Part 6

The Saints were wid us; in half an hour we had him as wet as an eel, and broke the bottle of ody-koloney over his back.

He was clane mad. "God save us all when he gets that chain off him!" I says. "God save us it is!" says Mikeen, looking around for a tree to shin.

Just at the minut we heard a great screechin' o' dogs, and through the fence comes the harrier pack that the Reserve orficers kept in the camp beyond. ("Harriers" they called them, but, begob! there wasn't anythin' they wouldn't hunt from a fox to a turkey, those ones.)

"What are they afther chasin'?" says Mikeen.

"'Tis a stag to-day, be the newspapers," I says, "but the dear knows they'll not cotch him this month, be must be gone by this half-hour, and the breath is from them, their tongues is hangin' out a yard," I says.

'Twas at that moment the Blessed Saints gave me wisdom.

"Mikeen," I says, "drag the mascot out before them; we'll see sport this day."

"Herself----" he begins.

"Hoult your whisht," says I, "and come on." With that we dragged me bowld goat out before the dogs and let go the chain.

The dogs sniffed up the strong blast of ody-koloney and let a yowl out of them like all the banshees in the nation of Ireland, and the billy legged it for his life--small blame to him!

Meself and Mikeen climbed a double to see the sport.

"They have him," says Mikeen. "They have not," says I; "the crature howlds them by two lengths."

"He has doubled on them," says Mikeen; "he is as sly as a Jew."

"He is forninst the rabbit holes now," I says. "I thank the howly Saints he cannot burrow."

"He has tripped up--they have him bayed," says Mikeen.

And that was the mortal truth, the dogs had him.

Oh, but it was a bowld billy! He went in among those hounds like a lad to a fair, you could hear his horns lambastin' their ribs a mile away. But they were too many for him and bit the grand silky hair off him by the mouthful. The way it flew you'd think it was a snowstorm.

"They have him desthroyed," says Mikeen.

"They have," says I, "God be praised!"

At the moment the huntsman leps his harse up on the double beside us; he was phlastered with muck from his hair to his boots.

"What have they out there?" says he, blinkin' through the mud and not knowin' rightly what his hounds were coursin' out before him, whether it would be a stag or a Bengal tiger.

"'Tis her ladyship's Rile Imperial Mascot Goat," says I; "an' God save your honour, for she'll have your blood in a bottle for this day's worrk."

The huntsman lets a curse out of his stummick and rides afther them, flat on his saddle, both spurs tearin'. In the wink of an eye he is down among the dogs, larrupin' them with his whip and drawin' down curses on them that would wither ye to hear him--he had great eddication, that orficer.

"Come now," says I to Mikeen, the poor lad, "let you and me bear the cowld corpse of the diseased back to Herself, mebbe she'll have a shillin' handy in her hand, the way she'd reward us for saving the body from the dogs," says I.

But was me bowld mascot dead? He was not. He was alive and well, the thickness of his wool had saved him. For all that he had not a hair of it left to him, and when he stood up before you, you wouldn't know him; he was that ordinary without his fleece, he was no more than a common poor man's goat, he was no more to look at than a skinned rabbit, and that's the truth.

He walked home with meself and Mikeen as meek as a young gerrl.

Herself came runnin' out, all fluttery, to look at him.

"Ah, but that's not my mascot," she says.

"It is, Marm," says I; and I swore to it by the whole Calendar--Mikeen too.

"Bah! how disgustin'. Take it to the cowhouse," says she, and stepped indoors without another word.

We led the billy away, him hangin' his head for shame at his nakedness.

"Ye'll do no more mascotin' avic," says I to him. "Sorra luck you would bring to a blind beggar-man the way you are now--you'll never step along again with the drums and tambourines."

And that was the true word, for though Herself had Mikeen rubbing him daily with bear's grease and hair lotion he never grew the same grand fleece again, and he'd stand about in the backfield, brooding for hours together, the divilment clane gone out of his system; and if, mebbe, you'd draw the stroke of an ash-plant across his ribs to hearten him, he'd only just look at you, sad-like and pass no remarks.

XIX

WAR VEGETATION

'Tis her ladyship up at the Castle that has the War at heart; 'tis no laughin' matter wid her.

She came back from England wid the grandest modern notions for conductin' the war in the home that ever ye'd see, an' a foreign domestic maid she had hired in London.

