The smiling summer landscape showed not a sign next morning of the
disturbances of the night before. The rain-washed foliage glistened in
the sunshine, and far below in the valley curled a ribbon of blue, hazy
smoke. Billie, greatly refreshed from the sleep which had come to her
after the storm, had almost forgotten the nightmare until the ringing of
a bell in the distance brought it to mind. She touched an electric
button, as she had been directed to do by Beatrice, and presently a
pretty Irish maid appeared carrying a tray on which was a glass of hot
milk. A few minutes later she reappeared with a small basin of hot
water. Billie wondered if this was to be her allowance. Probably in an
ancient abbey hot water was scarce. But it was only a sample upon which
she was to pass judgment.
"It's quite right, thank you," she said, testing the temperature with
the tip of her finger. Next there was a sound of water being poured into
a tub in the dressing-room and she was aware that the bath was prepared.
Leaning back on the pillows she sipped her milk comfortably.
"My, but this is luxury," she thought. "_Vanitas vanitatum_ for a fact."
"Your bath is ready, Miss," announced the girl, pausing irresolutely.
"Did you want to say anything, Bridget?" asked Billie, noticing that the
maid lingered in the doorway.
"Bad luck has come to us this day, Miss, and may the Saints preserve us
all."
"Why, what is it?"
"The owld i-ron bell rang in the night, Miss, and then toombled down to
the ground and broke itself in half, and shure the owld sayin's come
thrue already--
"'The hour the i-ron bell doth fall
Brings throuble to Kilkenty Hall.'
"His Grace, the Duke, Miss, toombled downstairs in the night and they
found him this morning stiff and stark as a corpse----"
"Dead?" asked Billie in a shocked voice.
"No, 'twas not dead he was, Miss, but unconscious-like. He must have hit
his head when he fell and lay there most of the night. Wurra! Wurra! and
it's bad luck that's come to him, surely, and he with no toime to ask
for forgiveness of the Blessed Lord. 'Tis mony a mass will be said for
the sowl of His Grace, and he a-callin' for his youngest, and a-givin'
to the poor and needy for his safe return. He's a changed man, Miss, the
servants at the Hall do be a-tellin' me. 'Twas only yesterday mornin' he
asked Patrick, the head gardener, how his wife did as was mother to
twins last week."
Billie could scarcely keep from smiling. Was it so wonderful for His
Grace to make a kind inquiry?
"He was nivver known to ask the loike before, Miss, but it may be he
felt the bad luck a-comin' on like a disease, and his little boy, as he
once was cold to, kept a-hauntin' him day and night. The little Lord
Arthur is dead, Miss. I'm as sure of that as I'm standin' on my two feet
here. 'Twas only yestiddy a black cat crossed my path twice. 'Tis a sign
of death, surely, and his father will follow him to the grave as certain
as the owld bell fell last night and broke into pieces."
Nothing can yield more readily to superstitious influence than the Irish
temperament. While the educated classes attempt to resist it, the
ignorant are an easy prey to signs and indications. Billie felt that she
herself might easily absorb some of it, if she lingered in the land for
any length of time. It was a strange coincidence, however, the Duke's
tumbling downstairs the very night the old bell had broken from its
fastenings and fallen to the ground! But of course the corrosion of
time,--goodness only knows how many centuries,--had loosened the stones
in the tower, and the great storm had finished the work of destruction.
You couldn't expect an old ruin to stand forever, and Billie was later
to find that half the tower had blown down with the bell. As for the
Duke, perhaps he wasn't as badly injured as Bridget had said. She was
glad he wanted little Arthur at last. Here Billie's thoughts gave a
flying leap across a broad gulf of conjecture and landed safely on the
other side. In fact, her methods of reasoning and arriving at
conclusions were very much like a rider on a fast horse leaping hurdles.
While she dressed, suspicions that for weeks had lurked in the dark
corners of her mind became convictions, and by the time she was ready to
join her friends at breakfast, she had arrived at a determination.
Lord Glenarm was nowhere about at breakfast, which in an English house
is an informal meal. The guests serve themselves from "hot water dishes"
or from platters of cold meat, if they want any; and most assuredly
these young Americans did not yearn for cold meat at breakfast.
Beatrice, somewhat pale and frightened, was telling the others what had
occurred when Billie joined them.
"How he escaped concussion of the brain is a miracle," she said, "but
he's resting comfortably now, only he keeps asking for little Arthur.
Uncle has ridden over to the Hall."
It had been a long time since uncle had ridden over to the Hall or had
anything whatever to do with his half-brother; but stranger things than
this were to happen at Kilkenty Hall.
Miss Campbell immediately suggested departing with her four charges, but
Maria, who had seen their host before he left, told them that Lord
Glenarm particularly requested them to remain.
The two older women, therefore, went out for a morning drive, and the
younger ones took a spin in the "Comet." This was what Billie especially
wished, and when they stopped in a pretty village some miles distant to
shop, she inquired the way to the telegraph office, and slipping away
from the others, sent a mysterious telegram to Telemac Kalisch. She
remembered the address perfectly even to the number of the room in "the
seventh heaven," and she breathed a sigh of relief now the thing was off
her mind.
