he’ll take charge of us -and run the whole show, and be entirely happy. Will you find him, Nor, -while I get the rods and basket?” - -Timsy was never difficult to find, when the seekers were the -Australians. He was digging his bare brown toes into the gravel by the -front door when Norah and Wally emerged from the garden. - -“Are you busy to-day, Timsy?” asked Norah, gravely. One of the things -that Timsy liked about these people from the other side of the world was -that they always treated him as an equal in age and sense, and did not -“talk down” to him. He had bitter memories of an English visitor who had -addressed him as “Little boy,” and of an elderly lady who had patted him -on the head, and called him “dear.” His blood still boiled when he -thought of it. - -“I am not,” he replied. “I’m after catching all the chickens me mother -wants,—and ’twas themselves give me a fine hunt. Chickens do be always -knowing when they’re wanted to be kilt.” - -“Then you can’t blame them for running,” said Norah. “No more jobs, -Timsy?” - -“There is not, miss. Me mother’s after telling me to get out and play.” - -“Mr. Wally and I are going to fish Lough Anoor,” Norah said. “We haven’t -been there yet, and we don’t know much about it. Would you care to come, -too, Timsy?” - -Swift delight leaped to the small boy’s eyes. - -“Is it me? Sure, wouldn’t I be in your way, miss?” - -“Why, you’ll be very useful,” said Norah. “You’d to come?” - -“Like!” said Timsy. Words failed him, and he could only beam at them -speechlessly. As they disappeared into the house they heard suppressed -yelps of joy, and presently, from the front windows, beheld Timsy -energetically turning handsprings on the path, in the effort to relieve -his overcharged feelings. - -They took the track across the bog leading to Lough Nacurra, skirted it, -following a sheep-path along the shore, and mounted a rise. Below them -lay the little lough they sought, a jewel in a setting of gently-rolling -hills. In one corner a number of queer, gnarled objects showed above the -surface of the water. - -“What are those, Timsy?” Wally asked. - -“They’s ould limbs of trees, sir; the lough does be low, and them ould -things sticks out. Me daddy says there was a mighty big forest here, one -time: there’s bog-wood everywhere in this part. There’s a small little -landing-stage near them, where the boat is.” - -They plunged down hill. Arrived at the boat, Wally whistled long and -low. - -“It must be a boat, I suppose,” he said, doubtfully. “Timsy said it was, -and he ought to know. But—Did you ever see anything quite like it, -Nor?” - -“I did not,” Norah said. - -The boat was flat-bottomed, clumsily and heavily built. The paint which -had originally declared her a white vessel had long ago peeled off or -faded to a yellowish grey. She squatted on the water like a very flat -duck, and water lay in her, and evidently had lain long. There were no -oars, and nothing that could be used to bale. Altogether, no craft could -have looked less tempting. - -“Well, Jim reckoned the boat on Lough Aniller bad, and the Nacurra one -only fit for a museum,” Wally said. “I’d like him to see this one: it -would do his old heart good. Timsy, how does one row a boat in this -country when there are no oars?” - -Timsy, thus appealed to, gave as his opinion that the paddles would be -up at Michael McCarthy’s house, beyant; further, that if Patsy knew how -the said Michael McCarthy had the boat left, he’d have him destroyed. -“Let ye sit down, sir, and Miss Norah, too,” concluded the small boy, -shouldering the burden of the responsibility. “I’ll slip up and bring -the paddles and a baling-tin down in no time at all.” - -“You won’t,” said Wally, firmly. “I’m in this job, Timsy. Come along and -we’ll interview Mr. McCarthy.” - -That gentleman, however, was from home, his place being taken by a lame -son, who produced two oars which were not even distantly related to each -other, remarking that his father was wore out with keeping the boat in -order for the gentry, and none of them coming anigh her. When Wally -demanded a baling-tin, he cast about him a wild glance which finally -rested on an excellent tin dipper which presumably belonged to his -mother. - -“Herself is away with the hins—let you take it,” he said, thankfully. -“Hiven send she do not come back on me before you’d be gone!” - -With this pious hope echoing in their ears, the marauding party -withdrew, Timsy racing ahead with the dipper, lest “herself” should make -an untimely appearance and demand her cherished vessel. When Norah and -Wally arrived at the boat he was baling furiously, and clung to his job -until he was too breathless to argue the question further with Wally. - -A flat-bottomed boat, built on elementary principles, is not the easiest -thing to empty. They tilted her sideways, getting very wet in the -process, and wielded the dipper until it scraped dismally against the -boards; but a large residue of water still lingered, defying anything -but a pump or a bath-sponge, equipment which they lacked. When they -restored her to an even keel the water slapped dismally across the -sodden bottom boards. - -“I’m afraid we’ll never get her dry,” Wally said, ruefully. “Tell you -what, Norah—I’ll put in a few bits of wood, and you can put your feet -on them; that will keep them out of the water, at any rate.” - -Wood is scarce in Donegal. There was not a bit to be found except the -tough lumps of bog-wood sticking out of the water, and of these Wally -managed to secure enough for his purpose. - -“They aren’t lovely,” he said, looking at the uneven logs. “Still, they -ought to keep your feet dry, and that’s something.” He worked the -unwieldy boat round until her stern pointed to the shore, so that Norah -could get in without being compelled to walk along the wet floor. Timsy -hopped in, bare-legged and cheery, and they shoved off, moving gingerly -among the half-submerged wood, which threatened momentarily to rip a -hole in the rotten flooring. - -“I’d hate to say a word against Ireland,” Wally remarked. “But you’d -wonder why they’d build the landing-stage in the very middle of a -submerged forest.” - -“The stones did be a thrifle more convanient there.” Timsy offered as a -solution. - -“Well—maybe. Still it would be no great lift to take them a little -further,” said Wally. “Does the boat never get snagged, Timsy?” - -“She do, sir. Many’s the time me daddy’s mended her, and he at home. -There’s no one to do it now, till I get a bit bigger—Patsy he’s -destroyed with work, he says, and he can’t be lugging tools all this -way, says he. And that Michael McCarthy, he’s no use at all in the -world.” Timsy knitted his brows, a worried little figure. “It’ll be a -good thing when the ould war is over and all them Germans kilt. Then me -daddy’ll come back and fix everything.” - -“Would you rather he hadn’t gone, Timsy?” - -The small boy’s lip trembled. - -“’Twas awful when he went. Me mother cried, and so did old Nanny and -Bridget. But me mother and me daddy they says there’s no dacint man can -stop out of it. I wisht I was big enough to go too. Will they take -drummer-boys in your regiment, Mr. Wally? I’m pretty big when I howld -meself straight.” - -“I’m afraid you’ve got to be a bit bigger yet, old man,” Wally told him. -“But you’ve got to be here, to keep an eye on the place; it must be a -great comfort to your daddy to know you’re here, to look after your -mother. There must be a certain number of fellows at home to mind -Ireland in case the Germans should send troops here, you know; so we -leave those at home who are too young or too old to march fast, and -carry heavy loads, and do rough digging. You’re doing your bit as long -as you’re helping at home.” - -“Is that so, truly?” said Timsy, much cheered. “And could I go when I’m -bigger?” - -“Of course you could, if the war is still there,” Wally answered, -cheerfully. “Only we hope it won’t be. You’ll be able to fight much -better in the next war if you have your daddy home to train you first. -It isn’t every fellow who can have a sergeant all on himself to train -him, you know.” - -“I’d be in great luck, wouldn’t I?” said the small boy, hopefully. “But -sure, we’ll all be in the heighth of luck once we get daddy home.” - -Wally had poled the old boat out of the submerged trees, with many a -bump and scrape that made him look apprehensively at the boards. The -gaunt and stunted tree-ghosts ceased, and the water deepened, so he took -to the oars. They pulled up against a freshening breeze to the head of -the lough, where Wally shipped the paddles thankfully. - -“That’s a great pair of oars,” said he. “One weighs a ton and the other -only a hundredweight, so pulling becomes a matter of scientific -adjustment. Well, we’ll drift down, Nor, and see what Lough Anoor -holds.” - -That the little lough held trout was made clear within the first five -minutes, when a fish rose at Norah, who struck too hard and missed it, -to her intense disgust. Luck favoured her, however, for it was a hungry -trout and came at her gamely on the next cast, this time departing with -an annoying mouthful of steel and feathers instead of the plump fly he -had hoped to engulf. He came to the surface after an exciting few -minutes, and, being very thoroughly hooked, survived three ineffectual -attempts by Wally to get the landing-net under him. The fourth landed -him in the bottom of the boat, both operators slightly breathless, while -Timsy, scarlet with excitement, jigged on his seat and uttered sage -counsel which no one heard. - -“Awfully sorry, Nor,—I nearly lost that fellow for you,” Wally -exclaimed. “Scooping up a jumping fish with that old net is much harder -than playing him, I think: I have the utmost respect for Patsy every -time he uses it. Never saw him make a mistake yet. I say, young Norah, -what’s the good of my putting down a floor of bog-wood for you? Your -feet are soaking!” - -Norah glanced down, still flushed with the pride of capture. - -“I’m sorry, truly,” she said, laughing. “You see, I can’t possibly play -a fish sitting down; I’ve just _got_ to stand up. And I tried to stand -on those old lumps of wood, but they simply turned over and deposited me -in the water. Never mind, Wally, it isn’t the first time I’ve had wet -feet.” - -“Don’t go and collect a cold, or your father and Jim will have my -blood,” said Wally, doubtfully. “You’ll have to land and run about if -you get chilly.” - -“If I said, ‘Land my grandmother!’ it would be rude, so I won’t,” said -Norah, who was casting again vigorously. “Quick, Wally, there’s a rise -near you!”—and Mr. Meadows forgot prudence in the excitement of trout. -At the end of the drift the basket held four fish, while a fifth had -made his escape at the very edge of the boat, and was doubtless in some -snug hole, reflecting on the Providence which helps little trout by -entrusting the landing-net to inexperienced hands. - -The wind had risen, and to pull the heavy, water-logged old boat up the -lough was no easy task. There was no rudder, and she steered very badly, -her awkwardness intensified by the unequal oars. The waves slapped -against her side, and occasionally flung in a little cloud of spray, and -she leaked fast. Norah baled energetically, with poor results. - -“She’s a noble vessel,” said Wally, pulling with a will. “Feel her -wallow in the trough of these silly little waves. I guess we’ll call her -‘The Walloping Window-Blind,’ Nor, after the boat in the song. Can you -swim, Timsy?” - -“I cannot, sir,” said Timsy, grinning. “Sure that one won’t sink on us.” - -“Blest if I know,” Wally answered, doubtfully. “I wouldn’t be surprised -at any old thing she’d do. Anyhow, Miss Norah and I can rescue you if -she goes down; and the water isn’t very cold. Timsy, did you ever hear -the sergeant’s opinion of this boat?” - -Timsy’s grin widened. - -“I did, sir,” he said, with probably prudent reticence. “Sure, there’s -no one does be liking her in these parts. She’s not an aisy puller at -all.” - -“True for you,” said Wally, panting. “Thank goodness, here’s the end of -the lough. Hurry up, Nor, she’ll drift back quickly before this wind, -and they ought to be rising.” His flies whistled out over the dancing -water. - -“If you’d let me have the net itself I could be landing the fish for -you,” said Timsy, eagerly. “I’ve landed ’em for me daddy many a time—he -taught me.” - -“Good man—what the sergeant taught you is good enough for us,” said -Wally. “Stand by, then—I’ve got a beauty on. He’s pulling like fury.” -He played the fish dexterously, his keen, brown face eager. “Come on, -you monster—I’d bet he weighs a pound, Norah! Ready, Timsy?—he’s about -done—ah, good kid!” as the small boy slipped the net under the -struggling fish with all the deftness of Mr. Burke himself. “Oh, a -beauty! And to think we used to imagine that a hand-line was sport!” - -“You live and learn,” said Norah, sagely. “That’s the biggest yet, -Wally, and didn’t he fight! Oh, I’ve got one!—be ready, Timsy.” - -Timsy crouched, alert, his hard little hand gripping the net. The fish -was a strong one and fought hard for his life; again and again he ran -the line out, even when almost at the side of the boat. Norah reeled him -in at last, almost done, but still fighting. - -“Oh, be careful, and he lepping!” Timsy uttered. “If you take the strain -off when he’s hooked slightly he’ll get off on you. Isn’t he the great -fighter entirely! Quick, miss, I’ll get him!” - -He dived at him with the net. The trout leaped to one side, a wave -hiding his flashing golden-brown body; and Timsy, following a thought -too far, overbalanced, and shot head first into the water. Wally, -casting in the bow, did not see. Norah had a moment’s vision of the -slight childish body as the brown water closed over him. He had not -uttered a sound. - -“Wally, quick—the oars!” she gasped, dropping her rod. The boat was -drifting fast before the wind. She watched, knowing that Timsy would be -far beyond their reach when he came to the surface. Then the little head -appeared for an instant and she sprang into the water. - -A year earlier, Wally would have followed without a thought. But -training and experience had steadied him; he knew that in the boat he -would be far more use than in the rough water, with the wind taking the -‘Walloping Window-Blind,’ their one refuge, swiftly away from them. He -flung himself at the oars and steadied her, watching, his heart in his -mouth. Norah swam like a fish, he knew; but the water was rough, and -Timsy would be a dead weight, even supposing that she had been able to -grip him. - -Then, to his utter relief, the two heads broke the water together. He -heard Norah’s voice: “Hold my shoulder, Timsy—you’re all right. Don’t -be scared.” - -“I’ll be beside you in a second, Nor,” Wally shouted. “Just keep -paddling.” He pulled the clumsy boat frantically up the lough, and let -her drop down to Norah, shipping the oars as he reached her. Leaning -over, he gripped Timsy firmly. - -“Hold on to the kid, and I’ll pull you both to the boat,” he said. “Can -you catch it?—I’ve got him.” He waited until Norah’s hand gripped the -side. “That’s right—let him go. Come on, Timsy.” He hauled the silent -small boy into the boat and turned back to Norah. “Hang on to me, old -girl—thank goodness we can’t pull this old tub over.” - -There was a struggle, and Norah came over the side, scrambling in with -difficulty. - -“Is Timsy all right?” - -“I am, miss,” said a small voice, between chattering teeth. - -Wally flung off his coat, and wrapped it round the child. - -“Poor old chap—that will keep the wind off you a bit,” he said. “Norah, -get hold of the oars and pull in—you’ll be nearly as quick as I would -be, and it will keep you warmer. My Aunt! that kid hung on to the -landing-net all the time! Well, you are a good sort, Timsy!” - -“I dunno why would I let it go,” shivered Timsy. “Bad enough for me to -be such an omadhaun, to be falling in—and herself going after me! Me -mother’ll be fit to tear the face off me!” - -“She’ll be too glad to see you alive,” said Wally, reassuringly. -“We’ll——” - -Timsy interrupted him with a cry. He caught Norah’s neglected rod. - -“Howly Mother, but the fish is in it yet!” he shouted. “Oh, will ye -come, please, sir!” - -They landed the trout between them, Timsy recovering some measure of his -self-respect by being allowed to use the net. - -“He had it nearly swallowed—if he hadn’t, he’d have been gone this long -time,” he chattered, watching Wally disengage the hook. “Isn’t it the -grand luck we’re in! and he the beautifullest trout! Oh, why would I -want to be falling in, and the fish rising!” He looked wistfully at -Norah. “Tis all wet ye are, and the day spoilt on ye,” he said, sadly. -“You won’t never take me out again, Miss Norah.” - -“Won’t we just!” said Norah, smiling at him through a tangle of wet -hair. “We don’t get out of friends because of a trifle like that, -Timsy.” She brought the “Walloping Window-Blind” floundering against the -shore. “There! it would warm an iceberg to pull that old tub. Come -along, Timsy, and I’ll race you home.” - -Wally put a detaining hand on her arm as he turned from securing the -boat. - -“Sure you’re all right, Nor?” - -“Right as—as anything,” said Norah, laughing at the anxious face. “I -believe you’re growing careful, Wally—what’s come to you?” - -“It’s all very well,” said Wally, unhappily. “Do you think it’s jolly -for a fellow to see you pitching into a beastly lough? And I’m going -home dry, and you and the kid wet. If there was any sense in it I’d jump -in and get wet, too!” - -“Only there isn’t,” said Norah—“and it was lucky for the two wet ones -that you were dry in the boat. An old and hardened warrior like you -ought to have more common sense.” - -“I suppose I ought,” said Wally, relapsing into a smile. “Only . . . Oh, -well. Now we’ve got to run, or we’ll never catch young Timsy.” - - - - -[Illustration: “Norah had read it over his shoulder.”] - - _Jim and Wally_] [_Page 118_ - - - - -[Illustration: “Then the little head appeared for an instant and she -sprang into the water.”] - - _Jim and Wally_] [_Page 128_ - - - - - CHAPTER VIII - JOHN O’NEILL - - - “A fiery soul, which, working out its way, - Fretted the pigmy body to decay.” - DRYDEN. - - - - “And we’re hanging out the sign - From the Leeuwin to the Line: - ‘This bit of the world belongs to US!’” - -THE words came floating down the hillside at the top of a cheery young -baritone. Also down the hillside came sounds of haste—heavy footsteps, -crashing undergrowth, and rustling of bracken. - -The hill sloped steeply, ending with an abrupt plunge into a boreen -below: a little winding lane, walled in by high banks, clad with heather -and furze, and all abloom with wild flowers. The main road ran westward, -dusty and hot in the June sunlight; but the boreen was all in shade, -twisting its way in and out between the hills. The dew was yet on its -grass, though in the blossoming furze above, fringing the banks, the -bees droned heavily, winging their busy way among the hot sweetness. - -The noise overhead came nearer, and there came into the song staccato -notes never intended by the composer, as the singer half-slid, -half-plunged, down the hillside, taking inequalities in the ground with -long strides. Nevertheless, the voice persevered, happy, if disjointed, -until it was just above the boreen. Then the song and the hurrying -footsteps ceased together, and there was a pause. - -“Wire!” said Wally’s disgusted tones. “And barbed, at that! Didn’t we -have enough in France!” - -The wire was half-hidden in the tangle of grass and furze; a tense -strand twanged as his boot caught it in clambering over. His thin face -showed for a moment, peeping over into the boreen. There was nothing to -do but slither, and slither he did, landing in the little lane with a -mighty thud, and bringing with him a shower of furze blossoms, and -clattering stones and clods. They fell close to a man sitting on a -fragment of rock and leaning back against the bank. He had not stirred -at the commotion overhead, and now he sat motionless, looking up at the -tall lad with a faint smile. - -“I beg your pardon!” said Wally, abashed. “I say. I hope nothing hit -you?” - -The man on the boulder shook his head. It was a big head, with a wide -brow and lines of pain round the eyes; but he was a small man, and the -hand lying on the knee of his rough tweed suit was startlingly thin. -Even as he leaned back against the bank it was easy to see that his -shoulders were misshapen and humped. Wally glanced once, and withdrew -his eyes hurriedly, with a boy’s instinctive dread of appearing to -notice anything amiss. - -“Beastly careless of me!” he said, apologetically. “I never thought of -anyone being down below.” - -“Well, you gave enough warning that you were coming,” said the man. -“Anyone remaining below did so entirely at his own risk. Do you always -come down a hill in that fashion, may I ask?” - -Wally grinned. - -“Not always,” he admitted. “But it was a jolly hill; and it had taken me -such a time to climb up it that I had a fancy to see how quickly I could -get down. And I was feeling awfully fit. It’s so jolly to be feeling -well—makes you act like a kid.” - -“It must be jolly,” said the other, laconically. - -Wally flushed hotly, in dread of having hurt him. It was painfully clear -that to feel well was not a common experience for the man on the -boulder. He had a sudden wild desire to undo the impression of exuberant -health and spirits. The tired eyes were even harder to face than the -twisted shoulders. - -“Been an awful crock, really,” he said, sitting down on another fragment -of rock. “Gassed—over there.” He nodded vaguely in the direction—more -or less—of Europe. “Makes you feel like nothing on earth.” - -“It’s pretty bad, isn’t it?” asked the other, with swift interest. - -“Rather. We didn’t get anything like a full dose, of course, or we -wouldn’t be here. But even a little is rather beastly. And the worst of -it is, that it hangs on to you long after you’re better—it seems to -lurk down somewhere inside you, and gets hold of you just as you’re -beginning to think you’re really all right. It actually makes a fellow -think he’s got nerves!” - -“You don’t look like it,” said the man, laughing for the first time. The -brown, boyish face did not suggest such attributes. - -“Well, it truly does make one pretty queer,” said Wally, laughing too. -“However, I believe we’ve nearly got rid of it—this country of yours is -enough to make us forget it.” - -“You’re Australian, aren’t you?” the man asked. - -Wally nodded. “How did you know?” - -“Oh, this is a little place,” said the other. “Strangers are our only -excitement, and since the war started we haven’t had nearly so many. All -the people who used to come here to fish are away fighting.” He sighed. -“Most of them will not come back any more. You were quite a godsend to -us. Your boatman told one of my men about you; and the baker’s boy tells -the cook; and the butcher tells every one; and the postmistress is -simply full of news about you. As for the shops, they are fairly -buzzing!” - -“Why, there are only two,” said Wally, laughing. - -“That’s why they buzz,” said the man. “I don’t go into shops, myself; -but I have been altogether unable to repress the delighted confidences -of my chauffeur. He tells me that you’re all very keen fishermen——” - -“And don’t know a thing about it!” said Wally. “Did he tell you that, -too?” - -“He said you were getting on,” said the other, guardedly, his eyes -twinkling. The chauffeur’s confidences had probably been ample. “But -your stories of Australia have them all fascinated, and if they -weren’t—most of them—grandfathers, they would probably emigrate in a -body. Thank goodness, though, we’ve not many slackers here: almost all -our young men are fighting. My chauffeur, poor lad, lost a leg at Ypres. -His wooden leg is fairly satisfactory, but of course he can’t go back, -much as he wants to. We’re nearly all old men or—cripples”—his voice -was suddenly bitter: “and it’s rather pleasant to see young faces again. -You bring the stir of the world with you.” - -“We’ve had so much stir that we were uncommonly glad to get away from -it,” Wally answered. “And this is a jolly place; if there were more big -timber it would be nearly as good as our bush-country.” He paused, -cheerfully certain of having paid Ireland the highest possible -compliment: then he rose. “I must be getting back.” - -The man on the boulder rose also, slowly. When he stood up, his crooked -shoulders became more evident. He took one or two steps slowly and -painfully. Then he staggered, stretching an uncertain hand towards the -bank. - -“Can I help you?” It was impossible to pretend any longer not to notice: -he was swaying, and Wally was beside him with a swift stride. The other -caught at the strong young arm. - -“Thank you,” he said, presently. There were drops of perspiration on his -brow, but his voice was steady. “I’m something of a crock myself, and -this happens to be one of my bad days. I came up here because I couldn’t -stand the car any more—it’s waiting for me on the road. If you would -not mind helping me——?” - -They went along the boreen slowly, between the blossoming banks. The man -rested heavily on Wally’s arm. - -“Sure I’m not tiring you?” he asked, once. “You’re not fit yourself, -yet.” - -“Oh, I’m all right,” Wally answered. “Please lean as much as you like. -Would you like a rest?” - -“No—we’re nearly there. And I’m better.” His face was white, but he -smiled up at the tall boy. Then a turn in the lane brought the high road -in view, and, drawn up by the side, a big touring-car. The chauffeur, -drowsing in his seat in the sun, became suddenly awake. He limped -quickly towards his master. - -“Sure I knew you had no right to be going up there alone,” he said, -reproachfully. “Will you give me the other arm, sir?” - -“I’m all right, Con. This gentleman has helped me splendidly.” But he -put a hand on the chauffeur’s sleeve, more, Wally fancied, to pacify him -than because he needed extra help. - -In the car, he leaned back with a sigh of relief. It was luxuriously -padded, and there were special cushions that the chauffeur adjusted with -a practised hand. - -“Awfully sorry to have been such a nuisance,” he said. “Thanks ever so -much; you saved me a rather nasty five minutes.” He looked wistfully at -Wally. “I suppose you wouldn’t come home with me?” - -Wally hesitated. He wanted badly to get back to his party and to the -trout that were so tantalizing and so engrossing. But there was -something hard to resist in the tired eyes. - -“You would be doing me a real kindness,” said the other. “I can send -word to your friends——” He broke off. “Oh, it’s hardly fair to ask -you—you didn’t come here to muddle about with a sick man. Never -mind—I’ll get you to come over some day when I’m more fit.” - -“I’d like to,” said Wally, cheerfully; “but I’m coming now, as well, if -I may.” He hopped into the car, and sat down. “If you could let them -know, I should be glad—they may be waiting for me.” - -“Where are they?