2222Honest Phil saddled the horses and brought them round in a twinkling, delighted always with a journey to the Abbey; for did not red-haired Biddy, who held his large heart in keeping, abide at the shebeen foreninst the Little House with her mamma, Jug Coyle? Jug Coyle--the Collough--or wise woman, mistress of hidden arts, whose little public-house, on Madam Gillin's land, had grown more orderly than heretofore during the last few months. It was not that grooms and soldiers frequented it the less, but that, instead of sitting on the bench without, roaring ribald staves into the small hours, as had been the objectionable custom, they now preferred the innermost room with a well-closed door. Yet, roistering or silent, there was the shebeen with its mouldering thatched roof and discoloured whitewash walls, and one of its tiny windows roughly boarded up, at the very gate of the lordly Abbey--an undiminished eyesore to the chatelaine.
Sara, whose gentle nature was perturbed by the scene at the supper-table--the pale faces and haggard looks--slept not a wink all night, and was most glad to join Terence in a canter by the seashore. She daily grew fonder of Doreen, whose quiet manner seemed to instil calmness into her own soul; who allowed the child in a gracious way to cling to her, to prattle of her little troubles, her suspicions and her fears, and her adoration of the undergraduate. Her father was too busy to listen to her babbling; the dear young undergraduate too much absorbed in what he called the cycle of injustice. All those with whom she had to do--except Doreen--were for ever prating of the Saxon's iron heel, shaking their fists at Heaven, venting dark anathemas and muttering such threats as terrified her. Something dreadfully mysterious was to take place soon--of that she felt assured--though when she asked questions, Mr. Curran pinched her chin, calling her a little silly kitten; then mused with eyes averted. Yes, there was a heavy intangible cloud o'ershadowing those she loved; all the little maid could do was to pour out her innocent soul to God, imploring His mercy for her father and her friends.
Wiser eyes than Sara's saw the cloud--observed that it grew blacker and more thunderous as it lowered nearer earth--that its lining, instead of being silvern, was lurid red. Some, like wreckers on a craggy beach, rejoiced in the approach of a storm which would bring them pelf; others watched it wistfully, as it darkened the sun, with a sickening sense of powerlessness to avert its coming. Among these was Doreen, who, surveying the gloomy prospect as from a watch-tower, grew hourly more grave and self-contained. Her position at the Abbey had changed but little during the interval. The dowager had never directly referred to the conversation in the rosary, but the damsel was not slow in perceiving that Shane and herself were thrown together as often as was practicable. Then this wild scheme was not to be abandoned idly? What could be the reason for it? Once, in her desire to escape from a false position, she begged her easy-going parent to take her to live with him in Dublin, telling him plainly that she could never marry Shane, imploring him to spare her a distressing ordeal. He only patted her hands, however, and nodded perplexedly, with an assurance that she should never be forced into anything she did not like. It was clear that Mr. Wolfe was growing more and more afraid of his sister, also that public affairs distressed him; for he plunged daily more deeply into routine business, attempting in a weak way now and then to pour oil upon the waters between Curran and Clare, carefully keeping his daughter out of the capital as much as he was able. Not but what he would stand up for his girl upon occasion, when my lady was too hard upon her. The dowager never grew weary of lifting up her voice against Doreen's unseemly proclivities, her free and easy ways, her ridings hither and thither, her expeditions none knew whither. It was a disgrace to the family, she averred--for in her own girlhood Irish ladies were content to sit by the fireside, or look after the pastry, study the art of dumpling-making, concoct cunning gooseberry-wine and raspberry-vinegar, prepare delicious minglings of roseleaves and lavender for the sweetening of the family linen. To all of which Mr. Wolfe was wont to reply mildly:
'The maiden is of a masculine turn, who delights not in sampler-stitching or pie-baking. She is three-and-twenty, of unusually staid manners. I'd like to see the man who dared insult her! Let be, let be. None would be more glad than I if she would think less of politics and the dreadful Penal Code. Guide her inexperience gently, if you will; but do not attempt coercion, or you'll get the worst of it.'
Despite this prudent counsel, there were several tussles 'twixt the maiden and her aunt; in one of which the elder dropped some incautious words, which were a revelation to Doreen.
'You play with edged tools, girl!' she had said. 'You form friendships with the enemies of the executive and urge them to deeds of rashness, knowing that, come what may, you, as a woman, will escape scot-free. Your unwarrantable proceedings fill your father with such anxiety that he dares not have you home, lest in Dublin you should set up for a heroine and disgrace us. You are the most stubborn stiff-necked piece of goods the world ever saw! Yet what can be expected of a Papist? This is Nemesis upon him for having married one.'
