“I can’t find the letter high or low,” said Doyle.
“Maybe now,” said Father McCormack, “it’s not in your pocket at all.”
“It should be,” said Doyle, “for it was there I put it after showing it
to the doctor here yesterday.”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Dr. O’Grady, “you can tell us what he said in
your own words.”
“What I told my nephew,” said Doyle, “when I was writing to him, was
that the committee was a bit pressed in the matter of time, owing to
next Thursday week being the only day that it was convenient for
the Lord-Lieutenant to attend for the opening of the statue. Well,
gentlemen, by the height of good luck it just happens that my nephew has
a statue on hand which he thinks would do us.”
“He has what?” said the Major.
“A statue that has been left on his hands,” said Doyle. “The way of it
was this. It was ordered by the relatives of a deceased gentleman, and
it was to have been put up in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Dublin.”
“That shows,” said Dr. O’Grady, “that it’s a first rate statue. They
wouldn’t let you put up anything second rate in a cathedral like that.”
“It must be a good one, surely,” said Father McCormack.
“But when the relatives of the deceased party went into his affairs,”
said Doyle, “they found he hadn’t died near as well off as they thought
he was going to; so they told my nephew that they wouldn’t take the
statue and couldn’t pay for it. It was pretty near finished at the time,
and what my nephew says is that he could make sure of having it ready
for us by the end of this week at the latest.”
“Look here, O’Grady,” said the Major, “I’m as fond of a joke as any man;
but I must draw the line somewhere. I’m hanged if I’ll be mixed up in
any way with a second-hand statue.”
“It’s not second-hand,” said Dr. O’Grady, “it’s perfectly new. At this
moment it isn’t even finished; I wouldn’t ask this committee to buy
anything second hand. But you can surely see, Major—you do see, for you
raised the point yourself, that with the very short time at our disposal
we must, if we are to have a statue at all, get one that’s more or less
ready made.”
“But—Good Heavens! O’Grady,” said the Major. “How can you possibly put
up a statue of somebody else and call it General John Regan? It won’t be
the least like him. How can you—the thing’s too absurd even for you. Who
was this man that the statue was made for?”
“Who was he, Doyle?” said Dr. O’Grady. “It doesn’t really matter to us
who he was; but you may as well tell the Major so as to satisfy him.”
“I disremember his name,” said Doyle, “and I can’t lay my hand on the
letter; but he was a Deputy-Lieutenant of whatever county he belonged
to.”
“There you are now, Major,” said Dr. O’Grady. “A Deputy-Lieutenant!
Nothing could be more respectable than that. You’re only a J.P.
yourself, and I don’t believe you’ll ever be anything more. You can’t
afford to turn up your nose at a Deputy-Lieutenant. We shan’t be doing
any injury to the General’s reputation by allowing him to be represented
by a man of high position, most likely of good family, who was at all
events supposed to be well off before he died.”
“I wasn’t thinking of the General’s reputation,” said the Major. “I
don’t care a hang——”
“I don’t see that we are bound to consider the feelings of the
Deputy-Lieutenant,” said Dr. O’Grady. “After all, if a man deliberately
leads his relatives to suppose that he is rich enough to afford a statue
in a cathedral and then turns out to be too poor to pay for it, he
doesn’t deserve much consideration.”
“I wouldn’t cross the road,” said Doyle, “to do a good turn to a man
that let my nephew in the way that fellow did. For let me tell you,
gentlemen, that statue would have been a serious loss to him if——”
“I’m not thinking of him or Doyle’s nephew either,” said the Major.
“I don’t know who that Deputy-Lieutenant was, and I don’t care if his
statue was stuck up in every market town in Ireland.”
“If you’re not thinking of the General,” said the doctor, “and if you’re
not thinking of the Deputy-Lieutenant, what on earth are you grumbling
about?”
“I’m grumbling, as you call it,” said the Major, “about the utterly
intolerable absurdity of the whole thing. Can’t you see it? You can of
course, but you won’t. Look here, Father McCormack, you’re a man of some
sense and decency of feeling. Can we possibly ask the Lord-Lieutenant to
come here and unveil a statue of General John Regan—whoever he was—when
all we’ve got is a statue of some other man? Quite possibly the
Lord-Lieutenant may have known that Deputy-Lieutenant personally, and if
he recognises the statue where shall we be?”