—at the hotel?” - -“No, they’re fishing Lough Nacurra. I said I would turn up about twelve -and hail them; it’s Australian mail-day, and I’ve been posting the -family’s letters.” - -“If doesn’t seem fair to keep you,” said the car’s owner. “But these -days I dread my own company. So if you’ll come to lunch with me I’ll -send you back to them in good time to get a few trout before the -evening. Home, Con.” The car started gently, and he leaned back and -closed his eyes. - -Wally felt slightly bewildered. Here was he, in company with a man whose -name he did not know, and who was apparently going to sleep—both of -them being whisked through the peaceful Irish landscape at an -astonishing rate of speed in a motor which surpassed anything he had -ever imagined in luxury of fittings. It was a very large car: four -people could easily have found room in the seat he shared with his -silent host, and there were, in addition, three little arm-chairs which -folded flat when not in use. It was splendidly upholstered, and there -were electric lamps in cunning places, and many of what Wally termed -“contraptions”; pockets and flaps for holding papers, a clock and -speedometer, and a silver vase in which nodded two perfect roses. Wally -infinitely preferred horses to motors: but this was indeed a motor to be -respected, and he gazed about him with frank interest, which did not -abate when he found that his host was looking at him. - -“I was admiring your car,” he said. “It’s a beauty; I don’t think I ever -saw such a big one.” - -“Well, I use it as a bedroom very often,” said the other. “I like -knocking about in it; and I hate hotels; so Con and I live in the car -when we go touring, and he cooks for me, camp-fashion. This seat makes a -very good bed; and I have various travelling fixtures that screw on here -and there when they are needed, or live under the seat. I planned it -myself, and I don’t think there’s a foot of waste space in it. Con -sleeps in the front seat. We have an electric cooker, and he turns out -uncommonly good meals. Of course, if we encounter really bad weather we -have to put in for shelter, but I’m glad to say that doesn’t often -happen to us.” - -“How jolly!” Wally exclaimed. “I suppose you’ve been all over Ireland in -that way?” - -“Ireland—Scotland—England: and most of Europe and America,” said his -host. “I’m an idle man, you see, and travelling, if I can do it in my -own fashion, makes amends for a good many things I can’t have.” The -weariness came back into his face. “I might as well introduce myself,” -he said; “I forgot that I had kidnapped you without the civility of -telling you my name, which is O’Neill—John O’Neill. I live at -Rathcullen House, where we shall be in another minute or two.” - -Memory came back to Wally of a road perched above the lough, and of a -little runabout car driven by a man in motor-goggles: and of the -boatman’s confidences. - -“Then you’re Sir John O’Neill?” he asked. - -“Yes—the first part of it doesn’t matter. The line goes back a good -way, but I’m the last of it. But the old house is rather jolly; I hope -you will all come and see it as often as you can spare the time.” - -The car swung off the road as he spoke, and through a great gateway -where beautiful gates of wrought iron stood open between massive stone -pillars. A little gabled lodge, with windows of diamond lattice-work, -was just within: a pleasant-faced woman in pursuit of a fleeing -mischievous child stopped, smiled, and dropped a curtsey, while the -three-year-old atom she had been chasing bobbed down in ridiculous -imitation, her elfish face breaking into smiles in its tangle of dark -curls. John O’Neill smiled in return; and the car sped on smoothly, up a -wide avenue lined with enormous beech-trees, arching and meeting -overhead so that they seemed to be driving into a tunnel of perfect -green. Between their mighty trunks Wally caught glimpses of a wide park, -where little black Kerry cattle grazed. - -For over a mile the avenue ran its winding way through the park. Then -the trees ceased, and they came out into a clear space of terraced lawn, -blazing with flower-beds, and sloping down to a lake fringed with -ornamental plants, and dotted with many-coloured water-lilies, among -which paddled lazily some curious waterfowl which Wally had never seen. -Beyond the lawn stood a long grey house; a house of old grey stone, of -many gables, clad in ivy and Virginia creeper. Even to the Australian -boy’s eyes it was mellow with the dignity of centuries. It was not -imposing or majestic, like the old houses he had seen in England; but -about it hovered an atmosphere of high breeding and of quiet peace: a -house of memories, tranquil in its beauty and in its dreams. - -The car came to rest gently beside a stone step, and in an instant a -white-haired old butler was at the door, offering his arm to his master. -John O’Neill got out slowly, and limped up the steps to the great -doorway, where an Irish wolf-hound stood, looking at him with liquid -eyes of welcome. - -“I say—what a jolly dog!” Wally uttered. - -“Yes, he’s rather a nice old chap,” said his host. “Shake hands, -Lomair”; and the big dog put a paw gravely into Wally’s hand. He -followed his master into the house. - -The great square hall was panelled with old oak, almost black in the -subdued light within. A staircase, with wide, shallow steps, wound its -way in a long curve to a gallery overhead: and at the far end, an -enormous fireplace was filled with evergreens. Eastern rugs lay on the -polished oaken floor; in one corner a stand of flowering plants made a -sheet of colour. On the walls were splendid heads—deer of many kinds, -markhor, ibex, koodoo, and two heads with enormous spreading antlers, -stretching, from tip to tip, fully eleven feet. They drew an exclamation -from Wally. - -“They belonged to the old Irish elk,” O’Neill explained. “He must have -been a pretty big fellow; a pity civilization proved too much for him. -He has been extinct thousands of years.” - -“Fancy seeing a herd of those fellows!” Wally exclaimed, gazing in -admiration at the noble head. “But however would he get those antlers -through timber?” - -“I don’t think he frequented forests much,” O’Neill said. “The plains -suited him better. But he must have been able to lay his horns right -back—all deer can do that when necessary. I dare say he could dodge -through trees at a good rate.” - -“Well, he looks as if he could hardly have got through the doorway of a -Town Hall,” Wally commented. “You have a splendid lot of heads. Did you -shoot them yourself?” - -“A few—I can’t do much stalking,” O’Neill said. “I got those two -tigers, but that was from the back of an elephant. My father shot most -of the others; he was a mighty hunter. The trout were mine”—he -indicated some huge stuffed specimens, in glass cases, on the wall. - -“They’re splendid,” Wally said, regarding his host with much admiration. -“And you actually shot the tigers! Was it very exciting?” - -“No—the trout took far more killing. The elephants and the beaters did -most of the work so far as the tigers were concerned; it was only a sort -of arm-chair performance on my part. I simply sat in a fairly -comfortable howdah and fired when I was told to do so.” - -“It sounds simple, but—well, I’d like to have the chance. And you must -have shot straight,” Wally said. He glanced from the grim masks to the -slight figure with ungainly shoulders, marvelling in his heart at the -contrast between hunter and hunted. At the moment John O’Neill did not -look capable of killing a mouse. - -He dropped in to a big arm-chair, motioning Wally to another. The colour -was returning to his face, and his eyes began to lose their pain-filled -expression. In the big chair’s depths he looked smaller than ever; but -his eyes were very bright, and soon Wally forgot his morning’s fishing -and altogether lost sight of his host’s infirmities in the fascination -of his talk. Half-crippled as he was, he had been everywhere, and done -many things that stronger men long vainly to do. He had travelled -widely, and not as the average tourist, who skims over many experiences -without gathering the cream of any. John O’Neill had gone off the beaten -track in search of the unusual, and he had found it in a dozen different -countries. He had hunted and fished; had shot big game in India and made -his way up unknown rivers in South America, until sickness had forced -him to abandon enterprise and return to civilization to save his life. -Wandering in the bypaths of the world, he had brought home a harvest of -queer experiences; he told them simply, with a twinkle in his eye and a -quick joy in the humorous that often left his hearer shaking with -laughter. - -Wally listened in growing wonderment and a great sense of pity. If this -man, so cruelly handicapped, had already done so much, what might he not -have done, given a straight and sound body! Yet how he had accomplished -even the tenth part of what he had done was a mystery. Wally looked at -the frail, slight figure with respectful amazement. - -John O’Neill broke off presently. - -“I rattle along at a terrible rate when I’m lucky enough to find a -listener,” he said. “And lately I’ve been horribly sick of my own -society. You see, they wouldn’t have me in any capacity at the Front; I -offered to do anything, and I did think they might have let me drive an -ambulance; but an ambulance driver over there really has to be a hefty -chap, able to put his shoulder literally to the wheel when a road goes -to pieces in front of him, owing to a shell lobbing on it; and of course -they said I wouldn’t do, so soon as they looked at me. So I went to -London and did Red Cross work and recruiting—and overdid it, like a -silly ass. Broke down, and had to crawl home and be ill.” - -“Hard luck!” said Wally, sympathetically. - -“Stupidity, you mean,” remarked his host. “A man ought to know when he -has had enough, whether it’s work or beer. But it’s not easy to stand -aside when all the lucky people—like you—are playing the real game. At -best, mine was only an imitation.” - -“I don’t agree with you,” Wally said, warmly. “We can’t all fight—the -rest of the country has to carry on.” - -“Oh, well, there are enough slackers and shirkers to do that,” O’Neill -said. “And anyhow, I couldn’t even carry on at what I did attempt to do. -Never mind—tell me your own adventures.” - -Wally’s story of war did not take long in the telling; but he spun it -out as much as possible, switching from war to Australia in response to -the eager questions of the man in the big leather chair. John O’Neill -was a curious blending: at one moment almost savagely cynical and -despondent, as his own physical handicap weighed upon him: at the next, -laughing like a boy, and full of a boy’s keen interest in what he had -not seen. Australian talk held him closely attentive: it was almost the -only corner of the world that he had not visited, but he meant to go -there, he said, after the war. Travelling by sea was unpleasant enough -at any time without the added chance of an impromptu ducking if a -submarine or a mine came across you. - -“Do they all buck—your horses?” he asked. “I can ride a bit, but a -buckjumper would be beyond me.” - -Wally reassured him as to the manners of Australian steeds. - -“There’s a general impression in England that we all live in red shirts, -in the bush, and ride fiery, untamed steeds,” said he, laughing. “It -goes with the universal belief that all Australia is tropical. I’ve -tried to tell fellows in England that there are parts of Australia where -we have a pretty decent imitation of Swiss winter sports—skiing, -skating, and all the rest of it; but they look on me with polite -disbelief. They can’t—or won’t—understand that Australia stretches -over enough of the map to have a dozen different kinds of climate. Not -that it matters, anyhow; I don’t think we expect people to be wildly -interested in us.” - -“We’ll know more about you by the time the war is over,” his host -suggested. - -“Well—I suppose so. Lots of our fellows will come to London; we’re all -awfully keen to see it, and it’s a great chance for us. I only hope we -shall take a lot of your men back with us; they’re falling over each -other in England—or will be, once the war is over: and we want them. We -needed them badly enough before the war: afterwards it will be worse -than ever.” - -“Don’t you preach emigration in Ireland,” said O’Neill, laughing. - -“Why not? They emigrate, whether you preach or not; only they go to -America and Canada, because they’re near and there’s nothing between -them and Ireland. They would probably do much better if they would come -to Australia, only they don’t know a thing about it. I told one old -woman a few things about Australia and wages there, and all she could -say was, ‘God help us!’ When I’d finished, she said. ‘And Australy’d be -somewhere in Americy, wouldn’t it, dear?’” - -“Did you say, ‘God help us’?” laughed O’Neill. - -“I might have,” grinned Wally. “They know Canada—but then, look what -Canada is!” He gave a mock shiver—Wally had been reared in hot -Queensland. “As one Canadian chap said to me, after visiting our -irrigation settlements—‘I don’t know why people come to us instead of -to you: just look at the climate you’ve got—and we have three seasons -in the year—July, August, and winter!’ But I suppose they seem nearer -home, and they can’t realize that when you once get on a ship you might -as well be there for a month as a week.” - -The white-haired butler announced luncheon, and they found the table -laid in the bow-window of a long and lofty room, whence could be seen -the park, ending in a glimpse of bog and heather, with a flash of blue -that meant a little lough caught among the hills. Afterwards, they -strolled out on the terrace and through the scented garden to the -stables, where two fine hunters and some useful ponies made friends with -Wally instantly. - -“The Government took most of my horses when war broke out; but I managed -to keep these two,” said O’Neill, his hand on an arching neck while a -soft muzzle sought in his pocket for a carrot. “I’d sooner have paid -what they were worth than let them go; they’re too good for war -treatment, unless it were absolutely necessary. And thank goodness this -is not a war of horses. Would you care to try one of these fellows, some -day?” - -“Wouldn’t I!” said Wally, beaming. “And—could Jim?” - -“Of course—and what about Jim’s sister? Does she ride?” - -“She does,” said Wally, suppressing a smile at that incomplete -statement. - -“Rides anything that ever looked through a bridle, I suppose,” said his -host, watching him. “She looks a workmanlike person. That brown pony is -pretty good; she might like him. I can show you all a bit of Irish -jumping—ditches and banks instead of your fly fences.” - -“We’ll probably fall off,” said Wally, with conviction. - -“Then you’ll find the falling softer than in Australia,” O’Neill said, -consolingly. “But I don’t fancy you will give us much fun that way.” - -The motor waited at the hall door. - -“Con will drop you near your people,” O’Neill said. “I’d like to come -with you—but if I overdo things to-day I’ll pay to-morrow; and I’m -anxious to see the last of this attack. Will you tell Mr. Linton I hope -to call on him in a few days?” - -“We’ll be awfully glad to see you,” Wally said. “And thanks ever so for -giving me such a good time.” - -O’Neill laughed. “Is it me now, to be giving you a good time?” he said. -“I thought ’twas the other way round it was. You have helped me through -a stiff day, and I’m very grateful.” He shook hands warmly, and the -motor whirred away. - -[Illustration: He fell close to a man sitting on a fragment of rock and -leaning back against the bank.”] - - _Jim and Wally_] [_Page 132_ - - - - - CHAPTER IX - PINS AND PORK - - - “Sure, this is blessed Erin, an’ this the same glen; - The gold is on the whin-bush, the wather sings again: - The Fairy Thorn’s in flower—an’ what ails my heart then?” - MOIRA O’NEIL. - -‟WELL—of all the deserters!” - -“Is it me?” asked Wally, modestly. He made an enormous stride from a -half-submerged stone into the boat, and nearly lost his balance, -collapsing in the stern. - -“You!” said Jim, steadying the boat, which endeavoured, under the -assault, to bury her nose in a muddy bank of rushes. “You, that was -going to catch several hundred trout, and instead cleared out——” - -“In a plutocratic motor,” said Norah. - -“With a bloated aristocrat,” added Jim. - -“And never said good-bye!” finished Mr. Linton, with an artistic catch -in his voice. - -“I did,” said Wally: “I did it all. And I didn’t want to.” - -Sounds of disbelief rose from his hearers. - -“You needn’t snort,” said the victim, inelegantly. - -“I don’t think it betters your case to describe our just indignation as -snorting,” said Mr. Linton. - -“If you were to grovel it would become you better,” said Norah. - -“Not in this boat,” hastily remarked her father. “It isn’t planned for -gymnastics.” - -“He’s too well-fed to grovel, anyhow,” said Jim brutally. “What did you -have in the ducal castle, Wal? ortolans and plovers’ eggs, and things?” - -“Chops,” said Wally. - -“Shades of Australia!” ejaculated Mr. Linton. “Is that what one eats in -company with dukes?” - -“I don’t know,” Wally answered, patiently. “He isn’t a duke, anyhow. -Where did you people get your soaring ideas?” - -“From a lame chauffeur who seemed to think you were getting a great deal -more than you deserved——” Jim began. - -“That’s what I’m getting now!” said Wally. - -“Well, he said you had gone off in the mothor to the big house. We -inferred from his tone that it was not merely big, but enormous. The -master had tuk you, he said; we further gathered that you might come -back when the master had finished with you. It sounded rather like Jack -and the Giant, and if we had known who had kidnapped you we might have -organized a search party. As we didn’t, we caught trout—lots of ’em.” - -“Did you, indeed?” said Wally, with open envy. “Lucky beggars—I wish I -had!” - -“And you rioting in baronial halls!” said Norah. “Some people don’t know -when they are well off.” - -“If we let Wally have a word in edgeways for a few minutes we might find -out a little more about the baronial halls,” said Mr. Linton. “Tell us -what happened to you, Wally. Was it a duke?” - -“It was not—only a poor hump backed chap with some sort of a handle to -his name. He’s Sir John O’Neill, and he has a lovely place; but you -never saw a man with less ‘frill,’” Wally remarked. “Simple as anyone -could be. And I don’t think I’ve ever been so sorry for anyone.” - -“Is he badly crippled?” Jim asked. - -“No—only he seems awfully delicate, and subject to beastly fits of -illness. He’s got any amount of pluck—rides and shoots and fishes, and -has motored half over the world. But of course he’s terribly -handicapped; the wonder is that he has done half as much.” - -“That must be the man Patsy was talking about—only he called him the -young masther,” Norah said. “Is he quite young?” - -“Oh, I’d put him down at about forty,” said Wally, to whom that age was -close on senile decay: “I think the old hands here would call a man the -young master until he died of old age. He’s queer: at times he’s like a -kid; and then I suppose the pain gets hold of him, because, in a minute -he seems to grow quite old, and he drops laughing and gets bitter.” - -“Poor fellow!” said Mr. Linton. “How did you find him, Wally?” - -“Why, I nearly fell on top of him getting down a bank into a lane,” -Wally answered. “He was sitting on a stone, hating himself, but he -didn’t seem to mind my sudden appearance at all, though I’m sure clods -hit him. Then we yarned, and I helped him back to his car, and he got me -to go back to lunch with him—I didn’t want to, but——” He was silent. - -“I expect he was glad of someone to talk to,” Mr. Linton said. - -“That’s it—he’s just as lonely as he can be. All his people are -fighting, and he’s knocked himself out over Red Cross work, and has had -to come back to Ireland and get fit. He’s coming to call on you, -sir—and he wants us all to go over to Rathcullen—his place—as much as -we can.” - -“H’m,” said Jim and Norah, together. - -“I wish baronial halls appealed more to my family,” said Mr. Linton, -laughing. - -“I didn’t mean to be horrid; but trout and loughs and bogs appeal so -much more,” said Norah. “Of course we’ll go, if he wants us.” - -“Well, it’s a jolly place, and he’s horribly lonely,” Wally answered. -“And I don’t know about his halls being baronial, but certainly his -stables are: they’re simply topping. He hasn’t many horses left—the -Government took most of them for the war; but there are two ripping -hunters, and some extra good ponies. And he wants to lend ’em to us.” - -“Eh!” said Jim, sitting up. “Wally, my child, how did you manage it?” - -“Didn’t have to,” said Wally, grinning. “He simply threw them at me. -Asked me if you could ride, Norah, so I suggested that if he had a quiet -donkey it might do.” - -“We have one that is not quiet,” said Norah, regarding him with a fixed -eye. “Tell me the truth, Wally—is there something I can ride?” - -“Wait till you see it—that’s all. And he’s going to teach us to jump -banks and ditches and things.” - -“Oh-h!” said Norah, blissfully, “I said this place only wanted horses to -make it perfect!” - -“Well, now you’re going to have the horses, little as you both deserve -’em,” said Wally; “and now, perhaps, you’ll all apologize humbly for -calling me unpleasant names!” - -“Certainly not,” Jim said, firmly. “If you didn’t deserve them at the -moment (and I’m not sure that you didn’t), you’re sure to deserve them -before long. Never mind, look at this!” - -He opened his fishing-basket carefully and showed a mass of damp grass, -among which could be seen glimpses of many trout. Jim dived in with his -finger and thumb, and drew out a speckled beauty, which he dangled -before Wally’s envious gaze. - -“A pound and a half, by my patent spring-balance!” he declared, -triumphantly. “I played him for what seemed like three hours, and I -never was so scared of anything in my life. He got tired at last, -however, and Norah officiated with the landing-net.” - -“Yes, and missed him twice,” said Norah, shame-faced. “It was the -greatest wonder he didn’t get off. But a big trout on the end of a -little line does wobble so much when it’s coming towards the net. It’s -much worse than a screwing ball at tennis.” - -“I know—and you feel perfectly certain the line is going to break, if -the rod doesn’t,” Wally said. “I feel like that over a quarter-pounder: -I don’t know how you ever managed to make a collected effort for that -big fellow.” - -“It wasn’t collected at all—I just swiped wildly, and got him by the -sheerest good luck,” Norah answered. “I mean to practise with a cricket -ball on a string, hung from the big tree outside my window: it would be -awful to miss another beauty like that.” - -They were drifting down the little lough very slowly. There were purple -shadows under the hills, lying across the strip of bog that stretched -westward, where the curlew and golden plover were calling. A little -breeze sprang up, just rippling the surface of the water. Wally got out -his rod hastily; but though the conditions seemed ideal, the trout had -apparently gone to sleep, and when an hour’s casting had not yielded so -much as a rise, it was decided that there might be better things than -fishing, and the party returned to the shore. A small boy, lurking about -the landing stage, was entrusted with the rods and baskets, and -disappeared slowly among the trees fringing the path that led to the -hotel. - -“What are we going to do?” Jim asked. - -“I’m going to Gortbeg,” Norah said. “I want some pins.” - -“Pins?” Jim echoed. “Why ever must you walk two miles for pins? I’m sure -you don’t use one in a year.” - -“No, and so I haven’t got any,” Norah said. “And I must have some, -because I want to shorten my bog-lepping skirt, and I can’t turn up the -edge without pins to keep it in place.” - -“But you sew that sort of thing, don’t you?” Jim asked, wrestling with -masculine obtuseness. - -“Of course—after you’ve pinned it in place. Jimmy, you had better let -me attack that skirt in my own way!” said Norah, justly incensed. “If -you’d tried climbing a mountain in a too-long skirt you wouldn’t argue -about making it shorter.” - -“I guess I would cut a foot off it without arguing at all,” said Jim, -laughing. “Skirts are fool-things out of a house. Well, lead on, my -child: I suppose we’re all going pin-hunting.” - -The road to Gortbeg lay between high banks, with occasional gaps through -which could be seen pleasant moors and fields, and sometimes an old -mansion, almost hidden by enormous beech-trees. Most of the great houses -of