Luttrell Of Arran Part 89

"I must be going now, grandady."

"Going, acushla! And will you leave me?"

"I most, there's no help for it; they wouldn't let me stay here."

"Begorra!" cried he, wildly,--"I forgot I was in gaol! May I never! if I didn't think I was at home again, and that we were only waiting for the boys to have our supper!"

"My poor old grandady," said she, stooping and kissing his forehead, "I'll come back to-morrow, and stay a long time with you. I have a great deal to say to you that I can't think of to-day. Here's a little basket, with something to eat, and some tobacco, too; the gaoler gave me leave to bring it in. And you'll drink my health to-night, grandady, won't you?"

"My darlin'--my own darlin', that I will! And where did you come from now--was it from England?"

"No, grandady. It was a long way off, but not from England."

"And who are you living with? Is it with that ould man in Wales?"

"No, not with him. I'll tell you all to-morrow."

"They tell me he's mighty rich."

She evidently had not heard his words, for she stood pressing her temples with both hands, and as if endeavouring to repress some severe pain.

"It's your head's aching you, darlin'!" said he, compa.s.sionately.

"Head and heart!" muttered she, drearily. "Good-by, my dear old grandady--good-by!" And, not able to control her emotion, she turned her face away.

"You'll have to call out through that gratin' before they'll open the door," said he, half sulkily. "You'd think we was all sentenced and condimned, the way they lock us up here! But I hear him coming now.

You'll let her in to see me to-morrow, Mr. Meekins, won't you?" said he, in an imploring tone. "She's my daughter's child, and nearly the last of us now."

"By my conscience, she's a fine creature!" said the turnkey, as she moved past. "It's mighty seldom the likes of her is seen in such a place as this!"

When Kate gained the street, the rain was falling heavily, and as she stood uncertain which way to turn, for the town was strange to her, O'Rorke came up.

"Haven't you as much as an umbrella, Miss Kate," said he, "or a cloak, in this dreadful weather?"

"I was not thinking of either. Which way do we go towards the inn?"

"I'd advise you to take shelter in a shop here, Miss; the shower is too heavy to last long."

"I have no time for this; I want to catch the post, and I believe it leaves at six o'clock.".

"You'll be drowned with this rain," muttered he. "But come along. I'll show you the way."

As they went, neither spoke; indeed, the noise of the plashing rain, and the sharp gusts of the sweeping wind, would have made it almost impossible to converse, and they plodded onward through the dreary and deserted streets, for even the poorest had now sought shelter. The inn was at the very end of a long straggling street, and, when they reached it, they were completely soaked through with rain.

"You have ordered a room for me here, you said?" asked Elate, as they entered.

"Yes, it's all ready, and your dinner too, whenever you like to eat it.--This is the young lady, ma'am," continued he, addressing the landlady, "that's coming to stop here; she's wet through, and I hope you'll take care of her, that she doesn't catch cold."

"Will you show me my room?" asked Kate, quietly. But the landlady never moved, but stood scrutinising her with an eye the very reverse of kindly.

"She's asking you where's her room," broke in O'Rorke.

"I hear her, and I think this isn't the house for her."

"How do you mean?--what are you saying?" cried he, angrily.

"She'll be better and more at home at Tom M'Cafferty's, that's what I mean," said she, st.u.r.dily.

"But I took a room here."

"And you'll not get it," rejoined she, setting her arms akimbo; "and if you want to know why, maybe you'd hear it, and hear more than you like."

"Come away--come away; let us find out this other place, wherever it be," said Kate, hurriedly.

"The other place is down there, where you see the red sign," said the landlady, half pushing her, as she spoke, into the street.

Shivering with cold, and wet through, Kate reached the little "shebeen,"

or carriers' inn, where, however, they received her with kindness and civility, the woman giving up to her her own room, and doing her very best to wait on her and a.s.sist her. As her trunk had been forgotten at the inn, however, Kate had to wait till O'Rorke fetched it, and as Mr.

O'Rorke took the opportunity of the visit to enter on a very strong discussion with the landlady for her insolent refusal to admit them, it was nigh an hour before he got back again.

