The home of the Glandores on Dublin Bay is a unique place, perched on rising ground, shaded by fine old timber. Originally an ecclesiastical establishment, it was turned into a fortress by Sir Amorey Crosbie in 1177, and has been altered and gutted, and rebuilt, with here a wing and here a bay, and there a winding staircase, or mysterious recess, to suit the whim of each succeeding owner, till it has swelled into a stunted honeycomb of meandering suites of rooms, whose geography puzzles a stranger on his first visit there. The only portions of it which remain intact, are (as may be seen by the great thickness of the walls) the hall, a long, low, narrow space, panelled in black oak and ceiled in squares; the huge kitchen, where meat might be roasted for an army; and the dungeons below ground. The remaining rooms (many of them like monkish cells) are of every shape and pattern, alike only in having heavy casement frames set with diamond panes, enormous obstinate doors, which creak and moan, declining to close or open unless violently coerced, and worm-eaten floors that slope in every freak of crooked line except the normal horizontal one. Indeed, the varied levels of the bedroom floor (there is but one storey) are so wildly erratic, that a visitor, who wakes for the first time in one of the pigeonholes that open one on the other, like the alleys of a rabbit warren, clings instinctively to his bedclothes as people do at sea, and, on second thoughts, is seized with a new panic lest the house be about to fall--an idle fear, as my lady is fond of showing; for the cyclopean rafters, that were laid in their places by the crumbled monks, are hard and black as iron, so seasoned by sea-air that they will possibly stand good so long as Ireland remains above the water. A gloomier abode than this it is scarce possible to picture; for the window-sashes are of exceeding clumsiness, the ornamentation of a ponderous flamboyancy in which all styles are twisted, without regard for canons, into curls and scrolls; and yet there is a blunt cosiness about the ensemble which seems to say, 'Here at least you are safe. If Dublin Bay were full of hostile ships, the adjacent land teeming with the enemy in arms, they might batter on for ever. They might beat at our portals till the last trump should summon them to more important business, but our panels would never budge.
On approaching the Abbey by the avenue, you are not aware of it--so masked is it by trees and ivy--till a sharp turn brings you upon a gravelled quadrangle, three sides of which are closed in by walls, while the fourth is marked out by a row of statues (white nymphs with pitchers), whose background is the chameleon sea. Directly facing these figures--at the opposite end of the square, that is--a short wide flight of steps, and a low terrace paved with coloured marbles, lead to the front entrance. The left side of the quadrangle is the 'Young Men's Wing,' sacred to whips and fishing-tackle, pierced by separate little doors for convenience on hunting mornings--two sets of separate chambers, in fact, which may be entered without passing through the hall; and above them is the armoury, a neglected museum of rusty swords and matchlocks, an eyrie of ghosts and goblins, which is never disturbed by household broom. The right side is bounded by a close-clipped ivied wall, pierced by an archway which gives access to the stables and the kennels, ended by a mouldering turret, converted long since into a water-tower.
The grand hall, low and dark as it is with sable oak and stiff limnings of dead Crosbies, occupies the whole length and width of the central portion of the house, or rather of the narrow band which joins the two side blocks together. You may learn, by looking at the time-discoloured map which hangs over its sculptured mantelpiece, that the ground-plan of the Abbey is shaped like the letter H, whose left limb forms the young men's wing, the offices, and dining-room; whose right limb is made up of my lady's bedroom, the staircase vestibule, and the reception saloons; while the grand hall, or portrait gallery, reproduces the connecting bar. Five steps, with a curiously-carved banister, lead out of the grand hall at either end; that to the left opening into the dining-room--a finely-proportioned chamber, panelled from floor to ceiling with trophies of rusty armour breaking its sombre richness; that to the right communicating with my lady's bedroom, painted apple-green with arabesques of gold, which is chiefly remarkable for luxuriously-cushioned window-seats, from whence a fine view may be obtained of the operations in the stable-yard. The late lord used to sip his chocolate here in brocaded morning-gown and nightcap, haranguing his whipper-in and bullying the horse-boys, or tossing scraps to favourite hounds as they were trotted by for his inspection; and my lady has continued the practice through her widowhood, for it gratifies her vanity, as chatelaine, to watch the numberless grooms and lacqueys, the feudal array of servants and retainers. An odd nest for a lady, no doubt; but the countess chooses to inhabit it, she says, till her son brings home a bride, for the late lord sent for Italian workmen to decorate it according to her taste, and in it she will remain till the hour for abdication shall arrive.
A second door, at right angles to my lady's, opens from the hall on to the staircase with its heraldic flight of beasts; beyond this is the chintz drawing-room, a cheery pale-tinted chamber which Doreen has taken to herself as a boudoir, although it is practically no better than a passage-room leading to the tapestried saloons. She likes it for its brightness, and because it looks out on the garden front, known as 'Miss Wolfe's Plot,' a little square fenced in at one end by the hall, on the further side by the dining-room, while at the other end there is a tall gilt grille of florid design, through which you may wander, if it pleases you, into the pleasaunce. This small quaint enclosure is Doreen's favourite haunt. She has laid it out with her own hands in strange devices of pebbles and clipped box, with a crazy sun-dial for a centre, and sits there for hours with needlework that advances not, dreaming sombrely, and sighing now and then, as her eyes travel along the cut beech hedges, smooth leafy walls, which spread inland in vistas beyond the golden gate, like the arms of some giant starfish. These hedges are the most remarkable things about a very remarkable abode. They are each of them half a mile long, thirty-six feet high, and twelve feet thick, perforated at intervals by arches; and they form together a series of triangular spaces sheltered from sea-blasts, in which flourish such a wealth of roses as is a marvel to all comers.
