THE HAVEN
Lady O'Gara came in by way of a little-used gate a few days later. She
had been to Inch, where the house was being turned out of doors and
everything aired and swept and dusted and repolished, for a home-coming
so long delayed that people had forgotten to look for it. Castle
Talbot had six entrance gates, each with its lodge: and this one was
rarely used.
Susan--as Mrs. Baker preferred to be called, Susan Horridge: she seemed
to wish to drop the "Mrs. Baker"--came out with a key to open the gate,
which was padlocked.
Such a different Susan! The old Susan might have been dropped with
"Mrs. Baker." She had been just ten days at the South lodge, and now,
in her neat print dress, her silken hair braided tidily, her small face
filling out, she looked as she dropped a curtsey just as might the
Susan Horridge of a score years earlier.
"You keep the gate padlocked, Susan?" Lady O'Gara asked, with a little
surprise. "This is a quiet, honest place. I hardly think you need
fear any disagreeable visitors."
"Oh, but, m'lady, you never know." Susan had admitted her by this
time. "A lone woman and a little boy, and him that nervous through
being frightened!" She hurried on as though she did not wish to make
any reference to the cause of Georgie's fright. "I heard men singin'
along the road the night before last it was. It fair gave me the
jumps. Glad I was to have that gate between me and them and the strong
padlock on it."
"This lodge is perhaps a little lonely for you. It's a very quiet
road. The people don't use it much. It runs down to a road where they
think there's a ghost. You're not afraid of ghosts?"
"No, m'lady. If but they'd keep the people from the road."
"Ah! you will find the people friendly and kindly after a time. You're
new to the place."
"Maybe so, m'lady. I always was one for keeping myself to myself. My
Granny brought me up strict. I wish I hadn't lost her when I did."
She heaved a deep sigh. "We had a sweet little place at home in
Warwickshire. Such a pretty cottage, _and_ an orchard, _and_ the roses
climbin' about my window."
What matter that she said "winder"! Her eyes, the pale large eyes, had
light in them as though she beheld a vision.
"'Twere all peace with my Granny and me," she went on. "And her
Ladyship at the Court,--Mr. Neville was our Squire and her Ladyship was
Lady Frances Neville--used to drop in to see Granny, and she used to
say what a good girl I was, always busy with my needle and my book.
And our Rector's wife, Mrs. Farmiloe, she gave me a silver thimble when
I was nine--a prize for needlework. Lady Frances used to say, 'Don't
you keep her too close to work, Mrs. Horridge. A child must play with
other children.' But my Granny she'd up and say: 'She's all I have,
and I'd rather bury her than see her trapesin' about with boys like
some I know.' And there was Miss Sylvia peepin' at me from behind her
Ladyship and me peepin' at her from behind my Granny. I went to the
Court at sixteen as sewing maid, and at twenty I was Miss Sylvia's own
maid. She married Lord Southwater, and I'd have gone with her only I
couldn't leave my Granny. She was failin', poor old soul!"
She paused and again she heaved the deepest of sighs.
"Beggin' your pardon, m'lady, for talkin' so much. You'd maybe take a
look at the little place?" she said.
Lady O'Gara turned aside. She was in no great hurry home and she was
interested in Susan. Susan had padlocked the gate again and held the
key swinging from her finger, while she looked up at Lady O'Gara as
though her saying "yes" or "no" meant a great deal to her.
"I wonder what would happen if we wanted to get in or out by that gate
at night time," Lady O'Gara said. "We don't use it much. Still we
might want to and you might be in bed."
"I'd get up at any hour, m'lady," Susan said eagerly. "I'm a light
sleeper: and it would only be to throw on something in a hurry."
She looked scared, as though her peace of mind was threatened, and Lady
O'Gara felt a pity for such manifest nervousness. Susan would forget
her terror presently as she got further and further away from the bad
days. Obviously she was very nervous. Her eyes dilated and her breath
came and went as she gazed imploringly at Lady O'Gara.
"Don't look like that, Susan," Lady O'Gara said, almost sharply. "You
look as though I were judge and executioner. You shall keep your
padlocked gate. After all it is a bad road, I don't think Sir Shawn
will want to take it, though it is the shortest way to Inch. You did
not find the gate padlocked when you came?"
