The Empire Trilogy Part 6

"The peac.o.c.ks," explained Edward. "Normally they only cry at dusk or after nightfall. I wonder what's got into them."

Dr Ryan said querulously: "It's going to pour again any minute."

"And where are they, the peac.o.c.ks?" Padraig wanted to know. "Could I have some feathers off of them?"

"Of course. Remind me after tea."

The Major looked out over the sea to where a black, ma.s.sive cloud-formation was swelling towards them from over the invisible Welsh coast. It was going to pour. "They have beautiful feathers, those birds," he mused aloud. "Why should they shriek like that?"

The land on this side of the hotel, Edward was explaining to Padraig with the old man limping along morosely a few paces behind them, was where the guests had diverted themselves in the old days. Was it not splendidly suited for the purpose? Look at the way it dropped in a series of wide terraces towards the sea. Each terrace had been reserved for a different recreation. This flat green meadow through which they were now pa.s.sing had been reserved for clock-golf and bowls; the one below for lawn tennis, a dozen separate courts, each one of fine quality and, like the hard courts round by the garages, angled so that the westering sun would never shine into the eyes of the server...and it worked, a.s.suming, of course, that none of the guests were stricken by an irrational craving to get up and take some exercise before, say, half eleven in the morning (but few, if any of them, Edward added with a sour chuckle, had ever been greatly discomfited by the rising sun, or so he understood). The soil for these courts, the draining system and the gra.s.s lawn itself had been imported from England, installed specially and with enormous care in order to emulate the heavenly growth that cloaked the courts at Wimbledon. Edward might have gone on with his explanation but at this moment Padraig spotted a peac.o.c.k sitting on the broken wall that snaked down from one terrace to another, protecting them from the north wind. As he skipped over to investigate, Edward muttered: "A fine lad, Doctor, a fine lad." But the surly old doctor merely grunted disagreeably, refusing to be mollified.

Padraig returned and together they descended a wide and imposing flight of stone steps lined at intervals with cracked urns bearing coats of arms but containing nothing more regal than a few tufts of gra.s.s, thistles, and in one of them what appeared to be a potato plant. Between the stone steps green whiskers sprouted unchecked in every crack and crevice. On the next terrace a young man stood smiling cheerfully out to sea. At the sound of footsteps he turned and, smiling down at the earth, went through the motions of digging with the spade he was holding.

"Ah there, Sean," Edward called to him.

"Good day, sor."

The Major noted with surprise that the foot which had come to rest, after one or two token digging motions, on the shoulder of the spade was shod in a gleaming shoe, the trouser-leg above it was neatly creased, and thrown over the young man's shoulders and knotted round his neck was what looked like a Trinity cricket sweater.

"I say, Edward, you have a very well-turned-out gardener."

But Edward was busy telling Padraig (who showed no sign of being interested) that the land here was ill-suited to the growing of potatoes: the soil contained a good deal of clay and held the moisture so that if it rained too copiously the potatoes would rot in the ground, likely as not, before they could be dug up and eaten. Taking this fact into account it would appear to have been a mistake to dig up the tennis courts (for, in an effort to make the land pay, one or two had been dug up). True, the ones that had been left had forgotten their aristocratic origins and "gone Irish," the delicate gra.s.s becoming thick and succulent in the damp climate, more suitable for feeding cows than hitting forehand drives off. Not that it mattered very much since the twins ("my two little girls... about your age") didn't seem to care very much for the game.

"Do you play tennis?"

Padraig, after his moment of enthusiasm for the peac.o.c.ks, had become sullen once more. "Indeed I do not." Padraig hated all games; he stated as much in a loud and satisfied tone. Particularly games which involved contact with other people's bodies.

"But tennis..." began Edward.

Having arrived at the lowest terrace, against which the sea lapped in chilly grey waves, they turned to the right, following a gravel path along the water's edge. This path was lined by monstrously unclipped privet hedges and ended at a boat-house complete with slipway and the half-exposed rotting ribs of what had once been a large yacht; built against the boat-house was a taller square building which Edward said was the squash court. (And what, Padraig wanted to know, was a "squash" court when it was at home? It sounded mighty unpleasant whatever it was.) It was in the squash court that Edward apparently kept his pigs. He opened the door and went inside, making cooing noises. Padraig, wrinkling his nose, followed. Dr Ryan heaved a sigh and turned his ancient, lined features to the Major.

"Ach, it's a long way for a man of eighty to walk with no tea inside him."

