The Art of Disappearing Part 19

"Did you ever dream in all your rainbow dreams," said Grahame, "of marching thus into Cruarig with escort of Her Majesty? It's damfunny.

But the question now is, what are we to do with the magistrate? Any sort of an inquiry will prove that we are more than suspicious characters. If they run across the ship we shall go to jail. If they discover you and me, death or Botany Bay will be our destination."

"It is simply a case of luck," Ledwith replied. "Scheming won't save us.

If Lord Constantine were in London now----"

"Great G.o.d!" cried Grahame in a whisper, "there's the luck. Say no more.

I'll work that fine name as it was never worked before."

He called out to Captain Sydenham to come around to his side of the car for a moment.

"I am afraid," he said, "that we have fallen upon evil conditions, and that, before we get through with the magistrates, delays will be many and vexatious. I feel that we shall need some of our English friends of last winter in New York. Do you know Lord Constantine?"

"Are you friends of Lord Leverett?" cried the Captain. "Well, then, that settles it. A telegram from him will smooth the magistrate to the silkiness of oil. But I do not apprehend any annoyance. I shall be happy to explain the circ.u.mstances, and you can get away to Dublin, or any port where you hope to meet your ship."

The Captain went back to Honora, and talked Lord Constantine until they arrived in the town and proceeded to the home of the magistrate.

Unfortunately there was little cordiality between Captain Sydenham and Folsom, the civil ruler of the district; and because the gallant Captain made little of the episode therefore Folsom must make much of it.

"I can easily believe in the circ.u.mstances which threw tourists into so unpleasant a situation," said Folsom, "but at the same time I am compelled to observe all the formalities. Of course the young lady is free. Messrs. Dillon and Grahame may settle themselves comfortably in the town, on their word not to depart without permission. Mr. Ledwith has a name which my memory connects with treasonable doings and sayings.

He must remain for a few hours at least in the jail."

"This is not at all pleasant," said Captain Sydenham pugnaciously. "I could have let these friends of my friends go without troubling you about them. I wished to make it easier for them to travel to Dublin by bringing them before you, and here is my reward."

"I wish you had, Captain," said the magistrate. "But now you've done it, neither is free to do more than follow the routine. We have enough real work without annoying honest travelers. However, it's only a matter of a few hours."

"Then you had better telegraph to Lord Constantine," said Sydenham to Grahame.

Folsom started at the name and looked at the party with a puzzled frown.

Grahame wrote on a sheet of paper the legend: "A telegram from you to the authorities here will get Honora and her party out of much trouble."

"Is it as warm as that?" said the Captain with a smile, as he read the lines and handed the paper to Folsom with a broad grin.

"I'm in for it now," groaned Folsom to himself as he read. "Wish I'd let the Captain alone and tended to strict business."

While the wires were humming between Dublin and Cruarig, Captain Sydenham spent his spare time in atoning for his blunders against the comfort of the party. Ledwith having been put in jail most honorably, the Captain led the others to the inn and located them sumptuously. He arranged for lunch, at which he was to join them, and then left them to their ease while he transacted his own affairs.

"One of the men you read about," said Grahame, as the three looked at one another dolorously. "Sorry I didn't confide in him from the start.

Now it's a dead certainty that your father stays in jail, Honora, and I may be with him."

"I really can't see any reason for such despair," said Arthur.

"Of course not," replied Grahame. "But even Lord Constantine could not save Owen Ledwith from prison in times like these, if the authorities learn his ident.i.ty."

"What is to be done?" inquired Honora.

"You will stay with your father of course?" Honora nodded.

"I'm going to make a run for it at the first opportunity," said Grahame.

"I can be of no use here, and we must get back the ship safe and sound.

Arthur, if they hold Ledwith you will have the honor of working for his freedom. Owen is an American citizen. He ought to have all the rights and privileges of a British subject in his trial, if it comes to that.

He won't get them unless the American minister to the court of St. James insists upon it. Said minister, being a doughhead, will not insist. He will even help to punish him. It will be your business to go up to London and make Livingstone do his duty if you have to choke him black in the face. If the American minister interferes in this case Lord Constantine will be a power. If the said minister hangs back, or says, hang the idiot, my Lord will not amount to a hill of beans."

"If it comes to a trial," said Arthur, "won't Ledwith get the same chance as any other lawbreaker?"

Honora and Grahame looked at each other as much as to say: "Poor innocent!"

"When there's a rising on, my dear boy, there is no trial for Irishmen.

Arrest means condemnation, and all that follows is only form. Go ahead now and do your best."

