The visit to White & Carmody’s law-office had weighed heavily upon the
mind of The O’Mahony during the whole voyage across the Atlantic, and
it still was the burden of his thoughts as he sat beside Jerry
Higgins--this he learned to be the car-driver’s name--in the train which
rushed up the side of the Lea toward Cork. The first-class compartment
to which Jerry had led the way was crowded with people who had arrived
by the _Moldavian_, and who scowled at their late fellow-passenger
for having imposed upon them the unsavory presence of the carman. The
O’Mahony was too deeply occupied with his own business to observe this.
Jerry smiled blandly into the hostile faces, and hummed a “come-all-ye”
to himself.
When, an hour or so after their arrival, The O’Mahony emerged from the
lawyers’ office the waiting Jerry scarcely knew him for the same man.
The black felt hat, which had been pulled down over his brows, rested
with easy confidence now well back on his head; his gray eyes twinkled
with a pleasant light; the long face had lost its drawn lines and
saturnine expression, and reflected content instead.
“Come along somewhere where we can get a drink,” he said to Jerry; but
stopped before they had taken a dozen steps, attracted by the sign and
street-show of a second-hand clothing shop. “Or no,” he said, “come
in here first, and I’ll kind o’ spruce you up a bit so’t you can pass
muster in society.”
When they came upon the street again, it was Jerry who was even more
strikingly metamorphosed. The captious eye of one whose soul is in
clothes might have discerned that the garments he now wore had not been
originally designed for Jerry. The sleeves of the coat were a trifle
long; the legs of the trousers just a suspicion short. But the smile
with which he surveyed the passing reflections of his improved image in
the shop-windows was all his own. He strode along jauntily, carrying the
heavy bags as if they had been mere featherweight parcels.
The two made their way to a small tavern near the quays, which Jerry
knew of, and where The O’Mahony ordered a room, with a fire in it, and a
comfortable meal to be laid therein at once.
“Sure, it’s not becomin’ that I should ate along wid your honor,” Jerry
remonstrated, when they had been left alone in the dingy little chamber,
overlooking the street and the docks beyond.
At this protest The O’Mahony lifted his brows in unaffected surprise.
“What’s the matter with _you?_” he asked, half-derisively; and no more
was said on the subject.
No more was said on any subject, for that matter, until fish had
succeeded soup, and the waiter was making ready for a third course. Then
the founder of the feast said to this menial:
“See here, you, don’t play this on me! Jest tote in whatever more you’ve
got, an’ put er down, an’ git out. We don’t want you bobbin’ in here
every second minute, all the afternoon.”
The waiter, with an aggrieved air, brought in presently a tray loaded
with dishes, which he plumped down all over The O’Mahony’s half of the
table.
“That’s somethin’ like it,” said that gentleman, approvingly; “you’ll
get the hang of your business in time, young man,” as the servant left
the room. Then he heaped up Jerry’s plate and his own, ruminated over a
mouthful or two, with his eyes searching the other’s face--and began to
speak.
“Do you know what made me take a shine to you?” he asked, and then made
answer: “’Twas on account of your dodrotted infernal cheek. It made me
laugh--an’ I’d got so it seemed as if I wasn’t never goin’ to laugh any
more. That’s why I cottoned to you--an’ got a notion you was jest the
kind o’ fellow I wanted. D’ye know who I am?”
Jerry’s quizzical eyes studied his companion’s face in turn, first
doubtingly, then with an air of reassurance.
“I do not, your honor,” he said at last, visibly restraining the
impulse to say a great deal more.
“I’m the O’Mahony of Murrisk, an’ I’m returnin’ to my estates.”
Jerry did prolonged but successful battle once more with his sense of
humor and loquacious instincts.
“All right, your honor,” he said, with humility.
“Maybe I don’t look like an Irishman or talk like one,” the other went
on, “but that’s because I was taken to America when I was a little
shaver, knee-high to a grasshopper, an’ my folks didn’t keep up no
connection with Irishmen. That’s how I lost my grip on the hull Ireland
business, don’t you see?”
“Sure, your honor, it’s as clear as Spike Island in the sunshine.”
“Well, that’s how it was. And now my relations over here have died
off--that is, all that stood in front of me--and so the estates come to
me, and I’m The O’Mahony.”
“An’ it’s proud ivery mother’s son of your tin-ints ‘ll be at that same,
your honor.”
“At first, of course, I didn’t know but the lawyers ’ud make a kick
when I turned up and claimed the thing. Generally you have to go to
law, an’ take your oath, an’ fight everybody. But, pshaw! why they jest
swallered me slick’n clean, as if I’d had my ears pinned back an’ be’n
greased all over. Never asked ‘ah,’ ‘yes,’ or ‘no.’ Didn’t raise a
single question. I guess there ain’t no White in the business now. I
didn’t see him or hear anything about him. But Carmody’s a reg’lar old
brick. They wasn’t nothin’ too good for me after he learnt who I was.
But what fetched him most was that I’d seen Abe Lincoln, close
to, dozens o’ times. He was crazy to know all about him, an’ the
assassination, an’ what I thought ’ud be the next move; so’t we hardly
talked about The O’Mahony business at all. An’ it seems ther’s been a
lot o’ shenanigan about it, too. The fellow that came out to America
to--to find me--Linsky his name was--why, darn my buttons, if he hadn’t
run away from Cork, an’ stole my papers along with a lot of others,
countin’ on peddlin’ ’em over there an’ collarin’ the money.”