"'Tis a poor Belgium refuge she is, Delaney," says Herself to meself. "In the home she is afther lavin' there is nothing left standin' but the wine-cellar, an' that full o' German Huns--she is wet wid weepin' yet," says Herself; "so be kind to her, for we must help our brave Allies."

So the Belgium refuge walks into the Castle an' becomes lady's maid. A fine, upstandin' colleen it is, too, by the same token, wid notions in dhress that turned all the counthry gurrls contemptjous wid envy, an' a hat on the head of her that was like a conservatory for the flowers that was in it. But did Herself's war work stop at adoptin' our brave Alice? It did not. She gave the young ladies of the high nobility a powerful organisin', an' they'd be in at Ballydrogeen every day o' the week sellin' Frinch, Eyetalian, Rooshan, an' Japan flags an' makin' a mint o' money at it. The lads that would be comin' into Ballydrogeen Fair to do a bit of hand slappin' over a pig, an' mebbe taste a tageen wid the luckpenny, would dishcover themselves goin' home in the ass cart, pig an' all, sober as stones an' plasthered thick wid flags the way you'd think they'd be the winnin' boat at Galway Regatta. For 'tis a bould bouchal will stand up to the young ladies of the high nobility whin they have their best dhresses on an' do be prancin' up to ye, the smiles an' blarney dhrippin' from them like golden syrup, wid their "Oh, Mickey, how is your dear darlint baby? Have ye not the least little shillin' for me, thin?" or their "Good day to ye, Terry Ryan; I'm all in love wid that bay colt ye have, an' I will plague my Da into his grave until he buys him for me. Will ye not have a small triflin' flag from me, Terry Ryan?"

But did Herself's war work stop at flag selling? It did not. Wan mornin' she comes steppin' down the garden as elegant as a champion hackney, holdin' her skirts high out of the wet.

"Is that you, Delaney?" says she.

"It is, your ladyship," says I, crawlin' out from behindt the swate pays.

"Listen to me," says she. "Thim flowers is nothin' but a luxury these days. I'll have nothin' but war vigitables in my garden."

Says I, "Beggin' your pardon, but phwat may they be?" She was puzzled for a moment, an' stands there scratchin' her ear as ye might say.

"Oh, jist ordinary vigitables, only grown under war conditions," says she at length. "At anny rate I'll have no flowers, so desthroy thim entirely, an' grow vigitables in their place--d'you understand?" says she.

"I do, your ladyship," says I.

I wint within to tell Anne Toher, the cook. "Herself is for desthroyin' the flowers entirely, an' plantin' war vigitables," says I.

"An' phwat may they be?" says the woman.

"The same as ordinary vigitables, only growed under war conditions," says I. "Ivvry spud doin' its duty, ivvry parsnip strugglin' to be two. We will have carrots an' onions in iwry bed up to the front door, Frinch beans trained all over the porch. Ye'll jist lane out of the kitchen winda an' gather in the dinner yourself; 'twill be a great savin' o' labour," says I.

"An' phwat'll ye do for the table decorations whin the gintry comes callin'?" says Anne Toher.

"Faith," says I, "'tis aisy done; I will jist set a bookay o' hothouse cabbages in the vases, an' if, mebbe, the Colonel would be comin' home on lave an' should ax a nosegay to stick in his coat, begob I'll have a fine sprig of parsley for him," says I.

"Ye poor man," says she, "'twill sour the heart within ye." Ah! That was the true word, 'twas like pullin' me heart's blood out be the roots to desthroy thim flowers; but it had to be done. War is war.

By June the garden was nothin' but a say of vigitables, an' divil a touch of colour to take your eye was there in it, no matter how long you'd look.

Wan day I am up at the yard, seein' if, mebbe, Anne Toher would have the taste o' tay in the pot, meself havin' a thirst on me that would face the Shannon by dint of the hoein' I was afther doin' in the spud plantations, whin the woman puts her head out of the kitchen winda. "Whist, Delaney," says she, "there's gintry to lunch," says she.

"Phwat gintry?" says I.

"Sir Patrick Freebody, o' Michaelstown," says she, an' at that me blood run cowld.