Then this was the cause of her being left at the Abbey--of Mr. Wolfe's evident anxiety? He dreaded lest--in her sorrow for her people--she should do something which would involve him in difficulties with Government. Poor, weak, loving father! No. That she clearly had no right to do. Yet she could surely not be expected to approve the acts of the executive; she, a Catholic, whose heart was rendered so sensitive by the iron which had worn into it from childhood. Was it her fault if her mind turned itself towards passing events instead of being absorbed by the manufacture of tarts? Surely not! Hers was a sturdier, braver nature than her father's. Loving him as she did, she strove not to perceive his truckling ways. Had she been a man she would have done as Tone had done--have seized a buckler and girded by her side a sword--to have at the oppressor, whose tricks were so crafty and so base. So both her father and her aunt suspected her, did they, of urging men on to conspire against the state? My lady would doubtless have placed her under lock and key if her brother had permitted of such a measure. And knowing or suspecting what she did, she was still anxious to bring about a union between the young people--her favourite son, the wealthy Earl of Glandore, and the Papist heiress who was so unmanageable. It was most amazing. Doreen failed to track out the slightest clue to the mystery.
Finding it so knotty she gave it up, choosing rather to ponder on the turn affairs were taking. She hated Lord Clare now with an indignant hatred, for he had raised his mask a little, and she had seen the devil's lineaments looking out from under it. He made no secret of his dislike of the Catholics, telling her to her face one day, with an arrogant hauteur which made her blood tingle, that he was going to make it his especial business to pull down the altars of Baal. Oh, if this Sisera would only lie down to sleep before her--with what satisfaction would she drive a great nail into his temple!
The lord chancellor was aware that the beautiful Miss Wolfe loved him not, and was wont to jest thereat when taking a dish of tea with his old flame the dowager. My lady smiled at his tirades, making merry over the appalling catalogue of things which he intended to do; for, being a brilliant Irishman, he of course had the national tendency to romancing, and it never entered into her mind to conceive that he actually could mean what he said. Though shrewd enough, my lady was quite taken in by my Lord Clare, who seeing in her a swaddler--one of those bigots who mistake rancour for virtue--was minded to make his ancient ally useful to his ends.
He failed to realise that my lady's bigotry was only skin-deep--that it was her way of protesting against the many disagreeable things which she had been forced to endure, and, thanks to Gillin, was still enduring. He therefore feared not to propose to her a something, at which her pride should have recoiled with horror, but which--thanks to his persuasive arts and her belief in his talent and integrity, she agreed at least to consider before repudiating. First he commiserated her position in being burthened with the responsible care of a damsel who was like to bring disgrace upon them all.
Behind the scenes as he was, he could see farther among the machinery than most people, and deeply deplored what seemed inevitable--namely, that the rash young lady would certainly commit herself with regard to the members of the Secret Society--be drawn into their schemes--and work grave mischief, such as should bring shame on the names both of Wolfe and Crosbie, unless something were done to circumvent her. Violent means were of course vulgar, and dangerous to boot, by reason of Miss Wolfe's character. My lady wished to unite her to her eldest son, did she? Well, it was an odd fancy, at which it was not his place to cavil. All the more reason then to render the folly of the girl of no effect by artifice. Once settled down as a wife and mother, she would forget the errors of her girlhood, and even thank her friends for having saved her from herself.
Now my Lord Clare knew through Mr. Pitt, whose spies in Paris told him everything, that Tone kept up a correspondence with Miss Wolfe under the name of Smith--that she fetched her letters from Jug Coyle's shebeen, where they were left for her under a prearranged name. His own spies told him that she talked sometimes with mysterious men, who came and went in a suspicious manner, between the environs of Dublin and the outlying districts. Yes, it was too true; my lady might well look shocked. The conspirators were making a catspaw of her niece, who hovered between two duties--the one to her Protestant father, the other to her crushed co-religionists.
Did my lady's eyes ask what was to be done? This, and only this. For it was clear, was it not, that her mines must be countermined for her own sake and that of her belongings? It would not do to seize the letters, because the villain in Paris would then invent some new method of communication, which it might take the spies some time to discover, and time was important just now. The young lady, being enthusiastic and inexperienced, was most shamefullyexploitée--the executive saw that, and were prepared to make allowances, provided her family would play a little into their hands. Did she see what he meant? No! Then my lady was duller than usual, and he must dot his i's. The executive knew that Miss Wolfe was artfully used as a spreader of secrets, because no one else in all Ireland occupied a position of similar complexity. Her heart was with the malcontents, to begin with. She, as daughter of the attorney-general--most cautious of time-servers--was not likely to be suspected of overt acts of treason. She was clearheaded, too, and resolute, useful in council. Ill-judged in other things, the conspirators had done wisely to employ Miss Wolfe as a means of intercommunication.
It would never do for Mr. Wolfe to be told of his child's transgressions, as he would only whimper and cry out; the stronger hand of his sister therefore must take the tiller, and steer the family through this difficulty. Did my lady see now? No! Well, the spies of the executive were cunning, no doubt; but their eyes could not pierce stone walls or sheets of paper tied tight with ribbon. My Lord Camden and the Privy Council wanted to know what the letters contained which were dropped at the 'Irish Slave' for Miss Doreen. Would my lady undertake the little service of finding out, and then tell her dear friend Lord Clare what plans were suggested, what names mentioned? He, on his side, would of course promise to be prudence personified, and swear never to divulge by what means the information had been obtained.
