It was Madam Gillin, who had been refused admittance to the cell of herprotégébecause his comrade lay under sentence of death, and had not yet been removed to solitude.
Thus was it, in the chaos produced by misrule, that these dissimilar members of an oppressed religion became acquainted at last. They had met so frequently over sick-beds or at Castle festivities that they seemed to be quite old friends, till the sound of an unfamiliar voice told them that it was not so. Is it not ofttimes thus? Do we not know a person so well by sight that every turn of expression seems to bind us to him till we hear his voice, which strikes us as strange, and, finding no echoing chord within our hearts, warns us that we are strangers?
The attention of the three ladies was arrested by a hubbub within the provost. There was a sound of chains, then the chaunt arose in chorus which was become, through the irony of fate, so piteous a mockery:
'What rights the brave? The sword!What frees the slave? The sword!'
'What rights the brave? The sword!What frees the slave? The sword!'
Alas, alas! There was no sword now but that of an avenging tyrant; when might it be sheathed? Sara screened her face with her hand and cowered over her saddle-bow, for a dearly loved voice had been wont to sing that song. With deep thankfulness she remembered that the Destroying Angel who had been so busy was kind at least to her. It might have been Robert clanking his chains within that door. Thank Heaven, he was far away across the sea in London--safe! Sara, guiltily glad in the midst of so much sorrow, reined in her horse, which shied upon the sudden opening of the door. Another voice--whose well-known richness sent a thrill through the bosoms of Doreen and Gillin--trolled forth in answer the Orange Hymn of 'Croppies, lie down.' The singer stood with burly legs, like pillars, across the threshold, a huge dark shadow against the light behind--a shadow of evil to both Gillin and Doreen--Cassidy.
'Lie down, dogs! or ye'll have a taste of the triangles!' he bellowed over his shoulder in his racy brogue, ere he perceived that he was watched.
Miss Wolfe's brow contracted, for this was the Cassidy without the mask, whose aspect at Glas-aitch-é had affected her like a snake; who had sold Theobald deliberately; whose real self was so different from the other one that would fain have been her lover. Presently he was aware of horses' hoofs, and recognised in the stream of radiance which poured across the road the brown velvet habit which he had been wont idiotically to sigh after. The sight of it did not improve his temper. He troubled not to assume the mask again, for the die was cast for better or for worse--by her. He was now an openly protected ruffian, a patronised Orange braggadocio. Rollicking, disrespectful, he jerked a thumb to his hat and grinned at Miss Wolfe.
'Leedies on a party of pleasure?' he jeered. 'Faix, Miss Doreen, ye're fond of singing-birds. I'd bring ye insoide, but 'tisn't clean enough. 'Deed it's not, now. I'll have it swept to-morrow. Is it Councillor Crosbie ye're afther trying to peep at? I wouldn't, if I were you, for he's not the purty boy at whom ye used to lower your eyelids.'
Doreen replied with studied calmness: 'You do well to drop disguise, Mr. Cassidy, since I know you as you are. If they are in your care, God help them!'
The marble beauty! Her scorn ate into his flesh like vitriol. He had, with long patience, shown a fictitious better side to her in vain. It was with fiendish pleasure that he exposed the real one.
But the contempt which knitted the maiden's brow and distended her finely-cut nostrils proved too much for the giant's pot-valour. He tried to wink with the slyness which used to keep supper-tables in a roar, but shrank under her steady glance, and retiring with a growl, discomfited, slammed the door. Then, the spell removed, cursing himself and her, he went through a pantomime of anathema, battering the panels from within with heavy fists till the turnkeys ran out, supposing him to have been attacked.
'She treats me like dirt!' he gnashed out between foul oaths. 'Yet, plaze the Lord, I'll brand myself on her memory till her dying day. Damn her! A fight, is it? A fight be it--deadly--to the last gasp. We'll see if her ladyship will be so hoity-toity then!'
The frown passed not from the maiden's face with the vanishing of Cassidy.Hethere, in apparent authority! His presence boded little good to either of the dear prisoners.
What a queer character was Cassidy's! Outwardly merry and good-humoured, he was by nature coldly fierce, calculating, callous. Reckless of life himself, its value to others made no impression on him. Playful and unpitying, commanding the smile and heeding not the sigh, he was a human paradox. The more Doreen considered him the less could she understand such a person, being herself true and impulsive and open as the day.
'We will go to Ely Place at once,' she said hurriedly. 'Lord Clare must and shall help us.'
The ladies walked their horses in order that panting Mrs. Gillin might tell all she knew. Tone's doom was fixed. Of that she was sure. Neither the chancellor nor anybody else could avert his passing. But Terence--so careless and so joyous a short while ago--his case was harrowing. Both were specially interested in him. Madam Gillin had heard for certain that his trial was to come on within a week, and that his henchman had been well triangled only a few hours since to extort evidence against his master. His butchers had even stopped their practical joke at intervals in order to give him time to pull his thoughts together. Did he say anything? Nothing that the narrator was aware of. Her nurse, old Jug, witnessed the scourging, and scurried home all of a tremble at the horrid spectacle. In her presence he had writhed and shrieked for mercy--had gnawed his tongue lest it should escape control--had swooned--and was then tossed upon some straw--half dead, but faithful so far.
Sara clung to her saddle-pommel as she listened, lest she too should swoon; and it dawned upon Doreen that they were out on a fool's errand. Life is a bitter gift to many; yet, charged as we are with illusory hopes, what suffering must be ours ere we master its full bitterness! She came out imagining that mercy was alive, that justice was only torpid, that she could plead with human creatures to whom justice and mercy were precious. How mad! For mercy she saw with terrible clearness the triangle; for justice, the shade of Cassidy. The Valley of the Shadow was of weary length, and she was groping in it darkly still. Nothing could come of this expedition; of that she felt convinced. Tone and Terence would be hanged. Terence, who held her heart--she knew it now with no tinge of shame, and gloried in it. She promised herself to be present at his trial, strengthening him by her sympathy. He might not be hers in this world. She had refused the boon of his affection when he had offered it; had presumed to preach to him--worse--had doubted him. Blind, fatuous girl! How justly punished! He was to die a martyr, blessed in that his life was to be in mercy shortened. She would tend his lowly bed, plant flowers on it, then take the veil and spend in prayer and vigil such days as it might be her lot to linger through. They would not be many. Heaven was very deaf. Surely this little boon of a speedy flitting might be vouchsafed to her jaded spirit? The tendency to asceticism which is buried more or less deep in all of us was asserting itself in this dark hour over Doreen. She looked forward to the cloister and the monastic habit with exultation.
