IN WHICH MISS MAGNOLIA MACNAMARA AND DR. TOOLE, IN DIFFERENT SCENES,
PROVE THEMSELVES GOOD SAMARITANS; AND THE GREAT DOCTOR PELL MOUNTS THE
STAIRS OF THE HOUSE BY THE CHURCH-YARD.
So pulse or no pulse, dead or alive, they got Sturk into his bed.
Poor, cowed, quiet little Mrs. Sturk, went quite wild at the bedside.
'Oh! my Barney--my Barney--my noble Barney,' she kept crying. 'He's
gone--he'll never speak again. Do you think he hears? Oh, Barney, my
darling--Barney, it's your own poor little Letty--oh--Barney, darling,
don't you hear. It's your own poor, foolish Letty.'
But it was the same stern face, and ears of stone. There was no answer
and no sign.
And she sent a pitiful entreaty to Doctor Toole, who came very
good-naturedly--and indeed he was prowling about the doorway of his
domicile in expectation of the summons. And he shook her very cordially
by the hand, and quite 'filled-up,' at her woebegone appeal, and told
her she must not despair yet.
And this time he pronounced most positively that Sturk was still living.
'Yes, my dear Madam, so sure as you and I are. There's no mistaking.'
And as the warmth of the bed began to tell, the signs of life showed
themselves more and more unequivocally. But Toole knew that his patient
was in a state of coma, from which he had no hope of his emerging.
So poor little Mrs. Sturk--as white as the plaster on the wall--who kept
her imploring eyes fixed on the doctor's ruddy countenance, during his
moments of deliberation, burst out into a flood of tears, and
thanksgivings, and benedictions.
'He'll recover--something tells me he'll recover. Oh! my
Barney--darling--you will--you will.'
'While there's life--you know--my dear Ma'am,', said Toole, doing his
best. 'But then--you see--he's been very badly abused about the head;
and the brain you know--is the great centre--the--the--but, as I said,
while there's life, there's hope.'
'And he's so strong--he shakes off an illness so easily; he has such
courage.'
'So much the better, Ma'am.'
'And I can't but think, as he did not die outright, and has shown such
wonderful endurance. Oh! my darling, he'll get on.'
'Well, well, Ma'am, there certainly have been wonderful recoveries.'
'And he's so much better already, you see, and I know so well how he
gets through an illness, 'tis wonderful, and he certainly is mightily
improved since we got him to bed. Why, I can _see_ him breathe now, and
you know it _must_ be a good sign; and then there's a merciful God over
us--and all the poor little children--what would become of us?' And then
she wiped her eyes quickly. 'The promise, you know, of length of
days--it often comforted me before--to those that honour father and
mother; and I believe there never was so good a son. Oh! my noble
Barney, never; 'tis my want of reliance and trust in the Almighty's
goodness.'
And so, holding Toole by the cuff of his coat, and looking piteously
into his face as they stood together in the doorway, the poor little
woman argued thus with inexorable death.
Fools, and blind; when amidst our agonies of supplication the blow
descends, our faith in prayer is staggered, as if it reached not the ear
of the Allwise, and moved not His sublime compassion. Are we quite sure
that we comprehend the awful and far-sighted game that is being played
for us and others so well that we can sit by and safely dictate its
moves?
How will Messrs. Morphy or Staunton, on whose calculations, I will
suppose, you have staked £100, brook your insane solicitations to spare
this pawn or withdraw that knight from prise, on the board which is but
the toy type of that dread field where all the powers of eternal
intellect, the wisdom from above and the wisdom from beneath--the
stupendous intelligence that made, and the stupendous sagacity that
would undo us, are pitted one against the other in a death-combat, which
admits of no reconciliation and no compromise?