The countess winced at the suggestion, and her face crimsoned. If Government chose to establish a bureau of paid informers, who were dubbed the Battalion of Testimony, it was no affair of hers, though she could not approve the principle; but as to becoming one herself, the bare idea was an audacious insult. The chancellor laughed airily as she turned on him, for he expected some such ebullition of feeling, and waited a little while ere he proceeded. Then, like the serpent luring Eve, he strove to decide her with specious arguments. He showed that, by helping to circumvent their plans, she might do signal service against the Catholics; that both her brother and eldest son might be made to benefit indirectly by her acts, and that nobody would know anything of what she had done. In love and war all means are fair. The girl had no excuse for the line she chose to take. It was right and fitting that the lower orders should be cowed; that the Papists should be stamped down into the serfdom from which in their insolence they struggled to escape; that this Tone, whom people had liked till he took up the cudgels of Antichrist, should be brought to punishment.
These were good reasons--strong enough surely to decide my lady. If she wanted another, let her think of Gillin and her 'Irish Slave.' It would be strange if that hateful enemy could not be mixed in the coming struggle, and crushed in the downfall of the conspirators. This last stroke almost settled the resolve of the wavering countess, whose mental mirror had been blurred by long dabbling in questionable waters, which, rising in her husband's throat to choking, had wrung that last cry from him before he died. It would be delightful to discomfit Gillin. It would be odd, too, if Doreen, in the contrition which follows upon being found out, did not throw herself on her aunt's mercy, and joyfully do as she was told, on condition of being saved. After meditating awhile, my lady said she would think about it; and Lord Clare, having planted his arrow, rode back to town, satisfied that he had gained his end.
Doreen was not chicken-feeding, as Terence had thought probable, on the morning when the riders started from the Priory. Yet was she up and about, for there is naught so invigorating as fresh sea-air with a whiff of tar in it, and the evenings at the Abbey were dreary enough to induce the most wakeful to take refuge betimes in bed. She tended the flowers in the tiny square called Miss Wolfe's plot, spent a few moments in affectionate communion with some eager wet muzzles and wagging tails in the kennels, then tripped away to the rosary, to study a letter received the night before--a letter signed 'Smith,' in a cramped hand. When such reached her, she invariably retired thither to decipher them; for in the seclusion formed by the high clipped hedges, she was sure of privacy, none being able to wander among the shady avenues of beech without giving notice of their intention by the clang of the golden grille, or the creaking of a lesser gate situated at the other end of the pleasaunce.
It was a letter which gave food for concern. Impetuous, hot, Keltic; dealing, too, with details which told of action imminent.
'I will have no priests in the business,' it said. 'Most of them are enemies to the French revolution. They will only do mischief. The republic is on the move; will give us five thousand men. I would attempt it with one hundred. My own life is of little consequence. Please God, though, the dogs shall not have my poor blood to lick. I am willing to encounter any danger as a soldier, but have a violent objection to being hanged as a traitor, consequently I have claimed a commission in the French army. This to ensure being treated as a soldier in case of the fortune of war throwing me into the hands of England.'
'His life--noble young hero!' Doreen reflected. 'Suppose that he were to lose his life in the coming struggle! If Moiley needed such a sacrifice, better that he should fall fighting than die a dog's death by the noose!'
As she thought what a blow his death would be, her bosom swelled with anxiety; for every earnest woman sets up an idol in her heart, to be clothed in the trappings of her own belief, which she takes for its native adornments. She sits and keeps pious vigil over it, and weaves ennobling legends concerning it, seeming to become purified by contact with a nobler power, which, after all, is but the reflection of her own better self. That her influence over Theobald was great, Doreen knew, but not so great as his was over her. There seemed to her mind, twisted as it was by circumstance into a sombre shape, something sublime even in the light way in which he wrote of gravest things. His letters were schoolboy documents, full of homely jests, quaint sayings, quotations from bad plays. Yet what a marvellous work was he achieving. A year ago he had gone forth a wanderer, armed with a few pounds and a large stock of hope. He had sailed to New York, narrowly escaping seizure by the crimpers on the sea; had then made for Paris, whither he arrived almost without a penny. He knew scarce a word of French, yet went he straight to Carnot, who, in a satin dressing-gown, was holdinglevéesat the Luxembourg. Partly in broken words, much more by signs, he made known his wishes to the Organiser of Victory, and, through him, to the Directory. They saw in his project for an invasion of Ireland a tempting way of harassing perfidious Albion, but unfortunately their treasury was empty, their armies disorganised, and so they gave to their suppliant a cool reception. But Tone was not to be easily put off. He haunted the antechambers of the ministers, learned their language, prepared statements, suggested plans; importuned all and each in broken jargon, till, amazed at his energy, filled with respect for his pure motives and simple life, they gave him a high place amongst their own officers, and promised that his desires should be gratified.
