Lord Kilgobbin by Charles Lever (page 7)

look she gave him did not lessen his embarrassment.

‘Well, sir,’ asked she, ‘go on: is this another reminiscence?’

‘No, Miss Kearney; I was only thinking of asking you who this Mr. Walpole was.’

‘Mr. Cecil Walpole is a nephew or a something to the Lord-Lieutenant, whose private secretary he is. He is very clever, very amusing–sings, draws, rides, and laughs at the Irish to perfection. I hope you mean to like him.’

‘Do you?’

‘Of course, or I should not have bespoken your sympathy. My cousin used to like him, but somehow he has fallen out of favour with her.’

‘Was he absent some time?’ asked he, with a half-cunning manner.

‘Yes, I believe there was something of that in it. He was not here for a considerable time, and when we saw him again, we almost owned we were disappointed. Papa is calling me from the window, pray excuse me for a moment.’ She left him as she spoke, and ran rapidly back to the house, whence she returned almost immediately. ‘It was to ask you to stop and dine here, Mr. O’Shea,’ said she. ‘There will be ample time to send back to Miss O’Shea, and if you care to have your dinner-dress, they can send it.’

‘This is Mr. Kearney’s invitation?’ asked he.

‘Of course; papa is the master at Kilgobbin.’

‘But will Miss Kearney condescend to say that it is hers also.’

‘Certainly, though I’m not aware what solemnity the engagement gains by my co-operation.’

‘I accept at once, and if you allow me, I’ll go back and send a line to my aunt to say so.’

‘Don’t you remember Mr. O’Shea, Dick?’ asked she, as her brother lounged up, making his first appearance that day.

‘I’d never have known you,’ said he, surveying him from head to foot, without, however, any mark of cordiality in the recognition.

‘All find me a good deal changed!’ said the young fellow, drawing himself to his full height, and with an air that seemed to say–‘and none the worse for it.’

‘I used to fancy I was more than your match,’ rejoined Dick, smiling; ‘I suspect it’s a mistake I am little likely to incur again.’

‘Don’t, Dick, for he has got a very ugly way of ridding people of their illusions,’ said Kate, as she turned once more and walked rapidly towards the house.

CHAPTER XLI

TWO FAMILIAR EPISTLES

There were a number of bolder achievements Gorman O’Shea would have dared rather than write a note; nor were the cares of the composition the only difficulties of the undertaking. He knew of but one style of correspondence–the report to his commanding officer, and in this he was aided by a formula to be filled up. It was not, then, till after several efforts, he succeeded in the following familiar epistle:–

‘KILGOBBIN CASTLE.

‘DEAR AUNT,–Don’t blow up or make a rumpus, but if I had not taken the mare and come over here this morning, the rascally police with their search-warrant might have been down upon Mr. Kearney without a warning. They were all stiff and cold enough at first: they are nothing to brag of in the way of cordiality even yet–Dick especially–but they have asked me to stay and dine, and, I take it, it is the right thing to do. Send me over some things to dress with–and believe me your affectionate nephew,

‘G. O’SHEA.

‘I send the mare back, and shall walk home to-morrow morning.

‘There’s a great Castle swell here, a Mr. Walpole, but I have not made his acquaintance yet, and can tell nothing about him.’

* * * * *

Towards a late hour of the afternoon a messenger arrived with an ass-cart and several trunks from O’Shea’s Barn, and with the following note:–

‘DEAR NEPHEW GORMAN,–O’Shea’s Barn is not an inn, nor are the horses there at public livery. So much for your information. As you seem fond of “warnings,” let me give you one, which is, To mind your own affairs in preference to the interests of other people. The family at Kilgobbin are perfectly welcome–so far as I am concerned–to the fascinations of your society at dinner to-day, at breakfast to-morrow, and so on, with such regularity and order as the meals succeed. To which end, I have now sent you all the luggage belonging to you here.–I am, very respectfully, your aunt, ELIZABETH O’SHEA.’

The quaint, old-fashioned, rugged writing was marked throughout by a certain distinctness and accuracy that betoken care and attention–there was no evidence whatever of haste or passion–and this expression of a serious determination, duly weighed and resolved on, made itself very painfully felt by the young man as he read.

‘I am turned out–in plain words, turned out!’ said he aloud, as he sat with the letter spread out before him. ‘It must have been no common quarrel–not a mere coldness between the families–when she resents my coming here in this fashion.’ That innumerable differences could separate neighbours in Ireland, even persons with the same interests and the same religion, he well knew, and he solaced himself to think how he could get at the source of this disagreement, and what chance there might be of a reconciliation.

Of one thing he felt certain. Whether his aunt were right or wrong, whether tyrant or victim, he knew in his heart all the submission must come from the others. He had only to remember a few of the occasions in life in which he had to entreat his aunt’s forgiveness for the injustice she had herself inflicted, to anticipate what humble pie Mathew Kearney must partake of in order to conciliate Miss Betty’s favour.

‘Meanwhile,’ he thought, and not only thought, but said too–‘Meanwhile, I am on the world.’

Up to this, she had allowed him a small yearly income. Father Luke, whose judgment on all things relating to continental life was unimpeachable, had told her that anything like the reputation of being well off or connected with wealthy people would lead a young man into ruin in the Austrian service; that with a sum of 3000 francs per annum–about L120–he would be in possession of something like the double of his pay, or rather more, and that with this he would be enabled to have all the necessaries and many of the comforts of his station, and still not be a mark for that high play and reckless style of living that certain young Hungarians of family and large fortune affected; and so far the priest was correct, for the young Gorman was wasteful and extravagant from disposition, and his quarter’s allowance disappeared almost when it came. His money out, he fell back at once to the penurious habits of the poorest subaltern about him, and lived on his florin-and-half per diem till his resources came round again. He hoped–of course he hoped–that this momentary fit of temper would not extend to stopping his allowance.

‘She knows as well as any one,’ muttered he, ‘that though the baker’s son from Prague, or the Amtmann’s nephew from a Bavarian Dorf, may manage to “come through” with his pay, the young Englishman cannot. I can neither piece my own overalls, nor forswear stockings, nor can I persuade my stomach that it has had a full meal by tightening my girth-strap three or four holes.

‘I’d go down to the ranks to-morrow rather than live that life of struggle and contrivance that reduces a man to playing a dreary game with himself, by which, while he feels like a pauper, he has to fancy he felt like a gentleman. No, no, I’ll none of this. Scores of better men have served in the ranks. I’ll just change my regiment. By a lucky chance, I don’t know a man in the Walmoden Cuirassiers. I’ll join them, and nobody will ever be the wiser.’

There is a class of men who go through life building very small castles, and are no more discouraged by the frailty of the architecture than is a child with his toy-house. This was Gorman’s case; and now that he had found a solution of his difficulties in the Walmoden Cuirassiers, he really dressed for dinner in very tolerable spirits. ‘It’s droll enough,’ thought he, ‘to go down to dine amongst all these “swells,” and to think that the fellow behind my chair is better off than myself.’ The very uncertainty of his fate supplied excitement to his spirits, for it is amongst the privileges of the young that mere flurry can be pleasurable.

When Gorman reached the drawing-room, he found only one person. This was a young man in a shooting-coat, who, deep in the recess of a comfortable arm-chair, sat with the _Times_ at his feet, and to all appearance as if half dozing.

He looked around, however, as young O’Shea came forward, and said carelessly, ‘I suppose it’s time to go and dress–if I could.’

O’Shea making no reply, the other added, ‘That is, if I have not overslept dinner altogether.’

‘I hope not, sincerely,’ rejoined the other, ‘or I shall be a partner in the misfortune.’

‘Ah, you ‘re the Austrian,’ said Walpole, as he stuck his glass in his eye and surveyed him.

‘Yes; and you are the private secretary of the Governor.’

‘Only we don’t call him Governor. We say Viceroy here.’

‘With all my heart, Viceroy be it.’

There was a pause now–each, as it were, standing on his guard to resent any liberty of the other. At last Walpole said, ‘I don’t think you were in the house when that stupid stipendiary fellow called here this morning?’

‘No; I was strolling across the fields. He came with the police, I suppose?’

‘Yes, he came on the track of some Fenian leader–a droll thought enough anywhere out of Ireland, to search for a rebel under a magistrate’s roof; not but there was something still more Irish in the incident.’

‘How was that?’ asked O’Shea eagerly.

‘I chanced to be out walking with the ladies when the escort came, and as they failed to find the man they were after, they proceeded to make diligent search for his papers and letters. That taste for practical joking, that seems an instinct in this country, suggested to Mr. Kearney to direct the fellows to my room, and what do you think they have done? Carried off bodily all my baggage, and left me with nothing but the clothes I’m wearing!’

‘What a lark!’ cried O’Shea, laughing.

‘Yes, I take it that is the national way to look at these things; but that passion for absurdity and for ludicrous situations has not the same hold on us English.’

‘I know that. You are too well off to be droll.’

‘Not exactly that; but when we want to laugh we go to the Adelphi.’

‘Heaven help you if you have to pay people to make fun for you!’

Before Walpole could make rejoinder, the door opened to admit the ladies, closely followed by Mr. Kearney and Dick.

‘Not mine the fault if I disgrace your dinner-table by such a costume as this,’ cried Walpole.

‘I’d have given twenty pounds if they’d have carried off yourself as the rebel!’ said the old man, shaking with laughter. ‘But there’s the soup on the table. Take my niece, Mr. Walpole; Gorman, give your arm to my daughter. Dick and I will bring up the rear.’

CHAPTER XLII

AN EVENING IN THE DRAWING-ROOM

The fatalism of youth, unlike that of age, is all rose-coloured. That which is coming, and is decreed to come, cannot be very disagreeable. This is the theory of the young, and differs terribly from the experiences of after-life. Gorman O’Shea had gone to dinner with about as heavy a misfortune as could well befall him, so far as his future in life was concerned. All he looked forward to and hoped for was lost to him: the aunt who, for so many years, had stood to him in place of all family, had suddenly thrown him off, and declared that she would see him no more; the allowance she had hitherto given him withdrawn, it was impossible he could continue to hold his place in his regiment. Should he determine not to return, it was desertion–should he go back, it must be to declare that he was a ruined man, and could only serve in the ranks. These were the thoughts he revolved while he dressed for dinner, and dressed, let it be owned, with peculiar care; but when the task had been accomplished, and he descended to the drawing-room, such was the elasticity of his young temperament, every thought of coming evil was merged in the sense of present enjoyment, and the merry laughter which he overheard as he opened the door, obliterated all notion that life had anything before him except what was agreeable and pleasant.