“There’s something in what the Major says,” said Father McCormack. “I’ll
not deny there’s something in what he says.”
“There isn’t,” said Dr. O’Grady. “Excuse my contradicting you flatly,
Father McCormack, but there really isn’t. We all know Doyle, and we
respect him; but I put it to you now, Father McCormack, I put it to any
member of the committee: Is Doyle likely to have a nephew who’d be able
to make a statue that anybody would recognise?”
“There’s something in that,” said Father McCormack. “I’m not well up
in statues, but I’ve seen a few in my time, and all I can say is that
unless Doyle’s nephew is a great deal better at the job than most of the
fellows that makes them, nobody would know, unless they were told, who
their statue’s meant to be like.”
“My nephew’s a good sculptor,” said Doyle. “If he wasn’t I wouldn’t
have brought his name forward to-day; but what the doctor says is true
enough. I’ve seen heads he’s done, for mural tablets and the like, and
so far as anybody recognising them for portraits of the deceased goes,
you might have changed the tablets and, barring the inscriptions, nobody
would have known to the differ. Not but what they were well done, every
one of them.”
“There now, Major,” said Dr. O’Grady. “That pretty well disposes of your
last objection.”
“That’s only a side issue,” said the Major, speaking with a calm which
was evidently forced. “My point is that we can’t, in ordinary decency,
put up a statue of one man to represent another.”
“I don’t know that I altogether agree with the Major there,” said Father
McCormack, “but there’s something in what he says.”
“I can’t see that there’s anything,” said Dr. O’Grady.
“Deputy-Lieutenants have uniforms, haven’t they? So have Generals.
Nobody can possibly know what the uniform of a Bolivian General was
fifty or a hundred years ago. All we could do, even if we were having
the statue entirely made to order, would be to guess at the uniform.
It’s just as likely to be that of a modern Deputy-Lieutenant as anything
else.”
“That’s true of course,” said Father McCormack.
“Anyway,” said Doyle, “if we’re to have a statue at all it’ll have to be
this one. There’s no other for us to get, so what’s the use of talking?”
The Major shrugged his shoulders helplessly.
“There’s evidently no use my talking,” he said.
“Is it your wish then, gentlemen,” said Father McCormack, “that the
offer of Mr. Aloysius Doyle to supply a statue of General John Regan be
accepted by the committee?”
“It is,” said Dr. O’Grady.
“Subject to the price being satisfactory,” said Gallagher. “We haven’t
heard the price yet.”
“I have the letter about the price which my nephew sent me,” said Doyle,
“and I think you’ll all agree with me that he’s giving it cheap.”
“He ought to,” said Gallagher, “considering that if he doesn’t sell it
to us it’s not likely he’ll sell it at all.”
“The demand for second-hand statues must be small,” said the Major.
“What he says is,” said Doyle, “that considering he’s dealing with a
member of his own family he’ll let the statue go at no more than the
price of the raw material, not making any charge for the work he’s
putting into it. I don’t know that we can expect more than that from
him.”
“You cannot, of course,” said Father McCormack.
“Let’s hear the figure,” said Gallagher.
“I should say,” said the Major, “that £10 would be a liberal offer on
our part.”
“Shut up, Major,” said Dr. O’Grady. “What do you know about the price of
statues? You wouldn’t get a plaster cast of a pet dog for £10.”
Doyle smiled amiably.
“There’s not a man in Ballymoy,” he said, “fonder of a joke than the
Major.”
“Let’s hear the figure,” said Gallagher.
“What he says,” said Doyle, “is £81.”
Major Kent whistled.
“But I wouldn’t wonder,” said Doyle, “but you could get him to knock
10s. off that and say £80 10s.”
Dr. O’Grady pulled a sheet of paper towards him and began to write
rapidly.
“Statue £80 10s.,” he said. “Carriage, say £1 10s. The railway companies
are robbers. Expenses of erection, say £2. You’ll let us have any mortar
and cement that are needed for nothing, Doyle; so we’ll only have to
pay for labour. I’ll superintend the erection without charging a fee.