Doreen followed the rapidity of his proceedings with astonished admiration, marvelling that he should work as he worked from sheer love of humankind; was quite persuaded that all he did was right; compared him daily to the men she saw around her--arrogant Clare, swinish Shane, idle, prosaic Terence--and felt almost prepared sometimes, if need were, to cast in her lot (as the chancellor surmised) with her mother's oppressed people, rather than with those of her highly-connected father. Gusts of loathing swept over her soul for the feudal magnificence of the Abbey; she seemed thrown on a bed of roses whose perfume sickened her. The idea of wedding all this splendour while her people groaned, was in itself revolting; to espouse Shane with it, filled the measure of her horror. Rather than submit to my lady's eccentric wish, she was prepared to run away--to hide herself in Connaught, anywhere; and this being comfortably settled, she went on with Theobald's last letter.
'Independence at all hazards. If the men of property won't help us, they must fall, and we must support ourselves by the aid of that numerous community,the men of no property. Alas for poor Pat! He is fallible; but a lame dog has been helped over a stile before now. Thearme blancheis the system of the French, and, I believe, for the Irish too. At least I shall recommend it, as Pat, being very savage and furious, takes more naturally to the pike than the musket, and the tactics of every nation should be adapted to its character. As for Dublin, one of two things must happen. Its garrison is at least five thousand strong. If a landing were effected. Government would either retain the garrison for their own security (in which case there would be five thousand men idle on the part of the enemy), or they would march them to oppose us, and then the people would seize the capital. Any way, we could starve Dublin in a week, without striking a blow.'
'Starve Dublin in a week!' Doreen pondered. 'What would happen to outlying places like the Abbey?' Then an idea struck her, whereby her own annoyances might be considerably lightened. 'Why not,' she thought, 'work on my aunt's prudential fears, and induce her to transfer the establishment to Ennishowen, in the north? Thus may Shane and his mother be removed from danger, whilst I am free of a dilemma--for, of course, when the moment of peril comes, my place will be beside my father.'
The golden grille clanged. A slight female figure, in a blue velvet habit and peaked hat, after the new mode, made its way among the roses, and Doreen advanced to welcome Sara.
Mr. Curran's pet was always a favourite of Miss Wolfe's, to whom her prattle was a rest in the midst of many perplexities. She rallied her archly about the undergraduate, marking, with a grave smile, the confusion in the young maid's face; listening absently to ecstatic descriptions of his numerous perfections, with a tender indulgence mixed with sadness; for it undoubtedly was sad to observe how blindly and artlessly the gay kitten gambolled, in spite of that threatening cloud; wondering, wide-eyed, whether he really and positively ever could come to care a tiny bit for a silly little thing like her.
Doreen knew quite well that Robert Emmett's was a lovable nature, that he was free from the ordinary frailties of youth, sensitive to a fault, just such a visionary as would suffer terribly in a great crisis such as was at hand. Just as Tone was a chivalrous man of action, so the younger Emmett was a dreamer of the most unpractical kind--one who, staring at the stars, and striving to pierce their mysteries, would plunge head-foremost into the first pitfall that was made ready for his feet. His admiration for Theobald was as great as Doreen's. When that cloud should burst, he would surely be found by his side--might possibly stumble where the other could stand erect--and, if aught befell him, what then would happen to the Primrose? But what is the use of courting melancholy? Doreen this morning, as at other times, shook off the dismal effects of her gay friend's castle-building, made efforts to meet her half-way, spoke hopefully of days to come, when Ireland should be content, when Sara should have become a wrinkled matron with a parterre of yellow blossoms round her, and beloved Robert a happy old paterfamilias with a treble chin.
Sara's peachy cheeks broke into dimples of pleasure at the description, as she looked up sideways like a bird.
'You are wasting your holiest affections, my child!' Doreen observed demurely; 'for men are dreadful, dreadful creatures who deceive and ride away. They don't care about our love one bit, unless we pretend to withhold it.'
'I love him so very much,' returned Sara, with a rapt gaze and trembling accents, 'that I could be content to worship him from a long way off if he would let me--he is so good and kind and noble!'
'He has never spoken to you of love?'
'Never.'
The child's eyes filled with tears, and Doreen's heart tightened for her. Poor fragile blossom. What might the nipping blast have in store for it?
'If any mischance were to befall him----' began the elder girl.
'I should die,' Sara answered simply, as though such a result was the only one which could be possible.
Doreen walked on in silence. She was twenty-three, her companion five years younger. Yet she could not comprehend this innocent pure heart which at eighteen gave itself unconditionally away to be trampled upon or treasured as its recipient should elect. She was sure that she had herself never loved any one, except Tone, and her father, and her mother's memory. The iron of the Penal Code had seared the germ of such a love within her if it ever had existed. She recalled the cold way in which she had calculated her capacity for playing Judith, and felt ashamed. But why should she, after all? The practical and the romantic were singularly blended in her character. What had a Catholic to do with love and the exchanging of young hearts? Fretfully she turned away from the enchantments of conservatories and hen-houses which she was displaying to her friend, and remarked as she led the way to the kennels:
'You said you had brought Terence with you. Can he be closeted all this while with his mother? That would be unusual. He does not favour us with much of his society. As I live, here's another visitor. It is such a lovely morning that I shall lay violent hands upon you all. Mr. Cassidy here is one of the best yachtsmen on the bay. We might go for a sail round Ireland's Eye if Terence would only condescend to show himself.'