Sir Patrick Freebody had the grandest garden over at Michaelstown that ivver you'd see in the nation of Ireland, an' a cousin to me, John O'Callaghan, was gardener to him. There was no love betwane us either, by the same token. I would as soon wake John O'Callaghan as I would the Divil, an' that's the morthal truth, for all that he was a cousin to me.

I knew how 'twould be as sure as I was alive in this worrld. Owld Sir Pat would be into lunch before a bare board, an' whin he wint home to Michaelstown he would be tellin' John O'Callaghan, an' I would be skinned raw wid the jeerin' an' blaggardin' the same John O'Callaghan would have wid me.

"Whisper, whin will they be atein'?" says I to Anne Toher.

"In ten minutes, please God, an' the spuds are soft," says she.

"Begob," says I to meself, "I'll set flowers on that table or cut my throat across," an' I ran away, not knowin' where I'd be findin' thim, not within five miles. But I was not half-way round the laurel bushes whin the Blessed Saints sent me light.

In sivin minuites I had flowers in the middle bowl, an' backed away behindt the hat-racks as Herself an' owld Sir Pat comes out of the drawin'-room an' goes in to lunch. I set me eye to the kayhole and watched, me heart like water betwane me teeth.

Owld Sir Pat, he mumbles an' coughs an' talks about the weather, an' the war, an' the recruitin'.

Herself she talks about the soldiers' shest-protectors an' her war work, an' how she was scared the Colonel was sittin' about at the Front wid wet fate.

Presently the owld man notices the flowers in the bowl an' lanes over the table blinkin' at thim through his spectacles in his half-blind way.

"Lovely flowers ye have there, Lady Nugent, positive blaze o' colour. How do you do it? Now, that scamp of a gardener of mine----" He sits back again, tellin' Herself how John O'Callaghan had left his chrysanthemums go to ruination wid blight. Her Ladyship takes wan look at the flowers, her eyebrows go up, she turns as red as a bateroot and bites her lip, but says nothin'. God bless her! I backed away, breathin' aisy once more, but at that minuite down the stairs comes our brave Alice, the Belgium refuge, all of a lather, gabbing like a turkey in the foreign tongue, and runs straight for the dinin'-room door.

'Tis a mercy I have the quick wit; I pulled down the Colonel's dhress-sword from where it hung on the wall and headed her off, wavin' it at her the way I'd draw the stroke of it across her windpipe. She wint leppin' back up the stairs like a mountainy hare among the rocks, thinkin', mebbe, the German Huns was come at her again out of the wine-cellar.

An hour later I heard owld Sir Pat's car lavin' the front door, so I sheathed me sword an' let her out of her bedroom where she had herself locked in.

A strong shindy the gurrl raised, an' Herself forced me to buy her a new hat out of me wages, seein' that her owld wan was desthroyed by dint of the soakin' an' crushin' it had in the flower bowl; but sorra the bit did I care, for I passed John O'Callaghan beyond in Michaelstown on Sunday, an' divil a word said he, but scowled at me in a way that did my heart good to see.

XX

A CHANGE OF FRONT

We fell asleep with goose feathers of snow whirling against the carriage windows, and woke to see a shot-silk sea flinging white lace along a fairy coast on one side and pink and yellow villas nesting among groves of palm and orange on the other.

"Of course this sort of thing doesn't happen in real life," said Albert Edward, flattening his proboscis against the pane. "Either it's all a dream or else those oranges will suddenly light up; George Grossmith, in a topper and spats, will trip in from the O.P. side; girls will blossom from every palm, and all ranks get busy with song and prance--tra-la-la!"

The Babe kicked his blankets off and sat up. "Nothing of the sort. We've arrived in well-known Italy, that's all. Capital--Rome. Exports--old masters, chianti and barrel-organs. Faces South and is centrally heated by Vesuvius."

We rattled into a cutting, the sides of which were decorated with posters: "Good Healt at the England," "Good Luck at Tommy," and drew up in a flag-festooned station, on the platform of which was a deputation of smiling signorinas who presented the Atkinses with postcards, fruit and cigarettes, and ourselves with flowers.

"Very _bon_--eh, what?" said the Babe as the train resumed its rumblings. "All the same I wish we could thank them prettily and tell them how pleased we are we've come. Does anybody handle the patter?"

Albert Edward thought he did. "Used to swot up a lot of Italian literature when I was a lad; technical military stuff about the divisions of Gaul by one J. Cæsar."

