Part 2
_Bartley:_ (_With a deep sigh, and shaking his head slowly._) Where is he, indeed?
_Magistrate:_ What have you to tell?
_Bartley:_ It is where he was this morning, standing in this spot, singing his share of songs--no, but lighting his pipe--scraping a match on the sole of his shoe----
_Magistrate:_ I ask you, for the third time, where is he?
_Bartley:_ I wouldn't like to say that. It is a great mystery, and it is hard to say of any man, did he earn hatred or love.
_Magistrate:_ Tell me all you know.
_Bartley:_ All that I know--Well, there are the three estates; there is Limbo, and there is Purgatory, and there is----
_Magistrate:_ Nonsense! This is trifling! Get to the point.
_Bartley:_ Maybe you don't hold with the clergy so? That is the teaching of the clergy. Maybe you hold with the old people. It is what they do be saying, that the shadow goes wandering, and the soul is tired, and the body is taking a rest--The shadow! (_Starts up._) I was nearly sure I saw Jack Smith not ten minutes ago at the corner of the forge, and I lost him again--Was it his ghost I saw, do you think?
_Magistrate:_ (_To policeman._) Conscience-struck! He will confess all now!
_Bartley:_ His ghost to come before me! It is likely it was on account of the fork! I to have it and he to have no way to defend himself the time he met with his death!
_Magistrate:_ (_To policeman._) I must note down his words. (_Takes out notebook._) (_To Bartley:_) I warn you that your words are being noted.
_Bartley:_ If I had ha' run faster in the beginning, this terror would not be on me at the latter end! Maybe he will cast it up against me at the day of judgment--I wouldn't wonder at all at that.
_Magistrate:_ (_Writing._) At the day of judgment----
_Bartley:_ It was soon for his ghost to appear to me--is it coming after me always by day it will be, and stripping the clothes off in the night time?--I wouldn't wonder at all at that, being as I am an unfortunate man!
_Magistrate:_ (_Sternly._) Tell me this truly. What was the motive of this crime?
_Bartley:_ The motive, is it?
_Magistrate:_ Yes; the motive; the cause.
_Bartley:_ I'd sooner not say that.
_Magistrate:_ You had better tell me truly. Was it money?
_Bartley:_ Not at all! What did poor Jack Smith ever have in his pockets unless it might be his hands that would be in them?
_Magistrate:_ Any dispute about land?
_Bartley:_ (_Indignantly._) Not at all! He never was a grabber or grabbed from any one!
_Magistrate:_ You will find it better for you if you tell me at once.
_Bartley:_ I tell you I wouldn't for the whole world wish to say what it was--it is a thing I would not like to be talking about.
_Magistrate:_ There is no use in hiding it. It will be discovered in the end.
_Bartley:_ Well, I suppose it will, seeing that mostly everybody knows it before. Whisper here now. I will tell no lie; where would be the use? (_Puts his hand to his mouth, and Magistrate stoops._) Don't be putting the blame on the parish, for such a thing was never done in the parish before--it was done for the sake of Kitty Keary, Jack Smith's wife.
_Magistrate:_ (_To policeman._) Put on the handcuffs. We have been saved some trouble. I knew he would confess if taken in the right way.
(_Policeman puts on handcuffs_.)
_Bartley:_ Handcuffs now! Glory be! I always said, if there was ever any misfortune coming to this place it was on myself it would fall. I to be in handcuffs! There's no wonder at all in that.
(_Enter Mrs. Fallon, followed by the rest. She is looking back at them as she speaks._)
_Mrs. Fallon:_ Telling lies the whole of the people of this town are; telling lies, telling lies as fast as a dog will trot! Speaking against my poor respectable man! Saying he made an end of Jack Smith! My decent comrade! There is no better man and no kinder man in the whole of the five parishes! It's little annoyance he ever gave to any one! (_Turns and sees him._) What in the earthly world do I see before me? Bartley Fallon in charge of the police! Handcuffs on him! O Bartley, what did you do at all at all?
