"Ain't you a fool, Betty?" says she, puttin' a hand on my shoulder.
"Maybe I am, miss," says I; "but there 's others fools as well as me!"
"But I mean," says she, "isn't it silly to fall out with mamma,--that
was always so good, and so kind, and so fond of you?"
I saw at once, Shusy, how the wind was, and so I just went on folding up
my collars and settling my things without a word.
"I 'm sure," says she, "you could n't leave her in a faraway country
like this!"
"The dearest friends must part, miss," says I.
"Not to speak of your own desolate and deserted condition," says she.
"There's them that won't lave me dissolute and disconsoled, miss,"
says I. And with that, Shusy, I told her that Taddy Hetzler had made me
honorable proposals.
"But you 'd not think of Taddy," says she. "He 's only a herd," says
she.
"We must take what we can get, miss," says I, "and be thanklul in this
life."
And she blushed red up to the eyes, Shusy; for she knew well what I
meant by _that!_
"But a nice girl, and a purty girl like you, Betty," says she,
"_slendering_" me, "is n't it throwing yourself away? Sure, ye have only
to wait a little to make an iligant match here on the Continent. Don't
be precipitouous," says she, "but see the effect you'll make with that
beautiful pink gownd;" and here, Shusan, she gave me all as one as a
bran new silk of the mistress's, with five flounces, and lace trim-mins
down the front! It's what they call glassy silk, and shines like it!
"I 'm sorry, miss," says I, "that as I took the mistress's warnin', I'm
obleeged to refuse you."
"Nonsense, Betty," says she; "I'll arrange all that."
"But my feelins, miss,--my feelins."
"Well, I'll even engage to smoothe these," says she, laughing.
And so, Shusy, I had to laugh too; for my nature is always to be easy
and complyiant; and when anybody means well to me, they can do what they
plaze with me. It's a weak part in my character, but I can't help it
"I'm not able to be selfish, Miss Mary Anne," says I.
"No, Betty, _that_ you are not," says she, patting my cheek.
But for all that, Shusy, I 'm not going to give up Taddy till I know
why,--tho' I did n't say so to her. So I just put up the pink gownd in
my drawer, and went up and told the mistress I'd stay; but begged she
wouldn't try my nerves that way another time, for my constitution would
n't bear repated shocks. I saw she was burstin' to say something, but
dar'n't, Shusy, and she tore a lace cuff to tatters while I was talk
in'. Well, well, there's no deny in' it, anyhow; manials has many
troubles, but they can give a great deal of annoyance and misery if they
set about it right You 'd like to hear about Taddy, and I 'll be candid
and own that he is n't what would be called handsome in Ireland, though
here he is reckoned a fine-looking man. He is six foot four and a half,
without shoes, a little bent in the shoulders, has long red hair, and
sore eyes; that cums from the snow, for he's out in all weathers--after
the pigs. You 're surprised at that, and well you may; for instead of
keeping the craytures in a house as we do, and giving them all the filth
we can find to eat, they turns them out wild into the woods, to eat
beech-nuts, and acorns, and chestnuts; and the beasts grow so wicked
that it's not safe for a stranger to go near them; and even the man that
guides them they call a "swine-fearer."(1) Taddy is one of these; and
when he 's dressed in a goat-skin coat and cap, leather gaiters buttoned
on his legs, and reachin' to the hips, and a long pole, with an iron
hook and a hatchet at the end of it, and a naked knife, two feet long,
at his side, you 'd think the pigs would be more likely to be afraid of
_him!_ Indeed, the first time I saw him come into the kitchen, with a
great hairy dog they call a fang-hound at his heels, I schreeched out
with frite, for I thought them--God forgive me!--the ugliest pare I ever
set eyes on. To be sure, the green shade he wore over his eyes, and
the beard that grew down to his breast, did n't improve him; but I 've
trimmed him up since that; and it's only a slight squint, and two teeth
that sticks out at the side of his mouth, that I can't remedy at all!
Paddy Byrne spends his time mock in' him, and makin' pictures of him
on the servants' hall with a bit of charcoal. It well becomes a dirty
little spalpeen like him to make fun of a man four times his size. His
notion of manly beauty is four foot eight, short legs, long breeches
and gaiters, with a waistcoat over the hips, and a Jim Crow! A monkey is
graceful compared to it!
Taddy is not much given to talkin', but he has told me that he has been
on the estate, "with the pigs," he calls it, since he was eight years
old; and as he said, another time, that "he was nine-and-twenty years a
herd," you can put the two together, and it makes him out thirty-three
or thirty-four years of age. He never had any father or mother, which
is a great advantage, and, as he remarks, "it's the same to him if there
came another Flood and drowned all the world to-morrow!"
Our plans is to live here till we can go and take a bit of land for
ourselves; and as Taddy has saved something, and has very good idais
about his own advantage, I trust, with the blessin' of the Virgin, that
we 'll do very well.
1 Perhaps the accomplished Betty has been led into this
pardonable mistake from the sound of the German epithet
"Schwein-führer."--Editor of "Dodd Correspondence."
This that I tell you now, Shusan, is all in confidence, because to the
neighbors, and to Sam Healey, you can say that I am going to be married
to a rich farmer that has more pigs--and that's thrue--than ye 'd see in
Ballinasloe Fair.
What distresses me most of all is, I can't make out what religion he 's
of, if he has any at all! I try him very hard about penance and 'tarnal
punishments, but all he says is, "When we 're married I 'll know all
about that."
As the mistress writ all about Mary Anne's marriage to Mrs. Galagher,
at the house, I don't say anything about it; but he's an ugly crayture,
Shusan dear, and there's a hangdog, treach'rous look about him I wonder
any young girl could like. The servants, too, knows more of him than
they lets on, but, by rayson of their furrin language, there's no
coming at it.
Between ourselves, she doesn't take to the marriage at all, for I seen
her twice cryin' in her room over some ould letters; but she bundled
them up whin she seen me, and tried to laugh.
"I wonder, Betty," says she, "will I ever see Dodsbor-ough again!"
"Who knows, miss?" said I; "but it would be a pity if you did n't, and
so many there that's fond of you!"
"I don't believe it," says she, sharp. "I don't believe there's one
cares a bit about me!"
"Baithershin!" says I, mocking.
"Who does?" says she; "can ye tell me even one?"
"Sure there 's Miss Davis," says I, "and the Kellys, and there's Miss
Kitty Doolan, and ould Molly, not to spake of Dr. Bel--"
"There, do not speak of him," says she, getting red; "the very names of
the people make me shudder. I hope I 'll never see one of them."
Now, Shusan dear, I told you all that it's in my mind, and hope you 'll
write to me the same. If you could send me the gray cloak with the blue
linin', and the bayver bonnet I wore last winter two years, they 'd
be useful to me here, and you could tell the neighbors that it was new
clothes you were sendin' me for my weddin'. Be sure ye tell me how Sam
Healey bears it. Tell him from me, with my regards, that I hope he won't
take to drink, and desthroy his constitution.
You can write to me still as before, to your attached and true friend,
Betty Cobb.