CHAPTER VIII

After the concert came a day of reckoning; that is to say, a winding up of the financial part of the performance. The parish complacently expected a substantial sum for coal and blankets, tea and sugar. Boots? Certainly there would be boots; and they were badly wanted. The simple folk had made their calculation something after this fashion: three hundred shillings was fifteen pounds, anyhow; the room was free. Take an average of five shillings all round, was not that seventy-five pounds? The neighbourhood nodded, and grinned, and figuratively rubbed its hands. But unfortunately the neighbourhood had reckoned without Mrs. Doran and her little bills for carting, hiring, lighting, decorations, printing, and refreshments--the amount came to £57 11_s._ 6_d._--and when she handed the small balance to the Rector and the Rev. Father Daly, their countenances expressed the blankest dismay. The lady was in her own house, entrenched in a business-like attitude behind her writing-table, as she tendered the cheque with an air of bold assurance, not unflavoured with patronage. For a moment there was an awful silence. Mr. West took the bit of paper, stared at it as if he could not credit his faculties, cleared his throat, and passed it on to the priest.

Father Daly became red in the face (he was a man of full habit and of somewhat impetuous temper). He spoke at last, in his deep rich brogue.

“Goodness preserve us, Mrs. Doran! what does this mean? What has become of all the money for our poor people?”

“Become?” she repeated. “Some was spent in their interest; the balance is in your hand--a cheque on the Munster Bank.”

“But surely to goodness----” he reiterated.

“There are my accounts,” she interrupted angrily. The lady was not prepared for this inquisition, and believed that the two men would thankfully accept her largesse and so depart.

“I certainly understood that the refreshments were provided gratis,” put in Mr. West, with unprecedented courage.

“Pray who said so? I’m sure _I_ never did. See, it is merely stated,” snatching up a programme, “_There will be refreshments_.”

A pause. Yes; the fact was patent; the statement had involved no promise; the matter had been understood, taken for granted, but Mrs. Doran never permitted anything to be _taken_ from her.

“Surely you don’t suppose for a moment,” she resumed, with rising temper, “that _I_ was to feed three hundred people, out of my own pocket, now do you?” and she threw herself back in her chair, and contemplated her visitors with her hard black eyes.

“Well, yes, ma’am,” rejoined the priest, “I must declare that I was under that impression. After all, it was only once in a way.”

“What nonsense!” she exclaimed. “Why, I was the only person who _gave_ anything. The room, the piano, my servants’ time, my own time and exertions, all the trouble. However”--and here she gave a sniff of definite resolve--“it will be a lesson to me not to put myself out another time.”

“Well, I suppose there is no more to be said!” exclaimed Mr. West, turning to his companion with an expression of despair.

“Except, perhaps, the little word _thank_ you?” sneered Mrs. Doran, who was trembling with suppressed rage.

“Well, I don’t know about thanks,” observed the priest, turning squarely on the lady, “but I’ll just say the _little word_”; and he paused. “God forgive me if I am wrong, but I believe, woman, you have cheated the poor! Yes”--with uplifted hand--“you got up this concert for them, and have put the earnings into your own hungry pocket. I am not a fool. You need not tell me that a few gallons of tea, and soup, and a couple of tins of kerosene oil, would cost nearly sixty pounds! And see, now I’ll punish you.”

“What? You will punish me!” she screamed hysterically. “I’d like to see you attempt it.”

“Yes, I’ll publish an account of the grand concert, and its takings, and all your little bills”--here he stretched out his big hand and gathered them up--“in the Cork paper and the _Irish Times_. This I will do at my own expense, and so let the world know what you are made of. If the Colonel were alive, I would never do it, nor shame him, good, innocent man; but as for you, you avaricious cormorant, you have no shame whatever--you do not know the name. Come away, West; this is no place for the servants of God!” and before Mrs. Doran could recover her senses and speech she was alone.

When the amount of the balance became known, naturally there was a terrible outcry. “The old wan” had surpassed herself this time! The lady had beaten every record. Some people laughed, others were furious, and as for the poor, they said, “Arrah! what could ye expect from Mrs. Doran? When did she give away bite or sup? She only gives trouble. Faix, the ould wan has it in for her.”