Before lunch the telegrams had done their best and worst. The party was free to go as they came with the exception of Ledwith. They had a merry lunch, enlivened by a telegram from Lord Constantine, and by Folsom's discomfiture. Then Grahame drove away to the ship, Arthur set out for Dublin, and Honora was left alone with her dread and her sorrows, which Captain Sydenham swore would be the shortest of her life.

CHAPTER XVI.

CASTLE MOYNA.

The Dillon party took possession of Castle Moyna, its mistress, and Captain Sydenham, who had a fondness for Americans. Mona Everard owned any human being who looked at her the second time, as the oriole catches the eye with its color and then the heart with its song; and Louis had the same magnetism in a lesser degree. Life at the castle was not of the liveliest, but with the Captain's aid it became as rapid as the neighboring gentry could have desired. Anne cared little, so that her children had their triumph. Wrapped in her dreams of amethyst, the exquisiteness of this new world kept her in ecstasy. Its smallest details seemed priceless. She performed each function as if it were the last of her life. While rebuffs were not lacking, she parried them easily, and even the refusal of the parish priest to accept her aid in his bazaar did not diminish the delight of her happy situation. She knew the meaning of his refusal: she, an upstart, having got within the gates of Castle Moyna by some servility, when her proper place was a _shebeen_ in Cruarig, offered him charity from a low motive. She felt a rebuke from a priest as a courtier a blow from his king; but keeping her temper, she made many excuses for him in her own mind, without losing the firm will to teach him better manners in her own reverent way. The Countess heard of it, and made a sharp complaint to Captain Sydenham.

The old dowager had a short temper, and a deep grat.i.tude for Anne's remarkable services in New York. Nor did she care to see her guests slighted.

"Father Roslyn has treated her shabbily. She suggested a booth at his bazaar, offered to fit it up herself and to bring the gentry to buy. She was snubbed: 'neither your money nor your company.' You must set that right, Sydenham," said she.

"He shall weep tears of brine for it," answered the Captain cheerfully.

"Tell him," said the Dowager, "the whole story, if your priest can appreciate it, which I doubt. A Cavan peasant, who can teach the fine ladies of Dublin how to dress and how to behave; whose people are half the brains of New York; the prize-fighter turned senator, the Boss of Tammany, the son with a gold mine. Above all, don't forget to tell how she may name the next amba.s.sador to England."

They laughed in sheer delight at her accomplishments and her triumphs.

"Gad, but she's the finest woman," the Captain declared. "At first I thought it was acting, deuced fine acting. But it's only her nature finding expression. What d'ye think she's planning now? An audience with the Pope, begad, special, to present an American flag and a thousand pounds. And she laid out Lady Cruikshank yesterday, stone cold. Said her ladyship: 'Quite a compliment to Ireland, Mrs. Dillon, that you kept the Cavan brogue so well.' Said Mrs. Dillon: 'It was all I ever got from Ireland, and a brogue in New York is always a recommendation to mercy from the court; then abroad it marks one off from the common English and their common Irish imitators.' Did she know of Lady Cruikshank's effort to file off the Dublin brogue?"

"Likely. She seems to know the right thing at the right minute."

Evidently Anne's footing among the n.o.bility was fairly secure in spite of difficulties. There were difficulties below stairs also, and Judy Haskell had the task of solving them, which she did with a success quite equal to Anne's. She made no delay in seizing the position of arbiter in the servants' hall, not only of questions touching the Dillons, and their present relations with the Irish n.o.bility, but also on such vital topics as the rising, the Fenians, the comparative rank of the Irish at home and those in America, and the standing of the domestics in Castle Moyna from the point of experience and travel. Inwardly Judy had a profound respect for domestics in the service of a countess, and looked to find them as far above herself as a countess is above the rest of the world. She would have behaved humbly among the servants of Castle Moyna, had not their airs betrayed them for an inferior grade.

"These Americans," said the butler with his nose in the air.

"As if ye knew anythin' about Americans," said Judy promptly. "Have ye ever thraveled beyant Donegal, me good little man?"

"It wasn't necessary, me good woman."

"Faith, it's yerself 'ud be blowin' about it if ye had. An' d'ye think people that thraveled five thousan' miles to spind a few dollars on yer miserable country wud luk at the likes o' ye? Keep yer criticisms on these Americans in yer own buzzum. It's not becomin' that an ould gossoon shud make remarks on Mrs. Dillon, the finest lady in New York, an' the best dhressed at this minnit in all Ireland. Whin ye've thraveled as much as I have ye can have me permission to talk on what ye have seen."

"The impidence o' some people," said the cook with a loud and scornful laugh.

"If ye laughed that way in New York," said Judy, "ye'd be sint to the Island for breaking the public peace. A laugh like that manes no increase o' wages."

"The Irish in New York are allowed to live there I belave," said a pert housemaid with a simper.