Before following him inside the Major turned to look back at the hotel, which at this point was much nearer; the ground fell away sharply and one crenellated wing of it hung almost directly above. Edward's voice from inside the squash court was calling him to have a look at his beauties, his three remarkable piglets. The building consisted of a small ante-chamber and an enormous oblong room with peeling white walls and a rotting wooden floor. The roof was of greenish gla.s.s that filled the place with a murky submarine light. In addition, Edward had lit two hurricane lanterns which hung from great metal arms riveted into the walls; the light from these poured down on mounds of straw, mud, excrement and pig-swill. The stench was intolerable.

Three piglets, glowing pink in the cascade of light from the lanterns, frisked around Edward, who was kneeling on a pile of steaming straw and doing his best to tickle their stomachs, though they were in such an ecstasy of excitement that they could hardly hold still for a moment, nipping and suckling at his fingers and tumbling over his shoes.

"Look at them, did you ever see such wonderful little fellows in all your life? Here now, calm down a bit and show your visitors how well you can behave. Here, Brendan, this is Mooney, that's Johnston, and the one sniffing at your sock is...o...b..ien. We feed them mostly with stale cakes from the bakery, you see...ones that haven't been sold. We get a couple of sacks sent down from Dublin on the train once a week: iced cakes, barm bracks, Swiss rolls, oh everything! lemon sponges, almond rings, currant buns, Battenbergs, Madeira cake...A lot of them are so fresh you wouldn't mind eating them yourself." And Edward gazed down with tenderness at the plump pink animals that were still whirling and somersaulting about his feet before turning to the Major for corroboration.

The Major cleared his throat for a favourable comment on the piglets. But he was silenced by a growl and an ear-splitting squeal. It was Rover, of course, who had followed them into the squash court undetected. For a few moments there was chaos while the other two pigs joined in the squealing and Edward tried to soothe them. The piglet Mooney, unaware that any creature on earth might wish him ill and perhaps thinking that the old spaniel was merely a somewhat hairy brother-pig, had playfully performed a somersault which had landed him within range of the dog's sharp teeth. A painful nip had been administered. For a moment the piercing noise, the grovelling figure of Edward, the swaying lanterns and the asphyxiating ammoniac stench all combined with weariness from his journey to make the Major wonder whether his reason had not become unhinged.

He poked his head out of the door and took a deep breath of cool, unscented air. The relief was extraordinary. There was the sound of footsteps. A buxom girl wearing an ap.r.o.n was skipping towards them along the path.

"The master?" she called. "Is he there? A gentleman does be at the door." The Major nodded and re-entered the building to tell Edward that he was wanted. The piglets had calmed down and were lying in a row on their backs having their stomachs rubbed. Getting to his feet with a grimace of annoyance, Edward said: "Look here, why don't you have a good look at the pigs and then follow me up to the house for a spot of tea when you've finished? See you up there in a few minutes." With that he hurried out. A moment later he returned to say: "By the way, would you mind dousing the lanterns before you leave?" Then he was gone again.

Dr Ryan and the Major exchanged a glance but said nothing. Padraig made a sour face and began to wipe one of his boots with a clean handful of straw. The three piglets, gradually becoming aware that the flow of pleasure over their fat pink stomachs had been interrupted, rolled over and sat up. Their three visitors stared at them grimly until, one by one, the animals crept away to a heap of oozing mud and straw in the farthest corner of the court and settled themselves with their backs to the strip of tin. From there they eyed with suspicion and alarm the hostile creatures who (in appearance, anyway) so much resembled their beloved Edward.

When he judged that they had gazed at the animals for a suitable interval the Major doused the lights (which turned the piglets as grey as rats) and ushered the doctor and his grandson out into the fresh air. The old gentleman looked very weary indeed now and his movements had become more trembling and tentative than ever. They began to climb in silence towards the looming house, with the old man leaning heavily on his grandson's slim shoulder and thrusting at the ground with his stick. "Really," thought the Major, "it was most inconsiderate of Edward to bring the 'senile old codger' all the way down here for this pig nonsense."

On a flight of stone steps between two terraces they stopped for a rest. They had gained sufficient alt.i.tude to afford the Major a view over the strip of park-land to the south-west, and beyond to the meadow. From the next terrace up, or from the one above that, he should be able to see clear to the tenants' farms and the rolling hills behind them. The farmhouses-he remembered them perfectly-would be cl.u.s.tered there on the green slopes looking, at this distance, like grey sugar cubes.

