The Catholic World Volume Ii Part 124

"Arra, didn't I know they'd dance?" said Murrin, giving two or three dumb squeezes with his elbow before the music came, like the three or four first pulls at a pump before the water flows.

It then ran like lightning through the crowd that the dance was going to begin, and old Murrin blew up in earnest at the top of his power.

He had, with the help of some of the best dancers amongst the girls on both sides, selected that spot for the purpose, before the game had commenced; and he had kept his ground patiently all through, playing all the planxties in Carolan's catalogue. But not without wetting his whistle; for as he belonged to neither party, he had been supplied with beer alternately by both.

Phil M'Dermott whispered a few words to the pretty Rathcash girl, and left her apparently in haste. But she was "heerd" by one of our gossips to say, "Of course, Phil; but I will not say 'with all my heart;' sure, it is only a pleasure postponed for a little,--now mind, Phil."

"Never fear, Sally." And he was off through the crowd, with his head up.

Phil's expedition was to look for Winny Cavana, to whom Emon-a-knock had been engaged for the first dance; and as he knew where the {819} bonnet trimmed with broad blue ribbon could be seen all day, he made for the spot. As he came within a few perches of it, he saw Tom Murdock in seemingly earnest conversation with the object of his search, and he hung back for a few minutes unperceived.

Tom Murdock, we have seen, was not a man to be easily taken aback by circ.u.mstances, or to stand self-accused by any apparent consciousness of guilt. Guilty or not, he always braved the matter out, whatever it might be, as an innocent man would, and ought. As the dance was now about to begin, and old Murrin's pipes were getting loud and impatient, Tom made up to Winny. He had watched an opportunity when she was partly disengaged from those around her; and indeed, to do them justice, they "made themselves scarce" as he approached.

"They are going to dance, Winny; will you allow me to lead you out?"

he said.

Winny had been pondering in her own mind the possibility of what had now taken place; and after turning and twisting her answer into twenty different shapes, had selected one as the safest and best she could give, with a decided refusal. Now, when the antic.i.p.ated moment had arrived, and she was obliged to speak, she was almost dumb. Not a single word of any one of the replies she had shaped out--and least of all the one she had rehea.r.s.ed so often as the best--came to her aid.

"Will you not even answer me, Winny?" he added, after an unusually long pause.

"I heard," she said hesitatingly, "that, as a proof of the good-will which was supposed to exist between the parishes, the Rathcash men were to ask the Shanvilla girls, and Shanvilla the Rathcash."

"That may be carried out too; but surely such an arrangement is not to prohibit a person from the privilege of asking a near neighbor."

"No; but you had better begin, as leader, by setting the example yourself. You were head of the Rathcash men all day, and they will be likely to take pattern by you."

"Well, I shall _begin_ so, Winny; but say that you will dance with me by-and-by."

"No, Tom, I shall not say any such thing, for I do not intend to do so. I don't think I shall dance at all; but if I do, it shall be but once--and that with a Shanvilla man."

"Do you mean to say, Winny, that you came here to-day intending to dance but once?"

"I mean to say," she replied rather haughtily, "that you have no right to do more than ask me to dance. That is a right I can no more deny you than you can deny me the right to refuse. But you have no right to cross-question me."

"If," he continued, "it is in consequence of that unfortunate accident, I protest--"

"Here, father," said Winny, interrupting him and turning from him; "shall we go up toward the piper? I see they are at it."

Tom stood disconcerted, as if riveted to the spot; and as old Ned and his daughter walked away, he saw Phil M'Dermott come toward them. He watched and saw them enter into conversation.

The first question old Ned asked, knowing that Phil had gone a piece of the way home with him, was of course to know how Emon was.

"So much better," said Phil, "that he had a mind to come back in the cart an' look on at the dancin'; but of course we would not let him do so foolish a turn. He then sent me back, afeerd Miss Winny here would be engaged afore I got as far as her. He tould me, Miss Winny, that he was to take you out for the first dance yourself; an' although Phil M'Dermott is a poor excuse for Emon-a-knock in a dance, or anywhere else, for that matther, I hope, Miss Winny, you will dance with me."

{820}

"_Ceade mille a faltha_, Phil, for your own sake as well as for his,"

said Winny, putting her arm through his, and walking up to where they were "at it," as she had said.

Tom Murdock had kept his eye upon her, and had seen this transaction.

Winny, although she did not know it, felt conscious that he was watching her; and it was with a sort of savage triumph she had thrust her arm through Phil M'Dermott's and walked off with him.