About poor Mrs. Nutter's illness, and the causes of it, various stories
were current in Chapelizod. Some had heard it was a Blackamoor witch who
had evoked the foul fiend in bodily shape from the parlour cupboard, and
that he had with his cloven foot kicked her and Sally Nutter round the
apartment until then screams brought in Charles Nutter, who was smoking
in the garden; and that on entering, he would have fared as badly as the
rest, had he not had presence of mind to pounce at once upon the great
family Bible that lay on the window-sill, with which he belaboured the
infernal intruder to a purpose. Others reported 'twas the ghost of old
Philip Nutter, who rose through the floor, and talked I know not what
awful rhodomontade. These were the confabulations of the tap-room and
the kitchen; but the speculations and rumours current over the
card-table and claret glasses were hardly more congruous or
intelligible. In fact, nobody knew well what to make of it. Nutter
certainly had disappeared, and there was an uneasy feeling about him.
The sinister terms on which he and Sturk had stood were quite well
known, and though nobody spoke out, every one knew pretty well what his
neighbour was thinking of.
Our blooming friend, the handsome and stalworth Magnolia, having got a
confidential hint from agitated Mrs. Mack, trudged up to the mills, in a
fine frenzy, vowing vengeance on Mary Matchwell, for she liked poor
Sally Nutter well. And when, with all her roses in her cheeks, and her
saucy black eyes flashing vain lightnings across the room in pursuit of
the vanished woman in sable, the Amazon with black hair and slender
waist comforted and pitied poor Sally, and anathematised her cowardly
foe, it must be confessed she looked plaguy handsome, wicked, and
good-natured.
'Mary Matchwell, indeed! _I'll_ match her well, wait a while, you'll see
if I don't. I'll pay her off yet, never mind, Sally, darling. Arrah!
Don't be crying, child, do you hear me. _What's_ that? _Charles?_ Why,
then, is it about Charles you're crying? Charles Nutter? Phiat! woman
dear! don't you think he's come to an age to take care of himself? I'll
hold you a crown he's in Dublin with the sheriff, going to cart that
jade to Bridewell. And why in the world didn't you send for _me_, when
you wanted to discourse with Mary Matchwell? Where was the good of my
poor dear mother? Why, she's as soft as butter. 'Twas a devil like me
you wanted, you poor little darling. Do you think I'd a let her frighten
you this way--the vixen--I'd a knocked her through the window as soon as
look at her. She saw with half an eye she could frighten you both, you
poor things. Oh! ho! how I wish I was here. I'd a put her across my knee
and--_no_--do you say? Pooh! you don't know me, you poor innocent little
creature; and, do ye mind now, you must not be moping here. Sally
Nutter, all alone, you'll just come down to us, and drink a cup of tea
and play a round game and hear the news; and look up now and give me a
kiss, for I like you, Sally, you kind old girl.'
And she gave her a hug, and a shake, and half-a-dozen kisses on each
cheek, and laughed merrily, and scolded and kissed her again.
Little more than an hour after, up comes a little _billet_ from the
good-natured Magnolia, just to help poor little Sally Nutter out of the
vapours, and vowing that no excuse should stand good, and that come she
must to tea and cards. 'And, oh! what do you think?' it went on. 'Such a
bit a newse, I'm going to tell you, so prepare for a chock;' at this
part poor Sally felt quite sick, but went on. 'Doctor Sturk, that droav
into town Yesterday, as grand as you Please, in Mrs. Strafford's coach,
all smiles and Polightness--whood a bleeved! Well He's just come back,
with two great Fractions of his skull, riding on a Bear, insensible into
The town--there's for you. Only Think of poor Mrs. Sturk, and the Chock
she's got on sight of Him: and how thankful and Pleasant you should be
that Charles Nutter is not a Corpes in the Buchar's wood, and jiggin
Home to you like Sturk did. But well in health, what I'm certain shure
he is, taken the law of Mary Matchwell--bless the Mark--to get her
emprisind and Publickly wiped by the commin hangman.' All which rhapsody
conjured up a confused and dyspeptic dream, full of absurd and terrific
images, which she could not well comprehend, except in so far as it
seemed clear that some signal disaster had befallen Sturk.