They were now taking a short cut across the penulti-mate terrace, which led them past an immense swimming-pool, a splendid-looking affair which for some reason the Major had never noticed before. Here and there bright blue tiles were visible through the green lichen that veiled its sides and they pa.s.sed the peeling white skeleton of a high-diving-board; beside it a springboard hung over the black water on the surface of which, by accident or design, lay the green discs of water-lilies. "It must be fresh water," he thought. "Rainwater, perhaps."

As he watched, something heaved powerfully beneath the surface. "Looks as if there might be good fishing. Pike, I wouldn't be surprised. Too bad Edward hasn't got a decent cook."

Turning a corner of the pool brought a reflection of the sky down on to the water for a moment and left the water-lilies floating in azure. He glanced back once more to see if any fish were rising, but the surface was gla.s.sy smooth. He was tempted to go back and try the springboard to see whether it had rotted through-but undoubtedly it had. And it was fitting that it should have. From here the fashionable young men, his erstwhile comrades in arms, had taken one, two, three steps, a jump, and jack-knifed into the azure. There was something moving about this remnant of a happy youth; the Major, at any rate, felt moved.

But at last they were on the final flight of steps and soon they would be sitting in armchairs drinking tea.

"We've scaled the Matterhorn, Doctor!" But the old man, head and shoulders bowed forward on to his chest, was too spent to reply.

The Major looked towards the meadow and sure enough the farmhouses were scattered like grey sugar cubes on the rolling, quilted fields. Much nearer, though (indeed, near enough to have been visible from the lower terrace if he had looked more carefully), not far from the wall of loose, flat stones which divided the park from the meadow, a man in a tattered overcoat was standing motionless, facing towards the Majestic but with his eyes on the ground. The Major wondered whether it was the same man he had noticed earlier and, as they went inside and their footsteps echoed beneath the great gla.s.s dome of the ballroom, the incongruous but disturbing thought occurred to him that perhaps this man also would not object to sharing some almost-fresh cakes with Edward's piglets. Before going off to wash and change his shirt he told Edward that there was some fellow hanging around in the meadow and Murphy was dispatched to tell the chap to buzz off. It was probably that bane of all respectable folk in Ireland, a tinker.

On an impulse he went inside. It was very dark. The heavy curtains were still half-drawn as he had left them six months earlier, only allowing the faintest glimmer of light to penetrate. The bottles and gla.s.ses on the bar glowed in the shadows; there was a strong smell of cats and some silent movement in the darkness. Looking up, he was taken aback for a moment to see a pair of disembodied yellowish eyes glaring down at him from the ceiling. It was only when he had moved to the window to draw back the curtains that he realized that the room was boiling with cats.

They were everywhere he looked; nervously patrolling the carpet in every direction; piled together in easy chairs to form random ma.s.ses of fur; curled up individually on the bar stools. They picked their way daintily between the bottles and gla.s.ses. Pointed timorous heads peered out at him from beneath chairs, tables and any other object capable of giving refuge. There was even a ma.s.sive marmalade animal crouching high above him, piloting the spreading antlers of a stag's head fixed to the wall (this must be the owner of the glaring yellow eyes that had startled him a moment ago). He had a moment of revulsion at this furry mult.i.tude before the room abruptly dissolved in a shattering percussion of sneezes. A fine grey cascade of dust descended slowly around him. "Well, I'll be d.a.m.ned, where the devil did this lot come from? All the cats in Kilnalough must be using the Majestic to breed in... and not all of them are wild either." Indeed, led by the giant marmalade cat which from the stag's brow had launched itself heavily into the air to land on the back of a chair and thence to slither to the floor, they were moving towards him making the most fearful noise. In a moment he was up to his shins in a seething carpet of fur.

He moved brusquely, however, and the animals scattered and watched him in fear. The smell had become nauseating. He tried to open the window but the wooden frame must have swollen with the dampness; it was wedged tight, immovable. He was about to leave when his eye fell on the envelope which lay on the bar. It was the letter from Angela which Edward had handed to him on the day of her funeral; his name was written on the envelope in the precise handwriting which had once been so familiar. He thought of it lying here, Angela's final message to him, through the long months he had been away, the cats multiplying around it, the seasons revolving. Uneasily he opened it...but he did not read it. It was much too long. He put it in his pocket and picked his way sadly through the cats to the door.

