My Lords of Strogue Volume I Part 16

'There's many a stout fellow about, whose heart it would plase if ye'd rub your pretty brogues on it, who'd like to set fire to the tobaccy in his pipe every blessed day by the light of your lovely eyes.'

Doreen glanced up at the giant with an amused smile.

'Fie! Mr. Ca.s.sidy. If I didn't think you too sensible a man, I should believe you were trying to propose to me.' Then it struck her that it was on this very spot that Terence had asked if he might hope.

'What possesses the men? How odd it is,' she said, thinking aloud.

'Fate settled long since that I was to die an old maid; and everybody seems to want to marry me. Why? I am surely not so irresistible? There are scores of girls who would be delighted to marry any one, but somehow n.o.body cares to ask them! Why not try Norah Gillin--Shane at least thinks her a paragon--and she has the advantage of being a Protestant.'

'Miss Doreen,' Ca.s.sidy whispered, 'if I undertook to work heart and soul for the cause you care so much for; if I made use of my opportunities--went about for you--as your agents do (you see I know all about it); if, when the hour comes, I promised to risk my life and all I have for you--'tisn't much--would you change your mind then?'

Miss Wolfe felt his hot breath upon her hair, and began to feel uncomfortable. It was her own fault. She should have cried 'Down!' to this importunate dog before.

'Mr. Ca.s.sidy,' she said, with the quiet dignity which was her best protection, 'you show yourself in a false light. You belong to the society--I fully believe--from conviction of the holiness of its aims.

Although a Protestant, you are an Irishman, as I am an Irishwoman. Our wrongs are common. Don't let me suppose you to be suggesting a bargain.'

'It is that good-for-nothing young councillor!' the giant muttered, grinding his teeth fiercely. 'If I was sure of it, I'd run him through! Have a care, young lady; don't trifle with honest men--or wigs will be on the green, and you may be sorry!'

The interview was becoming extremely painful. Ca.s.sidy, when tried, was showing the cloven foot, as under-bred persons will. Miss Wolfe drew herself up to her full height, knitted her dark brows, and said coldly:

'You forget yourself strangely, sir! My aunt and my cousin have been over-kind to you; I have tried, for my poor part, to make your visits pleasant, believing you, as I still believe, to be honest, if bearish and uncouth. If you dare to persecute me any further I will speak to my aunt, and the doors of the Abbey will be closed to you for ever.

Then seeing how rueful, how dismayed the hapless giant looked, she took compa.s.sion and held out a frank little brown hand. 'Come, come!

This is childish nonsense. I must not be hard on you. We must not quarrel, you know, but cling together closely for the good cause's sake. If petty private feuds begin to divide us, the enemy will dance for joy. I want a friend in whom to trust. You shall be that friend.

Will you? Come! Be good, and I will pardon you.'

She placed her hand in his, where it lay like a small leaf, and her companion said sulkily, as he stroked it with a great finger:

'You evaded the question about Mr. Crosbie.'

'Well then,' she answered, 'I care no more for him than for Shane or you. I will never marry till Erin is righted. Ah me! doesn't that look like perpetual maidenhood? My husband, too, must have won his spurs as a hero, and heroes are scarce. There. Shake hands, and let there be an end of it. Your heart is in the cause, as mine is. Your acts speak for you, and Theobald shall thank you some day. Depend on it, the best tenure of earthly attachment is tenancy at will. You have the use of the soil, and nothing you plant in it shoots so deeply but it may be removed with ease. Let us be friends--trusty friends, Mr. Ca.s.sidy--no more.'

At this juncture, Terence came briskly round the corner, and started to see the att.i.tude of the twain. His sudden suspicion cooled, however, upon perceiving that his cousin was no whit confused. Her hand still remained in that of Ca.s.sidy, and she said, laughing, as she swung it to and fro:

'Here is a big creature who threatens by-and-by to bud into a hero of romance. When he kneels victorious in the lists, I, as queen of beauty, am to bestow the laurel crown. What a delectable picture, isn't it? Glad to see you, Terence. You are determined we shall value your society. You give us so very little of it.'