By the time the party turned into Ely Place, Doreen had lost her courage and her hope. She felt as shy almost as Sara--panted only for the swift coming of the shot that she might stagger away into the covert.
Strange! There was a party at Lord Clare's. All the windows were ruddy with light, filtering through cosy curtains. Incongruous spectacle! Sedans were ranged in rows; their bearers could be heard yelling in an adjacent tavern. The entry-door was wide open lacqueys in sumptuous liveries hurried in and out; there was a clatter of knives and forks, the popping of corks and shouts of laughter.
Miss Wolfe was aghast. This contingency had not occurred to her. It never struck her that at such a moment men could be found who were capable of making merry.
'Let us go home!' timid Sara urged. 'What can we do? It's dreadful!'
Mrs. Gillin laughed bitterly, and clutched Miss Wolfe's bridle.
'Do you know what they're at?' she whispered, glancing round lest any one should hear her. 'It's a merry-making, true enough; but there's business at the bottom of it. I know more than I'm supposed to know, I tell you. The members of the Houses are chap-fallen. Their consciences are working inconveniently. Dinners are being organised by those in office to raise their drooping "sowls," in case, at the last moment, they should waver in their allegiance. We know what they're driving at--sure, it's splendid! The friends of Government dine together and drink toasts, and hob and nob with lusty choruses, and swill claret as pigs swill wash, to keep their loyalty at boiling-point. While the friends of Erin sit in ashes, and the scrag-boy's worn to the bone with villain's work! It's a quare world, isn't it, Miss Wolfe?'
The little party was beginning to enlist attention. Women on horseback did not often linger out so late. The gold braid upon their habits, the plumes in their hats, proclaimed their superior position. Obsequious yeomen sprang up as though out of the ill-paved street; lackeys surrounded them. What could be done for their honours? Sure, half the aristocracy was pledging my lord chancellor. Glorious, gay dogs! Was aught amiss? Sure, 'twas a pity to spoil fun! Which of 'em did the ladies want to see? A private hint might be conveyed to the lucky ones.
The soldiers leered at the ladies who dared to be out at such a time of night--with stringent orders as to curfew, too! It was like the impudence of their craft to dare seek their gallants at the chancellor's own door. Reckless, bold baggages! Insolent, good-looking hussies! Madam Gillin was preparing for a fray. She was a good hand at bandying retorts, and perceived at once the suspicions of the bystanders; but she was not destined to show her prowess on this occasion, for the astonished hall-porter recognised the ladies, and waddled out to welcome them as quickly as amazement and short breath would permit.
'Is it Miss Wolfe, good luck? Sure his lordship your father's here. Will I call him?'
'No. I wish to see Lord Clare,' Doreen stammered, her courage oozing strangely. 'Don't tell him that 'tis I.'
Sara, who all along had been supported in this singular adventure by the valiance of her friend, saw that Doreen was breaking down. The amazon--the cool, calm heroine! If she gave way, then must the case indeed be desperate. The poor gentle little thing instantly broke down, too, in most lamentable fashion. Tears rolled down her cheeks; blonde elf-locks hung over her eyes. She was a piteous object, if a lovely one, to look upon, and refused all Madam Gillin's rough attempts at comforting.
Lord Clare came forth with a napkin in his hand. A silhouette, with arm upraised, appeared on the window-curtain, and the thick, quavering voice of Lord Glandore rang out above the din of glasses. 'A toast! A toast!' he shouted. 'The Hero of the Nile, who has taught the French their bearings!' Doreen shivered. An English toast from the lips of Terence's brother. Alas! it signified little now what should befall the French. Ireland was beyond succour. Summoning together with a desperate effort the shreds of her wavering purpose, she implored the chancellor to go at once with her to the Castle. If the matter were clearly explained, the Viceroy would exert his right of clemency. Tone might be saved. At least his passing might be postponed, which practically would come to the same thing. The trial of Terence might also be put off. In the confusion of troublous days like these, a few weeks make all the difference. A little time works wonders; each grain of trickling sand is priceless.
Lord Clare lifted the two girls from their saddles; bade a groom take the horses to his stable, and prepare a coach forthwith.
'Come within,' he said gravely. 'It is not fitting that you should play the knight-errant thus; you might be insulted. What would your father think of it?'
He paced up and down his study in silent meditation until the carriage was announced, while Madam Gillin's clack was stilled by awe, and the two girls watched his every movement with breathless eagerness. Then, striking his hands together as though his web of thought were complete, he stood opposite to Doreen with a glance less like the alligator's than his was usually.
'I've done my best already with Lord Cornwallis,' he said; 'but he heeds me no more than a crazy table. I begged him to quash this last trial; to show leniency with regard to your cousin. He retorted that he was forbidden to be lenient; that he had promised to let the trials run their course; that I had myself to thank for it, having complained of him to Mr. Pitt. I cannot stop this trial. Mr. Pitt is as ungrateful, I find, as other men. He made use of me, then flung me aside without the least compunction. I see it now--too late. As for the other----'
Doreen sank on her knees before the chancellor.
'As for Tone,' he went on, severely, 'it is right and fit that he should die. I would not move a finger to save him from the hangman. The mischief-maker! Come, my carriage shall take you back to Strogue. An officer shall ride behind to protect it.' Then, seeing how distressed she looked, he took her hand, and continued, in a kinder voice, 'I'm not so heartless as you imagine. Girls should not trouble their pretty heads with politics, which they are unable to understand. You think it very shocking to be giving feasts at such a time? Yet both your cousin Shane and your father are here for state reasons. These festivities have a political meaning. Now, get you home and go to bed to refresh your roses. My word! Madam Gillin, if I mistake not? A strange companion for my lady's niece! Good-night. For his sake I will not tell your father of this escapade.'
And so the maiden's effort was as vain as the little lawyer's was. She sat sedate and still as the coach rattled on, murmuring once, in an undertone, 'That I, who never kneel to any one but God, should have knelt at that man's feet in vain!' She thought of Theobald. What was he doing? Was he praying, or sleeping a last sleep? It must need all a soldier's courage to walk calmly to a scaffold. A cause should be a good one that has power to produce such martyrs.
