Hyacinth Part 24

Thus he found himself engaged in ameliorating the lot of the Connaught peasants. Mr. Clifford used to describe him as 'a bit of a bounder--in fact, a complete outsider--but no fool.' His estimate of Mr. Clifford was perhaps less complimentary.

'Every business,' he used to say, 'must have at least one gentleman in it to do the entertaining and the dining out. We have Mr. Clifford. He's a first-rate man at one of the Lord Lieutenant's b.a.l.l.s.'

A professor from Trinity College was one of the two guests conducted by the Reverend Mother herself. Nominally this learned gentleman existed for the purpose of impressing upon the world the beauties of Latin poetry, but he was best known to fame as an orator on the platforms of the Primrose League, and a writer of magazine articles on Irish questions. He was a man who owed his success in life largely to his faculty for always keeping beside the most important person present. The Lord Lieutenant, being slightly indisposed, had been unable to make an early start, so the most honourable stranger was Mr. Chesney, the Chief Secretary. To him Professor Cairns attached himself, and received a share of the Reverend Mother's blandishments.

Mr. Chesney himself was dapper and smiling as usual. Even the early hour at which he had been obliged to leave home had neither ruffled his temper nor withered the flower in his b.u.t.tonhole. He spent his money generously at the various stalls in the garden, addressed friendly remarks to the women in the factory, and asked the questions with which Mr. Davis had primed him in the train.

Quite a crowd of minor people followed the great statesman. There were barristers who hoped to become County Court Judges, and ladies who enjoyed a novel kind of occasion for displaying their clothes, hoping to see their names afterwards in the newspaper accounts of the proceedings.

There were a few foremen from leading Dublin shops, who foresaw the possibility of a fashionable boom in Robeen tweeds and flannels. There were also reporters from the Dublin papers, and a representative--Miss O'Dwyer--of a syndicate which supplied ladies' journals with accounts of the clothes worn at fashionable functions.

The supreme moment of the day arrived when the company a.s.sembled to listen to words of wisdom from the orators selected to address them.

Seats had been provided by carting in forms from the neighbouring national schools. A handsomely-carved chair of ecclesiastical design awaited Mr. Chesney.

He opened his speech by a.s.suring his audience that there was no occasion for him to address them at all, a truth which struck home to the heart of Sir Gerald, who was trying to arrange himself comfortably at a desk designed for a cla.s.s of infants.

'Facts,' Mr. Chesney explained himself, 'are more eloquent than words.

You have seen what I could never have described to you--the contented workers in this factory and the artistic designs of the fabrics they weave. Many of you remember what Robeen was a few years ago--a howling wilderness. We are told on high authority that even the wilderness shall blossom as a rose.'

He bowed in the direction of the Reverend Mother, possibly with a feeling that it was suitable to acknowledge her presence when quoting Holy Writ, possibly with a vague idea that she might consider herself a spiritual descendant of the Prophet Isaiah. 'You see it now a hive of happy industry.'

He observed with pleasure that the reporters were busy with their note-books, and he knew that these editors of public utterance might be relied on to unravel a tangled metaphor before publishing a speech. He went on light-heartedly, confident that in the next day's papers his wilderness would blossom into something else, and that the hive, if it appeared at all, would be arrived at by some other process than blossoming. The habit of rolling out agreeable plat.i.tudes to audiences forced to listen is one which grows on public men as dram-drinking does on the common herd. Mr. Chesney was evidently enjoying himself, and there seemed no reason why he should ever stop. He could, and perhaps would, have gone on for hours but for the offensive way in which Judge Saunders snapped the case of his watch at the end of every period. There was really no hurry, for the special train which was to bring them back to Dublin would certainly wait until they were ready for it. Mr. Chesney felt aggrieved at the repeated interruption, and closed his speech without giving the audience the benefit of his peroration.

The Judge came next, and began with reminding his hearers that he was known as 'Satan Saunders.' An account of the origin of the name followed, and was enjoyed even by those who had listened to the Judge's oratory before, and therefore knew the story. There was something piquant, almost _risque_, in the constant repet.i.tion of a really wicked word like 'Satan' in the halls of a nunnery. The audience laughed rea.s.suringly, and the Judge went on to supply fresh pabulum for mirth by suggesting that the Reverend Mother should clothe her nuns in their own tweeds. He was probably right in supposing that the new costumes would add a gaiety to the religious life. Other jests followed, and he sat down amid a flutter of applause after promising that when he next presided over the Winter a.s.sizes in a draughty court-house he would send for a Robeen blanket and wrap his legs in it.