'You look like having quite enough of it by-and-by,' Terence answered moodily. 'I brought with me a note from Mr. Curran to my mother, in which he says that he won't have me at the Priory any more; that I must come home like an obedient child, and wash my face and brush my hair and say I'm sorry. If I had known what was in the letter I should have stayed away.'

'But you'll stop,' Doreen said, so earnestly as to cause the giant to look askance at her. 'It is sad for members of a family to be at daggers-drawn. Come--to please me--let me be peacemaker. Shane shall say you are welcome, and we'll all be in harmony together again.

Promise me--and I'll tell you some rare news that has been burning my tongue this month past. You are both to be trusted, I know.'

'I would every one was as thrue as the councillor here and I!'

e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the giant, his frown breaking into sunshine, as if suddenly convinced, by some queer reasoning, that there was nothing between Terence and Miss Wolfe. 'It's mighty careful we'll have to be by-and-by with them rapscallions of ould Sirr's. Wisht! now, and I'll tell ye what he told me,' he pursued, lowering his voice and glancing round as though the dogs could speak. 'There's a place called the Staghouse, over foreninst Kilmainham gaol, bad cess to it, where the Battalion of Testimony are housed and fed, as these hounds are. They have their rations and potteen and a penny or two for toh-baccy--for all the world like gentlemen born. I'll make it my business to stroll in there some day, just to draw their pictures on my mind's eye. Maybe it'll be useful to know the spalpeens' faces.'

'This system of spies is terribly base,' Terence said, sighing.

'Enough to bring down chastis.e.m.e.nt upon any cause. I don't believe Lord Camden knows of it. The gentry are arming right and left, my mother says, in case the people should be ill-advised enough to rise.

Yeomanry corps are being formed in every county. Shane has been this morning applied to, to take the lead in this district.'

'Shane raise a regiment? With what result?' Doreen inquired quickly.

'With none as yet,' answered Terence, laughing; 'because my lord is sleeping off the effects of a terrible bout last night, which ended in two duels and the killing of a baker, and probably will allow my mother and Lord Clare to settle such a thing as that, as they may deem most wise.'

'It is too late for such organisation to be dangerous,' Doreen affirmed gaily. 'Now I'll tell you the great secret, for it is only fair you, Mr. Ca.s.sidy, should know, and Terence will not divulge. Now, lend me your ears. The French fleet is almost ready to sail. Our friends will start in two parties before the summer's over, from a northern port; making the one for Cork, the other for some point on the west coast. Hoche himself has promised to lead the expedition. The delegates of our own provincial centres have secret orders. We may expect to look on the ships which shall bring us deliverance by the commencement of the autumn at the latest. Here's Theobald's last letter; you may read it.'

The giant looked eagerly to seaward, sniffing like a war-horse, as though already he could discern the vessels in the offing; and whistled a subdued whistle, as if saying to himself, 'This is news worth taking that early ride for.' With each great fist deep in a breeches-pocket, he listened to the letter, and then said: '_Arme blanche_. Eh! He agrees with us then, and is right. The pike's the thing for Paddy. The difficulty of landing powder enough to be of service would be enormous. Moreover, since the Gunpowder Act, Pat knows nothing of its use, and would do more harm to himself in the long-run than to the enemy.'

Doreen declared that of such details she could of course know nothing, to which the giant retorted that there were hosts of reasons in favour of the pike. The Hessian and Hanoverian mercenaries who were being slowly drafted into Ireland were experienced only in the orthodox mode of warfare. The courage of armies is so uncertain that they are often disconcerted and panic-stricken by a style of fighting to which they are unaccustomed.

'See here!' the giant said, drawing a paper from his pocket and presenting it to Terence. 'This is a model by which thousands are being made all over the country. Long, flat, ugly no doubt--but easily forged. Could ye improve on that?'