In the Palm Court the Major was greeted by Edward with a fresh burst of enthusiasm, as if the few minutes which had elapsed had been yet another long separation. No sooner had the Major forced his way through the new and astonishing growth of bamboo that threatened to occlude the entrance entirely (for here too the seasons had continued to revolve) when Edward was on his feet calling: "Here he is, the man himself. Come here, Brendan, and explain why you haven't been keeping in touch with us all this time...Eh? Let's hear his excuses, what! d.a.m.ned if the fellow hasn't been too busy chasing the ladies to give his old friends a thought. Doctor, what d'you think? What d'you make of a friend who won't write letters, poor sort of a chap, isn't he? And I'm dashed if he hasn't put on weight into the bargain. A bit of riding is what he needs, I should think, and a few early mornings out with a gun and a dog...How does that sound to you, Brendan? Not so bad, eh? I thought you'd get tired of being citified sooner or later. Now then, come and tell us all your news, old man. Sit here so we can have a look at you. Yes, that one looks solid enough...pull it up a bit and I'll do the honours. Och, yes, I have to do it all m'self these days, I'm turning into an old woman so I am, a real old woman. We started. You don't mind, do you? Thought we wouldn't wait for the tea to get cold..."

While the Major sipped his tea and peered curiously around at his scarcely familiar surroundings Edward fired questions at him, flitting from one subject to another, as often as not without waiting for replies. Such was his state of excitement that he could scarcely keep still. Indeed, he kept jumping to his feet to make unnecessary adjustments to the table.

"What was Ascot like last year?" he would cry gaily, handing everyone an extra teaspoon. "You must have been there ...now don't tell me you weren't. Yes? Yes? No, wait a minute, try a fill of this and see how you like it. I got the man in Fox's to make it up specially...a special blend, my own concoction, thought I'd try it out on you, see how you like it. No, wait, have a slice of cake first. Bewley's. They say it's very good, don't know much about cake m'self, but they say it's a good one...Did I tell you I'd taken up science again? Have to keep the old brain from getting rusty, don't we? Body and mind. Body and mind. Body and soul, as Sammy would tell you. Never had any time for Ascot, Brendan. Ascot is for the ladies, m'father used to say, the men just stand there like stuffed parrots. Give me a good point-to-point any day where there's none of that nonsense. Used to let poor Angie and her mother bully me into it sometimes. (Poor Angela, echoed the Major in his thoughts, feeling a remote ache of compa.s.sion from the folded wad of paper in his breast pocket.) Didn't care for it, though...Now, young man, what'll you have? Another slice of cake to put some muscle on you, eh? And you, Doctor? More tea? Now, Brendan, frankly I don't know what this country is coming to...Have they gone mad over there in London? You tell us, you've just come from there...have they gone mad or what? The b.l.o.o.d.y Shinners are getting away with murder. Land-grabbing is the latest. Pious articles in the papers about what they call 'land-hunger in the west' and d'you know what it is? They're forcing chaps to sign over their land at gunpoint for a pittance..."

"Don't be a d.a.m.n fool, Edward!" the doctor said distinctly.

"There, you see, Brendan," Edward went on grimly. "You see what I mean. The good doctor and I have been having words about this already. D'you know that they've even been trying it on with me?" And leaping to his feet once again Edward seized a bread-knife and began to slash away at the foliage with it as if it were a machete. And it was true that the growth of ferns, creepers, rubber-plants and G.o.d only knew what had become so luxuriant as to be altogether beyond a joke. Whereas previously the majority of the chairs and tables had been available, here and there, in clearings joined by a network of trails, now all but a few of them had been engulfed by the advancing green tide. While Edward slashed away with the bread-knife the Major, anxious to change the subject, observed politely that he had never in his life seen indoor plants "succeed" so well. Edward, his exuberance subsiding abruptly, murmured something indistinct about the system of irrigation, then something further about sewage and the septic tank. "A devil's own job" something would be "and frankly the expense..." With a sigh he kicked the slashed leaves and twigs into a pile beside the table and slumped back into his chair.

"And anyway, what does it matter in the long run?" the Major understood him to murmur very softly, eyes raised, mouth open, to the great skylight above them, itself almost obliterated by vegetation. Rover, who had been dozing with his chin on the Major's instep, went over to inspect the pile of leaves, lifted a leg to sprinkle them with a few drops of urine before, inertia overcoming him, he rolled over on to his side to doze off once more.

There was a long silence as they sat there in the green-ish gloom. The old man was motionless, deeply sunk in an armchair just as the Major remembered him from his first visit and, for all one knew, fast asleep behind the drooping lids. The Major noted with dismay that the doctor's flies were undone; a fold of flannel was protruding like the stuffing from a broken doll. Really! someone should have reminded the poor old fellow; at his age one couldn't be blamed for such a lapse. And why had n.o.body thought of removing his hat? He looked absurd sitting there at the tea-table wearing a hat (though it was true that the foliage made one feel as if one were out of doors).