‘We want to know if you play croquet, Mr. O’Shea?’ said Nina as he entered. ‘And we want also to know, are you a captain, or a Rittmeister, or a major? You can scarcely be a colonel.’

‘Your last guess I answer first. I am only a lieutenant, and even that very lately. As to croquet, if it be not your foreign mode of pronouncing cricket, I never even saw it.’

‘It is not my foreign mode of pronouncing cricket, Herr Lieutenant,’ said she pertly, ‘but I guessed already you had never heard of it.’

‘It is an out-of-door affair,’ said Dick indolently, ‘made for the diffusion of worked petticoats and Balmoral boots.’

‘I should say it is the game of billiards brought down to universal suffrage and the million,’ lisped out Walpole.

‘Faith,’ cried old Kearney, ‘I’d say it was just football with a stick.’

‘At all events,’ said Kate, ‘we purpose to have a grand match to-morrow. Mr. Walpole and I are against Nina and Dick, and we are to draw lots for you, Mr. O’Shea.’

‘My position, if I understand it aright, is not a flattering one,’ said he, laughing.

‘We’ll take him,’ cried Nina at once. ‘I’ll give him a private lesson in the morning, and I’ll answer for his performance. These creatures,’ added she, in a whisper, ‘are so drilled in Austria, you can teach them anything.’

Now, as the words were spoken O’Shea caught them, and drawing close to her, said, ‘I do hope I’ll justify that flattering opinion.’ But her only recognition was a look of half-defiant astonishment at his boldness.

A very noisy discussion now ensued as to whether croquet was worthy to be called a game or not, and what were its laws and rules–points which Gorman followed with due attention, but very little profit; all Kate’s good sense and clearness being cruelly dashed by Nina’s ingenious interruptions and Walpole’s attempts to be smart and witty, even where opportunity scarcely offered the chance.

‘Next to looking on at the game,’ cried old Kearney at last, ‘the most tiresome thing I know of is to hear it talked over. Come, Nina, and give me a song.’

‘What shall it be, uncle?’ said she, as she opened the piano.

‘Something Irish, I’d say, if I were to choose for myself. We’ve plenty of old tunes, Mr. Walpole,’ said Kearney, turning to that gentleman, ‘that rebellion, as you call it, has never got hold of. There’s _”Cushla Macree”_ and the _”Cailan deas cruidhte na Mbo.”_’

‘Very like hard swearing that,’ said Walpole to Nina; but his simper and his soft accent were only met by a cold blank look, as though she had not understood his liberty in addressing her. Indeed, in her distant manner, and even repelling coldness, there was what might have disconcerted any composure less consummate than his own. It was, however, evidently Walpole’s aim to assume that she felt her relation towards him, and not altogether without some cause; while she, on her part, desired to repel the insinuation by a show of utter indifference. She would willingly, in this contingency, have encouraged her cousin, Dick Kearney, and even led him on to little displays of attention; but Dick held aloof, as though not knowing the meaning of this favourable turn towards him. He would not be cheated by coquetry. How many men are of this temper, and who never understand that it is by surrendering ourselves to numberless little voluntary deceptions of this sort, we arrive at intimacies the most real and most truthful.

She next tried Gorman, and here her success was complete. All those womanly prettinesses, which are so many modes of displaying graceful attraction of voice, look, gesture, or attitude, were especially dear to him. Not only they gave beauty its chief charm, but they constituted a sort of game, whose address was quickness of eye, readiness of perception, prompt reply, and that refined tact that can follow out one thought in a conversation just as you follow a melody through a mass of variations.

Perhaps the young soldier did not yield himself the less readily to these captivations that Kate Kearney’s manner towards him was studiously cold and ceremonious.

‘The other girl is more like the old friend,’ muttered he, as he chatted on with her about Rome, and Florence, and Venice, imperceptibly gliding into the language which the names of places suggested.

‘If any had told me that I ever could have talked thus freely and openly with an Austrian soldier, I’d not have believed him,’ said she at length, ‘for all my sympathies in Italy were with the National party.’

[Illustration: He knelt down on one knee before her]

‘But we were not the “Barbari” in your recollection, mademoiselle,’ said he. ‘We were out of Italy before you could have any feeling for either party.’

‘The tradition of all your cruelties has survived you, and I am sure, if you were wearing your white coat still, I’d hate you.’

‘You are giving me another reason to ask for a longer leave of absence,’ said he, bowing courteously.

‘And this leave of yours–how long does it last?’

‘I am afraid to own to myself. Wednesday fortnight is the end of it; that is, it gives me four days after that to reach Vienna.’

‘And presenting yourself in humble guise before your colonel, to say, “_Ich melde mich gehorsamst_.”‘

‘Not exactly that–but something like it.’

‘I’ll be the Herr Oberst Lieutenant,’ said she, laughing; ‘so come forward now and clap your heels together, and let us hear how you utter your few syllables in true abject fashion. I’ll sit here, and receive you.’ As she spoke, she threw herself into an arm-chair, and assuming a look of intense hauteur and defiance, affected to stroke an imaginary moustache with one hand, while with the other she waved a haughty gesture of welcome.

‘I have outstayed my leave,’ muttered Gorman, in a tremulous tone. ‘I hope my colonel, with that bland mercy which characterises him, will forgive my fault, and let me ask his pardon.’ And with this, he knelt down on one knee before her, and kissed her hand.

‘What liberties are these, sir?’ cried she, so angrily, that it was not easy to say whether the anger was not real.

‘It is the latest rule introduced into our service,’ said he, with mock humility.

‘Is that a comedy they are acting yonder,’ said Walpole, ‘or is it a proverb?’

‘Whatever the drama,’ replied Kate coldly, ‘I don’t think they want a public.’

‘You may go back to your duty, Herr Lieutenant,’ said Nina proudly, and with a significant glance towards Kate. ‘Indeed, I suspect you have been rather neglecting it of late.’ And with this she sailed majestically away towards the end of the room.

‘I wish I could provoke even that much of jealousy from the other,’ muttered Gorman to himself, as he bit his lip in passion. And certainly, if a look and manner of calm unconcern meant anything, there was little that seemed less likely.

‘I am glad you are going to the piano, Nina,’ said Kate. ‘Mr. Walpole has been asking me by what artifice you could be induced to sing something of Mendelssohn.’

‘I am going to sing an Irish ballad for that Austrian patriot, who, like his national poet, thinks “Ireland a beautiful country to live out of.”‘ Though a haughty toss of her head accompanied these words, there was a glance in her eye towards Gorman that plainly invited a renewal of their half-flirting hostilities.

‘When I left it, _you_ had not been here,’ said he, with an obsequious tone, and an air of deference only too marked in its courtesy.

A slight, very faint blush on her cheek showed that she rather resented than accepted the flattery, but she appeared to be occupied in looking through the music-books, and made no rejoinder.

‘We want Mendelssohn, Nina,’ said Kate.

‘Or at least Spohr,’ added Walpole.

‘I never accept dictation about what I sing,’ muttered Nina, only loud enough to be overheard by Gorman. ‘People don’t tell you what theme you are to talk on; they don’t presume to say, “Be serious or be witty.” They don’t tell you to come to the aid of their sluggish natures by passion, or to dispel their dreariness by flights of fancy; and why are they to dare all this to _us_ who speak through song?’

‘Just because you alone can do these things,’ said Gorman, in the same low voice as she had spoken in.

‘Can I help you in your search, dearest?’ said Kate, coming over to the piano.

‘Might I hope to be of use?’ asked Walpole.

‘Mr. O’Shea wants me to sing something for _him_,’ said Nina coldly. ‘What is it to be?’ asked she of Gorman. With the readiness of one who could respond to any sudden call upon his tact, Gorman at once took up a piece of music from the mass before him, and said, ‘Here is what I have been searching for.’ It was a little Neapolitan ballad, of no peculiar beauty, but one of those simple melodies in which the rapid transition from deep feeling to a wild, almost reckless, gaiety imparts all the character.

‘Yes, I’ll sing that,’ said Nina; and almost in the same breath the notes came floating through the air, slow and sad at first, as though labouring under some heavy sorrow; the very syllables faltered on her lips like a grief struggling for utterance–when, just as a thrilling cadence died slowly away, she burst forth into the wildest and merriest strain, something so impetuous in gaiety, that the singer seemed to lose all control of expression, and floated away in sound with every caprice of enraptured imagination. When in the very whirlwind of this impetuous gladness, as though a memory of a terrible sorrow had suddenly crossed her, she ceased; then, in tones of actual agony, her voice rose to a cry of such utter misery as despair alone could utter. The sounds died slowly away as though lingeringly. Two bold chords followed, and she was silent.

None spoke in the room. Was this real passion, or was it the mere exhibition of an accomplished artist, who could call up expression at will, as easily as a painter could heighten colour? Kate Kearney evidently believed the former, as her heaving chest and her tremulous lip betrayed, while the cold, simpering smile on Walpole’s face, and the ‘brava, bravissima’ in which he broke the silence, vouched how he had interpreted that show of emotion.

‘If that is singing, I wonder what is crying,’ cried old Kearney, while he wiped his eyes, very angry at his own weakness.’ And now will any one tell me what it was all about?’

‘A young girl, sir,’ replied Gorman, ‘who, by a great effort, has rallied herself to dispel her sorrow and be merry, suddenly remembers that her sweetheart may not love her, and the more she dwells on the thought, the more firmly she believes it. That was the cry, “He never loved me,” that went to all our hearts.’

‘Faith, then, if Nina has to say that,’ said the old man, ‘Heaven help the others.’

‘Indeed, uncle, you are more gallant than all these young gentlemen,’ said Nina, rising and approaching him.

‘Why they are not all at your feet this moment is more than I can tell. They’re always telling me the world is changed, and I begin to see it now.’