Now Terence, had he been wise, would have refused the challenge, sapiently declining to know anything of the model pike, for the giant was bent somehow on securing him--but, intoxicated by the enthusiasm of his pretty cousin, whose cairngorm eyes, under their long lashes, were as usual making sad havoc of his judgment, he took the design and thought he could improve upon it. Ca.s.sidy's muddle-headedness stood in the way of his understanding, and the young councillor was forced to sketch out a new design, with elaborate instructions as to how it might be hammered out with a maximum of wounding power and a minimum of labour. Of course 'it was just the thing,' Ca.s.sidy declared, delighted, and brought down his sledge-hammer palm upon the other's shoulder.

'We'll have to crimp you?' he vowed, with a peal of merriment in which Doreen softly joined, 'and so gain a gineral, as the Sa.s.sanagh gains sailors. Ye'll be with us some day, Masther Terence, see if you aren't!'

And now, too, he declared that he must have more advice about these said pikes--there was terrible difficulty in storing them as they were made. He had an audacious idea. What did Master Terence think of it?

Some of the gentry from the Staghouse were, he was informed, constantly on the prowl in search of such information as might be bartered against good living; for Major Sirr laid it down as an initial axiom, that a member of his battalion who remained silent beyond a certain limit of time was to be cashiered as incompetent. It was literally a case of 'singing for supper,' and one of the simplest methods of obtaining credit with the town-major was to discover and denounce a depot of concealed weapons.

Now Jug Coyle (mistress of the shebeen hard-by)--this was a tremendous secret--was deeply involved in the affairs of the society. Her back garden contained many more pike-heads than praties. It stood to reason that she should be so involved, for was she not a collough, a trafficker in charms and simples, who was called in by the peasantry around for the curing of their bodily ills; and was it possible for one who was bone of their bone to refrain from meddling with their wrongs also? Well, she could store no more without awaking the suspicions of the Staghouse gentry, who seemed already to suspect that seditious meetings were held under her thatch; and yet it was very necessary that many more weapons should be stored somewhere in the immediate neighbourhood of the city. The question was, where could a spot be found for them to lie snugly--a place where folks would least suspect their existence?

The giant was becoming so earnest, and so lucid in his earnestness, that Doreen quite marvelled at him. She knew more of Jug Coyle's manage than he was aware of, and listened with growing interest, for red-polled Biddy, whilst acting as Theobald's post-office, was constantly declaring that she felt like living on a powder-magazine.

'It has been suggested,' the giant went on, 'that Mrs. Gillin of the Little House should take some; but that would not be wise, for she is a Catholic whose opinions are well known, though latterly she has cultivated a discreet tongue. It might enter the head of the town-major to search her place.'

'It would certainly be unwise!' Terence said. 'Remember her daughter's connection with my brother. May she be trusted? There are female spies as well as male, I suppose. You people are dreadfully rash, Ca.s.sidy.'

'Never fear, Master Terence,' returned the giant, with a twinkle in his eye. 'Both she and her daughter are children of the people, who would sacrifice this lord and many another to boot for the good cause, if need were. Her heart is with us, like many another; but in this case at least it's best she should play blind.'

'But what is your suggestion?' Doreen inquired, for the giant was beating about the bush in an exasperating manner.

'This is it. Don't cry out now when ye hear it.' He glanced round with caution, and lowered his voice. 'The ould armoury above in the young men's wing there.'

'What! Here at the Abbey!' Terence exclaimed. 'You are mad.'

Ca.s.sidy was watching him in sidelong fashion as he felt his way.

'Sure there's a power of blackguard knives there already, which no one touches from year's end to year's end, as the cobwebs show. I'd stake my life ye've not been in there yourself this year or two. n.o.body would search there, would they? They might be pa.s.sed up from the shebeen at night-time--Biddy and your man Phil would see to it--over the old ivy wall, and exchange a kiss or two into the bargain.'