* * * * *
While Curran and Doreen were straining every nerve for him, Tone stared moodily out into his prison-yard and watched the building of a new gallows there. 'A soldier's end was all I asked,' he sighed, 'and they even deny me that small grace.'
In the evening he took a tender farewell of Terence, and moved into an adjoining cell, which, as for a distinguished person who was condemned to death, had been set apart for him.
'Let us sit together to the last,' Terence objected, with a mournful smile. 'Why should we be parted who are both hovering on the confines of eternity? Well, come in and look at me again before you go.'
Theobald embraced his friend with clinging warmth, and whispering once more, 'We shall meet again,' withdrew. When the gaolers came to lead him to the gallows-foot they were too late. His body lay cold upon the pallet. An ensanguined mark was on his throat. He had escaped the scrag-boy--cheated 'Jack the Breath-stopper'--and was gone!
Though Shane roared out gay toasts to the health of Nelson, he was by no means happy in his mind. No dwelling could be more disagreeable than Strogue. His supposed participation in the capture of the arch-martyr was speedily punished by the people. His cattle were houghed. It happened to be a late season; all his corn was cut and trampled in one night by unseen avengers. He was in constant dread of Moiley, of being sent to his account from behind a hedge--ignominious exit for a king of Cherokees. He even felt inclined to do as many fellow-proprietors did, namely, to barricade himself in his Abbey and endure a state of siege till better times should come. In order to curry favour with the executive he underlined his open disavowal of his brother's acts, spoke flippantly of traitors; an unfeeling course which did not raise him in the esteem of blunt Lord Cornwallis. That nobleman expressed his opinion of Pat in no measured terms, vowing, as testily he poked the fire, that the Irish were unfit to govern themselves; that, independent of the benefit which would accrue to England, the sooner a legislative union could be brought about, the better it would be for Ireland herself. The few months of his residence in Dublin had melted all his scruples on that head. On principle, Mr. Pitt's game was an iniquitous one. There could be no two opinions as to that. But the new Viceroy was not long in discovering that a union would materially improve the condition of the people by freeing them from the persecution of bigoted factions, provided that the King could only be brought to allow that the Catholics should be permitted to exist. After all, how could a scuffle about a union affect the lower orders? Under home-rule were they not always slaves? Did they not profess to hate the yoke of English and Anglo-Irish equally? It would be a change of masters; a change from tyranny to mildness; for it was understood by Lord Cornwallis that the Reign of Terror had been brought about to disgust the country with its ruling classes; and that that result being attained, a skilfully contrasted millennium was to be inaugurated instantly. The members of the senate had been cajoled, with a few exceptions, into disgracing themselves beyond redemption. Could they be coaxed a stage lower--just one? Possibly. The Marquis Cornwallis, so far as his private honour was concerned, drew the line at this. He would supervise the stew, without direct personal interference in its brewing. It did not behove a man who had won immortal laurels in the field, to stoop to put salt on the tails of the Irish Lords and Commons. No! That unworthy work must be done by the chancellor and such others as were ready to paddle in thecloaca. This is how it was that, despite the paling of his star, my Lord Clare was giving dinners--symposia intended to act as birdlime to fluttering legislators--feasts at which hints were dropped of the future emoluments that awaited the complaisant. Mr. Pitt's ball was rolling steadily to the goal, while my Lord Clare swept clear its course. The bloody drama was all but concluded now. One more trial and the pageant at the Sessions-House would come to a close, and those who had escaped so far would probably be permitted to disappear in the medley. Nearly all had been tried who could be safely sentenced; there were some left whom it would be best not to try. The last serious state-trial must be got over without more ado--a trial complicated by private venom and a series of false statements which were twisted into attempted murder as well as treason; a trial which must be so conducted as to bear sifting by the opposition, examination by the scrutiny of Europe--a trial wherein both sides would wrestle with all their strength and cunning. Which was to enact Jacob, and which the angel?
Theobald Wolfe Tone having vanished from the scene, the eyes of Dublin were still turned fearfully to the selfsame cell at the provost, wherein the companion of his last hours lingered. The people counted the moments that were left to him. Coronachs were crooned in secret before their time in many a cabin, with beatings of the breast. None doubted but that Charon, resting on his oars, awaited his next fare with confidence. As Terence himself expressed it--he stood on an isthmus between two lives. If one was desperately turbid, was it not better cheerfully to turn his back on it, and plunge with courage into the other?
Strogue Abbey from within, was no more pleasant to its owner than from without. Doreen's serenity, which for years had made Shane uncomfortable, assumed now a preternatural repulsion. Odours as of gravecloths seemed to emanate from her garments. The phosphorescence of the charnel-house was a nimbus to her head. Her brow was circled by the calm that appertains not to mundane matters; which chills the creeping souls of those who cling to earth. Instead of being shocked that Theobald should have evaded the offices of the scrag-boy, she was content. Her hero was beyond the reach of vulgar slings and arrows. His fretted rope was snapped; the boundary was passed, the inevitable plunge taken, and he slept. A few brief days of swiftly speeding hours and Terence would be conveyed with him in the boat of Charon, who was waiting, to a less rugged shore. A little, little patience, and he too would sleep. Then she, less blessed than they, would withdraw from the troubles that weighed her down, and, meekly kneeling, would await the unveiling of the White Pilgrim. What a message was his! 'Home to the homeless; to the restless rest!' Doreen's manner had something awful about it which scared another besides Shane--poor Sara, whose Robert was unscathed and well. The cairngorm eyes of the elder damsel were opened to their full width with the far-seeing blindness of a somnambulist. Her obstinate moods and perverse waywardness were quelled. She went about her avocations with mechanical deliberation; dusted her cousin's fishing-rods and guns in his little sanctum, as if he were only gone away upon a visit; wore her best clothes to please her aunt; tendered regularly each morning to cousin Shane a corpse-cheek whose coldness took away the little appetite which he could boast of; conversed calmly about events--all but the one event, which for that matter each member of the household was equally desirous to shun. Strogue was full of spectres, and they rattled their bones in grim concert.
Councillor Curran, who looked like a moulting bird, grey-skinned, unkempt, essayed to speak words of comfort; but she seemed not to understand. What comfort could there be for one whose fairest prospect was the cloister and the grave? Theobald had passed; a procession of young shades like Banquo's sons had passed; Terence was prepared to join the shadowy convoy into spirit-land. Why prate of comfort? Had not Mr. Curran done all that might be done by man to prevent this hideous nightmare? Then he murmured something of a postponement--of a delay which might save the life of the last victim; but Doreen only shook her graceful head. It was better, she averred, to put aside illusions, and look straight into Truth's hard face. The postponement of the trial was impossible, and it was better so, for a speedy end was the best boon for a true Irishman to pray for. Mr. Curran's heart died within him to hear this girl, in the full flush of youth and beauty, speaking of this life as though existence had no charms.
