THE WILD IRISH.
The somewhat slow Irish train jogged along its way; it never put itself
out, did that special train, starting when it pleased, and arriving when
it chose at its destination. Its guard, Jerry by name, was of a like
mind with itself; there was no hurry about Jerry; he took the world
“aisy,” as he expressed it.
“What's the good of fretting?” he used to say. “What can't be cured must
be endured. I hurry no man's cattle; and my train, she goes when she
likes, and I aint going to hurry her, not I.”
On one occasion Jerry was known to remark to a somewhat belated
traveler:
“Why, then, miss, is it hurrying ye are to meet the train? Why, then,
you can take your time.”
“Oh, Jerry!” said this anxious person, fixing her eyes on his face in
great excitement, “I forgot a most important parcel at a shop half a
mile away.”
“Run and fetch it, then, honey,” replied Jerry, “and I'll keep her a bit
longer.”
This the lady accordingly did. When she returned, the heads of all the
other angry passengers were out of the windows expostulating with Jerry
as to the cause of the delay.
“Hurry up, miss,” he said then. He popped her into a compartment, and
she, as he called the train, moved slowly out of the station.
At times, too, without the smallest provocation, Jerry would stop this
special train because a little “pigeen” had got off one of the trucks
and was running along the line. He and the porter shouted and raced
after the animal, caught it, and brought it back to the train. On
another occasion he calmly informed a rather important passenger, “Ye
had best get out here, for she's bust.” “She” happened to be the engine.
Into this train now got English Molly and Irish Nora. Mr. Hartrick
pronounced it quite the vilest service he had ever traveled by. He began
to grumble the moment he got into the train.
“It crawls,” he said; “and it absolutely has the cheek to call itself an
express.”
But Nora, with her head out of the window, was shouting to Jerry, who
came toward her full of blessings, anxious to shake her purty white
hand, and telling her that he was as glad as a shower of gould to have
her back again in the old country.
At last, however, the slow, very slow journey came to an end; and just
after sunset the party found themselves at the little wayside station.
Here a sight met Nora's eyes which displeased her exceedingly. Instead
of the old outside car which her father used to drive, with the shabby
old retainer, whose livery had long ago seen its best days, there
arrived a smart groom, in the newest of livery, with a cockade in his
hat. He touched his hat respectfully to Mr. Hartrick, and gave a quick
glance round at Nora and Molly.
“Is the brougham outside, Dennis?” was Mr. Hartrick's response.
“Yes, sir; it has been waiting for half an hour; the train is a bit
late, as usual, sir.”
“You need not tell me that this train is ever in time,” said Mr.
Hartrick. “Well, girls, come along; I told Dennis to meet us, and here
we are.”
Molly thought nothing at all of the neat brougham, with its pair of
spirited grays; she was accustomed to driving in the better-class of
carriage all her life; but Nora turned first pale and then crimson. She
got into the carriage, and sat back in a corner; tears were brimming to
her eyes.
“This is the first. How am I to bear all the rest?” she said to herself.
Mr. Hartrick, who had hoped that Nora would be pleased with the
brougham, with Dennis himself, with the whole very stylish get-up, was
mortified at her silence, and, taking her hand, tried to draw her out.
“Well, little girl,” he said, “I hope you will like the improvements
I have made in the Castle. I have done it all at your instigation,
remember.”
“At my instigation?” cried Nora. “Oh, no, Uncle George, that you have
not.”
He looked at her in some amazement, then closed his lips, and said
nothing more. Molly longed to get her father alone, in order to explain
Nora's peculiar conduct.
“It is difficult for an Englishman to understand her,” thought Molly.
“I do, and I think her altogether charming; but father, who has gone to
this enormous expense and trouble, will be put out if she does not show
a little gratitude. I will tell her that she must; I will take the very
first opportunity.”
And now they were turning in at the well-known gates. These gates were
painted white, whereas they had been almost reduced to their native
wood. The avenue was quite tidy, no weeds anywhere; but Nora almost
refused to look out. One by one the familiar trees seemed to pass by her
as she was bowled rapidly along in the new brougham, as if they were so
many ghosts saying good-by. But then there was the roar--the real, real,
grand roar--of the Atlantic in her ears. No amount of tidiness, nothing
could ever alter that sound.
“Oh, hurrah for the sea!” she said. She flung down the window and popped
out her head.