‘I suspect, sir, it’s pretty much what it used to be,’ lisped out Walpole. ‘We are only less demonstrative than our fathers.’

‘Just as I am less extravagant than mine,’ cried Kilgobbin, ‘because I have not got it to spend.’

‘I hope Mademoiselle Nina judges us more mercifully,’ said Walpole.

‘Is that song a favourite of yours?’ asked she of Gorman, without noticing Walpole’s remark in any way.

‘No,’ said he bluntly; ‘it makes me feel like a fool, and, I am afraid, look like one too, when I hear it.’

‘I’m glad there’s even that much blood in you,’ cried old Kearney, who had caught the words. ‘Oh dear! oh dear! England need never be afraid of the young generation.’

‘That seems to be a very painful thought to you, sir,’ said Walpole.

‘And so it is,’ replied he. ‘The lower we bend, the more you’ll lay on us. It was your language, and what you call your civilisation, broke us down first, and the little spirit that fought against either is fast dying out of us.’

‘Do you want Mr. Walpole to become a Fenian, papa?’ asked Kate.

‘You see, they took him for one to-day,’ broke in Dick, ‘when they came and carried off all his luggage.’

‘By the way,’ interposed Walpole, ‘we must take care that that stupid blunder does not get into the local papers, or we shall have it circulated by the London press.’

‘I have already thought of that,’ said Dick, ‘and I shall go into Moate to-morrow and see about it.’

‘Does that mean to say that you desert croquet?’ said Nina imperiously.

‘You have got Lieutenant O’Shea in my place, and a better player than me already.’

‘I fear I must take my leave to-morrow,’ said Gorman, with a touch of real sorrow, for in secret he knew not whither he was going.

‘Would your aunt not spare you to us for a few days?’ said the old man. ‘I am in no favour with her just now, but she would scarcely refuse what we would all deem a great favour.’

‘My aunt would not think the sacrifice too much for her,’ said Gorman, trying to laugh at the conceit.

‘You shall stay,’ murmured Nina, in a tone only audible to him; and by a slight bow he acknowledged the words as a command.

‘I believe my best way,’ said Gorman gaily, ‘will be to outstay my leave, and take my punishment, whatever it be, when I go back again.’

‘That is military morality,’ said Walpole, in a half-whisper to Kate, but to be overheard by Nina. ‘We poor civilians don’t understand how to keep a debtor and creditor account with conscience.’

‘Could you manage to provoke that man to quarrel with you?’ said Nina secretly to Gorman, while her eyes glanced towards Walpole.

‘I think I might; but what then? _He_ wouldn’t fight, and the rest of England would shun me.’

‘That is true,’ said she slowly. ‘When any is injured here, he tries to make money out of it. I don’t suppose you want money?’

‘Not earned in that fashion, certainly. But I think they are saying good-night.’

‘They’re always boasting about the man that found out the safety-lamp,’ said old Kearney, as he moved away; ‘but give me the fellow that invented a flat candlestick!’

CHAPTER XLIII

SOME NIGHT-THOUGHTS

When Gorman reached his room, into which a rich flood of moonlight was streaming, he extinguished his candle, and, seating himself at the open window, lighted his cigar, seriously believing he was going to reflect on his present condition, and forecast something of the future. Though he had spoken so cavalierly of outstaying his time, and accepting arrest afterwards, the jest was by no means so palatable now that he was alone, and could own to himself that the leave he possessed was the unlimited liberty to be houseless and a vagabond, to have none to claim, no roof to shelter him.

His aunt’s law-agent, the same Mr. McKeown who acted for Lord Kilgobbin, had once told Gorman that all the King’s County property of the O’Sheas was entailed upon him, and that his aunt had no power to alienate it. It is true the old lady disputed this position, and so strongly resented even allusion to it, that, for the sake of inheriting that twelve thousand pounds she possessed in Dutch stock, McKeown warned Gorman to avoid anything that might imply his being aware of this fact.

Whether a general distrust of all legal people and their assertions was the reason, or whether mere abstention from the topic had impaired the force of its truth, or whether–more likely than either–he would not suffer himself to question the intentions of one to whom he owed so much, certain is it young O’Shea almost felt as much averse to the belief as the old lady herself, and resented the thought of its being true, as of something that would detract from the spirit of the affection she had always borne him, and that he repaid by a love as faithful.

‘No, no. Confound it!’ he would say to himself. ‘Aunt Betty loves me, and money has no share in the affection I bear her. If she knew I must be her heir, she’d say so frankly and freely. She’d scorn the notion of doling out to me as benevolence what one day would be my own by right. She is proud and intolerant enough, but she is seldom unjust–never so willingly and consciously. If, then, she has not said O’Shea’s Barn must be mine some time, it is because she knows well it cannot be true. Besides, this very last step of hers, this haughty dismissal of me from her house, implies the possession of a power which she would not dare to exercise if she were but a life-tenant of the property. Last of all, had she speculated ever so remotely on my being the proprietor of Irish landed property, it was most unlikely she would so strenuously have encouraged me to pursue my career as an Austrian soldier, and turn all my thoughts to my prospects under the Empire.’

In fact, she never lost the opportunity of reminding him how unfit he was to live in Ireland or amongst Irishmen.

Such reflections as I have briefly hinted at here took him some time to arrive at, for his thoughts did not come freely, or rapidly make place for others. The sum of them, however, was that he was thrown upon the world, and just at the very threshold of life, and when it held out its more alluring prospects.

There is something peculiarly galling to the man who is wincing under the pang of poverty to find that the world regards him as rich and well off, and totally beyond the accidents of fortune. It is not simply that he feels how his every action will be misinterpreted and mistaken, and a spirit of thrift, if not actual shabbiness, ascribed to all that he does, but he also regards himself as a sort of imposition or sham, who has gained access to a place he has no right to occupy, and to associate on terms of equality with men of tastes and habits and ambitions totally above his own. It was in this spirit he remembered Nina’s chance expression, ‘I don’t suppose _you_ want money!’ There could be no other meaning in the phrase than some foregone conclusion about his being a man of fortune. Of course she acquired this notion from those around her. As a stranger to Ireland, all she knew, or thought she knew, had been conveyed by others. ‘I don’t suppose _you_ want money’ was another way of saying, ‘You are your aunt’s heir. You are the future owner of the O’Shea estates. No vast property, it is true; but quite enough to maintain the position of a gentleman.’

‘Who knows how much of this Lord Kilgobbin or his son Dick believed?’ thought he. ‘But certainly my old playfellow Kate has no faith in the matter, or if she have, it has little weight with her in her estimate of me.

‘It was in this very room I was lodged something like five years ago. It was at this very window I used to sit at night, weaving Heaven knows what dreams of a future. I was very much in love in those days, and a very honest and loyal love it was. I wanted to be very great, and very gallant, and distinguished, and above all, very rich; but only for _her_, only that _she_ might be surrounded with every taste and luxury that became her, and that she should share them with me. I knew well she was better than me–better in every way: not only purer, and simpler, and more gentle, but more patient, more enduring, more tenacious of what was true, and more decidedly the enemy of what was merely expedient. Then, was she not proud? not with the pride of birth or station, or of an old name and a time-honoured house, but proud that whatever she did or said amongst the tenantry or the neighbours, none ever ventured to question or even qualify the intention that suggested it. The utter impossibility of ascribing a double motive to her, or of imagining any object in what she counselled but the avowed one, gave her a pride that accompanied her through every hour of life.

‘Last of all, she believed in _me_–believed I was going to be one day something very famous and distinguished: a gallant soldier, whose very presence gave courage to the men who followed him, and with a name repeated in honour over Europe. The day was too short for these fancies, for they grew actually as we fed them, and the wildest flight of imagination led us on to the end of the time when there would be but one hope, one ambition, and one heart between us.

‘I am convinced that had any one at that time hinted to her that I was to inherit the O’Shea estates, he would have dealt a most dangerous blow to her affection for me. The romance of that unknown future had a great share in our compact. And then we were so serious about it all–the very gravity it impressed being an ecstasy to our young hearts in the thought of self-importance and responsibility. Nor were we without our little tiffs–those lovers’ quarrels that reveal what a terrible civil war can rage within the heart that rebels against itself. I know the very spot where we quarrelled; I could point to the miles of way we walked side by side without a word; and oh! was it not on that very bed I have passed the night sobbing till I thought my heart would break, all because I had not fallen at her feet and begged her forgiveness ere we parted? Not that she was without her self-accusings too; for I remember one way in which she expressed sorrow for having done me wrong was to send me a shower of rose-leaves from her little terraced garden; and as they fell in shoals across my window, what a balm and bliss they shed over my heart! Would I not give every hope I have to bring it all back again? to live it over once more–to lie at her feet in the grass, affecting to read to her, but really watching her long black lashes as they rested on her cheek, or that quivering lip as it trembled with emotion. How I used to detest that work which employed the blue-veined hand I loved to hold within my own, kissing it at every pause in the reading, or whenever I could pretext a reason to question her! And now, here I am in the self-same place, amidst the same scenes and objects. Nothing changed but _herself_! She, however, will remember nothing of the past, or if she does, it is with repugnance and regret; her manner to me is a sort of cold defiance, not to dare to revive our old intimacy, nor to fancy that I can take up our acquaintanceship from the past. I almost fancied she looked resentfully at the Greek girl for the freedom to which she admitted me–not but there was in the other’s coquetry the very stamp of that levity other women are so ready to take offence at; in fact, it constitutes amongst women exactly the same sort of outrage, the same breach of honour and loyalty, as cheating at play does amongst men, and the offenders are as much socially outlawed in one case as in the other. I wonder, am I what is called falling in love with the Greek–that is, I wonder, have the charms of her astonishing beauty and the grace of her manner, and the thousand seductions of her voice, her gestures, and her walk, above all, so captivated me that I do not want to go back on the past, and may hope soon to repay Miss Kate Kearney by an indifference the equal of her own? I don’t think so. Indeed, I feel that even when Nina was interesting me most, I was stealing secret glances towards Kate, and cursing that fellow Walpole for the way he was engaging her attention. Little the Greek suspected, when she asked if “I could not fix a quarrel on him,” with what a motive it was that my heart jumped at the suggestion! He is so studiously ceremonious and distant with me; he seems to think I am not one of those to be admitted to closer intimacy. I know that English theory of “the unsafe man,” by which people of unquestionable courage avoid contact with all schooled to other ways and habits than their own. I hate it. “I am unsafe,” to his thinking. Well, if having no reason to care for safety be sufficient, he is not far wrong. Dick Kearney, too, is not very cordial. He scarcely seconded his father’s invitation to me, and what he did say was merely what courtesy obliged. So that in reality, though the old lord was hearty and good-natured, I believe I am here now because Mademoiselle Nina commanded me, rather than from any other reason. If this be true, it is, to say the least, a sorry compliment to my sense of delicacy. Her words were, “You shall stay,” and it is upon this I am staying.’