If his stately cousin was a kill-joy in the household, Shane's mother was no better than she. My lady alternated between fevered activity, without apparent object, and helpless lassitude. Her own ghost kept faithful watch and ward over the countess. When Lord Clare told her gently that all hope of saving her son was gone, she gave herself over to the phantom hand and foot; and her old friend blamed himself for rushing, as we all have a proneness to do, to hasty conclusions of blame. It was evident that my lady was not indifferent to the fate of her younger-born. On the contrary, she was overwhelmed by a remorseful, fascinating ecstasy, which haunted her day and night--something connected with Terence in the past, which took from his mother the power to reason in clear sequence. She blinked like a white owl in the great chair in the tapestry saloon, heeding goers or comers no more than drifting leaves--engrossed all day by withering meditation till Doreen announced to her that it was time for bed. Then she permitted herself to be undressed and laid upon her back without a word, and blinked on at the ceiling through the still hours; and then was dressed and propped up again in the great chair. Some said she was broken; some that her circulation was weak; some that paralysis was imminent. Lord Clare and Curran alone amongst her friends perceived that it was her mind that was diseased--that there was a rooted sorrow festering there which no mortal hand might have strength to pluck away.
News of the countess's state was brought by Shane to the Little House, whither he escaped whene'er he could, to forget his dismal home in the company of Norah. But his welcome there was no longer what it used to be, even though through his good offices the dreadful infliction of soldiers' wives had been removed. Madam Gillin felt too strongly the heartless selfishness of Lord Glandore to be decently civil to him, even though by civility her child might win a coronet. For a host of reasons, her sympathies were all with Terence. When Shane talked querulously about his mother, she listened eagerly, seeing in fancy the dying man at Daly's, who implored his stern wife to save herself from the torment he then suffered. But she would not. Nemesis, if slow of foot, is sure--her vengeance complete, if tardy.
The fatal day in due course arrived which was big with the fate of Terence. Curran implored Doreen to stop at home--in vain. Her resolve was immutable. Since her cousin's trial could not be postponed, she decided to see the last of him whom she had dared to doubt. Under escort of the little advocate, she entered the Sessions-House, and took her seat close to the dock. When the inevitable sentence should come to be spoken, the brown hand which he loved best in all the world would grasp his firmly. His courage would not waver. He was too good and true for that. But he should in that supreme moment read the love that went out from her, and with it a promise that she would not stay long behind.
Her father was to occupy the bench with my Lord Carleton. Toler (bully, butcher, and buffoon), whose nose was like a scarlet pincushion well studded, was down for the prosecution; he of the silver tongue for the defence. The hall was close and inconvenient; its murky skylight thick with dust, its jaundiced walls sallow and blotched with damp. A lofty seat was prepared for the judges under a canopy at one end, surmounted by the royal arms. Below this were three crazy benches for counsel and attorneys; then came an open space on the floor of the hall; then a barrier enclosing a small pen, which was intended for public use, but which was already more than half monopolised by soldiers of the yeomanry. On the right side of the counsellors' benches was the dock; on the left, the jury-paddock, and a low table with a chair on it for the accommodation of witnesses. These, till they were wanted, leaned against the wall behind, conversing in loud tones with other members of the Battalion of Testimony, or fawning with fulsome scrapings about Major Sirr, who, with the pompous airs of a jack-in-office, acted as master of the judicial ceremonies. Government tried to make proceedings look less dirty by making much of the informers; did its best to dignify them in the eyes of those who were selected to decide the fate of the accused. These men, as all the world knew, were capable of anything, deeming that he was a pitiful fellow who, to please his master, would stick at a little perjury.
Curran marked uneasily that the battalion was in great force to-day. Was it out of curiosity, or were they here on business? Long impunity had developed all the native ferocity and brazenness of these Staghouse demons. They wore new modish suits of clothes, with fashionable bows of ribbon at the knee, provided at Government expense. They looked sleek and well-to-do, for they were sumptuously fed and boarded, and provided with three guineas a day for pocket-money. Cockahoop was the jovial crew, for the band was too compact and strong to fear Moiley now; though time was when one of the number who was ill dared not take his medicine, lest haply he should find his quietus in it. Those times were past. The people were cowed and trampled. These men had, for a fee, sworn away the lives of their brothers and then fathers. Moiley had over-eaten herself--was languid through repletion. There was no room in her maw even for a strangled informer. They were growing rich, budding into proprietors; some screening their names under an alias from infamy some too callous to feel any shame at all. Which of the rowdy knot was to do the work to-day? Since the battalion had become so highly trained, Lord Clare's ingenious invention with respect to the testimony of a single witness was a dead letter. That the oath of one person should, at a pinch, consign a man to the scrag-boy was a wholesome and judicious rule that was likely to save much trouble. But when you have a whole pack of hounds at your command, each one taught to yelp at a given signal, it is pretty sport to watch their tricks. Besides, a pile of testimony, more or less irrelevant and contradictory, has an improving effect upon a jury. The Irish are eminently superstitious. These trials sometimes lasted through the night. Men were apt to get frightened at shadows on the wall, at the flickering candles with their guttering winding-sheets. It was well to pile Pelion upon Ossa, to crush out any stray drop of pity. A heap of evidence confused and dazed them. Many crawled home after sentence was pronounced, fully persuaded that they had only done their duty--that so many witnesses, each with his pat story, must of a surety have spoken truth; that they had earned their honest stipend without injuring their souls.
Which of the rowdy knot--and how many--were to do the work to-day? Cassidy--finely dressed in a grand coat of padusoy, with a posy in his breast, and a new bobwig--was lolling on the counsellors' bench cracking jests with Major Sirr, behind whom stood a bevy of admirers. The presence of those two boded no good to either prisoner. The town-major, indeed, had openly told Curran that if his defence was too clever it would be the worse for him; to which the little man had replied, with a finger-snap, 'In court a liar, in the street a bully, in the gaol a fiend--you shall reap your reward, meejor! I don't carethatfor you or your murderers by the Book!' and so had left him. He was used to threats, and took no heed of them. They might as well have hoped to drive the stars from heaven by violence as to frighten John Curran into abandoning a client. And they were not mere clients for whom he had been pleading, for whose sake he risked his life during these trials. They were dear friends whom he loved, whom as brother-patriots he honoured. Some, despite his impassioned oratory, were slaughtered; others he saved. Ministers were secretly afraid of that silver tongue; for his burning words were reported and circulated, despite the efforts of the executive. All the world respected Curran; his exhortations wormed themselves into men's minds, and warmed into fruition there.
