The Northern Iron Part 4

"Draw your chair to the fire, Neal," he said. "You may stay and listen to us."

At first the talk was of old days. An hour went by. Donald filled his pipe more than once, and finished his tumbler of punch. Story followed story of the doings of the Hearts of Steel and Hearts of Oak. Donald, as a boy, had taken his part--and that a daring part--in the fierce struggle by which the northern tenant-farmers gained fuller security and a chance of prospering a whole century before their brethren in the south and west, with the aid of the English Parliament, won the same privileges. Then Donald, speaking oftener and smoking less, told of his own share in the American War of Independence. Neal, listening, was thrilled with the stories of unequal battles between citizen soldiers and trained troops. He glowed with excitement as he came to understand the indomitable courage which faced reverse after reverse and s.n.a.t.c.hed complete victory in the end. Donald dwelt much on the part which Irishmen had taken in the struggle, especially on the work of Ulster men, Antrim men, men of the hard northern breed, of the Presbyterian faith.

"There's no breaking our people, Micah; men of iron, men of steel."

"Shall iron break the northern iron, and the steel?" quoted Micah Ward, and then, with that wonderful Puritan accuracy of reference to the Bible, gave chapter and verse for the words--Jeremiah the 15th and 12th.

"And the spirit's not dead in you at home, is it, Micah? The breed is pure still."

It was Micah's turn to speak. Neal sat in astonishment while his father told of the wrongs which the northern Presbyterians and the southern Roman Catholics suffered. Never before had he heard his father speak with such pa.s.sion and fierceness. There was a pause at last, and Donald rose to his feet. He re-filled his gla.s.s from the punch-bowl, raised it aloft, and said:--

"I give you a toast. Fill your gla.s.s, brother. No, that will not do.

Fill it full, and fill a gla.s.s for Neal. Stand now. I will have this toast drunk standing. 'Here's to America and here's to France, the pioneers of human liberty, and may Ireland soon be as they are now!'"

"Amen," said Mica h Ward solemnly.

"Drink, Neal, drink. Drain your gla.s.s, boy. I will have it," said Donald.

"The northern iron, the northern iron, and the steel," muttered Micah.

Then the brothers drew their chairs closer together, and Micah, speaking low, as if he dreaded the presence of some unseen listener, began to tell of the plans of the United Irishmen. He mentioned the names of one leader and another; told how the Government, vigilant and alert, had already struck at the organisation; of the general dread of spies and informers. He entered into details; told how the cannon, once given by the Government to the Volunteers, were hidden in one place, how muskets were stored in another, how the smiths in every village were fashioning pike heads, how many men in each locality were sworn, how every male inhabitant of Rathlin Island had taken the oath. Donald interrupted him now and then with sharp questions. The talk went on and on. The tones of the speakers grew lower still. Neal lost much of what was said. His interest slackened. His eyes closed at last, and he fell fast asleep.

It was late, close on midnight, when his uncle shook him into consciousness again. The candles were burned down. The fire was out. The atmosphere of the room was heavy with tobacco smoke. The punch-bowl was empty, and the two bottles, empty also, stood beside it. It seemed to Neal that his uncle spoke thickly in bidding him good night, and walked unsteadily across the room. But Micah Ward's voice was clear and his steps were firm. Only, as Neal thought, his eyes shone more brightly than usual, and he held himself upright. The stoop was gone from his shoulders, and the peering, peaked look from his eyes.

CHAPTER III

The Lords of Dunseveric once lived in a castle perched on the edge of a cliff, a place inferior to the neighbouring Dunluce as a stronghold, but equally uncomfortable as a residence. The walls were thick, the rooms little larger than prison cells, and the windows very small and narrow, but they were wide enough to let the wind whistle through them and the rain trickle over their sills to the stone floors inside. The doctor of a modern sanatorium for consumptive people would have been well satisfied with the ventilation of Dunseveric Castle. On stormy days in winter it must have been most unsafe to venture out of doors. The worst winds, fortunately, always blow inwards from the sea, but there are eddies round buildings, and with precipices on three sides of him, the ancient lord of Dunseveric had need to walk cautiously and provide himself, when possible, with something to hold on to. Some time at the end of the seventeenth century the reigning lord, giving up in despair the attempt to render habitable a home more suited to a seagull than a n.o.bleman, being also less in dread than his ancestors of sea pirates and land marauders, determined to build himself a house in which he could live comfortably. He selected a site about a mile inland from the original castle, and laid the foundations of Dunseveric House. Then, despairing perhaps of living to complete his architect's grandiose plans, he gave up the idea of building and hired a house near Dublin.