Obese, old-fashioned roses, as big as your fist, hang in cataracts from tottering posts which once were orchard trees; large pink blossoms or bunches of small white ones, whose perfume weighs down the air; balls of glorious colour, which, when a rare breeze shakes them, shower their sweet petals in a lazy swirl upon the grass, whence Doreen gleans and harvests them for winter, with cunning condiments, in jars. From time to time the perfume varies, as the wind sets E. or W., from that of Araby the blest to one of the salt sea--a tarry, seaweedy, nautico-piratical odour, with a strong dash of brine in it, which seems wafted upward from below to remind the dwellers in the Abbey of their long line of corsair ancestors.
The most sumptuous of all the apartments is undoubtedly the tapestried saloon, nicknamed by wags my lady's presence-chamber; for there, looking out upon the roses, she loves to sit erect surrounded by ghostly Crosbies whose mighty deeds are recorded on the walls, portrayed by the most skilful hands upon miracles of Gobelin manufacture. Mr. Curran often wondered, as he played cribbage with the chatelaine, whether those deeds were fabulous; for if not, he reflected, judging the present by the past--then were the mighty grievously come down. Here was Sir Amorey alone on a spotty horse trouncing a whole army with his doughty sword. There was Sir Teague at the head of his Kernes, making short work of the French at Agincourt. Further on the first earl--prince of salt-water thieves, with a vanquished Desmond grimacing underneath his heel. How different were these from the present and last Glandores, whose lives were filled up to overflowing with wine and with debauchery; whose sins lacked the picturesque wickedness of these defunct seafaring murderers. Then, perceiving the countess's eye fixed on him, her crony would feel guilty for his unflattering reflections, and rapidly pursue the game; for my lady as she aged grew just the least bit garrulous, and as he loved not the aristocracy as such, it was afflicting to listen to long-winded dissertations upon the family magnificence, which he declared she invented as she went along. He was never tired though, when he could snatch a rare holiday from his professional labours, of exploring the dungeons and chimney recesses and awful holes and crannies. He it was who ferreted out the long-lost secret way beneath the sea from the water-tower to Ireland's Eye; and bitterly he repented later that he had not kept that discovery to himself; for by means of it he might have brought about the vanishing of many of the proscribed, instead of--but we travel on too fast.
My lady sat upright in the tapestried saloon, marvelling that no one filled the teapot. It was with a distressed amazement, like that of Louis XIV. when he waited, that she stared at the silver equipage, at the pathetically hissing urn. Where was Doreen the tea-maker? It was quite dark, and the incorrigible damsel was still galloping about the country, who might tell whither? It really was shocking; no wonder if milady's quills of propriety stood out, after the manner of the fretful one. It's that drop of Papist blood, she muttered; then turned to admonish her brother as to his heiress. But Arthur Wolfe listened without a word, for he was accustomed to his sister's querulous complaining, and built a bulwark of silence against her jeremiads. People said all his time was spent in negative apologies for the one error of his youth; and it did look like it; for he was marvellously patient in the face of her most tyrannical whims, listening without a struggle to endless sermons which prated of the woe to come, reflecting that, poor soul, she had much to put up with. Although she was reticent and mysterious to an extreme degree, Arthur Wolfe knew that her lines were not cast in pleasant places; for did not flaunting Gillen abide at the very gates, whose odious vicinity caused her to shrink as much as might be from passing beyond her own domains?
Time and this bitter pill had made of her ladyship a 'swaddler.' Like many of the oldsters of the patrician order, she grew sorely repentant for youthful peccadilloes, took to psalm-singing, displayed strong ultra-Protestant proclivities. The prejudices of a less enlightened age curtained her brain with cobwebs which excluded the daylight from the vermin they engendered. On this 12th of July she set aside, according to custom, the pearly grey which becomes her age so well, to don weird orange vestments which make her look like a macaw--she who is usually dressed in such perfect taste in a robe of silvered satin, with snowy hair in rolls unpowdered. Although she is but fifty-two, my lady is a white-haired queen Bess; and handsome in an imposing way, which she never was in youth. The thin nose looks higher than it used to be, and pinched. The cheek is pale and marked with anxious wrinkles; but the straight line of imperious brow remains the same, and the eyes--netted with crowsfeet--assume a more vigorous life by reason of the fading of their surroundings. The Countess of Glandore has in twelve years become an awful dowager, before whom the cottagers shake in their shoes; for to a misleading appearance of patriarchal majesty she adds a quick incisive way of speech, and the bodily activity of a middle-aged woman who enjoys a perfect constitution. Those startled eyes tell tales, though, of a diseased mind, and sleepless nights of tossing. And she does pass sleepless nights, despite the Consoler's fanning, when the secret chord is struck. Then as she lies on her laced pillows she sees once more the sheeted body at the clubhouse, hears the last warning wail, 'For my sake, for your own--that you may be spared this torment!' and then she lights a lamp and reads angrily till daylight--loathing herself for what her sound sense condemns as morbidness--lest peradventure her thoughts should drive her mad. Then rising with a headache and haggard looks, she sits in the window-seat and feeds the hounds, and reflects with stern satisfaction that the odious baggage who lives in the Little House has never found joints in her armour--has never caught her tripping with regard to her younger son. Since my lord's death no spiteful unduly-elected guardian could complain of the boy's treatment. Her purse had always been open to him; from childhood he was rich in guns and ponies. But she failed sufficiently to consider that there was one thing for which the warm-hearted lad had pined and which she had consistently denied him--love. It is evident that we cannot bestow that which we have not to give. This reproach therefore sat lightly on her mind. The deficit in affection was made up with bank-notes, and she bred unconsciously in her second-born a recklessness in spending which his after-income would by no means justify. Her influence over him was small. Not that this mattered much, for he was a bright good-natured lad, such as give little serious trouble to their elders. He had a way of quarrelling with Shane though, which opened dread visions of possible complications in the future. Sometimes the brothers were so near the point of open rupture, that milady had to interfere, and then with undutiful fierceness my lord would remind her of the oath she had herself extorted, and she would be stricken dumb, cursing herself for the idle folly of the act. If my lady nourished old-fashioned feudal views about the conduct of one brother to another, she was clumsy in her method of realising them. Terence ignored the whole proceeding, and to prove his freedom kept the household in a constant state of simmering breeziness, which was more lively than comfortable. Shane, on the other hand, was disposed to be benignant if Terence would abstain from being rude. There was little in common between the two, and it would have been odd if Shane had kept his temper when Terence flogged his horse-boy, though he had a private young henchman of his own. My lady looked with uneasiness at the constant trivial squabblings, and was not altogether sorry, as the twain grew up, to see that their tastes divided them, that they met less and less; for Shane became engrossed with the pleasures of the capital, while Curran, taking a fancy for the second son, turned his attention to the Bar.