The Sessions-House in Green Street was filled with a strange company that day, as people forced themselves in till it was crammed. There was a buzz of expectation, which rose into a hubbub and fell again. The dock remained empty, though the morning had passed to noon. The heaviness in the air was sickening, by reason of the densely-packed assembly and moist garments; for the sun was veiled, the weather gloomy. A drizzling rain began to fall. Madam Gillin, in gaudy attire--a sight to kill parrots with envy--elbowed a passage through the mob, closely followed by old Jug, who, with her mistress, sat near Doreen. What an odd condition of society was this of Dublin! The prisoners who would stand at the bar presently were closely connected, either by ties of blood or friendship, with advocates, judges, and many more in the surrounding audience. It was quite a family-party.
Mr. Curran reflected that no judge could be more partial than Lord Kilwarden; that some among the jury, with whom he was to intercede, were his own cronies. Yet was he not happy about his case. Lord Clare, for once, would have juggled in opposition to his usual principles; but Lord Clare's hands were tied through his own act. Through his own intervention the Viceroy had promised not to dip his finger in the Staghouse caldron till the cooking was complete. If the Viceroy declined to interfere, no one else could take the initiative. It was a deadlock. A pebble or two, if authorities napped for a moment, might have been inserted to make a wheel veer awry. How was it that the said wheel insisted upon keeping its accustomed track, and that extra celerity was even given to its motion? Some one unseen was pushing. Who was it? If higher powers were debarred from inserting pebbles, there was, unhappily, nothing to prevent interested inferiors from exerting private pressure. Curran felt that Cassidy and Sirr were at the bottom of this. What a cruel chance for Mr. Curran's client that neither Viceroy nor Chancellor could interfere!
How much longer was the delay to last? It was three o'clock. Sirr and Cassidy had retired and returned refreshed. Curran sent out for sandwiches, which he divided with the ladies. Old Jug somehow seemed feverishly excited; nodding and mumbling to herself, moping and mowing, muttering weird incantations, which were impressed on the air with a gnarled finger. Mrs. Gillin ate her meat with a relish, in spite of grief. There are some appetites which no trouble may vanquish.
Doreen was in a trance-like state. Her skin was mottled, her eyes a dusky fire, surrounded by dark discs; a singular, unearthly smile played about her lips. To please her friend the advocate, she strove to eat, but her throat was contracted by spasms. She looked appealingly to him, and Curran took the food away with a sigh.
Toler came over to discuss matters with his adversary. All this was woefully illegal; but what did that matter? It was a melancholy comfort that a tattered remnant of the robe of Justice yet remained. Maybe in time, with coaxing, the lady would come back to Ireland. Who might tell what would happen next?
'Will ye inform me, Toler,' Curran interrupted, 'who your witnesses are? I'm quite in a muzz, I tell ye.'
Toler clapped the little man upon the back, and roared with hoarse laughter.
'That's the critical brook in the steeple-chase, mee boy!' he chuckled. 'We rely on a surprise to confound the prisoners. But I'll tell ye this, ould chap. Sirr, for some reason, is bent upon a conviction. Nothing you can say will make a difference. So cut it short, and let us out of this nasty hole. Be good-natured, and keep your breath to cool your porridge.'
So his suspicions were correct. Sirr was at the bottom of this, impelled by revenge for those slashes on his calves; urged too, probably, by Cassidy, who had made it up with the town-major. What could they gain by surprising the prisoners? Truly, the mechanism of the law was lamentably out of gear.
At last there was a stamping without--a surge of feet--a murmur of commiseration in the street. The judges, clad in crimson, took their places. Lord Carleton, ponderous and overbearing; Lord Kilwarden, nervous and subdued, with wrinkled brow and downcast visage--the one determined to do his duty, the other to avoid it if he could. Shortly afterwards a side-door opened. Terence and his henchman, Phil, were thrust into the dock. Terence peered round with contracted pupils, unable to distinguish friends from foes in the dim haze. He saw not Doreen, though she was close below. She clasped her hands upon her breast to still a rising sob when she marked how changed he was. Fever had paled his ruddy cheek, shrunken his burly frame. It was not that which shocked her, for that was to be expected. It was the uncanny glitter, the reflection through open portals of a radiance belonging to another world--the look she had last seen in Tone, the glimmer of the grave--that it was which caused her heart to bound. He stood erect, one hand resting on the rail, the other supported by a green scarf about his neck. Even his gaoler had remonstrated as he dressed that morning: 'Don't wear such things. Why prejudice the coort?' To which he had answered, smiling: 'The cause is already judged. It matters not what I wear; Erin will be green again when I rest under her sod--all the greener for her recent soaking.'
In striking contrast to his quiet dignity was the behaviour of his faithful henchman. He walked crooked and stiff, by reason of the whippings he had undergone. Jug Coyle scrutinised him with meaning from beneath her penthouse brows, and seemed satisfied. The trim, obliging, smiling Phil was transmuted into another and quite untidy person. 'Twas not only pain that caused his steps to waver; there could be no doubt about it--he wasdrunk!
Terence was woundily annoyed; a flush of anger overspread his face as he placed his arm about his companion to check his stumbling, and gave him a savage shaking. Phil drunk, at such a time, who used to be so good and sober! He had not improved under the town-major's auspices. This was no doubt one of the arch-devil's tricks to turn a solemn and impressive scene into a subject for laughter and contempt. It was a pity Phil was not more strong-minded. Had he disguised himself in liquor to steal a march upon his fears? The poor fellow was ignorant and underbred; fortitude was hardly to be expected from such as he. The jury sitting opposite had their orders. Perhaps it was as well for Phil that he could drown the knowledge of the present. On the morrow it would all be over--blessed morrow! Both he and his master would know by dawn the secret which oppresses all of us.