_Bartley:_ O Mary, there has a great misfortune come upon me! It is what I always said, that if there is ever any misfortune----
_Mrs. Fallon:_ What did he do at all, or is it bewitched I am?
_Magistrate:_ This man has been arrested on a charge of murder.
_Mrs. Fallon:_ Whose charge is that? Don't believe them! They are all liars in this place! Give me back my man!
_Magistrate_. It is natural you should take his part, but you have no cause of complaint against your neighbours. He has been arrested for the murder of John Smith, on his own confession.
_Mrs. Fallon:_ The saints of heaven protect us! And what did he want killing Jack Smith?
_Magistrate:_ It is best you should know all. He did it on account of a love affair with the murdered man's wife.
_Mrs. Fallon:_ (_Sitting down._) With Jack Smith's wife! With Kitty Keary!--Ochone, the traitor!
_The Crowd:_ A great shame, indeed. He is a traitor, indeed.
_Mrs. Tully:_ To America he was bringing her, Mrs. Fallon.
_Bartley:_ What are you saying, Mary? I tell you----
_Mrs. Fallon:_ Don't say a word! I won't listen to any word you'll say! (_Stops her ears._) O, isn't he the treacherous villain? Ohone go deo!
_Bartley:_ Be quiet till I speak! Listen to what I say!
_Mrs. Fallon:_ Sitting beside me on the ass car coming to the town, so quiet and so respectable, and treachery like that in his heart!
_Bartley:_ Is it your wits you have lost or is it I myself that have lost my wits?
_Mrs. Fallon:_ And it's hard I earned you, slaving, slaving--and you grumbling, and sighing, and coughing, and discontented, and the priest wore out anointing you, with all the times you threatened to die!
_Bartley:_ Let you be quiet till I tell you!
_Mrs. Fallon:_ You to bring such a disgrace into the parish. A thing that was never heard of before!
_Bartley:_ Will you shut your mouth and hear me speaking?
_Mrs. Fallon:_ And if it was for any sort of a fine handsome woman, but for a little fistful of a woman like Kitty Keary, that's not four feet high hardly, and not three teeth in her head unless she got new ones! May God reward you, Bartley Fallon, for the black treachery in your heart and the wickedness in your mind, and the red blood of poor Jack Smith that is wet upon your hand! (_Voice of Jack Smith heard singing._)
The sea shall be dry, The earth under mourning and ban! Then loud shall he cry For the wife of the red-haired man!
_Bartley:_ It's Jack Smith's voice--I never knew a ghost to sing before----. It is after myself and the fork he is coming! (_Goes back. Enter Jack Smith._) Let one of you give him the fork and I will be clear of him now and for eternity!
_Mrs. Tarpey:_ The Lord have mercy on us! Red Jack Smith! The man that was going to be waked!
_James Ryan:_ Is it back from the grave you are come?
_Shawn Early:_ Is it alive you are, or is it dead you are?
_Tim Casey:_ Is it yourself at all that's in it?
_Mrs. Tully:_ Is it letting on you were to be dead?
_Mrs. Fallon:_ Dead or alive, let you stop Kitty Keary, your wife, from bringing my man away with her to America!
_Jack Smith:_ It is what I think, the wits are gone astray on the whole of you. What would my wife want bringing Bartley Fallon to America?
_Mrs. Fallon:_ To leave yourself, and to get quit of you she wants, Jack Smith, and to bring him away from myself. That's what the two of them had settled together.
_Jack Smith:_ I'll break the head of any man that says that! Who is it says it? (_To Tim Casey:_) Was it you said it? (_To Shawn Early:_) Was it you?
_All together:_ (_Backing and shaking their heads._) It wasn't I said it!
_Jack Smith:_ Tell me the name of any man that said it!
_All together:_ (_Pointing to Bartley._) It was _him_ that said it!
_Jack Smith:_ Let me at him till I break his head!