the country were silent and closely-shuttered; the men of the family -away fighting, the women doing Red Cross work in London, or nursing as -near the firing-line as they could manage to establish themselves. In a -few were faint signs of occupation: a white-haired old lady on a lawn, -an old man, surrounded by a number of dogs, of many breeds, wandering -through the woods; but even in these houses there was an air of brooding -quiet and expectancy, of silent daily watching for news. The gardens -were gay with summer flowers, and nothing could spoil the beauty of the -trees; but there were weeds in the mould, and the paths were unkempt and -moss-grown. The district was never a rich one, and now the war had taken -all its men and money. - -Down the road, to meet them, came a boy on a donkey: a cheery small boy, -sitting very far back with his knees well in. The donkey was guiltless -of bridle or saddle, obeying, with meekness, if not with alacrity, -suggestions conveyed to it by the pressure of the bare knees and -occasional blows with an ash cudgel. - -“The asses of Ireland are a patient race,” remarked Wally. - -“They had need to be,” Jim answered. - -“It’s up to the ass to be patient in most places,” remarked Mr. Linton. -“Life isn’t exactly a picnic to him anywhere. On the whole, the Irish -donkeys seem well enough cared for; I have seen their brothers in other -countries far worse treated. That’s a nice donkey you have, sonny”—to -the small rider, who passed them, grinning cheerfully. - -“He is, sorr”; and the grin widened. - -“They’re such jolly kids in these parts,” Wally said. “They always greet -you as if you were the one person they had wanted to see for years; and -they’re so interested in you. It doesn’t seem like curiosity, either, -but real, genuine interest.” - -“So it is, as far as it goes,” Jim said. - -“Well it may not go far, but it’s comforting while it lasts—and it -generally lasts as long as one is there oneself. It’s just as well it -doesn’t go deeper, or visitors would leave an awful trail of unrequited -affection behind them. As it is, one feels they recover after one has -gone, after doing all they can to make one’s stay pleasant. Yes, I think -Ireland’s a nice, friendly country,” Wally finished. “And there’s -Gortbeg, looking as if it had forgotten to wake up for about five -hundred years.” - -There was not much of Gortbeg. A busy little river flowed past it -hurriedly, and the village had sprung up along one bank: one winding -street, with a few cottages and a whitewashed inn which called itself -the Fisherman’s Arms. Some boats were moored in the stream near the inn, -where a crazy landing-stage jutted out. Scarcely anyone was to be seen -except a few children, playing on the green, which they shared with -numerous geese, a few donkeys, and some long-haired goats; while over -the half-door of one of the cabins a knot of shawled women gossiped. - -“There’s your shop, Norah,” Mr. Linton said, indicating a dingy building -which bore in its window a curious assortment of cheap sweets, slates, -apples, red flannel, and bacon. - -“It looks a bit queer,” Norah commented, regarding the emporium rather -doubtfully. “However, it’s sure to have pins.” - -The shop was prudently secured, by a bolted half-door, against the -ravages of predatory geese or goats. Within, it was very dark, and -prolonged hammering on the counter failed to bring any response. Finally -Jim found his way into a back room and cooee’d lustily, returning in -some haste. - -“Phew-w! There’s a gentleman in corduroys, asleep on a bed, and two dead -pigs hanging by their heels,” he said. “None of them took any notice of -me; but some one out at the back answered. Here he comes.” - -The proprietor of the shop entered hurriedly: a plump little man, very -breathless and apologetic, and more than a little damp. - -“I left a bit of a young gossoon to mind the shop,” he said—“and I -washin’ meself. It’s gone he is, playin’ with the other boys—sure I’ll -teach him to play when I get a holt of him. Pins, miss? Is it hairpins, -now, you’d be wanting?” - -“No, just ordinary pins,” Norah told him. - -“H’m,” said the shopman, doubtfully. “I dunno would I have them, at all. -If it was hairpins, now, there’s not a place in Donegal where you’d get -a finer selection. Pins . . .” He pondered deeply, and rummaged in a box -that seemed sacred to extremely sticky bull’s eyes. “Well, well, we’d -better look for them. It might be they’d be in some odd corner.” - -The wall behind him was divided into innumerable little compartments, -and he looked faithfully through them all, striking match after match to -illumine his progress. There were assorted goods in the compartments: -nails and screws, tin saucepan-lids, marbles, boots, soap, oranges, -reels of cotton, biscuits, socks, and ass’s shoes; he searched them all, -turning over the contents of each until the match burned down to his -fingers, when he would throw it hastily on the floor, strike another, -and move on to the next collection. The box of matches was nearly -exhausted when at length he gave up his quest. - -“They’re not in it at all,” he said, despondently. “I did have some, one -time, but I expect they’re sold on me. When the traveller comes I could -be getting some in from Belfast, if there was no hurry.” - -Norah indicated that there was hurry, and asked if there were another -shop. - -“There’s Mary Doody’s,” said the man of business, sadly; “at the least, -you might call it a shop, though it’s only herself knows what she sells. -That’s the only one.” He came to the doorway, and pointed down the -street. “The last house, it is. If ’twas anything in the wurruld now, -except pins, I’d have it.” - -A little way from the shop, he caught them up, breathless, but aflame -with business enterprise. - -“Is it from Moroney’s ye are? Would ye tell Mrs. Moroney that I’ve the -grandest bit of pork ever she seen—killed yesterday, an’ they me own -pigs that I rared on the place. Peter Grogan—sure, she’ll know me.” - -“Thank you,” Jim said, hurriedly. “Good night.” - -“Good night,” responded Mr. Grogan. “Tell her to-morrow’s early closing -day, an’ I could bring one over in the little ass-cart as aisy as not.” -The last words were uttered in a high shriek as the distance widened -between himself and the Linton party. - -“Pork is a good thing,” said Mr. Linton, sententiously. “Isn’t it, Jim?” - -“If you’d seen the room I saw!” said his son, with feeling. “Such a -bedroom: and the gentleman in bed, and I should say very drunk. No, I -don’t think I’ll deliver that message.” - -“I wouldn’t,” said Mr. Linton. - -Mary Doody’s place of business stood back a little from the road. There -was no window for the display of goods, and the door was shut. The -uninitiated might, indeed, have been pardoned for failing to regard it -as a shop, or for passing by, unnoticed, the brief legend over the door -which stated that Mrs. Doody’s residence was a Generil Store, and added -that she was further empowered to sell stout and porter. The inhabitants -of Gortbeg, however, were clearly to be numbered among the initiated, -for sounds of conviviality came, muffled, from within, and once a voice -broke into a snatch of a song. Norah hesitated. - -“I suppose I needn’t knock.” - -“They might not hear you, if you did,” Jim said. He opened the door. - -Within, a long, low room was dim with a mixture of turf and tobacco -smoke, and heavy with the fumes of porter. A swinging lamp shed a -depressed ray over the scene. As her eyes grew accustomed to the smoky -twilight, Norah made out a number of men and a few women sitting on -benches near the fire, each with a mug that evidently held comforting -liquor. Every one seemed to be talking at once; but a dead silence fell -as the door opened on the unfamiliar figures. Norah resisted an -inclination to turn and seek fresh air. An immensely fat woman, with a -grimy shawl pinned across her bosom, waddled forward. - -“Good evening, dear,” she said, dividing the greeting impartially -between Jim and Norah. - -“Good evening,” Norah responded. “This is a shop, isn’t it?” - -“It is, dear,” Mrs. Doody said, bridling a little at any doubt being -cast on her emporium. “Were you wantin’——?” - -“Pins,” Norah said hastily. “Do you keep them?” - -“I dunno would I,” said Mary Doody, unconsciously echoing Mr. Grogan. -“Pins. Would they be small pins, now?” - -“Yes—just common pins.” - -“Pins,” said Mary Doody, reflecting deeply. She turned and sought in -unsavoury boxes which held a stock as varied, if not so numerous, as -that of Mr. Grogan. The porter-drinkers became immensely interested. -Some of the women came nearer and stared at the strangers, and one or -two, catching Norah’s eye, smiled a greeting. - -Mary Doody heaved her mighty form up from the box over which she had -been crouching. - -“I had some, wanst,” she said. “But ’tis gone they are, or may be them -gerrls has them taken. Wouldn’t anything else do for you, dear?” - -“No, thank you,” Norah said, hastily. She turned to go, pursued by Mrs. -Doody, who suddenly became interested in the case. - -“Did you try Peter Grogan?” she asked. “He have a little shop up -yonder.” - -Norah admitted having tried and failed. - -“My, my!” said Mary Doody. “’Tis puttin’ a bad direction on a counthry -when you can’t buy a paper of pins in it, isn’t it, dear?” - -Norah laughed. “I’m sorry you haven’t got them,” she said. - -“No. There’s no call for them here, dear. We do be using buttons,” said -Mary Doody, blandly. - -Under cover of this broadside Norah made a confused exit, to find Jim -and Wally helpless with laughter without. - -“Never did I see anyone taught her place so beautifully!” said Jim, -ecstatically. “That will teach you to be tidy, young Norah!” - -“Buttons!” said Norah, laughing. “I’d like to see Mary Doody shorten a -skirt with the aid of buttons. Anyhow, I’ve got to do it without the aid -of pins, that’s evident. Come home, you unsympathetic frivollers!” - -It was two days later, that, coming in late and ravenously hungry after -a long tramp across the bog, the Lintons made a hurried toilet and a -still more hurried descent to the dining-room. Dinner had been kept -waiting for them, and they applied themselves to it with an energy born -of a long day in the open air and a sandwich lunch. It was when the -first edge of appetite had been taken off, and they were toying with a -mammoth apple-pie, that Mrs. Moroney bore down upon them. - -“I’m afraid we were very late, Mrs. Moroney,” said Mr. Linton. - -“Ah, ’tis no matter,” said the lady of the house, waving away the -suggestion. “In the heighth of the season there’s many a one roaring for -dinner, and it ten o’clock at night. Did you enjoy your dinner, now?” - -“We did, indeed,” said Mr. Linton; “it was most excellent pork——” - -He stopped, catching Jim’s eye, into which had come a sudden light of -comprehension. - -“Pork!” said Jim faintly. “Yes, it _was_ pork. Mrs. Moroney, . . . I -wonder . . . did you . . . ?” - -“Don’t tell me there was anything wrong with it,” said Mrs. Moroney, -aflame in the defence of the pork. “I never see better pigs than them -ones of Peter Grogan’s; and he after killing them only last Tuesday!” - - - - - CHAPTER X - THE ROCK OF DOON - - - “Hills o’ my heart! - Let the herdsman who walks in your high haunted places - Give him strength and courage, and weave his dreams alway: - Let your cairn-heaped hero-dead reveal their grand exultant faces. - And the Gentle Folk be good to him betwixt the dark and day.” - ETHNA CARBERY. - -SIR John O’Neill paid his formal call on the Australians, tactfully -choosing a day so hopelessly wet as to forbid any thought of fishing or -“bog-lepping.” Bog excursions had a peculiar fascination for Norah and -the boys, who loved rambling among the deep brown pools, leaping from -tuft to tuft of sound grass, and making experiments—frequently -disastrous—in mossy surfaces that looked sound, but were very likely to -prove quagmires which effectually removed any lurking doubt in Norah’s -mind that an Irish bog could be boggy. They sought the bogs in almost -all weathers. But the day that brought Sir John to the old house on -Lough Aniller was one of such pitiless rain that prudence, in the shape -of Mr. Linton, forbade any excursion to patients so newly recovered as -Jim and Wally. - -Even in the most homelike of boarding-houses a wet day is apt to be -depressing to open-air people. It was with relief, mingled with -amazement, that they saw the motor coming up the dripping avenue in the -afternoon; and a moment later Bridget, obviously impressed, ushered Sir -John into the drawing-room. The Lintons were established as favourites -in the household on their own merits; but it was placing them on quite a -different standard of respect to find that they were visited by the -“ould stock.” - -Every one enjoyed the visit. Sir John was better, the lines of pain that -Wally had seen nearly gone from his face. There was an almost boyish -eagerness about him; he was keen to know them all, to hear their frank -talk, to make friends with them. David Linton and his son liked him from -the moment they met his eyes; brown eyes, with something of the mute -appeal that lies in the eyes of a dog. As for Norah, in all her life she -had not known what it meant to be so sorry for anyone as she felt for -this brave, crippled man, with his high-bred face and gallant bearing. -Afterwards, when John O’Neill looked back at heir meeting, one of his -memories of Norah was that she had never seemed to see his misshapen -shoulders. - -That first visit had stretched over the whole afternoon, no one quite -knew how. Outside, the rain streamed down the window-panes and lashed -the lough into waves; but within the old house a fire of turf and -bog-wood blazed, casting ruddy lights on the furniture, and sending its -pleasant, acrid smell into the room. They gathered round it in a -half-circle and “yarned”—exchanging stories of Ireland, and Australia, -and London and war. There could be no talk in those grim days without -war-stories and war-rumours; but after a time they drifted away to -far-off times, and Sir John, beginning half-timidly with an old Irish -legend, found that he had a suddenly enthralled circle of listeners, who -demanded more, and yet more—tales of high and far-off times and of the -mighty heroes of Ireland: Finn MacCool and the Fianna, Cuchulain, Angus -Og, and the half-real, half-legendary past that holds Ireland in a mist -of romance. He knew it all, and loved it, telling the stories with the -quiet pride of a descendant of a race whose roots were deep in the soil -of the land that had borne them: and the children of the country that -had no history hung upon his words. - -“What must you think of me?” he said at last, when, in a pause, the -clock in the hall boomed out six strokes. “I come to call, and I remain -to an unseemly hour spinning yarns. The fact is, you—well, you just -aren’t strangers at all, and I certainly knew you before. Were you in -Ireland in a previous incarnation, Miss Norah?” - -Norah laughed. - -“I would love to think so,” she said. “One would like to have had some -part in the Ireland you can talk about. Will you come again and tell us -more, Sir John?” - -His eyes were grateful. - -“If I don’t bore you. I fastened upon this poor boy”—indicating Wally -with a friendly nod—“the other day when I was desperately sick of my -own company, and now I seem to have done the same to you all; and you’re -very good to a lonely man. But I want all of you at Rathcullen.” - -“We’re coming,” said Wally, solemnly. - -“Will you? I timed my call to-day, because I didn’t think even -half-amphibious Australians would be out in such weather—and see what -luck I’ve had!” He looked no older than the boys, his eager face glowing -in the firelight. “But please don’t come to Rathcullen formally, Mr. -Linton; if I bring the car over can I carry you all off to-morrow for -lunch? There are horses simply spoiling to be ridden, Miss Norah.” - -“Oh-h!” said Norah. “But I’ve no riding-things with me.” - -“That doesn’t matter: I have two young cousins who occasionally pay me a -visit, and their riding-kit is at Rathcullen, since they can’t use it in -London. I’m sure you can manage with it; details of fit don’t signify -much in Donegal.” He rose, and stood on the hearthrug looking eagerly at -them. When he was sitting, his finely-modelled head and clever face made -it easy to forget his dwarfed body: standing, among the lithe, tall -Australians, it was suddenly pitifully evident. He felt it, for he -flushed, and for a moment his eyes dropped; then he faced them again, -bravely. Mr. Linton spoke, hurriedly. - -“We would be delighted to go to you. But are we not rather a numerous -party? I think we ought to send a detachment!” - -“No, indeed—I wouldn’t know which to choose!” returned the Irishman, -whimsically. “You see, you are just a godsend to me, if you will spare -me a little of your time; I have been so long shut up alone. And it’s -not good to be alone when one is spoiling to be in the thick of things; -I grow horribly bad-tempered. When I know that these young giants are -out of the hunt, too, I become more reconciled to circumstances. You see -my complete selfishness!” He smiled at them delightfully. “So, may I -come for you all to-morrow?” - -“Thanks—but there is really no reason why we should trouble you to -bring the motor. We can easily walk over.” - -“There’s every reason; I’ll get you earlier!” said O’Neill, laughing. - -The motor slid down the avenue in the driving rain, and the Australians -looked at each other. - -“Did you ever make friends so quickly with anyone, dad?” Jim asked. - -“I don’t think I did,” David Linton answered. “There’s something about -him one can’t quite express: so much of the child left in the man. Poor -fellow—poor fellow!” - -“I think he’s the bravest man I ever saw,” said Norah. - -The day at Rathcullen House was the first of many. Sir John was so -frankly eager to have them there, and his welcome was so spontaneous and -heart-felt, that the Australians suddenly felt themselves “belong,” and -the beautiful old house became to them an Irish version of their own -Billabong. Ireland, always many-sided, showed them a new and fascinating -face. They had loved the lanes and bogs and moors where they had been -free to wander. But now they found themselves free of a wide demesne -where wealth and art had done all that was possible to aid Nature, with -a perfect understanding of where it was best to leave Nature alone. The -park, with its splendid old trees, and the well-kept fields around it, -gave opportunities for trying Sir John’s horses; and Norah and the boys -were soon under the spell of jumping the big banks that the hunters took -so cleverly,—although, at first, to see them jump on to a bank, change -feet with lightning rapidity, and leap down the far side, seemed to -Antipodean eyes more like a circus performance than ordinary riding! -Beyond the park stretched miles of deer-forest, unlike an ordinary -forest in that it had no trees,—being a great expanse of heathery hills -and moor, seamed and studded with rocks, streams babbling here and -there, half-hidden in deep channels fringed with long grass and heather -and ling. As land, it Was worthless; nothing would grow in the stony -barren soil save the moorland plants; but it formed a glorious ground -for long rambles. O’Neill was fast recovering his normal strength, and -his energy was always like a devouring fire; he could not, however, walk -far, and he and David Linton would find rocky seats on the moor while -Norah and the boys rambled far over the deer-forest, often stalking -patiently for an hour, armed with field-glasses, to catch a glimpse of -the shy red-deer. - -“A don’t know why people want to shoot them,” Norah said, after a long -crawl through the rough heather, which had resulted in a splendid view -of a magnificent stag. “They’re so beautiful; and it’s just as much fun -to stalk them like this!” To which Jim and Wally returned non-committal -grunts, and exchanged, privately, glances of amazement at the -strangeness of the feminine outlook. - -Sometimes there were days on the lough at the far end of the Rathcullen -bog: a well-stocked lough where no outside fishing was permitted, and -which yielded them trout of a weight far beyond their dreams; and there -were motor-drives far afield, exploring the country-side, with Sir John -always ready with legends and stories of the “ould ancient” times. Even -on wet days the big Rolls-Royce would appear early in the morning, -bearing an urgent invitation; and wet days were easy to spend in -Rathcullen—in the great hall, the well-stocked library, the -conservatories, or the picture-gallery, where faces of long-dead -O’Neills, some of them startlingly like their host, stared down at them -from the panelled walls. In the billiard-room Wally and Jim fought -cheerful battles, while Mr. Linton would write Australian letters in the -library, and Norah and Sir John explore other nooks and corners of the -great house, or discourse music after their own fashion. His friendship -seemed fitted to each: with Mr. Linton he could be the man of affairs, -deeply-read and thoughtful; while to the boys and Norah he was the most -delightful of chums, as full of fun even as Wally. - -“He fits in so,” said Jim. “He’s never in our way, and—what is a good -deal more wonderful—I don’t believe we’re ever in his!” - -Many times Sir John begged them to transfer themselves altogether to -Rathcullen. But something of Australian independence held them back; -they preferred to retain their rooms at the Lough Aniller house, though -it saw less and less of them in the daytime, and Timsy openly bewailed -their constant absence—until the sergeant came home on furlough, when -Timsy promptly forgot every one else in the world, and walked with his -head in clouds of glory. - -“Indeed,” Mr. Linton said, one day, in answer to a renewed -invitation—“I am frequently ashamed to think how completely we seem to -have quartered ourselves on you, O’Neill. It’s hardly fair to inflict -you still further.” - -“If you could but guess what you have done for me, you might be -surprised,” Sir John answered. - -They were in the motor, running along a smooth high road near the little -narrow-gauge railway line. Ahead, Norah and the boys could be seen -across a field, riding; they had come across country, taking banks and -ditches as they came, and were making towards a point where they were -all to meet. John O’Neill looked at the racing trio with a smile. - -“I was in a pretty bad way when Wally dropped on me in the boreen that -morning,” he said, presently. - -“He said you were suffering terribly,” David Linton said. - -“Oh—that was nothing. I’m fairly well used to pain when my stupid -attacks come on, though that had certainly been a stiff one. But—well, -I think I was beginning to lose heart. My physical disadvantages have -always been in my way, naturally; but I have managed to keep them in the -background to a certain extent and live a man’s life, even in a -second-rate fashion. But since the war began I couldn’t do it. I was so -useless—a cumberer of the ground, when every man was needed. My people -have always been fighters, until——until I came, to blot the record.” - -“You have no right to say that,” said David Linton, sharply. “You did -more than thousands of men are doing.” - -“I did what I could. But I wanted to fight, man—to fight! If you knew -how I envied every private I saw marching through London! every lucky -youngster with a sound heart and a pair of straight shoulders. I had -always set my teeth, before, and got through a man’s work, somehow or -other. But here was something I couldn’t do—they wouldn’t have me. And -even over what work I was able to tackle, I went to pieces. When I came -back to Ireland I felt like rubbish, flung out of the way—out of the -way of men who were men.” - -“It’s not fair to feel like that,” David Linton said. “And it is not -true.” - -“Well—you have all helped me to believe that perhaps I am not -altogether on the dust-heap. You came when I was desperate; every day in -Rathcullen was making me worse. I couldn’t go into the picture-gallery; -the fighting-men on the walls seemed to look at me in scorn to see to -what a poor thing the old house had come down. And then you all came, -and you didn’t seem to notice that anything was wrong with me. You made -me one of you—even those youngsters, full of all the energy and -laughter and youth of that big young country of yours. They have made a -chum of me: I haven’t laughed for years as I’ve laughed in the last -fortnight. And I’m fitter than I’ve been for years—I’ve forgotten to -think of myself, and when you all go I also am going back, to work. -There must be work, even for me.” - -“For you! Why, you’re a young man, full of energy, even if you can’t -have active service,” said David Linton. “And I am a grey old man, but -there’s work for me. Don’t think that you have no job, because you can’t -get the job you like; that’s an easy attitude to adopt. Every man can -find his job if he looks for it with his eyes open.” - -“Well, you have helped mine to open,” O’Neill said. “I was miserable -because I had hitched my wagon to a star and had found I couldn’t drive -it. The old servants—bless their kind hearts!