"No, m'lady. 'Twas Mr. Kenny. He guessed I'd be frightened, so he
brought the padlock and put it on himself."
The finest little line showed itself in Lady O'Gara's smooth forehead.
Her skin was extraordinarily unfretted for her forty-five years of
life. But now the little crease came, deepened and extended itself to
a line, where its presence had been unsuspected.
"Patsy is very kind," she said, with a penetrating glance at Susan.
What a pretty girl Susan must have been, so soft and pale and
appealing, a little human wood-anemone! She would be very pretty again
when she had got over the scared look and the thinness which was almost
emaciation. And how well that print suited her! Lady O'Gara had sent
down a bundle of things to the South lodge, so that Susan might not
appear as a scarecrow to the people. The print had pale green leaves
sprinkled over a white surface. It suggested a snowdrop, perished by
the winter, as a comparison for Susan rather than the wood-anemone one.
"Indeed he's very kind," said Susan; and dropped a curtsey. "The
clothes fitted Georgie as though they were made for him. I'll be able
to use all you sent, m'lady, I'm such a good needlewoman. I hope I may
mend your Ladyship's lace or any fine embroideries. Once we're
settled--with Georgie away at school all day--I'll have a deal o' time
on my hands. I'd like to do something for you, m'lady."
"So you shall, Susan. Margaret McKeon, who has been with me since I
was a child, is no longer able for work that tries the eyes. I promise
I'll keep you busy as soon as you get settled in here."
"Oh, m'lady! Thank you, m'lady!" said Susan, colouring as though Lady
O'Gara had promised her something very delightful. "I do love fine
needle-work, m'lady. Any fine damask cloths or the like I'll darn so
you'd hardly know. I'm never happier than when I'm sewin' an' my
Georgie reads a bit to me. He's a good scholar, is my Georgie,
although he's but nine."
"You've made a pretty place of it," Lady O'Gara said, looking round the
lodge with satisfaction. "I was afraid it was going to be a grimy
place for you, for it had been empty since old Mrs. Veldon died. You
see we didn't know you were coming. You've had it whitewashed."
"Yes, m'lady. Mr. Kenny came and whitewashed it. He was very good,
better than ever I can repay. He cleaned out the little place for me.
The pots and pans turned in well. And he lent me a few things
till,--maybe--I could earn a bit, washin' or mendin' or sewin'; I'm a
good dressmaker. Maybe I could get work that way."
"There hasn't been a dressmaker in the village since the last one went
to America. I'll ask the parish priest and the nuns to tell the women
you can dressmake. You'll have your hands full."
Again Susan flushed delicately.
"I'm never so happy as when I've no time for thinkin'," she said. "Any
work pleases me, but fine work best of all. I can do lovely work
tuckin' and veinin'. When I'm at it I'm happy. 'Tis like what drink
is to some people; it makes me forget."
The lodge was indeed altered from what Lady O'Gara remembered it, when
Mrs. Veldon lived there. Mrs. Veldon had been so piteously sure than
any washing or whitewashing would kill her with rheumatism that she had
been left to her murky gloom. Now, with a few gaily coloured pictures
of the Saints and Irish patriots on the walls, the dresser filled with
bright crockery, including a whole shelf of lustre jugs, the pots and
pans set out to advantage, to say nothing of the cans, a clean scrubbed
table, a few chairs, a strip of matting in front of the fireplace,
flowers in a jug on the table which also bore Susan's few implements of
sewing and a pile of white stuff, the place was homelike and pretty.
Lady O'Gara decided that Susan was one of the women who have the gift
of creating a home wherever they may be. So much the worse, she added
in her own mind, not particularizing what it was that was so much the
worse. Round Susan, standing meekly by the table while her Ladyship
sat, floated the mysterious aura which draws men and children as to a
warm hearth-fire.
So much the worse, thought Lady O'Gara, and commented to herself that
Patsy must have stripped his own house bare. Those jugs were his, the
gay crockery, and the pictures of the Saints and patriots--she wondered
what appeal these might have for Susan--and that shelf of books in the
corner. Patsy had a taste, laughed at by his fellows, for book-buying,
whenever the occasion arose. He was well-known at auctions round about
the country, where he bought miscellaneous lots of books, with some few
ornaments as well. She could see the backs of two books Patsy had a
great admiration for, "Fardarougha the Miser" and "Charles O'Malley";
and, on the chimney-piece, there were two large pink shells and a
weather house which she had often seen on Patsy's chimney-piece. The
more solid pieces of furniture and some of the plain crockery had been
sent down from Castle Talbot.