(_Bartley backs in terror. Neighbours hold Jack Smith back._)
_Jack Smith:_ (_Trying to free himself._) Let me at him! Isn't he the pleasant sort of a scarecrow for any woman to be crossing the ocean with! It's back from the docks of New York he'd be turned (_trying to rush at him again_), with a lie in his mouth and treachery in his heart, and another man's wife by his side, and he passing her off as his own! Let me at him can't you.
(_Makes another rush, but is held back._)
_Magistrate:_ (_Pointing to Jack Smith._) Policeman, put the handcuffs on this man. I see it all now. A case of false impersonation, a conspiracy to defeat the ends of justice. There was a case in the Andaman Islands, a murderer of the Mopsa tribe, a religious enthusiast----
_Policeman:_ So he might be, too.
_Magistrate:_ We must take both these men to the scene of the murder. We must confront them with the body of the real Jack Smith.
_Jack Smith:_ I'll break the head of any man that will find my dead body!
_Magistrate:_ I'll call more help from the barracks. (_Blows Policeman's whistle._)
_Bartley:_ It is what I am thinking, if myself and Jack Smith are put together in the one cell for the night, the handcuffs will be taken off him, and his hands will be free, and murder will be done that time surely!
_Magistrate:_ Come on! (_They turn to the right._)
HYACINTH HALVEY
PERSONS
_Hyacinth Halvey._ _James Quirke, a butcher._ _Fardy Farrell, a telegraph boy._ _Sergeant Carden._ _Mrs. Delane, Postmistress at Cloon._ _Miss Joyce, the Priest's House-keeper._
HYACINTH HALVEY
_Scene: Outside the Post Office at the little town of Cloon. Mrs. Delane at Post Office door. Mr. Quirke sitting on a chair at butcher's door. A dead sheep hanging beside it, and a thrush in a cage above. Fardy Farrell playing on a mouth organ. Train whistle heard._
_Mrs. Delane:_ There is the four o'clock train, Mr. Quirke.
_Mr. Quirke:_ Is it now, Mrs. Delane, and I not long after rising? It makes a man drowsy to be doing the half of his work in the night time. Going about the country, looking for little stags of sheep, striving to knock a few shillings together. That contract for the soldiers gives me a great deal to attend to.
_Mrs. Delane:_ I suppose so. It's hard enough on myself to be down ready for the mail car in the morning, sorting letters in the half dark. It's often I haven't time to look who are the letters from--or the cards.
_Mr. Quirke:_ It would be a pity you not to know any little news might be knocking about. If you did not have information of what is going on who should have it? Was it you, ma'am, was telling me that the new Sub-Sanitary Inspector would be arriving to-day?
_Mrs. Delane:_ To-day it is he is coming, and it's likely he was in that train. There was a card about him to Sergeant Carden this morning.
_Mr. Quirke:_ A young chap from Carrow they were saying he was.
_Mrs. Delane:_ So he is, one Hyacinth Halvey; and indeed if all that is said of him is true, or if a quarter of it is true, he will be a credit to this town.
_Mr. Quirke:_ Is that so?
_Mrs. Delane:_ Testimonials he has by the score. To Father Gregan they were sent. Registered they were coming and going. Would you believe me telling you that they weighed up to three pounds?
_Mr. Quirke:_ There must be great bulk in them indeed.
_Mrs. Delane:_ It is no wonder he to get the job. He must have a great character so many persons to write for him as what there did.
_Fardy:_ It would be a great thing to have a character like that.
_Mrs. Delane:_ Indeed I am thinking it will be long before you will get the like of it, Fardy Farrell.
_Fardy:_ If I had the like of that of a character it is not here carrying messages I would be. It's in Noonan's Hotel I would be, driving cars.
_Mr. Quirke:_ Here is the priest's housekeeper coming.
_Mrs. Delane:_ So she is; and there is the Sergeant a little while after her.
(_Enter Miss Joyce._)
_Mrs. Delane:_ Good-evening to you, Miss Joyce. What way is his Reverence to-day? Did he get any ease from the cough?