The young lord emancipated himself from leading-strings, and became a pattern Dublin buck. He wore gorgeous raiment, carried wonderful walking-sticks with jewelled tops and incrusted mottoes; was elected President of the Blaster and Cherokee clubs, which honourable post made it his duty to fight at least one duel a week, and to force quarrels upon people whom he had never seen before. There were several established ways (as all the world knows) of bringing this about. Sometimes he sat in a window and spat on the hats of passers-by, or stood over a crossing pushing folks into the mire, or kissed a pretty girl in the presence of her male protector, or flung chicken bones from a balcony at a passing horseman in full fig. His mother took no heed of these vagaries; the ways of the Glandores had been imperious for generations. But in course of time an event happened which sent the blood rushing in a tumult to her heart. At a masquerade one night my lord met a maid who smote his fancy. She was cheerful, and not too modest (his one terror was a lady of quality), with eyes like a mouse and a good set of teeth. Her mamma, a homely, buxom dame of forty, invited him home to supper, and he was as surprised as charmed to discover that the sprightly pair were his neighbours, who on account of some crotchet or other his mother declined to visit. He was received with open arms; nothing could be more jolly than his welcome.
''Deed the space is limited,' mamma observed, with a guffaw. 'If ye put your arm down the chimbly ye could raise the door-latch; but, sure, a snug mouthful's better than a feast any day.'
He remained toasting his hostesses till daylight; called in a week; stopped to dinner; was treated as an honoured guest. Madam was a Papist, he found out, which would account for my lady's prejudice, but my lord had no such prejudices. If a young lady touch your fancy, do you ask her to say her Catechism?
When the terrible fact broke upon my lady, she groaned in spirit and was stunned. The spiteful baggage, baffled by her rival's exemplary conduct as a mother, had hit on a new way to torture her. The damsel in question was Madam Gillin's daughter, who had been brought up a Protestant, at the late lord's special wish. The reason for this singular proceeding was only too clear. That low hateful wretch, who had remained quiescent till the countess was almost at ease, was still pursuing her. Of course she could not be so truly wicked as to mean anything serious--for her own child's sake. It was a sword tied over her head to force her to grovel down upon her knees. But boys (specially heads of houses) always begin by falling in love with the wrong people. This was a transitory flirtation. Shane would grow tired of the vulgar chit. Vainly my lady hoped. Then with beatings of the breast it occurred to her, that as Gillin was a Catholic she must of course be capable of any crime. Before things attained a hopeless pitch, would it be needful for my lady to bow her haughty neck under Gillin's caudine forks? Oh! the agony of a stubborn pride which must publicly do penance! Would the ruthless tormentor exact such abasement as an exposure to her own children of the insulting behaviour of their father? Would it be requisite to crave a boon of the too jolly tyrant? Never! my lady decided that such humiliation might never be--death would be preferable. She would bide awhile and take refuge in religion, and pray that the cup might in mercy be removed.
The petty annoyances which made up the sum of my lady's bitterness were endless. She was in the habit of bestowing broken meats upon the cottagers with stately condescension, accompanied sometimes with drugs. Mrs. Gillin followed suit. There were two ladies bountiful in the field, and the dowager sometimes came off second best; for, as amateur doctors will, she made mistakes, and killed people with fresh patent medicines, whilst her rival escaped active harm, because her boluses were innocent through lengthened sleep in the village apothecary's phials. So the cottagers only trembled and curtsied when the chatelaine called to see them, and emptied her bottles on the sly, whilst they eagerly consulted Madam Gillin as to their ailments, a preference of which madam made the most, when the ladies met over an invalid. Faithful to herrôle, she never spoke to the scowling dowager, but addressed scathing remarks to a third person who was always the companion of her wanderings--one Jug Coyle, her ancient nurse, who passed with many for a witch, whilst all admitted that she was a 'wise-woman.' This old harridan, who was learned in the use of simples, was established by her mistress in a one-eyed alehouse on the verge of her little property--on the outside edge of it which looked towards the Abbey. The noise of roysterous shouting there penetrated sometimes as far as my lady's chamber, yet she did not complain. It was one of her rival's thorns--one of the petty persecutions which the chatelaine was doomed to bear.