Mr. Hartrick nodded to Molly. “She will see a great deal more to delight
her than just the old ocean,” he said.
Molly was silent. They arrived at the house; the butler was standing on
the steps, a nice, stylish-looking Englishman, in neat livery. He came
down, opened the carriage door, let down the steps, and offered his arm
to Nora to alight; but she pushed past him, bounded up the steps, and
the next moment found herself in her mother's arms.
“How do you do, my dear Nora?” said Mrs. O'Shanaghgan. “I am glad to
see you, dear, but also surprised. You acted in your usual headstrong
fashion.”
“Oh, another time, mother. Mummy, how are you? I am glad to see you
again; but don't scold me now; just wait. I'll bear it all patiently
another time. How is the dad, mummy?--how is the dad?”
“Your father is doing nicely, Nora; there was not the slightest occasion
for you to hurry off and give such trouble and annoyance.”
“I don't suppose I have given annoyance to father,” said Nora. “Where is
he--in his old room?”
“No; we moved him upstairs to the best bedroom. We thought it the wisest
thing to do; he was in considerable pain.”
“The best bedroom? Which is the best bedroom?” said Nora. “Your room,
mummy?”
“The room next to mine, darling. And just come and have a look at the
drawing room, Nora.”
“I will go to father first,” said Nora. “Don't keep me; I can't stay.”
She forgot Molly; she forgot her uncle; she even forgot her mother. In
a moment she was bounding upstairs over those thick Axminster
carpets--those awful carpets, into which her feet sank--down a corridor,
also heavily lined with Axminster, past great velvet curtains, which
seemed to stifle her as she pushed them aside, and the next instant she
had burst open a door.
In the old days this room had been absolutely destitute of furniture. In
the older days again it had been the spare room of Castle O'Shanaghgan.
Here hospitality had reigned; here guests of every degree had found a
hearty welcome, an invitation to stay as long as they pleased, and the
best that the Castle could afford for their accommodation. When Nora had
left O'Shanaghgan, the only thing that had remained in the old room
was a huge four-poster. Even the mattress from this old bed had been
removed; the curtains had been taken from the windows; the three great
windows were bare of both blinds and curtains. Now a soft carpet covered
the entire floor; a neat modern Albert bed stood in a recess; there
were heavy curtains to the windows, and Venetian blinds, which were so
arranged as to temper the light. But the light of the sunset had already
faded, and it was twilight when Nora popped her wild, excited little
face round the door.
In the bed lay a gaunt figure, unshaven, with a beard of a week's
growth. Two great eyes looked out of caverns, then two arms were
stretched out, and Nora was clasped to her father's breast.
“Ah, then, I have you again; may God be praised for all His mercies,”
said the Squire in a great, deep hoarse voice.
Nora lay absolutely motionless for nearly half a minute in his arms,
then she raised herself.
“Ah,” she said, “that was good. I hungered for it.”
“And I also hungered for it, my darling,” said the Squire. “Let me look
at you, Light o' the Morning; get a light somehow, and let me see your
bonny, bonny, sweet, sweet face.”
“Ah, there's a fire in the grate,” said Nora. “Are there any matches?”
“Matches, bedad!” said the Squire; “there's everything that's wanted.
It's perfectly horrible. They are in a silver box, too, bedad! What do
we want with it? Twist up a bit of paper, do, Nora, like a good girl,
and light the glim the old way.”
Nora caught at her father's humor at once. She had already flung off her
hat and jacket.
“To be sure I will,” she said, “and with all the heart in the world.”
She tore a long strip from the local paper, which was lying on a chair
near by, twisted it, lit it in the fire, and then applied it to a
candle.
“Only light one candle, for the love of heaven, child,” said the Squire.
“I don't want to see too many of the fal-lals. Now then, that's better;
bring the light up to the bed. Oh, what I have suffered with curtains,
and carpets, and---”
“It's too awful, father,” said Nora.
“That's it, child. That's the first cheery word I have heard for the
last six weeks--too awful I should think it is. They are smothering me
between them, Nora. I shall never get up and breathe the free air again;
but when you came in you brought a breath of air with you.”
“Let's open the window. There's a gale coming up, We'll have some air,”
said Nora.
“Why, then, Light o' the Morning, they say I'll get bronchitis if the
window is opened.”
