THE DUEL.
As the boatmen pulled in towards the shore we perceived, a few hundred
yards off, a group of persons standing, whom we soon recognized as our
opponents. “Charley,” said the count, grasping my arm tightly, as I stood
up to spring on the land,--“Charley, although you are only a boy, as I may
say, I have no fear for your courage; but still more than that is needful
here. This Bodkin is a noted duellist, and will try to shake your nerve.
Now, mind that you take everything that happens quite with an air of
indifference; don’t let him think that he has any advantage over you, and
you’ll see how the tables will be turned in your favor.”
“Trust to me, Count” said I; “I’ll not disgrace you.”
He pressed my hand tightly, and I thought that I discerned something like
a slight twitch about the corners of his grim mouth, as if some sudden and
painful thought had shot across his mind; but in a moment he was calm, and
stern-looking as ever.
“Twenty minutes late, Mr. Considine,” said a short, red-faced little
man, with a military frock and foraging cap, as he held out his watch in
evidence.
“I can only say, Captain Malowney, that we lost no time since we parted. We
had some difficulty in finding a boat; but in any case, we are here _now_,
and that, I opine, is the important part of the matter.”
“Quite right,--very just indeed. Will you present me to your young friend.
Very proud to make your acquaintance, sir; your uncle and I met more than
once in this kind of way. I was out with him in ‘92,--was it? no, I think
it was ‘93,--when he shot Harry Burgoyne, who, by-the-bye, was called the
crack shot of our mess; but, begad, your uncle knocked his pistol hand to
shivers, saying, in his dry way, ‘He must try the left hand this morning.’
Count, a little this side, if you please.”
While Considine and the captain walked a few paces apart from where I
stood, I had leisure to observe my antagonist, who stood among a group of
his friends, talking and laughing away in great spirits. As the tone they
spoke in was not of the lowest, I could catch much of their conversation at
the distance I was from them. They were discussing the last occasion that
Bodkin had visited this spot, and talking of the fatal event which happened
then.
“Poor devil,” said Bodkin, “it wasn’t his fault; but you see some of the
--th had been showing white feathers before that, and he was obliged to go
out. In fact, the colonel himself said, ‘Fight, or leave the corps.’ Well,
out he came; it was a cold morning in February, with a frost the night
before going off in a thin rain. Well, it seems he had the consumption or
something of that sort, with a great cough and spitting of blood, and this
weather made him worse; and he was very weak when he came to the ground.
Now, the moment I got a glimpse of him, I said to myself, ‘He’s pluck
enough, but as nervous as a lady;’ for his eye wandered all about, and his
mouth was constantly twitching. ‘Take off your great-coat, Ned,’ said one
of his people, when they were going to put him up; ‘take it off, man.’ He
seemed to hesitate for an instant, when Michael Blake remarked, ‘Arrah, let
him alone; it’s his mother makes him wear it, for the cold he has.’ They
all began to laugh at this; but I kept my eye upon him, and I saw that his
cheek grew quite livid and a kind of gray color, and his eyes filled up. ‘I
have you now,’ said I to myself, and I shot him through the lung.”
“And this poor fellow,” thought I, “was the only son of a widowed mother.”
I walked from the spot to avoid hearing further, and felt, as I did so,
something like a spirit of vengeance rising within me, for the fate of one
so untimely cut off.
“Here we are, all ready,” said Malowney, springing over a small fence into
the adjoining field. “Take your ground, gentlemen.”
Considine took my arm and walked forward. “Charley,” said he, “I am to give
the signal; I’ll drop my glove when you are to fire, but don’t look at me
at all. I’ll manage to catch Bodkin’s eye; and do you watch him steadily,
and fire when he does.”
“I think that the ground we are leaving behind us is rather better,” said
some one.
“So it is,” said Bodkin; “but it might be troublesome to carry the young
gentleman down that way,--here all is fair and easy.”
The next instant we were placed; and I well remember the first thought that
struck me was, that there could be no chance of either of us escaping.