'Oh yes!' cried ecstatic Sara, 'it would be entrancingly delicious.' She would run and tell my lady, who was probably breakfasting, that she must give us her son for the general good.
It was the jolly giant, who on his big bay hunter clattered into the courtyard; come, probably, in search of news on his own account, in spite of what he had said to Terence a few hours before. He had watered his horse at the shebeen, had taken a plunge into the sea to dissipate the fumes of last night's revel, had given red-haired Biddy such a smacking kiss as would have roused the ire of Terence's devoted henchman if he had been within fifty yards, and was now come to pay his respects to the inmates of the Abbey.
He praised the dogs in a flurried sort of way, stood on one great foot and then the other, rapping the dust from his full-skirted riding-coat with his hunting-crop, whilst his eyes devoured the fine lines of Miss Wolfe's figure, which indeed compelled admiration through its tight-fitting, high-waisted frock. During the last year he had made considerable advance in the good graces of the chatelaine, and of her first-born. She, as chatelaines ought to be, was delighted to have a host of philanderers hanging about the Abbey, swilling its liquor, devouring its beef, while my lord deigned to make the squireen useful in a multitude of ways. Belonging as he did to the half-mounted class, such homage as he could pay was due to a great lord, who was kind enough to smile upon him. That he might be hand and glove with the United Irishmen was neither here nor there; was he not also an ally of Major Sirr's as well as aprotégéof the chancellor's--tolerated too by Curran, Lord Clare's arch-enemy? He was all things to all men, a typical 'tame cat:' it remained to be seen which side he would take when the crisis should come--at least so people remarked who did not know, as we do, that he had taken the oath and was given to mystical questions anent the placing of a bough in the crown of England. A man who can turn his hand to anything, rides well to hounds, sings jovial ditties, makes genteel play with a rapier, can sigh like a furnace, and look languishingly at a pretty girl, is sure of being a general favourite. Doreen liked Mr. Cassidy as much as Shane did, an unusual circumstance, for his likes and dislikes were generally in direct opposition to hers. She was wont to jest at his many blunders, lecture him for his stupidity, allow him greater liberties than were usual between an heiress and a 'half-mounted.' For there was no harm in him. He would not be likely to try to run off with this prize, for Shane's sword--champion-spit of the Cherokees and Blasters--was a universally dreaded weapon, and Mr. Cassidy was too fond of the good things of this life to think of suddenly quitting it with daylight through his vitals. Sometimes he made love to her. Then she held out a warning finger while smiles wreathed her ruddy lips, as she would have done to any inmate of the kennels that should dare leap with dirty paws upon her flowered muslin.
This morning his behaviour was not what it should have been. Sure that dip in Dublin Bay had not washed away the impudence begot of claret. She looked so ravishingly fresh and neat in the chip hat which, with a plain white ribbon knotted beneath the chin, gave a yet fuller glow to her rich complexion, the close-clinging robe spangled here and there with a bunch of poppies, that there was little wonder if prudence was for once outrun by passion. She was not Miss Hoyden any more. Her clothes were of the most fashionable cut; nimblest-fingered of Dublin tailoresses made her frock; long mitts of daintiest Carrick lace masked only to accentuate the golden ripeness of her finely modelled arms; a pair of stout pointed brogues, silver buckled, drew down the eye to the clean ankle and high instep, which told of healthful exercise by a series of suave contours and voluptuous curves.
Now the mind of Cassidy was gross in its essence; jaded too by appetites in riot. What would be more likely to stimulate a coarse illiterate squireen than the aspect of such a living paradox as this? His political intentions were admirable, doubtless; possibly when the time came he, like a few others, would rise to the occasion, cast aside low vices, and, passing like gold through the fire, achieve deeds which would endear him to his countrymen. That was possibly in the future. The present only whispered, as his eyes wandered over the figure of the girl before him, that such a morsel could not be too dearly bought. With unwonted courage, he blurted out the original remark:
'Mistress Doreen, you're monsthrous beautiful!'
'Am I?' she replied, raising her eyebrows. 'Alas! it's of little consequence.'
'Is it now?' returned Cassidy, endeavouring in his murky brain to plod out a reason for the statement. 'Oh!' he said at length, 'becase you're booked, and you don't care whether my lord is pleased or not.'
'My lord?' inquired the girl, her brows arching yet higher.
'Aren't you to be the future lady of Ennishowen? I can put two and two together.'
So this hateful match was being freely canvassed. Even muddlepated Cassidy had penetrated my lady's plans. He was peering straight into her eyes, trying to find what he could at the bottom of their brown depths. The heat of angry humiliation sent the blood bubbling to her face. Cassidy observed it, and leered pleasantly.
'He's not good enough for you--I don't like your marrying him,' he observed with decision.
'No more do I,' returned calm Miss Wolfe.
Cassidy's looks sought the ground--his big hand fondled the muzzles of the dogs. After a long pause, he said in a low voice:
'If you don't care about him it's small blame to you.'
'Neither for him, nor anybody else.' (The slightest contraction of a fine nostril.)
'Don't say that, Miss Doreen, darlint,' said the giant, quickly. 'There's many a stout fellow about, whose heart it would plase if ye'd rub your pretty brogues on it, who'd like to set fire to the tobaccy in his pipe every blessed day by the light of your lovely eyes.'
