CHAPTER XI

NORTHWARD

“Says he to all belongin’ him, ‘Now happy may ye be! But I’m off to find me fortune,’ sure he says, says he.” MOIRA O’NEILL.

‟IS Mr. Linton in, Timsy?”

“He is, sir. Leastways, he’s out, down by the lough, and all of them with him.” The small boy looked up at Sir John O’Neill with more awe than he was wont to regard most people. “Will I get him for you, sir?”

“No—I’ll go down, myself. Is your father well, Timsy?”

“He does be splendid, sir,” said Timsy, his eye brightening. “Only they’ll be takin’ him back soon, to fight them ould Germans.”

“I expect Lord Kitchener can’t do without him,” said Sir John, confidentially. “Never mind,—we’ll have him back in Donegal altogether, before long, please goodness. And whisper, Timsy—when he comes back for good, he’ll have a splendid medal on his coat!” He patted the small boy on the head and left him speechless before a prospect so tremendous.

The Linton party was discovered by the well on the lough shore, where Wally was scratching the nose of the patient donkey and talking to him, as Norah said, as man to man. He had his back to the path down from the garden, and did not hear Sir John’s approach.

“If you’d come back to Australia with us, acushla machree,” he said, “I’d guarantee you the best of grass and you wouldn’t have any water to draw at, all.” The ass drooped his head lower, and appeared, not at all impressed by this dazzling future. “And Murty would love you, and Norah would ride you after cattle.” (“I would _not_!” from Norah.) “And you could tell the horses about Ireland, and we’d tie green ribbons round your neck on St. Patrick’s Day, and let you wave a green flag with a harp on it in your pearl-pale hand. Oh, lovely ass——!”

“Were you speaking to me?” asked Sir John, politely, near his ear; and Wally jumped, and joined in the laugh against himself.

“We’re twin-souls, this patient person and myself,” he explained. “I’ve found it out, and I’m trying to make the ass see it. Never mind, old chap; we’ll continue this profitable conversation when we are alone; unfeeling listeners only make you bashful.” He produced a carrot from his pocket, and the ass ate it, despondently.

“I’m awfully sorry to have interrupted your heart-to-heart talk; but the fact is, Mr. Linton, I’m simply bursting with an idea, and I had to hurry over and put it before you.” Sir John spoke eagerly, turning to Norah with a laugh. “Is it a good moment to approach him, Norah? I want him to promise to do something.”

“He ate a noble breakfast,” said Norah, gravely. “And he’s nearly finished his pipe. I should think the moment’s favourable. Anyway, it will have to be now, because I simply can’t wait to hear what it is!”

“You see, we know your ideas, O’Neill,” Mr. Linton said, laughing. “They generally combine a great deal of trouble for yourself with something quite new in the way of entertainment for us. This must be particularly outrageous, as you want me to promise beforehand. I think you had better make a clean breast of it.”

“Well, it’s this,” Sir John answered. “The weather is glorious, and the glass is high; it’s useless weather for fishing, and I think you have explored this neighbourhood pretty thoroughly. The motor holds six quite easily. What do you say to a trip north—a little tour, to last about a week?”

Subdued gasps came from Norah, Jim, and Wally. Mr. Linton laughed outright.

“What did I tell you?” he demanded.

“Not at all,” responded Sir John. “I think”—unblushingly—“that Con needs a change; and it would be an excellent way to give him one, if you would only be kind enough to help me. You surely wouldn’t refuse poor Con such a little thing!”

“I’ve re-cast a good many of my ideas about Ireland,” David Linton said. “But to utilize five people to take one chauffeur for a change is certainly what I was brought up to call an Irish way of doing things! Seriously, however, O’Neill, your proposal is a very tempting one. Shall we put it to the committee?”

“The committee says, ‘Carried _nem. con._’ I should say,” said Jim. “It would be simply top-hole. But isn’t it putting rather a strain on you and the motor?”

“Certainly not—as far as I am concerned, a run in sea-air is all I need to make me quite fit again,” O’Neill answered. “What do you say about it, Norah?”

“I’m speechless; and as for Wally, he’s leaning up against the ass for support,” said Norah, indicating Mr. Meadows, who grasped the hapless donkey fondly. “It’s the most glorious plan, Sir John; and it’s just like you, to think of it.”

O’Neill’s delicate face flushed with pleasure.

“You’re all such satisfactory people, because you’re never bored,” he said. “And then, you like Ireland, which makes everything delightful. Well, I thought we might have a look at Horn Head and Sheep Haven, Mr. Linton, and perhaps get across to The Rosses; or would you rather have no fixed plan, but just wander about, seeking what we may find? There are innumerable little bays and inlets up there, all rather fascinating; we should be between mountain and sea scenery, and the inns here and there are fairly good.”