"You said I could have some peac.o.c.k feathers," Padraig said plaintively, but Edward made no reply and silence fell once more.

A faint rustling sound became audible, as of someone making his way with caution along one of the trails through the thicket. There had previously been a way through, the Major remembered, from one end of the Palm Court to the other (leading to a spiral staircase down into the cellars). It seemed, to judge by the steadily approaching rustle of leaves, that against all probability this trail was still practicable. The noise of movement stopped for a moment near at hand, and there was a deep sigh, a long exhalation of breath, almost a sob. Then the noise started again. In a moment whoever it was would step into view from behind an extraordinarily powerful tropical shrub which seemed to have drilled its roots right through the tiles of the floor into the oozing darkness below. No sound but for the rustling footsteps. Even the doctor appeared to have stopped breathing. The Major tried to see past the hairy, curving, reticulated trunk of this tree, to distinguish (between succulent, oily leaves as big as dinner-plates) the tiny figure that slowly shuffled into sight. It was old Mrs Rappaport.

She stopped in the clearing opposite the tea-table and turned her sightless eyes in their direction.

"Edward!"

Edward said nothing but continued to sit there as if made of stone.

"Edward, I know you're there," the old lady repeated shrilly. "Edward!"

Edward looked agonized but said nothing. After a long pause the old lady turned and began to move forward again. For what seemed an age they listened to the decreasing rustle of her progress followed by a prolonged wrestling with the grove of bamboo shoots. Listening to the interminable thrashing as she tried to escape from the toils of bamboo, the Major wondered whether he should go to her a.s.sistance. But at last the thrashing stopped. Mrs Rappaport had won through into the residents' lounge.

Silence returned and it seemed to the Major that the greenish gloom had deepened into an intolerable darkness. If only the famous "Do More" generator had been working they could have repulsed this aqueous darkness with a cleansing flood of electric light. He looked round for the tall-stemmed lamp which Angela had once switched on in this very glade, but although it was no doubt still somewhere near at hand (few things being ever deliberately changed at the Majestic) there was no longer any way of telling which of these leafy shrubs possessed a tubular metal trunk and gla.s.s corolla.

"Have you had enough to eat, old chap?"

"Eh?" said the Major.

Edward was talking to the dog, however. After a moment, though, as if the sound of his own voice had startled him into activity, he stirred uncomfortably and looked at his guests. He stood up for an instant, without pushing his chair back, then sat down again.

"Glad to hear you're something of a sportsman," he said to Padraig with an effort. "Good for a young fellow...cricket, hockey and so forth. Mind you, I was never much of a cricketer myself...Too impatient with it all, I suppose."

"I hate cricket," Padraig said sullenly.

Whether or not this exchange served to clear the air, Dr Ryan now also began to speak, though so softly that it was all the Major could do to make out what he was saying. Several moments pa.s.sed before he realized that the old fellow had begun to speak hoa.r.s.ely, comfortingly, consolingly to Edward of someone who had died...and several more moments before he realized that that someone was Angela, as if she had only been dead for a matter of hours rather than months.

People are insubstantial, he understood the old man to be saying, a doctor should know that better than anyone. They are with us for a while and then they disappear and there is nothing to be done about it...A man must not let himself become bitter and defeated because of this state of affairs, because really there is no point to it...There is no rock of ages cleft for anyone and one must accept the fact that a person ("You too, Edward, and the Major, and this young boy as well")...a person is only a very temporary and makeshift affair, as is the love one has for him...And so Edward must understand that this young girl who had just died, his beloved daughter Angela whom he, Dr Ryan, had a.s.sisted into the world, even at the height of her youth and health was temporary and insubstantial because...people are insubstan-tial. They really do not ever last...They never last. A doctor should know. People never last.

Edward laughed heartily and, lighting a candle, said: "I remember one time some fellows in Trinity asked me to bowl in the practice nets with them (used to like to keep myself in trim during the vacations) and I'm d.a.m.ned if I didn't have such a swelled head in those days that I made up some c.o.c.k-and-bull story about being a demon bowler. Well, they had the nets up against the wall, of course. First ball I bowled (fella called Moore was batting, later played for the Gentlemen of Ireland), first ball, mind you, I'm dashed if it didn't sail clean over the batsman, over the back of the net, over the wall, bounced on the roof of a carriage in Na.s.sau Street and went half-way up Dawson Street! Eh? What? How about that for a piece of bowling, eh? You can bet my face was like a beetroot and, by Jove, did they laugh at me...Och, after that I stuck to the gloves, I can tell you." Bubbling with mirth Edward gradually subsided once more.