“Now then,” said the count, “I’ll walk twelve paces, turn and drop this
glove; at which signal you fire, and _together_ mind. The man who reserves
his shot falls by my hand.” This very summary denunciation seemed to meet
general approbation, and the count strutted forth. Notwithstanding the
advice of my friend, I could not help turning my eyes from Bodkin to watch
the retiring figure of the count. At length he stopped; a second or two
elapsed; he wheeled rapidly round, and let fall the glove. My eye glanced
towards my opponent; I raised my pistol and fired. My hat turned half round
upon my head, and Bodkin fell motionless to the earth. I saw the people
around me rush forward; I caught two or three glances thrown at me with an
expression of revengeful passion; I felt some one grasp me round the waist,
and hurry me from the spot; and it was at least ten minutes after, as we
were skimming the surface of the broad Shannon, before I could well collect
my scattered faculties to remember all that was passing, as Considine,
pointing to the two bullet-holes in my hat, remarked, “Sharp practice,
Charley; it was the overcharge saved you.”
“Is he killed, sir?” I asked.
“Not quite, I believe, but as good. You took him just above the hip.”
“Can he recover?” said I, with a voice tremulous from agitation, which I
vainly endeavored to conceal from my companion.
“Not if the doctor can help it,” said Considine; “for the fool keeps poking
about for the ball. But now let’s think of the next step,--you’ll have to
leave this, and at once, too.”
Little more passed between us. As we rowed towards the shore, Considine
was following up his reflections, and I had mine,--alas! too many and too
bitter to escape from.
As we neared the land a strange spectacle caught our eye. For a
considerable distance along the coast crowds of country people were
assembled, who, forming in groups and breaking into parties of two and
three, were evidently watching with great anxiety what was taking place at
the opposite side. Now, the distance was at least a mile, and therefore any
part of the transaction which had been enacting there must have been quite
beyond their view. While I was wondering at this, Considine cried out
suddenly, “Too infamous, by Jove! We’re murdered men!”
“What do you mean?” said I.
“Don’t you see that?” said he, pointing to something black which floated
from a pole at the opposite side of the river.
“Yes; what is it?”
“It’s his coat they’ve put upon an oar to show the people he’s
killed,--that’s all. Every man here’s his tenant; and look--there! They’re
not giving us much doubt as to their intention.”
Here a tremendous yell burst forth from the mass of people along the shore,
which rising to a terrific cry sunk gradually down to a low wailing, then
rose and fell again several times as the Irish death-cry filled the air and
rose to Heaven, as if imploring vengeance on a murderer.
The appalling influence of the _keen_, as it is called, had been familiar
to me from my infancy; but it needed the awful situation I was placed in to
consummate its horrors. It was at once my accusation and my doom. I knew
well--none better--the vengeful character of the Irish peasant of the west,
and that my death was certain I had no doubt. The very crime that sat upon
my heart quailed its courage and unnerved my arm. As the boatmen
looked from us towards the shore and again at our faces, they, as if
instinctively, lay upon their oars, and waited for our decision as to what
course to pursue.
“Rig the spritsail, my boys,” said Considine, “and let her head lie up the
river; and be alive, for I see they’re bailing a boat below the little reef
there, and will be after us in no time.”
The poor fellows, who, although strangers to us, sympathizing in what they
perceived to be our imminent danger, stepped the light spar which acted
as mast, and shook out their scanty rag of canvas in a minute. Considine
meanwhile went aft, and steadying her head with an oar, held the small
craft up to the wind till she lay completely over, and as she rushed
through the water, ran dipping her gun-wale through the white foam.
“Where can we make without tacking, boys?” inquired the count.
“If it blows on as fresh, sir, we’ll run you ashore within half a mile of
the Castle.”
“Put an oar to leeward,” said Considine, “and keep her up more to the wind,
and I promise you, my lads, you will not go home fresh and fasting if you
land us where you say.”
“Here they come,” said the other boatman, as he pointed back with his
finger towards a large yawl which shot suddenly from the shore, with six
sturdy fellows pulling at their oars, while three or four others were
endeavoring to get up their rigging, which appeared tangled and confused at
the bottom of the boat; the white splash of water which fell each moment
beside her showing that the process of bailing was still continued.
“Ah, then, may I never--av it isn’t the ould ‘Dolphin’ they have launched
for the cruise,” said one of our fellows.
“What’s the ‘Dolphin,’ then?”
“An ould boat of the Lord’s [Lord Clanricarde’s] that didn’t see water,
except when it rained, these four years, and is sun-cracked from stem to
stern.”
“She can sail, however,” said Considine, who watched with a painful anxiety
the rapidity of her course through the water.
“Nabocklish, she was a smuggler’s jolly-boat, and well used to it. Look
how they’re pulling. God pardon them, but they’re in no blessed humor this
morning.”
“Lay out upon your oars, boys; the wind’s failing us,” cried the count, as
the sail flapped lazily against the mast.