But Major Sirr appeared as surprised as the rest of the watchful audience, and was even heard to utter unseemly execrations. Who had dared to give his pet victim drink? It was no part of his intention that his troubles should be soothed. On the contrary, he had kept a surprise in store which was meant to be wormwood to the hapless creature.
After a deal of whispering and wig-shaking, counsel for prosecution plunged forthwith into the matter of the town-major's calves, and the shocking behaviour of certain ruffians to an upright gintleman, with the connivance of certain leedies, who should be nameless.
Toler's inflamed visage glowered at Madam Gillin; but she tossed her head and tittered. She dreaded not free-quarters, or the visits of virago soldiers' wives, now that Lord Glandore was back to protect Norah. Toler might bray any fiddlefaddle that he chose. Sure my Lord Carleton, up there in the fine robes, had been mighty glad, once on a time, to spend his evenings at her cosy house. So counsel, discovering that he made no impression on her (she had always abstained from inviting him, which made him spiteful), droned on about his client's wrongs--for he had but done his duty in capturing such notorious rebels--his excellent qualities and virtues, the services he had done the state, the wicked wounds upon his calves. Was the law, which all respected so much, to leave a faithful servant without protection? And so on and so forth, in a tangle of verbosity, for an hour and more.
Irritated possibly by his husky voice, Phil's conduct grew more and more outrageous, drawing on him marks of indignant disapprobation from my Lord Carleton, a look of pained bewilderment from Lord Kilwarden. 'Was ever anything so indecent?' clamoured the members of the battalion, in loud whispers. 'Face to face with conviction, too! He had put himself beyond the pale of mercy. The brute ought to be scragged untried. He reeked of whisky, the besotted pig!' The odour of it, they vowed, reached their shocked nostrils across the court. In truth, he did comport himself after an intoxicated fashion. It was as much as his master could do to keep him in tolerable order. His legs were in constant motion. He sang and talked in a low tone, occasionally breaking into convulsive fits of laughter; grimacing and nodding his head to the witnesses, as one by one they sat on the table and swore away his life.
As the case proceeded--crushingly against the prisoners, who were proved beyond a doubt to have taken and administered the oath, to have worn green orders, and otherwise misbehaved themselves--his mood altered. He was getting over the madness of his drink. That was a mercy. Soon he would drop into a maudlin sleep, and his master might, unheedful of the monotonous and confused proceedings, take refuge from this mockery within himself until the verdict came. How dreary and how long was all this useless evidence! The case looked as if it would last for ever. What an array of witnesses--and what lies they told! At this rate it would be morning before the judges pronounced sentence. Already it was dark. Candles flared in rough iron sockets. The red judges loomed like lurid phantoms; the jury were haggard in the flickering smoke. Mr. Curran leaned back in his seat exhausted, his neck supported on his clasped hands--resolved to husband his strength for a great effort by-and-by.
Drunken, disgraceful Phil became quiet. Old Jug, whose keen vision naught escaped, suggested to an usher to let him have a chair. He sank into the seat, his chin buried in his breast. His face was blue (was it the effect of light?), his pupils dilated, his breathing stertorous. The air was sickeningly close. Sweat stood in drops upon his forehead. Could he be fainting? No. He rallied, and commenced muttering again.
The hours went by, and yet the farce continued. No jot of the informal formalities was omitted. Those who had resolved to hang the prisoners were evidently determined that there should be no lack of justification for it. Half the battalion had told their story. Curran listened, and said nothing (what was the use of cross-examining these men?) till he saw the big figure of Lieutenant Hepenstall advance. Then, turning to the judges, he grunted:
'They're not content with witnesses, my lords; they've brought in the Walking Gallows, to work them off at once! Sure, isn't it convanient and obleeging?'
Time moved on steadily. Terence was as upright and motionless as a statue. He had learned by this time who was sitting near. A small brown hand had fluttered into his, to tell by occult pressure its own sweet tale. Doreen was as still as he.
Drunken Phil tore open his shirt, gasping. How dense the air was! It was cruel to drag out the proceedings thus. His head was heavy--he could not hold it up; so, resting his fingers on the dock-rail, he laid his wet face on them. By degrees he sank into a snoring slumber, his limbs twitching now and then with a tremulous convulsion. The visage of old Jug was illumined with a mysterious satisfaction. Not one of his movements escaped her keen observation; she drank in every shiver. Presently she plucked her mistress by the robe, and, like a wild woman, whispered something in her ear. Madam Gillin, who, overpowered by heat, had been dozing, woke with a cry, and turned her affrighted gaze from Phil to her nurse and back again.
'Is it thrue, Jug--is it, by the Holy Mother?' she asked, in an awed whisper.
'Thrue 'tis, by mee sowl!' returned the other. 'He is a farrier, isn't he? And Crummell's curse is on the likes of him, isn't it? He begged the ould collough for a root, and she gave it; and, by St. Patrick, 'twas well done!'
In deep agitation Mrs. Gillin motioned Curran to her side. She saw it all. It was by her own order that Jug had visited the farrier. Farriers and colloughs are national foes. Phil--faithful fellow!--had begged the collough to exercise her skill in herbs on him. He could bear hanging--had thus far endured the lash. But torture may be pushed beyond our power of bearing. Rather than run a risk of betraying the master whom he worshipped, he had taken poison, and was dying.
Curran's genius embraced at once the new element in the situation. It struck him instantly that by this sacrifice the poor fellow might perhaps unwittingly have saved his master. When did he take the poison? How long would it be before its work would be accomplished? If he were to fall dead--there--in the dock, before the court assembled, under the eye of the public, it would create such a sensation that the trial would be perforce adjourned. The harrowing details of the suicide would then be spread abroad; they would do much to bring the vile cruelties of the yeomanry home in all their loathsomeness to the British mind, which was so culpably indifferent as to what happened in this colony. There would be a revulsion--an energetic protest. In the confusion Terence might be saved! Poor faithful Phil! He knew not the extent of the service that he rendered. His life would not be sacrificed in vain!
'How much longer will the poison take to work?' Curran whispered in Jug's ear. 'What was it?'
'Sure, it was a tiny root of water-drop wort. Like an illigant parsnip, faith! How much longer? An hour perhaps--maybe two--certainly not more than three.'
It was eleven at night. Toler had two more witnesses to call, he said. If cross-examined they might be made to detain the court for an hour or so. After that the silver tongue must move to good purpose--must toy with argument and rhetoric till the doomed man dropped.
The virtuous ire of the town-major was kindled.