Sure the late lord would have spared his widow had he realised the worries which would come on her by reason of the proximity of Gillin. The mistress of the Little House gave excellent rowdy suppers, and entertained theéliteof Dublin. The judges bibbed her claret, and shook the night air with choruses, whereas they only paid state visits to the abbey once or twice a year. Her nurse's shebeen--a tumble-down festering hostelry thatched with decaying straw--was no better than a dog-boy's boozing ken, a disgraceful trysting-place for drunken soldiers, who were enticed thither by its excellent poteen. Jug Coyle's shock-pated daughter Biddy was a scandal to the neighbourhood, so recklessly did she profess to adore sodgers; while as for mischief, there was none perpetrated within ten miles round but that red-poled slattern was at the bottom of it. By-and-by Old Jug hung out a sign, a rude picture of a chained man, with 'The Irish Slave' as cognizance; and after that mysterious persons were seen to arrive at unseasonable hours who might or might not be United Irishmen. My lady knew all these doings, and hoped fervently that the new clients would turn out conspirators, for in that case there seemed a chance that she might sweep away the nuisance which vexed her day by day. I saysheadvisedly, because Shane was too busily engaged as King of Cherokees, to look after his property, and was only too thankful to his mother for undertaking the management of the estates.
In intervals of complaining about the still absent tea-maker, the countess exposed her views for the hundredth time, as to the enormity of the obnoxious Gillin, to her ally Lord Clare, who smiled and nodded. The chancellor was a constant visitor at the Abbey, riding over frequently to dinner for a gossip or a game of cards with his old friend. He told her the last scandal, discussed the political situation, dropped hints about the movements of the patriots, lamented the mad folly of her brother Arthur'sprotégé; and unconsciously she came to see things through his spectacles, living herself a retired life. Not but what she heard something of the other side from Mr. Curran; but then he seemed to avoid these subjects, while Lord Clare delighted in gloating on them. The two mortal foes met frequently at the Abbey as on neutral ground, and snarled and showed their teeth, and thereby exemplified in their own persons one of the most singular features of a society now happily died away. During the last tempestuous years which preceded the Union, members of all parties were accustomed to meet in social intercourse, dining to-day with men they would hang tomorrow, even in some cases advancing funds out of their own pockets to secure the escape of those whom it was their duty to convict. The cause of the anomaly is not far to seek. Dublin society, though magnificent, was limited to a tiny circle. Absenteeism being voted low, the great families became interwoven by a series of intermarriages, while they were torn at the same time by religious or political dissensions. If your wife's brother holds precisely opposite views to your own, and is in danger of losing his head, still he is your near relative, and as such you will save him from the gallows if you may. It was not surprising then that Mr. Curran, when at length he arrived with the rest, should have courteously taken Lord Clare's jewelled fingers in his own with a hope that his health was good, though he loved him as dogs love cats. Was he not obliged to meet him several times a day in the four courts, or at Daly's? The city would have been too small to hold them if they had come to open strife.
My lady dropped her jeremiad when the young people entered, for the Little House and its belongings formed a mystery which they might not fathom. If Shane chose to distress his mother by flirting with Norah Gillin, it behoved the rest to ignore his sin. Even independent Doreen, who would have liked to scrape acquaintance with a co-religionist, abstained from so doing lest she should offend her aunt. Once, when in a passion, she threatened to call at the Little House, but my lady appeared so pained that she repented the idle threat.
My lady looked at Lord Clare as if to bid him start a subject, then shook her head at Curran for keeping the girls out so late.
Lord Clare was in excellent spirits as he crossed one natty stocking over the other, and, fingertip to fingertip, began to purr over the virtues of the new Viceroy. 'Lord Camden,' he averred, 'was an angel. He was open to advice. Things would have to take place sooner or later which would make it essential that those who governed should be of one mind. The silly geese who dubbed themselves patriots had received a check by the discomfiture of young Tone, but the snake was scotched, not killed. They would doubtless find leaders, and again leaders, who would have to be crushed in turn, and Government had hit on a bright idea for the simplifying of the process of suppression. By virtue of an English law there was a foolish rule which forbade conviction for treason save on the testimony of two witnesses. How ponderous a piece of mechanism! The wheels of the Irish car of justice wanted greasing. Why not one witness? One dear, delightful, useful creature, who would come forward and say his say and finish off the matter in a trice. What did Mr. Curran think of it, that clever advocate?'
Mr. Curran sipped his tea in silence, while his dusky cheek turned dun. They would not dare pass so outrageous an enactment, he reflected. They would dare much, but, with the eyes of Europe on them, not so much as that. The chancellor was drawing him out. So he smiled sweetly, and, handing his cup to be refilled, observed that as Justice did not live in Ireland, it would be folly to provide a car for her. The spectacle of an English Viceroy making believe to dally with the stranger would be as astounding to Irishmen as the spectacle of a horse-racing Venetian.
'Lord Clare likes his joke,' chorused the giant Cassidy, 'but Curran won't be hoodwinked.'
'I assure you I am in earnest,' declared the chancellor, eyeing his foe from under alligator lids. 'I protest the idea is splendid. If they are bent on hanging themselves, why not give them rope? One witness, my dear Curran, would surely be enough.'
'Your joke is a bad one, my lord,' returned the other, sulkily. 'There are hundreds of idle wretches, hanging round Castle-yard, who for a pittance would swear anything. Is it so much trouble to suborn two? Major Sirr, your lordship's jackal, would see to it, I'm sure.'
'An admirable person!' murmured the chancellor.
'If he's not a villain,' retorted his enemy, 'give me as offal to the curs of Ormond Quay. Cassidy here was reproved only an hour ago by one whom we all respect for being too intimate with the rascal.'
'I can only repeat,' said Cassidy, with the crumpling of skin which made his flat face so droll, 'that I care nought for him, though I should be sorry if he came to be put away as his paid informers often are--consigned to Moiley, as the common people say. It is important for a poor man like me to have a friend at court. I might be taken any day on false information, and lie perdu in Newgate till my bones rotted. My Lord Clare is a kind patron, but too much engaged to heed the fate of such humble squireens as I. I have no genius like Mr. Curran. My disappearance would cause no hue-and-cry. We must look after our own bodies, and Sirr is my sheet-anchor.'
