According to the official programme—so described by Dr. O’Grady—the
Lord-Lieutenant and Lady Chesterton were to arrive in Ballymoy by
motor-car at half-past twelve o’clock. There might be two motor-cars.
That depended on the number of aides-de-camp and of the suite which the
Lord-Lieutenant brought. There would certainly be one, and Doyle had the
coach-house in his back-yard emptied and carefully cleaned to serve for
the garage. Everything in the town was ready before half-past ten.
The statue had been erected on its pedestal the day before and excited
general admiration. Even Major Kent admitted that it was a striking
work of art which would be an ornament to the town. The deceased
Deputy-Lieutenant was dressed in flowing robes which resembled those
worn by judges. He held a large roll, intended to represent parchment,
in his left hand. This, Dr. O’Grady said, might very well be taken for
the original draft of the Bolivian Constitution. His right hand pointed
upwards with extended forefinger. In the case of the Deputy-Lieutenant,
who was almost certainly a strong Unionist, this may have symbolised
an appeal to the higher powers—the House of Lords, or even the King—to
refuse consent to a Home Rule Bill. When the statue ceased to be a
Deputy-Lieutenant and became General John Regan the attitude was taken
to express his confidence in the heavenly nature of the national liberty
which he had won for Bolivia. This was the explanation of the uplifted
forefinger which Dr. O’Grady offered to Thady Gallagher. But Gallagher
was curiously sulky and suspicious. He seemed unimpressed.
Doyle’s nephew came down to Ballymoy and personally superintended the
fixing of the statue on its pedestal. He complained that the cement
supplied for the purpose by his uncle was of very inferior quality, and
expressed grave doubts about the stability of the structure. Dr. O’Grady
did not seem very anxious. He hinted that the people of Ballymoy would
be quite satisfied if the statue stood for twenty-four hours. The
weather was exceptionally fine and calm. There was no reason—if the
unveiling were carefully done—why Doyle’s cement should be subjected to
any strain whatever.
At nine o’clock on the morning of the Lord-Lieutenant’s visit, Dr.
O’Grady, with the help of Doyle and two labourers, who had three
step-ladders, veiled the statue. They draped it from the head to the
bottom of the pedestal in a large sheet of blay calico of a light
yellowish colour. This was carefully done, and an elaborate arrangement
of string was made, leading out from the statue to the place where the
Lord-Lieutenant was to stand. Dr. O’Grady satisfied himself by a series
of experiments that the apparatus would work. At a single pull at the
end of the string the whole sheet fluttered to the ground and exposed
the Deputy-Lieutenant to public view.
It was ten o’clock before these arrangements were completed and the
step-ladders taken away. Dr. O’Grady went into the barrack and warned
Sergeant Colgan that he would be held personally responsible if any
curious wayfarer pulled the string before the proper time. Sergeant
Colgan at once ordered Moriarty to mount guard over the statue. Dr.
O’Grady went over to the hotel and inspected the luncheon table. He
had laid it himself the night before, so he felt fairly confident that
everything was as it should be; but he was not inclined to run any
risks. It was just possible that Doyle, acting on advice from somebody
else, might have altered the position of the spoons and forks during the
night.
“It’ll be after lunch,” said Dr. O’Grady, “that we’ll introduce the
subject of a pier.”
“Then or sooner,” said Doyle.
“Hints will have been given before that,” said Dr. O’Grady. “Father
McCormack has promised to touch on the undeveloped condition of our
fishing industry when he’s making his introductory remarks previous to
the unveiling of the statue. If I get half a chance, I mean to point out
what excellent stones there are in that old mill of yours. The matter
is distinctly alluded to at the end of the illuminated address, but I’m
afraid they’re not likely to read that till they get back to Dublin, if
then. I suppose, by the way, the address has arrived all right?”
“It has,” said Doyle, “but I haven’t it unpacked yet. It’s in a case.”
“We’d better have it quite ready. Get a screwdriver, will you, and a
hammer.”
The address turned out to be very large indeed and most magnificently
coloured. In the top left-hand corner was a small photograph of the
market square of Ballymoy, without the statue. In the right-hand Corner
was a picture, supplied by Mr. Aloysius Doyle, of the statue itself. In
the bottom left-hand corner was a photograph of the Viceregal Lodge in
the Phoenix Park, and opposite it a portrait of the Lord-Lieutenant in
his state robes. The whole left-hand side of the address was occupied
by an immensely complicated design made up of spirals, serpents, and
trumpet pattern ornaments, which twisted in and out of each other in
a way most bewildering to the eye. This was supposed to represent the
manner in which ancient Irish artists made the letter “t,” when they
were not in a hurry. “T” is the first letter of the word “to” with
which the actual address began. The words “Excellency,” “Lord,” and
“Lieutenant” were similarly honoured with capital letters of Celtic
design, but inferior size. “Ireland,” which came on a line to itself,
was blazoned in red and green, on a background of dull gold, laid on
smoothly, and afterwards dinted here and there with some instrument
which must have resembled a blunt pin. The rest of the letter-press was
done in crooked, angular characters, very ornamental to look at, but
most difficult to read.