Illuminated Address, £4. Bouquet £1 is. That’s a good deal to give for
a bouquet, but I don’t think we’ll get a decent one for less. Dresses,
etc., for Mary Ellen—the green stockings will have to be ordered
specially, and so will come to a little money. And we may have to get
that grey tweed dress which Mrs. Ford wants, just to prevent her kicking
up a row. Two dresses, stockings, etc., for Mary Ellen, say £4. That
will include shoes with buckles. She’ll have to wear an Irish brooch of
some sort, but we’ll probably be able to borrow that. Lunch for the Vice
Regal party on the day of the unveiling—there’ll be at least four of
them, say five in case of accidents. That will allow for two aides de
camp and a private secretary. They can’t want more. The five of us and
Mr. Billing, who said he’d be back for the ceremony. That makes eleven.
I suppose you could do us really well, Doyle, at 7s. 6d. a head,
including drinks, and there’ll have to be three or four bottles of
champagne on the sideboard, just for the look of the thing. We may not
have to open more than one. Eleven times 7s. 6d. makes £4 2s. 6d. What
do you mean to charge us for the printing of the posters, Gallagher?”
“I’ll say £3,” said Gallagher, “to include posters and advertisements in
the paper. I’ll be losing money on it.”
“You’ll not be losing much,” said Dr. O’Grady, “but we’ll say £3. That
will make—let me see——”
He added up his column of figures and then checked the result by adding
them downwards.
“That comes to £100 3s. 6d.,” he said, “and we’ve not put down anything
for postage. You’ll have to get your nephew to knock another 10s. off
the price of the statue. After all, when he said £81, he must have
been prepared to take £80, and he’ll have to cut the inscription for us
without extra charge.”
“He might,” said Doyle, “if we approached him on the subject.”
“He’ll have to,” said Dr. O’Grady, “for £100 is all we’ve got, and we
can’t run into debt.”
“He did say,” said Doyle, “that 3d. a letter was the regular charge for
cutting inscriptions.”
“We’ll make it short,” said Dr. O’Grady. “We won’t stick him for more
than about 10s. over the inscription. After all long inscriptions
are vulgar. I propose that Mr. Thaddeus Gallagher, as the only
representative of the press among us, be commissioned to write the
inscription.”
“We couldn’t have a better man,” said Father McCormack.
“I’ll not do it,” said Gallagher. He had a solid reason for refusing
the honour offered to him. The writer of an inscription at the base of a
statue is almost bound to make some statement about the person whom the
statue represents.
“You will now, Thady,” said Doyle, “and you’ll do it well.”
“I will not,” said Gallagher. “Let the doctor do it himself.”
“There’s no man in Connacht better fit to draw up an inscription of the
kind,” said Father McCormack, “than Mr. Gallagher.”
Thady Gallagher was susceptible to flattery. He would have liked very
well to draw up an inscription for the statue, modelling it on the
resolutions which he was accustomed to propose at political meetings
in favour of’ Home Rule. But he was faced with what seemed to him an
insuperable difficulty. He did not know who General John Regan was.
“Let the doctor do it,” he said reluctantly.
“Whoever does it,” said Doyle, “it’ll have to be done at once. My nephew
said that on account of the way we are pressed for time he’d be glad if
the words of the inscription was wired to him to-day.”
“It would, maybe, be better,” said Father McCor-mack, “if you were to
do it, doctor. We’ll all be sorry that the words don’t come from the
accomplished pen of our respected fellow citizen, Mr. Gallagher——”
“I’ll not do it,” said Gallagher, “for I wouldn’t know what to say.”
“Write it out and have done with it, O’Grady,” said the Major. “What’s
the good of keeping us sitting here all day?”
“Very well,” said Dr. O’Grady. “After all, it’s not much trouble. How
would this do? ‘General John Regan—Patriot—Soldier—Statesman—Vivat
Bolivia’.”
“We couldn’t do better,” said Father McCormack.
“What’s the meaning of the poetry at the end of it?” asked Gallagher.
“It’s not poetry,” said Dr. O’Grady, “and it doesn’t mean much. It’s the
Latin for ‘Long live Bolivia.’”
Gallagher rose to his feet. He had been obliged to confess himself
unable to write an inscription; but he was thoroughly well able to make
a speech.
“Considering,” he said, “that the town of Ballymoy is in the Province of
Connacht which is one of the provinces of Ireland, and considering the
unswerving attachment through long centuries of alien oppression which
the Irish people have shown to the cause of national independence, it’s
my opinion that there should be something in the inscription, be the
same more or less, about Home Rule. What I say, and what I’ve always
said——”
“Very well,” said Dr. O’Grady, “I’ll put ‘Esto Perpetua,’ if you like.