"It may lead to nothing at all and it may lead to a great deal. Who
knows?" she thought.
All the afternoon she waited anxiously for an answer. Telegrams to the
Abbey were telephoned over from the village, she had been informed, and
she made an excuse not to walk with the others before tea, and sat in
the great refectory reading a book. Her chair was drawn near an open
window through which floated the perfume of the flowers on the terraced
lawn and the soft stir made by the breeze in the tree tops. Billie
closed her eyes and rested her cheek against the high tapestry back of
the chair. For the hundredth time that afternoon she was endeavoring to
persuade herself that she had done right. If she were entirely on the
wrong track, how could she ever explain to Mr. Kalisch? So she was
thinking when something fluttered onto her lap. She opened her eyes
languidly, thinking perhaps a stray leaf had floated in on the breeze,
and lo and behold, there was the message! Not to this day does she know
how it reached her. Probably through the window, but just as probably in
some other way. It was merely a scrap of paper and scrawled across it in
an uneducated handwriting was: "Your message received. Be in the garden
to-morrow at five."
She sat a long time staring at the paper until the voices of the others
broke in on her reverie. Then she rolled it into a little ball and
tossed it out of the window.
"I can't understand," she said. "It's too deep for me."
"Well, you did miss it by not coming," cried Nancy, dashing into the
room excitedly, her arms filled with roses. "We have been over to
Kilkenty Hall--think of that! The housekeeper showed us all over the
house. There's a picture gallery and a grand ballroom and a beautiful
boudoir all hung in pink brocade. Beatrice saw her uncle and he kissed
her, the first time since she was a child, she said; and he didn't fall
in the hall at all, but down a flight of steps leading to the chapel,
where he had gone to pray."
"Dear me," exclaimed Billie, "I never heard such an interesting mixture
of news in all my life. You'll be telling me His Grace kissed you next."
"He didn't, but he ordered the head gardener to take us through the hot
houses----"
"Conservatories, child," corrected Billie.
"And we came away simply laden with flowers. These are Killarney roses.
Mary chose white roses and Elinor took pink carnations."
Undoubtedly a wonderful change had come over the Duke of Kilkenty and
his whole nature appeared to be transformed.
It was not easy for Billie to conceal from the watchful eye of Miss
Campbell and the girls the tremendous secret that she must keep to
herself until five o'clock the next afternoon. It was an anxious and
uneasy time for her. Suppose Beatrice should arrange to take them off
somewhere at that hour, she thought. Suppose there should be visitors to
tea in the garden; suppose it should be raining; suppose a hundred
things. The weary minutes stretched themselves into hours and the hours
became interminably long, it seemed to her, before the time even
approached five o'clock the next day. The strain of waiting was almost
more than she could endure alone. At last, after an endless time of
playing tennis and walking and visiting the kennels and doing fifty
other things, the five girls repaired to the Abbey garden, where Miss
Campbell and Maria sat talking with Lord Glenarm and--was it
possible?--the Duke of Kilkenty, himself. He was pale and his head was
bandaged, but he insisted on rising and being duly presented to the four
agitated young Americans. Did he recall the five pounds and the angry
beast Feargus had killed? They could not tell. He was extremely
courteous and there was a kindly light in his eyes that reassured them.
Billie sat down limply in a chair and waited. Some one gave her a cup of
tea which she forgot to drink. Her eyes were fastened on the ivy-grown
arch in the wall of the ruins, and all the time a little figure was
approaching slowly along the garden walk from the other end.
It was Beatrice who first called out with much excitement:
"Why, who is that?"
Everybody looked up and the Duke of Kilkenty cried:
"Arthur! Arthur!"
"Papa, have you cut your head?" demanded the little boy, who was
strangely familiar and yet unfamiliar, and the next minute he was in
their midst and they were all laughing and embracing him at once.
It was some time before they could realize that the pale, delicate
Arthur was a sturdy, beautiful boy. His face was tanned to a healthy
brown and his eyes were clear and merry.
"Where have you been all this time, Arthur?" demanded his father,
lifting him onto a bench and gazing at him with the expression of one
who has made a wonderful and happy discovery.
"I've been with grandpapa," answered Arthur. The half-brothers exchanged
a long look. "Grandpapa and Marie-Jeanne. We have had such ripping
times. We played out of doors every day and I never had to study at all.
Marie-Jeanne knows more games than Grandpapa, even. And she can make
little cakes. I have been very happy, but Grandpapa said you wanted me
and you loved me now----"
The Duke stroked the little boy's head and looked down.
"I should think he might feel a trifle uncomfortable," thought Miss
Campbell, still a bit skeptical over the Duke's complete reformation.
"And Grandpapa said that Billie sent word I was to come home and it was
all right."
"Who's Billie?"