"I see Patsy's been lending you his treasures," she said.
"Yes, indeed, m'lady. I asked him not to, but he wouldn't take any
notice of me. He said he'd no use for the things. He's stripped
himself bare, m'lady. I didn't know men were like that. Small wonder
the dumb beasts love him. I wonder he has anything left to give."
She spoke with such fervour that Lady O'Gara was touched.
"You've had a sad experience of men, my poor Susan," she said. "But
you are quite right about Patsy. There are few men as gentle as he is.
We all look on Patsy as a dear and valued friend. I must find him some
other things to keep him from missing these. Not books--I know his
house is piled with books. He won't miss those, though he has given
you the ones he like best. I wonder whether I could find pictures like
those. I think I have seen that Robert Emmet, or something like it, in
a shop-window in Galway."
"I don't know who the gentlemen are," Susan said, looking from one
patriot to another, "and I didn't want to have them taken from his
walls. I expect they've left a mark on the wall-paper where they were
taken down, for he said he'd got to do some papering for himself."
It was on Lady O'Gara's tongue to utter a gentle warning that Patsy
must not be too much about the South lodge, but the warning remained
unspoken.
"He's the best man I ever knew," said Susan, "I didn't know there was
his like in the world. It's a strange thing, m'lady, that men can be
so different. Listen, m'lady,--if Baker was to come back--you wouldn't
let him claim me? The Master wouldn't let him claim me? I'd drown
myself and the child before we'd go back to him. He did knock us about
something cruel. And my Georgie, so gentle that he'd move a heart of
stone. I frightened Baker from laying a hand on Georgie; I told him
I'd kill him if I was to be hanged for it."
The woman's eyes, no longer gentle, blazed at Lady O'Gara.
"Hush! Hush!" she said. "He shall not trouble you. If he should come
back..."
"He's found us out no matter where we've been. Even good Christians
got tired at last of Baker comin' and askin' for his wife and son and
makin' a row and the police fetched, and it gettin' in the papers.
They give us up. Oh, Lord, if they knew what they was givin' us up to!
They'd better have shot us."
"If he comes back he will be prosecuted for deserting you. We shall
not give you up to him. You may be sure of that. Here is my hand on
it."
She held out a firm white hand which showed a couple of beautiful
rings. Susan looked at it for a moment in amazement before she took
it. The colour flooded back into her face. Her eyes became quieter.
Then she took the hand and kissed it, hard.
"Thank you, m'lady," she said. "I trust you."
Lady O'Gara walked to the door and paused to ask for news of Georgie,
who was already at school. He was doing very well. It was so easy for
him to reach the school by this gate, and he was beginning to get on
well with the boys; and Mr. McGroarty, Mr. O'Connell's successor, gave
a very favourable report of him.
"We feel so safe inside the big wall, me and Georgie," said Susan
Horridge. "It isn't likely he'd come on us from the Park." She looked
a little apprehensively over the beautiful prospect of trees in their
early Summer beauty, and the shining greensward; with the hills beyond.
Through an opening in the trees there was a glimpse of a deer feeding.
"No one here associates you with that man. Patsy and I have taken care
of that," Lady O'Gara assured her. "If he came back looking for you no
one could tell him where you were. Would you like a dog for company?
There is a litter of puppies of Shot's breed in the stable-yard. You
shall have one, if you like it."
"Is it like it?" asked Susan, her face lighting up,--"I should be very
pleased to have it. So would Georgie. That boy's fair gone on
animals."
"Those dogs make very good watch-dogs, though they are so gentle. You
should see how Shot keeps walking before and behind me if he thinks he
sees a suspicious character when we are out walking! I shall send down
a puppy, then."
Susan Horridge stood in her doorway shading her eyes with her hand, as
she looked after Lady O'Gara. There were tears in her eyes. "The Lord
didn't forget us," she said to herself.
"I shall have to speak to Patsy," Lady O'Gara was thinking as she
hurried along. She was a little late for lunch. "Poor Patsy! It
would be a thousand pities if his heart should open to that poor
creature for the first time."