During the early part of the eighteenth century he interested himself in Irish politics, and succeeded, as influential politicians did in those days, in providing comfortably for outlying members of his family from the public purse. His son, when it came to his turn to reign, ignored the foundations which his father had laid, and erected a mansion such as Irish gentlemen delighted in at the time--a Square block of grey masonry with small windows to light large rooms, a huge bas.e.m.e.nt storey, and an impressive flight of stone steps leading up to the front door. He also enclosed several acres of land with a stone wall, called the s.p.a.ce a garden and planted it with some fruit trees which did not flourish.

His son, the Lord Dunseveric of 1798, having little left him to do in the way of building, devoted his early years to planting and laying out pleasure grounds round the new house. His wife, a French woman of Irish extraction, brought a cultivated taste to his aid. No doubt her ideas and her husband's energy would in the end have created a beautiful and satisfying demesne round Dunseveric House if it had not been for the north wind and the sea spray. These were hard enemies for a landscape gardener to fight, and when Lady Dunseveric died her husband gave up the struggle, having nothing better to show for his time and money than some fringes of dejected-looking alders and a few groves of stunted Scotch firs. He even neglected the gla.s.s houses which his wife had built. Irish politics became extremely interesting just after Lady Dunseveric died, and an Irish gentleman might well be forgiven for neglecting the culture of his demesne when his time was occupied with drilling Volunteers, pa.s.sing Grand Jury resolutions in support of the use of Irish manufactured goods, and subsequently preparing schemes for the internal development of Ireland.

Thus Dunseveric House was by no means an attractive place to Estelle, Comtesse de Tour-neville, when she first visited it. Accustomed to the scenery round her dead husband's chateau in the valley of the Loire, and attached to the life of the French Court, the appearance of Dunseveric House struck her as utterly dismal. She had every reason beforehand to suppose that it would be dismal, and was quite convinced that it would not suit her as a place of residence. Forced to flee from France in 1793, she put off taking refuge in her brother-in-law's house as long as possible, and only arrived there after spending three years among hospitable friends in England.

"The poor Marie, my poor sister," she said, when Lord Dunseveric, at the end of the long drive from Ballymoney, turned the horses up the bare avenue.

To her maid, in the privacy of her bedroom, she opened her grief more fully.

"I remember very well when my sister married, though I was but a little girl at the time, eight or perhaps nine years old. I remember that all the world talked of her handsome Irish husband. He was a fine man then.

He is a fine man still, and has the grand manner. Oh, yes, he is very well. And my nephew. He is well made, big and strong like all the men of his race and blood. But he has no manner--none. If only my sister had lived she might have formed him. But--poor Marie!"

She sighed. The maid hazarded a suggestion that Lady Dunseveric had found life _triste_, too _triste_ to be endurable.

"You are right," said the Comtesse, "she must have died of sheer dulness. She had two children. That was occupation for a while, no doubt. But, _mon dieu_, a lady cannot go on having children every year like a woman of the _bourgeoisie_. It would be too tedious. She died.

She was right. And now I am here in her place. I am here with my lord, who has good manners but does not care about me, wishes me anywhere but in his house; a nephew who has no manners and a great deal of stupidity, and a niece who is much too old to be my niece, and who is too like me in face and figure for us to get on well together. Otherwise, truly, she is not like me. She is content to spend all day in a boat on the sea catching fish. Conceive it yourself, Susanne, she was catching fish, and her companion was the son of the _cure_, a man of some altogether impossible Protestant sect."

But the Comtesse had the good manners or the good sense not to grumble about her surroundings to anyone except her maid. She so far understood the philosophy of a happy life as to know that pleasure awaits those only who succeed in making themselves pleasant.

She came down the morning after she arrived in time for breakfast, although the English breakfast was a meal she had learned to detest, and the North of Ireland families have made an even more serious business of it. She expressed a delight which she cannot be supposed to have felt at the sight of salmon, fried, cold, kippered; ham, eggs, fowl, farles of home-made bread, oat-cake, honey, jam, b.u.t.ter. To the secret amus.e.m.e.nt of Lord Dun-severic she even accepted a bowl of porridge which her nephew offered her, and then, to the astonishment of Maurice, asked if she might eat honey with it. She was delightfully optimistic about the prospects of amus.e.m.e.nt for the day.

"Where are you going to take me, Una? There are so many things that I want to see. I recall the letters which Marie, your mother, used to write to me about wonderful cliffs and gloomy caves and white rocks and long strands. Of course you have all the business of the house to attend to. I quite understand. I will wait. But afterwards, where will you take me?"

