Rossmoyne Part 40

"I came to see the baby an' to get me dinner," says the boy, with hanging head, his silence arising more from shyness than sullenness. The potatoes have just been lifted from the fire by Mrs. Moloney, and are steaming in a distant corner. Paudheen looks wistfully towards them.

"d.i.c.kens a sign or taste ye'll get, then, if only to tache ye better manners. Be off, now, an' don't let me see ye agin."

"I'm hungry," says the boy, tears coming into his eyes.

"Oh, Mrs. Daly!" says Monica, in a distressed tone.

"A deal o' harm it will do him to be hungry, thin!" says the culprit's mother, with an angry voice, but with visible signs of relenting in her handsome eyes. "Be off wid ye now, I tell ye." This is the last burst of the storm. As the urchin creeps crestfallen towards the doorway her rage dies, its death being as sudden as its birth. "Come back here!" she cries, inconsistently. "What d'ye mane be takin' me at me word like that? Come back, I tell ye, an' go an' ate something, ye crathur. How dare ye behave as if I was a bad mother to ye?"

The boy comes back, and, raising his bonny head, smiles at her fondly but audaciously.

"Look at him, now, the blackguard," says the mother, returning the smile in kind. "Was there ever the like of him? Go an' ate yer praties now, and thank yer stars Miss Monica was here to say a good word for ye."

Paddy, glad of his rescue, casts a shy glance at Monica, and then, going over to where his grandmother and the pot of potatoes rest side by side, sits down (close cuddled up to the old dame) to fill his little empty stomach with as many of those esculent roots as he can manage, which, in truth, is the poor child's only dinner from year's end to year's end.

And yet it is a remarkable fact that, in spite of this scanty fare, the Irish peasant, when come to man's estate, is ever strong and vigorous and well grown. And who shall say he hasn't done his queen good service, too, on many a battle-field? and even in these latter days, when sad rebellion racks our land, has not his name been worthy of honorable mention on the plains of Tel-el-Kebir?

"I don't think he _looks_ like a bad boy, Mrs. Daly," says Monica, reflectively, gazing at the liberated Paddy.

"Bad, miss, is it?" says the mother, who, having made her eldest born out a villain, is now prepared to maintain he is a veritable saint. "You don't know him, faix. Sure there niver was the like of him yet. He is a raal jewel, that gossoon o' mine, an' the light of his father's eyes.

Signs on it, he'd die for Daly! There niver was sich a love betwixt father an' son. He's the joy o' my life, an' the greatest help to me.

'Tis he minds the pig, an' the baby, an' ould granny there, an'

everything. I'd be widout my right hand if I lost him."

"But I thought you said----" begins Monica, mystified by this change from righteous wrath to unbounded admiration.

"Arrah, niver mind what I said, acushla," says the younger Mrs. Daly, with an emphatic wink. "Sure 'twas only to keep him in ordher a bit, I said it at all at all! But 'tis young he is yet, the crathur."

"_Very_ young. Oh, Mrs. Daly, _look_ at baby! See how she is trying to get at my hair!" Monica is beginning in a delighted tone,--as though to have one's hair pulled out by the roots is the most enchanting sensation in the world,--when suddenly her voice dies away into silence, and she herself stares with great open violet eyes at something that darkens the doorway and throws a shadow upon the a.s.sembled group within.

It is Desmond!

Kit, feeling as guilty as though she were the leading character in some conspiracy, colors crimson, and retires behind Mrs. Moloney. She lowers her eyes, and is as mute as death. But Monica speaks.

"Is it you?" she says. Which, of course, is quite the silliest thing she _can_ say, as he is standing there regarding her with eyes so full of light and love that the cleverest ghost could not copy them. But then she is not sillier than her fellows, for, as a rule, all people, if you remark, say, "Is that you?" or "Have you come?" when they are actually looking into your face and should be able to answer the question for themselves.

"Yes, it is," says Desmond, with such an amount of diffidence (I hope it wasn't a.s.sumed) as should have melted the heart of the hardest woman upon earth. Monica is _not_ the hardest woman upon earth.

