Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon Volume Ii Part 68

"A very charming person, indeed; I have seen the lady," replied his lordship, as he opened the door of a small room, and beckoned me to follow.

The table was covered with paper and materials for writing; but before I had time to ask for any explanation of this unaccountable mystery, he added, "Oh, I was forgetting; this must be witnessed. Wait one moment."

With these words he left the room, while I, amazed and thunderstruck, vacillating between fear and hope, trembling lest the delusive glimmering of happiness should give way at every moment, and yet totally unable to explain by any possible supposition how fortune could so far have favored me.

While yet I stood hesitating and uncertain, the door opened, and the senhora entered. She looked a little pale though not less beautiful than ever; and her features wore a slight trace of seriousness, which rather heightened than took from the character of her loveliness.

"I heard you had come, Chevalier," said she, "and so I ran down to shake hands with you. We may not meet again for some time."

"How so, Senhora? You are not going to leave us, I trust?"

"Then you have not seen Fred. Oh, I forgot; you know nothing of our plans."

"Here we are at last," said the amba.s.sador, as he came in followed by Sir George, Power, and two other officers. "Ah, _ma belle_, how fortunate to find you here! I a.s.sure you, it is a matter of no small difficulty to get people together at such a time as this."

"Charley, my dear friend," cried Power, "I scarcely hoped to have had a shake hands with you ere I left."

"Do, Fred, tell me what all this means? I am in a perfect maze of doubt and difficulty, and cannot comprehend a word I hear about me."

"Faith, my boy, I have little time for explanation. The man who was at Waterloo yesterday, is to be married to-morrow, and to sail for India in a week, has quite enough upon his hands."

"Colonel Power, you will please to put your signature here," said Lord Clancarty, addressing himself to me.

"If you will allow me," said Fred, "I had rather represent myself."

"Is not this the colonel, then? Why, confound it, I have been wishing him joy the last quarter of an hour!"

A burst of laughter from the whole party, in which it was pretty evident I took no part, followed this announcement.

"And so you are not Colonel Power? Nor going to be married, either?"

I stammered out something, while, overwhelmed with confusion, I stooped down to sign the paper. Scarcely had I done so, when a renewed burst of laughter broke from the party.

"Nothing but blunders, upon my soul," said the amba.s.sador, as he handed the paper from one to another.

What was my confusion to discover that instead of Charles O'Malley, I had written the name of Lucy Dashwood. I could bear no more. The laughing and raillery of my friends came upon my wounded and irritated feelings like the most poignant sarcasm. I seized my cap and rushed from the room. Desirous of escaping from all that knew me, anxious to bury my agitated and distracted thoughts in solitude and quiet, I opened the first door before me, and seeing it an empty and unoccupied room, throw myself upon a sofa, and buried my head within my hands. Oh, how often had the phantom of happiness pa.s.sed within my reach, but still glided from my grasp! How often had I beheld the goal I aimed at, as it were before me, and the next moment all the bleak reality of my evil fortune was lowering around me!

"Oh, Lucy, Lucy!" I exclaimed aloud, "but for you and a few words carelessly spoken, I had never trod that path of ambition whose end has been the wreck of all my happiness. But for you, I had never loved so fondly; I had never filled my mind with one image which, excluding every other thought, leaves no pleasure but in it alone. Yes, Lucy, but for you I should have gone tranquilly down the stream of life with naught of grief or care, save such as are inseparable from the pa.s.sing chances of mortality; loved, perhaps, and cared for by some one who would have deemed it no disgrace to have linked her fortune to my own. But for you, and I had never been--"

"A soldier, you would say," whispered a soft voice, as a light hand gently touched my shoulder. "I had come," continued she, "to thank you for a gift no grat.i.tude can repay,--my father's life; but truly, I did not think to hear the words you have spoken; nor having heard them, can I feel their justice. No, Mr. O'Malley, deeply grateful as I am to you for the service you once rendered myself, bound as I am by every tie of thankfulness, by the greater one to my father, yet do I feel that in the impulse I had given to your life, if so be that to me you owe it, I have done more to repay my debt to you, than by all the friendship, all the esteem I owe you; if, indeed, by my means, you became a soldier, if my few and random words raised within your breast that fire of ambition which has been your beacon-light to honor and to glory, then am I indeed proud."

"Alas, alas, Lucy!--Miss Dashwood, I would say,--forgive me, if I know not the very words I utter. How has my career fulfilled the promise that gave it birth? For you, and you only, to gain your affection, to win your heart, I became a soldier; hardship, danger, even death itself were courted by me, supported by the one thought that you had cared for or had pitied me; and now, and now--"

"And now," said she, while her eyes beamed upon me with a very flood of tenderness, "is it nothing that in my woman's heart I have glowed with pride at triumphs I could read of, but dared not share in? Is it nothing that you have lent to my hours of solitude and of musing the fervor of that career, the maddening enthusiasm of that glorious path my s.e.x denied me?

I have followed you in my thoughts across the burning plains of the Peninsula, through the long hours of the march in the dreary nights, even to the battle-field. I have thought of you; I have dreamed of you; I have prayed for you."

"Alas, Lucy, but not loved me!"