Mr. Clifford, who followed the Judge, began by wondering whether anyone present had ever been in Lancashire. After a pause, during which no one owned to having crossed the Channel, he said that Lancashire was the home of the modern factory. There every man and woman earned good wages, wore excellent clothes, and lived in a house fitted with hot and cold water taps and a gas-meter. It was his hope to see Mayo turned into another Lancashire. When ladies of undoubted commercial ability, like the Lady Abbess who presided over the Robeen convent--Lady Abbess sounded well, and Mr. Clifford was not strong on ecclesiastical t.i.tles--took the matter up, success was a.s.sured. All that was required for the development of the factory system in Mayo was capital, and that 'we, the Congested Districts Board, are in a position to supply.' With the help of some prompting from Mr. Davis, he proceeded to lay before the audience a few figures purporting to explain the Board's expenditure.

Professor Cairns was evidently anxious to follow Mr. Clifford, if only in the humble capacity of the proposer of a vote of thanks. But Ids name was not on the programme, and Mr. Chesney was already engaged in a whispered conversation with the Reverend Mother. Ignoring the professor, almost rudely, he announced that the company in general was invited to tea in the dining-room.

The refreshments provided, if not substantial, were admirable in quality. There happened just then to be a young lady engaged, at the expense of the County Council, in teaching cookery in a neighbouring convent. She was sent over to Robeen for the occasion, and made a number of delightful cakes at extremely small expense. The workers in the factory had given the b.u.t.ter she required as a thank-offering, and the necessary eggs came from another convent where the nuns, with financial a.s.sistance from the Congested Districts Board, kept a poultry-farm.

The Reverend Mother dispensed her hospitality with the same air of generosity with which Mr. Clifford had spoken of providing capital for the future ecclesiastical factories.

CHAPTER XXIII

The Reverend Mother bowed out the last of her guests, and retired to her own room well satisfied. She was a.s.sured of further support from the Congested Districts Board, and certain debts which had grown uncomfortably during her struggle with Mr. Quinn need trouble her no longer. Her goods would be extensively advertised next morning in the daily press. Her house would obtain a celebrity likely to attract the most eligible novices--those, that is to say, who would bring the largest sums of money as their dowries. There arose before her mind a vision of almost unbounded wealth and all that might be done with it.

What statues of saints might not Italy supply! French painters and German organ-builders would compete for the privilege of furnishing the chapel of her house. Already she foresaw pavements of gorgeous mosaic, windows radiant with Munich gla.s.s, and store of vestments to make her sacristy famous. Grandiose plans suggested themselves of founding daughter houses in Melbourne, in Auckland, in Capetown, in Natal. All things were possible to a well-filled purse. She saw how her Order might open schools in English towns, where girls could be taught French, Italian, Latin, music, all the accomplishments dear to middle-cla.s.s parents, at ridiculously low fees, or without fees at all. She stirred involuntarily at the splendour of her visions. The day's weariness dropped off from her. She rose from her chair and went into the chapel.

She prostrated herself before the altar, and lay pa.s.sive in a glow of warm emotion. For G.o.d, for the Mother of G.o.d, for the Catholic Church, she had laboured and suffered and dared. Now she was well within sight of the end, the golden reward, the fulfilment of hopes that had never been altogether selfish.

Her thoughts, sanctified now by the Presence on the altar, drifted out again on to the shining sea of the future. What she, a humble nun, had done others would do. A countless army of missionary men and women marching from the Irish sh.o.r.e would conquer the world's conquerors, regain for the Church the Anglo-Saxon race. Once in the far past Irish men and women had Christianized Europe, and Ireland had won her glorious t.i.tle, 'Island of Saints.' Now the great day was to dawn again, the great race to be reborn. For this end had Ireland been kept faithful and pure for centuries, just that she might be at last the witness to the spiritual in a materialized world. For this end had the Church in Ireland gone through the storm of persecution, suffered the blight of the world's contempt, that she might emerge in the end entirely fitted for the bloodless warfare.