It’s the same number of letters, and it’s what Grattan said about the
last Home Rule Parliament. That ought to satisfy you, and I’m sure the
Major won’t mind.”
“I’m pretty well past minding anything now,” said the Major.
“There’s no example in history,” said Gallagher, “of determined devotion
to a great cause equal to that of the Irish people who have been
returning Members of Parliament pledged to the demand which has been
made with unfaltering tongue on the floor of the House at Westminster——”
“Get a telegraph form, Doyle,” said Dr. O’Grady, “and copy out that
inscription while Thady is finishing his speech.”
“There’s one other point that I’d like to mention,” said Doyle, “and
it’s this——”
“Wait a minute, Thady,” said Dr. O’Grady. “We’ll just deal with this
point of Doyle’s and then you’ll be able to go on without interruption.
What is it, Doyle?”
“My nephew says,” said Doyle, “that he’d be glad of a cheque on account
for the statue; he having been put to a good deal of out-of-pocket
expense.”
“Very well,” said Dr. O’Grady, “send him £25. Now go on, Thady.”
“Is it me send him £25?” said Doyle doubtfully.
“Of course it’s you. You’re the treasurer.”
“But it’s you has Mr. Billing’s cheque,” said Doyle.
“I haven’t got Mr. Billing’s cheque,” said Dr. O’Grady.
“If you haven’t,” said Doyle, helplessly, “who has?”
“It’s my belief,” said Gallagher, in a tone of extreme satisfaction,
“that there’s no cheque in it.”
“Do you mean to say, Doyle,” said Dr. O’Grady, “that you’ve been such a
besotted idiot as to let that American escape out of this without paying
over his subscription for the statue?”
“You’ll never see him again,” said Gallagher. “He’s not the first man
that skipped the country after letting everybody in.”
“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” said Father McCormack, “order, please, order.”
“We’ll have to drop the whole thing now,” said the Major, “and I must
say I’m extremely glad.”
“I’m no more an idiot than you are yourself, doctor,” said Doyle, “and I
won’t have language of the kind used to me. How was I to know he hadn’t
given you the cheque?”
“You were the treasurer,” said Dr. O’Grady. “What on earth is a
treasurer for if he doesn’t get in the subscriptions?”
“That nephew of yours will have his statue on his hands a bit longer,”
said Gallagher.
He still spoke in a tone of satisfaction; but even as he contemplated
the extreme disappointment of Doyle’s nephew it occurred to him that
there might be a difficulty about paying his own bill for £3. The same
thought struck Father McCormack.
“Gentlemen,” he said, “there’s been an unfortunate mistake, but it might
be worse.”
“That American fellow has us robbed,” said Gallagher.
“We’ll prosecute him when we catch him,” said Doyle.
“It might be worse,” said Father McCormack. “We haven’t spent very much
yet. The dresses for Mary Ellen can hardly have been put in hand yet, so
we won’t have to pay for them.”
“There’s my bill,” said Gallagher.
“So there’s only Mr. Gallagher’s little account,” said Father McCormack.
“We’ll have a house-to-house collection,” said Doyle, “till we get the
money raised.”
“Don’t be a blithering idiot, Doyle,” said Dr. O’Grady. “How can you go
round and ask people to subscribe to——”
“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” said Father McCormack.
“We must fall back upon the subscription list that was published in
the Connacht Eagle,” said the Major, “as well as I recollect we all
promised——”
“Nobody promised anything,” said Doyle. “It was Dr. O’Grady that
promised for us and before I pay a penny for a man that owes me more
this minute than he can pay——”
“Oh, do shut up, Doyle,” said Dr. O’Grady. “What’s the good of raking
up the past? What we’ve got to do now is to find a way out of the
confounded hole we’ve been let into through your incompetence and
carelessness.”
“I’m down for £5,” said the Major, “and I’ll consider that I’m very
well out of this business if I have to pay no more. I’d rather give five
pounds any day than stand by watching Mary Ellen and the Lord-Lieutenant
making faces at a second-hand statue.”
“It’s a handsome offer, so it is,” said Father McCormack, “and the
thanks of the meeting——”
“I’ll not pay a penny,” said Doyle, “and what’s more, if the doctor
doesn’t pay me what he owes me I’ll put him into the County Court.”
“It’s you that’ll have to pay,” said Gallagher, “whether you like it or
not.”
“I’m damned if I do,” said Doyle.