The chancellor glanced at Cassidy with a whimsical expression on his face, half curiosity, half contempt, while Curran said:
'That town-major is too much considered. Beware, my lord, of Jacks-in-office, who, in the intoxication of gratified vanity, mistake the dictates of passion for the suggestions of duty, and consider that power unemployed is so much wasted. But I'm a fool. Your lordship is laughing at me.'
Doreen, having presided over the tea-table, retired to the open window, for her heart was full of Theobald, and this chatter grated on her nerves. My lady seized the opportunity to discourse of the proceedings of the day, of how Lord Camden had marched round William's statue with all his peers, and of how the scum had looked stupidly at the pageant with angry scowls. 'I was glad to see it,' she went on complacently, 'for tribulation is good for their sins, and bears fruit. There have been a blessed number of conversions of late.'
'Some are too weak to endure oppression,' remarked Arthur, gently, 'and turn Protestant to escape from misery.'
'Then it is good that the oppression, as you call it, should continue,' returned his sister, with decision. 'The scarlet woman and her progeny of vices shall be extinguished. When people are so ignorant and brutish, they must be snatched from the fire by any means.'
'My lady, my lady!' laughed Curran. 'Your speech and your deeds are ever at variance. Your words breathe fire and sword, yet none are more kindly to the poor. Extremes meet, you know. I believe that you will die a Catholic.'
My lady glanced at Doreen, pursed up her lips, and said nothing.
'Did we not agree t'other day about true religion? It lies not in abusing our neighbours, but in cultivating a heart void of offence to God and man. Remember that definition, Terence, and act on it, my boy. It was a saying of the great Lord Chatham.'
'If only Luther had never been born!' groaned Arthur Wolfe. 'Christianity was good enough for Christendom in old days.'
This was an awkward subject. Lord Clare changed it with accustomed tact.
'Do you know, Curran,' he said, 'that Tone has left a sting behind him which till yesterday we did not suspect? We have reason to believe that the University, of which we are all so justly proud, has been tampered with. That's bad, you know. I am informed that there are no less than four branches of the secret society within its walls. Severest measures may be necessary. As chancellor of Trinity I will see to it.'
Doreen turned round and listened. So did Terence, for he had many friends in Trinity.
'Have you any basis to work upon?' asked my lady.
'Certainly! A man whom I can trust in every way is hand and glove with them. The unhappy wretches have a traitor in their midst. Young McLaughlin is bitten with the mania, a sad scatterbrain and Bond, and Ford, who's half an idiot. The only one I'm sorry for is young Emmett, who should know better, being son of a State-physician. But then his brother, who dabbles in journalism, is a bad example. I should not be surprised if he were hanged some day.'
Poor Sara, who had gone to where Doreen was sitting, glanced from one at another, her pupils expanded by terror. She knew that the dear undergraduate had not taken the oath. But to be suspected at such times as were looming was a matter of grave jeopardy. Her father looked serious, and so did Terence. Both liked the Emmetts, and were sorry to hear about this traitor. My Lord Clare's flippant discourse was distasteful to all. Was he making himself disagreeable on purpose? Curran was shaking his hair ominously. Terence burst out in defence of the young men who were, he swore, as good as gold, and his personal friends--more worthy than others who should be nameless. My lady, in her orange robe, looked like a thunder-cloud. Cassidy, to pour oil on the troubled waters, proposed that Miss Wolfe should sing, and Arthur, relieved at the diversion, drew out his girl's harp into the room.
Doreen would have refused if she had dared, for these covert bickerings constantly renewed upon topics which moved her so strongly, were wearing to the nerves. But everybody suddenly desired music.
'Something Irish, set to one of your own melodies,' suggested Cassidy. 'Sure, Curran will play a second on his violoncello; and I'll give you a new song afterwards.'
Well, anything was better than the grating of Lord Clare's harsh voice. Listlessly sitting down to the harp, Doreen permitted her shapely arms to wander over its strings. Then, fired by a kind of desperation, she lifted her proud head and began in a rich contralto, while Mr. Curran, on a low stool beside her, scraped out an impromptu bass:
'"Brothers, arise! The hour has come to strike a blow for Truth and God.Why sit ye folded up and dumb? why, bending, kiss a tyrant's rod?For what is death to him who dies, the martyr's crown upon his head?A charter--not a sacrifice--a life immortal for the dead. And life itsel3 is only great when man devotes himself to be By virtue, thought, and deed the mate of God's true children and the free!"'
'"Brothers, arise! The hour has come to strike a blow for Truth and God.Why sit ye folded up and dumb? why, bending, kiss a tyrant's rod?For what is death to him who dies, the martyr's crown upon his head?
A charter--not a sacrifice--a life immortal for the dead. And life itsel3 is only great when man devotes himself to be By virtue, thought, and deed the mate of God's true children and the free!"'
Her voice trembled and gave way, and bowing her neck over the instrument, the girl wept. Sara stole up and kissed away the tears. Her own heart was exceeding heavy, she knew not why, except that she saw visions of Robert in peril, such as she was thankful to think were only visions. If aught befell him, she would lie down and die--of that she was quite sure--foolish virgin! She had bestowed her pure heart unasked. Would he who held it value the priceless gift?
My lady and Lord Clare looked at Arthur Wolfe in consternation. Where did the naughty damsel learn such a song? Of what dangerous stuff was she made to presume to chant it before the chancellor himself? 'It is the cloven foot,' her aunt thought with fury. That terrible blot! Anxieties were thickening. Something must be done, or the girl would go to perdition even faster than she galloped across country.