Una glanced out of the window. The south wind of the day before had brought, as south winds usually do in County Antrim, abundant rain.

Maurice, appealed to, gave it as his opinion that there was no chance of the weather improving until three o'clock, and that there wasn't much chance of sunshine even then.

"But, at least," said the Comtesse, "I shall be able to see your old castle? I have heard so much about the castle. Could we not even go there?"

"We might," said Una dubiously, "but you will have to walk across two fields, and the gra.s.s is long at this time of year. I don't mind getting wet, of course, but you----"

"I think, Estelle," said Lord Dunseveric, "that you had better give up the idea of any expedition out of doors. Una will have a good fire lighted for you in the morning-room, and you must make yourself as comfortable as you can."

When breakfast was over, Lord Dunseveric himself conducted his sister to the morning-room. He selected a chair for her. He placed a small table beside her. He stirred the fire into a fair blaze. He even fetched some books for her from the library. But the Comtesse was not content.

"Please sit down," she said, "and talk with me."

The prospect of a long morning spent sitting on a chair talking to a woman was not one which pleased Lord Dunseveric very greatly, but his manners were, as his sister-in-law had observed, excellent. He had letters to write and an important communication from the general in command of the troops in Belfast to consider. But he sat down beside his sister-in-law as if he were really pleased at having the chance of a long chat with her, as if she did him a favour in granting him the privilege of keeping her company.

"What shall we talk about?" she said. "About dear Marie? About old times? That would be too sad. About Maurice and Una? What is Maurice to do? Have you obtained for him--how do you say it?--a commission in the army? There is nothing better for a young man than to spend a short time in the army. He sees the world. He learns manners and how to bear himself and speak to a woman. And Una? We must have Una presented at Court. Will you take her to Dublin this year? I think that you ought to.

It is not good for a girl to grow up all alone here."

"I fear it will hardly be possible for me to go to Dublin either this year or next."

"But why? Surely you would be well received? Or is it not so? I suppose that you are one of the _grands seigneurs_ of Ireland, one of the leaders of your aristocracy. Besides, _mon frere_, your appearance, your manner----. There cannot be many of your Irish gentry----."

She paused and smiled on him most pleasantly. Lord Dunseveric was sufficiently a man of the world to understand that this pretty lady was flattering him. He even thought that she was not doing it very well, that her methods were too obvious to be really artistic. Nevertheless, he liked it. We most of us enjoy being flattered very much, especially by pretty women, though we take a great deal of trouble to persuade ourselves that we despise the flatterer and her ways. The Comtesse would have said similar things to any man whom she wanted to please, and Lord Dunseveric was quite aware of the fact. Still he was pleased. It was a long time since a woman in a pretty dress, a woman who knew how to a.s.sume a graceful att.i.tude, had taken the trouble to flatter him. He smiled response to her smile.

"I've no doubt that I should be, as you put it, well received. I'm not afraid that His Excellency would show me the cold shoulder, but the present condition of the country is critical. I think it my duty to stay at home. I am afraid that we are on the brink of an attempt at revolution."

"_Mon dieu!_ And have you Jacobins, too? I thought there were no such things in Ireland. Tell me about your Jacobins."

Again Lord Dunseveric was conscious that the Comtesse was trying to please him, was displaying an interest, which did not seem wholly natural, in a subject on which he would like to talk.

"I'm afraid, Estelle, that an account of our Irish politics would weary you. Politics are dull. You would send me away if I talked about politics."

"I a.s.sure you, no," she said. "In France we found politics most exciting. The poor Comte, my husband, found them altogether too exciting. Do tell me about your Irish Jacobins. Are they also _sans-culottes?_"

"They are mostly Presbyterians, dour, pigheaded, fanatical Republicans, who want to get an army of your French friends over to help them."

"Presbyterians! How droll! I thought Presbyterians were----But is not Maurice's friend, the young man who goes out fishing in the sea with Una, is not he a Presbyterian? I think they said last night that he was the son of a _cure_."

"Yes, he is. His father has the reputation of being one of the most fanatical of the whole lot. But the young fellow is all right, so far as I know."

The Comtesse was silent for a minute or two. She appeared to be considering Lord Dunseveric's last remark. When she spoke again it was evident that her thoughts had wandered from Neal Ward's politics to another subject.

"Is it right, do you think, that this young man should be so intimate with Una? She is a very attractive girl, and at a very dangerous age."