Doreen glanced up at the giant with an amused smile.
'Fie! Mr. Cassidy. If I didn't think you too sensible a man, I should believe you were trying to propose to me.' Then it struck her that it was on this very spot that Terence had asked if he might hope.
'What possesses the men? How odd it is,' she said, thinking aloud. 'Fate settled long since that I was to die an old maid; and everybody seems to want to marry me. Why? I am surely not so irresistible? There are scores of girls who would be delighted to marry any one, but somehow nobody cares to ask them! Why not try Norah Gillin--Shane at least thinks her a paragon--and she has the advantage of being a Protestant.'
'Miss Doreen,' Cassidy whispered, 'if I undertook to work heart and soul for the cause you care so much for; if I made use of my opportunities--went about for you--as your agents do (you see I know all about it); if, when the hour comes, I promised to risk my life and all I have for you--'tisn't much--would you change your mind then?'
Miss Wolfe felt his hot breath upon her hair, and began to feel uncomfortable. It was her own fault. She should have cried 'Down!' to this importunate dog before.
'Mr. Cassidy,' she said, with the quiet dignity which was her best protection, 'you show yourself in a false light. You belong to the society--I fully believe--from conviction of the holiness of its aims. Although a Protestant, you are an Irishman, as I am an Irishwoman. Our wrongs are common. Don't let me suppose you to be suggesting a bargain.'
'It is that good-for-nothing young councillor!' the giant muttered, grinding his teeth fiercely. 'If I was sure of it, I'd run him through! Have a care, young lady; don't trifle with honest men--or wigs will be on the green, and you may be sorry!'
The interview was becoming extremely painful. Cassidy, when tried, was showing the cloven foot, as under-bred persons will. Miss Wolfe drew herself up to her full height, knitted her dark brows, and said coldly:
'You forget yourself strangely, sir! My aunt and my cousin have been over-kind to you; I have tried, for my poor part, to make your visits pleasant, believing you, as I still believe, to be honest, if bearish and uncouth. If you dare to persecute me any further I will speak to my aunt, and the doors of the Abbey will be closed to you for ever. Then seeing how rueful, how dismayed the hapless giant looked, she took compassion and held out a frank little brown hand. 'Come, come! This is childish nonsense. I must not be hard on you. We must not quarrel, you know, but cling together closely for the good cause's sake. If petty private feuds begin to divide us, the enemy will dance for joy. I want a friend in whom to trust. You shall be that friend. Will you? Come! Be good, and I will pardon you.'
She placed her hand in his, where it lay like a small leaf, and her companion said sulkily, as he stroked it with a great finger:
'You evaded the question about Mr. Crosbie.'
'Well then,' she answered, 'I care no more for him than for Shane or you. I will never marry till Erin is righted. Ah me! doesn't that look like perpetual maidenhood? My husband, too, must have won his spurs as a hero, and heroes are scarce. There. Shake hands, and let there be an end of it. Your heart is in the cause, as mine is. Your acts speak for you, and Theobald shall thank you some day. Depend on it, the best tenure of earthly attachment is tenancy at will. You have the use of the soil, and nothing you plant in it shoots so deeply but it may be removed with ease. Let us be friends--trusty friends, Mr. Cassidy--no more.'
At this juncture, Terence came briskly round the corner, and started to see the attitude of the twain. His sudden suspicion cooled, however, upon perceiving that his cousin was no whit confused. Her hand still remained in that of Cassidy, and she said, laughing, as she swung it to and fro:
'Here is a big creature who threatens by-and-by to bud into a hero of romance. When he kneels victorious in the lists, I, as queen of beauty, am to bestow the laurel crown. What a delectable picture, isn't it? Glad to see you, Terence. You are determined we shall value your society. You give us so very little of it.'
'You look like having quite enough of it by-and-by,' Terence answered moodily. 'I brought with me a note from Mr. Curran to my mother, in which he says that he won't have me at the Priory any more; that I must come home like an obedient child, and wash my face and brush my hair and say I'm sorry. If I had known what was in the letter I should have stayed away.'
'But you'll stop,' Doreen said, so earnestly as to cause the giant to look askance at her. 'It is sad for members of a family to be at daggers-drawn. Come--to please me--let me be peacemaker. Shane shall say you are welcome, and we'll all be in harmony together again. Promise me--and I'll tell you some rare news that has been burning my tongue this month past. You are both to be trusted, I know.'
'I would every one was as thrue as the councillor here and I!' ejaculated the giant, his frown breaking into sunshine, as if suddenly convinced, by some queer reasoning, that there was nothing between Terence and Miss Wolfe. 'It's mighty careful we'll have to be by-and-by with them rapscallions of ould Sirr's. Wisht! now, and I'll tell ye what he told me,' he pursued, lowering his voice and glancing round as though the dogs could speak. 'There's a place called the Staghouse, over foreninst Kilmainham gaol, bad cess to it, where the Battalion of Testimony are housed and fed, as these hounds are. They have their rations and potteen and a penny or two for toh-baccy--for all the world like gentlemen born. I'll make it my business to stroll in there some day, just to draw their pictures on my mind's eye. Maybe it'll be useful to know the spalpeens' faces.'