“I think we will leave it entirely to you, so far as planning the route goes,” Mr. Linton answered. “You know the country, and we don’t; and as for us, any part of Ireland is good.”

“I vote for having no fixed plan at all,” Jim said. “It’s when you have no plans that the best things happen to you!”

“We’ll leave it at that, then,” said Sir John. “Can we start to-morrow?”

“We have only two weeks more leave,” said Jim. “So the sooner we go the better.”

“And you can be ready, Norah?”

“Me? Oh, certainly,” said Norah, who, Wally declared, was always ready at any time for anything.

“Then, I’ll be off,” Sir John declared. “I left Con hard at work on the car, giving her a thorough overhaul—we could not believe that you would be so hard-hearted as to refuse him the trip! But I have a good many things to see to, and I’ll have a busy day.”

“Could I help you?” Jim asked. “I’m handy at odd jobs.”

“Would you care to? I’ll be awfully glad of your company,” said Sir John warmly. They went off together, the boy’s great shoulders towering above O’Neill’s dwarfed form.

Jim did not return until late that night. Norah, just about to blow out her candle, heard his light step on the stair and called to him softly.

“Not asleep yet, kiddie?” Jim said, sitting down on the bed. “You should be; you’ll be tired to-morrow.”

“I’m all right,” said Norah, disregarding this friendly caution. “Jim, I packed your bag; and there’s a list of things just inside it, in case I made any mistakes.”

“Well, you are a brick!” said Jim, who was accustomed to stern independence, but, like most people, greatly appreciated a little spoiling now and then. “I was looking forward rather dismally to a midnight packing; O’Neill wants to get off quite early in the morning.”

“We guessed that was likely. Did you have a good day, Jim?”

“Quite. I don’t think I was any particular help to O’Neill; he found a few jobs for me, but I fancy he had to rack his brains for them. But we pottered about together all day, and had a very jolly time; he’s such fun when he’s in good form, and he was like a kid to-day. Made me laugh no end.” Jim pondered, beginning to unlace his boots. “I think it’s only when he is alone that those bitter fits get hold of him; and he just dreads being alone. That’s why he took me over, of course.”

“I thought so,” nodded Norah. “But I do think he’s happier than he was, Jim.”

“I believe he is. Well, we’ll try to keep him laughing for the next week or so, anyhow,” said Jim. “Now, you go to sleep, old kiddie.”

The fine weather held, making it easy to leave trout which would have nothing to do with them; and next day the motor took them away into bypaths of Ireland, with new beauty and new legend at every turn. They passed Gartan, and saw the birthplace of Saint Columba, a tiny stone cell with a curiously indented stone; and Columba’s ruined church of grey stone, roofless, and with almost-effaced carvings on its walls. Near it a tall, narrow stone stood crookedly—all that remained of a cross. The ground before it, hard as iron, was hollowed where the knees of thousands of pilgrims had knelt in prayer, and the stone itself was smooth from kisses that had been pressed upon it through century after century. Sir John knew many legends of the hot-tempered, fighting saint, whose warlike proclivities eventually led to his banishment from the Ireland he loved, to work and suffer home-sickness until Death came at last to release him.

“The emigrants pray to him specially, since he, too, knew what it meant to be lonely for Ireland,” Sir John said. “He was a worker: he wrote three hundred books and founded the same number of churches. So he came to be called Columcille—_cille_ meaning church. An O’Donnell he was: one of the old house. He made a famous copy of the Psalms, the disputed ownership of which caused the fight that led to his leaving Ireland: and this copy—it was called The Cathach, or Battler—was an heirloom in the O’Donnell family, who always carried it with them into battle, in a shrine. One hates to think of him, exiled, working, and longing for home. The first monastery he founded was near Derry; he was only a young man then, but long afterwards he wrote that the angels of God sang in every glade of Derry’s oaks. I always think one can see him in this queer little church—big and powerful, with the fighting face and toilworn hands.”

For a time they kept near the railway that creeps through the heart of Donegal: a quaint, narrow-gauge line where the trains saunter, forgetful of time. Its way runs through deep bogs, which made its construction no light matter, since solid foundation was in some places only found eighty feet below the surface, and great causeways, embankments, and viaducts had to be built to carry it. Sometimes, in contrast, the way had to be hewn through solid rock. On one hand lay wild and rugged mountains, with some fine dominating peaks: Muckish—“the hog’s back”—with its long, flattened ridge, changing from every angle of vision; and the great peak of Errigal, bare and glistening, the highest mountain in Donegal.

“It’s a great old peak,” said Sir John, looking at it affectionately. “You can see Scotland from the top—and all over Donegal, and southward to the Sligo and Galway hills.”

“How it glistens!” said Norah, watching the great cone as the motor went slowly along. “What makes it so white?”