Arthur looked wistfully at his sister, then at his child, who, the paroxysm past, was a cold statue again--haughty, unabashed. To look at her, you would feel assured that she had done right, while all the rest were wrong. Some people are incorrigible, and Miss Wolfe was evidently one of them. Her father suspected shrewdly that she had learnt the song at Curran's. He knew that she worshipped Tone, and that she had been in the habit of meeting him at the Priory. But he never had the courage to stand between the Catholic and the Protestant champion of her faith. As usual, he temporised, striving to serve two masters, and, as usual, suffered for his weakness.
Lord Clare read him like a book, and was disgusted with his friend. Wolfe's sensitive conscience was constantly racked by doubts which a natural diffidence magnified into bugbears. Clare's inflexibly ambitious mind despised the hysterics of the country which he governed; brazen and hard, he was a fit tool for Mr. Pitt. As he looked at Arthur, who hung his head over his daughter's escapade, he decided that this was a square peg in a round hole. As attorney-general, acts might be demanded of him by-and-by, from which he would shrink with lamentable want of character. What if he were to shillyshally when prompt action was urgent! He might upset the deftest schemes, overturn the most skilful combinations, by his bungling. Only a few minutes ago, his tell-tale face had shown how he disapproved of the one witness project. What a pity it was that the inoffensive fellow had ever been promoted, for as a simple lawyer he would have been pushed by events into the background. Well, well! He must be tried, and trotted forth to test his mettle. If he were proved wanting, there would be nothing for it but to pass him on again--to shelve him somewhere in the Lords, where he might drone harmlessly.
But this outrageous bit of scorn--his daughter! My lady must have a hard time with her. She was going awry, as hysterical girls will; yet surely the dowager was more than capable of coping with this febrile phase of a strong nature half developed? Then the astute idea passed through the schemer's brain of how convenient it would be if the budding Joan of Arc could be used as an unconscious spy upon her party. An ingenious notion, but one difficult to carry out--a delicate game, which would have to be worked through the countess, who was a crotchety soured woman, with a nice sense of honour, who would slave night and day for a cause which she esteemed a rightful one, but who would rather cut off her hand than stoop to what she knew was a meanness--provided that it did not affect her interests.
My Lord Clare could not forbear smiling when, glancing round the party, he noted the effect of the song. My lady dumbly furious; Arthur apologetic; Doreen herself indifferent; Terence uneasy and taken aback. One savage breast alone had music soothed; and Terence, who revered his chief, thanked Cassidy with a nod for having withdrawn him from further contest. Once with his huge machine between his feet, he was invulnerable even to Erin's wrongs, scraping himself into a condition of ecstatic beatitude, from which there was no fretting him. any more. There he sat, crouching like a black-beetle on a kitchen boiler, his underlip protruded, his face lighted with satisfaction, his head nodding to the time, and his frenzied eye fixed on the coat-of-arms upon the ceiling, as though to invoke its supporting monsters to turn and cock their ears. My Lord Clare's smile faded presently; he hated music nearly as much as he hated Curran.
'Turn out the lights!' he cried. 'I wonder your ladyship has patience with the fellow's grimaces. And you, my lad,' he continued seriously, addressing Terence, 'accept the lesson of the times and avoid enthusiasm. In this country it leads to the halter. Steer your course wisely. Take a safer pilot to guide your inexperience than yonder hurdy-gurdyman, so that you may find yourself on the winning side at last. There is no doubt which that will be.'
'I will use my own judgment,' replied Terence, simply, with a dignity which would have won approval from his cousin, had she not just descended into the pleasaunce to recover, amid the influences of night, her natural calmness of demeanour.
'That beast's din addles my brains,' went on the chancellor, rising to depart. 'Drive back with me, Arthur. I have a special subject to talk to you about. You must take a bolder course in politics. The ball is at your feet. We must teach you to find pluck enough to strike it.'
Wolfe smiled gently as he answered:
'I'll take a drive with pleasure, but you'll find me terribly deceitful; for I must grub up money for my daughter's sake; and yet, in certain ways, I'm an impracticable person--a mule with his feet together. Vacillating you think me. In some things you'll find I'm adamant.'
All were glad when at last the chancellor departed. Even my lady admitted that he could be crabbed at times. He was gone, but, like the gentleman in black, he left an evil savour in his wake.
Startled from reverie by the clang of the hall-door, Curran threw aside his bow and scratched his elf-locks pensively.
'No!' he said. 'These laws which they are continually framing are too dreadful. If the testimony of one witness is to be sufficient to convict us, then, are we foredoomed; for any one may be summoned to join in the Kilmainham minuet by the malice of a discharged groom, or the greed of the meanest cowboy. Trial and evidence are not children's baubles; they were not even established for the sole purpose of punishing the guilty; their most precious use is for the security of innocence.'
The little lawyer looked so horror-stricken, that both my lady and the giant burst out a-laughing.
'Come,' said the former, wresting the violoncello from his grasp, 'your music carries you too far. Lord Clare was out of sorts, and played upon your fears. Thank heaven he is no Blunderbore, or he would not be my welcome guest. Now to bed. Sara looks worn out.'
'He has no sense of right and wrong,' grumbled Curran.
'For shame! You are both good men. What a pity you can only agree in looking at each other through distorted glasses!'
'Faix, her ladyship's right,' acquiesced Cassidy, with a grin. 'You magnify the number of the informers. I should be sorry to believe there are half as many as you think.'
'Did not Tone say you were simple?' asked Curran, sadly. 'So there's some one watching the Emmetts? Can you guess? No! Nor I; but they must be warned. Clare is brewing some new devil's haricot, and will dip Arthur's ladle in it, if he may. What a net it is that they are winding about Erin! Pray God that we and ours may escape entanglement!'