“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” said Father McCormack, “will you mind what
you’re saying? That’s no language to be using, Mr. Doyle; and I don’t
think the doctor has any right—not that I mind myself what you say for
I’m not particular; but if it was to get out to the ears of the general
public that this meeting had been conducting itself in ways that’s very
far from being reputable——”
“There’s no general public here,” said Dr. O’Grady, “and that’s just as
well.”
“What I’m trying to tell you,” said Father McCormack, “and what I would
tell you if you’d listen to me, is that there’s somebody knocking at the
door of the room we’re in and whoever it is must have heard every word
that’s been said this last five minutes.”
Doyle and Gallagher stopped growling at each other when the priest
spoke. Dr. O’Grady sat upright in his chair and bent his head towards
the door. There was a moment’s silence in the room and a very faint, as
it were an apologetic, knock was heard at the door.
“Come in,” said Dr. O’Grady.
Mary Ellen opened the door and looked in. She appeared to be rather
frightened. If, as Father McCormack supposed she heard every word spoken
during the previous five minutes, she had very good reason for feeling
nervous. She had a still better reason a moment later when Doyle caught
sight of her. Doyle had completely lost command of his temper.
“Get away out of that, Mary Ellen,” he said, “and if I catch sight of
you here again before I call for you I’ll have the two ears cut off you
and yourself sent home to your mother with them in a paper parcel in the
well of the car.”
Curiously enough this appalling threat seemed to cheer Mary Ellen a
little. She smiled.
“Mrs. Gregg says——” she said.
“If you’re not outside the door and it shut after you before I’ve done
speaking I’ll do what I’ve said and worse on top of that,” said Doyle.
“I won’t have Mary Ellen bullied,” said Dr. O’Grady. “It’s all you’re
fit for, Doyle, to frighten helpless little girls. If you’d talked that
way to Billing when he was trying to run away without paying——”
“You’re a nice one to talk about paying,” said Doyle.
Dr. O’Grady left his seat and walked over lo the door.
“What is it now, Mary Ellen?” he said.
“Mrs. Gregg says,” she said, “will I be wearing a hat or will I not?”
“Go back to Mrs. Gregg,” said Dr. O’Grady, “and tell her that you will
not wear a hat, but you’ll have your hair tied up with a green silk
ribbon to match your stockings. Would you like that?”
“I’d as soon have a hat,” said Mary Ellen, “and Mr. Moriarty says———”
“Surely to goodness,” said Dr. O’Grady, “he hasn’t been helping to order
your clothes!”
“He has not,” said Mary Ellen, “but he was outside the barrack and me
coming along the street——”
“He always is,” said Dr. O’Grady.
“And he said to me that it wouldn’t do for me to be dressed up any way
foolish like.”
“Let Constable Moriarty mind his own business,” said Dr. O’Grady. “You
go back and tell Mrs. Gregg what I say.”
The other members of the committee sat listening with amazed interest to
all Dr. O’Grady said to Mary Ellen. Even Doyle was too much astonished
to attempt an interruption. He said nothing till the doctor, having
dismissed Mary Ellen, returned to the table. Then he spoke.
“And who’s going to pay for the green ribbon which is to go along with
the stockings? Who’s going to pay for it? That’s what I’m asking you.
You needn’t be thinking that I will.”
“Gentlemen,” said Dr. O’Grady, “I owe you all an apology. I’m afraid I
lost my temper for a minute or two. Father McCormack, I beg your pardon,
and if I said—as I fear I did say—anything disrespectful to you as
chairman——”
“Don’t speak another word, Doctor,” said Father McCormack, “you’ve said
enough. Sure anyone might have been betrayed into a strong expression
when he was provoked. Not that you said a word to me that you’ve any
reason to be sorry for.”
“Major Kent,” said Dr. O’Grady, “if I’ve in any way insulted you——”
“Not worse than usual,” said Major Kent. “I’m quite accustomed to it.”
“Mr. Doyle,” said the doctor, “I’m afraid that in the heat of the moment
I may have—but I can do no more than ask your pardon———”
“I don’t care a thraneen,” said Doyle, “what you called me, and I’ll
give you leave to call me that and more every day of the week if you see
your way to get the £100 out of the American gentleman.”
“I can’t do that,” said Dr. O’Grady, “but I have a proposal to lay
before the meeting which I think will get us out of our difficulty.”