“It’s a good address, so it is,” said Doyle, “and worth the money,
though, mind you, it was a big lot we gave for it. A cheaper one would
have done well enough.”
“I call it cheap at the price,” said Dr. O’Grady. “I’d no idea you could
get so much for £4. Now what about the bouquet?”
“I have it in a jug of water,” said Doyle, “under the counter of the
bar. I thought it would be better in water the way it would be fresh.”
“Quite right. But be sure you wipe the stalks before you give it to
Mrs. Gregg. It doesn’t so much matter about Lady Chesterton. She must
be pretty well accustomed to handling damp bouquets. But I’d be sorry
to spoil Mrs. Gregg’s new gloves. She’s sure to have new gloves. By the
way, what’s being done about getting Mary Ellen ready? That girl can’t
be trusted to dress herself.”
“Mrs. Gregg is putting the clothes on her this minute,” said Doyle,
“above in the best bedroom. She said she’d do it early so as she’d have
time after to go home and dress herself.”
“There’s been no trouble with Moriarty, I suppose? I told you about the
way he threatened me, didn’t I?”
“He hasn’t said a word to me, but he’s a fellow I wouldn’t trust further
than I can see him, and he’s had an ugly look about him this three days,
like as if he had some mischief in his mind.”
“I wouldn’t trust him either,” said Dr. O’Grady; “but I don’t see what
he could do. He wouldn’t venture to meddle with the statue, would he?
Tangle up the strings we have tied to the sheet or anything of that
sort?”
“He would not; for he knows well it would be the worse for him if
he did. It’s not likely Mr. Gregg would overlook it if Moriarty did
anything that put a stop to Mrs. Gregg presenting the bouquet.”
“We’ll have to chance it anyway, and I don’t see that he can do much
except sulk, and that won’t hurt us. I think I’ll be getting home now,
Doyle. I have to shave and generally clean up a bit before the Viceregal
party arrives. You don’t own a silk hat, I suppose?”
“I do not. What would I have the like for?”
“You might have worn it if you had,” said Dr. O’Grady. “My own is so old
that I’m ashamed to put it on. However, it doesn’t really matter.
Both the Major and Father McCormack are sure to have them, so the
Lord-Lieutenant won’t notice that you and I haven’t and nobody would
expect much from Thady Gallagher. After all, our hats will be in our
hands most of the time, and we can keep them behind our backs.”
At half-past eleven Mary Ellen and Mrs. Gregg came out of the hotel
together. Mary Ellen’s costume was beautifully complete. An English
tourist accustomed to buy the coloured picture postcards with which the
Germans obligingly supply our shops, would have recognised her at once
as an Irish colleen. Her stockings were of the brightest shade of green.
Her shoes, which were highly polished, had aggressively square toes and
enormous steel buckles which flashed in the sunlight as she walked. Her
skirt reached half way down the calves of her legs. It was of crimson
flannel, made very wide. A green and black tartan shawl was fastened
round her with a large Tara brooch which also held in its place a trail
of shamrock. Underneath the shawl she had a green silk blouse. It showed
very little but it exactly matched her stockings. Her hair was
brushed smoothly back from her forehead, and covered with a black and
white-checked kerchief tied beneath her chin and falling in a neat
triangle at the nape of her neck. Mrs. Gregg, who was naturally very
pleased, led Mary Ellen over to the statue, placed her beside it, and
told her not to move or in any way disorder her dress. Then she herself
hurried away.
Constable Moriarty, who was on guard beside the statue, scowled at Mary
Ellen. He approached her slowly, walked round her, surveyed her from
every point of view, and then snorted with intense disapproval.
“Your mother wouldn’t know you,” he said.
Mary Ellen smiled. She was greatly pleased at her own appearance and
chose to take Moriarty’s remark as a compliment.
“She might not,” she said, in a tone of evident delight.
Moriarty intended to say more; but at that moment the town band began
to play. Young Kerrigan had collected the members of it early in the day
and kept them in a group outside his father’s shop. The arrival of Mary
Ellen seemed to him to be a suitable occasion for a tune. He gave a
signal and the band struck up. “Rich and Rare Were the Gems She Wore”
was the tune on which they chanced. It was remarkably appropriate. The
band marched twice round the statue playing that tune. With the last
note it came to rest again in its old position outside Kerrigan’s shop.