Doreen stood by the crazy sun-dial, looking at the milky way, and reflecting upon the chatter which had assailed her ears. Consigned to Moiley! The dragon of the newrégimewas beginning to show that his hunger was insatiable. The prisons were filling apace. Lord Clare had hinted that worse was yet to come, that the shadow of the gibbet was to stretch across the earth, that hemp would soon be at a premium. But there were two Moileys--two goddesses of vengeance and retaliation, ready to strike, one for the oppressor, one for the oppressed. If their blood was roused, who might foretell what havoc they would make ere they sheathed their swords again!
The rustle of my lady's skirts recalled the maiden to herself, and she perceived her aunt descending into the garden. It was seldom that my lady changed her routine in the smallest particular. What could be the cause of this sudden fancy for star-gazing?
'A lovely night,' exclaimed her ladyship. 'How sweet the roses smell! I vow it is a sin to go to bed.'
'Shane seems to think so,' returned Doreen. 'He never comes in till the small hours.'
My lady looked sharply in her niece's face, but was nothing there save a settled sadness.
'Come,' she said, 'Curran and his child are gone to rest. We'll take a turn in the pleasaunce.'
They sauntered through the golden gate and down a leafy avenue, in silence, while owls and bats flitted past their heads and circled away among the foliage. My lady had something to say, and did not know how to say it. Doreen was thinking of the dear wanderer, who was tossing on the sea by this time. Presently my lady said abruptly:
'Doreen, you must change your ways.'
The damsel's nostrils dilated a little; but, biting her lip, she answered nothing.
'You are twenty-two,' pursued her aunt. 'It is time that you gave up playing Miss Hoyden, and settled down into a respectable married woman.'
The girl walked on without a word, wondering what was coming next, while her aunt, growing exasperated at what she was pleased to consider stubbornness, bent down to sniff a rose which wept gems upon her dress.
'Does it trouble you,' she said, wiping the dew from her skirts carefully with a handkerchief, 'that Shane should stop out so late? The Glandores were always rakes, but were none the worse for that. For my part I hate a milksop.'
Poor lady! The late lord had given her little experience of the milksop!
'What can it signify to me what he does?' asked Doreen, with a tinge of bitterness. 'He is drinking to King William now, no doubt, if not insensible beneath the table.'
This was awkward, for my lady desired to make the best of Shane, and the fact of his doing homage to the Immortal memory was not likely to be pleasing to a Roman Catholic. So she turned her batteries.
'You are wild, and will come to shipwreck,' she declared, 'if we do not set some one to look after you. The way you behaved just now was most deplorable. Your poor father looked wretched; but the dear soul is a goose. Unless you mend your ways you will find no one to marry you at all, which will be dreadful, and a disgrace to all of us. Your behaviour to Terence is not quite seemly, for you forget that he is grown up, and that you should not trifle with an inflammable youth.'
This shot went home. Thoroughly taken aback, Doreen cried:
'Terence! You must be jesting, aunt! He is my first cousin, almost my brother. You will accuse me of flirting with Shane next.'
'That is quite another matter,' replied my lady, coldly, for she was nettled at the contemptuous manner in which the girl spoke of her favourite son. 'I say you must be married before you disgrace us all, which you certainly will do unless curbed, being half a plebeian born.'
The blood flooded the girl's face, and she clasped her bosom with both hands to still the indignation rising there. For my lady, when annoyed beyond a given point, was apt to make sneering remarks about the late Mrs. Wolfe which filled her child with rage.
'What do you mean?' she exclaimed haughtily. 'There is nomustabout the matter. You should have learned by this time that I will not be driven by any one on earth; certainly not by you.' Then recovering herself, she went on more softly: 'What a puzzle you are! Sometimes so kind, sometimes so cruel! I think you really care for me; you were so good to the motherless little one. If my mother had lived I might have been different. A Miss Hoyden, am I? I have never had any one in whom to put my trust, to whom I might tell my troubles; and a heart closed up, without sympathy, is a sore thing for one of my age!'
The girl's voice died away, and her aunt felt uncomfortable.
'To-day,' Doreen resumed, 'I went to see Ally Brady, who is dying, and nearly threw myself upon the neck of the lady who is nursing her. She looked so kind and hearty as her tears fell for the peasant-woman, and she clings to the prescribed creed as I do. It was Mrs. Gillin, of the Little House.'
My lady looked up sharply.
'You dared to speak to her?'
'No; I retired. But she looked after me with such a strange pity. Aunt, why do you object to my knowing this lady, though all the world speaks well of her? Shane goes to the Little House, and Norah makes him welcome. He told me so. I have seen Norah often, and she is very pretty. What does it all mean? Is Shane going to marry her? May I speak to her when she's Shane's wife? If he knows and likes the Gillins, why should not I, who, as a Catholic, have a sort of right to cherish them?'
My lady started and stood still, as if she had seen an adder in her path, and said in an altered voice:
'Have I not commanded you never to mention that woman's name before me? Shane is more wild than I could wish. He does what he chooses; and, besides, a man may do what a woman may not. If he were well married, he would grow quieter, no doubt. Your father's wish is the same as mine. You know it, and are obstinate.'
Doreen was astonished, for Lady Glandore was not given to displays of emotion; and now she was much agitated, while her features worked as if in physical pain. Kissing her niece on the forehead, she gathered up her skirts and walked rapidly back towards the house.
For an hour and more the girl wandered in the pleasaunce, taking no heed of dew, though her high-waisted dress was of the thinnest muslin. She was weighing her aunt's hints, and the strange complications of her own position.