As though the air of the room grew more hard to breathe with this thought before him, he arose and leaned half-way out of the window.

As he did so, his ear caught the sound of voices. It was Kate and Nina, who were talking on the terrace above his head.

‘I declare, Nina,’ said Kate, ‘you have stripped every leaf off my poor ivy-geranium; there’s nothing left of it but bare branches.’

‘There goes the last handful,’ said the other, as she threw them over the parapet, some falling on Gorman as he leaned out. ‘It was a bad habit I learned from yourself, child. I remember when I came here, you used to do this each night, like a religious rite.’

‘I suppose they were the dried or withered leaves that I threw away,’ said Kate, with a half-irritation in her voice.

‘No, they were not. They were oftentimes from your prettiest roses, and as I watched you, I saw it was in no distraction or inadvertence you were doing this, for you were generally silent and thoughtful some time before, and there was even an air of sadness about you, as though a painful thought was bringing its gloomy memories.’

‘What an object of interest I have been to you without suspecting it,’ said Kate coldly.

‘It is true,’ said the other, in the same tone; ‘they who make few confidences suggest much ingenuity. If you had a meaning in this act and told me what it was, it is more than likely I had forgotten all about it ere now. You preferred secrecy, and you made me curious.’

‘There was nothing to reward curiosity,’ said she, in the same measured tone; then, after a moment, she added, ‘I’m sure I never sought to ascribe some hidden motive to _you_. When _you_ left my plants leafless, I was quite content to believe that you were mischievous without knowing it.’

‘I read you differently,’ said Nina. ‘When _you_ do mischief you mean mischief. Now I became so–so–what shall I call it, _intriguee_ about this little “fetish” of yours, that I remember well the night you first left off and never resumed it.’

‘And when was that?’ asked Kate carelessly.

‘On a certain Friday, the night Miss O’Shea dined here last; was it not a Friday?’

‘Fridays, we fancy, are unlucky days,’ said Kate, in a voice of easy indifference.

‘I wonder which are the lucky ones?’ said Nina, sighing. ‘They are certainly not put down in the Irish almanac. By the way, is not this a Friday?’

‘Mr. O’Shea will not call it amongst his unlucky days,’ said Kate laughingly.

‘I almost think I like your Austrian,’ said the other.

‘Only don’t call him _my_ Austrian.’

‘Well, he was yours till you threw him off. No, don’t be angry: I am only talking in that careless slang we all use when we mean nothing, just as people employ counters instead of money at cards; but I like him: he has that easy flippancy in talk that asks for no effort to follow, and he says his little nothings nicely, and he is not too eager as to great ones, or too energetic, which you all are here. I like him.’

‘I fancied you liked the eager and enthusiastic people, and that you felt a warm interest in Donogan’s fate.’

‘Yes, I do hope they’ll not catch him. It would be too horrid to think of any one we had known being hanged! And then, poor fellow, he was very much in love.’

‘Poor fellow!’ sighed out Kate.

‘Not but it was the only gleam of sunlight in his existence; he could go away and fancy that, with Heaven knows what chances of fortune, he might have won me.’

‘Poor fellow!’ cried Kate, more sorrowfully than before.

‘No, far from it, but very “happy fellow” if he could feed his heart with such a delusion.’

‘And you think it fair to let him have this delusion?’

‘Of course I do. I’d no more rob him of it than I’d snatch a life-buoy from a drowning man. Do you fancy, child, that the swimmer will always go about with the corks that have saved his life?’

‘These mock analogies are sorry arguments,’ said Kate.

‘Tell me, does your Austrian sing? I see he understands music, but I hope he can sing.’

‘I can tell you next to nothing of my Austrian–if he must be called so. It is five years since we met, and all I know is how little like he seems to what he once was.’

‘I’m sure he is vastly improved: a hundred times better mannered; with more ease, more quickness, and more readiness in conversation. I like him.’

‘I trust he’ll find out his great good-fortune–that is, if it be not a delusion.’

For a few seconds there was a silence–a silence so complete that Gorman could hear the rustle of a dress as Nina moved from her place, and seated herself on the battlement of the terrace. He then could catch the low murmuring sounds of her voice, as she hummed an air to herself, and at length traced it to be the song she had sung that same evening in the drawing-room. The notes came gradually more and more distinct, the tones swelled out into greater fulness, and at last, with one long-sustained cadence of thrilling passion, she cried, ‘_Non mi amava–non mi amava!_’ with an expression of heart-breaking sorrow, the last syllables seeming to linger on the lips as if a hope was deserting them for ever. ‘_Oh, non mi amava!_’ cried she, and her voice trembled as though the avowal of her despair was the last effort of her strength. Slowly and faintly the sounds died away, while Gorman, leaning out to the utmost to catch the dying notes, strained his hearing to drink them in. All was still, and then suddenly, with a wild roulade that sounded at first like the passage of a musical scale, she burst out into a fit of laughter, crying ‘_Non mi amava,_’ through the sounds, in a half-frantic mockery. ‘_No, no, non mi amava,_’ laughed she out, as she walked back into the room. The window was now closed with a heavy bang, and all was silent in the house.

‘And these are the affections we break our hearts for!’ cried Gorman, as he threw himself on his bed, and covered his face with both his hands.

CHAPTER XLIV

THE HEAD CONSTABLE

The Inspector, or, to use the irreverent designation of the neighbourhood, the Head Peeler, who had carried away Walpole’s luggage and papers, no sooner discovered the grave mistake he had committed, than he hastened to restore them, and was waiting personally at Kilgobbin Castle to apologise for the blunder, long before any of the family had come downstairs. His indiscretion might cost him his place, and Captain Curtis, who had to maintain a wife and family, three saddle-horses, and a green uniform with more gold on it than a field-marshal’s, felt duly anxious and uneasy for what he had done.

‘Who is that gone down the road?’ asked he, as he stood at the window, while a woman was setting the room in order.

‘Sure it’s Miss Kate taking the dogs out. Isn’t she always the first up of a morning?’ Though the captain had little personal acquaintance with Miss Kearney, he knew her well by reputation, and knew therefore that he might safely approach her to ask a favour. He overtook her at once, and in a few words made known the difficulty in which he found himself.

‘Is it not after all a mere passing mistake, which once apologised for is forgotten altogether?’ asked she. ‘Mr. Walpole is surely not a person to bear any malice for such an incident?’

‘I don’t know that, Miss Kearney,’ said he doubtingly. ‘His papers have been thoroughly ransacked, and old Mr. Flood, the Tory magistrate, has taken copies of several letters and documents, all of course under the impression that they formed part of a treasonable correspondence.’

‘Was it not very evident that the papers could not have belonged to a Fenian leader? Was not any mistake in the matter easily avoided?’

[Illustration: Nina came forward at that moment]

‘Not at once, because there was first of all a sort of account of the insurrectionary movement here, with a number of queries, such as, “Who is M—-?” “Are F. Y—- and McCausland the same person?” “What connection exists between the Meath outrages and the late events in Tipperary?” “How is B—- to explain his conduct sufficiently to be retained in the Commission of the Peace?” In a word, Miss Kearney, all the troublesome details by which a Ministry have to keep their own supporters in decent order, are here hinted at, if not more, and it lies with a batch of red-hot Tories to make a terrible scandal out of this affair.’

‘It is graver than I suspected,’ said she thoughtfully.

‘And I may lose my place,’ muttered Curtis, ‘unless, indeed, you would condescend to say a word for me to Mr. Walpole.’

‘Willingly, if it were of any use, but I think my cousin, Mademoiselle Kostalergi, would be likelier of success, and here she comes.’

Nina came forward at that moment, with that indolent grace of movement with which she swept the greensward of the lawn as though it were the carpet of a saloon. With a brief introduction of Mr. Curtis, her cousin Kate, in a few words, conveyed the embarrassment of his present position, and his hope that a kindly intercession might avert his danger.

‘What droll people you must be not to find out that the letters of a Viceroy’s secretary could not be the correspondence of a rebel leader,’ said Nina superciliously.

‘I have already told Miss Kearney how that fell out,’ said he; ‘and I assure you there was enough in those papers to mystify better and clearer heads.’

‘But you read the addresses, and saw how the letters began, “My dear Mr. Walpole,” or “Dear Walpole”?’

‘And thought they had been purloined. Have I not found “Dear Clarendon” often enough in the same packet with cross-bones and a coffin.’

‘What a country!’ said Nina, with a sigh.

‘Very like Greece, I suppose,’ said Kate tartly; then, suddenly, ‘Will you undertake to make this gentleman’s peace with Mr. Walpole, and show how the whole was a piece of ill-directed zeal?’

‘Indiscreet zeal.’

‘Well, indiscreet, if you like it better.’

‘And you fancied, then, that all the fine linen and purple you carried away were the properties of a head-centre?’

‘We thought so.’

‘And the silver objects of the dressing-table, and the ivory inlaid with gold, and the trifles studded with turquoise?’

‘They might have been Donogan’s. Do you know, mademoiselle, that this same Donogan was a man of fortune, and in all the society of the first men at Oxford when–a mere boy at the time–he became a rebel?’

‘How nice of him! What a fine fellow!’

‘I’d say what a fool!’ continued Curtis. ‘He had no need to risk his neck to achieve a station, the thing was done for him. He had a good house and a good estate in Kilkenny; I have caught salmon in the river that washes the foot of his lawn.’

‘And what has become of it; does he still own it?’

‘Not an acre–not a rood of it; sold every square yard of it to throw the money into the Fenian treasury. Rifled artillery, Colt’s revolvers, Remington’s, and Parrot guns have walked off with the broad acres.’