_Miss Joyce:_ He did not indeed, Mrs. Delane. He has it sticking to him yet. Smothering he is in the night time. The most thing he comes short in is the voice.
_Mrs. Delane:_ I am sorry, now, to hear that. He should mind himself well.
_Miss Joyce:_ It's easy to say let him mind himself. What do you say to him going to the meeting to-night? (_Sergeant comes in._) It's for his Reverence's _Freeman_ I am come, Mrs. Delane.
_Mrs. Delane:_ Here it is ready. I was just throwing an eye on it to see was there any news. Good-evening, Sergeant.
_Sergeant:_ (_Holding up a placard._) I brought this notice, Mrs. Delane, the announcement of the meeting to be held to-night in the Courthouse. You might put it up here convenient to the window. I hope you are coming to it yourself?
_Mrs. Delane:_ I will come, and welcome. I would do more than that for you, Sergeant.
_Sergeant:_ And you, Mr. Quirke.
_Mr. Quirke:_ I'll come, to be sure. I forget what's this the meeting is about.
_Sergeant:_ The Department of Agriculture is sending round a lecturer in furtherance of the moral development of the rural classes. (_Reads._) "A lecture will be given this evening in Cloon Courthouse, illustrated by magic lantern slides--" Those will not be in it; I am informed they were all broken in the first journey, the railway company taking them to be eggs. The subject of the lecture is "The Building of Character."
_Mrs. Delane:_ Very nice, indeed. I knew a girl lost her character, and she washed her feet in a blessed well after, and it dried up on the minute.
_Sergeant:_ The arrangements have all been left to me, the Archdeacon being away. He knows I have a good intellect for things of the sort. But the loss of those slides puts a man out. The thing people will not see it is not likely it is the thing they will believe. I saw what they call tableaux--standing pictures, you know--one time in Dundrum----
_Mrs. Delane:_ Miss Joyce was saying Father Gregan is supporting you.
_Sergeant:_ I am accepting his assistance. No bigotry about me when there is a question of the welfare of any fellow-creatures. Orange and green will stand together to-night. I myself and the station-master on the one side; your parish priest in the chair.
_Miss Joyce:_ If his Reverence would mind me he would not quit the house to-night. He is no more fit to go speak at a meeting than (_pointing to the one hanging outside Quirke's door_) that sheep.
_Sergeant:_ I am willing to take the responsibility. He will have no speaking to do at all, unless it might be to bid them give the lecturer a hearing. The loss of those slides now is a great annoyance to me--and no time for anything. The lecturer will be coming by the next train.
_Miss Joyce:_ Who is this coming up the street, Mrs. Delane?
_Mrs. Delane:_ I wouldn't doubt it to be the new Sub-Sanitary Inspector. Was I telling you of the weight of the testimonials he got, Miss Joyce?
_Miss Joyce:_ Sure I heard the curate reading them to his Reverence. He must be a wonder for principles.
_Mrs. Delane:_ Indeed it is what I was saying to myself, he must be a very saintly young man.
(_Enter Hyacinth Halvey. He carries a small bag and a large brown paper parcel. He stops and nods bashfully._)
_Hyacinth:_ Good-evening to you. I was bid to come to the post office----
_Sergeant:_ I suppose you are Hyacinth Halvey? I had a letter about you from the Resident Magistrate.
_Hyacinth:_ I heard he was writing. It was my mother got a friend he deals with to ask him.
_Sergeant:_ He gives you a very high character.
_Hyacinth:_ It is very kind of him indeed, and he not knowing me at all. But indeed all the neighbours were very friendly. Anything any one could do to help me they did it.
_Mrs. Delane:_ I'll engage it is the testimonals you have in your parcel? I know the wrapping paper, but they grew in bulk since I handled them.
_Hyacinth:_ Indeed I was getting them to the last. There was not one refused me. It is what my mother was saying, a good character is no burden.
_Fardy:_ I would believe that indeed.
_Sergeant:_ Let us have a look at the testimonials.