There could be no further doubt that my lady desired to unite her niece to Shane. Doreen had suspected it before, but the idea seemed too preposterous. What motive could be strong enough to bring about so amazing a desire on the part of the proud chatelaine, as a union between one of the hated faith, whose mother was of doubtful origin, and the dearly-loved head of the Glandores, who was young, rich, Protestant, good-looking? That she should ever come to permit a match even with the poor younger son, whom she did not love, would be surprising enough; but a motive might be found for that in his poverty and extravagance, and her trifling nest-egg. The blot on the escutcheon would not have mattered so much in his case, for he was unlikely ever to wear the coronet, and the attorney-general's scrapings would have gilded a more unpleasant bolus than his handsome daughter.
But Shane, who by reason of his wealth and position was a great catch, who might throw his handkerchief to whom he pleased! What could be the reason? Was it that his mother dreaded his being caught by some low and penniless adventuress--he who was so self-willed and given to low company? It could hardly be that; for in the eyes of the chatelaine, Doreen herself was little better, save in the way of money; and where the young earl was himself so wealthy, her little fortune could not be taken into consideration. If he would only go into good society, Shane might aspire to the most brilliant match.
It was a riddle to which the damsel could find no solution, so she began calmly to consider how she should act herself. Should she yield to her aunt's wishes, and assume the high position of the young earl's bride? If she said 'Yes,' would Shane indeed take her to his bosom, or would he be disobedient in this as other things? If he came and asked her, would she say 'Yes,' or 'No?' She was amazed to find that she was by no means sure. He was an ignoble sot, a drunkard, and a debauchee; but, in the eyes of most young ladies, such qualities were rather admired than not. It was thought fine for a spark's eye to have a noble fierceness which softened to the mildness of the dove when contemplating 'the sex.' But then Doreen's education had been peculiar--different in many ways to that of other young ladies--partly on account of her motherlessness, partly because of the faith she professed. The Penal Code had eaten into her soul--she was more thoughtful and sober than girls of her age usually are; was given to day-dreams and impracticable heroic longings, tinged, all of them, by a romance due to her Irish nature and the romantic conditions of her time.
She had never thought much of marrying or giving in marriage, and it came upon her now as a new light, that by a marriage she might benefit the 'cause.' As she sauntered up and down, she reflected that, by espousing Shane, she might make of herself a Judith for her people's sake. Shane was already sodden and sottish, given to excessive tippling. She, Doreen, was of a masculine strength of character, and knew it. Once established at the Abbey as its mistress, why should she not take on herself the control of the estates, as the present countess did, and manage them according to her liking? The United Irishmen were sadly in need of funds. Tone had said that a bloodless revolution was impossible. Arms and powder would be required when the struggle came. Why should not she provide a portion of it out of the wealth of the lord of Strogue? It seemed an ignoble thing to do; yet, for the cause's sake, was not anything justifiable? Did not Judith, the noblest of women, the purest of patriots, lower herself to the disguise of a harlot for the saving of her people? Doreen felt the holy flame burning within her, which goes to the making of Judiths.
Her father, though she loved him fondly, could never be of real service to her. What would he think of such a wedding? It mattered not, situated as she was. Her battle of life must be fought alone, without help from any one. She was fully aware of that, and was prepared to fight it--to the end--after her own fashion.
She was startled from her reverie by the banging of doors and shouts of discordant laughter. Cassidy had been singing some time since in the young men's wing, trolling out pathetic ballads for the edification of Terence and his chief--but these had retired to rest long since. This must be the young lord and his boon companions--come to finish the night in wine and play as joyous gallants should. It would be awkward to meet them in their cups; so she stole as noiselessly as might be through the golden gate, past the sun-dial among the flowers, and reached her chamber, which was over the chintz drawing-room (her own boudoir), just as there came a crash and awful din in the hall. Then followed a babel of angry voices. Lights appeared in the dining-hall opposite, the blinds of which were not drawn down, and a posse of young nobles--their clothes muddy and disarranged; their hair dishevelled; their action wild and excited--crowded in around their host. She could distinguish my lord by the glistening of his diamond coat-buttons as he was held back by four companions, from whose grasp he strove to free himself. One of them, whose brain was less heated than the rest, had removed hiscouteau de chassefrom its sheath, and was expostulating with him; but he was evidently not to be appeased without a scapegoat, for he kept pointing angrily at a broken bust of William III. which my lady had crowned with laurel that very day.
She could see that somebody had upset the bust, and that my lord wished to wipe out the insult to the Protestant champion with the blood of the offender. My lady did not appear. She had been well broken to orgies of the kind by the late lord, and took no heed of the uproar; but the aged butler, who, as a matter of course, had produced magnums of claret in tin frames upon the appearance of the party, seemed to be coaxing his young master into good temper, and with some success apparently, for by-and-by thecouteau de chassewas given back and the party settled down amicably, having first tossed the offender out of window, who lay snoring upon the flower-beds till morning, wrapped in the sound sleep of drunkards.
Doreen sat at the open window, her chin buried in her hand, watching the proceedings of her cousin. His cravat was gone; his fair young chest exposed; his velvet surtout torn and stained; his striped silk stockings in tatters; the bunches of ribbon wrenched from off his half-boots. His face was blotched and bloated; his forehead disfigured by an ugly cicatrice which turned of a bright red when he was far gone in liquor or in passion. She saw him rise on his unsteady legs and wave a goblet at the fractured bust, while he clung with the other arm round the neck of the youth next to him. Then all the rest rose and bowed as well as they were able; some falling on the floor in the attempt and remaining there, while the others sat down to their drink again and clamoured for cards, shouting the while a chorus, which came muffled to her through the window-glass.