“Ah, the thief of the earth!” said Jerry.
“Well, he got killed there, in about the last battle there was in the
war; an’ ’twas by the finding of the papers on him that--that I came
by my rights.”
“Glory be to God!” commented Jerry, as he buried his jowl afresh in the
tankard of stout.
A term of silence ensued, during which what remained of the food was
disposed of. Then The O’Mahony spoke again:
“Are you a man of family?”
“Well, your honor, I’ve never rightly, come by the truth of it,
but there are thim that says I’m descinded from the O’Higginses of
Westmeath. I’d not venture to take me Bible oath on it, but--”
“No, I don’t mean that. Have you got a wife an’ children?”
“Is it me, your honor? Arrah, what girl that wasn’t blind an’ crippled
an’ deminted wid fits wud take up wid the likes of me?”
“Well, what is your job down at Queenstown like? Can you leave it right
off, not to go back any more?”
“It’s no job at all. Sure, I jist take out Mikey Doolan’s car, wid that
thund’rin’ old Maggie, givin’ warnin’ to fall to pieces on the road in
front of me, for friendship--to exercise ’em like. It’s not till every
other horse and ass in Queenstown’s ingaged that anny mortial sow ’ll
ride on my car. An’ whin I gets a fare, why, I do be after that long
waitin’ that--”
“That you drive ’em up on top of the hill whether they want to go or
not, eh?” asked The O’Mahony, with a grin.
Jerry took the liberty of winking at his patron in response.
“Egor! that’s the way of it, your honor,” he said, pleasantly.
“So you don’t have to go back there at all?” pursued the other.
“Divila rayson have I for ever settin’ fut in the Cove ag’in, if your
honor has work for me elsewhere.”
“I guess I can fix that,” said The O’Mahony, speaking more slowly, and
studying his man as he spoke. “You see, I ain’t got a man in this hull
Ireland that I can call a friend. I don’t know nothin’ about your ways,
no more’n a babe unborn. It took me jest about two minutes, after I got
out through the Custom House, to figger out that I was goin’ to need
some one to sort o’ steer me--and need him powerful bad, too. Why, I
can’t even reckon in your blamed money, over here. You call a shillin’
what we’d call two shillin’s, an’ there ain’t no such thing as a dollar.
Now, I’m goin’ out to my estates, where I don’t know a livin’ soul, an’
prob’ly they’d jest rob me out o’ my eye-teeth, if I hadn’t got some one
to look after me--some one that knew his way around. D’ye see?”
The car-driver’s eyes sparkled, but he shook his curly red head with
doubt, upon reflection.
“You’ve been fair wid me, sir,” he said, after a pause, “an’ I’ll not
be behind you in honesty. You don’t know me at all. What the divil,
man!--why, I might be the most rebellious rogue in all County Cork.”
He scratched his head with added dubiety, as he went on; “An’, for the
matter of that, faith, if you did know me, it’s some one else you’d
take. There’s no one in the Cove that ’ud give me a character.”
“You’re right,” observed The O’Mahony. “I don’t know you from a side o’
soleleather. But that’s my style. I like a fellow, or I don’t like him,
and I do it on my own hook, follerin’ my own notions, and just to suit
myself. I’ve been siz’in’ you up, all around, an’ I like the cut o’ your
gib. You might be washed up a trifle more, p’r’aps, and have your hair
cropped; but them’s details. The main point is, that I believe you’ll
act fair and square with me, an see to it that I git a straight deal!”
“Sir, I’ll go to the end of the earth for you,” said Jerry. He rose, and
by an instinctive movement, the two men shook hands across the table.
“That’s right,” said The O’Mahony, referring more to the clasping of
hands than to the vow of fealty. “That’s the way I want ’er to stand.
Don’t call me ‘yer honor,’ or any o’ that sort o’ palaver. I’ve been a
poor man all my life. I ain’t used to bossin’ niggers around, or playin’
off that I’m better’n other folks. Now that I’m returnin’ to my estates,
prob’ly I’ll have to stomach more or less of that sort o’ nonsense.
That’s one of the things I’ll want you to steer me in.”
“An’ might I be askin’, where are these estates, sir?”
“So far’s I can make out, they’re near where we come in sight of Ireland
first; it can’t be very far from here. They’re on the seashore--I
know that much. We go to Dunmanway, wherever that is, by the railroad
to-morrow, and there the lawyers have telegraphed to have the agent meet
us. From there on, we’ve got to stage it. The place itself is Murrisk,
beyond Skull--nice, comfortable, soothin’ sort o’ names you Irish have
for your towns, eh?”
“And what time’ll we be startin’ to-morrow?”
“The train leaves at noon--that is, for Dunmanway.”
“Thank God for that,” said Jerry, with a sigh of relief.
The O’Mahony turned upon him with such an obviously questioning glance
that he made haste to explain:
“I’ll be bound your honor hasn’t been to mass since--since ye were like
that grasshopper ye spoke about.”
“Mass--no--how d’ye mean? What is it?”
“Luk at that, now!” exclaimed Jerry, triumphantly. “See what ’d ’a’
come to ye if ye’d gone to your estates without knowing the first word
of your Christian obligations! We’ll rise early to-morrow, and I’ll get
ye through all the masses there are in Cork, betune thin an’ midday.”
“Gad! I’d clean forgotten that,” said The O’Mahony. “An’ now let’s git
out an’ see the town.”