'The drunken brute is asleep!' he called out. 'What an insult to the court! Sure, he'll have a long sleep enough when Moiley eats him. Wake him up!'
Major Sirr was particularly anxious that he should be aware who the next witness was. By dint of shaking, the ushers roused the prisoner from lethargy. With brows painfully knitted he tried to raise his leaden lids, beheld with dilated pupils a blurred vision on the table; sank again without recognition into unconsciousness. Jug too beheld--and gave a low growl.
The new witness was Croppy Biddy; she of the russet locks, who since the burning of the 'Irish Slave' had given herself up to drink and to debauchery--who was become one of the shining Staghouse lights--one of the pet agents of an honourable executive--the Joan of Arc of the Battalion of Testimony. She was dressed like a lady, in a costly beaver with ostrich plume, and a laced riding-dress--the same as she was wont to wear when galloping at the head of a troop of dragoons in search of food for Moiley. No longer a slattern serving-wench in a low shebeen, but a paid and honoured favourite of Government; a lying, drunken, brazen hyæna. This was an admirable joke of Major Sirr's. What a pity it was that it should miscarry! What humour could be more sly and delicate than to clinch a man's fate by the false witness of her whom he had elected to love? Yet, thanks to some officious idiot or other, the bit of fun was spoiled. Biddy was there--saucy, pert, shameless, ready to go any lengths; but her lover was asleep, with his chin upon his breast. The surprise missed fire.
As it turned out, though, the joke was just the least bit too racy. The loud giggling laugh, the palpable untruths flung carelessly about by Biddy, shocked and disgusted the entire audience. Lord Kilwarden turned red, and bowed his face over his papers; even Lord Carleton coughed; and there was an angry murmur from the public who packed the floor.
Mr. Curran, no longer listless and dejected--for hope had revived again--turned the wretched woman round his finger; ensnared her with soft suggestions; led her floundering along from perjury to perjury, turned her inside out; then with a sarcastic bow to Toler, congratulated him upon his witness. By skilful fence half an hour was gained. Counsel for prosecution glared at Sirr. Was this the way to train up witnesses? Biddy was hustled off the table, for her training was lamentably incomplete. There was one more yet to come. It was to be hoped he would do away with the bad impression she had left.
This time it was Doreen's turn to utter a stifled cry, while her fingers clasped more closely those of Terence. Had that wretch no compunction? Had he no mercy--this villain who had wriggled himself by specious arts into the confidence of honest men--this snake in the grass--this bravo who, smilingly looking in your face, could coldly choose the most fitting moment for stabbing you? It was Cassidy--actually Cassidy, who before her, before Lord Kilwarden, before Curran, could get upon the table to swear away the life of him whom he had called friend.
Even the little advocate, whose faith in the innate goodness of human nature was not strong, was staggered.
'I've heard of assassination by sword and dagger,' he muttered; 'but here is a ruffian who would dip the Evangelists in blood!' The giant took the Testament and kissed it.
'Why make him swear at all?' scoffed Mr. Curran. 'Why let a murderer's touch pollute the purity of the Gospel? Well! if you will go through the mockery, let it be, I pray you, on the symbol of his profession--the knife.'
Cassidy scowled down on the sturdy scoffer, and looked round at his comrades with an air of reproachful innocence, which was speedily answered by a burst of menace and a clash of arms from the yeomanry behind, accompanied by threatening looks and gestures. Mr. Curran, drawing himself up to the full of his small stature, fixed his eyes sternly on them, and exclaimed in a loud voice:
'You may assassinate me, gentlemen, but you shall never intimidate me!'
This was a scandal. Things were going ill. Lord Carleton came to the rescue.
'Beware, Mr. Curran,' he said, 'lest you forfeit your gown. A little more of such unseemly language and I shall commit you.'
'Then we shall both have the consolation, my lord,' Curran retorted, with a bow, 'of reflecting that I'm not the worst thing you have committed.'
Lord Carleton looked up with wonder at the skylight. What was the world coming to? He glanced at Lord Kilwarden, who leaned on his elbow, taking no share in the business, his eyes shaded with his hand.
Counsel for prosecution played skilfully on his witness--an admirable witness, who merely answered questions, instead of blurting forth rash and inconvenient statements. Mr. Curran cross-examined him as cleverly, but with little effect. He could elicit nothing new or special. People were accustomed to find themselves handed over to the scrag-boy by their most intimate friends. Mr. Curran, indeed, was tedious to lay such stress on the point. The jury shuffled on their seats. Lord Carleton yawned. New candles were placed in the sockets by attentive ushers. At this rate it would certainly be morning before the affair was settled.
Very monotonous and very dreary! A rat-tat of subdued voices in question and reply. The paled candles dim and wan through a mist of collected breath--a stifling, noisome atmosphere of clammy heat which made the temples of all to throb, the ears to sing. Though the case was one of palpitating interest, men's strength gave way, women felt ill and dizzy. Lord Carleton, to keep his wits clear, inhaled the fumes from a sponge dipped in vinegar. Mrs. Gillin sniffed at the rue upon the dock-rail.
Still Terence stood erect and pallid--motionless. Still Phil's respiration laboured with stertorous snores. His teeth chattered at intervals, as if from cold; his fingers twitched, his knees trembled. Was it the effect of light? his eyes seemed protruding from their sockets. But there were no signs of the end yet.
It was past midnight when he of the silver tongue arose for the defence, and people roused themselves to listen, for they were accustomed to expect from him rapid electrical transitions from passion to passion, from the deepest emotions which agitate the soul to the liveliest combinations of sportive imagery; whimsical metaphors, such as at one moment seemed culled from the dunghill, at the next to be snatched from heaven. He implored the jury to consider the reputation of the witnesses who had striven to wreck these men. He entreated them to consider what objects save the highest and most pure could have induced a noble to desert his ease and risk his neck for Erin.
'Do you dare,' he cried, in crystal accents which rang with startling clearness along the cobwebbed rafters, 'in a case of life and death, of honour and of infamy, to credit a vile informer--the perjurer of a hundred oaths--a beast whom pride, or honour, or religion cannot bind? He dresses like a gentleman--the tones of his soft voice savour of growing authority. He measures his value by the coffins of his victims, and, in the field of evidence, appreciates his fame as an Indian savage does in fight by the number of scalps with which he can swell his triumphs!'