That night, at nine o'clock, the great Doctor Pell arrived in his coach,
with steaming horses, at Sturk's hall-door, where the footman thundered
a tattoo that might have roused the dead; for it was the family's
business, if they did not want a noise, to muffle the knocker. And the
doctor strode up, directed by the whispering awestruck maid, to Sturk's
bed-chamber, with his hands in his muff, after the manner of doctors in
his day, without asking questions, or hesitating on lobbies, for the
sands of his minutes ran out in gold-dust. So, with a sort of awe and
suppressed bustle preceding and following him, he glided up stairs and
straight to the patient's bedside, serene, saturnine, and rapid.
In a twinkling the maid was running down the street for Toole, who had
kept at home, in state costume, expecting the consultation with the
great man, which he liked. And up came Toole, with his brows knit, and
his chin high, marching over the pavement in a mighty fuss, for he knew
that the oracle's time and temper were not to be trifled with.
In the club, Larry the drawer, as he set a pint of mulled claret by old
Arthur Slowe's elbow, whispered something in his ear, with a solemn
wink.
'Ho!--by Jove, gentlemen, the doctor's come--Doctor Pell. His coach
stands at Sturk's door, Larry says, and we'll soon hear how he fares.'
And up got Major O'Neill with a 'hey! ho--ho!' and out he went, followed
by old Slowe, with his little tankard in his fist, to the inn-door,
where the major looked on the carriage, lighted up by the footman's
flambeau, beneath the old village elm--up the street--smoking his pipe
still to keep it burning, and communicating with Slowe, two words at a
time. And Slowe stood gazing at the same object with his little faded
blue eyes, his disengaged hand in his breeches' pocket, and ever and
anon wetting his lips with his hot cordial, and assenting agreeably to
the major's conclusions.
'Seize ace! curse it!' cried Cluffe, who, I'm happy to say, had taken no
harm by his last night's wetting; 'another gammon, I'll lay you fifty.'
'Toole, I dare thay, will look in and tell us how poor Sturk goes on,'
said Puddock, playing his throw.
'Hang it, Puddock, mind your game--to be sure, he will. Cinque ace!
well, _curse_ it! the same throw over again! 'Tis too bad. I missed
taking you last time, with that stupid blot you've covered--and now, by
Jove, it ruins me. There's no playing when fellows are getting up every
minute to gape after doctors' coaches, and leaving the door open--hang
it, I've lost the game by it--gammoned twice already. 'Tis very
pleasant. I only wish when gentlemen interrupt play, they'd be good
enough to pay the bets.'
It was not much, about five shillings altogether, and little Puddock had
not often a run of luck.
'If you'd like to win it back, Captain Cluffe, I'll give you a chance,'
said O'Flaherty, who was tolerably sober. 'I'll lay you an even guinea
Sturk's dead before nine to-morrow morning; and two to one he's dead
before this time to-morrow night.'
'I thank you--no, Sir--two doctors over him, and his head in two
pieces--you're very obliging, lieutenant, but I'll choose a likelier
wager,' said Cluffe.
Dangerfield, who was overlooking the party, with his back to the fire,
appeared displeased at their levity--shook his head, and was on the
point of speaking one of those polite but cynical reproofs, whose irony,
cold and intangible, intimidated the less potent spirits of the
club-room. But he dismissed it with a little shrug. And a minute after,
Major O'Neill and Arthur Slowe became aware that Dangerfield had glided
behind them, and was looking serenely, like themselves, at the Dublin
doctor's carriage and smoking team. The light from Sturk's bed-room
window, and the red glare of the footman's torch, made two little
trembling reflections in the silver spectacles as he stood in the shade,
peering movelessly over their shoulders.
''Tis a sorry business, gentlemen,' he said in a stern, subdued tone.
'Seven children and a widow. He's not dead yet, though: whatever Toole
might do, the Dublin doctor would not stay with a dead man; time's
precious. I can't describe how I pity that poor soul, his wife--what's
to become of her and her helpless brood I know not.'
Slowe grunted a dismal assent, and the major, with a dolorous gaze, blew
a thin stream of tobacco-smoke into the night air, which floated off
like the ghost of a sigh towards the glimmering window of Sturk's
bed-room. So they all grew silent. It seemed they had no more to say,
and that, in their minds, the dark curtain had come down upon the drama
of which the 'noble Barney,' as poor Mrs. Sturk called him, was hero.