'Phil is not affiliated,' objected Terence.

'Is he not?' grunted the giant, shortly. 'It's surprised I'd be if he could not tell us as much about a green bough in England's crown as is known to you or I.'

Doreen's eyes were on her cousin. Her face wore its usual serene look.

The enormity of the proceeding did not seem so great to her as it did to him. He did not take into consideration the sublime manner in which women look straight to a goal, without marking the mud which may have to be crossed to reach it. A thought shot through his brain, flooding it with joy. If she could contemplate such a trick being played upon the earl, she could not care about him. That was a rare thing to know.

And why should it not be played on him? The brothers were so estranged, that the younger one felt no call to interfere in such a matter on behalf of the elder. It was impossible that he should have lived so long on terms of familiarity with the disaffected without being unconsciously tainted to at least a small extent with their oft-repeated complaints. Not that he was prepared to admit that these modern grievances were well-founded. No doubt it had been very improper--all those years ago--for a Protestant invader to seize, _vi et armis_, the territory of a Catholic nation--to eject the sons of the soil by force, in favour of themselves and their heirs. But really it was too late now to remedy that misfortune.

The English were to all seeming a happy and contented people, who had long since given up groaning over the Norman invasion and the freebooting proceedings of William the Conqueror. It was merely a matter of time. Ireland must accept the past, and pick out the thorns from the bed on which she lay as well as she could. Thus was Terence, in his idle good-humoured way, accustomed to argue when his personal friends gnashed their teeth at the Sa.s.sanagh. But these new theories that were beginning to be broached--even by Mr. Curran himself--charging the executive with motives which, if they in truth existed, were _lese-patrie_ of the most heinous kind, caused even his careless junior to pause and think. And then he consoled himself with considering that high-principled King George could not be Blunderbore--that my Lord Clare was not a Feefofum. Yet there was no doubt that my Lord Clare was unduly harsh--that the low-bred squireens were apt to treat the common folk cruelly to curry favour with the Castle. He did not pause to ask himself why cruelty to common folk should be pleasing in the Castle's eye. These yeomanry corps were likely to be productive of much evil. Terence had said as much to his mother but now. It was possible that Shane, in his overbearing pride of birth and fierce tendency to fire-eating, might become a terrible flail if he accepted the task of organising a regiment--indeed from his nature he was sure to do so. It would be a whimsical revenge for the people that he should be unconsciously guarding their weapons for them.

Councillor Crosbie laughed loud at the conceit, declaring that he saw no reason why pikeheads should not be added to the 'blackguard knives'

in the armoury, and his cousin gave him such a distracting look of thanks that he chid himself for considering the matter at all; while Ca.s.sidy, who also caught the look, glared out to seaward, clenching his fists in his deep pockets.

'That eccentric person, Mrs. Gillin!' Terence cried gaily. 'So she's mixed up with all this plotting, is she? Has she taken the oath, or is she but a privileged outsider like myself? And my man Phil, too--that's to please red-polled Biddy, doubtless. Let's take the oath, Doreen, while we can make a favour of it, for all Ireland will, it seems, be in it soon. The good lady was in her garden as I pa.s.sed this morning, strutting about with leather gloves and garden-shears, and bowed solemnly to me as I pa.s.sed. What a queer woman! At the Rotunda the other day she came and stood before me, though we have never been introduced, and said, "Are you sure, young man, that you left your home of your free will?" When I said "Certainly," she gave a satisfied nod and disappeared in the crowd. If her daughter is pining for Shane, her mother evidently sets her cap at me. I trust you will all be civil to the future Madam Crosbie. This is the way she walks----' and the irreverent scapegrace proceeded to waddle up and down with so exact an imitation of Mrs. Gillin's peculiarities that Ca.s.sidy fairly shouted. That lady and her doings being a tabooed subject at the Abbey, there was special delight in talking of her on the sly.