'And I am one of the race, a daughter of Ireland. And I am a worker--nay, one who has accomplished something--in the vineyard of the Church. Ah, G.o.d!'

She was swept forward on a wave of emotion. Thought ceased, expiring in the ecstasy of a communion which transcended thought. Then suddenly, sharp as an unexpected pain, an accusation shot across her soul, shattering the coloured glory of the trance in an instant.

'Who am I that I should boast?'

The long years of introspection, the discipline of hundreds of heart-searching confessions, the hardly-learned lesson of self-distrust, made it possible for her to recognise the vain-glory even with the halo of devotion shining round it. She abased herself in penitence.

'Give me the work, my Lord; give others the glory and the fruit of it.

Let me toil, but withhold the reward from me. May my eyes not see it, lest I be lifted up! Nay, give me not even work to do, lest I should be praised or learn to praise myself. "Nunc dimittis servam tuam, Domine, secundum verb.u.m tuum in pace."'

There stole over her a sense of peace--numb, silent peace--wholly unlike the satisfaction which had flooded her in her own room or during the earlier ecstasy before the altar. She raised her eyes slowly till they rested on the shrine where the body of the sacrifice reposed.

'Quia viderunt oculi mei salutare tuum.'

At last she rose. The lines of care and age gathered again upon her face. Her eyes gleamed with keen intelligence. She braced herself with the thought of all that might still lie before her. The advice of Iago, strangely sanctified, clamoured in her heart--' Put money in thy purse.'

CHAPTER XXIV

The Reverend Mother was not the only person well satisfied with the day. The Right Hon. T. J. Chesney leant back in his saloon-carriage, and puffed contentedly at his cigar. It might be his part occasionally--indeed, frequently--to talk like a fool, but the man was shrewd enough. It really seemed that he had hit on the true method of governing Ireland. Nationalist members of Parliament could be muzzled, not by the foolish old methods of coercion, but by winning the goodwill of the Bishops. No Irish member, dared open his mouth when a priest bid him keep it shut, or give a vote contrary to the wishes of the hierarchy. And the Bishops were reasonable men. They looked at things from a point of view intelligible to Englishmen. There was no ridiculous sentimentality about their demands. For so much money they would silence the clamour of the Parliamentary party; for so much more they would preach a modified loyalty, would a.s.sert before the world that the Irish people were faithful servants of the Sovereign; for a good lump sum down they would undertake to play 'G.o.d Save the King' or 'Rule, Britannia'

on the organ at Maynooth. Of course, the money must be paid: Mr. Chesney was beginning to understand that, and felt the drawback. It would have been much pleasanter and simpler if the Bishops would have been content with promises. There was a certain difficulty in obtaining the necessary funds without announcing precisely what they-were for. But, after all, a man cannot be called a great statesman without doing something to deserve the t.i.tle, and British statesmanship is the art of hoodwinking the taxpayer. That is all--not too difficult a task for a clever man.

Mr. Chesney reckoned on no power in Ireland likely to be seriously troublesome. The upper cla.s.ses were either helpless and sulking, or helpless and smiling artificially. They might grumble in private or try to make themselves popular by joining the chorus of the Church's flatterers. Either way their influence was inconsiderable. Was there anyone else worth considering? The Orangemen were still a noisy faction, but their organization appeared to be breaking up. They were more bent on devouring their own leaders than interfering with him. There were a number of people anxious to revive the Irish language, who at one time had caused him some little uneasiness. He had found it quite impossible to understand the Gaelic League, and, being an Englishman, arrived gradually at the comfortable conclusion that what he could not understand must be foolish. Now, he had great hopes that the Bishops might capture the movement.

If once it was safely under the patronage of the Church, he had nothing more to fear from it No doubt, resolutions would be pa.s.sed, but resolutions------ Mr. Chesney smiled. There were, of course, the impossible people connected with the _Croppy_. Mr. Chesney did not like them, and in the bottom of his heart was a little nervous about them.

they seemed to be very little afraid of the authority of the Church, and he doubted if the authority of the state would frighten them at all. Still, there were very few of them, and their abominable spirit of independence was spreading slowly, if at all.