Still, she makes him no further speech, and Desmond begins to wonder if he is yet forgiven. He is regarding her fixedly; but she, after that first swift glance, has turned her attention upon the baby on her knee, and is seemingly lost in admiration of its little snub nose. Why will she not look at him? What did he say to her last night that is so difficult to forgive? Can wrath be cherished for so long in that gentle bosom? Her face is as calm as an angel's; surely

"There's nothing ill can dwell in such a temple."

"Ah! come in, Misther Desmond," says Mrs. Daly, hospitably. "I'm glad 'tis company I have before you the day. Maybe 'twill coax ye to come again. Where have you been this week an' more? Faix, ye were so long in comin', I thought 'twas angry wid me ye were."

"n.o.body is ever angry with a pretty woman like you," says Desmond, saucily.

"Oh, now, hark to him!" says Mrs. Daly laughing heartily. "I wonder ye aren't ashamed of yourself. An' is the ould Squire hearty?"

"He's as well as even _you_ could wish him. How d'ye do, Kit? Won't you come and speak to me?"

He has been afraid to shake hands with Monica up to this, but now she turns suddenly towards him and holds out to him one slender fair hand, the other being twined round the baby. She does this musingly.

He grasps the little snowy hand with almost senile delight, and holds it for--as long as he dares. During this undefined period he tells himself what a perfect picture she is, with her clear, pale, beautiful face, and her nut-brown hair, and the tender sweetness of her att.i.tude, as she bends over the smiling baby. Could any vaunted Madonna be half as lovely? At this moment a growing contempt for all the greatest masterpieces of the greatest masters permeates his being and renders him weak in faith.

"Won't ye sit down, thin?" says Mrs. Daly. Being a woman, she grasps the situation at a glance, and places a chair for him close to Monica.

"What's the matther wid ye to-day, Misther Desmond, that ye haven't a word to give us?"

"You ought to know what I'm thinking of," says Desmond, accepting the chair, and drawing it even a degree closer to Monica.

"Faix, thin, I don't," says Mrs. Daly junior, her handsome face full of smiles. A love-affair is as good as a saint's day to an Irish peasant; and here she tells herself, with a glance at Monica, is one ready-made to her hand.

"I'm thinking what a lucky man Daly is," says Desmond, promptly.

"Oh, git along wid ye now, an' yer blarney!" says Mrs. Daly, roaring with laughter; whilst even Mrs. Moloney the dismal, and the old granny in the corner, chime in merrily.

And then the visit comes to a close, and they all rise and bid Mrs. Daly and the others "good-by;" and Monica, mindful of his late affliction, bestows a soft parting word upon the subdued Paddy.

And now they are all in the open air again, and, turning down the boreen that leads to the Daly's homestead, reach the road that leads to Moyne.

It is Desmond's way as well as theirs, so he accompanies the girls without remark.

"What brought you to see the Dalys, to-day?" asks Monica, suddenly, without any ulterior meaning beyond the desire of making conversation; but to Kit's guilty soul this question seems fraught with mischief.

"Oh, I often go to see Daly. I want him to come fishing with me to-morrow: he's the best man about here for that, and trudges behind one for miles without complaining."

"Poor Daly!"

"Well, I hope you enjoyed your visit to-day," says Kit, blithely, glancing at him mischievously from beneath her broad hat.

"There was a drawback," says Brian, unthinkingly. "I went there full of hope, and, after all, she never offered me any of your pudding!"

Tableau!

Kit's agonized glance and Monica's questioning eyes awake Mr. Desmond to a knowledge of what he has done.

"How did _you_ hear of Kit's pudding?" asks Monica, looking keenly from Brian to Kit, and then back again.

"Oh!--the pudding," stammers Desmond.

"There! don't commit yourself," says Monica, in a tone that trembles.

"Oh, Kit!"

Both culprits are afraid to look at her. Does the tremble mean tears, or anger, or what? Perhaps horror at their duplicity, or contempt. Is she hopelessly angered?

Then a suppressed sound reaches their ears, creating a fresh panic in their b.r.e.a.s.t.s. Is she positively _choking_ with indignation? Cautiously, anxiously, they glance at her, and find, to their everlasting relief, that she is convulsed with laughter.

"When next you meditate forming a brilliant plot such as this," she says to Kit, "I think I should look out a more trustworthy accomplice if I were you."

"Catch me having a secret with _him_ again," says Kit now her fears are appeased, turning wrathfully upon Desmond.