The advocate laid stress upon the awful responsibilities of a jury; striving to wring their consciences, though he knew that each man among them had received his wage. He knew that nothing he could say would make them waver. Yet now he had a new courage and a new hope that distilled jewels from his lips, which almost caused the degraded jurymen to blench. From time to time as his eloquent periods rolled out in majestic waves, he turned an anxious eye upon the farrier whom Jug sat watching with the gaze of a lynx, How she had botched the job! How long the soul wrestled ere it could burst its bonds!
Then, to the amazement of Toler, he lost his temper with the jury, and told them unpleasant truths, rating them soundly for their sins. His opponent thought he must be mad to rage where it was so evidently his interest to conciliate. But Madam Gillin listened and nodded approval; for she knew that it was only a matter of gaining time, and that as there was to be no verdict there was no use in blarneying the jurors. With what eloquence he talked! His words seemed to flicker in sunlight--a kaleidoscope of gems, some rough, some polished, strung loosely on a cord.
'Life can present no situation,' the orator said, 'wherein the human power of man can be so divinely exerted as yours should be now; and if any labours can peculiarly attract the approving eye of Heaven, it is when God looks down on a human being assailed by human turpitude; struggling with practices against which the Deity placed His special canon, when He said, "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour; thou shalt not kill!" We embrace the principles of the British constitution; and when I look on you, the proudest benefit of that constitution, I am relieved from the fears of advocacy, since I place my clients under the influence of its sacred shade. This is not the idle sycophancy of words. It is not crying, "Lord! Lord!" but doing "the will of my Father who is in heaven!" If my clients had been arraigned before a jury of Cornhill shopkeepers, they would ere now be in their lodgings. The law of England suffers no man to be openly butchered in a court of justice. The law of England recognises the innate blackness of the human heart--the possibility of villains thirsting for the blood of their fellow-creatures; and the people of Ireland have but too good cause to be acquainted with that thirst. At the awful foot of Eternal Justice I call on you to acquit these men. Their characters have been given. Nothing could be more pure. In the name of Justice I implore you to interpose, while there is time, between the wanton perjurer and his ensanguined feast; that in the next life your reward may be more lasting than the perishable crown which the ancients gave to those who saved a fellow-citizen in battle. Your own turns may come, for the informer has bowels for himself alone! If it should be the fate of any of you to count the moments of captivity, in sorrow and in pain, pining in a dungeon's damps, may you find refuge in the recollection of the example you this day set to those who may be called to pass judgment on your lives! Recollect too that there is another, more awful tribunal than any upon earth, which we must all some day approach, before which the best of us will have occasion to look back to what little good he has done this side the grave. I do pray that Eternal Justice may record the deed you are about to do, and give to you the full benefit of your claims to an undying reward, a requital in mercy upon your souls!'
The growing fog, the deep silence, the midnight hour, the flickering candles, enhanced the effect of Mr. Curran's words, which were spoken with a rapt solemnity that sent a thrill of awe through his impressionable audience. The vision of a wrathful angel with a fiery sword rose before their excited imagination--of an avenging God who knew that they, the jury, were bought. Women rocked themselves and wrung their hands, and stuffed ends of shawls into their mouths to check their wailing. The jurymen hovered 'twixt greed and fear. The advocate paused for an instant, to wipe his brow, and to allow his sentences to sink into their minds.
There was a hum of muffled talk, of groans and lamentation, before which the moaning in the court was hushed. It came from the dock. Phil was awake and sensible; had risen on his tottering feet, was swaying from side to side as he clung to his young master. Terence saw now that he had wronged his henchman, who was not drunk, but ill. His features were livid, his lips blue, so was his swollen tongue; his teeth rattled as in ague; his eyes saw nothing, though they stared painfully; a steam ascended from his hair.
'Master Terence!' Phil gasped, with thick effort, 'I could not help your being taken--though it was--it was my fault. They pushed the heap--of rope--off of my head. They shall get ne'er a word out of me--ne'er a one--though they flay me to the bone. Master Terence--master--will ye forgive----'
Phil staggered and slid from the grasp of his fellow prisoner to the floor, and lay there on his face.
'One of your victims appears to be insensible,' Mr. Curran remarked shortly.
''Deed it seems so,' acquiesced Lord Carleton, peering through his glasses. 'A very indecent exhibition. Does there chance to be e'er a doctor in the coort?'
One of the jurymen was an apothecary. He left the box and turned the prostrate figure over.
'Can ye speak with assurance of the man's state?' demanded the judge.
'He is near his end, my lord,' answered the juryman.
'Is he now--are ye sure?' What with the heat, and what with the untoward incident, my Lord Carleton was puzzled. No help could he get from Lord Kilwarden, who leaned with his elbow on the desk and his eyes shaded by his hand.
'Open the windy!' puffed the judge. 'For the Lord's sake let's have a little air; maybe he's only sick. Can ye rouse him to hear his judgment?'
The apothecary laid a palm upon his patient's heart.
'I cannot, my lord,' he replied. 'The man is dead!'
Already powerfully impressed by the surroundings and the lawyer's warning, the people could endure no more. A panic seized them. They rushed to the doors as though stifled by some fell miasma, and battled to get out. The women screamed that they were being trodden under foot; the men rained frantic blows upon the doors, tearing clothes and fingers as they dragged them down. It was a scene of unreasoning frenzy, such as none who were involved in it might ever forget. The angel with the fiery sword was there; though invisible, his presence could be felt. Lord Carleton ordered the remaining prisoner's removal. Doreen's robe gleamed white in the first tinge of morning as, standing by his side, she wound her arms about his neck. By-and-by Curran gently disentangled them, and led her to her father, whilst dragoons formed round the patriot, and cleared a passage for him through the mob.
'More men to secure him in Kilmainham--there'll be a rescue!' bawled Cassidy, who was driven to overmastering wrath by the posture of Miss Wolfe, under his very nose.
'Fear nothing,' Terence replied; 'I will go quietly.'
Lord Kilwarden and Curran bore the maiden to a coach, and carried her back to Strogue. Both were so filled with thankfulness for this reprieve that they shook hands again and again, while Miss Wolfe lay speechless in the carriage-corner. Her nerves had been strung to extreme tension for the worst. Sudden joy is more hard to bear than sorrow. The finely tempered steel which had withstood so many assaults, gave way under the last shock. She remained long oblivious of the world's affairs, tenderly nursed by Sara, who wondered, as day followed day, whether her reason would ever return from the far-off groves in which it wandered.