‘Fine fellow–a fine fellow!’ cried Nina enthusiastically.

‘That fine fellow has done a deal of mischief,’ said Kate thoughtfully.

‘He has escaped, has he not?’ asked Nina.

‘We hope not–that is, we know that he is about to sail for St. John’s by a clipper now in Belfast, and we shall have a fast steam-corvette ready to catch her in the Channel. He’ll be under Yankee colours, it is true, and claim an American citizenship; but we must run risks sometimes, and this is one of those times.’

‘But you know where he is now? Why not apprehend him on shore?’

‘The very thing we do not know, mademoiselle. I’d rather be sure of it than have five thousand pounds in my hand. Some say he is here, in the neighbourhood; some that he is gone south; others declare that he has reached Liverpool. All we really do know is about the ship that he means to sail in, and on which the second mate has informed us.’

‘And all your boasted activity is at fault,’ said she insolently, ‘when you have to own you cannot track him.’

‘Nor is it so easy, mademoiselle, where a whole population befriend and feel for him.’

‘And if they do, with what face can you persecute what has the entire sympathy of a nation?’

‘Don’t provoke answers which are sure not to satisfy you, and which you could but half comprehend; but tell Mr. Curtis you will use your influence to make Mr. Walpole forget this mishap.’

‘But I do want to go to the bottom of this question. I will insist on learning why people rebel here.’

‘In that case, I’ll go home to breakfast, and I’ll be quite satisfied if I see you at luncheon,’ said Kate.

‘Do, pray, Mr. Curtis, tell me all about it. Why do some people shoot the others who are just as much Irish as themselves? Why do hungry people kill the cattle and never eat them? And why don’t the English go away and leave a country where nobody likes them? If there be a reason for these things, let me hear it.’

‘Bye-bye,’ said Kate, waving her hand, as she turned away.

‘You are so ungenerous,’ cried Nina, hurrying after her; ‘I am a stranger, and would naturally like to learn all that I could of the country and the people; here is a gentleman full of the very knowledge I am seeking. He knows all about these terrible Fenians. What will they do with Donogan if they take him?’

‘Transport him for life; they’ll not hang him, I think.’

‘That’s worse than hanging. I mean–that is–Miss Kearney would rather they’d hang him.’

‘I have not said so,’ replied Kate, ‘and I don’t suspect I think so, either.’

‘Well,’ said Nina, after a pause, ‘let us go back to breakfast. You’ll see Mr. Walpole–he’s sure to be down by that time; and I’ll tell him what you wish is, that he must not think any more of the incident; that it was a piece of official stupidity, done, of course, out of the best motives; and that if he should cut a ridiculous figure at the end, he has only himself to blame for the worse than ambiguity of his private papers.’

‘I do not know that I ‘d exactly say that,’ said Kate, who felt some difficulty in not laughing at the horror-struck expression of Mr. Curtis’s face.

‘Well, then, I’ll say–this was what I wished to tell you, but my cousin Kate interposed and suggested that a little adroit flattery of you, and some small coquetries that might make you believe you were charming, would be the readiest mode to make you forget anything disagreeable, and she would charge herself with the task.’

‘Do so,’ said Kate calmly; ‘and let us now go back to breakfast.’

CHAPTER XLV

SOME IRISHRIES

That which the English irreverently call ‘chaff’ enters largely as an element into Irish life; and when Walpole stigmatised the habit to Joe Atlee as essentially that of the smaller island, he was not far wrong. I will not say that it is a high order of wit–very elegant, or very refined; but it is a strong incentive to good-humour–a vent to good spirits; and being a weapon which every Irishman can wield in some fashion or other, establishes that sort of joust which prevailed in the melee tournaments, and where each tilted with whom he pleased.

Any one who has witnessed the progress of an Irish trial, even when the crime was of the very gravest, cannot fail to have been struck by the continual clash of smart remark and smarter rejoinder between the Bench and the Bar; showing how men feel the necessity of ready-wittedness, and a promptitude to repel attack, in which even the prisoner in the dock takes his share, and cuts his joke at the most critical moment of his existence.

The Irish theatre always exhibits traits of this national taste; but a dinner-party, with its due infusion of barristers, is the best possible exemplification of this give and take, which, even if it had no higher merit, is a powerful ally of good-humour, and the sworn foe to everything like over-irritability or morbid self-esteem. Indeed, I could not wish a very conceited man, of a somewhat grave temperament and distant demeanour, a much heavier punishment than a course of Irish dinner-parties; for even though he should come out scathless himself, the outrages to his sense of propriety, and the insults to his ideas of taste, would be a severe suffering.

That breakfast-table at Kilgobbin had some heavy hearts around the board. There was not, with the exception of Walpole, one there who had not, in the doubts that beset his future, grave cause for anxiety; and yet to look at, still more to listen to them, you would have said that Walpole alone had any load of care upon his heart, and that the others were a light-hearted, happy set of people, with whom the world went always well. No cloud!–not even a shadow to darken the road before them. Of this levity, for I suppose I must give it a hard name–the source of much that is best and worst amongst us–our English rulers take no account, and are often as ready to charge us with a conviction, which was no more than a caprice, as they are to nail us down to some determination, which was simply a drollery; and until some intelligent traveller does for us what I lately perceived a clever tourist did for the Japanese, in explaining their modes of thought, impulses, and passions to the English, I despair of our being better known in Downing Street than we now are.

Captain Curtis–for it is right to give him his rank–was fearfully nervous and uneasy, and though he tried to eat his breakfast with an air of unconcern and carelessness, he broke his egg with a tremulous hand, and listened with painful eagerness every time Walpole spoke.

‘I wish somebody would send us the _Standard_; when it is known that the Lord-Lieutenant’s secretary has turned Fenian,’ said Kilgobbin, ‘won’t there be a grand Tory out-cry over the unprincipled Whigs?’

‘The papers need know nothing whatever of the incident,’ interposed Curtis anxiously, ‘if old Flood is not busy enough to inform them.’

‘Who is old Flood?’ asked Walpole.

‘A Tory J.P., who has copied out a considerable share of your correspondence,’ said Kilgobbin.

‘And four letters in a lady’s hand,’ added Dick, ‘that he imagines to be a treasonable correspondence by symbol.’

‘I hope Mr. Walpole,’ said Kate, ‘will rather accept felony to the law than falsehood to the lady.’

‘You don’t mean to say–‘ began Walpole angrily; then correcting his irritable manner, he added, ‘Am I to suppose my letters have been read?’

‘Well, roughly looked through,’ said Curtis. ‘Just a glance here and there to catch what they meant.’

‘Which I must say was quite unnecessary,’ said Walpole haughtily.

‘It was a sort of journal of yours,’ blundered out Curtis, who had a most unhappy knack of committing himself, ‘that they opened first, and they saw an entry with Kilgobbin Castle at the top of it, and the date last July.’

‘There was nothing political in that, I’m sure,’ said Walpole.

‘No, not exactly, but a trifle rebellious, all the same; the words, “We this evening learned a Fenian song, ‘The time to begin,’ and rather suspect it is time to leave off; the Greek better-looking than ever, and more dangerous.”‘

Curtis’s last words were drowned in the laugh that now shook the table; indeed, except Walpole and Nina herself, they actually roared with laughter, which burst out afresh, as Curtis, in his innocence, said, ‘We could not make out about the Greek, but we hoped we’d find out later on.’

‘And I fervently trust you did,’ said Kilgobbin.

‘I’m afraid not; there was something about somebody called Joe, that the Greek wouldn’t have him, or disliked him, or snubbed him–indeed, I forget the words.’

‘You are quite right, sir, to distrust your memory,’ said Walpole; ‘it has betrayed you most egregiously already.’

‘On the contrary,’ burst in Kilgobbin, ‘I am delighted with this proof of the captain’s acuteness; tell us something more, Curtis.’

‘There was then, “From the upper castle yard, Maude,” whoever Maude is, “says, ‘Deny it all, and say you never were there,’ not so easy as she thinks, with a broken right arm, and a heart not quite so whole as it ought to be.”‘

‘There, sir–with the permission of my friends here–I will ask you to conclude your reminiscences of my private papers, which can have no possible interest for any one but myself.’

‘Quite wrong in that,’ cried Kilgobbin, wiping his eyes, which had run over with laughter. ‘There’s nothing I’d like so much as to hear more of them.’

‘What was that about his heart?’ whispered Curtis to Kate; ‘was he wounded in the side also?’

‘I believe so,’ said she dryly; ‘but I believe he has got quite over it by this time.’

‘Will you say a word or two about me, Miss Kearney?’ whispered he again; ‘I’m not sure I improved my case by talking so freely; but as I saw you all so outspoken, I thought I’d fall into your ways.’

‘Captain Curtis is much concerned for any fault he may have committed in this unhappy business,’ said Kate, ‘and he trusts that the agitation and excitement of the Donogan escape will excuse him.’

‘That’s your policy now,’ interposed Kilgobbin. ‘Catch the Fenian fellow, and nobody will remember the other incident.’

‘We mean to give out that we know he has got clear away to America,’ said Curtis, with an air of intense cunning. ‘And to lull his suspicions, we have notices in print to say that no further rewards are to be given for his apprehension; so that he’ll get a false confidence, and move about as before.’

‘With such acuteness as yours on his trail, his arrest is certain,’ said Walpole gravely.

‘Well, I hope so, too,’ said Curtis, in good faith for the compliment.’ Didn’t I take up nine men for the search of arms here, though there were only five? One of them turned evidence,’ added he gravely;’ he was the fellow that swore Miss Kearney stood between you and the fire after they wounded you.’

‘You are determined to make Mr. Walpole your friend,’ whispered Nina in his ear; ‘don’t you see, sir, that you are ruining yourself?’

‘I have often been puzzled to explain how it was that crime went unpunished in Ireland,’ said Walpole sententiously.

‘And you know now?’ asked Curtis.

‘Yes; in a great measure, you have supplied me with the information.’

‘I believe it’s all right now,’ muttered the captain to Kate. ‘If the swell owns that I have put him up to a thing or two, he’ll not throw me over.’