'This system of spies is terribly base,' Terence said, sighing. 'Enough to bring down chastisement upon any cause. I don't believe Lord Camden knows of it. The gentry are arming right and left, my mother says, in case the people should be ill-advised enough to rise. Yeomanry corps are being formed in every county. Shane has been this morning applied to, to take the lead in this district.'
'Shane raise a regiment? With what result?' Doreen inquired quickly.
'With none as yet,' answered Terence, laughing; 'because my lord is sleeping off the effects of a terrible bout last night, which ended in two duels and the killing of a baker, and probably will allow my mother and Lord Clare to settle such a thing as that, as they may deem most wise.'
'It is too late for such organisation to be dangerous,' Doreen affirmed gaily. 'Now I'll tell you the great secret, for it is only fair you, Mr. Cassidy, should know, and Terence will not divulge. Now, lend me your ears. The French fleet is almost ready to sail. Our friends will start in two parties before the summer's over, from a northern port; making the one for Cork, the other for some point on the west coast. Hoche himself has promised to lead the expedition. The delegates of our own provincial centres have secret orders. We may expect to look on the ships which shall bring us deliverance by the commencement of the autumn at the latest. Here's Theobald's last letter; you may read it.'
The giant looked eagerly to seaward, sniffing like a war-horse, as though already he could discern the vessels in the offing; and whistled a subdued whistle, as if saying to himself, 'This is news worth taking that early ride for.' With each great fist deep in a breeches-pocket, he listened to the letter, and then said: 'Arme blanche. Eh! He agrees with us then, and is right. The pike's the thing for Paddy. The difficulty of landing powder enough to be of service would be enormous. Moreover, since the Gunpowder Act, Pat knows nothing of its use, and would do more harm to himself in the long-run than to the enemy.'
Doreen declared that of such details she could of course know nothing, to which the giant retorted that there were hosts of reasons in favour of the pike. The Hessian and Hanoverian mercenaries who were being slowly drafted into Ireland were experienced only in the orthodox mode of warfare. The courage of armies is so uncertain that they are often disconcerted and panic-stricken by a style of fighting to which they are unaccustomed.
'See here!' the giant said, drawing a paper from his pocket and presenting it to Terence. 'This is a model by which thousands are being made all over the country. Long, flat, ugly no doubt--but easily forged. Could ye improve on that?'
Now Terence, had he been wise, would have refused the challenge, sapiently declining to know anything of the model pike, for the giant was bent somehow on securing him--but, intoxicated by the enthusiasm of his pretty cousin, whose cairngorm eyes, under their long lashes, were as usual making sad havoc of his judgment, he took the design and thought he could improve upon it. Cassidy's muddle-headedness stood in the way of his understanding, and the young councillor was forced to sketch out a new design, with elaborate instructions as to how it might be hammered out with a maximum of wounding power and a minimum of labour. Of course 'it was just the thing,' Cassidy declared, delighted, and brought down his sledge-hammer palm upon the other's shoulder.
'We'll have to crimp you?' he vowed, with a peal of merriment in which Doreen softly joined, 'and so gain a gineral, as the Sassanagh gains sailors. Ye'll be with us some day, Masther Terence, see if you aren't!'
And now, too, he declared that he must have more advice about these said pikes--there was terrible difficulty in storing them as they were made. He had an audacious idea. What did Master Terence think of it? Some of the gentry from the Staghouse were, he was informed, constantly on the prowl in search of such information as might be bartered against good living; for Major Sirr laid it down as an initial axiom, that a member of his battalion who remained silent beyond a certain limit of time was to be cashiered as incompetent. It was literally a case of 'singing for supper,' and one of the simplest methods of obtaining credit with the town-major was to discover and denounce a depot of concealed weapons.
Now Jug Coyle (mistress of the shebeen hard-by)--this was a tremendous secret--was deeply involved in the affairs of the society. Her back garden contained many more pike-heads than praties. It stood to reason that she should be so involved, for was she not a collough, a trafficker in charms and simples, who was called in by the peasantry around for the curing of their bodily ills; and was it possible for one who was bone of their bone to refrain from meddling with their wrongs also? Well, she could store no more without awaking the suspicions of the Staghouse gentry, who seemed already to suspect that seditious meetings were held under her thatch; and yet it was very necessary that many more weapons should be stored somewhere in the immediate neighbourhood of the city. The question was, where could a spot be found for them to lie snugly--a place where folks would least suspect their existence?
The giant was becoming so earnest, and so lucid in his earnestness, that Doreen quite marvelled at him. She knew more of Jug Coyle's manage than he was aware of, and listened with growing interest, for red-polled Biddy, whilst acting as Theobald's post-office, was constantly declaring that she felt like living on a powder-magazine.
'It has been suggested,' the giant went on, 'that Mrs. Gillin of the Little House should take some; but that would not be wise, for she is a Catholic whose opinions are well known, though latterly she has cultivated a discreet tongue. It might enter the head of the town-major to search her place.'