“They! Who are they?” said Nora, with scorn.
“Why, you wouldn't believe it, but they had a doctor down from Dublin to
see me. I don't believe he had a scrap of real Irish blood in him, for
he said I was to be nursed and messed over, and gruels and all kinds of
things brought to my bedside--I who would have liked a fine potato with
a pinch of salt better than anything under the sun.”
“You'll have your potato and your pinch of salt now that I am back,”
said Nora. “I mean to be mistress of this room.”
The Squire gave a laugh.
“Isn't it lovely to hear her?” he said. “Don't it do me a sight of good?
There, open the window wide, Nora, before your mother comes in. Oh, your
mother is as pleased as Punch, and for her sake I'd bear a good deal;
but I am a changed man. The old times are gone, never to return. Call
this place Castle O'Shanaghgan. It may be suitable for an English
nobleman to live in, but it's not my style; it's not fit for an Irish
squire. We are free over here, and we don't go in for luxuries and
smotherations.”
“Ah, father, I had to go through a great deal of that in England,”
said Nora. “It's awful to think that sort of life has come here; but
there--there's the window wide open. Do you feel a bit of a breeze,
dad?”
“To be sure I do; let me breathe it in. Prop me up in bed, Nora. They
said I was to lie flat on my back, but, bedad! I won't now that you have
come back.”
Nora pushed some pillows under her father, and sat behind him to support
him, and at last she got him to sit up in bed with his face turned to
the wide-open window.
The blinds were rattling, the curtains were being blown into the room,
and the soft, wild sound of the sea fell on his ears.
“Ah, I'm better now,” he said; “my lungs are cleared at bit. You had
best shut the window before your lady-mother comes in. And put the
candle so that I can't see the fal-lals too much,” he continued; “but
place it so that I can gaze at your bonny face.”
“You must tell me how you were hurt, father, and where.”
“Bedad! then, I won't--not to-night. I want to have everything as
cheerful as possible to-night. My little girl has come back--the joy
of my heart, the light of my eyes, the top of the morning, and I'm not
going to fret about anything else.”
“You needn't--you needn't,” said Nora. “Oh! it is good to see you again.
There never was anybody like you in all the world. And you were longing
for Nora?”
“Now, don't you be fishing.”
“But you were--wern't you?”
“To be sure--to be sure. Here, then, let me grip hold of your little
hand. I never saw such a tiny little paw. And so they haven't made a
fine English lady of you?”
“No, not they,” said Nora.
“And you ran away to see your old dad? Why, then, you have the spirit of
the old O'Shanaghgans in you.”
“Horses would not have kept me from you,” said Nora.
“I might have known as much. How I laughed when your mother brought in
the telegram from your Aunt Grace this morning! And weren't they in a
fuss, and wasn't your Uncle George as cross as he could be, and your
mother rampaging up and down the room until I said, 'If you want to
bring on the fever, you'll go on like that, Ellen; and then she went
out, and I heard her talking to your uncle in the passage. Clap, clap
went their tongues. I never knew anything like English people; they
never talk a grain of anything amusing; that's the worst of it. Why,
it's the truth I'm telling you, darling; I haven't had a hearty laugh
since you left home. I'll do fine now. When they were out of the room
didn't I give way! I gave two loud guffaws, that I did, when I thought
of the trick you had played them. Ah, you're a true daughter of the old
race!”
Nora nestled up to her father, squeezing his hand now and then, and
looking into his face.
“We'll have a fine time to-morrow, and the next day, and the next day,
and the next,” she said. “Oh! I am determined to be near you. But isn't
there one little place in the house left bare, father, where we can go
and have a happy moment?”
“Never a square inch,” said the Squire, looking at her solemnly. “It's
too awful; even the attics have been cleared out and put in order, for
the servants, forsooth! says your Uncle George.”
“What do we want so many retainers for? I am sure, now, if they would
take a good houseful of some of the poor villagers and plant them up in
those attics, there would be some sense in it.”
“Oh, Nora, couldn't we get a bit of a place just like the old place, all
to ourselves?”
“I'll think it over,” said Nora; “we'll manage somehow. We can't stand
feather-beds for ever and ever, father.”
“Hark to her,” said the Squire; “you're a girl after my own heart, Light
o' the Morning, and it's glad I am to see you, and to have you back
again.”