‘Would you give me three minutes of your time?’ whispered Gorman O’Shea to Lord Kilgobbin, as they arose from table.

‘Half an hour, my boy, or more if you want it. Come along with me now into my study, and we’ll be safe there from all interruption.’

CHAPTER XLVI

SAGE ADVICE

‘So then you’re in a hobble with your aunt,’ said Mr. Kearney, as he believed he had summed up the meaning of a very blundering explanation by Gorman O’Shea; ‘isn’t that it?’

‘Yes, sir; I suppose it comes to that.’

‘The old story, I’ve no doubt, if we only knew it–as old as the Patriarchs: the young ones go into debt, and think it very hard that the elders dislike the paying it.’

‘No, no; I have no debts–at least, none to speak of.’

‘It’s a woman, then? Have you gone and married some good-looking girl, with no fortune and less family? Who is she?’

‘Not even that, sir,’ said he, half impatient at seeing how little attention had been bestowed on his narrative.

”Tis bad enough, no doubt,’ continued the old man, still in pursuit of his own reflections; ‘not but there’s scores of things worse; for if a man is a good fellow at heart, he’ll treat the woman all the better for what she has cost him. That is one of the good sides of selfishness; and when you have lived as long as me, Gorman, you’ll find out how often there’s something good to be squeezed out of a bad quality, just as though it were a bit of our nature that was depraved, but not gone to the devil entirely.’

‘There is no woman in the case here, sir,’ said O’Shea bluntly, for these speculations only irritated him.

‘Ho, ho! I have it, then,’ cried the old man. ‘You’ve been burning your fingers with rebellion. It’s the Fenians have got a hold of you.’

‘Nothing of the kind, sir. If you’ll just read these two letters. The one is mine, written on the morning I came here: here is my aunt’s. The first is not word for word as I sent it, but as well as I can remember. At all events, it will show how little I had provoked the answer. There, that’s the document that came along with my trunks, and I have never heard from her since.’

‘”Dear Nephew,”‘ read out the old man, after patiently adjusting his spectacles–‘”O’Shea’s Barn is not an inn,”–And more’s the pity,’ added he; ‘for it would be a model house of entertainment. You’d say any one could have a sirloin of beef or a saddle of mutton; but where Miss Betty gets hers is quite beyond me. “Nor are the horses at public livery,”‘ read he out. ‘I think I may say, if they were, that Kattoo won’t be hired out again to the young man that took her over the fences. “As you seem fond of warnings,”‘ continued he, aloud–‘Ho, ho! that’s at _you_ for coming over here to tell me about the search-warrant; and she tells you to mind your own business; and droll enough it is. We always fancy we’re saying an impertinence to a man when we tell him to attend to what concerns him most. It shows, at least, that we think meddling a luxury. And then she adds, “Kilgobbin is welcome to you,” and I can only say you are welcome to Kilgobbin–ay, and in her own words–“with such regularity and order as the meals succeed.”–“All the luggage belonging to you,” etc., and “I am, very respectfully, your Aunt.” By my conscience, there was no need to sign it! That was old Miss Betty all the world over!’ and he laughed till his eyes ran over, though the rueful face of young O’Shea was staring at him all the time. ‘Don’t look so gloomy, O’Shea,’ cried Kearney: ‘I have not so good a cook, nor, I’m sorry to say, so good a cellar, as at the Barn; but there are young faces, and young voices, and young laughter, and a light step on the stairs; and if I know anything, or rather, if I remember anything, these will warm a heart at your age better than ’44 claret or the crustiest port that ever stained a decanter.’

‘I am turned out, sir–sent adrift on the world,’ said the young man despondently.

‘And it is not so bad a thing after all, take my word for it, boy. It’s a great advantage now and then to begin life as a vagabond. It takes a deal of snobbery out of a fellow to lie under a haystack, and there’s no better cure for pretension than a dinner of cold potatoes. Not that I say you need the treatment–far from it–but our distinguished friend Mr. Walpole wouldn’t be a bit the worse of such an alterative.’

‘If I am left without a shilling in the world?’

‘Then you must try what you can do on sixpence–the whole thing is how you begin. I used not to be able to eat my dinner when I did not see the fellow in a white tie standing before the sideboard, and the two flunkeys in plush and silk stockings at either side of the table; and when I perceived that the decanters had taken their departure, and that it was beer I was given to drink, I felt as if I had dined, and was ready to go out and have a smoke in the open air; but a little time, even without any patience, but just time, does it all.’

‘Time won’t teach a man to live upon nothing.’

‘It would be very hard for him if it did; let him begin by having few wants, and work hard to supply means for them.’

‘Work hard! why, sir, if I laboured from daylight to dark, I’d not earn the wages of the humblest peasant, and I’d not know how to live on it.’

‘Well, I have given you all the philosophy in my budget, and to tell you the truth, Gorman, except so far as coming down in the world in spite of myself, I know mighty little about the fine precepts I have been giving you; but this I know, you have a roof over your head here, and you’re heartily welcome to it; and who knows but your aunt may come to terms all the sooner, because she sees you here?’

‘You are very generous to me, and I feel it deeply,’ said the young man; but he was almost choked with the words.

‘You have told me already, Gorman, that your aunt gave you no other reason against coming here than that I had not been to call on you; and I believe you–believe you thoroughly; but tell me now, with the same frankness, was there nothing passing in your mind–had you no suspicions or misgivings, or something of the same kind, to keep you away? Be candid with me now, and speak it out freely.’

‘None, on my honour; I was sorely grieved to be told I must not come, and thought very often of rebelling, so that indeed, when I did rebel, I was in a measure prepared for the penalty, though scarcely so heavy as this.’

‘Don’t take it to heart. It will come right yet–everything comes right if we give it time–and there’s plenty of time to the fellow who is not five-and-twenty. It’s only the old dogs, like myself, who are always doing their match against time, are in a hobble. To feel that every minute of the clock is something very like three weeks of the almanac, flurries a man, when he wants to be cool and collected. Put your hat on a peg, and make your home here. If you want to be of use, Kitty will show you scores of things to do about the garden, and we never object to see a brace of snipe at the end of dinner, though there’s nobody cares to shoot them; and the bog trout–for all their dark colour–are excellent catch, and I know you can throw a line. All I say is, do something, and something that takes you into the open air. Don’t get to lying about in easy-chairs and reading novels; don’t get to singing duets and philandering about with the girls. May I never, if I’d not rather find a brandy-flask in your pocket than Tennyson’s poems!’

CHAPTER XLVII

REPROOF

‘Say it out frankly, Kate,’ cried Nina, as with flashing eyes and heightened colour she paced the drawing-room from end to end, with that bold sweeping stride which in moments of passion betrayed her. ‘Say it out. I know perfectly what you are hinting at.’

‘I never hint,’ said the other gravely; ‘least of all with those I love.’

‘So much the better. I detest an equivoque. If I am to be shot, let me look the fire in the face.’

‘There is no question of shooting at all. I think you are very angry for nothing.’

‘Angry for nothing! Do you call that studied coldness you have observed towards me all day yesterday nothing? Is your ceremonious manner–exquisitely polite, I will not deny–is that nothing? Is your chilling salute when we met–I half believe you curtsied–nothing? That you shun me, that you take pains not to keep my company, never to be with me alone is past denial.’

‘And I do not deny it,’ said Kate, with a voice of calm and quiet meaning.

‘At last, then, I have the avowal. You own that you love me no longer.’

‘No, I own nothing of the kind: I love you very dearly; but I see that our ideas of life are so totally unlike, that unless one should bend and conform to the other, we cannot blend our thoughts in that harmony which perfect confidence requires. You are so much above me in many things, so much more cultivated and gifted–I was going to say civilised, and I believe I might–‘

‘Ta–ta–ta,’ cried Nina impatiently. ‘These flatteries are very ill-timed.’

‘So they would be, if they were flatteries; but if you had patience to hear me out, you’d have learned that I meant a higher flattery for myself.’

‘Don’t I know it? don’t I guess?’ cried the Greek. ‘Have not your downcast eyes told it? and that look of sweet humility that says, “At least I am not a flirt?”‘

‘Nor am I,’ said Kate coldly.

‘And I am! Come now, do confess. You want to say it.’

‘With all my heart I wish you were not!’ And Kate’s eyes swam as she spoke.

‘And what if I tell you that I know it–that in the very employment of the arts of what you call coquetry, I am but exercising those powers of pleasing by which men are led to frequent the salon instead of the cafe, and like the society of the cultivated and refined better than–‘

‘No, no, no!’ burst in Kate. ‘There is no such mock principle in the case. You are a flirt because you like the homage it secures you, and because, as you do not believe in such a thing as an honest affection, you have no scruple about trifling with a man’s heart.’

‘So much for captivating that bold hussar,’ cried Nina.

‘For the moment I was not thinking of him.’

‘Of whom, then?’

‘Of that poor Captain Curtis, who has just ridden away.’

‘Oh, indeed!’

‘Yes. He has a pretty wife and three nice little girls, and they are the happiest people in the world. They love each other, and love their home–so, at least, I am told, for I scarcely know them myself.’

‘And what have I done with _him_?’

‘Sent him away sad and doubtful–very doubtful if the happiness he believed in was the real article after all, and disposed to ask himself how it was that his heart was beating in a new fashion, and that some new sense had been added to his nature, of which he had no inkling before. Sent him away with the notes of a melody floating through his brain, so that the merry laugh of his children will be a discord, and such a memory of a soft glance, that his wife’s bright look will be meaningless.’

‘And I have done all this? Poor me!’

‘Yes, and done it so often, that it leaves no remorse behind it.’

‘And the same, I suppose, with the others?’

‘With Mr. Walpole, and Dick, and Mr. O’Shea, and Mr. Atlee too, when he was here, in their several ways.’

‘Oh, in theirs, not in mine, then?’

‘I am but a bungler in my explanation. I wished to say that you adapted your fascinations to the tastes of each.’

‘What a siren!’

‘Well, yes–what a siren; for they’re all in love in some fashion or other; but I could have forgiven you these, had you spared the married man.’

‘So you actually envy that poor prisoner the gleam of light and the breath of cold air that comes between his prison bars–that one moment of ecstasy that reminds him how he once was free and at large, and no manacles to weigh him down? You will not let him even touch bliss in imagination? Are _you_ not more cruel than _me_?’

