"So you're goin' to Steve's, Deirdre?"
It was Thad McNab who spoke. He stood on the doorstep in the sunshine,
his yellow face thrust through the doorway, the pale eyes in it,
smiling.
Deirdre was putting the last of her ribbands, handkerchiefs and little
personal belongings into a small canvas saddle-bag. McNab's voice
startled her. She glanced across at him.
"Yes," she said. The sight of his crooked figure there, in the doorway,
with the sunlight playing across it, brought her a sense of uneasy
wondering.
Quite suddenly, the night before, Farrel had decided to go up to the
hills with Conal in the morning. He had told Deirdre to follow them as
soon as she had set the cottage in order and collected her clothes. She
wanted to go with them, but there were a hundred and one things to keep
her busy in the house--dishes to scour, floors to sweep, covers and
crockery to lock away in the cupboards. She had just quenched the fire.
The ashes were smoking behind her, under the water she had poured over
them, when McNab appeared. The township was well astir by this time. The
Schoolmaster had talked of going to Steve's for long enough; she did not
expect anyone to be surprised at it. He did not seem to expect that
anyone would be surprised either, though he had made up his mind rather
suddenly the night before, and had told her to ride out quietly and
without chattering to anyone in the morning.
Yet McNab seemed surprised and annoyed. She wondered how he knew so soon
that the Schoolmaster had gone with Conal. It was very early. The
sunshine was still of an untarnished brilliance. Mrs. Mary Ann's ducks
and geese were making their first trip in wavering white and mottled
lines to the shallow pools left by the tide beside the river. Deirdre
could see them through the open doorway.
"Mighty sudden the Schoolmaster made up his mind, eh, my blackbird?"
Thad said, with, what for him was geniality, though geniality on his
voice had a sour sound.
He shuffled into the room and stood near her.
Deirdre folded a ribband and packed it into her bag. She made a great
appearance of being busy, going to and from the kitchen and the
cupboards, wrapping up and putting into the bag all manner of things
that she had not meant to take, in order that she might not be still to
look at, or to talk to McNab. She did not want him to see how the sight
of him had set her heart throbbing, a little nervous pulse fluttering in
her throat. His nearness filled her with a sick fear, but she would not
have had McNab guess it. She knew the shrewd sharpness of those pale,
shifty eyes of his. Her eyes met his clearly. There was not a flicker of
the smooth, white lids above them.
"Oh, no," she said, "he'd fixed to go to-day, sometime ago."
"Well, he might 've said so," replied McNab. "There was something I
wanted to talk to him about, something--partic'lar."
"Can I tell him what it is?"
His eyes fell before the clear innocence of her gaze. He moved uneasily.
"No," he said, "I dursay I'll find time to go and see him up at Steve's
one of these days. Tell him that ... I'll come soon." He chuckled a
moment. "They tell me," he went on, eyeing her narrowly, "they tell me,
he's taken that cub of Cameron's with him."
He did not wait for her reply, but ran on, the malice that was never far
from it an undercurrent in his voice again.
"He's not very clever, your father, my dear, for all he's a
Schoolmaster, or he wouldn't have done that! Give him my respects and
say I hope the hills'll be for the good of his health. And you--I hope
you'll be enjoyin' y'rself up there. Though it's no place, to be buryin'
the most beautiful woman in the South."
"Well, I'll have to be going now!" Deirdre moved quickly.
He had edged nearer and nearer her, until his breath touched her face as
she pulled the strings of her bag together.
"Socks has been saddled this half hour. Father'll be glad to see you any
day at Steve's, I'm sure, Mr. McNab," she added, backing towards the
door.
McNab got between her and it. He put his hand on her arm.
"My, the pretty neck it is," he gurgled, his voice deep in his throat.
"But where's the gold chain Pat Glynn told me he had for you from
a--'devoted admirer,' no less. A gold chain it was, with rubies and
pearls on it--fit for a lady to wear! And there's more for you, where it
come from. The one that sent it would dress you up like the finest lady
in the land, Pat said, if you would--"
Deirdre wrenched herself away from the clutching hands. They caught at
her again.
"You must kiss me good-bye then, pretty," he whispered.
She saw the flame in his eyes, the wry smile on his lips.
The chestnut was standing saddled, his bridle over the post by the door.
Deirdre leapt to his back, her bag in her hand.
Thad followed her out-of-doors and stood watching her, rubbing his hands
together.
"So shy, my blackbird, so shy!" he exclaimed, almost gleefully. "Never
mind. Another day, perhaps!"
Deirdre looked down at him, her eyes blazing.
"If father heard you talking like that, he'd thrash you within an inch
of your life," she cried passionately.
McNab lost countenance.
"Eh, would he?" he snarled.
The fear of death and revenge, the dealing out to himself of what he had
dealt so often to others, was the continual dogging terror that haunted
him. Then he smiled again and chuckled.
"If I let him, eh, my pretty," he said, gazing up at her. "If I let him.
I wouldn't advise you to ... to tell him ... create bad feelin' between
us ... it'd be a pity ... seeing ... me and y'r father's pretty good
friends, and they say it's better to make a friend than an enemy of
McNab. Besides it was only my little bit of fun, Deirdre. Haven't I
known you since you were--so high."
Deirdre turned the chestnut to the road.
"Good-bye, me dear," McNab called. "And my respects to the Schoolmaster,
don't forget! Tell him I think it was mean to do me the trick of
clearin' out without lettin' me know though, 'n me wantin' to stand by
him in any little bit of trouble that's comin' to him. But I'll be
comin' up to see him, soon--sooner than he thinks--p'raps."
There was a warning, a veiled threat, in the words.
As the chestnut flew out along the green roadsides, that mean voice with
its geniality and thin-edged malice, reverberated in Deirdre's ears. She
looked back when she was some distance out on the flat road that wound
over the plains to the hills, and saw McNab hobbling back towards the
whitewashed irregular and dilapidated huts of the Wirree township. Her
eyes went out to the ranges with an eager sigh. She quickened the
chestnut's pace again with a rub of her heels on his sleek side.