The O'Donoghue Part 30

"Oh! it's nothing," said Travers, lightly. "There's an old adage--'Snow should not scare a soldier.'"

"There's another proverb in the French service," said Kate, laughing, as she pointed to the blazing hearth--"'Le soldat ne tourne pas son dos au feu.'"

[Ill.u.s.tration: 199]

"I accept the augury," cried Frederick, laughing heartily at the witty misapplication of the phrase, and resumed his seat once more.

"Cousin Kate plays chess," said Herbert, in his anxiety to suggest a plausible pretext for delaying Frederick's departure.

"And I am pa.s.sionately fond of the game; would you favour me so far?"

"With pleasure," said she smiling; "I only ask one condition, 'point se grace'--no giving back--the O'Donoghues never take or give quarter--isn't that so, Mark? Oh! he's gone," and now for the first time it was remarked that he had left the apartment.

In a few moments after, they had drawn the little marquetrie table close to the fire, and were deeply interested in the game.

At first, each party played with a seeming attention, which certainly imposed on Herbert, who sat eagerly watching the progress of the game.

Frederick Travers was, however, far more occupied in observing his antagonist than in the disposition of his rooks and p.a.w.ns. While she, soon perceiving his inattention, half suspected that he did not deem her an enemy worth exerting his skill upon, and thus, partly in pique, she bestowed more watchfulness than at first.

"So, Mademoiselle," cried Travers at length, recurring to his game, "I perceive you have only permitted me to advance thus far, to cut off my retreat for ever. How am I to save myself now?"

"It's hard to say, Sir Captain. It's the old tactique of Celts and Saxons on both sides; you would advance into the heart of the enemy's country, and as, unhappily, the men in ivory are truer than the natives were here, and won't take bribes to fight against their fellows, you must e'en stand or fall by your own deservings."

"Come, then, the bold policy for ever. Check."

"And you lose your castle."

"And you your bishop!"

"We must avenge the church, sir. Take care of your queen."

"'Parbleu,' Mademoiselle, you are a fierce foe. What say you, if we draw the battle?"

"No, no, cousin Kate; continue, and you win it."

"Be it so. And now for my turn," said Travers, who was really a first-rate player, and at length began to feel interested in the result.

The move he made exhibited so much of skill, that Kate foresaw that the fortune of the day was about to change. She leaned her brow upon her hand, and deliberated long on the move; and at length, lifting her head, she said--

"I should like much to beat you--but in fair fight, remember--no courtesy nor favour."

"I can spare neither," said Travers, smiling.

"Then, defeat is no dishonour. There's my move."

"And mine," cried Fred, as rapidly.

"What prevents my taking you? I see nothing."

"Nor I either," said he, half chagrined, for his move was an oversight.

"You are too proud to ask quarter--of course, you are--or I should say, take it back."

"No, Kate, no," whispered Herbert, whose excitement was at the highest.

"I must abide my fortune," said Frederick, bowing; "and the more calmly, as I have won the game."

"Won the game! How?--where?"

"Check!"

"How tauntingly he says it now," said Kate, while her eyes sparkled brilliantly. "There is too much of the conqueror in all that."

Frederick's glance met hers at the instant, and her cheek coloured deeply.

Who knows the source of such emotions, or of how much pleasure and pain they are made up! "And yet, I have not won," said he, in a low voice.

"Then, be it a drawn battle," said Kate. "You can afford to be generous, and I can't bear being beaten--that's the truth of it."

"If I could but win!" muttered Travers, as he rose from the table; and whether she overheard the words, and that they conveyed more than a mere allusion to the game, she turned hastily away, and approached the window.

"Is that snow-ball your horse, Captain Travers?" said she, with a wicked smile.

"My father's favourite cob, by Jove!" exclaimed Frederick; and, as if suddenly aroused to the memory of his lengthy visit, made his 'adieus'

with more confusion than was exactly suitable to a fashionable Guardsman--and departed.

"I like him," said Herbert, as he looked out of the window after him.

"Don't you, cousin Kate?"

But cousin Kate did not reply.