—were purring over me and -pitying me, and I was feeling raw; and then you all walked into my life -and declined to notice that I was a useless dwarf——” - -“Because you aren’t,” said the other man, sharply. “Don’t talk utter -nonsense!” - -O’Neill laughed. - -“Well—I won’t forget,” he said. “But I am grateful; only I sometimes -wonder if I ask for too much of your time. Do you think the youngsters -are bored?” - -“Bored!” Mr. Linton said in amazement. “Why, they are having the time of -their lives! I could not possibly have given them half the pleasure you -have Put in their way. You talk of gratitude, but to my mind it should -be entirely on our side.” - -“No,” said O’Neill firmly. “Still, I’m glad to think they are enjoying -themselves,—not merely being polite and benevolent!” Whereat David -Linton broke into laughter. - -“I trust they’d be polite in any circumstances,” he said. “But even -politeness has its limits. You wouldn’t call that sort of thing forced, -would you? Look.” - -He pointed across a field. Norah and the boys were galloping to meet -them. They flashed up a little hill, dipped down into a hollow, and -scurried up another rise, where a stiff bank met them, with a deep drop -into the next field. Norah’s brown pony got over it with the cleverness -of a cat, and she raced ahead of the boys, who set sail after her, -vociferating quite unintelligible remarks about people who took unfair -short cuts. Their merry voices brought echoes from the hills. Norah -maintained her advantage until a low bank brought them out into the -road, and all together they trotted towards the waiting motor. Their -glowing faces sufficiently answered Sir John’s doubts. - -“Why, of course you beat them, Norah—easily!” he said, shamelessly -ignoring the boys’ side of the race. “Didn’t I tell you that pony could -beat most things in Donegal, if she got the chance?” - -“I did cut a corner,” Norah admitted, laughing. “But ’tis themselves has -the animals of great size—and they flippant leppers!” She dropped into -brogue with an ease born of close association with Timsy and his -parents. “Sir John, is that the Doon Rock?” - -She pointed with her whip to a great rocky eminence half a mile away. - -“Yes, that’s the Rock,” O’Neill answered. “It’s rather a landmark, isn’t -it? We’ll wait for you at the foot, if you’ll jog on after us.” - -The riders followed the motor slowly. The road led past the great mass, -half hill, half rock, that towered over the little fields. It was about -three hundred feet high, with sparse vegetation endeavouring to find a -footing on its rugged sides, and grey boulders, weather-worn and clothed -with lichen, jutting out, grim and bleak. The motor halted under its -shadow, and the groom who occupied the front seat with Con, the lame -chauffeur, led the horses away to a cottage close by. - -A few hundred yards away a curious sight puzzled the Australians. On a -little green, where some grey stones marked a well, was a little -plantation of sticks stuck in the ground. Fluttering rags waved from -many of them, and ornamented the ragged brambles near the well. - -“You haven’t seen a holy well, have you?” O’Neill asked. “That is one of -the most famous—the Well of Doon.” - -“But what are the sticks?” Wally asked. - -“Come and see.” - -They walked over to the well. A deeply marked path led to it, and all -about it the ground was beaten hard by the feet of many people, save in -the patch of ground where the sticks stood upright. There were all kinds -of sticks; rough stakes, cut from a hedge, ash-plants, blackthorns—some -of no value, others well-finished and costly. Rags, white and coloured, -fluttered from them. And there was more than one crutch, standing -straight and stiff among the lesser sticks. - -“But what is it?” breathed Norah. - -“It’s a holy well. Hundreds of years ago there was a great sickness in -the country, and the people sent to a saint who had originally come from -these parts, begging him to come and help them. The saint was in Rome, -and he could not come. But he was sorry for the people; and the legend -goes that he threw his staff into a well in Rome, and it sank, and -emerged from the water of the Well of Doon here: and ever since then the -people believe that the water has healing power, and that it will heal -anyone who pilgrimages to it barefoot.” - -“But does it?” asked Wally, incredulously. - -“Well—they say the age of miracles is past. But the age of -faith-healing is not; and you won’t find an Irishman, whatever his -religion, sneering at the old holy places of Ireland. I don’t pretend to -understand these things, but I respect them. And then—there is no doubt -whatever as to the genuineness, and the permanence, of many of the -cures.” He pointed to the little forest of sticks. “Look at those -sticks: each one left here by a grateful man or woman who came leaning -on the stick, and went away not needing it.” - -“Great Scott!” said Wally. “And the rags?” - -“They are votive offerings. If you look on that flat stone near the well -you’ll find hundreds of others—tokens, medals, little ornaments, even -hairpins: all valueless, but left by people too poor to give even a -penny. They believe the saint understands: and I think he would be a -hard saint if he did not.” - -The stone was almost covered with tiny offerings. - -“Does no one touch them?” Jim asked. - -“They’re sacred. If you left money there it would not be touched.” He -pointed to a handful of wilting daisies. “I expect those were left by -children on their way to school. All the poor know that it is the -spirit, not the letter, of an offering that counts: and even those -daisies are left in perfect faith that the saint will see to the matter -if trouble should come to them.” - -“I never thought such beliefs still existed,” said Mr. Linton, greatly -interested. “Look at this crutch—it’s quite good, and looks -newly-planted.” - -A woman, barefooted and with a shawl over her head, had come across the -grass from the cottage. She curtseyed to O’Neill. - -“It was left this morning, sir,” she said, indicating the crutch. “Sure, -the man that owned it was in a bad way: he come from Dublin, an’ he -crippled in his hip. On a side-car they brought him, and there was two -men to lift him on and off it, and he yellow with the dint of the pain -he had. I seen him limping on his crutch across to the well. And when he -went away he walked over to the car as aisy as you or me, and not a limp -on him at all, and him throwing a leg on to the car like a boy.” - -“You mean to say he went away cured?” exclaimed Mr. Linton. - -“Sure, there’s his crutch,” said the woman, simply. “He’d no more use at -all for it.” - -“Well-l!” The Australians looked blankly at each other. - -“’Tis fourteen years I’ve been living over beyant,” said the woman. -“I’ve seen them come on sticks and on crutches; some of them carried, -and some of them put on cars: but they all walked away—all that had -faith in the saint. Why wouldn’t they?” - -It was a brief question that somehow left them without any answer, since -simple faith is too big a thing to meddle with. They said good-bye to -the woman and went back to the Rock, where the groom was waiting to help -his master in the climb—an old groom with a face like a withered rosy -apple. The ascent was not difficult: a winding path led to the summit of -the Rock, and they were soon at the top. - -“Between them, Elizabeth and Cromwell didn’t leave us many of our old -monuments,” said O’Neill, looking away across the country. “But thank -goodness they couldn’t touch the Doon Rock!” - -The summit was almost flat; a long narrow plateau with soft grass -growing in its hollows. One end was wider than the other, with a kind of -saddle connecting the two: and in the middle of the smaller end was a -great flat stone that looked almost like an altar. All about the high, -precipitous eminence the country lay like an unrolled map far beneath -them: a wide expanse of flat moor and field and fallow, in the midst of -which the great Rock showed, almost startling in its rugged steepness. -Little villages were dotted here and there, and sometimes could be seen -the blue gleam of water. The white smoke of a train made a creeping line -against the dark bog. - -Con and the groom had placed the luncheon-basket in a grassy hollow -where there was shelter from the breeze that swept keenly across the -high Rock; and had retreated with the instinctive delicacy of the Irish -peasant, who never intrudes upon “the genthry” when eating, and himself -prefers to eat alone. After lunch, Norah and Wally collected the débris -of the feast and burned it under the lee side of a boulder, in the -belief that no decent person leaves such things as picnic-papers for the -next comer to see: and then they strolled across the narrow saddle to -the stone on the farther side, where the others had already wandered. - -“Tell us about it, Sir John, please,” Norah begged. - -“It was here that the old O’Donnell chiefs were inaugurated,” O’Neill -said. “They were the rulers of Tyrconnell, which is now north-west -Ulster: the old name is still used in a good deal of Irish poetry. All -the clan used to gather when a new leader was to be installed, the -people clustering down in the plain below, and the chieftain and his -principal men up here on the Rock. It must have been worth seeing.” - -Jim drew a long breath. - -“I should just think so,” he said, “Tell us more, O’Neill: I want to -reconstruct it. This old Rock must have looked just the same as it does -to-day. It’s something to have seen even that!” - -“Just the same,” said Sir John, his eyes kindling at the boy’s -enthusiasm. “The Inauguration Stone may have been in better -preservation, but a few dozen centuries can’t do much to the Rock. -Well—you can picture the people down below, thousands of them. All the -country would be a great unfenced plain—no banks and hedges such as you -see to-day, and very likely no roads worth calling roads. There would be -forests, most probably, and, in them, animals that became extinct long -ago, like the wild boar and wolf. The ground below would be a great -camp—every one making merry and dressed in their best.” - -“I should think that even in those days it wouldn’t take much to make an -Irish crowd merry,” Wally said. - -“They would have plenty of entertainment: jugglers, fortune-tellers, -buffoons in painted masks, and champions, showing feats with weapons and -strength—probably ‘spoiling for a fight.’ Music there would be in -abundance: pipes, tube-players, harps, and bands of chorus-singers. -There would be any amount of fun in the crowd. But, of course, the Rock -would be the centre of everyone’s thoughts.” - -“It’s all coming quite distinctly,” said Norah, who was sitting on the -grass, gazing out over the plain. “If you look hard you can see them -all, in saffron kilts and flowing cloaks like you told us, Sir John. Now -tell us who is up here on the Rock.” - -“The new chief is where Wally is, sitting on the great stone,” said -O’Neill, smiling at her. “Do you want to know what he’s wearing?” - -“Oh, please!” - -“Well, you can picture him a goodly man, to begin with, for no chief -could reign unless he were a champion, free from the slightest physical -defect. ‘He was graceful and beautiful of form, without blemish or -reproach,’ one old chronicle says. ‘Fair yellow hair he had, and it -bound with a golden band to keep it from loosening. A red buckler upon -him, with stars and animals of gold thereon, and fastenings of silver. A -crimson cloak in wide descending folds around him, fastened at his neck -with precious stones. A torque of gold round his neck’—that’s a broad -twisted band: you can see them to-day in the Museum in Dublin. ‘A white -shirt with a full collar upon him, intertwined with red gold thread. A -girdle of gold, inlaid with precious stones, around him. Two wonderful -shoes of gold, with golden loops, about the feet. Two spears with golden -sockets in his hands, with rivets of red bronze.’ There—can you see -him, Norah?” - -“I’m trying, but he dazzles me!” Norah said. “Go on, please. Who else is -there?” - -“All his nobles and councillors, dressed almost as splendidly as the -chief himself. The old books are full of details of the richness of -their apparel: gold and silver and fine clothing must have been an -ordinary thing with them—and not only was it so, but the workmanship -was exquisite. They had ‘shirts ribbed with gold thread, crimson fringed -cloaks, embroidered coats of rejoicing, clothing of red silk, and shirts -of the dearest silk.’ They wore helmets, and carried spears, ’sharp, -thin, hard-pointed, with rivets of gold and silk thongs for throwing’; -‘long swords, with hilts and guards of gold; and shields of silver, with -rim and boss of gold.’ One man is described as ‘having in his hand a -small-headed, white-breasted hound, with a collar of rubbed gold and a -chain of old silver’: and a horse had a bridle of silver rings and a -gold bit. They had shoes of white bronze, and great golden brooches, -with ‘gold chains about their necks and bands of gold above them -again.’” - -O’Neill stopped and laughed. - -“I could go on for a long time,” he said. “But I’m afraid it begins to -sound like the description of Solomon’s Temple!” - -“And to think,” said Jim, unheeding him, “that we had a vague idea that -Ireland had been inhabited only by savages!” - -“Schools don’t teach you anything about Ireland,” said O’Neill, -contemptuously. “A few hours among the exquisite old things in the -Dublin Museum would open your eyes: the finest goldsmiths and -silversmiths of the present world cannot touch the beauty of the -workmanship of the treasures there;—and some of them were dug up out of -bogs, after lying there no one knows how many hundred or thousand years. -They were craftsmen in those days, and they loved the work. You don’t -get that spirit in Trades Union times!” - -“Oh, don’t talk about Trades Unions!” Norah cried. “We’re on the Doon -Rock, and I can see all those people round the chief, and the crowd on -the plain below, looking up. What else, Sir John?” - -“There would be white-robed Druids,” O’Neill said; “and the King’s bards -or poets would be about him. The bard was a very important person and a -high functionary, with wide powers. In a sense he was the -war-correspondent of his day: he never fought, but he was always present -at a battle, and very much in it, noting the heroic deeds of the -warriors, and afterwards recording them in his songs. Poetry in those -days was a most business-like and practical thing, for everything of any -importance was written in verse, such as the laws, the genealogies of -the clans, and their history. The poet held an exalted position, and was -educated for it from his boyhood by a course of careful study: and the -chief poet ranked next to the king, and went about with almost as fine a -retinue. They were the professors of their day, and kept schools for -training lads for their order. A man had to be very careful not to -offend one, or he would write a satire against the culprit; and these -satires were dreaded extremely, since they were believed to cause -disaster and desolation to fall not only on a man but on his whole -family. Nowadays, editors are said to keep special wastepaper baskets -for dealing with poets, but it wouldn’t have done in the ould ancient -times—the post of an editor would have been too unhealthy!” - -“I suppose it is through them that the old stories have come down,” Jim -said. - -“Of course. They had to write the verse-tales, and they had to tell -them, too; they were obliged to learn and teach three hundred and fifty -kinds of versification, and an Ollave, or chief poet, could recite at -any moment any of three hundred and fifty stories. They did a lot of -harm, because they abused their power; and at last, in the sixth -century, were nearly banished from Ireland altogether. Columcille saved -them from that fate, but they were made much less important. However, -the poets that you are looking at with your mind’s eye, Norah, were ages -before that, and you can imagine them as gorgeous and as haughty as -possible, and every one is very polite to them.” - -“I’m going to get off this stone and make room for the chief,” said -Wally, solemnly, rising. “There’s the ghost of a poet, glaring at me, -and he’s going to burst into a satire.” He subsided on the grass beside -Norah. “Go on, please.” - -“Well, that is the crowd on top of the Rock,” Sir John said: “nobles, -councillors, poets, and Druids, all in order of rank: the Rock would -hold three or four hundred, all told. And the crowd below, gazing up. -I’m glad you got off the stone, Wally, because the chief wants it now. -He takes off his wonderful shoes of gold, and places one foot on the -stone, and swears to preserve all ancient customs inviolable, to deliver -up the rulership peaceably, when the time comes, to his successor, to -rule the people with justice, and to maintain the laws. Then he puts -away his weapons, and the highest of his nobles, an hereditary official, -gives him a straight white rod in token of authority—straight, to -remind him that his administration should be just, and white, that his -actions should be pure and upright. Then he gives him new sandals: and -keeping one of the golden shoes, he throws the other over the new -chief’s head and proclaims him O’Donnell. All the nobles repeat the -title—can’t you hear the mighty shout, and the crowd below taking it -up, so that it rings over Tyrconnell!” - -“Oh-h!” breathed Norah. “And it was here, where we are sitting!” She put -her hand on the ground that had felt the tramp of the hosts of ancient -days. “Was that all, Sir John?” - -“That ended the ceremony; except that each subject paid a cow as -rod-money, a sort of tribute to the new chief. But of course there was -high feasting and festival, probably for days. They had splendid feasts, -too. Once, when one of the great nobles entertained the chief and all -the men of Tyrconnel, the preparations took a whole year. A special -house was built, surpassing all other buildings in beauty of -architecture, with splendid pillars and carvings: in the banqueting-hall -the wainscotting was of bronze thirty feet high, overlaid with gold. It -took a wagon-team to carry each beam, and the strength of seven men to -fix each pole; and the royal couch was set with precious stones ‘radiant -with every hue, making night bright as day.’” - -O’Neill broke off, and hesitated. - -“Do I tell you too much?” he asked. “I’m afraid my tongue runs away with -me—but I did want you to realize something of what Ireland was. There -were great men in those days, and the fighting-men had high ideals of -what great champions should be. It is what kept us all through our -lifetime,’ one said—‘truth that was in our hearts, and strength in our -arms, and fulfilment on our tongues.’” - -He was silent, looking away. The proud soul, pent in the misshapen body, -found comfort in turning from the present, that held so little for him, -back to the mighty past when the O’Neills, too, had been chieftains and -champions. - -Presently he stood up, with a shrug. - -“Time we went down, I’m afraid,” he said, cheerfully. “Before we go, -Norah, I will proceed to relate for your benefit the six womanly gifts -which were demanded of properly-brought-up young women in the high and -far-off times in Ireland. They were, the gift of modest behaviour, the -gift of singing, the gift of sweet speech, the gift of beauty, the gift -of wisdom, and the gift of needlework!” - -“Wow!” said poor Norah, in dismay. “Perhaps it’s as well I got born in -Australia!” - - - - - CHAPTER XI - NORTHWARD - - - “Says he to all belongin’ him, ‘Now happy may ye be! - But I’m off to find me fortune,’ sure he says, says he.” - MOIRA O’NEILL. - -‟IS Mr. Linton in, Timsy?” - -“He is, sir. Leastways, he’s out, down by the lough, and all of them -with him.” The small boy looked up at Sir John O’Neill with more awe -than he was wont to regard most people. “Will I get him for you, sir?” - -“No—I’ll go down, myself. Is your father well, Timsy?” - -“He does be splendid, sir,” said Timsy, his eye brightening. “Only -they’ll be takin’ him back soon, to fight them ould Germans.” - -“I expect Lord Kitchener can’t do without him,” said Sir John, -confidentially. “Never mind,—we’ll have him back in Donegal altogether, -before long, please goodness. And whisper, Timsy—when he comes back for -good, he’ll have a splendid medal on his coat!” He patted the small boy -on the head and left him speechless before a prospect so tremendous. - -The Linton party was discovered by the well on the lough shore, where -Wally was scratching the nose of the patient donkey and talking to him, -as Norah said, as man to man. He had his back to the path down from the -garden, and did not hear Sir John’s approach. - -“If you’d come back to Australia with us, acushla machree,” he said, -“I’d guarantee you the best of grass and you wouldn’t have any water to -draw at, all.” The ass drooped his head lower, and appeared, not at all -impressed by this dazzling future. “And Murty would love you, and Norah -would ride you after cattle.” (“I would _not_!” from Norah.) “And you -could tell the horses about Ireland, and we’d tie green ribbons round -your neck on St. Patrick’s Day, and let you wave a green flag with a -harp on it in your pearl-pale hand. Oh, lovely ass——!” - -“Were you speaking to me?” asked Sir John, politely, near his ear; and -Wally jumped, and joined in the laugh against himself. - -“We’re twin-souls, this patient person and myself,” he explained. “I’ve -found it out, and I’m trying to make the ass see it. Never mind, old -chap; we’ll continue this profitable conversation when we are alone; -unfeeling listeners only make you bashful.” He produced a carrot from -his pocket, and the ass ate it, despondently. - -“I’m awfully sorry to have interrupted your heart-to-heart talk; but the -fact is, Mr. Linton, I’m simply bursting with an idea, and I had to -hurry over and put it before you.” Sir John spoke eagerly, turning to -Norah with a laugh. “Is it a good moment to approach him, Norah? I want -him to promise to do something.” - -“He ate a noble breakfast,” said Norah, gravely. “And he’s nearly -finished his pipe. I should think the moment’s favourable. Anyway, it -will have to be now, because I simply can’t wait to hear what it is!” - -“You see, we know your ideas, O’Neill,” Mr. Linton said, laughing. “They -generally combine a great deal of trouble for yourself with something -quite new in the way of entertainment for us. This must be particularly -outrageous, as you want me to promise beforehand. I think you had better -make a clean breast of it.” - -“Well, it’s this,” Sir John answered. “The weather is glorious, and the -glass is high; it’s useless weather for fishing, and I think you have -explored this neighbourhood pretty thoroughly. The motor holds six quite -easily. What do you say to a trip north—a little tour, to last about a -week?” - -Subdued gasps came from Norah, Jim, and Wally. Mr. Linton laughed -outright. - -“What did I tell you?” he demanded. - -“Not at all,” responded Sir John. “I think”—unblushingly—“that Con -needs a change; and it would be an excellent way to give him one, if you -would only be kind enough to help me. You surely wouldn’t refuse poor -Con such a little thing!” - -“I’ve re-cast a good many of my ideas about Ireland,” David Linton said. -“But to utilize five people to take one chauffeur for a change is -certainly what I was brought up to call an Irish way of doing things! -Seriously, however, O’Neill, your proposal is a very tempting one. Shall -we put it to the committee?” - -“The committee says, ‘Carried _nem. con._’ I should say,” said Jim. “It -would be simply top-hole. But isn’t it putting rather a strain on you -and the motor?” - -“Certainly not—as far as I am concerned, a run in sea-air is all I need -to make me quite fit again,” O’Neill answered. “What do you say about -it, Norah?” - -“I’m speechless; and as for Wally, he’s leaning up against the ass for -support,” said Norah, indicating Mr. Meadows, who grasped the hapless -donkey fondly. “It’s the most glorious plan, Sir John; and it’s just -like you, to think of it.” - -O’Neill’s delicate face flushed with pleasure. - -“You’re all such satisfactory people, because you’re never bored,” he -said. “And then, you like Ireland, which makes everything delightful. -Well, I thought we might have a look at Horn Head and Sheep Haven, Mr. -Linton, and perhaps get across to The Rosses; or would you rather have -no fixed plan, but just wander about, seeking what we may find? There -are innumerable little bays and inlets up there, all rather fascinating; -we should be between mountain and sea scenery, and the inns here and -there are fairly good.” - -“I think we will leave it entirely to you, so far as planning the route -goes,” Mr. Linton answered. “You know the country, and we don’t; and as -for us, any part of Ireland is good.” - -“I vote for having no fixed plan at all,” Jim said. “It’s when you have -no plans that the best things happen to you!” - -“We’ll leave it at that, then,” said Sir John. “Can we start to-morrow?” - -“We have only two weeks more leave,” said Jim. “So the sooner we go the -better.” - -“And you can be ready, Norah?” - -“Me? Oh, certainly,” said Norah, who, Wally declared, was always ready -at any time for anything. - -“Then, I’ll be off,” Sir John declared. “I left Con hard at work on the -car, giving her a thorough overhaul—we could not believe that you would -be so hard-hearted as to refuse him the trip! But I have a good many -things to see to, and I’ll have a busy day.” - -“Could I help you?” Jim asked. “I’m handy at odd jobs.” - -“Would you care to? I’ll be awfully glad of your company,” said Sir John -warmly. They went off together, the boy’s great shoulders towering above -O’Neill’s dwarfed form. - -Jim did not return until late that night. Norah, just about to blow out -her candle, heard his light step on the stair and called to him softly. - -“Not asleep yet, kiddie?” Jim said, sitting down on the bed. “You should -be; you’ll be tired to-morrow.” - -“I’m all right,” said Norah, disregarding this friendly caution. “Jim, I -packed your bag; and there’s a list of things just inside it, in case I -made any mistakes.” - -“Well, you are a brick!” said Jim, who was accustomed to stern -independence, but, like most people, greatly appreciated a little -spoiling now and then. “I was looking forward rather dismally to a -midnight packing; O’Neill wants to get off quite early in the morning.” - -“We guessed that was likely. Did you have a good day, Jim?” - -“Quite. I don’t think I was any particular help to O’Neill; he found a -few jobs for me, but I fancy he had to rack his brains for them. But we -pottered about together all day, and had a very jolly time; he’s such -fun when he’s in good form, and he was like a kid to-day. Made me laugh -no end.” Jim pondered, beginning to unlace his boots. “I think it’s only -when he is alone that those bitter fits get hold of him; and he just -dreads being alone. That’s why he took me over, of course.” - -“I thought so,” nodded Norah. “But I do think he’s happier than he was, -Jim.” - -“I believe he is. Well, we’ll try to keep him laughing for the next week -or so, anyhow,” said Jim. “Now, you go to sleep, old kiddie.” - -The fine weather held, making it easy to leave trout which would have -nothing to do with them; and next day the motor took them away into -bypaths of Ireland, with new beauty and new legend at every turn. They -passed Gartan, and saw the birthplace of Saint Columba, a tiny stone -cell with a curiously indented stone; and Columba’s ruined church of -grey stone, roofless, and with almost-effaced carvings on its walls. -Near it a tall, narrow stone stood crookedly—all that remained of a -cross. The ground before it, hard as iron, was hollowed where the knees -of thousands of pilgrims had knelt in prayer, and the stone itself was -smooth from kisses that had been pressed upon it through century after -century. Sir John knew many legends of the hot-tempered, fighting saint, -whose warlike proclivities eventually led to his banishment from the -Ireland he loved, to work and suffer home-sickness until Death came at -last to release him. - -“The emigrants pray to him specially, since he, too, knew what it meant -to be lonely for Ireland,” Sir John said. “He was a worker: he wrote -three hundred books and founded the same number of churches. So he came -to be called Columcille—_cille_ meaning church. An O’Donnell he was: -one of the old house. He made a famous copy of the Psalms, the disputed -ownership of which caused the fight that led to his leaving Ireland: and -this copy—it was called The Cathach, or Battler—was an heirloom in the -O’Donnell family, who always carried it with them into battle, in a -shrine. One hates to think of him, exiled, working, and longing for -home. The first monastery he founded was near Derry; he was only a young -man then, but long afterwards he wrote that the angels of God sang in -every glade of Derry’s oaks. I always think one can see him in this -queer little church—big and powerful, with the fighting face and -toilworn hands.” - -For a time they kept near the railway that creeps through the heart of -Donegal: a quaint, narrow-gauge line where the trains saunter, forgetful -of time. Its way runs through deep bogs, which made its construction no -light matter, since solid foundation was in some places only found -eighty feet below the surface, and great causeways, embankments, and -viaducts had to be built to carry it. Sometimes, in contrast, the way -had to be hewn through solid rock. On one hand lay wild and rugged -mountains, with some fine dominating peaks: Muckish—“the hog’s -back”—with its long, flattened ridge, changing from every angle of -vision; and the great peak of Errigal, bare and glistening, the highest -mountain in Donegal. - -“It’s a great old peak,” said Sir John, looking at it affectionately. -“You can see Scotland from the top—and all over Donegal, and southward -to the Sligo and Galway hills.” - -“How it glistens!” said Norah, watching the great cone as the motor went -slowly along. “What makes it so white?” - -“That’s white quartz; it gives it its name, ‘the silver mountain.’ It -looks a single peak from here, but as we round it you’ll see that there -are really two heads close together; there is a narrow ridge, with a -track about a foot wide, connecting them. Some day, when you all come -back to stay with me at Rathcullen, we must arrange an expedition for -you to climb it.” - -Their wandering way led them from the railway line, after a time; and -they struck northward into lonely country of moors and bogs, dotted with -tiny cabins from which blue turf-smoke curled lazily. Once they passed -an old man riding a grey mare, with his wife perched behind him on a -pillion, holding under her shawl a turkey in a sack, from the mouth of -which protruded the head of the indignant bird, making loud protests. -None of the women they met, whether young or old, wore hats: all had the -heavy Irish shawl round head and shoulders,—and whether the face that -looked from the folds were that of a withered old woman or a fresh and -smiling colleen, somehow the shawl seemed the best setting that could -have been devised for it. - -Often, for miles and miles, they met no one and passed no habitation: or -perhaps the loneliness of the way would be broken by a little thatched -cabin, where ragged children ran to the doorway, to gaze, round-eyed, at -the strangers. In one little town, however, a fair was in progress, and -the cobbled street presented a lively spectacle. Men, women and -children; asses, ridden and driven; horses, cattle, sheep, and pigs, and -a few stray geese, mingled in loud-voiced confusion, while dogs slipped -hither and thither, managing to intensify the urgency of any situation. -To get the big Rolls-Royce through such a concourse was no easy task, -and even with a people so good-humoured, a tactless driver would have -achieved swift unpopularity. Sir John, however, was at the wheel -himself, and he slowed down to a crawl, sounding the hooter -occasionally, more in the manner of a gentle suggestion than anything -else. His Irish accent was a shade more in evidence than usual as he -exchanged greetings with the crowd. - -“’Tis a fine season we’re having, thank God!” - -“It is, your honour. G’wan now, Mary Kate; get the little ass out of the -way of the mothor.” - -“Ah, don’t be hurrying her. I have plenty of time.” - -“Sure ye’d need it, your honour, the place is that throng.” - -“And that’s a good sign; it’s a great fair you’re having!” - -“Well indeed, sir, it is not bad, thank God!” - -O’Neill swerved to avoid an old woman in an ass-cart, who was talking -volubly to some neighbours, while the ass took its own direction among -the crowd. Voices broke into swift upbraidings. - -“Take a howld of the ass there, will you, Maria Cooney!” - -“Oh, wirra, it’s desthroyed she’ll be!” - -“She will not, but the great mothor!” - -“Is it to scratch the beautiful paint ye would, with the cart!” cried a -wrathful man hauling the ass aside bodily, while the unhappy Mrs. Cooney -stammered out excuses that no one heard, and blinked feebly at the -Rolls-Royce—which was pardonable, since she had never seen one before. - -“God help us, ’tis the heighth of a house!” - -“I’m sorry to disturb you, ma’am,” said O’Neill, smiling at her -distressed face. The crowd broke into smiles in answer. - -“’Tis not like the Englishman he is—the one that galloped his machine -over Ellen Clancy’s gander, an’ he goin’ to Rosapenna!” shrilled a -voice. - -“Watch him now—and the bonnivs under the wheels of him!”—as a drove of -fat pink pigs broke through the crowd, scattered, in the infuriating -manner peculiar to pigs, and resisted all efforts to collect them out of -harm’s way. Their owner, a lean, black-whiskered man, lifted up his -voice and bewailed them. - -“Yerra, he have them thrampled! No—aisy, sir, just a moment, till I get -at him with a stick. That one do be always in the wrong place.” He -hauled a pig bodily from beneath the car, retaining it by one leg, while -it drowned any other remarks with its shrieks, and its companions -scattered through the crowd, pursued hotly by the dogs. - -“Sorry—I ought not to bring a motor through a fair,” said O’Neill, -willing to concede the right to the road to the “bonnivs.” - -“An’ why wouldn’t you?” said their owner, cheerfully. “Many’s the time -I’d not so much as the one left to me when I’d brang ’em through, an’ I -scourin’ every boreen after them. Let you go on, sir—it’s all right.” - -The motor wormed its way along. When the crowd grew less congested, -O’Neill ventured to increase the speed. Just as he did so, a small -child, escaping from its mother, who was driving a wordy bargain over a -matter of geese, toddled into the road in pursuit of a fat puppy; and -having caught it, sat down suddenly, right in the path of the motor. - -A girl shrieked, and O’Neill wrenched the car to a standstill, the -bonnet not two yards from the baby. Jim was out in the road in a flash, -and picked up the urchin, who showed considerable annoyance at the -escape of the puppy, but was otherwise quite unmoved, and accepted a -penny with a composure worthy of a duke. The crowd collected anew with -unbelievable swiftness, and O’Neill groaned. - -“’Tis Maggie O’Hare’s baby. Woman, dear, where are ye? an’ he after -being nearly kilt on ye?” - -“Did ye see his honour pull up? An ass wouldn’t have done it, an’ he -dhrawin’ a cart!” - -“I seen him sit down in the road, in-under the mothor, an’ I knew he was -dead, only I’d not time to let a bawl out of me!” - -“Is it dead? Sure, look at him, an’ the big gentleman carryin’ him, no -less!” - -“Grinning he is, the way you’d say he was the best boy in Ireland. Ah, -that’s the dotey wee thing!” - -“Sure, that one has no fear at all. _He_’ll be the boy for the -trenches!” - -At this point Maggie O’Hare arrived breathlessly, having just become -aware of her son’s peril—with some difficulty, owing to six of her -friends having excitedly explained the matter together. To an -unprejudiced onlooker, it would have seemed that her principal maternal -emotion was horror at finding her offspring perched on Jim’s shoulder. - -“Come down out of that, Micky—have behaviour, now, an’ don’t be -throublin’ the gentleman! Put him down, sir—I’d not have you annoyed -with him.” She received Micky with much apparent wrath, but her arms -were tight round the little body. “Isn’t it the rascal he is!—an’ I but -lettin’ him out of me hand that minute, the way I’d be feedin’ the -goose!” - -In England, Jim had learned to give tips; and for a moment his hand -sought his pocket. Fortunately, he checked the impulse in time. The -woman’s eyes met his with the good breeding that lends something of -dignity to the poorest Irish peasant. - -“He’s a great boy,” he said, in his pleasant voice. “Not a bit of fear -in him—have you, Micky?” He lifted his cap, and said “Good-bye,” -striding back to the motor. They moved on, slowly, leaving the little -town seething behind them. - -“It isn’t altogether without incident to drive through a fair!” said -O’Neill, dreamily. - -Towards evening they came to their halting-place for the night—a grey -village, nestling among brown hills. - -“The inn used to be very fair, but one can’t guarantee anything in -war-time,” Sir John remarked. “Of course it isn’t big enough to suffer -from the complaint that suddenly affected all the important hotels—the -hurried departure of French cooks and German waiters. Many hotel-keepers -will speak until the end of their lives, with tears in their voices, -about the awful day when Henri and Gaston, and Fritz and Karl, the props -of their establishment, dropped their aprons and fled to their -respective Fatherlands. You can’t convince those hotel-keepers that they -do not know all about the horrors of war!” - -“This little place doesn’t suggest imported cooks and waiters,” said Mr. -Linton. - -“No, as I remember it, the landlady was the cook, and her daughter the -housemaid; and a nondescript gentleman of the ‘odd-boy’ type doubled the -parts of boots, barkeeper, groom, and waiter, with any other varieties -of usefulness that might be demanded of him. And there he is still, by -the same token, bringing in a load of turf.” Sir John indicated a wiry -little man leading a shambling old black horse bearing two creels slung -across his back, piled high with sods. He turned into the back gateway -of the inn as they drew up at the front door; and, hearing the motor, -cast a glance over his shoulder, realized the presence of guests, and -administered a sounding slap on the black horse’s quarter, disappearing -hurriedly. They heard his voice, shrilly summoning the unseen. - -“Is himself within?—let ye hurry! There’s a pack of gentry at the door, -in a mothor-car!” And a voice yet more shrill: - -“Wirra! An’ me fire black out—an’ what in the world, at all, ’ll I give -’em for their dinners!” - -They made acquaintance with the problem a little later when, hungry and -cheerful, they gathered in the long, low dining-room, where last year’s -heather and ling filled the fireless grate. The “odd-boy,” cleansed -beyond belief, awaited them. - -“What can we have for dinner?” O’Neill inquired. - -“Is it dinner? Sure, anything you’d fancy, sir,” said the “odd-boy,” -with a nervous briskness that somehow induced disbelief. - -“H’m,” said Sir John, remembering the cry of woe that had floated -through the air, earlier. “Chops or steaks?” - -The “odd-boy” shifted from one foot to the other. - -“I’m afeard there’s none in the house, sir,” he said. “’Tis the way the -butcher——” - -“Oh well—cold meat,” O’Neill said, cutting short the butcher’s -iniquities. - -“Yes, sir—certainly, sir!” said the “odd boy,” and disappeared. There -was an interval during which the party admired the view and endeavoured -to repress the pangs of hunger. Finally the messenger reappeared. - -“I’m sorry, sir,” he said, nervously. “Cold meat is off, they do be -tellin’ me.” - -“Well, what can we have?” O’Neill said, losing the finer edge of his -patience. - -The “odd-boy” grew confidential. - -“’Tis this way, sir,” he said. “The fair was yesterday: an’ them -cattle-jobbers have us ate out of the house. So there’s just three -things ye can have, sir: an’ the first eggs; an’ the second’s bacon; and -third is eggs and bacon. An’ ye can have your choice-thing of them -three!” - - - - - CHAPTER XII - ASS-CART _VERSUS_ MOTOR - - - “The grand road from the mountain goes shining to the sea, - And there is traffic on it, and many a horse and cart: - But the little roads of Cloonagh are dearer far to me, - And the little roads of Cloonagh go rambling through my heart.” - EVA GORE-BOOTH. - -THROUGH the tiny window of Norah’s room came the soft sunlight which -makes an Irish morning so perfect a thing that to stay in bed a moment -longer than necessary would be criminal. Norah woke up, and looked at it -sleepily for a few minutes, wishing the window were bigger. It had -altogether declined to remain open the night before, until she had -propped it with the water-jug, which now stood rakishly on the sill, and -had already excited considerable interest and speculation in the street -below. She dressed quickly, somewhat embittered by the fact that -investigation discovered no sign of a bathroom. The search was a nervous -one, since the corridor seemed principally to consist of shut doors; and -after cautiously opening one which looked promising, but which revealed -a tousled head on a pillow, with loud snores saluting her, she was -seized with panic, and fled back to her own room. - -When she emerged, fully dressed, she still seemed the only person awake. -Downstairs, however, she encountered the “odd-boy,” who was sweeping the -hall with a lofty disregard of corners, wherein the dust of many -sweepings had accumulated in depressing heaps. Through a cloud of dust -he blinked in amazement at her. - -“Were you wantin’ anything, miss?” - -“No, thanks,” Norah answered; “I was going for a walk. Is there anything -to see in the village?” - -The “odd-boy” thought deeply, and finally replied with gloom that he -didn’t know why anybody would be looking at it at all. Then, suddenly -inspired, he hastened to the door in Norah’s wake. - -“There’s Willy Gallaher’s ould pig, miss, an’ she after having eleven of -the finest little ones yesterday. Ye’d ought to see them. Willy’s the -proud man. ’Twas himself was due for a bit of good luck, though, with -twins not a week old!” - -“Thanks,” said Norah, laughing. “But I’d rather see the twins.” Which -astounding preference left the “odd-boy” gaping. Twins were a -regrettable everyday occurrence, but eleven “bonnivs” were the gift of -Providence, and not to be lightly regarded. - -Norah made her way up the narrow street. The air was full of the -pleasant smell of newly-lit turf fires, and in the cottages the women -were beginning their day’s work. Children ran to peep over the half-door -at the stranger, and Norah, peeping over in her turn, saw fat babies -crawling about the earthen floors and made friends with them until their -mothers picked them up and brought them to the half-door for further -admiration. Thus her progress up the street was slow, and it was some -time before she came to the outskirts of the village and crossed a green -where asses, geese, fowls, and long-haired goats wandered sociably. - -Beyond the green the high road curved, and, following it, Norah came -upon a narrow river that tumbled from the hills, racing under an old -bridge of grey stone in a mass of foaming rapids. On the other side was -a little ruined castle, upon which she advanced joyfully, with the -passion for anything old which gave the Australians the keenest -enjoyment of all their experiences of travel. - -It was not much of a castle; the walls had long since collapsed into -heaps of broken stone, most of which had been carried away to build -cabins and were now concealed under the whitewash of years. A small -square tower yet stood, but was obviously unsafe, since the crumbling -stairway that wound upwards inside it had been shut off by rusty iron -bars. It was not easy to make out the outlines of what had been rooms, -for the stones had fallen in all directions, and grass and brambles grew -wildly over them. But everywhere, softening the cruelty and destruction -of time, ivy clambered; a kindly cloak of green that blotted out harsh -outlines and turned the whole into something exquisite. - -Norah crossed the bridge and climbed upon a half-fallen wall, perching -herself on a huge flat stone that lay bathed in sunshine. Above her the -jackdaws which nested in the ivy-covered tower chattered and scolded, -flying in and out to their homes; below was no sound save the hurried -babble of the river, where now and then came the flash of a leaping -trout. It was very peaceful. She tried to “reconstruct” it in the way -they loved, seeing again the old days when the castle stood proudly, and -chieftains and fair ladies, richly clad, moved about the rooms and -looked through the narrow window slits at the river, running just as it -ran to-day. It was a fascinating employment; so that she did not hear a -light step, until a falling stone brought her back to the present with a -jump. - -“Did I startle you?” Sir John asked, looking up at her. “They told me -you had gone out, and I guessed that if you weren’t somewhere playing -with a baby you would have found the ruin!” - -“The babies and the ruin are both lovely,” Norah said, smiling. “I’m -taking them in turn.” - -“Did you sleep well?” Sir John asked, climbing up to the wall, and -lighting a cigarette. - -“Oh, yes, thanks; only the morning was too nice to stay in bed. I had -such a funny little room, all nooks and corners.” - -“_I_ had a feather bed!” said Sir John, with a wry face. “Awful things; -I don’t know how people ever slept on them. It was very huge and puffy, -and I sank down into its depths, and felt as if the waters were closing -over my head. Then I dreamed wild dreams of battle. Altogether, I feel -as if I had an adventurous night.” - -“I read once of an old woman who slept on a turkey-feather bed for -twenty years, until at last all the feathers stuck together in a solid -mass like a mat, and he had a sealskin coat made out of it!” said Norah. - -“I’d love to believe it, but it beats any fishing-yarn I ever heard,” -said Sir John, regarding her fixedly. “Do you believe it yourself?” - -“I don’t know anything about the ways of featherbeds,” Norah said, -laughing. “But I always thought she must have been an unpleasant old -lady, for it showed clearly that she hadn’t shaken up her mattress for -twenty years. Oh, Sir John, did you find a bathroom?” - -“I did not; there isn’t one. I’m sorry, Norah. We ought to have better -luck at our stopping-place to-night.” - -“I suppose one can’t expect baths everywhere,” Norah said. “The queer -part to us is being charged extra for one’s tub; no hotel in Australia -ever does anything so ungracious. They rather encourage one to take -baths there.” - -“It’s a ridiculous charge, especially where a water-supply is no -trouble,” O’Neill answered. “Did I ever tell you the story of a friend -of mine who was staying in a very old-fashioned country-house, where his -early cup of tea was brought in by a very old butler? My friend asked -for a bath, and was told there was no hot water available—‘the pipes -have froze on us,’ said the butler, sadly. Next day it was the same; but -the third morning the butler came in with triumph in his eye. - -“‘Sure, the bath will be all right this morning, sir,’ he said, -confidentially. ‘I have the hot wather beyant.’ - -“He went out, and returned panting under an enormous bath of the flat -tin-saucer variety, which he put down with pride, while my friend—who -happened to be as big as your father—watched him, much thrilled. Next -he laid down a smart bath-mat, and hung over a chair a bath-towel as -large as a sheet. Finally, he went out, and brought back a very small -can of hot water, which he poured very carefully into the bath; as my -friend said, it made a thin film of wet on its great flat surface. The -old butler straightened up, beaming. - -“‘Now, sir,’ he said, proudly—‘ye can have your little dive!’” - -Norah’s shout of laughter was echoed by Wally and Jim, whose heads -suddenly appeared over the ivy-covered wall. - -“I don’t see why you retire to ruins to tell your best stories, -O’Neill,” Jim said. “Also, we feel that it’s breakfast-time, and we’ve -been scouring the country for you both.” - -“I begin to feel that way myself,” Norah said, jumping down. - -Mr. Linton was smoking in front of the hotel. In the dining-room, the -“odd-boy,” again thinly disguised for the moment as a waiter, hovered -about their table for orders, a procedure which seemed superfluous, -since the possibilities of the house did not exceed the inevitable bacon -and eggs. No one, however, was disposed to quarrel with the meal; and -very soon after, they were again on the road, leaving the friendly -little village by a winding highway that soon brought them within sight -and sound of the sea—one of the deep inlets that thrust themselves far -into the wild northern coast of Ireland. The road led, now close to the -shore, now striking across country to find a short cut over the neck of -a peninsula. They skirted little bays where a golden beach gleamed -invitingly, and ran out on rocky headlands, on which the sullen sea -thundered. Inland, the country grew more and more lonely and desolate. - -“How on earth do these people get a living?” Jim ejaculated, looking at -the wretched cabins in a tumbledown village. “The soil is nearly all -stone—and how horribly bleak it must be in winter! This is July, and -still the wind is wild enough.” - -“I don’t think they get much of a living at all,” Sir John said. -“Fishing helps, of course; and all the able-bodied men hire themselves -out for the harvesting to Scotch and English farmers, and bring home -what seems a big sum in these parts, together with stories of the wealth -across the water: - - “The people that’s in England is richer nor the Jews— - There’s not the smallest young gossoon but thravels in his shoes!” - -“Indeed, they don’t do that here,” said Mr. Linton, looking at the -ragged boy by the wayside. - -“Not they—shoes only come with years of discretion, and often, not -then. But don’t they look rosy and well?