The very words, as I spoke them, sank with a despairing cadence upon my heart. Her hand, which had fallen upon mine, trembled violently; I pressed my lips upon it, but she moved it not. I dared to look up; her head was turned away, but her heaving bosom betrayed her emotion.

"No, no, Lucy," cried I, pa.s.sionately, "I will not deceive myself; I ask for more than you can give me. Farewell!"

Now, and for the last time, I pressed her hand once more to my lips; my hot tears fell fast upon it. I turned to go, and threw one last look upon her.

Our eyes met; I cannot say what it was, but in a moment the whole current of my thoughts was changed; her look was bent upon me beaming with softness and affection, her hand gently pressed my own, and her lips murmured my name.

The door burst open at this moment, and Sir George Dashwood appeared. Lucy turned one fleeting look upon her father, and fell fainting into my arms.

"G.o.d bless you, my boy!" said the old general, as he hurriedly wiped a tear from his eye; "I am now, indeed, a happy father."

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE WELCOME HOME.]

CHAPTER LV.

CONCLUSION.

The sun had set about half an hour. Already were the dusky shadows blending with the faint twilight, as on a lovely July evening we entered the little village of Portumna,--we, I say; for Lucy was beside me. For the last few miles of the way I had spoken little; thoughts of the many times I had travelled that same road, in how many moods, occupied my mind; and although, as we flew rapidly along, some well-known face would every now and then present itself, I had but time for the recognition ere we were past. Arousing myself from my revery, I was pointing out to Lucy certain well-known spots in the landscape, and directing her attention to places with the names of which she had been for some time familiar, when suddenly a loud shout rent the air, and the next moment the carriage was surrounded by hundreds of country people, some of whom brandished blazing pine torches; others carried rude banners in their hands,--but all testified the most fervent joy as they bade us welcome. The horses were speedily unharnessed, and their places occupied by a crowd of every age and s.e.x, who hurried us along through the straggling street of the village, now a perfect blaze of bonfires.

Mounds of turf, bog-fir, and tar-barrels sent up their ruddy blaze, while hundreds of wild, but happy faces, flitted around and through them,--now dancing merrily in chorus; now plunging madly into the midst of the fire, and scattering the red embers on every side. Pipers were there too, mounted upon cars or turf-kishes; even the very roof-tops rang out their merry notes; the ensigns of the little fishing-craft waved in the breeze, and seemed to feel the general joy around them; while over the door of the village inn stood a brilliantly lighted transparency, representing the head of the O'Malleys holding a very scantily-robed young lady by the tips of the fingers; but whether this damsel was intended to represent the genius of the west, or my wife, I did not venture to inquire.

If the welcome were rude, a.s.suredly it was a hearty one. Kind wishes and blessings poured in on every side, and even our own happiness took a brighter coloring from the beaming looks around us. The scene was wild; the lurid glare of the red torchlight, the frantic gestures, the maddening shouts, the forked flames rising amidst the dark shadows of the little hamlet, had something strange and almost unearthly in their effect; but Lucy showed no touch of fear. It is true she grasped my hand a little closer, but her fair cheek glowed with pleasure, and her eye brightened as she looked; and as the rich light fell upon her beauteous features, how many a blessing, heart-felt and deep, how many a word of fervent praise was spoken.

"Ah, then, the Lord be good to you; it's yourself has the darling blue eyes! Look at them, Mary; ain't they like the blossoms on a peac.o.c.k's tail?

Musha, may sorrow never put a crease in that beautiful cheek! The saints watch over you, for your mouth is like a moss-rose! Be good to her, yer honor, for she's a raal gem: devil fear you, Mr. Charles, but you'd have a beauty!"

We wended our way slowly, the crowd ever thickening around us, until we reached the market-place. Here the procession came to a stand, and I could perceive, by certain efforts around me, that some endeavor was making to enforce silence.

"Whisht, there! Hould your prate! Be still, Paddy! Tear an' ages, Molly Blake, don't be holding me that way; let us hear his reverence. Put him up on the barrel. Haven't you got a chair for the priest? Run, and bring a table out of Mat Haley's. Here, Father--here, your reverence; take care, will you,--you'll have the holy man in the blaze!"

By this time I could perceive that my worthy old friend Father Rush was in the midst of the mob with what appeared to be a written oration, as long as the tail of a kite, between his hands.

"Be aisy, there, ye savages! Who's tearing the back of my neck? Howld me up straight! Steady, now--hem!"

"Take the laste taste in life to wet your lips, your riverence," said a kind voice, while at the same moment a smoking tumbler of what seemed to be punch appeared on the heads of the crowd.

"Thank ye, Judy," said the father, as he drained the cup. "Howld the light up higher; I can't read my speech. There now, be quiet, will ye! Here goes.

Peter, stand to me now and give me the word."

This admonition was addressed to a figure on a barrel behind the priest, who, as well as the imperfect light would permit me to descry, was the coadjutor of the parish, Peter Nolan. Silence being perfectly established, Father Rush began:--

"When Mars, the G.o.d of war, on high, Of battles first did think, He girt his sword upon his thigh, And--

and--what is't, Peter?"