(_Hyacinth Halvey opens parcel, and a large number of envelopes fall out._)
_Sergeant:_ (_Opening and reading one by one_). "He possesses the fire of the Gael, the strength of the Norman, the vigour of the Dane, the stolidity of the Saxon"----
_Hyacinth:_ It was the Chairman of the Poor Law Guardians wrote that.
_Sergeant:_ "A magnificent example to old and young"----
_Hyacinth:_ That was the Secretary of the DeWet Hurling Club----
_Sergeant:_ "A shining example of the value conferred by an eminently careful and high class education"----
_Hyacinth:_ That was the National Schoolmaster.
_Sergeant:_ "Devoted to the highest ideals of his Mother-land to such an extent as is compatible with a hitherto non-parliamentary career"----
_Hyacinth:_ That was the Member for Carrow.
_Sergeant:_ "A splendid exponent of the purity of the race"----
_Hyacinth:_ The Editor of the _Carrow Champion_.
_Sergeant:_ "Admirably adapted for the efficient discharge of all possible duties that may in future be laid upon him"----
_Hyacinth:_ The new Station-master.
_Sergeant:_ "A champion of every cause that can legitimately benefit his fellow-creatures"---- Why, look here, my man, you are the very one to come to our assistance to-night.
_Hyacinth:_ I would be glad to do that. What way can I do it?
_Sergeant:_ You are a newcomer--your example would carry weight--you must stand up as a living proof of the beneficial effect of a high character, moral fibre, temperance--there is something about it here I am sure--(_Looks._) I am sure I saw "unparalleled temperance" in some place----
_Hyacinth:_ It was my mother's cousin wrote that--I am no drinker, but I haven't the pledge taken----
_Sergeant:_ You might take it for the purpose.
_Mr. Quirke:_ (_Eagerly._) Here is an anti-treating button. I was made a present of it by one of my customers--I'll give it to you (_sticks it in Hyacinth's coat_) and welcome.
_Sergeant:_ That is it. You can wear the button on the platform--or a bit of blue ribbon--hundreds will follow your example--I know the boys from the Workhouse will----
_Hyacinth:_ I am in no way wishful to be an example----
_Sergeant:_ I will read extracts from the testimonials. "There he is," I will say, "an example of one in early life who by his own unaided efforts and his high character has obtained a profitable situation"--(_Slaps his side._) I know what I'll do. I'll engage a few corner-boys from Noonan's bar, just as they are, greasy and sodden, to stand in a group--there will be the contrast--The sight will deter others from a similar fate--That's the way to do a tableau--I knew I could turn out a success.
_Hyacinth:_ I wouldn't like to be a contrast---
_Sergeant:_ (_Puts testimonials in his pocket._) I will go now and engage those lads--sixpence each, and well worth it--Nothing like an example for the rural classes.
(_Goes off, Hyacinth feebly trying to detain him._)
_Mrs. Delane:_ A very nice man indeed. A little high up in himself, may be. I'm not one that blames the police. Sure they have their own bread to earn like every other one. And indeed it is often they will let a thing pass.
_Mr. Quirke:_ (_Gloomily._) Sometimes they will, and more times they will not.
_Miss Joyce:_ And where will you be finding a lodging, Mr. Halvey?
_Hyacinth:_ I was going to ask that myself, ma'am. I don't know the town.
_Miss Joyce:_ I know of a good lodging, but it is only a very good man would be taken into it.
_Mrs. Delane:_ Sure there could be no objection there to Mr. Halvey. There is no appearance on him but what is good, and the Sergeant after taking him up the way he is doing.
_Miss Joyce:_ You will be near to the Sergeant in the lodging I speak of. The house is convenient to the barracks.
_Hyacinth:_ (_Doubtfully._) To the barracks?
_Miss Joyce:_ Alongside of it and the barrack yard behind. And that's not all. It is opposite to the priest's house.
_Hyacinth:_ Opposite, is it?