"Too technical for everyday use," I objected. "A person called D'Annunzio is their best seller now, I believe."

"Somebody'd better hop off the bus at the next stop and buy a book of the words," said the Babe.

At the next halt I dodged the deputation and purchased a phrase-book with a Union Jack on the cover, entitled _The English Soldier in Italy_, published in Milan.

Among military terms, grouped under the heading of "The Worldly War," a _garetta_ (sentry-box) is defined as "a watchbox," and the machine-gunner will be surprised to find himself described as "a grapeshot-man." It has also short conversations for current use.

"Have you of any English papers?"

"Yes, sir, there's _The Times_ and _Tit-Bits_."

(Is it possible that the land of Virgil, of Horace and Dante knows not _The Daily Mail_?)

"Give me, please, many biscuits."

"No, sir, we have no biscuits; the fabrication of them has been avoided by Government."

"Waiter, show me a good bed where one may sleep undisturbated."

_In the train_:--

"Dickens! I have lost my ticket."

"Alas, you shall pay the price of another."

A jocular vein is recommended with cabbies:--

"Coachman, are you free?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then long live liberty."

Very young subalterns with romantic notions may waste good beer-money on foreign phrase-books and get themselves enravelled in hopeless international tangles, but not old Atkins. The English soldier in Italy will speak what he has always spoken with complete success in Poperinghe, Amiens, Cairo, Salonika, Dar-es-Salaam, Bagdad and Jerusalem, to wit, English.

But to return to our train. At nightfall we left the fairy coast behind, its smiling _signorinas_, flags, flowers and fruit, and swarmed up a pile of perpendicular scenery from summer to winter. During a halt in the midst of moonlit snows our carriage door was opened and we beheld outside an Italian officer, who saluted and gave us an exhibition of his native tongue at rapid fire.

"He's referring to us," said the Babe. "Answer him, somebody; tell him we're on his side and all that."

"_Viva l' Italia_," William exclaimed promptly.

The Italian countered with a "Viva l'Inghilterra" and swept on with his monologue.

"Seems to want something," said Albert Edward. "Wonder if Cæsar is too technical for him."

"Read him something from _The English Soldier in Italy_," I suggested.

The Babe thumbed feverishly through the handbook. "'Let us get in; the guard has already cried'--No, that won't do. 'Give me a walk and return ticket, please'--That won't do either. 'Yes, I have a trunk and a carpet-bag'--Oh, this is absurd." He cast the book from him.

At that moment the engine hooted, the trucks gave a preliminary buck and started to jolt forward. The Italian sprang upon the running board and, clinging to the hand-rail, continued to declaim emotionally through the window. William became alarmed. "This chap has something on his mind. Perhaps he's trying to tell us that a bridge has blown up, or that the train is moving without a movement order, or the chauffeur is drunk. For Heaven's sake somebody do something--quick!"

Thereupon Babel broke loose, each of us in his panic blazing off in the foreign language which came easiest to his tongue.

William called for a bath in Arabic. The Babe demanded champagne in French. Albert Edward declined _mensa_, while I, by the luckiest chance, struck a language which the Italian recognised with a glad yelp. In a moment explanations were over and I had swung him into the carriage and slammed the door.

The new-comer was a lieutenant of mountain artillery. He was returning from leave, had confided himself to the care of a Railway Transport Officer, had in consequence missed every regular train and wanted a lift to the next junction. That was all. I then set about to make him as comfortable as possible, wrapping him in one of the Babe's blankets and giving him his maiden drink of whisky out of William's First Field Dressing. With tears streaming down his cheeks he vented his admiration of the British national beverage.

In return he introduced me to the Italian national smoke, an endless cigar to be sucked up through a straw. Between violent spasms I implored the name and address of the maker. We were both very perfect gentlemen.

We then prattled about the War; he boasting about the terrific depths of snow in which he did his battling, while I boasted about the Flanders mud. We broke about even on that bout. He gained a bit on mountain batteries, but I got it all back, and more, on tanks. He had never seen one, so I had it all my own way. Our tanks, after I had finished with them, could do pretty nearly anything except knit.

Defeated in the field, he turned home to Rome for something to boast about. I should see St. Peter's, he said. It was magnificent, and the Roman art treasures unsurpassable.