On an impulse the Major had slipped Angela's letter out of his pocket and (overcome by curiosity and a vague dread as to what it might contain) was straining his eyes in the candle-lit gloom to read it, while the doctor began a rambling and incoherent monologue about there being a new spirit in Ireland (it was clear that the old chap was so exhausted and his mind so fogged that he no longer knew where he was or what he was talking about).

Ah, it was as he thought, Dearest Brendan Dearest Brendan-the regular handwriting, line after line like small waves relentlessly lapping a gentle sh.o.r.e. On my dressing-table On my dressing-table-the mirror, the brushes, the jewellery-cases, even a photograph of himself. From the window of my bedroom I can see From the window of my bedroom I can see...but what could she see? Only two elms and an oak, reputed to be a hundred and fifty years old, the second or third oldest tree on the estate, the edge of a path where the dogs sometimes wandered, but at this distance she could hardly recognize them...Foch or Fritz? Collie or Flash? They were too far away, in a sense (thought the Major) they were too particular now...only a generality like the circling of the planets could hold her attention now. But at twelve minutes past eleven the doctor came at twelve minutes past eleven the doctor came and he and Angela had a long chat which, for all that, didn't prevent her noticing and recording that and he and Angela had a long chat which, for all that, didn't prevent her noticing and recording that one of his waistcoat b.u.t.tons was dangling by a thread one of his waistcoat b.u.t.tons was dangling by a thread and that there was a copious spot of what was undoubtedly porridge on his jacket...(Meanwhile the doctor muttered in the querulous tones of a tired old man: "There's a new spirit in Ireland; I can feel it, you know, and see it everywhere. The British are finished here. The issue is no longer in doubt, hasn't been for the last twenty years. There's nothing now except a huge army that'll keep Ireland under the British yoke. If you take my advice, Edward, you'll give in gracefully now while you still can, you'll give them the land they're asking for, because, if you don't, they'll take it anyway...Parnell was the last man who could have preserved some sort of life for the British in Ireland but the d.a.m.n fools didn't realize it, thought he was their enemy! Serves 'em right. I've no sympathy for them, they've lived here for generations like c.o.c.ks in pastry without a thought for the sufferings of the people. Now it's their turn and I'll shed no tears for them...Ach, things have changed since I was a boy...they have a different look to them, the people, it would take a fool not to see it.") and that there was a copious spot of what was undoubtedly porridge on his jacket...(Meanwhile the doctor muttered in the querulous tones of a tired old man: "There's a new spirit in Ireland; I can feel it, you know, and see it everywhere. The British are finished here. The issue is no longer in doubt, hasn't been for the last twenty years. There's nothing now except a huge army that'll keep Ireland under the British yoke. If you take my advice, Edward, you'll give in gracefully now while you still can, you'll give them the land they're asking for, because, if you don't, they'll take it anyway...Parnell was the last man who could have preserved some sort of life for the British in Ireland but the d.a.m.n fools didn't realize it, thought he was their enemy! Serves 'em right. I've no sympathy for them, they've lived here for generations like c.o.c.ks in pastry without a thought for the sufferings of the people. Now it's their turn and I'll shed no tears for them...Ach, things have changed since I was a boy...they have a different look to them, the people, it would take a fool not to see it.") "But this is an enormous letter," thought the Major, appalled, hefting the wad of crinkly paper in his hand. "It would take a prodigious effort even to write such a letter if one were weakened by illness, if one were unable to take proper nourishment (he thought with a pang of the untouched trays of food ferried up and down the stairs) and...and the detail in it is intolerable."