_Miss Joyce:_ A very respectable place, indeed, and a very clean room you will get. I know it well. The curate can see into it from his window.
_Hyacinth:_ Can he now?
_Fardy:_ There was a good many, I am thinking, went into that lodging and left it after.
_Miss Joyce:_ (_Sharply._) It is a lodging you will never be let into or let stop in, Fardy. If they did go they were a good riddance.
_Fardy:_ John Hart, the plumber, left it----
_Miss Joyce:_ If he did it was because he dared not pass the police coming in, as he used, with a rabbit he was after snaring in his hand.
_Fardy:_ The schoolmaster himself left it.
_Miss Joyce:_ He needn't have left it if he hadn't taken to card-playing. What way could you say your prayers, and shadows shuffling and dealing before you on the blind?
_Hyacinth:_ I think maybe I'd best look around a bit before I'll settle in a lodging----
_Miss Joyce:_ Not at all. _You_ won't be wanting to pull down the blind.
_Mrs. Delane:_ It is not likely _you_ will be snaring rabbits.
_Miss Joyce:_ Or bringing in a bottle and taking an odd glass the way James Kelly did.
_Mrs. Delane:_ Or writing threatening notices, and the police taking a view of you from the rear.
_Miss Joyce:_ Or going to roadside dances, or running after good-for-nothing young girls----
_Hyacinth:_ I give you my word I'm not so harmless as you think.
_Mrs. Delane:_ Would you be putting a lie on these, Mr. Halvey? (_Touching testimonials._) I know well the way you will be spending the evenings, writing letters to your relations----
_Miss Joyce:_ Learning O'Growney's exercises----
_Mrs. Delane:_ Sticking post cards in an album for the convent bazaar.
_Miss Joyce:_ Reading the _Catholic Young Man_----
_Mrs. Delane:_ Playing the melodies on a melodeon----
_Miss Joyce:_ Looking at the pictures in the _Lives of the Saints_. I'll hurry on and engage the room for you.
_Hyacinth:_ Wait. Wait a minute----
_Miss Joyce:_ No trouble at all. I told you it was just opposite. (_Goes._)
_Mr. Quirke:_ I suppose I must go upstairs and ready myself for the meeting. If it wasn't for the contract I have for the soldiers' barracks and the Sergeant's good word, I wouldn't go anear it. (_Goes into shop._)
_Mrs. Delane:_ I should be making myself ready too. I must be in good time to see you being made an example of, Mr. Halvey. It is I myself was the first to say it; you will be a credit to the town. (_Goes._)
_Hyacinth:_ (_In a tone of agony._) I wish I had never seen Cloon.
_Fardy:_ What is on you?
_Hyacinth:_ I wish I had never left Carrow. I wish I had been drowned the first day I thought of it, and I'd be better off.
_Fardy:_ What is it ails you?
_Hyacinth:_ I wouldn't for the best pound ever I had be in this place to-day.
_Fardy:_ I don't know what you are talking about.
_Hyacinth:_ To have left Carrow, if it was a poor place, where I had my comrades, and an odd spree, and a game of cards--and a coursing match coming on, and I promised a new greyhound from the city of Cork. I'll die in this place, the way I am. I'll be too much closed in.
_Fardy:_ Sure it mightn't be as bad as what you think.
_Hyacinth:_ Will you tell me, I ask you, what way can I undo it?
_Fardy:_ What is it you are wanting to undo?
_Hyacinth:_ Will you tell me what way can I get rid of my character?
_Fardy:_ To get rid of it, is it?
_Hyacinth:_ That is what I said. Aren't you after hearing the great character they are after putting on me?
_Fardy:_ That is a good thing to have.
_Hyacinth:_ It is not. It's the worst in the world. If I hadn't it, I wouldn't be like a prize mangold at a show with every person praising me.
_Fardy:_ If I had it, I wouldn't be like a head in a barrel, with every person making hits at me.
_Hyacinth:_ If I hadn't it, I wouldn't be shoved into a room with all the clergy watching me and the police in the back yard.