CHAPTER XX. TEMPTATION IN A WEAK HOUR

When Mark O'Donoghue left the room, his pa.s.sion had become almost ungovernable--the entrance of his cousin Kate had but dammed up the current of his anger--and, during the few moments he still remained afterwards, his temper was fiercely tried by witnessing the courtesy of her manner to the stranger, and the apparent intimacy which subsisted between them. "I ought to have known it," was the expression he muttered over and over to himself--"I ought to have known it! That fellow's gay jacket and plumed hat are dearer to her woman's heart, than the rude devotion of such as I am. Curses be on them, they carry persecution through every thing--house, home, country, rank, wealth, station--ay, the very affection of our kindred they grudge us! Was slavery ever like this?" And with these bitter words, the offspring of bitterer thoughts, he strode down the causeway, and reached the high road. The snow was falling fast--a chilling north wind drove the thin flakes along--but he heeded it not. The fire of anger that burned within his bosom defied all sense of winter's cold; and with a throbbing brow, and fevered hand, he went, turning from time to time to look up at the old castle, whence he expected each moment to see Travers take his departure. Now he hurried eagerly onward, as if to reach some destined spot--now he would stop, and retrace his steps, irresolutely, as though half determined to return home.

"Degraded, insulted, outraged on the very hearth of my father's house!"

cried he, aloud, as he wrung his hands in agony, and gave his pa.s.sion vent. Again he pressed forward, and at last arrived at that part of the glen, where the road seems escarped between the two mountains, which rise several hundred feet, like walls, on either side. Here he paused, and after examining the spot for some seconds, he muttered to himself, "He has no choice here, but stand or turn!" and so saying, he drew from the breast of his coat two pistols, examined the priming of each, and then replaced them. The prospect of speedy revenge seemed to have calmed his vindictive spirit, for now he continued to walk backwards and forwards, at a slow pace, like a sentinel on his post, pausing occasionally to listen if a horse's hoofs could be heard upon the road, and then resuming his walk once more. A rustling sound in the brushwood above his head once startled him, but the granite cliffs that overhung the road prevented his seeing from what it proceeded, and his heart was now bent on a very different object than the pursuit of the deer. At that moment, the proudest of the herd might have grazed in safety, within pistol-shot of him, and he had not deigned to notice it. Thus pa.s.sed an hour--a second--and a third succeeded--and, already, the dull shadows of approaching night were falling--yet, no one came. Tortured with strange conjectures, Mark saw the day waning, and yet no sight nor sound of him he looked for. Let not poets speak of the ardent longing of a lover's heart, as in throbbing eagerness he waits for her, whose smile is life and hope, and heaven. Compared with the mad impatience of him who thirsts for vengeance, his pa.s.sion is but sluggish apathy. It is the bad, that ever calls forth the sternest energies of human nature. It is in crime, that men transcend the common attributes of mankind. Here was one, now, who would have given his right hand beneath the axe, for but one brief moment of vengeance, and have deemed years of suffering cheaply bought, for the mere presence of his enemy before him.

"He must have guessed my meaning when I left the room;" was the taunting expression he now uttered, as his unsated anger took the shape of an insolent depreciation of his adversary. "An Irishman would not need a broader hint!"

It grew darker--the mountains frowned heavily beneath the canopy of clouds, and night was rapidly approaching, when, from the gloom of his almost extinguished hope, Mark was suddenly aroused. He heard the tramp of a horse's feet; the dull reverberation on the deep snow filled the air, and sometimes they seemed to come from the opposite part of the glen, when the pace slackened, and, at last, the sounds became almost inaudible.

"There is yet enough of daylight, if we move into the broad road," was Mark's soliloquy, as he stooped his ear to listen--and at the instant, he beheld a man leading his horse by the bridle, while he himself seemed seeking along the road-side, where the snowdrift had not yet fallen, as if for some lost object. A glance, even by the imperfect light, and at some thirty paces off showed Mark it was not him he sought, and were it not that the att.i.tude attracted his curiosity, he had not wasted a second look on him; but the horseman by this time had halted, and was sc.r.a.ping with his whip-handle amid the pebbles of the mountain rivulet.

"I'll never see it again--it's no use!" was the exclamation of the seeker, as he gathered up his reins, and prepared to mount.