Then Thady Gallagher came out of his office. He walked over and looked
at Mary Ellen.
“If you’re not ashamed of yourself,” he said, “you ought to be.”
“I am not, then,” said Mary Ellen.
Gallagher turned to Moriarty.
“You’re sure now,” he said, “that the tune the band is to play is the
one you told me.”
Moriarty grinned malevolently.
“I am sure,” he said.
“For if you’re playing any kind of a trick on me——”
“I am not. Amn’t I wanting to get my knife into the doctor the same as
yourself?”
“And why would you want that?”
“It’s on account of the way he has Mary Ellen dressed up. Will you look
at the girl?”
Gallagher looked at her again, long and carefully.
“Play acting!” said Moriarty, “and she’s a respectable girl. It’s not
decent, so it’s not.”
“If the tune’s what you say it is,” said Gallagher, “it’ll not be played
in Ballymoy to-day nor any other day. I’ll put the fear of God into
young Kerrigan before he’s an hour older.”
Moriarty grinned again. It seemed that, with the aid of Gallagher, he
was going to hit Dr. O’Grady on a vital spot. He understood that great
importance was attached to the performance of “Rule, Brittania” by the
band. Gallagher walked across to young Kerrigan.
“I know now,” he said, “what the tune is you’re meaning to play.”
“If you know that,” said Kerrigan, “you know more than I do.”
“None of your lies now. Constable Moriarty is after telling me the name
of the tune.”
“If you know it,” said Kerrigan, “maybe you’ll tell me. Not that I care
what the name of it is, for it’s a good tune, name or no name.”
“You will care,” said Gallagher. “You will care before the day is out.”
“Why don’t you tell me the name of it, then? if so be you know it.”
“You know well why I don’t tell you. It’s because I wouldn’t defile my
lips with the name of it, because I wouldn’t say the words that would be
a disgrace to any Irishman.”
“You’re mighty particular,” said young Kerrigan. “It would have to be a
pretty bad name that’s on the tune if it’s worse than what you said many
a time.”
Gallagher was not in a mood to submit calmly to taunts of this kind. He
knew that he was perfectly right in refusing to pronounce the name of
the tune. He was convinced that young Kerrigan knew and was able to talk
as he did only because he was dead to all sense of decency or shame.
“Let me tell you this,” he said, “and it’s my last word. If that tune’s
played in Ballymoy to-day it’ll be the worse for you, and the worse for
your father, and the worse for all belonging to you. Let you not play
that tune or the grass will be growing on the step outside your father’s
shop before any decent Nationalist will go into it to buy a bit of meat.
Them that makes their living off the people will have to mind themselves
that they don’t outrage the convictions of the people.”
This was an awful threat, and it cowed young Kerrigan a good deal. He
did not believe that Gallagher was capable of having it carried out to
the last extremity. The grass would not actually grow on his father’s
doorstep, because the people of the west of Ireland, though swift and
passionate in resentment, find a difficulty in keeping up a personal
quarrel long enough to permit of the growth of grass. But a great deal
of temporary inconvenience might be caused by a boycott initiated by
Gallagher and taken up by the local branch of the League. Young Kerrigan
was shaken.
“You’d better speak to the doctor about it,” he said. “It’s his tune and
not mine.”
“I will speak to the doctor,” said Gallagher. “I’ll speak to him in a
way he won’t like. I was thinking all along he was up to some mischief
with that tune; but I didn’t know how bad it was till Moriarty was
talking to me this morning. Where is the doctor?”
“He was over in Doyle’s hotel a minute ago,” said Kerrigan, “but I don’t
know is he there yet. He might not be, for I seen him going out of it
and along the street.”
“Wherever he is I’ll make it hot for him,” said Gallagher, as he turned
away.
“Constable Moriarty be damned,” said young Kerrigan softly but fervently
as soon as Gallagher was safely out of earshot. Gallagher stopped on his
way to the hotel to take another scornful look at Mary Ellen.
“If your father that’s dead was alive this day,” he said, “he’d turn you
out of the house when he seen you in them clothes.”
Mary Ellen had no recollection of her father, who had died before she
was twelve months old, but she was more hopeful about him than Gallagher
seemed to be.
“He might not,” she said.
Then Father McCormack appeared, walking briskly up the street from
the-presbytery. He was wearing, as Dr. O’Grady had anticipated, a silk
hat. He had a very long and voluminous frock coat. He had even, and this
marked his sense of the importance of the occasion, made creases down
the fronts of his trousers. Gallagher went to meet him.