‘This is mere nonsense,’ said Kate boldly. ‘You either believe that man was fooling _you_, or that you have sent him away unhappy? Take which of these you like.’

‘Can’t your rustic nature see that there is a third case, quite different from both, and that Harry Curtis went off believing–‘

‘Was he Harry Curtis?’ broke in Kate.

‘He was dear Harry when I said good-bye,’ said Nina calmly.

‘Oh, then, I give up everything–I throw up my brief.’

‘So you ought, for you have lost your cause long ago.’

‘Even that poor Donogan was not spared, and Heaven knows he had troubles enough on his head to have pleaded some pity for him.’

‘And is there no kind word to say of _me_, Kate?’

‘O Nina, how ashamed you make me of my violence, when I dare to blame you! but if I did not love you so dearly, I could better bear you should have a fault.’

‘I have only one, then?’

‘I know of no great one but this. I mean, I know of none that endangers good-nature and right feeling.’

‘And are you so sure that this does? Are you so sure that what you are faulting is not the manner and the way of a world you have not seen? that all these levities, as you would call them, are not the ordinary wear of people whose lives are passed where there is more tolerance and less pain?’

‘Be serious, Nina, for a moment, and own that it was by intention you were in the approach when Captain Curtis rode away: that you said something to him, or looked something–perhaps both–on which he got down from his horse and walked beside you for full a mile?’

‘All true,’ said Nina calmly. ‘I confess to every part of it.’

‘I’d far rather that you said you were sorry for it.’

‘But I am not; I’m very glad–I’m very proud of it.

Yes, look as reproachfully as you like, Kate! “very proud” was what I said.’

‘Then I am indeed sorry,’ said Kate, growing pale as she spoke.

‘I don’t think, after all this sharp lecturing of me, that you deserve much of my confidence, and if I make you any, Kate, it is not by way of exculpation; for I do not accept your blame; it is simply out of caprice–mind that, and that I am not thinking of defending myself.’

‘I can easily believe that,’ said Kate dryly.

And the other continued: ‘When Captain Curtis was talking to your father, and discussing the chances of capturing Donogan, he twice or thrice mentioned Harper and Fry–names which somehow seemed familiar to me; and on thinking the matter over when I went to my room, I opened Donogan’s pocket-book and there found how these names had become known to me. Harper and Fry were tanners, in Cork Street, and theirs was one of the addresses by which, if I had occasion to warn Donogan, I could write to him. On hearing these names from Curtis, it struck me that there might be treachery somewhere. Was it that these men themselves had turned traitors to the cause? or had another betrayed them? Whichever way the matter went, Donogan was evidently in great danger; for this was one of the places he regarded as perfectly safe.

‘What was to be done? I dared not ask advice on any side. To reveal the suspicions which were tormenting me required that I should produce this pocket-book, and to whom could I impart this man’s secret? I thought of your brother Dick, but he was from home, and even if he had not been, I doubt if I should have told him. I should have come to you, Kate, but that grand rebukeful tone you had taken up this last twenty-four hours repelled me; and finally, I took counsel with myself. I set off just before Captain Curtis started, to what you have called waylay him in the avenue.

‘Just below the beech-copse he came up; and then that small flirtation of the drawing-room, which has caused you so much anger and me such a sharp lesson, stood me in good stead, and enabled me to arrest his progress by some chance word or two, and at last so far to interest him that he got down and walked along at my side. I shall not shock you by recalling the little tender “nothings” that passed between us, nor dwell on the small mockeries of sentiment which we exchanged–I hope very harmlessly–but proceed at once to what I felt my object. He was profuse of his gratitude for what I had done for him with Walpole, and firmly believed that my intercession alone had saved him; and so I went on to say that the best reparation he could make for his blunder would be some exercise of well-directed activity when occasion should offer. “Suppose, for instance,” said I, “you could capture this man Donogan?”

‘”The very thing I hope to do,” cried he. “The train is laid already. One of my constables has a brother in a well-known house in Dublin, the members of which, men of large wealth and good position, have long been suspected of holding intercourse with the rebels. Through his brother, himself a Fenian, this man has heard that a secret committee will meet at this place on Monday evening next, at which Donogan will be present. Molloy, another head-centre, will also be there, and Cummings, who escaped from Carrickfergus.” I took down all the names, Kate, the moment we parted, and while they were fresh in my memory. “We’ll draw the net on them all,” said he; “and such a haul has not been made since ’98. The rewards alone will amount to some thousands.” It was then I said, “And is there no danger, Harry? “‘

‘O Nina!’

‘Yes, darling, it was very dreadful, and I felt it so; but somehow one is carried away by a burst of feeling at certain moments, and the shame only comes too late. Of course it was wrong of me to call him Harry, and he, too, with a wife at home, and five little girls–or three, I forget which–should never have sworn that he loved me, nor said all that mad nonsense about what he felt in that region where chief constables have their hearts; but I own to great tenderness and a very touching sensibility on either side. Indeed, I may add here, that the really sensitive natures amongst men are never found under forty-five; but for genuine, uncalculating affection, for the sort of devotion that flings consequences to the winds, I say, give me fifty-eight or sixty.’

‘Nina, do not make me hate you,’ said Kate gravely.

‘Certainly not, dearest, if a little hypocrisy will avert such a misfortune. And so to return to my narrative, I learned, as accurately as a gentleman so much in love could condescend to inform me, of all the steps taken to secure Donogan at this meeting, or to capture him later on if he should try to make his escape by sea.’

‘You mean, then, to write to Donogan and apprise him of his danger?’

‘It is done. I wrote the moment I got back here. I addressed him as Mr. James Bredin, care of Jonas Mullory, Esq., 41 New Street, which was the first address in the list he gave me. I told him of the peril he ran, and what his friends were also threatened by, and I recounted the absurd seizure of Mr. Walpole’s effects here; and, last of all, what a dangerous rival he had in this Captain Curtis, who was ready to desert wife, children, and the constabulary to-morrow for me; and assuring him confidentially that I was well worth greater sacrifices of better men, I signed my initials in Greek letters.’

‘Marvellous caution and great discretion,’ said Kate solemnly.

‘And now come over to the drawing-room, where I have promised to sing for Mr. O’Shea some little ballad that he dreamed over all the night through; and then there’s something else–what is it? what is it?’

‘How should I know, Nina? I was not present at your arrangement.’

‘Never mind; I’ll remember it presently. It will come to my recollection while I’m singing that song.’

‘If emotion is not too much for you.’

‘Just so, Kate–sensibilities permitting; and, indeed,’ she said,’ I remember it already. It was luncheon.’

CHAPTER XLVIII

HOW MEN IN OFFICE MAKE LOVE

‘Is it true they have captured Donogan?’ said Nina, coming hurriedly into the library, where Walpole was busily engaged with his correspondence, and sat before a table covered not only with official documents, but a number of printed placards and handbills.

He looked up, surprised at her presence, and by the tone of familiarity in her question, for which he was in no way prepared, and for a second or two actually stared at without answering her.

‘Can’t you tell me? Are they correct in saying he has been caught?’ cried she impatiently.

‘Very far from it. There are the police returns up to last night from Meath, Kildare, and Dublin; and though he was seen at Naas, passed some hours in Dublin, and actually attended a night meeting at Kells, all trace of him has been since lost, and he has completely baffled us. By the Viceroy’s orders, I am now doubling the reward for his apprehension, and am prepared to offer a free pardon to any who shall give information about him, who may not actually have committed a felony.’

‘Is he so very dangerous, then?’

‘Every man who is so daring is dangerous here. The people have a sort of idolatry for reckless courage. It is not only that he has ventured to come back to the country where his life is sacrificed to the law, but he declares openly he is ready to offer himself as a representative for an Irish county, and to test in his own person whether the English will have the temerity to touch the man–the choice of the Irish people.’

‘He is bold,’ said she resolutely.

‘And I trust he will pay for his boldness! Our law-officers are prepared to treat him as a felon, irrespective of all claim to his character as a Member of Parliament.’

‘The danger will not deter him.’

‘You think so?’

‘I know it,’ was the calm reply.

‘Indeed,’ said he, bending a steady look at her. ‘What opportunities, might I ask, have you had to form this same opinion?’

‘Are not the public papers full of him? Have we not an almost daily record of his exploits? Do not your own rewards for his capture impart an almost fabulous value to his life?’

‘His portrait, too, may lend some interest to his story,’ said he, with a half-sneering smile. ‘They say this is very like him.’ And he handed a photograph as he spoke.

‘This was done in New York,’ said she, turning to the back of the card, the better to hide an emotion she could not entirely repress.

‘Yes, done by a brother Fenian, long since in our pay.’

‘How base all that sounds! how I detest such treachery!’

‘How deal with treason without it? Is it like him?’ asked he artlessly.

‘How should I know?’ said she, in a slightly hurried tone. ‘It is not like the portrait in the _Illustrated News_.’

‘I wonder which is the more like,’ added he thoughtfully, ‘and I fervently hope we shall soon know. There is not a man he confides in who has not engaged to betray him.’

‘I trust you feel proud of your achievement.’

‘No, not proud, but very anxious for its success. The perils of this country are too great for mere sensibilities. He who would extirpate a terrible disease must not fear the knife.’

‘Not if he even kill the patient?’ asked she.

‘That might happen, and would be to be deplored,’ said he, in the same unmoved tone. ‘But might I ask, whence has come all this interest for this cause, and how have you learned so much sympathy with these people?’

‘I read the newspapers,’ said she dryly.

‘You must read those of only one colour, then,’ said he slyly; ‘or perhaps it is the tone of comment you hear about you. Are your sentiments such as you daily listen to from Lord Kilgobbin and his family?’

‘I don’t know that they are. I suspect I’m more of a rebel than he is; but I’ll ask him if you wish it.’

‘On no account, I entreat you. It would compromise me seriously to hear such a discussion even in jest. Remember who I am, mademoiselle, and the office I hold.’

‘Your great frankness, Mr. Walpole, makes me sometimes forget both,’ said she, with well-acted humility.

‘I wish it would do something more,’ said he eagerly. ‘I wish it would inspire a little emulation, and make you deal as openly with _me_ as I long to do with _you_.’