“That’s white quartz; it gives it its name, ‘the silver mountain.’ It looks a single peak from here, but as we round it you’ll see that there are really two heads close together; there is a narrow ridge, with a track about a foot wide, connecting them. Some day, when you all come back to stay with me at Rathcullen, we must arrange an expedition for you to climb it.”

Their wandering way led them from the railway line, after a time; and they struck northward into lonely country of moors and bogs, dotted with tiny cabins from which blue turf-smoke curled lazily. Once they passed an old man riding a grey mare, with his wife perched behind him on a pillion, holding under her shawl a turkey in a sack, from the mouth of which protruded the head of the indignant bird, making loud protests. None of the women they met, whether young or old, wore hats: all had the heavy Irish shawl round head and shoulders,—and whether the face that looked from the folds were that of a withered old woman or a fresh and smiling colleen, somehow the shawl seemed the best setting that could have been devised for it.

Often, for miles and miles, they met no one and passed no habitation: or perhaps the loneliness of the way would be broken by a little thatched cabin, where ragged children ran to the doorway, to gaze, round-eyed, at the strangers. In one little town, however, a fair was in progress, and the cobbled street presented a lively spectacle. Men, women and children; asses, ridden and driven; horses, cattle, sheep, and pigs, and a few stray geese, mingled in loud-voiced confusion, while dogs slipped hither and thither, managing to intensify the urgency of any situation. To get the big Rolls-Royce through such a concourse was no easy task, and even with a people so good-humoured, a tactless driver would have achieved swift unpopularity. Sir John, however, was at the wheel himself, and he slowed down to a crawl, sounding the hooter occasionally, more in the manner of a gentle suggestion than anything else. His Irish accent was a shade more in evidence than usual as he exchanged greetings with the crowd.

“’Tis a fine season we’re having, thank God!”

“It is, your honour. G’wan now, Mary Kate; get the little ass out of the way of the mothor.”

“Ah, don’t be hurrying her. I have plenty of time.”

“Sure ye’d need it, your honour, the place is that throng.”

“And that’s a good sign; it’s a great fair you’re having!”

“Well indeed, sir, it is not bad, thank God!”

O’Neill swerved to avoid an old woman in an ass-cart, who was talking volubly to some neighbours, while the ass took its own direction among the crowd. Voices broke into swift upbraidings.

“Take a howld of the ass there, will you, Maria Cooney!”

“Oh, wirra, it’s desthroyed she’ll be!”

“She will not, but the great mothor!”

“Is it to scratch the beautiful paint ye would, with the cart!” cried a wrathful man hauling the ass aside bodily, while the unhappy Mrs. Cooney stammered out excuses that no one heard, and blinked feebly at the Rolls-Royce—which was pardonable, since she had never seen one before.

“God help us, ’tis the heighth of a house!”

“I’m sorry to disturb you, ma’am,” said O’Neill, smiling at her distressed face. The crowd broke into smiles in answer.

“’Tis not like the Englishman he is—the one that galloped his machine over Ellen Clancy’s gander, an’ he goin’ to Rosapenna!” shrilled a voice.

“Watch him now—and the bonnivs under the wheels of him!”—as a drove of fat pink pigs broke through the crowd, scattered, in the infuriating manner peculiar to pigs, and resisted all efforts to collect them out of harm’s way. Their owner, a lean, black-whiskered man, lifted up his voice and bewailed them.

“Yerra, he have them thrampled! No—aisy, sir, just a moment, till I get at him with a stick. That one do be always in the wrong place.” He hauled a pig bodily from beneath the car, retaining it by one leg, while it drowned any other remarks with its shrieks, and its companions scattered through the crowd, pursued hotly by the dogs.

“Sorry—I ought not to bring a motor through a fair,” said O’Neill, willing to concede the right to the road to the “bonnivs.”

“An’ why wouldn’t you?” said their owner, cheerfully. “Many’s the time I’d not so much as the one left to me when I’d brang ’em through, an’ I scourin’ every boreen after them. Let you go on, sir—it’s all right.”

The motor wormed its way along. When the crowd grew less congested, O’Neill ventured to increase the speed. Just as he did so, a small child, escaping from its mother, who was driving a wordy bargain over a matter of geese, toddled into the road in pursuit of a fat puppy; and having caught it, sat down suddenly, right in the path of the motor.

A girl shrieked, and O’Neill wrenched the car to a standstill, the bonnet not two yards from the baby. Jim was out in the road in a flash, and picked up the urchin, who showed considerable annoyance at the escape of the puppy, but was otherwise quite unmoved, and accepted a penny with a composure worthy of a duke. The crowd collected anew with unbelievable swiftness, and O’Neill groaned.