The particulars of the great scene in the study were imparted to Barky and Ulick. Barky, who was, of course, on his mother’s side, swore a terrible vengeance on Father Daly, but his brother was overwhelmed with shame. He wrote to his banker’s, and he rode down to Mr. West and had a good square talk with him; and the result of the conversation was that Father Daly withdrew his threatened exposure when he received an anonymous contribution of sixty pounds. Well, he knew where the money came from--generous young Ulick was his father’s own son; and accordingly, the scandal respecting “refreshments” was quickly hushed up, and not suffered to spread, though in the immediate neighbourhood of the Castle “Mrs. Doran’s concert” is talked of to the present day!

* * * * *

The frost did not last long. Hunting was speedily resumed, and Ulick was in his element. He had three capital horses, and rode them in the first flight. As the meets were early, and at a distance, and it was dark when he jogged home, he had not much chance of prosecuting his acquaintance with Mary Foley; now and then he came across her; once he met her on Sunday, just outside the Castle gates, coming from mass, with her prayer-book neatly wrapped in a clean handkerchief, and accosted her.

“So you’ve been saying your prayers?” he began.

“Yes, yer honour”--a curtsey--“but there was a sermon too.”

“Was it a good one?”

“It was so, sir.”

“Tell me what is your idea of a good sermon, Mary?”

“Oh, well, one that makes yer blood creep. Father Dunne is a nice quiet man, but he never frightens ye, or puts the fear of death in ye, not like Father Daly. ’Twas him as preached to-day.”

“Yes. Tell me all about it?”

“Then, sir, I declare ye might have heard the people breathing! They were just paralysed!”

“Ah! And were you frightened?”

“I cannot say I was all out--just a bit disheartened with myself. I know I’m a black sinner.”

“I wish to God my soul was as white as yours, Mary!”

“O Lord, sir!” she ejaculated, aghast, “you must not say the like of these things to _me_, and--and----” Colouring up, and taking a firm hold of her resolution, she curtseyed herself off.

One afternoon, some weeks later, Ulick Doran overtook the pretty egg-girl on her way from market. Her mother was beginning to feel the distance long, unless she could get a lift, and Mary was alone.

The young man dismounted from his weary horse, and walked beside her with the bridle over his arm for three whole happy miles. The afternoon was clear; there was a slim young moon. A red coat is somewhat conspicuous, and the couple were passed by one or two of the neighbours, and descried from a distance by Father Daly himself! All the same, their conversation was absolutely harmless--it was even stupid (but they could subsequently recall each precious syllable); and yet, with every step they took, they fell deeper and deeper into love (but with a frightened consciousness, like--as R. L. Stevenson says--a pair of children venturing together into a dark room). Sixteen and twenty-three--how could they help it?

They were both sensible of an indescribable something that drew them irresistibly towards one another. He appealed to her, because he was just Mr. Ulick--and a gentleman. She to him by her strange magnetic personality; she was totally different to any girl he had ever seen--coarsely clad yet dainty, bold yet shy; as for her face, it recalled the exquisite miniature of some piquante beauty at the court of Louis XIV., and Ulick Doran was poignantly aware of her soft low voice, her sweet eyes, her hair, and her upturned, questioning gaze.

But Mary was Mary, a peasant’s daughter, and, being a girl of the people, his lips were locked. Nevertheless, he adored her.

By-and-by, with the spring weather, a little “talk” began to circulate. It was whispered that Mr. Ulick had given Mary Foley his red pup, and that more than once he had been seen walking out with her! The news came to the ears of Father Daly, who had indeed beheld the couple with his own two eyes, and promptly descended upon Mrs. Foley and Mary, and gave them an impressive, never-to-be-forgotten lecture. The gossip also reached Mrs. Doran, who was furious. She made no remark to her son, but she went to Foley’s corner, and enacted a great scene with Katty, having discovered that unhappy woman alone. The lady strode into the cottage, and began without any preamble, such as “How are you?” or “A fine day!” “Katty Foley, only you have a lease here, do you know that I’d throw you into the road!” Long residence in Ireland had infected the matron’s vocabulary.

“Ah, for why, me lady?” rising stiffly as she spoke.

“Why? Because of your daughter’s brazen behaviour with my son, Mr. Ulick. It’s the scandal of the county.”

“Mary is a good girl,” responded Katty, in a tremulous voice. “God knows there’s no harm in her, whativer.”

“Is there not? She is going the right way about losing her character, walking the roads with a gentleman.”

“She never did no such thing! Once I’ll allow he overtook her; on another time she overtook him--it was a pure accident.”

“An accident on purpose!” said Mrs. Doran venomously. “She waylaid him. And I suppose he has not lent her books; that’s not his dog lying there?”