‘It might embarrass you very much, perhaps.’

‘As how?’ asked he, with a touch of tenderness in his voice.

For a second or two she made no answer, and then, faltering at each word, she said, ‘What if some rebel leader–this man Donogan, for instance–drawn towards you b some secret magic of trustfulness, moved by I know not what need of your sympathy–for there is such a craving void now and then felt in the heart–should tell you some secret thought of his nature–something that he could utter alone to himself–would you bring yourself to use it against him? Could you turn round and say, “I have your inmost soul in my keeping. You are mine now–mine–mine?”‘

‘Do I understand you aright?’ said he earnestly. ‘Is it just possible, even possible, that you have that to confide to me which would show that you regard me as a dear friend?’

‘Oh! Mr. Walpole,’ burst she out passionately, ‘do not by the greater power of _your_ intellect seek the mastery over _mine_. Let the loneliness and isolation of my life here rather appeal to you to pity than suggest the thought of influencing and dominating me.’

‘Would that I might. What would I not give or do to have that power that you speak of.’

‘Is this true?’ said she.

‘It is.’

‘Will you swear it?’

‘Most solemnly.’

She paused for a moment, and a slight tremor shook her mouth; but whether the motion expressed a sentiment of acute pain or a movement of repressed sarcasm, it was very difficult to determine.

‘What is it, then, that you would swear?’ asked she calmly and even coldly.

‘Swear that I have no hope so high, no ambition so great, as to win your heart.’

‘Indeed! And that other heart that you have won–what is to become of it?’

‘Its owner has recalled it. In fact, it was never in _my_ keeping but as a loan.’

‘How strange! At least, how strange to me this sounds. I, in my ignorance, thought that people pledged their very lives in these bargains.’

‘So it ought to be, and so it would be, if this world were not a web of petty interests and mean ambitions; and these, I grieve to say, will find their way into hearts that should be the home of very different sentiments. It was of this order was that compact with my cousin–for I will speak openly to you, knowing it is her to whom you allude. We were to have been married. It was an old engagement. Our friends–that is, I believe, the way to call them–liked it. They thought it a good thing for each of us. Indeed, making the dependants of a good family intermarry is an economy of patronage–the same plank rescues two from drowning. I believe–that is, I fear–we accepted all this in the same spirit. We were to love each other as much as we could, and our relations were to do their best for us.’

‘And now it is all over?’

‘All–and for ever.’

‘How came this about?’

‘At first by a jealousy about _you_.’

‘A jealousy about _me_! You surely never dared–‘ and here her voice trembled with real passion, while her eyes flashed angrily.

‘No, no. I am guiltless in the matter. It was that cur Atlee made the mischief. In a moment of weak trustfulness, I sent him over to Wales to assist my uncle in his correspondence. He, of course, got to know Lady Maude Bickerstaffe–by what arts he ingratiated himself into her confidence, I cannot say. Indeed, I had trusted that the fellow’s vulgarity would form an impassable barrier between them, and prevent all intimacy; but, apparently, I was wrong. He seems to have been the companion of her rides and drives, and under the pretext of doing some commissions for her in the bazaars of Constantinople, he got to correspond with her. So artful a fellow would well know what to make of such a privilege.’

‘And is he your successor now?’ asked she, with a look of almost undisguised insolence.

‘Scarcely that,’ said he, with a supercilious smile. ‘I think, if you had ever seen my cousin, you would scarcely have asked the question.’

‘But I have seen her. I saw her at the Odescalchi Palace at Rome. I remember the stare she was pleased to bestow on me as she swept past me. I remember more, her words as she asked, “Is this your Titian Girl I have heard so much of?”‘

‘And may hear more of,’ muttered he, almost unconsciously.

‘Yes–even that too; but not, perhaps, in the sense you mean.’ Then, as if correcting herself, she went on, ‘It was a bold ambition of Mr. Atlee. I must say I like the very daring of it.’

‘_He_ never dared it–take my word for it.’

An insolent laugh was her first reply. ‘How little you men know of each other, and how less than little you know of us! You sneer at the people who are moved by sudden impulse, but you forget it is the squall upsets the boat.’

‘I believe I can follow what you mean. You would imply that my cousin’s breach with _me_ might have impelled her to listen to Atlee?’

‘Not so much that as, by establishing himself as her confidant, he got the key of her heart, and let himself in as he pleased.’

‘I suspect he found little to interest him there.’

‘The insufferable insolence of that speech! Can you men never be brought to see that we are not all alike to each of you; that our natures have their separate watchwords, and that the soul which would vibrate with tenderness to this, is to that a dead and senseless thing, with no trace or touch of feeling about it?’

‘I only believe this in part.’

‘Believe it wholly, then, or own that you know nothing of love–no more than do those countless thousands who go through life and never taste its real ecstasy, nor its real sorrow; who accept convenience, or caprice, or flattered vanity as its counterfeit, and live out the delusion in lives of discontent. You have done wrong to break with your cousin. It is clear to me you suited each other.’

‘This is sarcasm.’

‘If it is, I am sorry for it. I meant it for sincerity. In _your_ career, ambition is everything. The woman that could aid you on your road would be the real helpmate. She who would simply cross your path by her sympathies, or her affections, would be a mere embarrassment. Take the very case before us. Would not Lady Maude point out to you how, by the capture of this rebel, you might so aid your friends as to establish a claim for recompense? Would she not impress you with the necessity of showing how your activity redounded to the credit of your party? She would neither interpose with ill-timed appeals to your pity or a misplaced sympathy. _She_ would help the politician, while another might hamper the man.’

‘All that might be true, if the game of political life were played as it seems to be on the surface, and my cousin was exactly the sort of woman to use ordinary faculties with ability and acuteness; but there are scores of things in which her interference would have been hurtful, and her secrecy dubious. I will give you an instance, and it will serve to show my implicit confidence in yourself. Now with respect to this man, Donogan, there is nothing we wish less than to take him. To capture means to try–to try means to hang him–and how much better, or safer, or stronger are we when it is done? These fellows, right or wrong, represent opinions that are never controverted by the scaffold, and every man who dies for his convictions leaves a thousand disciples who never believed in him before. It is only because he braves us that we pursue him, and in the face of our opponents and Parliament we cannot do less. So that while we are offering large rewards for his apprehension, we would willingly give double the sum to know he had escaped. Talk of the supremacy of the Law–the more you assert that here, the more ungovernable is this country by a Party. An active Attorney-General is another word for three more regiments in Ireland.’

‘I follow you with some difficulty; but I see that you would like this man to get away, and how is that to be done?’

‘Easily enough, when once he knows that it will be safe for him to go north. He naturally fears the Orangemen of the northern counties. They will, however, do nothing without the police, and the police have got their orders throughout Antrim and Derry. Here–on this strip of paper–here are the secret instructions:–“To George Dargan, Chief Constable, Letterkenny District. Private and confidential.–It is, for many reasons, expedient that the convict Donogan, on a proper understanding that he will not return to Ireland, should be suffered to escape. If you are, therefore, in a position to extort a pledge from him to this extent–and it should be explicit and beyond all cavil–you will, taking due care not to compromise your authority in your office, aid him to leave the country, even to the extent of moneyed assistance.” To this are appended directions how he is to proceed to carry out these instructions: what he may, and what he may not do, with whom he may seek for co-operation, and where he is to maintain a guarded and careful secrecy. Now, in telling you all this, Mademoiselle Kostalergi, I have given you the strongest assurance in my power of the unlimited trust I have in you. I see how the questions that agitate this country interest you. I read the eagerness with which you watch them, but I want you to see more. I want you to see that the men who purpose to themselves the great task of extricating Ireland from her difficulties must be politicians in the highest sense of the word, and that you should see in us statesmen of an order that can weigh human passions and human emotions–and see that hope and fear, and terror and gratitude, sway the hearts of men who, to less observant eyes, seem to have no place in their natures but for rebellion. That this mode of governing Ireland is the one charm to the Celtic heart, all the Tory rule of the last fifty years, with its hangings and banishments and other terrible blunders, will soon convince you. The Priest alone has felt the pulse of this people, and we are the only Ministers of England who have taken the Priest into our confidence. I own to you I claim some credit for myself in this discovery. It was in long reflecting over the ills of Ireland that I came to see that where the malady has so much in its nature that is sensational and emotional, so must the remedy be sensational too. The Tories were ever bent on extirpating–_we_ devote ourselves to “healing measures.” Do you follow me?’

‘I do,’ said she thoughtfully.

‘Do I interest you?’ asked he, more tenderly.

‘Intensely,’ was the reply.

‘Oh, if I could but think _that_. If I could bring myself to believe that the day would come, not only to secure your interest, but your aid and your assistance in this great task! I have long sought the opportunity to tell you that we, who hold the destinies of a people in our keeping, are not inferior to our great trust, that we are not mere creatures of a state department, small deities of the Olympus of office, but actual statesmen and rulers. Fortune has given me the wished-for moment, let it complete my happiness, let it tell me that you see in this noble work one worthy of your genius and your generosity, and that you would accept me as a fellow-labourer in the cause.’

The fervour which he threw into the utterance of these words contrasted strongly and strangely with the words themselves; so unlike the declaration of a lover’s passion.

‘I do–not–know,’ said she falteringly.

‘What is that you do not know?’ asked he, with tender eagerness.

‘I do not know if I understand you aright, and I do not know what answer I should give you.’

‘Will not your heart tell you?’

She shook her head.

‘You will not crush me with the thought that there is no pleading for me there.’

‘If you had desired in honesty my regard, you should not have prejudiced me: you began here by enlisting my sympathies in your Task; you told me of your ambitions. I like these ambitions.’

‘Why not share them?’ cried he passionately.

‘You seem to forget what you ask. A woman does not give her heart as a man joins a party or an administration. It is no question of an advantage based upon a compromise. There is no sentiment of gratitude, or recompense, or reward in the gift. She simply gives that which is no longer hers to retain! She trusts to what her mind will not stop to question–she goes where she cannot help but follow.’

‘How immeasurably greater your every word makes the prize of your love.’

‘It is in no vanity that I say I know it,’ said she calmly. ‘Let us speak no more on this now.’