“’Tis Maggie O’Hare’s baby. Woman, dear, where are ye? an’ he after being nearly kilt on ye?”

“Did ye see his honour pull up? An ass wouldn’t have done it, an’ he dhrawin’ a cart!”

“I seen him sit down in the road, in-under the mothor, an’ I knew he was dead, only I’d not time to let a bawl out of me!”

“Is it dead? Sure, look at him, an’ the big gentleman carryin’ him, no less!”

“Grinning he is, the way you’d say he was the best boy in Ireland. Ah, that’s the dotey wee thing!”

“Sure, that one has no fear at all. _He_’ll be the boy for the trenches!”

At this point Maggie O’Hare arrived breathlessly, having just become aware of her son’s peril—with some difficulty, owing to six of her friends having excitedly explained the matter together. To an unprejudiced onlooker, it would have seemed that her principal maternal emotion was horror at finding her offspring perched on Jim’s shoulder.

“Come down out of that, Micky—have behaviour, now, an’ don’t be throublin’ the gentleman! Put him down, sir—I’d not have you annoyed with him.” She received Micky with much apparent wrath, but her arms were tight round the little body. “Isn’t it the rascal he is!—an’ I but lettin’ him out of me hand that minute, the way I’d be feedin’ the goose!”

In England, Jim had learned to give tips; and for a moment his hand sought his pocket. Fortunately, he checked the impulse in time. The woman’s eyes met his with the good breeding that lends something of dignity to the poorest Irish peasant.

“He’s a great boy,” he said, in his pleasant voice. “Not a bit of fear in him—have you, Micky?” He lifted his cap, and said “Good-bye,” striding back to the motor. They moved on, slowly, leaving the little town seething behind them.

“It isn’t altogether without incident to drive through a fair!” said O’Neill, dreamily.

Towards evening they came to their halting-place for the night—a grey village, nestling among brown hills.

“The inn used to be very fair, but one can’t guarantee anything in war-time,” Sir John remarked. “Of course it isn’t big enough to suffer from the complaint that suddenly affected all the important hotels—the hurried departure of French cooks and German waiters. Many hotel-keepers will speak until the end of their lives, with tears in their voices, about the awful day when Henri and Gaston, and Fritz and Karl, the props of their establishment, dropped their aprons and fled to their respective Fatherlands. You can’t convince those hotel-keepers that they do not know all about the horrors of war!”

“This little place doesn’t suggest imported cooks and waiters,” said Mr. Linton.

“No, as I remember it, the landlady was the cook, and her daughter the housemaid; and a nondescript gentleman of the ‘odd-boy’ type doubled the parts of boots, barkeeper, groom, and waiter, with any other varieties of usefulness that might be demanded of him. And there he is still, by the same token, bringing in a load of turf.” Sir John indicated a wiry little man leading a shambling old black horse bearing two creels slung across his back, piled high with sods. He turned into the back gateway of the inn as they drew up at the front door; and, hearing the motor, cast a glance over his shoulder, realized the presence of guests, and administered a sounding slap on the black horse’s quarter, disappearing hurriedly. They heard his voice, shrilly summoning the unseen.

“Is himself within?—let ye hurry! There’s a pack of gentry at the door, in a mothor-car!” And a voice yet more shrill:

“Wirra! An’ me fire black out—an’ what in the world, at all, ’ll I give ’em for their dinners!”

They made acquaintance with the problem a little later when, hungry and cheerful, they gathered in the long, low dining-room, where last year’s heather and ling filled the fireless grate. The “odd-boy,” cleansed beyond belief, awaited them.

“What can we have for dinner?” O’Neill inquired.

“Is it dinner? Sure, anything you’d fancy, sir,” said the “odd-boy,” with a nervous briskness that somehow induced disbelief.

“H’m,” said Sir John, remembering the cry of woe that had floated through the air, earlier. “Chops or steaks?”

The “odd-boy” shifted from one foot to the other.

“I’m afeard there’s none in the house, sir,” he said. “’Tis the way the butcher——”

“Oh well—cold meat,” O’Neill said, cutting short the butcher’s iniquities.

“Yes, sir—certainly, sir!” said the “odd boy,” and disappeared. There was an interval during which the party admired the view and endeavoured to repress the pangs of hunger. Finally the messenger reappeared.

“I’m sorry, sir,” he said, nervously. “Cold meat is off, they do be tellin’ me.”

“Well, what can we have?” O’Neill said, losing the finer edge of his patience.

The “odd-boy” grew confidential.

“’Tis this way, sir,” he said. “The fair was yesterday: an’ them cattle-jobbers have us ate out of the house. So there’s just three things ye can have, sir: an’ the first eggs; an’ the second’s bacon; and third is eggs and bacon. An’ ye can have your choice-thing of them three!”