“Sure, Mr. Ulick gave him to me, because the house is so lonesome, me lady,” she answered, with submissive deprecation. “No one in the house since I buried poor John, so Mr. Ulick, he says, ‘Would you like a dog, Katty?’ and there he is.”

“There he is, indeed! Love me, love my dog. You could have got one anywhere; pups are as common as kittens. He gave that terrier to Mary--a prize one, that cost him three guineas.”

As Mrs. Foley could not combat this statement, her visitor resumed: “I’ve just come to say one word, and it is my last. If you encourage my son here, and he ever darkens your door, you never enter my gates, and I will make it very unpleasant for you, Mrs. Foley. Look after your daughter, forbid her to speak to him, or you will be sorry yet. You don’t suppose that he would marry her, do you?”

“God knows I never thought of such a thing, my lady; I’d never wish my girl to be looked down on. I would not let him put a ring on her; I have my pride.”

“_Your_ pride!” cried Mrs. Doran. “Well, that is a good joke. Your pride!” she repeated hysterically, as she swept out of the kitchen, like a tornado in black petticoats.

Not long after this raid, the lady of the castle came suddenly on the culprit herself. It was a fine March afternoon, and, wearing her best merino frock and her Sunday shoes, Mary was on her way to drink a cup of tea with her friend Bridget Curran, and show her the elegant fine-drawn work she was after doing for Mrs. Hogan. Suddenly, at a corner, she found herself face to face with the person she most dreaded in the whole world, who deliberately halted, stared hard, and then burst out, “Where did you get that gold locket and chain? But I need not ask; you have a bold face to be going about the country, wearing my son’s presents”; and before the girl was aware Mrs. Doran suddenly stretched out her hand, broke the chain with a violent snap, and flung it and the little locket, into the middle of the road.

“What are ye doing, ma’am?” cried the girl, roused to passion.

“I’m tearing my son’s presents off you, you wicked, scheming little hussy!”

“’Tis none of your son’s presents,” rejoined Mary, with her face aflame. “I’m not that sort; I take nothing from a gentleman.”

“You took his dog!” retorted the other triumphantly.

“I did not,” replied Mary, quivering with antagonism; “and I bought the locket with my own money”; and she held up her head and surveyed Mrs. Doran with fierce, if unspoken defiance.

“You’re a liar! a liar! a liar!” screamed her enemy, now abandoning all self-control.

“I am not, and it’s as true as if I was to be judged, that I bought it with my egg money; and God knows it took me long enough to gather--six mortal years; but it came out of his mother’s meanness, and not out of Mr. Ulick’s purse.” And when she concluded, Mary stooped and picked up the battered little gewgaw, which had cost her three pounds.

“As for being a liar,” she resumed, “them’s queer sort of words for a lady to use--but then _you_ are no lady.”

“If you don’t take care, I’ll box your ears!” screamed the matron. Father Daly had called her “shameless.” This chit of an egg-girl declared she was no “lady.” Was the world coming to an end? “Mind”--and she seized the girl’s arm in a grip of passion--“if ever you dare to speak to my son again, it will be worse for you.”

“I see ye have a poor opinion of Mr. Ulick, ma’am,” she answered, wrenching herself out of Mrs. Doran’s grasp.

“No, but of you, you double-faced schemer--you odious little red-haired flirt. You will come to a bad end!” and Mrs. Doran passed on, now breathless, and completely exhausted by the violence of her own emotions.

Mary had solemnly promised her mother and the priest that she would never speak again with Mr. Ulick, and somehow the little scandal (and it was a small one) was scotched and smothered. The girl kept out of her lover’s way with conscientious avoidance; once, indeed, she met him riding with a beautiful young lady on a grey horse, and he had nodded gaily to her; but when they were out of sight, the miserable girl had crept into a field close by, pulled her shawl over her head, and wept, oh! such hot, painful, jealous tears. Shortly afterwards Mr. Ulick went away to England, and his admiration for Mary Foley was forgotten; the little Foley girl now took her eggs to market town--she never went near the Castle. This stubborn defection was a disagreeable experience to Mrs. Doran, who drove a thriving trade with a considerable egg connection--friends to whom she offered the surplus of her hen-house, posting many boxes at a clear profit of sixpence a dozen. Mary’s supply was regular--such nice, large brown eggs! Unfortunately the recent scene on the road had actually cost poor Mrs. Doran several shillings a week!

It was noticed that Mary had grown rather white and “dawnchie” looking; some people said the poor angashore was losing her good looks, whilst others declared she was going into a decline, same as Kathleen Kelly when her boy died in America, and eagerly recommended a strong infusion of cat-nip tea.