—nothing of the pinched look of -the youngsters in a city slum.” - -“No—I think the air must be nourishing!” remarked Wally. - -“You’re quite right; it is. But they grow little crops, in tiny corners -between the stones. The soil is bad enough; they are lucky if they are -near the sea, for then they can bring up mussels and kelp as manure. -There’s a woman bringing some now”; and Sir John pointed to a bent -figure, bare-legged, a red shawl over head, and on her back a huge -basket, beneath which she was labouring up a steep cliff-path. “She has -a kish full of shell-fish there—you wouldn’t find it a light load, even -on the level, but they carry hundreds of them up these cliffs. There are -parts of Donegal so bleak that they have to warm the ground before -sowing the seed; they burn the dried sea-weed on the prepared soil, and -sow the crop while the ashes are still smoking.” - -“Great Scott!” said Jim, feebly. “Fancy an Australian doing that!” - -Sir John laughed grimly. - -“I fancy an Australian would flee in horror if he were offered as a gift -a tract of land that supports hundreds of these people,” he said. “You -should see them reaping their tiny, pocket-handkerchief crops; they do -it with a little reaping-hook, and, upon my word, some of them are so -small that you might harvest them with a pair of scissors! Of course -they’re not worth much; but then these people are accustomed to live on -very little, and they scarcely need more than they have, if the sea is -kind and the fishing fair. They look wild enough; but they are -intelligent, even if ignorant, and you will always meet with courtesy -among them.” - -“They would make great fighting men,” Jim observed, watching a -broad-shouldered, dark-faced young fellow who was digging in a tiny -field by the road. He had paused to look at the motor, one foot on the -spade, and his splendid young body upright. - -“Oh, every sound Irishman is that naturally,” Sir John said, with a -laugh. “And the women could do their bit if occasion arose. Did you -hear, by the way, of the women of Limerick, when some of the disaffected -idiots of whom there are too many in the country made a pro-German -demonstration there lately? They chose a day when most of the loyal men -of the city were away; these fellows were from Dublin, and they made a -procession and planned quite a little show. But they reckoned without -the women.” - -“What—did they take a hand?” asked Mr. Linton. - -“They did, indeed, with sticks and stones and whatever other missiles -came handy. It was most effective: they broke up the procession -completely, and the gallant rebels had to be rescued by the police. The -women had a great day. I asked one why they didn’t leave the matter -entirely to the police, and she looked at me in scorn and asked why -would they accommodate themselves with the ignorance of policemen? And -indeed, I didn’t know. After all, some things are managed much better -without the law.” - -The road had for some time been leading away from the sea, and now began -to climb up a steep cutting, between rock-walls fringed with ferns and -mosses. On the hills above them a few goats browsed, their kids cutting -capers among the boulders, with complete enjoyment of the game. They -mounted steadily for awhile; then, topping the rise, began to glide -downwards. The road turned and twisted as they neared the level ground, -following the course of a little stream that came rushing from some -unseen source. Sir John, who was driving, sounded his horn steadily. - -“There are not many people on these roads,” he said, over his shoulder. -“But it doesn’t do to take risks with the country folk.” - -“No. Still, I never saw a more desolate road, so far as traffic goes,” -Mr. Linton answered. “We have not seen a soul for miles on it.” - -“I don’t think there _is_ a soul on it,” said Sir John, laughing. - -The motor swung round a corner, with a prolonged hoot; and there, so -close that the bonnet of the car seemed almost to be touching the ass’s -nose, came an old woman, nodding sleepily in a cart. There was no time -to stop, and no room to turn. The ass planted all four feet stubbornly, -stopping dead, and they heard a faint cry from the shawled old figure. - -“Sit tight,” said O’Neill between his teeth. - -The brake jammed hard on as he spoke; they had been running down-hill -slowly, with the power shut off. The ass backed indignantly; and the -great motor swerved to one side, where there was a little more room in -the cutting, bumped heavily over dry channels worn by the winter rains, -and rammed her bonnet gently into the rock wall. The occupants of the -tonneau found themselves in a heap on the floor. The car throbbed to -silence, and the old woman in the ass-cart said, “God help us!” loudly. - -“Well, indeed, He did,” said O’Neill, under his breath. “Are you all -right, all of you?” - -“We’re mixed, but undamaged,” Jim answered. “What about you, O’Neill?” - -“I’m all right. How is she, Con?” - -Con had swung himself out before the car finally stopped, and was -examining the battered bonnet dismally, finally appealing for help to -push her away from the wall. - -“In a minute,” O’Neill said. - -He walked over to the old woman, who still sat motionless on the floor -of the ass-cart, her withered face pitifully afraid. - -“Did you not hear the horn?” O’Neill asked. - -“I did, sir—but I didn’t rightly know what it was, an’ I half asleep.” -She rocked herself to and fro, wretchedly. “Oh, wirra, the great mothor! -Is it desthroyed entirely, sir?” - -“It is not—but it’s the mercy of Heaven we’re not all killed, and you -and the little ass, too. When you hear that horn, mother, get to one -side of a road quickly: and don’t be afraid to call out, if it happens -to be a narrow road.” - -“I . . . I . . .” She looked at him helplessly, her voice breaking. - -“Don’t worry—you’re all right,” he said gently. “Is it tired you are?” - -“I been sittin’ up with my son these two nights,” she said, finding -words. “Mortal ill he was, an’ the woman he married no more use than a -yalla-haired doll. An’ when they’re sick they do be wantin’ their -mothers again, like as if they’d gone back to be little boys.” Just for -a moment he caught a gleam of triumph in her dulled eyes. - -“And is he better?” - -“He is, sir, God be praised, and I’m gettin’ home to me man; there’s no -knowin’ what he’ll have done to himself, not used to bein’ alone and -all.” - -Something passed from O’Neill’s palm into the trembling, work-worn old -hand. - -“That’s to bring you luck for your son,” he said, forestalling her -protests. “Let you get home, mother, and have a meal. Wait a moment.” - -He unscrewed the cap of his flask, and made her drink out of the silver -cup, to her own great horror. - -“If I’d a tin, itself!” she protested. “But your honour’s cup!” - -“Drink it up,” said O’Neill, unmoved. He took back the cup and stood -aside; and the little ass moved on, the old woman calling down blessings -upon him, with tears finding well-accustomed furrows down her cheeks. - -“Sitting up two nights, and probably doing the work of the house during -the day, in addition to nursing; and most likely on bread and stewed -black tea!” said O’Neill, indignantly, striding back to the motor. “You -wouldn’t wonder if she went to sleep in front of the car of Juggernaut. -Poor old soul! I say, you people have been busy!” - -They had levered the heavy car back, chocking the wheels with great -stones, and the chauffeur was making explorations into her vital parts. -Sir John joined him, and they discoursed unintelligibly in technical -language. - -“Well, it might be worse, but it’s not too good,” Sir John said, at -last, emerging from the investigation and wiping his hands on a ball of -cotton-waste. “There’s no moving her without men and horses, and no -getting her going again until we get some spare parts; and they’re no -nearer than Belfast or Dublin; possibly we shall have to telegraph to -London for them.” - -“But she’s not desthroyed entirely?” Norah said, happily. - -“She is not. Hadn’t we the luck of the world that it happened where it -did, just on level ground and where there was a little room to manœuvre! -If it had been three minutes earlier, on the side of the hill, in the -narrow cutting, we should simply have gone clean over the poor old soul -and her ass. Nothing could have saved them.” - -“It might easily have been infinitely worse,” Mr. Linton said. “But I’m -sorry for the car, O’Neill.” - -“Oh, the car’s nothing,” Sir John answered, cheerfully. “I’m only sorry -for the interruption to our trip. However, things might be more -uncomfortable. We’re only three or four miles from Carrignarone, where I -meant to stop the night: there is quite a passable inn there, small and -homely, but it’s clean and comfortable enough. We could stay there for a -few days, while Con goes to Belfast to get what is necessary—that is, -if you like. The coast is interesting, and we might get some -sea-fishing. Of course, if you thought that too slow, we could drive to -the railway, and get back to Killard.” He looked rather wistful. “I had -hoped this was going to be such a jolly trip,” he said. - -“Why, so it is,” Jim responded. “I’m awfully sorry for the damage to the -motor, but we’re going to have plenty of fun all the same. It will be -rather good fun to be on a coast again, and we’re all keen on -sea-fishing. And you know, O’Neill, we wouldn’t make any definite plans, -so that the unexpected could take charge of us!” - -“It has certainly done that,” Sir John said, laughing. “Well, I think -the next thing is lunch: a good thing I got the hotel to put us up -something, though it will probably be only hard-boiled eggs.” - -It _was_ hard-boiled eggs, and they ate them merrily, sitting on the -bank of the little stream, where lichen-covered boulders, smooth and -weather-worn, made convenient seats. - -“I am perfectly certain,” Mr. Linton said, “that if I were in London and -ate an enormous meal of soda-bread, eggs like bullets, and very black -tea out of a Thermos, I should have dyspepsia. Not that I ever had it; -but the mixture sounds dyspeptic when you couple it with London. But -sitting on the bank of a Donegal river it seems quite the proper thing, -and I shall be very well after it.” - -“No one could be anything but well in Donegal,” Wally said, decisively. -“Whew-w, Jim! think of the trenches, in a fortnight!” - -“I’d rather not, if you don’t mind,” said Jim, lighting his pipe. “I -want my little hit-back at Brer Boche, but I’d much rather it was in the -open: there’s no romance in war when you carry it on in an -over-populated ditch.” - -“Lucky young animals!” said Sir John, openly envious—and the boys -flushed a little. As a rule, they were careful not to talk of the Front -in the presence of the man whose whole soul longed to be out there with -them. “But you’ll all come back, won’t you? and Mr. Linton, when the war -is over, or when these ancient campaigners next get leave, you will -bring them back to Rathcullen? I want to know that that is a settled -thing.” - -“That is a matter which I don’t need to put to the committee,” Mr. -Linton replied, looking at the cheery faces. “We’ll certainly come, -O’Neill, since you are so good. And then, when we pack up finally for -Australia and Billabong, what about you? You know it’s high time you -visited that little country of ours.” - -“He’s coming with us,” said Norah, with decision. “Say you are, Sir -John—please!” - -“Well, indeed, I begin to think I am,” O’Neill answered. “I was getting -terribly old when you invaded Donegal, but now I believe I shall soon be -nearly as young as Mr. Linton! At any rate, I might follow you out.” But -the boys protested, arguing that there was no point in travelling alone -when they might make a family party. - -“It would be miles jollier,” said Wally. “Then we could ‘personally -conduct’ you to Billabong, and you would have the unforgettable -experience of seeing Brownie go mad. I’m quite certain she and Murty -will be delirious on the day that Norah comes marching home again!” So -they planned happily, in gay defiance of the guns thundering across the -Channel. That sullen menace was only a fortnight ahead, and already -Norah dreamed of it at night. But in the daytime it was better to -pretend that it did not exist. - -Con was left with the motor, to administer what “first-aid” was -possible: and after lunch the rest of the party set off along the road -to Carrignarone, which was reached after an easy walk of an hour and a -half. It was a little fishing-village, boasting a better inn than others -of its type, since in normal years the sport to be obtained brought a -small harvest of visitors. War, however, had meant lean times—wherefore -the people of the inn fell thankfully on the windfall afforded them by a -stranded party of six, and ran three ways at once in preparing for their -comfort. A cart, with a couple of strong horses, was forthcoming, and -under the charge of Jim and Wally, set off to the rescue of the -motor—which was eventually towed into the village, where it caused what -the war-reports term “a certain liveliness.” At the steering-wheel sat -Con, a picture of humiliation—deepening to disgust when the carter -politely offered him a whip! - -“Them machines do be all very well to play with, for genthry an’ for -them that have too much money,” said the carter, drawing a distinction -that was not lost on his hearers. “But ’tis mighty glad they are of the -ould horses when annything goes wrong with the works!” Which was so -obviously true at the moment that no one had any spirit to contradict -him. - - - - - CHAPTER XIII - THE CAVE AMONG THE ROCKS - - - “The great waves of the Atlantic sweep storming on their way, - Shining green and silver with the hidden herring-shoal; - But the Little Waves of Breffny have drenched my heart in spray - And the Little Waves of Breffny go stumbling through my soul.” - EVA GORE-BOOTH. - -WALLY ran out upon a point of rock that ended abruptly in a sheer face, -under which the outgoing tide ran swiftly, deep and green. For a moment -he stood motionless, his slim body gleaming white against sea and rock; -then he curved forward and shot into the water in a clean dive that made -scarcely any splash. He reappeared, shaking the water from his eyes, his -brown face glowing. - -“Coo-ee, Jim! Come on—it’s ripping!” - -Jim appeared from a cave, shedding the last of his raiment. There was no -pause in his dive; his swift rush along the point ended in a leap that -carried him far out, and when he emerged, strong over-arm strokes -carried him quickly in towards a tiny bay where hard yellow sand made a -perfect landing-place. Wally gave chase, unavailingly: when his feet -touched the shore Jim was already racing again along the rocks, his dive -this time beginning with a complete somersault in the air, before, with -a mighty splash, he disappeared once more. Wally came hard upon his -heels, springing in, in a sitting position, his hands locked under his -knees; and for the next twenty minutes the chums sported in the water -like a couple of seals, racing, playing tricks upon each other, and -practising the dozen different dives taught them in schoolboy days in -Australia. Finally they rubbed themselves down with dry, warm sand, -donned their clothes, and subsided, glowing, on a sunny rock, to light -their pipes. - -“What a perfect place for a swim!” Jim said, looking at the long, narrow -inlet with its twin headlands. “That point only needs one thing, Wal—a -really good spring-board.” - -“Yes. Do you remember the big spring-board in the St. Kilda baths—the -one you broke when you were trying how high you could spring before -diving?” - -“Do I not!” said Jim ruefully. “It was the pride of the baths, and -replacing it made me a poor man for the rest of the term!” He pitched a -shell far out into the sea. “Doesn’t that seem ages ago!” - -“So it is: anything that happened before the war _is_ ages ago,” Wally -answered. “And I suppose, when we get back to Billabong, all this”—he -swept a comprehensive gesture that included Ireland and Europe—“will -seem a kind of prehistoric dream. Anyhow it’s a good dream while it -lasts.” - -“Yes, it’s all too good to have missed it,” Jim said. “Ireland has been -jolly, beyond our hopes, thanks to O’Neill—what a brick that poor chap -is! Now if we can only finish up by a bit of real fighting, it will all -be a huge lark. I’m not a scrap sorry to have been in the trenches; it -was all good experience. But I say, Wal, I do want to get going above -ground!” - -“Rather!” Wally answered. “I want to take a hand in a general worry, and -afterwards to be in it when we chase the lovely Hun back to his happy -home. And I specially want to be there when we chase ’em out of -Brussels: I’d like to see that plucky Belgian King marching down his -main street again. Won’t they howl!” - -“We’ll all howl when that day comes,” said Jim. “You know, Ireland has -been just topping, and it’s jolly to be with old dad and Norah again; -but I’m beginning to think it’s about time we got back to work. We’re -fit as possible now; and we didn’t sign on to play about. This sort of -thing”—he touched his rough tweed clothes—“was all very well when we -were crocks. But we aren’t crocks now. I think, of course, that it was -only common sense to get quite fit; they don’t want half-cured people -over yonder. Still——” - -“Still, being cured, it’s time we dug out our khaki again,” Wally said, -nodding. “I quite agree: one would begin to feel a shirker if one stayed -much longer. And Australians haven’t shown themselves shirkers in this -war.” - -“No. It’s funny, you know,” Jim reflected. “I did hate the trenches—the -filth, and the flies, and the smells, and the vermin; and I used to -wonder if I was a tin-soldier, and had no business to have come at all, -because lots of chaps say they love it, no matter what the conditions -are. Well, I didn’t love it; I’d sooner have driven bullocks, any day.” - -“Same here,” said Wally. - -“It used to buck me that you felt the same,” Jim said, “because of -course I knew you weren’t any tin-soldier, and the other fellows used to -say how keen you were, and that you’d get on well.” - -“But they said just the same to me about you, you old ass!” said Wally -laughing. “Who got a special pat on the back at the last inspection, I’d -like to know?” - -“Oh, that was only luck,” said Jim, much embarrassed. “Bit of eye-wash -for the C.O. Anyway, I used to worry for fear I wasn’t any good at the -game; and it worried me that I was so awfully glad to come away, after -they gassed us. But lately, I’ve been a bit bucked, because I’m getting -no end keen to be back. We’ll hate it again, I’m certain. But one has -got to see the job through. You feel it too, don’t you?” - -“’M,” nodded Wally. “I suppose it’s just the beastliness one hates, but -one likes one’s job.” - -“I expect so. I used to get horribly annoyed with young Wilson, in my -platoon, but I’d like uncommonly to know how the little beggar is -shaping now, and who has the handling of him. He’s a queer-tempered, -obstinate, cross-grained varmint, but he’ll do anything for you if you -treat him like a human being. Only you can’t drive him. I hope we’ll get -our old crowds back—though I’m afraid it’s rather too much to hope -for.” - -“I’m afraid so,” Wally agreed. “My corporal was a dear old thing; only -he would persist periodically in forgetting that I was grown-up. I don’t -blame them—the old N.C.O.’s know ever so much more than we do. That -chap had been all over the world, and seen no end of service; he’d have -had a commission if he could have kept off beer. It was when he was -drunk that he used to think I was his small boy. I had my own troubles -with him”—and Wally grinned reminiscently. - -“They were such a good lot of fellows,” Jim said. “Oh, it will be pretty -good to get back; and to see Anstruther and Garrett and Blake, and all -the crowd again, and make them fight their battles over for us. It’s one -of the annoying parts about our dose of gas that I haven’t the slightest -recollection of our own little scrap. I used to remember the beginning; -but now my only memory is of you sitting on a biscuit-tin eating bully, -and I’m sure that happened before the fun began. I wonder if the other -fellows will have much to talk about?” - -“Well, _we_ won’t, anyhow,” Wally said. “Ireland isn’t the place for -adventures. Let’s hope we may get some good specimens of our own in -Flanders—and in Germany—and then we needn’t envy any of ’em.” - -“Rather!” assented Jim. “I say, suppose we move on—the sun isn’t as hot -as it was, or I’m colder than I was; and anyhow, we may as well -explore.” He sprang up, followed by his chum, and they strolled across -the rocks. - -The party had been at Carrignarone for three days, and there was, as -yet, no word from Con, who had departed on an outside car, _en route_ to -Belfast, to obtain what was necessary to restore the motor to health. -Not that anyone minded the delay. The little inn was clean and -well-kept; the sea-fishing was good, and the bathing perfect; while the -shore, with its alternating strand and rock, was a never-failing -fascination. Wally and Jim had made friends with an old fisherman, who -had taken them out with him very early that morning; and luck had been -so good that they had come in some hours earlier than they were -expected, so that the big haul they brought could be taken to the -railway and landed in Dublin in time for the next morning’s market. At -the inn, they found that Sir John, Norah, and Mr. Linton had gone out, -leaving no word of their movements; so the boys, after an enormous -lunch, had departed to explore the shore farther than their previous -walks had led them, until the long narrow inlet had tempted them to -bathe. - -They strolled round the beach from the point where they had dived, now -and then picking up a curious shell or some sea-treasure that might be -included in the parcels that went periodically to Billabong, where -Brownie would have cherished the veriest rubbish if only her nurslings -had gathered it for her. The tide was almost out, and at the farther -headland the rocks lay uncovered for a long way, full of alluring -rock-pools, gleaming with sea-anemones. It was impossible to round the -point, however, for it was higher than the other headland, and the water -roared at its base, even at low tide; so they strolled back across the -rocks, looking for the nearest place where it would be possible to climb -up and cross the point. - -The crags above them grew more accessible presently, and they scrambled -up, slipping and clambering until they found themselves on a jutting -rock with a wide flat surface, which, bathed in sunshine, invited them -to stop and rest. Loose fragments of rock lay about the flat top, and -Wally perched on one, but rose hastily. - -“That thing wriggled under me,” he said, “It’s just on the balance: I -believe I could push it over.” - -“‘That Master Wally have the mischieviousness of ten boys,’ as Brownie -used to say,” Jim remarked, lazily. “Sit down, and don’t play tricks -with the landscape.” - -“It would be considerably like hard work, so I don’t think I will,” said -Wally, sitting down on another fragment. “This old table of a rock wants -tidying up, I think—did you ever see so many loose chunks scattered -about?” - -“I expect a bit of the cliff fell on it from above, and flew into bits,” -said Jim. “Anyhow, it’s warm and jolly. What’s that?” - -Something tinkled on the rock, and Wally uttered a sharp exclamation of -annoyance. - -“Botheration! That’s my knife.” - -“Hard luck!” said Jim, looking at a cleft in the surface, down which the -knife had vanished. “Never mind; I’ve got two with me, and you can have -one.” - -“Thanks, but I don’t want to lose that fellow,” Wally said, vexedly. -“It’s that extra-special knife Norah gave me when I was going out—the -big one she called ‘the lethal weapon.’ It’s full of all sorts of -dodges. I’d sooner lose a lot of odd things than that knife.” - -He lay flat, and put his eye to the cleft in the rock, peering -downwards. - -“Afraid it’s gone for good, old man,” Jim said. “It’s hard luck—but -Norah will understand. She’ll probably jump at the chance of giving you -another.” - -“I want this one,” said Wally, his voice slightly muffled. He peered -harder. “I say, Jim, I can see daylight down here.” - -“I don’t see how you can,” Jim said, leaning over in his turn. “This old -rock seems pretty solid. Let’s look.” He applied his eye to the cleft, -in his turn. - -“Well, there is light,” he said presently, sitting up. “I wonder if -there’s some opening below, Wal?” - -“Don’t know, but I’m going to see,” Wally answered. He swung himself -over the edge of the flat rock and climbed down, followed by his chum. -They hunted about the great pile, seeking for some opening that might -explain the glimmer of daylight that had greeted them above. - -On one side of the mass was the long stretch of rock from which they had -first climbed up; but on the other they found smooth hard sand, only -lately under water. There were openings here and there among the -boulders, but they led to nothing, and had no communication with the -upper air; they explored them in turn, but found no solution of the -problem. Then, as Wally was backing out on hands and knees from one of -these false scents, he heard a low whistle from Jim, and hurried round a -boulder, to find him regarding what looked like a slit, about three feet -high, between two masses of rock. - -“There’s some sort of a cave in there,” Jim said. “I’ve been in a little -way, and it looks rather interesting, so I came back for you. There’s -light far above one’s head; I believe we’ll find your knife there.” - -They crawled into the narrow passage. Almost immediately it turned, so -sharply that a casual searcher might easily have been misled into -thinking it ended: and then it widened and they found themselves in a -long, narrow cave. They could see no roof; but far above, a faint bar of -light glimmered, and made it possible to see where they were going. -Underfoot was hard sand. The walls were dripping with wet and encrusted -with seaweeds and limpets. - -“This is a real sea-cave,” Wally said cheerfully. - -An echo took his voice and went muttering round the rocks, the mutter -rising at length almost to a cry. It was an eerie sound, in the wet dusk -of the cave, with the dark smell of a submerged place in their nostrils; -and the boys jumped. - -“I guess this isn’t a place to raise one’s voice in,” Wally said, -dropping his to a whisper. “That’s a nice, tame echo; I’d like to take -it back to Billabong!” - -“Would you!” uttered Jim, with feeling. “The blacks would say it was the -Bunyip come back; and anyhow, you’d get into trouble for bringing out a -prohibited immigrant.” He made a quick pounce on an object that -glittered faintly on the sand. “There’s your knife, old man!” - -“Bless you!” said Wally, thankfully receiving his property. “I say, what -luck! and haven’t you the eye of a hawk?” - -“Why, I kicked it,” said Jim. “A good thing it’s so big: I always -thought Norah gave it to you with the idea that you might club a few -Germans with it, if you got the chance—and scalp ’em afterwards. Get -out!