“It’s no use, yer honor,” said the elder. “We’ll be only breaking our
hearts to no purpose. They’re sure to catch us.”
“Do as I bade you, at all events. What’s that ahead of us there?”
“The Oat Rock, sir. A vessel with grain struck there and went down with
all aboard, four years last winter. There’s no channel between it and the
shore,--all sunk rocks, every inch of it. There’s the breeze.”
The canvas fell over as he spoke, and the little craft lay down to it till
the foaming water bubbled over her lee bow.
“Keep her head up, sir; higher--higher still.”
But Considine little heeded the direction, steering straight for the narrow
channel the man alluded to.
“Tear and ages, but you’re going right for the cloch na quirka!”
“Arrah, an’ the devil a taste I’ll be drowned for your devarsion!” said the
other, springing up.
“Sit down there, and be still,” roared Considine, as he drew a pistol from
the case at his feet, “if you don’t want some leaden ballast to keep you
so! Here, Charley, take this, and if that fellow stirs hand or foot--you
understand me.”
The two men sat sulkily in the bottom of the boat, which now was actually
flying through the water. Considine’s object was a clear one. He saw that
in sailing we were greatly overmatched, and that our only chance lay in
reaching the narrow and dangerous channel between Oat Rock and the shore,
by which we should distance the pursuit, the long reef of rocks that ran
out beyond requiring a wide berth to escape from. Nothing but the danger
behind us could warrant so rash a daring. The whole channel was dotted with
patches of white and breaking foam,--the sure evidence of the mischief
beneath,--while here and there a dash of spurting spray flew up from the
dark water, where some cleft rock lay hid below the flood. Escape seemed
impossible; but who would not have preferred even so slender a chance with
so frightful an alternative behind him? As if to add terror to the scene,
Considine had scarcely turned the boat ahead of the channel when a
tremendous blackness spread over all around, the thunder pealed forth, and
amidst the crashing of the hail and the bright glare of lightning a squall
struck us and laid us nearly keel uppermost for several minutes. I well
remember we rushed through the dark and blackened water, our little craft
more than half filled, the oars floating off to leeward, and we ourselves
kneeling on the bottom planks for safety. Roll after roll of loud thunder
broke, as it were, just above our heads; while in the swift dashing rain
that seemed to hiss around us every object was hidden, and even the other
boat was lost to our view. The two poor fellows--I shall never forget their
expression. One, a devout Catholic, had placed a little leaden image of a
saint before him in the bow, and implored its intercession with a torturing
agony of suspense that wrung my very heart. The other, apparently less
alive to such consolations as his Church afforded, remained with his hands
clasped, his mouth compressed, his brows knitted, and his dark eyes bent
upon me with the fierce hatred of a deadly enemy; his eyes were sunken and
bloodshot, and all told of some dreadful conflict within. The wild ferocity
of his look fascinated my gaze, and amidst all the terrors of the scene I
could not look from him. As I gazed, a second and more awful squall struck
the boat; the mast went over, and with a loud report like a pistol-shot
smashed at the thwart and fell over, trailing the sail along the milky sea
behind us. Meanwhile the water rushed clean over us, and the boat seemed
settling. At this dreadful moment the sailor’s eye was bent upon me, his
lips parted, and he muttered, as if to himself, “This it is to go to sea
with a murderer.” Oh, God! the agony of that moment! the heartfelt and
accusing conscience that I was judged and doomed! that the brand of Cain
was upon my brow! that my fellow-men had ceased forever to regard me as a
brother! that I was an outcast and a wanderer forever! I bent forward till
my forehead fell upon my knees, and I wept. Meanwhile the boat flew through
the water, and Considine, who alone among us seemed not to lose his
presence of mind, cut away the mast and sent it overboard. The storm began
now to abate; and as the black mass of cloud broke from around us we beheld
the other boat, also dismasted, far behind us, while all on board of
her were employed in bailing out the water with which she seemed almost
sinking. The curtain of mist that had hidden us from each other no sooner
broke than they ceased their labors for a moment, and looking towards us,
burst forth into a yell so wild, so savage, so dreadful, my very heart
quailed as its cadence fell upon my ear.
“Safe, my boy,” said Considine, clapping me on the shoulder, as he steered
the boat forth from its narrow path of danger, and once more reached the
broad Shannon,--“safe, Charley; though we’ve had a brush for it.” In a
minute more we reached the land, and drawing our gallant little craft on
shore, set out for O’Malley Castle.