I replied that our cathedral at Westminster was far newer, and that the art in our National Cold Storage had cost an average of £5473 19s. 154d. per square foot. Could he beat it?

That knocked him out of his stride for a moment, but he struggled back with some remark about seeing his Coliseum by moonlight.

I replied that at ours we had modern electric light, Murphy and Mack, Vesta Tilley and the Bioscope.

Whether he would have recovered from that I know not, for at this moment the lights of the junction twinkled in at the frosted windows and he took his departure, first promising to call in at our Mess and suffer some more whisky if in return I would crawl up his mountain and meet the chamois and edelweiss.

Later on, as I was making up my bed for the night, Albert Edward poked his head out of the cocoon of horse-blankets in which he had wound himself.

"By the way, what ungodly jargon were you and that Italian champing together so sociably?"

"German," I whispered; "but for the Lord's sake don't tell anybody."

XXI

ANTONIO GIUSEPPE

Our squadron is at the present moment billeted in what the house-agents would describe as a "unique old-world property," a ramshackle pile which looks like a palace from the south and a workhouse from the north.

It commenced its career, back in the long ago, as a glorified week-end bungalow for Doges. In course of time it became a monastery.

When the pious monks took over they got busy with whitewash and obliterated most of the Doges' sportive mural decorations. Most, but not all.

Methinks the Abbot had tripped the boulevards in his youth and he spared some of the brighter spots of the more sportive frescoes in memory of old times and to keep his heart up during Lent. Anyhow they are still there.

To-day our long-faced chums champ their feeds in cloisters where once the good monks told their beads, and our bold sergeant boys quaff their tonics beneath a painted ceiling whereon Rackham satyrs are depicted chivvying Kirchner nymphs across a Leader landscape.

A small portion of one immense wing is inhabited by a refugee lady, who had retired in good order, haling the whole menagerie along with her, calves, fowls, children, donkey, piebald pig and all.

When first we came into residence here we heard strange nocturnal swishings and shufflings overhead, where none should be, and attributed them to the ghost of the Abbot, who had returned from Purgatory with a bucket of lime and was striving to wash out his former lapses. Later on we discovered it was the calves, who from inscrutable motives of their own prefer living in the attics. How Mrs. Refugee hoisted them up there in the first place and how she proposes to get them down again when they ripen are questions she alone can answer, but will never do so because we haven't enough Italian to ask her.

The piebald pig is supported entirely by voluntary contributions, and, like many other such institutions, keeps frequent fasts. When he retreated here there was no sty to accommodate him; but Mrs. Refugee, with the practical originality that distinguishes her, routed out a retired dog-kennel from somewhere and anchored him to it. This has had the effect of creating in him a dual personality.

Sometimes he thinks he is just fat old Dolce F. Niente the pig, and behaves as such, and one can tread all over him without disturbing his melodious slumbers. At others the collar and chain prey on his mind and he imagines he is Patrise Defensor the trusty watch-dog, and mows down all comers.

The children and fowls are doing nicely. They speedily discover what innumerable fowls and children all the world over had discovered before them, namely, that the turtling dove is a wild beast compared with the British warrior and his war-horse, and they victimise the defenceless creatures accordingly.

The result is that the Atkinses get only what husks of their rations the children have neglected, and the fowls only allow the hairies what oats they cannot possibly stagger away with.

Antonio Giuseppe the donkey was also a war profiteer. Commerce might stagnate, armies clash and struggle, nations bleed to death, he did not care. "_Viva la guerra!_" said Antonio Giuseppe. "As long as there is a British unit handy to dine out with I'm all for it." These sentiments, though deplorable, were not without reason, for until we came I very much doubt if he had ever had a full meal--a real rib-straining blow-out--in his life.

He was a miserable little creature, standing about a yard high by six inches broad. By tucking in his tail he could have passed for a rabbit at any fancy-dress ball. His costume was a patch-work affair of hairy tufts and bare spaces. I think he must have been laid away in a drawer without camphor at one time and been mauled by a moth.

A disreputable ragamuffin person was Antonio Giuseppe the donkey, but for all that he had a way with him, and was in his day the Light-weight Champion Diner-out of all Italy--probably of the world.

At night he reposed in the kitchen along with Mrs. Refugee, the bambini and fowls. The day he spent in his observation post, lurking behind a screen of mulberries and vines, keeping a watchful eye on the horses.