—” as Wally tipped his cap off. “Remember that you’re in a -subterranean locality, and behave as such. Hark at that echo!” - -He had raised his voice, unwittingly, and the echo had sent it shrieking -round the cave. It was quite a relief when the sound died away to a low -murmur. - -“I’m not at all sure that it isn’t the Bunyip, an’ he livin’ here at his -aise, as Con would say,” Wally muttered. “Come on; we’ll see how far -this place goes.” - -The light grew dimmer as they moved on, away from the crack overhead. -Fortunately, Jim was never to be found without a tiny electric torch in -his pocket, and its little beam of light was sufficiently to guide them. -But for the torch their explorations would certainly have come to an end -immediately, for it was not half a minute before they found themselves -against a wall that apparently ended the cave. - -“Well, it isn’t much of a cavern, after all,” Jim remarked. “Not bad as -a dressing-room for Norah, if she wants to bathe from this -beach—there’s clear sand right down to the water from the entrance in -one place. She will have to come at low tide, though.” - -He flashed his torch into the comers as they turned to retrace their -steps. One was plainly nothing but solid wall: but in the other -something caught his eye; a darker patch of shadow that was not quite -like the rock. - -“Why, I believe there’s an opening in that corner,” he said. “It must be -another cave, communicating with this one. Come and see.” - -The opening was only wide enough to admit one at a time, and so screened -by a jutting boulder that it was almost invisible. Within was a cave -very like the first one, though much larger; differing from it, too, in -that the sand ended, and the floor was of fairly smooth rock, which, in -the middle, held a great pool of water. This time there was no doubt -that they were at the end of their subterranean journey; Jim flashed the -light right round the wall, but there was no break in the solid rock, -glistening with wet. - -“Well, that’s the finish,” Wally said. “It isn’t a wildly exciting -place, except for that demoniacal echo. We’ll bring Norah and the others -here and make it talk. I’d like to hear what its little efforts would be -like if one gave a football yell!” - -“Something would break,” said Jim, suppressing a laugh. He strolled -across to the pool, and turned the light on its black surface. - -“That is a deep and mysterious and probably, haunted water-hole and -you’d better be careful,” said Wally in a sepulchral whisper. “Most -likely the Bunyip lives there, and in a moment we shall see his grisly -head emerge from the unfathomed depths, and then all will be over with -two promising young officers of His Majesty’s Army.” He paused for -breath. - -“Idiot!” said Jim, pleasantly. “I wonder if it’s deep. Lend me your -stick, Wal.” - -He leaned over the pool and thrust the stick into its depths. It went in -for its full length. Then came a sound which made the boys look at each -other in bewilderment. - -“It sounds as if the Bunyip had been chucking his old tins in,” Wally -said. - -“It’s tin, I’ll swear,” Jim answered. “And solid at that; I can’t move -it.” - -He took off his coat, rolled his shirt-sleeve to the shoulder, and -recommenced investigations. It was easy enough to feel the stick -scraping on tin; beyond that, he could make out nothing, save that there -was plenty of tin to scrape. Jim desisted at length, and stood -pondering. - -“I think this is pretty queer,” he said, presently. “Wonder if we’ve -stumbled on a smuggler’s cave, Wal. Look here, I’m going to paddle.” - -“Well, you don’t know the depth of that beastly place,” Wally said. “For -all we know it may be miles deep.” - -“Well, can’t I swim?” Jim queried in amazement. - -“Yes, a little. Anyhow, I’m coming, too.” - -Jim laughed softly. - -“I thought that was it,” he said. “Look here—you stay at the edge with -the light, and I’ll hold one end of the stick, and you can hang on to -the other. That will make it all right. There’s no sense in out both -paddling in.” - -Wally assented, more or less reluctantly; and Jim took off his boots and -stockings and rolled his trouser-legs high. Then, he stepped carefully -into the black pool. - -“By Jove, it’s cold!” he said. - -“What’s the bottom like?” - -“Fairly smooth.” He moved on, becoming less cautious. Then he uttered an -exclamation. - -“What’s up?” came from Wally. - -“I’ve stubbed my silly toe against something—my own fault.” Jim -answered. “Why, it’s another tin!” - -He stooped, feeling in the water. Presently he let go of the stick, and -plunged both hands in: and in a moment turned, carrying something that -was evidently heavy. He put it on the rock at the edge of the pool, and -stepped out of the water. Wally flashed the light on the treasure-trove, -and then whistled softly. - -“Petrol!” - -Jim nodded. - -“The pool is full of it, I believe: I felt lots of other tins.” He -turned the big square can over and over, finding no mark upon it. “H’m. -Now I’m going to put it back.” - -“Why are you in such a hurry?” - -“Because I don’t know whom we have to deal with,” Jim said. He waded in -again and replaced the heavy tin, returning quickly, and picking up his -boots and stockings. - -“Slip out and reconnoitre, carefully,” he said. “Take care that you -aren’t seen. Find out if anyone is in sight.” - -Wally returned in a few minutes. - -“Not a soul,” he reported. “And there’s not a footmark visible on the -sand, except our own.” - -“That’s good, anyhow,” Jim said. “We’ll get out of this.” - -He led the way out, not speaking until they were clear of the rocks near -the cave. Then he sat down, and for the first time the two boys looked -at each other. Their faces were grave. - -“It’s submarines, of course?” Wally asked. “Germans?” - -“Couldn’t be anything else. And what a depôt! Look at this inlet—shut -in by the headlands, with a perfect sandy bottom: a submarine could come -in here and lie in complete safety, and no one would ever dream of -looking for her. The cave is not five minutes from the water’s edge, -even at low tide—of course, no one could get in to it at all unless the -tide were right out: when it is in there’s a foot of water over the -entrance.” - -“Yes—and at low tide the sand is as hard as iron,” Wally said, -excitedly. “They could fill their collapsible boat with petrol tins in -ten minutes with two or three men to fish them out of the water and a -few more to carry them down. Oh, Jimmy, we’ve got to bag them!” - -“Rather!” Jim answered. “The question is, how?” - -He thought deeply. - -“We must be awfully careful,” he said, at last. - -“It’s much too big and important for us to mess up by trying to keep it -to ourselves. But there isn’t a policeman in the district, and if there -were, he might mess it up as badly as ourselves. We’ve got to get a -patrol-boat round to the inlet somehow; you know they’re all round the -coast, and it wouldn’t take long to bring one here. But one doesn’t know -whom to trust. The Germans may be getting help from on shore, for all we -can tell.” - -“Of course they may,” Wally cried. “People say there are plenty of -pro-Germans about; and they’d pay well enough to tempt these peasantry. -But all the people we’ve talked to in Carrignarone seem just as keen as -we are about the war. I don’t believe they’re in it.” - -“Neither do I, but it’s hard to tell,” Jim answered. “Oh, it’s -maddening!—the brutes may come in to-night, for all we know! We can -telegraph to the nearest coastguard station, of course, or wherever one -can catch a patrol-boat—there are some sort of instructions about -submarines and aeroplanes posted up in every post-office. But she might -not be in time.” - -“I suppose we can trust the postmistress?” - -“If we can’t, we’re done,” Jim said. “If only the motor were all right -we needn’t trust anyone. Isn’t it simply sickening to think we may do -the wrong thing altogether? And if we make a mistake, and the submarine -gets away with a fresh supply of petrol, she may sink half a dozen -_Lusitanias_ before she is caught!” - -“We’ve just got to get her,” Wally said, between his teeth. “It seems to -me there’s only one thing to do: we must telegraph for the patrol-boat, -and, meanwhile, watch every night at low tide. It’s a comfort that they -can’t get into the cave at any other time, isn’t it? I say, Jim, your -father said we were kids to bring our revolvers with us—but isn’t it a -mercy we did!” - -“Rather!” Jim said. The revolvers had been new toys; they had not felt -able to part from them. “And O’Neill has one, too—you remember, he said -we might have some shooting-practice in these lonely parts and teach -Norah how to use one.” He became silent, suddenly, and Wally, watching -his thoughtful face, did not interrupt him. After a while he spoke, -half-apologetically. - -“I say, Wal, old chap.” - -“Yes?” - -“Look here,” Jim said. “It’s your show as much as mine, of course, and I -won’t do anything to which you don’t agree. But——” he stopped again. - -“Oh, do go on!” said Wally. “Say it!” - -“Well, it’s just this. We’ll get lots of shows later on, if we’ve any -luck: not so important as this, perhaps, but still, there ought to be -chances. Anyhow, we’re able to go out to the Front and do our bit. And -that poor chap isn’t.” - -“O’Neill?” Wally said. “No.” - -“Well—do you see what I mean?” - -“It takes brains,” said Wally, laughing. “But I think I do. You want to -make this his show?” - -Jim nodded. - -“It wouldn’t hurt us,” he said. “He is such a brick, and he’s eating his -heart out over the whole thing. It’s just the toughest sort of luck—and -here he is, knocking about with us and giving us a ripping time, and -you’d think that every time he looks at us it must remind him of what he -wants to have and can’t. And now here’s a thing he could be right in.” - -“Rather!” Wally said. “I’m jolly glad you thought of it, old man. And it -isn’t any beautiful sacrifice on our parts, either, for he has tons more -brains than we have, and he’s a first-class shot. Let’s get him to run -it altogether, and we’ll be his subalterns.” - -Jim sighed with relief. - -“It seemed a bit hard to ask you to give up the credit,” he said. - -“And what about you?” grinned Wally - -“Oh, credit be hanged!” said Jim, laughing. “Anyhow, we’ll get all the -fun!” - - - - -[Illustration: “Wally flashed the light on the treasure-trove, and then -whistled softly.”] - - _Jim and Wally_] [_Page_ 225 - - - - - CHAPTER XIV - A FAMILY MATTER - - - “To count the life of battle good, - And clear the land that gave you birth, - And dearer yet the brotherhood - That binds the brave of all the earth.” - HENRY NEWBOLT. - -JOHN O’NEILL was dressing for dinner: an operation which consisted in -putting on a clean soft collar and brushing his hair, since the -travellers’ possibilities of toilet were limited to one small kit-bag -apiece. To him there came a discreet knock on the door; and Wally and -Jim, suitably apologetic, appeared. - -“You look like conspirators,” said Sir John, surveying the pair. “What’s -the matter?” - -“We’ve struck a job that’s a size too large for us,” Jim answered. “So -we’ve come meekly to you.” - -O’Neill’s short laugh was rather bitter. - -“Too large for _you_!” he said. “If that’s the case, it would be rather -an out-size for me, I should say.” His look travelled over the two tall -lads, wiry and powerful. “Unless—it isn’t money, I suppose, Jim?” - -“No, indeed; it’s brains!” Jim answered. “And we haven’t got any. -Anyhow, we don’t know how to handle this situation.” - -“Well, I’m at your disposal,” Sir John said. “Fire away—there’s plenty -of time before dinner.” - -“We’ve found a little submarine supply-depôt,” Jim said. “What does one -do?” - -O’Neill dropped his brush, and stared at him. - -“You say it much as you might say, ‘We’ve found a mushroom: how do we -cook it?’” he uttered. “It isn’t a joke, Jim?” - -“Indeed it’s not,” the boy said, quickly. “It’s because it’s so horribly -serious that we’ve come to you.” - -“But—where?” - -“In a little inlet about a couple of miles up the coast,” Jim said. -“Funny little shut-in place: you could sail past it outside and never -notice it, the headlands are so close together.” He described their -discovery briefly. - -O’Neill sat down on the side of his bed and knitted his brows. - -“Of course, the first thing is to get a patrol-boat down,” he said. “As -it happens, I know Bob Aylwin, who is in command of one of them: his -headquarters are at Port Brandon, and he could get here quite quickly.” - -“Then we must telegraph, I suppose,” Jim said. “But we were wondering if -it would be safe; things leak out so quickly in a tiny place like this, -and you know that people ashore are said to be helping the submarines in -some districts. One doesn’t like to misjudge anyone, but——” He paused, -knitting his brows. - -“One has to suspect every one,” O’Neill said, shortly. “And telegrams -are horribly public things.” - -“If only the motor were available!” Wally said, anxiously. - -“But it is!” - -They stared at him. - -“Didn’t you know Con was back? He turned up early this morning, with the -things he went for: and he and a handy man he picked up have been inside -her bonnet ever since. He came in just now to report that she is ready -to start.” - -“Oh, good business!” ejaculated Jim. “Will you send him?” - -O’Neill thought swiftly. - -“I can trust Con absolutely,” he said. “But he’s an ignorant lad, and he -is lame. Would your father go with him, do you think?” - -“He’ll do anything,” Jim said, quickly. - -“Wally, will you bring him here?” O’Neill asked. “Hurry!” He sprang to -the table and opened a touring map of Donegal. “Where’s your inlet, -Jim?” - -“Here,” Jim replied, promptly, indicating a tiny indentation on the -rugged coast-line. - -O’Neill drew a line round it with a red pencil. - -“It will be quite clear on Aylwin’s charts, of course,” he said. “This -will be sufficient guide to begin with. Now can you draw a rough plan of -the cave and the path down to the water? I’ll explain to your father.” - -Mr. Linton came hurrying in, and at Sir John’s request Wally told him -the story, illustrating it with Jim’s drawing. - -“I know the inlet,” David Linton said; “I walked past it the other day -when I was out for an early-morning stroll. Queer, land-locked corner: I -marked it down as a good bathing-place for you youngsters.” - -“That’s excellent, for you’ll be able to direct them by land, if -necessary. Now, will you go in the motor to Port Brandon, Mr. Linton? -it’s only twenty miles, and Con knows the roads. They’re not good, but -he’ll get you there quickly.” - -“I’ll do anything you like,” David Linton said. “What will you do here?” - -Sir John had taken instinctive command of the situation. For a few -moments he did not speak. - -“Aylwin must use his own judgment about coming,” he said. “He may not -want to appear here in daylight, for fear of scaring the enemy away; on -the other hand, they may be here already, lying snugly on the bottom of -the inlet, and only waiting for night and low water to get the petrol. -You say the pool was full of it, Jim?” - -“So far as I could tell. I poked with a stick from one side, and waded -in from the other. The tins are stacked in it; I don’t think they can -have taken any out.” - -“All the more likely that they will soon be in,” O’Neill said. “I knew -they had been in the north lately; the brutes nearly got one of our -transports. But if Aylwin shows up off the mouth of the inlet he may -scare them away altogether. If one knew what was best to do! We’ve got -to bag them!” His eyes were dancing. “Great Scott! what a chance it is!” - -There came a knock at the door, and Norah’s voice. - -“Is dad here?” - -The conspirators looked at each other guiltily. - -“Norah must be told,” Jim said. “She’s perfectly safe; and we can’t -carry on this without explaining to her, poor kid. May she come in, -O’Neill?” - -Sir John was already at the door. Norah, her face troubled, spoke -hurriedly. - -“I’ve been looking everywhere for dad or the boys. Are they here, Sir -John?” - -“Come in, if you don’t mind,” O’Neill said, holding the door open. He -closed it carefully behind her. “We’re having a council of war, Norah, -and——” - -Jim interrupted him, watching his sister’s face. - -“Is there anything wrong with you, Nor?” - -“There’s something I thought I’d better tell you,” Norah said. “I went -along the road just now with some sweets for those babies in the end -cottage, beyond the village; and coming back I got over the bank into -the field to get some wild flowers. Just as I was going to climb back I -heard voices, and I peeped through the hedge and saw two men—men in -rough clothes. They had been buying things in the village, for they had -parcels, and some bread that wasn’t wrapped up. So I bobbed down behind -the hedge until they had gone past—they didn’t look nice, somehow.” - -“Yes,” said Jim. “Did they see you?” - -“No, it’s a lonely bit of the road, and there are no houses. I don’t -suppose they even thought of any one being there. And, Jim, they were -talking in German!” - -“Are you sure?” - -“Perfectly. I couldn’t make out what they said, for their voices were -very low—and anyhow I never learned enough German at school to -understand it when spoken. But I do know the sound of it, and I caught -one or two words.” - -O’Neill drew a long breath. - -“If that U-boat isn’t lying on the bottom of the inlet I’ll eat my hat!” -he said. “Probably they put up a collapsible boat last night and sent -her round to some other beach—they’ll take risks to get fresh food. And -to-night she’ll paddle back and get her cargo of petrol, and the -submarine will take her on board and slide out to do a little more -pirate-work. But we may have a few remarks to make first. If I only knew -what Aylwin would want to do!” - -He sat down, and put his face in his hands. Presently he looked up. - -“Jim—is there driftwood on the shore?” - -“Lots,” said Jim, briefly. - -“That’s all right. Could we get some up on one of the headlands?” - -“Oh—easily. We were bathing off the northern point, and there’s quite -an easy way up—it isn’t nearly as high as the southern headland. Do you -mean enough for a fire?” - -“Yes. Mr. Linton, will you tell Captain Aylwin that he need not come -right in to shore. We will build a signal-fire on the northern headland, -and watch the cave at low tide—that will be about two o’clock in the -morning. If the Germans come ashore, we’ll light the fire—we can carry -up a few bottles of petrol from the motor supply to soak the drift-wood. -Aylwin can have a boat ready and come in if he sees the blaze; unless he -sees it he will know they won’t land for another twenty-four hours, for -they’ll never try it in the daytime. Is that clear?” - -“Quite. I have only to describe the place to Captain Aylwin, tell him -about the signal-fire, and accompany him if he needs me. Otherwise, I -suppose I may break the speed-limit in coming back?” - -“Of course. There’s a wireless station up there—they’ll get Aylwin for -you. If he should be away they will know where to send a message.” - -“Very well. And what will you three do?” David Linton’s eyes lingered -hungrily on his son. - -“We can only get the beacon ready, and then watch. Two of us can hide -near the cave, and the third must be up on the point to light the fire -if he hears a shot. If they come—well, we must let them land and get to -the cave; and then we must try to prevent their getting back.” - -“You will be heavily outnumbered.” - -“Yes—but the advantage of surprise will be on our side, and we can take -cover. I do not dare to get help; it may not be safe to trust anyone.” - -“Very well,” David Lint on said, quietly. “Will you order the motor, -O’Neill? I can be off in three minutes.” - -He shook hands with the boys, wishing them luck very gravely knowing -that in all probability it was the last time he should speak to them. -Jim went downstairs with him, without a word. - -Con and the motor were at the door. - -“You’ll be there by eight o’clock, with luck,” O’Neill said. “Remember, -you’re racing, Con. And——” He dropped his voice. “I’ll keep him safe -for you if I can, sir.’ - -“Thanks,” said David Linton. He shook hands with his boy again. The -motor whirred off in a cloud of dust. - -They went up the staircase in silence, to where Norah and Wally waited -for them. - -“Wally has told me all about it,” said Norah, pale, but steady-eyed. -“Oh, Sir John, I could help! Do let me.” - -“You can help by keeping out of harm’s way,” he told her, gently. - -“And you all fighting!” - -“Norah, dear, we can’t have you in it,” O’Neill said. “I know it’s hard: -far harder than anything we have to do. But you have too much sense not -to know that this isn’t woman’s work.” - -Norah choked back a sob. - -“I know you couldn’t have me where there’s shooting,” she said. “But I -can do something, if you’ll let me: and in Australia women always did -help men when there was need, and they didn’t talk about things being -‘women’s work.’ Women had to fight the blacks, too.” - -“Norah, we _can’t_ let you fight,” Jim said. “Be sensible, old kiddie.” - -“I don’t want to fight,” said poor Norah. “At least, I do, but I know -that’s out of the question. But why on earth shouldn’t I light the -beacon?” - -“Because there would be risk,” O’Neill said roughly. “Norah, I hate -hurting you. Don’t make it harder for us.” - -“I don’t want to, indeed I don’t,” Norah faltered. “But . . .” There was -a lump in her throat, and she turned away, fighting for her voice. Jim’s -arm round her shoulders steadied her. - -“You know you’ll be outnumbered,” she said. “You can’t tell any of these -people, and there are only the three of you until daddy brings help. And -one of you is going to light the beacon! If you let me do it, it leaves -you all free to fight; and there’s no risk to me. No one will be on the -point. I’d only have to light a match and get out of the way.” - -“No,” said Wally, his young voice strained. “You aren’t going to do it.” - -“I know what it will be,” Norah said. “The one of you who lights the -beacon will come tearing down the rocks to help the others, and the -Germans will just shoot him easily. I needn’t do that; I can hide up on -the point. There isn’t any risk—not a bit.” - -“Oh, Norah, Norah, I wish you’d gone to bed!” uttered Jim. “Don’t you -see we can’t let you?” - -“No, I don’t,” said his sister. “You haven’t any right to stop me. You -know it will be only a chance if you three can stop the submarine going -out if help doesn’t come in time. And if there are only two of you, it’s -so much less chance. Dad’s gone away looking dreadful, only he wouldn’t -say a word, because he knows he hasn’t any right to hinder you.” Norah -was sobbing openly now. “And you have no right to lose any chances. We -can’t let that beastly thing go out, to sink other ships full of women -and kiddies like the _Lusitania_ babies. Goodness knows I’m f-fool -enough,” said poor Norah. “But at least I can put a match to a fire!” - -“She’s quite right,” Jim said, quietly. “All serene, Nor. Buck up, old -kiddie!” - -“Jim—you can’t——!” Wally burst out. - -“I can’t agree to it,” John O’Neill said, wretchedly. - -“She’s quite right,” Jim repeated. “The job is bigger than we are. It’s -only a question, as she says, if all three of us can check those people -at the cave: and if we can get the beacon lit in any other way, we -simply have no right to reduce our number by one-third. There really -should be no danger: she has only to put a match to it, and get away -before the firelight shows her up.” He spoke firmly, but his young face -was drawn and haggard. “I am quite sure dad would say the same.” - -“I know he would,” Norah said. - -“And I thought this was rather a lark!” said Wally, with a groan. He -turned and walked to the window. - -“If you are certain your father would be satisfied, I have no more to -say,” O’Neill said. “It certainly makes an enormous difference: three -can stop a rush where two would be hopelessly outclassed. And the man -coming down from the headland wouldn’t have a chance: the people on the -submarine would get him in a minute.” - -“Remember,” said Wally sharply, turning from the window, “as soon as -your match is lit, duck, and crawl away. That old wood will flare wildly -directly it’s lit, if it’s soaked in petrol. Don’t wait a second.” - -“I won’t,” said Norah, and nodded at him cheerfully. “Don’t worry; I’ll -be all right.” - -“All right! I think it’s awful to let you do it!” Wally uttered. - -“Wally, I’ve _got_ to. Don’t you see I have?” Norah put her hand on his -arm. - -“Yes, I suppose I do,” he said. “All our lives put together don’t matter -twopence if we can put an end to even one submarine. I know we must let -you. But I wish to goodness we’d left you in Australia!” - -“Wally!” Norah flushed scarlet. - -“I say . . . I didn’t mean to be a beast,” the boy said, contritely. -“Only—I just can’t stand it!” He went out, his swift strides echoing -down the corridor. - -“Don’t mind him, little chap: he’s only worried about you,” Jim said, -gently. “He’ll be all right when he comes back.” - -“At any rate, we mustn’t have you bothered,” Sir John said, patting -Norah’s shoulder. “You’ll need to be quite calm and cool for your job, -and for getting away quietly after it. And I really don’t believe you’ll -be in any danger; the Germans can’t possibly rake that point with -gunfire from the submarine. They might hit a standing figure, but not -one lying flat. And I hope the men on shore will be too busy to take -interest in beacons.” There was a grim note in his voice, but his face -was extraordinarily happy. - -“The more I think of it,” Jim said, “the more likely it seems that we’re -here just in time. You see, they can’t get into the cave except at low -tide; and of course they want darkness. But there’s very little darkness -just now; it’s twilight until nearly ten o’clock, and then dawn comes -not long after three, or even earlier. The tide is out just before dawn: -the very best time for them to work. In a few days it would not suit -them nearly so well.” - -“Quite so,” O’Neill said. “Everything seems to point to to-night or -to-morrow. I would hope with all my heart for to-night if I were sure of -Aylwin getting here in time; for every day means more risk of their -suspecting us, especially if they are in league with any of the people -on shore. The Irish peasants are very quick to suspect a stranger.” - -“Oh, I hope it’s to-night!” Norah cried. “But, Sir John, supposing we -can—I mean, you and the boys can——” - -“Not a bit of it—it’s certainly ‘we,’” said O’Neill, laughing. - -“Well, supposing we can cut off the men who come ashore. What will the -submarine