"My best girl," answered Arthur, running over and leaning against the
blushing Billie's shoulder with entire confidence.
Then she was obliged to explain what she had done. His Grace was much
moved. He pressed her hand and said she was a remarkable young woman,
and that she had done what the highest paid detectives in the kingdom
had been unable to accomplish, and he wished to thank her with all his
heart.
Thus five o'clock merged into six, and six into half past, and at last
His Grace took his little son away, leaving the others still in the
garden feeling quite as if they had been taking part in a play.
All this time Billie wondered where Marie-Jeanne was, but she never came
and they have never seen her from that day to this. However, she has
written to Billie several long happy letters. She and her mother had a
little home on the bank of the river near Oxford, she said, and besides
her household duties, she was studying history and French.
That night, after dinner, Beatrice and Billie walked arm in arm in the
moonlit garden.
"Billie," began Beatrice, "uncle says that since you were cleverer than
all the detectives and really found little Arthur, you have a right to
know something, and he has given me permission to tell you."
"Is it about Telemac Kalisch?"
"I suppose you know him by that name. He is really Arthur's
great-grandfather, and the grandfather of Maddelina, my uncle's second
wife. But he is many more things besides and we are quite afraid of him,
although uncle has met him and says he is charming."
"He is," said Billie, "but what is the mystery about him?"
"He is supposed to be at the head of a great secret society. It's
everywhere, all over the world, and it's for poor people,--socialistic,
uncle calls it,--but it has members in all classes and it's to establish
peace. Of course, it's not actually known that the society exists, and
if it does, how far it goes and what it actually does. It's only
supposed. Uncle says that there is no telling who belongs, perhaps some
of his own servants for all he knows. At any rate, Mr. Kalisch is a very
marvelous old man. No one knows his age, but Uncle once heard he was
very, very old, but that he doesn't believe in age or in illness. He has
all kinds of queer theories and he has friends in all classes, princes
and common people. He isn't afraid of anything in the world. Uncle said
long ago that His Grace, as we always used to call Uncle Max, had better
be careful. Old Telemac loved his granddaughter, and he would certainly
have an eye on little Arthur."
"It's all very queer," said Billie, deeply interested in the history of
the strange old man.
The two girls followed the walk leading to the other side of the ruined
chapel, where stood the half-demolished tower, and Billie told Beatrice
the dream she had had the night of the storm, and how she had heard the
bell ring out once, probably as it fell.
"The queerest part of it all is," observed Beatrice, "that the old
prophecy did come true in a way:
"'If hatred turns to love before
Trouble will not cross the door.'
"Uncle and I thought of it, you may be sure. If Uncle Max had not
repented when he did, he would surely have had concussion of the brain
or some awful thing."
Billie smiled.
"Do you believe that?" she asked. "It was just a coincidence, of
course."
"Call it whatever you like. It did come out just as the old rhyme said
it would," answered Beatrice. "I could tell you queerer things than this
that have happened to some of the old families in Ireland and England."
"But what made him repent, Beatrice?" asked Billie.
"Who can tell what makes such things happen? Perhaps he suddenly saw
himself as he really was; or perhaps he had a vision. It has happened
before in this family. They do say that the ancestor who built this old
abbey was a wild and lawless character and he reformed and entered a
monastery, and then he built the abbey as a monument of his repentance,
I suppose."
"What would he think of it now, I wonder?" thought Billie.
It was growing late and the two girls turned back and presently joined
their friends in the refectory.
Before the Motor Maids and Miss Campbell left Ireland, they received a
call one morning from Feargus O'Connor, whose round, good-natured face
now beamed with happiness. He and his family had been able to return to
their old home, he said; his mother now had a deed to the place and
there would never again be any disputes about the title. He himself had
been appointed First Officer on a merchant ship. Some day he would be
Captain of the ship, but for the present he was well content to sail the
high seas as First Officer.
Billie would have liked to clear up some of the mystery about Telemac
Kalisch, but she hesitated to question Feargus. That the Duke of
Kilkenty had been known as "Tweedledum" in that mysterious association,
and that Feargus had been chosen to kidnap the little Lord Arthur and
had refused, she was fairly certain. Like as not, he had not learned
until later that old Telemac was the grandfather of the boy.
One more incident remains to be told before we close the history of the
Motor Maids' travels in the British Isles. At a grand farewell dinner at
Kilkenty Hall, His Grace, the Duke, made an appropriate speech of thanks
and presented Billie with a beautiful enamelled brooch in the design of
a wreath of roses, shamrocks and thistles intertwined.
So ended the strange drama into which the Motor Maids had been
unwittingly drawn. It had, however, enabled them to see many sides of
life; to touch the edge of a vast secret movement for universal peace;
to see the miracle of hatred turned to love and wrong made right. The
most unpleasant memories connected with their trip were softened by the
happy ending they had somehow brought about.
When they journey abroad again, they will sail to the faraway land of
Japan, and then we may, if we will, join "THE MOTOR MAIDS IN FAIR
JAPAN."
THE END.