"Surely," said Tom to himself, "it is not possible that she's going to dance with Phil M'Dermott, the greatest clout of a fellow in all Shanvilla--and that's a bold word. Nothing but a bellows-blower to his father--a common nailor at the cross-roads. Thank G.o.d, I put Emon, as she calls him, from dancing with her, any way. He would be bad enough; but he is always clean at all events, that's one thing--_neen han an shin_. See! by the devil, there she's out with him, sure enough. I think the girl is mad."

Now Tom Murdock's ill-humor and vexation had led him, though only to himself, to give an under-estimate of Phil M'Dermott in more respects than one. In the first place, Phil's father, so far from being a common nailor, was a most excellent smith-of-all-work. He made ploughs, harrows, and all sorts of machinery, and was unequivocally the best horse-sh.o.e.r in the whole country. People were in the habit of sending their horses five, ay ten, miles to Bryan M'Dermott's forge--"establishment" it might almost be called--and Tom Murdock himself, when he kept the race-mare, had sent her past half-a-dozen forges to get her "properly fitted" at Phil M'Dermott's.

Phil himself had served his time to his father, and was no less an adept in all matters belonging to his trade; and as to "driving a nail," there never was a man wore an ap.r.o.n could put on a shoe so safely. A nail, too, except for the above purpose, was never made in their forge. If sometimes Phil threw up his bare hairy arm to pull down the handle of the bellows, it was only what his father himself would do, if the regular blower was out of the way.

In fact, "Bryan M'Dermott and Son, Smiths," might have very justly figured over their forge-door; but they were so well known that a sign-board of any kind was superfluous.

Then as to being a _clout_, Phil was the very furthest from it in the world, if it can have any meaning with reference to a man at all.

There are _nails_ called _clouts_; and perhaps as a nailor was uppermost in Tom's cantankerous mind, it had suggested the epithet.

We have now only to deal with the dirt--the _neen han an shin_ of his spite.

That Phil M'Dermott was very often dirty was the necessary result of his calling, at which the excellence of his knowledge kept him constantly employed. But on this occasion, as on all Sundays and holidays, Phil M'Dermott's person could vie with even Tom Murdock's, "or any other man's," in scrupulous cleanliness. Now indeed, if there were some streaks and blotches of blood upon the breast of his shirt, he might thank Tom Murdock's handiwork for that same.

Such as he was, however, b.l.o.o.d.y shirt and all, Winny Cavana went out to dance with him before the whole a.s.sembly of Rathcash boys, speckless as they were.

Kate Mulvey had been endeavoring to carry on her own tactics privately all the morning, and had refused two or three Shanvilla boys, saying that she heard there would be no dance, but that if there was, she would dance with them before it was over. She now _accidentally_ stood not very far from where Tom had been snubbed and turned away from by her bosom friend, Winny Cavana. Tom Murdock saw her, and saw that she was alone as far as a partner was concerned.

Determined to let Winny see that there were "as good fish in the sea as {821} ever were caught," and that she had not the power to upset his enjoyment, Tom made up to Kate, and, a.s.suming the most amiable smile which the wicked confusion of his mind permitted, he asked her to dance.

"How is it that you are not dancing, Kate? Will you allow me to lead you out?"

"I would, Tom, with the greatest possible pleasure; but I heard the Rathcash boys were to dance with the Shanvilla girls, and so by the others with the Rathcash girls."

"That's the old story, Kate. It was thrown up to me just now; but there is no such restriction upon any of us at either side. And I'll tell you what it is, Kate Mulvey--not a Shanvilla girl I'll dance with this day, if I never struck a foot under me!"

Kate was not sorry to find him in this humor. If she could soothe round his feelings on her own account now, all would be right. Under any phase of beauty, Kate's expression of countenance was more amiable than Winny Cavana's, although perhaps not so regularly handsome, and she felt that she was now looking her best.

"Fie, fie, Tom; you should not let that little accident put you through other like that, to be making you angry. I heard that was the rule, and I refused a couple of the Rathcash boys. But if you tell me there is no such rule, sure I'll go out with you, Tom, afore any man in the parish."

"Thank you, Kate; and if you wish to know the truth, there's not a girl in Rathcash, or Shanvilla either, that I'd so soon dance with."

"Ah,_na bocklish_, Tom; you'll hardly make me b'lieve that."

"Time will tell, Kate dear," said he, and he led her to the ring.

Kate made herself as agreeable as possible; amiable she always was.

She rallied her partner upon his ill-humor. "It is a great shame for you, Tom," she said, "to let trifles annoy you--"

"They are not trifles, Kate."

"The way you do, where you have so much to make you happy; plenty of money and property, and everybody fond of you."

"No, not everybody."

"And you can do just as you like."