By this time, what with the effects of cold and wet, and what with the intense anxieties of the morning, Kate's head began to ache violently, and frequent shiverings gave warning of the approach of fever. Her impatience, too, to be in time for the post became extreme. She wanted to write to her uncle; she was confident that, by a frank, open statement of what she had done, and said, and seen, she could deprecate his anger. The few words in which she could describe her old grandfather's condition, would, she felt certain, move her uncle to thoughts of forgiveness. "Is he coming?--can you see him with my trunk?--why does he delay?" cried she at every instant. "No, no, don't talk to me of change of clothes; there is something else to be thought of first. What can it be that keeps him so long? Surely it is only a few steps away. At last!--at last!" exclaimed she, as she heard O'Rorke's voice in the pa.s.sage. "There--there, do not delay me any longer. Give me that desk; I don't want the other, it is my desk, my writing-desk, I want. Leave me now, my good woman--leave me now to myself."

"But your shoes, Miss; let me just take off your shoes. It will kill you to sit that way, dripping and wet through."

"I tell you I will not be dictated to!" cried she, wildly, for her face was now crimson with excitement, and her brain burning. "By what right do you come here into my room, and order me to do this or that? Do you know to whom you speak? I am a Luttrell of Arran. Ask him--that man below--if I am not speaking the truth. Is it not honour enough for your poor house that a Luttrell should stop here, but that you must command me, as if I were your servant? There--there, don't cry; I did not mean to be unkind! Oh! if you but knew how my poor head is aching, and what a heavy, heavy load I am carrying here!" And she pressed her hand to her heart. And, with this, she fell upon her bed, and sobbed long and bitterly. At last she arose, and, a.s.suring the hostess that after she had written a few lines she would do all that she asked her, she persuaded the kind-hearted woman to leave her, and sat down to the table to write. What she wrote, how she wrote, she knew not, but the words followed fast, and page after page lay before her as the clock struck six. "What!" cried she, opening her door, "is it too late for the post?

I hear it striking six!"

"I'll take it over myself to the office," said O'Rorke, "and by paying a trifle more they'll take it in."

"Oh do! Lose no time, and I'll bless you for it!" said she, as she gave him the letter.

"Come up here and sit with me," said Kate to the woman of the house; and the honest creature gladly complied. "What a nice little place you have here," said Kate, speaking with intense rapidity. "It is all so clean and so neat, and you seem so happy in it. Ain't you very happy?"

"Indeed, Miss, I have no reason to be anything else." "Yes; I knew it--I knew it!" broke in Kate, rapidly. "It is the striving to be something above their reach makes people unhappy. You never asked nor wished for better than this?"

"Never, Miss. Indeed, it's better than ever I thought to be. I was the daughter of a poor labourin' man up at Belmullet, when my husband took me."

"What a dreary place Belmullet is! I saw it once," said Kate, half speaking to herself.

"Ah! you don't know how poor it is, Miss! The like of _you_ could never know what lives the people lead in them poor places, with only the fishin' to look to, G.o.d help them! And when it's too rough to go to sea, as it often is for weeks long, there they are with nothing but one meal a day of wet potatoes, and nothing but water to drink."

"And _you_ think I know nothing about all that!" cried Kate, wildly--"nothing of the rain pouring down through the wet thatch--nothing of the turf too wet to burn, and only smouldering and smoking, till it is better to creep under the boat that lies keel uppermost on the beach, than stay in the wretched hovel--nothing of the poor mother, with fever in one corner, and the child with small-pox in the other--nothing of the two or three strong men huddled together under the lee of the house, debating whether it wouldn't be better to go out to sea at any risk, and meet the worst that could happen, than sit down there to die of starvation?"

"In the name of the blessed Virgin, Miss, who towld you all about that?"

"Oh, that I never knew worse! Oh, that I had never left it!" burst out Kate, as, kneeling down, she buried her head in the bed, and sobbed as if her heart were breaking.

The poor woman did her very best to console and comfort her, but Kate was unconscious of all her kindness, and only continued to mutter unceasingly to herself, till at last, worn out and exhausted, she leaned her head on the other's shoulder and fell off into a sort of disturbed sleep, broken by incessant starts.