("Of course, I was a child then, too young to remember those days, but my father had seen it and my uncles too, G.o.d rest them, they were old men before thirty with the worry and the trouble...and I remember the way people talked of it, you know. It must be G.o.d's will, they'd say. He sent it to punish us, d'ye see? so what is there for a man to do? Sure we'll have to go to another country, says he, to America on a ship because in Ireland we'll never do any good; we'll die for sure and there'll be no help for it...Man, I'd say, what need is there to leave? The hunger is over and there's food enough. But sure it'll come again, says he, you'd never know...'tis best to leave Ireland. B'the Lord Harry, in those days they were leaving so quick they were even starving there on the quays of New York. There's no luck in Ireland, they'd tell you...") "There's no luck in Ireland," agreed Edward, winking at the Major, who was thinking: "Such detail is intolerable,"-the design of the carpet over which the shrinking white feet of the patient still continued to patter day after day, morning and evening, to perform her ablutions...till the day inevitably came (he had been waiting for it with despair), till the page inevitably came when the pitcher and the bowl and the sponge came to her her over the carpet and the carpet dropped out of her world and she too prepared to drop out of her world. "Such detail is quite obviously intolerable," thought the Major as Edward reached out in the gloom to feel whether the teapot's plump belly was still warm, at the same time absent-mindedly handing the sugar-bowl to the doctor, who did not need it and was muttering incoherent words to the effect that if Edward or anyone else laughed at what he was saying it was because he or they, was or were, British black-guards and fools (some part of the Major's brain had remained on duty to straighten out the grammar while he thought: "Really, when I arrived and attempted to kiss her hand she flinched away from me as she might have flinched from some uncouth stranger."). over the carpet and the carpet dropped out of her world and she too prepared to drop out of her world. "Such detail is quite obviously intolerable," thought the Major as Edward reached out in the gloom to feel whether the teapot's plump belly was still warm, at the same time absent-mindedly handing the sugar-bowl to the doctor, who did not need it and was muttering incoherent words to the effect that if Edward or anyone else laughed at what he was saying it was because he or they, was or were, British black-guards and fools (some part of the Major's brain had remained on duty to straighten out the grammar while he thought: "Really, when I arrived and attempted to kiss her hand she flinched away from me as she might have flinched from some uncouth stranger.").

"Those were the days," declared Edward absently, perhaps still thinking of the day he had bowled a cricket-ball up Dawson Street.

"They certainly were not not!" snapped the doctor.

So why should she write all this? Page after page to someone she scarcely knew. The relentlessly regular handwriting lapped rhythmically on. Only on the last few pages did it begin to waver a little.

I shall not die now.

Brendan, if I die who will look after you when I am gone?

And there were a number of other observations, feebly scratched out, which the Major had not the heart to decipher.

"People are insubstantial," murmured the doctor, as his bowler-hatted head drooped sleepily on to his chest. "They never last. Of course, it makes no difference in the long run."

It was signed, without the usual qualification about the "loving fiancee," quite simply: Angela. Angela.

"The old chap's fallen asleep," Edward said. "Such a lot of rot he talks...I'm afraid he's becoming a bit you-know-what."

Getting to his feet he shouted deafeningly to Murphy to bring more candles because it had become infernally dark. The Major returned the letter to his pocket. Glancing down, he noted with dismay that his own flies were undone. He fumbled with them hastily before Murphy arrived with more candles.

"Can I have some peac.o.c.k feathers?" demanded Padraig stubbornly. "You promised."

"Of course, of course," Edward told him genially. "Look, why don't you go and ask the twins for some; I'm sure they have lots of that sort of thing. Murphy, show this young man where he can find the girls."

When Padraig had departed with Murphy the Major asked: "What are the twins doing at home? Shouldn't they be at school?"

"They were sent home," replied Edward sombrely. "A spot of bother at school." He sighed but did not elaborate.

They waited in silence for Padraig to return. Presently they heard the thrashing and rustling of his advent. A few moments later he appeared out of the darkness. The Major stared at him. His face was flushed and indignant and he seemed close to tears. His hair had been ruffled and his shirt was hanging out at the back. In one hand he clutched a bunch of peac.o.c.k feathers.

Edward looked at him with concern, seemed about to say something but changed his mind. At length he sighed again and said that he thought it was about time to wake the doctor and send him home.

Before leaving, the doctor, who had been restored by his brief nap and now remembered why he had come, said: "For the last time, Edward, will you come to some arrangement with the farmers about the land, for your own good as much as for theirs?"

"So far I have received two threatening letters. Both of them I have given to the District Inspector. There happens to be a law in the land which protects a man's private property and I have no intention of giving in to threats."

"Is that your last word?"

"Yes," Edward replied curtly.

LENIN AND POLAND.

"To be delivered from her Oppressors"The Paris Matin Matin says: "A wireless message has been transmitted from Moscow announcing in glowing terms that the whole of Russia is rising to fight Poland. On May 6th the majority of the Moscow garrison of 120,000 men left the Soviet capital for the Dnieper front. Lenin and Trotsky addressed the troops. Lenin said: 'We do not want to fight Poland but we are going to deliver her from her oppressors. Death to the Polish landlords! Long live the Polish Workers' and Peasants' Republic!'" says: "A wireless message has been transmitted from Moscow announcing in glowing terms that the whole of Russia is rising to fight Poland. On May 6th the majority of the Moscow garrison of 120,000 men left the Soviet capital for the Dnieper front. Lenin and Trotsky addressed the troops. Lenin said: 'We do not want to fight Poland but we are going to deliver her from her oppressors. Death to the Polish landlords! Long live the Polish Workers' and Peasants' Republic!'"