One evening late, Katty was in bed; Mary still sat up working--what was the use of lying down, she asked herself, when she could not sleep? She was knitting close to the kitchen window, by the light of a fine April moon; outside it was nearly as bright as day. She intended to finish the stocking that night; she liked knitting, for she could both knit and--think.

All at once something interposed between the moon and herself--a face, a man’s face, was pressed against the window. Mary rose with a half-stifled scream, and then recognised, with a violent thrill and shock of joy, the well-cut features of Mr. Ulick.

“Mary!” he said, “Mary! Come quite close to the window, will you?”

“Whist,” she answered sharply. “I must not speak to you; I’ve promised my mother and the priest.” But she approached nearer to the window all the same.

“You may speak to me this once, Mary, for I’ve come to bid you good-bye. I am off to India to-morrow.”

“Is it to India?” she repeated mechanically.

“Yes, and I ran across the mountains just to try and catch a sight of you before I start, for the chances are----” He stopped, and his lips twitched.

“Yes?” she asked.

“That we shall never see one another again.”

“Oh, Mr. Ulick! Oh, Mr. Ulick!” She broke down, her thoughts filled with the terror of separation, and tears ran from her eyes. “Don’t say that. Don’t.”

“Yes. There is nothing half so sweet in life as love’s young dream, and it has been very sweet. Mary, although I’ve never said one word to you that I might not have addressed to your mother, I’m sure you have _guessed_. Now I came here to tell you the truth; I felt that before I went away, I must speak. I love you, Mary, and I know my own mind. I shall never forget you to my dying day. Yet we can never be anything to one another.”

Mary gazed at his face--white in the moonlight--and made a sudden shivering gesture, pierced with a sense of something tragic and irreparable. She moaned, “Oh, I wish I was dead, that I do.”

“Oh, no, don’t say that. You will have many happy years before you. Why, you are only sixteen. You will soon forget me, and it will be better for you.”

“If you can remember, so can I,” she answered proudly.

“It is hard lines, Mary. I wish I was just a labouring boy for your sake; but you know that unequal matches bring no luck. There is a barrier between us, like this pane of glass.”

“Yes, that’s true,” she murmured.

“Open the window, Mary,” he urged. “Just an inch.”

“Sure I can’t; it’s nailed fast! Are ye up at the Castle?”

“Up at the Castle they think I am in Queenstown. My mother was very rude to you, I’m afraid; she has a hot temper, poor woman, and she believes the Dorans are next door to royalty. She would like me to marry an earl’s daughter. I’ll never marry now, and I must go. God bless you. I wish I could shake you by the hand, but I won’t ask to come in----” He paused, and stared hard at her. “Mary, look here. Will you kiss me through the window? It won’t be a _real_ kiss, you know, but it will be something for me to carry away, and a sign you cared for me--here, just on this little star.”

As she nodded quickly, he bent his head, removed his cap, and pressed his lips on the pane. Mary too leant forward, and deliberately laid hers on the self-same spot. Then he stepped back and looked at her with misty eyes that said farewell. Suddenly he, with a vehement and pathetic gesture, waved his hand, and vanished.

Mary Foley spent the remainder of that unhappy night rocking to and fro and sobbing in a chair. Her heart was broken, she told herself--broken, broken, broken! What was the good of living at all, when she could never again lay an eye on Mr. Ulick, and Mr. Ulick loved her! Struggling through the eclipse of grief, that truth shone like a fixed star.

Meanwhile a light, active figure might be seen, running or walking by turns along a short cut which led to a junction over the hills nine miles away. Ulick Doran had to catch a mail train at one o’clock. If he missed it, he would forfeit his passage in the trooper lying at Queenstown, and be reported absent without leave.

He had dallied too long with his love, and now it became a race for his commission, and his career. In the still cool night he fancied he heard the train approaching miles away, the faint, muffled rumble becoming more and more distinct. He ran the last mile downhill at extraordinary speed, and dashed into the junction just as the signal was lowered, and the night mail to Cork came thundering over the points.

“It had been a narrow shave, and he had only just done it,” Ulick said to himself, as he sat in a corner of an empty smoking carriage. When the express moved on, he seemed every now and then to see Mary Foley’s beautiful wistful face gazing at him from the other side of the glass.

But no; it was a mirage--a mere mocking fancy! All that was visible through the clear pane, was the flying landscape, the high full moon, and the melancholy dark mountains of his native land.

END OF PART I