do? We can’t touch her.” - -“There’s where Aylwin comes in, of course,” O’Neill said. “If we can cut -off the shore party and keep them from rejoining the submarine, I don’t -think she can get away. She would not have much fuel, for one thing; and -for another, she does not carry enough men to spare those we may have -the luck to bag. She would probably submerge; but she can’t remain below -more than twenty-four hours; and then the destroyer would get her -easily. Of course, there is a lot of supposition about it all. I am -calculating by the little I know of submarines, but the Germans may have -a later and more powerful pattern that I don’t understand, with a larger -crew. We can only do our best. It ought to be a good fight, anyhow.” - -A knock came, and Jim opened the door. - -“The misthress is afther sending me up to say the dinner’ll be spoilt on -ye,” said a patient voice. “Them little chickens do be boiled to rags; -’tis that tender they are they’d fall asunder if you did but prod them -with your finger!” - -“We’ll hurry, Mary,” said Jim. “Come on, you people.” - -“Dinner!” said Norah. “Oh, I don’t believe I could eat any.” - -“Yes, you could,” said Wally, appearing suddenly. “Little girls who -won’t eat dinner can’t light bonfires!” He tucked her hand into his arm -and raced her down the staircase. At the foot, he stopped. - -“Norah, I’m sorry,” he said. “Is it all right?” - -“Of course it’s all right,” said Norah. “But you were never cross with -me before, in all your life, and don’t you do it again!” - -“I never got you mixed up in a war before!” said Wally soberly. “Don’t -you do it again, either!” - - - - - CHAPTER XV - PLANS OF CAMPAIGN - - - “They are fighting in the heavens: they’re at war beneath the sea— - Ay, their ways are mighty different from the ways o’ you an’ me!” - DUDLEY CLARK. - -DINNER at the Carrignarone Hotel, where the Australians and Sir John -were the only guests, was apt to be a lengthy and hilarious affair, with -everybody very hungry and very merry, and with jokes flying, much to the -disorganization of the waitress, who was wont to spend much of her time -in clapping her hand over her mouth and rushing from the room. When the -necessities of the meal forbade these hasty retreats, the waitress was -apt to explode in short, sharp gasps, greatly endangering whatever dish -she happened to be handing. - -This evening, however, the younger members of the party were inclined to -be unusually silent. Mr. Linton’s vacant seat was in itself depressing; -and since it was impossible to talk of the subject seething in their -minds, conversation of any kind was not easy. But John O’Neill was like -a child; and before long they all fell under the spell of his merriment. -Never had they seen him in such a happy mood. Every line was smoothed -from his worn face, and his eyes danced with an eager joy that was -almost uncanny. All his being seemed transformed in the complete -contentment that had possession of him. Deliberately he set himself to -make the others laugh; and succeeded so well that they astonished -themselves by making an extremely good dinner and feeling, at its -conclusion, considerably reinforced for the work that lay before them. - -O’Neill led the way out to the little landing-stage near the inn, where -the fishing-boats were anchored, their brown nets drying on rough fences -on the beach. They sat down on some upturned fish-boxes, looking -westward across the water, where the sun was preparing to set in a glory -of golden cloud. - -“Now I’m going to be sensible,” Sir John said. “I’ve been thinking out a -plan of campaign, and I want your views.” - -He brought out from his pocket a plan of the inlet, drawn by Jim—a -companion to the one Mr. Linton had carried to Captain Aylwin. - -“You have ‘Flat Rock’ marked here over the cave,” he said. “Is that the -rock you were sitting on when Wally dropped his knife?” - -“Yes, that’s the one,” Jim answered. “It has a cleft in it through which -the knife went down—just wide enough to admit the knife. It’s really a -kind of lid over the rocks that form the first cave.” - -“And you said there were loose boulders lying on it?” - -“Yes; big fragments of rock. I should think that a big chunk of the -cliff must have fallen on it once, probably splitting it and making the -crack, and breaking itself as well. A lot of it went down: the biggest -piece buried itself partly in the sand.” - -“That’s the boulder that almost hides the entrance, then?” - -Jim nodded assent. - -“It’s about three feet from the entrance and a good deal wider than it,” -he said. “There are so many similar rocks lying about that it would be -quite easy to miss the cave altogether.” - -“Then I take it that the top of the flat rock is above high-water mark?” - -“Oh, yes,” Jim answered. “High-water mark is about a foot over the top -of the entrance, and the rock is quite four feet higher than that. -Otherwise I don’t fancy the waves would have left those big pieces of -loose rock lying on it.” - -“That’s what I wanted to know. Now listen. Suppose the Germans land, and -most of them disappear into the caves, to fish for petrol. What is to -hinder two active people, armed with levers, from sending down from the -top of the rock enough boulders to block the entrance?” - -Jim started, his pipe falling from his hand. - -“By—Jove!” he uttered. “What a ripping idea!” - -“Why, we could do it as easily as possible,” Wally said, excitedly. “The -rocks are quite close to the edge: one of them is so loose that we were -rocking it this afternoon. We’ve pretty hefty muscles—we could send -half a dozen over in no time with a couple of iron bars. Glory, O’Neill, -you _have_ a head!” - -“Yes,” said Jim, his eyes dancing—“and they could hardly miss the -entrance, because the big boulder in front would prevent their rolling -out too far. What chumps we were, not to think of it, Wal!” - -“Then you’d have the Germans like rats in a trap—and with no shooting -at all!” Norah cried, delightedly. - -“Something like that: with luck,” said O’Neill. “Of course, they would -have a guard posted outside, and another at the boat. But the main crowd -would be inside, I should think.” - -“It’s really rather a staggering notion, it’s so simple,” Jim said. “And -I don’t see how it can go wrong.” - -“It certainly simplifies our plan of action,” O’Neill remarked. “And it -doesn’t beat us, even if it fails; you would have to jump down among the -boulders, in that case, and do the best you could with your revolvers as -the people inside came out—which they would do in a hurry. My own -little game must be the boat and the guard at it. It’s rather important -that it should not be allowed to get back; a submarine without a -collapsible is rather like a horse with a lame leg.” He turned his face -towards the sunset, its expression of child-like happiness stronger than -ever. “Wow! isn’t it going to be a jewel of a fight!” - -Jim laughed. - -“Aren’t you the Berserk!” he said. “But I don’t much like being -separated. You’ll be careful, O’Neill, won’t you, and keep well behind -cover? There are plenty of boulders near where they must land.” - -“Rather!” Sir John answered. “For once in my life I have a job that -matters, and I’m certainly not going to risk carrying it out by getting -shot unnecessarily. They won’t leave a strong guard at the boat: a -submarine crew is too limited to use many men, and then, so far as we -know, they feel perfectly safe, and have no reason to take extra -precautions. Speed will be their main idea; they must make the most of -the short time between low-water and daylight.” He swung round towards -Norah, smiling at her. “How are you feeling, mate?” - -“I’m feeling very cheerful,” said Norah, whose face bore out her words. -“There isn’t nearly so much danger for the boys on top of the rock, is -there, Sir John?” - -“Certainly not; if they can block the entrance from above they may not -even have to use their revolvers—which will be a sad blow to them,” -O’Neill answered. “I’m always against promiscuous shooting, especially -when there are ladies present—even to satisfy fire-eaters like Wally -and Jim!” - -“Are you sure you’ll be all right, Sir John?” - -“I’ll be as right as possible,” he assured her, laughing at her anxious -face. “All I have to do is to sit comfortably behind my little rock and -pot at fat Germans; and when you hear me potting, you can light the -beacon and crawl away with discreet haste. I hope you realize that we -couldn’t carry out this plan at all if we hadn’t you as fire-lighter: we -couldn’t do without a fourth hand.” - -“I’m so glad,” Norah said, happily. “When do we start, Sir John?” - -“We’ll slip out about half-past nine,” he answered. “You and I will -stroll along in one direction, and the boys in another, and we can meet -near the northern headland where we must have the beacon. Each of us -must carry a bottle of petrol—I’ll see to getting them ready; and as we -go we can pick up stray bits of wood. There is driftwood everywhere on -the beach, and we can collect plenty beyond the inlet: I don’t want to -go there, nor do I want to show up on the north headland while there is -much light. We don’t know where the Germans you saw this evening may be -hiding—though I would think, judging from the direction in which they -were going, that their boat must be hidden in a tiny bay that lies south -of the inlet. Still, it doesn’t do to risk things.” - -“I suppose,” said Wally, “those fellows with the boat will stay wherever -they are hiding until nearly low-water; then they’ll pull round to the -inlet, and the submarine will bob up, and they’ll take the other men on -board and go ashore after the petrol.” - -“That’s the most likely thing,” O’Neill said. “We must be in position -long before that. A good thing it’s a warm night: still, we shall have -to lie still for a good while, and you’d better dress warmly, all of -you.” He looked at his watch. “Nine o’clock, and time we began to get -ready. There are crowbars in the old shed Con used as a garage, boys; I -noticed them this morning. I’m going after bottles for the petrol.” - -He stood up, looking at the three young faces. They were all eager; but -it was as though a living light glowed in his own dark eyes. He held his -gallant head high, the twisted body forgotten. - -“I’d like to say ‘Thank you,’ only I don’t know how,” he said. “If you -hadn’t come, this wouldn’t have happened; and now, whatever comes, I’ll -always have it to remember that just once in my life I had a chance of a -man’s job.” His light stride carried him quickly across the beach. - - - - - CHAPTER XVI - THE FIGHT IN THE DAWN - - - “The fighting man shall from the sun - Take warmth, and life from the glowing earth; - Speed with the light-foot winds to run. - And with the trees to newer birth; - And find, when fighting shall be done, - Great rest, and fulness after dearth.” - JULIAN GRENFELL. - -IN the little inlet, shadowed by the high rocks, everything was very -quiet. The tide was running out rapidly: foot by foot the smooth -boulders came out of the sea, to stand like sentinels until once more -the heaving green water should swing back and climb gently until it -rippled over their heads. Inch by inch the opening grew, forming the -entrance to the cave under the rocks, and the water slid out as though -rejoicing to escape from its dark prison within and to seek the laughing -freedom of the sea that tumbled beyond the headlands. Overhead a -half-moon sailed, now and then blotted out by drifting clouds; and in -the East was the faintest glimmer of the coming dawn. But the water of -the little bay lay black and formless, and though the sands showed, -visible and pale, the shadows that lay about the great boulders were -like pools of ink. - -On the flat rock over the cave Jim and Wally crouched, now and then -moving cautiously to keep their tired limbs from stiffening. It was very -cold, in the silent hour before dawn. Two hours earlier they had climbed -down from above, making use of the scant moonlight or clinging like -limpets to the cliff when the clouds blotted out the moon’s faint -radiance: glad to arrive at their destination with nothing worse than -bruises and torn clothes. - -Once on the rock, they had set about their preparations: crawling all -over it, making sure of knowing every inch in the dark, and becoming -acquainted with each boulder that lay upon its surface. They tested them -with their crowbars in the darkness, and found it possible to move all -but two or three. The great fragment that balanced near the edge they -levered nearer still, so that only a little effort would be needed to -send it crashing down; and then they moved others near it, working with -caution that was almost painful, lest even a scratch of rock on rock -should carry a warning across the dark water. Below them, the waves had -at first rippled and splashed against the crags; but gradually they -receded, and leaning over, lying flat on the stone, they could make out -the position of the great boulder that marked the entrance to the cave, -and so make sure that their balanced rock was in the right place. Then -there was nothing to do but wait. - -How the minutes dragged! Far up on the northern headland, Norah crouched -among sparse furze and heather, unheeding the prickly branches that -forbade comfort. The edge of the low cliff prevented her seeing the -inlet; she could only watch the dim outline of the coast, stretching -northward, and the stormy sky with its hurrying clouds. Before her -loomed dimly the heap of petrol-soaked wood and furze which they had -roughly piled in the darkness behind a boulder that hid it from watching -eyes, should any be on the alert. She had expected to be afraid when at -last they had all shaken hands with her and wished her luck before -creeping away to their posts; but now she found that she had no sense of -fear. Jim had stayed behind for a moment and kissed her, calling her -“old kiddie” in the way she loved. In the agony of wondering if she -would ever hear his voice again there was no room for fear for herself. - -John O’Neill had had longer to wait before climbing down to the beach. -He had lain on the edge of the high ground, motionless, taking advantage -of every moonlit moment to learn by heart the scene below as the tide -crawled backward. Jim’s plan was fresh in his memory: now he stared at -each boulder, studying opportunities for cover and making out the path -that the Germans must take to the cave. He knew where it was, though he -could not see it: it relieved him, too, that he was unable to discern -Jim and Wally, or to hear the faintest sound of their presence, although -he knew they must be on the rock. Finally, he made his cautious way to -the beach, and followed the tide out yard by yard, creeping from one -shadow to another: a shadow himself, white-faced and frail, among the -rugged boulders. - -It was very cold, on the wet sand; he shivered, and his teeth chattered. -He fell to rubbing himself steadily, chafing his wrists and ankles; but -it seemed as though the long watch would never end. Once, when the -clouds suddenly blew apart and the moon shone more brightly, he fancied -he saw a dim shape outside the headlands: a shape that might have been a -ship. But before he had time to be certain the dark masses overhead -drifted together once more, leaving him in doubt as to whether it had -not been his imagination. - -The shadow of dawn came in the east, and O’Neill felt his heart sink. -They were not coming, after all: soon it would be daylight and the tide -would turn and come creeping back to hide the cave for another twelve -hours. For a moment the keenness of disappointment made him shiver, -suddenly colder than he had ever been; and then his heart thumped and -the blood seemed to rush through his veins. Something, long, and grey, -and very faint was showing on the water. It was not a dream: he heard a -faint plash that he knew was an oar, muffled yet distinct in the deep -stillness: and then a low mutter of a voice, coming across the sea to -him. He drew a long, satisfied breath, and felt a hatchet that hung at -his belt, as he had felt it a hundred times, to make sure that it hung -where he could draw it easily. Then his hand closed on the revolver in -his coat-pocket and clung to it almost lovingly. For the first time in -his life it did not matter in the least that he was a hunchback. - -The low sound of oars came nearer, and gradually, out of the darkness, a -boat loomed upon the water and grounded softly on the strand. They were -not half a dozen yards from where O’Neill crouched in a patch of black -shadow, watching between two rocks. The men in her stepped out, quietly, -but showing no sense of danger. They were more in number than he had -expected; there would be a stiff fight if Jim and Wally failed to trap -them. He crouched lower, scarcely daring to breathe. Then one who was -evidently in command gave a low curt order and they filed off along the -winding path between the strewn boulders, leaving two of their number in -the boat. - -The rocks hid the main body for a moment. The guards worked the boat -round until her bow pointed outwards in readiness for the run back to -the submarine; then they came out, stamping on the sand to keep warm. -One of them, a thick-set fellow in oilskins, strode inland a few yards, -pausing so close to O’Neill that the Irishman could have touched him, -and for a sick instant he thought he was discovered; but the sailor -strolled back to his companion with a muttered curse at the cold, and -they stood by the boat, talking in low tones. O’Neill searched the rocks -with his eyes, straining to see the entrance to the cave. Surely it was -time for them to have reached it. Would the sound he longed for never -come? - -Then came a long reverberating crash, and another, and yet another and a -long, terrible cry, and above it a shrill whistle. The men on the beach -swung round, breaking into a torrent of bewildered furious speech. On -the northern headland came a flicker of light that spread upwards and -soared in a sheet of flame; and simultaneously Sir John fired at the man -nearest him and saw him pitch into the water on his face. The second man -rushed at him as he rose from behind the rock, and he fired again, and -missed; and the German Was upon him, towering over the slight, misshapen -form, and firing as he came. O’Neill felt a sharp agony in his side. The -two revolvers rang out together, and the German staggered and fell -bodily upon him, crushing him to the sand, while his revolver flew from -his hand, splashing into a pool in a rock. - -The Irishman twisted himself from under the inert weight, and struggled -to his feet. A German was rushing towards the boat, threading his way -among the rocks, his face desperate in its bewilderment and rage. The -sight gave strength to John O’Neill anew; he ran to the boat, staggering -as he ran, and pulling at his hatchet. There were dark stains on it as -he grasped it. The German saw his intention and shouted furiously, and -shots began to whistle past O’Neill. There was no time to look: he flung -himself into the boat, hacking wildly at the bottom, smiling as it split -under his blows and he felt the cold inrush of the water round his feet. -The German was upon him: just once he glanced aside from his work and -saw the cruel face and the levelled revolver very close, somewhere it -seemed that Jim and Wally were shouting. He smiled again, turning for a -final blow at the boat. Then sea and rock and sky seemed to burst round -him, with a deafening roar, in a blaze of white light that turned the -grey dawn into a path of glory. - - - -He woke from a dreamless sleep. They were all about him: kind faces that -loved him, that bent over him speaking gently. Some one had propped his -head, and had spread coats over him: he was glad of it, for he was very -cold. The wavering faces steadied as his vision grew clearer, and he saw -them all: David Linton and the boys, and Norah kneeling by him, her eyes -full of tears. That troubled him, and he groped for her hand, and held -it. - -“You mustn’t cry,” he whispered. - -Some one raised his head a little, putting a flask to his lips. He drank -eagerly. Then he saw another face he knew. - -“Hallo, Aylwin!” he said. “Did you get her?” - -The sailor nodded. “Don’t talk, old man.” - -O’Neill laughed outright. The brandy had brought life back to him. - -“I’m perfectly well,” he said. “Tell me, Jim—quick!” - -“We got them quite easily,” Jim said, his voice shaking. “The first rock -blocked the entrance, and they’re there yet. We sent down all the rocks, -and one fell on one of the two guards they left; the other managed to -wing Wally before he ran.” - -O’Neill started. - -“Is he hurt?” - -“Only my arm,” said Wally. “It’s quite all right—don’t you worry. It -wasn’t much to pay for the haul we got—thanks to you.” The boyish face -twitched, and he put out his hand and took O’Neill’s in its grip. - -“Go on, please,” Sir John begged. - -“The other chap ran,” Jim said: “of course his idea was to get the boat -back to the submarine. The brute got a start of us while we were making -sure the others were blocked in securely.” - -“Have you put a guard there?” O’Neill interrupted, anxiously. “They -might break out.” - -“Half a dozen of my men,” Aylwin said, quickly. “It’s all right, old -chap.” - -“We saw him begin to fire at you, and we did our best,” said Jim, with a -groan. “We didn’t dare fire, for fear of hitting you, until we were -close. Then we got him—but——” His strained voice ceased. - -“You needn’t worry—his mate had fixed me first,” said O’Neill, -serenely. “It was great luck I had, to be able to get to the boat at -all: your man didn’t matter.” He laughed happily. “This makes up for -having lived. Tell me your part of it, Bob.” - -“We got down in very good time,” Aylwin said. “The ship couldn’t come -in, of course; but I’ve a handy motor-boat with a gun rigged in her, and -we sneaked in and lay just under the south headland. It was quite -simple; we were into the inlet before the first flare died down, and -there was the submarine, with nothing doing. It was as easy as shelling -peas.” - -“Then it was your gun . . . ?” O’Neill said. - -“Yes. We’re on guard, of course; but she won’t come up again. When it’s -light we’ll deal with the gentlemen in the cave.” The sailor’s curt -voice became even more abrupt. “Never saw a show better planned—the -whole thing went like clockwork. I always knew you had the makings of a -general in you, Jack!” - -O’Neill gave a quick, happy sigh. - -“The boys and Norah did it all,” he said. “But it was splendid fun, to -be able to take a hand. I said it would be a jewel of a fight!” - -A slow wave of weakness stole over him, and he closed his eyes. - -“Is the tide coming in?” he said, presently. “I thought I felt -it—creeping.” - -Jim took off his coat and put it on his feet. - -“We’ll get you up to the motor presently,” he said, his young voice -unsteady. O’Neill laughed. - -“Not before the finish,” he said. “It won’t be long.” - -Norah’s head went down suddenly on his hand. - -“You can’t die!” she said,—“we can’t spare you, dear Sir John. We’re -going to make you better!” - -“Dying is only a very little matter, dear little mate,” O’Neill said. -“It’s living that hurts. And just think of what I have—a man’s finish! -That is a great thing, when one has lived a hunchback.” - -He did not speak for a long time, lying with closed eyes. The dawn was -breaking: light grew on the surface of the inlet, where long streaks of -oil floated on the ripples. They watched the quiet figure. Under the -coats that covered him, all traces of deformity were lost. Something of -new beauty had crept into the high-bred features; and when he opened his -eyes again they were like the smiling eyes of a child. They met Jim’s, -and the lips smiled too, while his weak hand rested on Norah’s head. - -“And I worrying,” he said, “because I was out of the war.” - -“You had your own job,” said Aylwin. “And you pulled it off, old man.” - -“It was great luck,” O’Neill said. “God had pity. Enormous luck . . . to -finish at a man’s job.” He did not speak again. The sun, climbing -upwards, shone tenderly upon the happy face. - - - - -[Illustration: “The German saw his intention and shouted furiously, and -shots began to whistle past O’Neill.”] - - _Jim and Wally_] [_Page_ 253 - - THE END. - - Butler & Tanner, Frome and London. - - - - - The Wonder Book - - THE FAVOURITE PICTURE - ANNUAL FOR BOYS & GIRLS - - _Crown 4to, Picture Boards, 3s. 6d. net. In handsome Cloth_ - _Gilt Binding, 5s. net. 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Fully Illustrated. 3s. 6d. net._ - - - Lord Roberts, K.G., V.C. - - By CAPTAIN OWEN WHEELER - -As a gift book for boys of all ages this story of a dauntless hero could -scarcely be surpassed, for long after his deeds as a soldier have lost -all but historical significance his character will remain as an example -to the manhood of Great Britain and the Empire, and indeed of all -English-speaking races. - -The book is lavishly illustrated with portraits and drawings which -practically depict the battle-history of the British Empire during a -period of sixty years. - - Dreadnoughts of the Dogger - - By ROBERT LEIGHTON - - _With Eight full-page Illustrations in tints._ - -“This is an adventure book of a kind to which the boy whose instinct is -for the Navy will turn with rejoicing, as it tells a tale of modern -naval fighting in the North Sea.”—_Bristol Times and Mirror._ - -“Every adventurous lad should read this tale, for from it he will learn -something of a stern discipline and at the same time make the -acquaintance of a really able piece of literary -craftsmanship.”—_Reading Standard._ - - - - - The Little Wonder - Books - - A Dainty New Series of Humorous Stories - for the Little Ones by HARRY GOLDING - - (_Editor of the WONDER BOOKS_) - - _Medium 16mo. 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