'They won't,' he said to himself, 'be of any importance for some years to come, at all events, and five years hence----'

In five years Mr. Chesney hoped to be Prime Minister, or perhaps to have migrated to the House of Lords, At least, he expected to be out of Ireland, Meanwhile, he lighted a fresh cigar. The condition of the country was extremely satisfactory, and his policy was working out better than he had hoped.

The other travellers by the special train were equally well pleased, Ireland, so they understood Mr. Chesney, was to be made happy and contented, peaceful and prosperous. It followed that there must be Boards under the control of Dublin Castle--more and more Boards, an endless procession of them. There is no way devised by the wit of man for securing prosperity and contentment except the creation of Boards, If Boards, then necessarily officials--officials with salaries and travelling allowances. Nice gentlemanly men, with villas at Dalkey and Killiney, would perform duties not too arduous in connection with the Boards, and carry out the benevolent policy of the Government. There was not a man in the train, except the newspaper reporters, who did not believe in the regeneration of Ireland by Boards, and everyone hoped to take a share in the good work, with the prospect of a retiring pension afterwards.

The local magnates--with the exception of Sir Gerald Geoghegan, whose temper had been bad from the first--also went home content. The minds of great ladies work somewhat confusedly, for Providence, no doubt wisely, has denied to most of them the faculty of reason. It was enough for them to feel that the nuns were 'sweet women,' and that in some way not very clear Mr. Chesney was getting the better of 'those wretched agitators.'

Only one of all whom the special train had brought down failed to return in it. Mary O'Dwyer slipped out of the convent before the speeches began, and wandered away towards the desolate stony hill where the stream which turns the factory mill took its rise. It grieved her to miss the cup of tea which a friendly nun had led her to expect; but even tea might be too dearly purchased, and Miss O'Dwyer had a strong dislike to listening to what Augusta Goold described as the 'sugared hypocrisies of professional liars.' Besides, she had her cigarette-case in her pocket, and a smoke, unattainable for her in the convent or the train, was much to be desired. She left the road at the foot of the hill, and picked her way along the rough bohireen which led upwards along the course of the stream. After awhile even this track disappeared. The stream tumbled noisily over rocks and stones, the bog-stained water glowing auburn-coloured in the sunlight. The ling and heather were springy under her feet, and the air was sweet with the scent of the bog-myrtle. She spied round her for a rock which cast a shade upon the kind of heathery bed she had set her heart to find. Her eyes lit upon a little party--a young man and two girls--encamped with a kettle, a spirit-stove, and a store of bread-and-b.u.t.ter. Her renunciation of the convent tea had not been made without a pang. She looked longingly at the steam which already spouted from the kettle. The young man said a few words to the girls, then stood up, raised his hat to her, and beckoned. She approached him, wondering.

'Surely it can't be--I really believe it is----'

'Yes, Miss O'Dwyer, it really is myself, Hyacinth Conneally.'

'My dear boy, you are the last person I expected to meet, though of course I knew you were somewhere down in these parts.'

'Come and have some tea,' said Hyacinth. 'And let me introduce you to Miss Beecher and Miss Elsie Beecher.'

Miss O'Dwyer took stock of the two girls. 'They make their own clothes,'

she thought, 'and apparently only see last year's fashion-plates. The eldest isn't bad-looking. How is it all West of Ireland girls have such glorious complexions? Her figure wouldn't be bad if her mother bought her a decent pair of stays. I wonder who they are, and what they are doing here with Hyacinth. They can't be his sisters.'

While they drank their tea certain glances and smiles gave her an inkling of the truth. 'I suppose Hyacinth is engaged to the elder one,'

she concluded. 'That kind of girl wouldn't dare to make eyes at a man unless she had some kind of right to him.'

After tea she produced her cigarette-case.

'I hope you don't mind,' she said to Marion. 'I know it's very shocking, but I've had a tiring day and an excellent tea, and oh, this heather is delicious to lie on!' She stretched herself at full length as she spoke.

'I really must smoke, just to arrive at perfect felicity for once in my life. How happy you people ought to be who always have in a place like this!'