LAWLESSNESS NEAR KILKENNY.

Ladies Terrorized by Armed MenLate on Monday night considerable excitement was caused in Kilkenny by the news of the "hold up" at Troyswood a mile outside the city, by masked men armed with revolvers, of a number of motor cars and horsed carriages which were taking ladies and gentlemen, in whose number were included Major J.B. Loftus, D.L., J.P., Mount Loftus, and Sir Hercules Langrishe, Bart, Knocktopher Abbey, to a ball at the house of Captain J.E. St. George, R.M., Kilrush House, Freshford, about ten miles from Kilkenny City. A barricade of large stones was placed across the road.Some of the cars did not pull up immediately when called upon to stop and several shots were discharged, but no one was injured, although some of the pa.s.sengers say that the bullets whizzed very near them.All the parties, who were in evening dress, were huddled together under a ditch while the destruction of the engines was carried out, and some of the ladies were very much frightened. Other horsed carriages came on the scene shortly afterwards and the raiders decamped, leaving their victims to get home as best they could.Yesterday morning six motor cars were lined up on the side of the road, and the engines appeared to have been smashed with some heavy, blunt instrument. In the corner of the field where the drivers and pa.s.sengers were placed there were remnants of chocolate boxes and cigarette packets.

Little had changed in Edward's study since the Major had first seen it on his first day in Kilnalough when they had come to arm themselves against "the Shinner on the lawn." There was the same solidly tangled ma.s.s of sporting equipment on the sofa. The drawer containing ammunition still lay on the floor, though the Persian cat (wisely disdaining the community in the Imperial Bar) had forsaken it for the superior comfort of an enormous greyish-white sweater that lay in one corner like a dead sheep. From under the window there came a steady creaking sound: the Major leaned out to investigate. In the yard below was a circle of brick surmounted by a huge horizontal cartwheel with worn wooden handles; against these handles two men were toiling, heads bowed with the exertion, round and round, straining like pit ponies.

"What on earth are they doing?"

"Pumping water up to the tanks on the roof. The other well by the kitchens is for drinking water, fills up from an underground spring. Lovely water...though for some reason it makes a weird cup of tea. You may have noticed, Brendan, that we sometimes get peculiar objects in the bath-water. Can't be helped. One of the old ladies was complaining she had a dead tadpole the other day. Better than a live one, I suppose." Without changing his tone he added: "Life has been h.e.l.l these last few months."

"I've been meaning to ask you about Ripon. I heard they were living in Rathmines."

"Ripon is a wash-out," Edward said bleakly. "I don't want to hear his name mentioned again. It's not that he took up with a Catholic girl, it's not just that. I'm not so narrow-minded that I don't know there are decent fellows among the Catholics in Ireland and plenty of 'em. I'd have put a stop to it if I could, of course, because mixed marriages don't go down well in this country, with one lot or the other... Besides, I don't want grandchildren of mine to be brought up believing all that unhealthy nonsense they teach them. All the same, if that's what the boy had set his heart on I wouldn't have stood in his way. He could have come to me and talked it over, man to man. He knew that. I may be an old fogey but I'm not a tyrant..." Edward paused and moodily looked at his watch. For a moment there was silence, then he said: "Come along to the lodge with me. There's something I want to show you."

They put on their hats and set off down the drive. The day was mild, overcast; although it had not been raining there was a smell of damp gra.s.s which the Major now always thought of as the smell of the Irish countryside.

"Ripon's a wash-out," Edward repeated. "I suppose everyone knew that except me. I suppose you realized it, Brendan, as soon as you set eyes on him..."

"Well, no," murmured the Major diffidently, but Edward was not listening.

"Going behind my back and doing what he did...playing the cad with an innocent young girl (and a Catholic at that!), getting her in trouble as if she were a common housemaid, that's something I'll not stand for. He's disgraced me and he's disgraced his sisters."

They walked on in silence. The Major could hear the dull continuous roar of the sea from somewhere behind the trees which were thickening into dense woods, matted with undergrowth and strung with brambles like trip-wires. They reached the end of the drive and the ruined lodge came into sight. Edward led the Major through some low bushes to the side of the building that faced the road. Here, high up on a part of the wall that had not been engulfed by ivy, a notice had been stuck.

"How d'you like that for cheek?"

The Major stepped forward to read it.