'It would certainly be unwise!' Terence said. 'Remember her daughter's connection with my brother. May she be trusted? There are female spies as well as male, I suppose. You people are dreadfully rash, Cassidy.'
'Never fear, Master Terence,' returned the giant, with a twinkle in his eye. 'Both she and her daughter are children of the people, who would sacrifice this lord and many another to boot for the good cause, if need were. Her heart is with us, like many another; but in this case at least it's best she should play blind.'
'But what is your suggestion?' Doreen inquired, for the giant was beating about the bush in an exasperating manner.
'This is it. Don't cry out now when ye hear it.' He glanced round with caution, and lowered his voice. 'The ould armoury above in the young men's wing there.'
'What! Here at the Abbey!' Terence exclaimed. 'You are mad.'
Cassidy was watching him in sidelong fashion as he felt his way.
'Sure there's a power of blackguard knives there already, which no one touches from year's end to year's end, as the cobwebs show. I'd stake my life ye've not been in there yourself this year or two. Nobody would search there, would they? They might be passed up from the shebeen at night-time--Biddy and your man Phil would see to it--over the old ivy wall, and exchange a kiss or two into the bargain.'
'Phil is not affiliated,' objected Terence.
'Is he not?' grunted the giant, shortly. 'It's surprised I'd be if he could not tell us as much about a green bough in England's crown as is known to you or I.'
Doreen's eyes were on her cousin. Her face wore its usual serene look. The enormity of the proceeding did not seem so great to her as it did to him. He did not take into consideration the sublime manner in which women look straight to a goal, without marking the mud which may have to be crossed to reach it. A thought shot through his brain, flooding it with joy. If she could contemplate such a trick being played upon the earl, she could not care about him. That was a rare thing to know. And why should it not be played on him? The brothers were so estranged, that the younger one felt no call to interfere in such a matter on behalf of the elder. It was impossible that he should have lived so long on terms of familiarity with the disaffected without being unconsciously tainted to at least a small extent with their oft-repeated complaints. Not that he was prepared to admit that these modern grievances were well-founded. No doubt it had been very improper--all those years ago--for a Protestant invader to seize,vi et armis, the territory of a Catholic nation--to eject the sons of the soil by force, in favour of themselves and their heirs. But really it was too late now to remedy that misfortune.
The English were to all seeming a happy and contented people, who had long since given up groaning over the Norman invasion and the freebooting proceedings of William the Conqueror. It was merely a matter of time. Ireland must accept the past, and pick out the thorns from the bed on which she lay as well as she could. Thus was Terence, in his idle good-humoured way, accustomed to argue when his personal friends gnashed their teeth at the Sassanagh. But these new theories that were beginning to be broached--even by Mr. Curran himself--charging the executive with motives which, if they in truth existed, werelèse-patrieof the most heinous kind, caused even his careless junior to pause and think. And then he consoled himself with considering that high-principled King George could not be Blunderbore--that my Lord Clare was not a Feefofum. Yet there was no doubt that my Lord Clare was unduly harsh--that the low-bred squireens were apt to treat the common folk cruelly to curry favour with the Castle. He did not pause to ask himself why cruelty to common folk should be pleasing in the Castle's eye. These yeomanry corps were likely to be productive of much evil. Terence had said as much to his mother but now. It was possible that Shane, in his overbearing pride of birth and fierce tendency to fire-eating, might become a terrible flail if he accepted the task of organising a regiment--indeed from his nature he was sure to do so. It would be a whimsical revenge for the people that he should be unconsciously guarding their weapons for them.
Councillor Crosbie laughed loud at the conceit, declaring that he saw no reason why pikeheads should not be added to the 'blackguard knives' in the armoury, and his cousin gave him such a distracting look of thanks that he chid himself for considering the matter at all; while Cassidy, who also caught the look, glared out to seaward, clenching his fists in his deep pockets.
'That eccentric person, Mrs. Gillin!' Terence cried gaily. 'So she's mixed up with all this plotting, is she? Has she taken the oath, or is she but a privileged outsider like myself? And my man Phil, too--that's to please red-polled Biddy, doubtless. Let's take the oath, Doreen, while we can make a favour of it, for all Ireland will, it seems, be in it soon. The good lady was in her garden as I passed this morning, strutting about with leather gloves and garden-shears, and bowed solemnly to me as I passed. What a queer woman! At the Rotunda the other day she came and stood before me, though we have never been introduced, and said, "Are you sure, young man, that you left your home of your free will?" When I said "Certainly," she gave a satisfied nod and disappeared in the crowd. If her daughter is pining for Shane, her mother evidently sets her cap at me. I trust you will all be civil to the future Madam Crosbie. This is the way she walks----' and the irreverent scapegrace proceeded to waddle up and down with so exact an imitation of Mrs. Gillin's peculiarities that Cassidy fairly shouted. That lady and her doings being a tabooed subject at the Abbey, there was special delight in talking of her on the sly.
All three were guiltily startled by the opening of my lady's bedroom window (which looked upon the courtyard), and the apparition of Queen Bess in a bad temper, summoning Miss Wolfe to her presence.