“Good morning, Thady,” said Father McCormack cheerfully. “We’re in great
luck with the weather.”
“Father,” said Gallagher, “you were always one that was heart and soul
with the people of Ireland, and it will make you sorry, so it will,
sorry and angry, to hear what I have to tell you.”
Father McCormack felt uneasy. He did not know what Gallagher meant
to tell him, but he was uncomfortably conscious that the day of the
Lord-Lieutenant’s visit might be a highly inconvenient time for proving
his devotion to the cause of the people. The worst of devotion to any
cause is that it makes demands on the devotee at moments when it is most
difficult to fulfil them. Father McCormack tried feebly to put off the
evil hour.
“To-morrow, Thady, to-morrow,” he said. “There isn’t time now. It’s
half-past eleven, and the Lord-Lieutenant may be here any minute.”
“Begging your reverence’s pardon,” said Gallagher firmly, “but to-morrow
will be too late. The insult that is about to be offered to the people
of this locality will be offered to-day if a stop’s not put to it.”
“Nonsense, Thady, nonsense, nobody is going to insult us.”
“You wouldn’t know about it,” said Gallagher, “for you’d be the last man
they’d dare to tell, knowing well that you’d be as angry as I am myself.
Do you know what the tune is that the doctor has taught to the band?”
Father McCormack did know, but he was very unwilling to enter into a
discussion of the subject with Gallagher.
“Constable Moriarty,” said Gallagher, “is after telling me the name of
the tune, and you’d be surprised, so you would, if you heard it.”
“You may be mistaken, Thady, you may be mistaken. One tune’s very like
another when it’s played on a band.”
“I am not mistaken,” said Gallagher, who was beginning to feel
suspicious about the priest’s evident desire to shelve the subject.
“And anyway,” said Father McCormack, “it’s Dr. O’Grady himself that
you’d better be speaking to about the tune.”
“I will speak to him; but he’s not here presently.”
“Try Doyle then,” said Father McCormack. “There he is coming out of the
hotel. I haven’t time to go into the matter. I want to go over and look
at Mary Ellen.”
He slipped away as he spoke, leaving Gallagher standing, sulky and very
suspicious, by himself. Doyle, who had no reason to think that anything
had gone wrong, greeted him heartily. Gallagher replied angrily.
“Do you know what tune it is that the band’s going to play?” he said.
“You and your old tune!” said Doyle. “You had the life plagued out of me
about that tune. Can’t you let it alone?”
“I will not let it alone, for——”
“Was it that you were talking to the priest about?”
“It was, and——”
“I thought it might have been,” said Doyle, “by the look of him. Why
can’t you have sense, Thady, instead of tormenting the whole town about
a tune?”
“It’s my belief,” said Gallagher, “that he knows more about the tune
than he’d care to own up to. He and the doctor is in the conspiracy
together.”
“I’ll not stand here listening to you talking disrespectfully about the
clergy,” said Doyle with a fine show of indignation.
He felt that he was on doubtful ground in discussing the tune, which
might, for all he knew, be an objectionable one. It was a satisfaction
to be able to put himself definitely in the right by protesting against
Gallagher’s tendency to anti-clericalism.
“I’d be the last man in Ireland,” said Gallagher, “that would say a word
against the clergy, but when we get Home Rule—and that won’t be long
now, please God——”
He paused impressively.
“Well,” said Doyle, “what’ll you do to the clergy when you get Home
Rule?”
“There’s some of them that will be put in their places mighty quick,
them that’s opposing the will of the people of Ireland behind their
backs.”
“If you mean Father McCormack, Thady, you’d better go home before you’ve
said what you’ll be sorry for.”
“I’ll not go home till I’ve told the doctor what I think of him.”
“Well, go and see him,” said Doyle. “He’s in his house. When you come
back you can tell me what he says to you. That’ll be better worth
hearing than anything you’re likely to say to him.”
Doyle looked round with an air of some satisfaction when Gallagher
left him. He had no doubt that Dr. O’Grady would be able to deal
satisfactorily with the difficulty about the tune. Everything else
seemed to be going well. A considerable number of people had already
gathered in the square. The band stood ready to play. Father McCormack
was apparently very much pleased with the appearance of Mary Ellen.
Constable Moriarty was on guard over the statue, looking unusually
stern. Sergeant Colgan had come out of the barrack and was exerting
all his authority to keep back a number of small children who wanted to
investigate Mary Ellen’s costume. Every time any of them approached her
with the intention of pulling her shawl or testing by actual touch the
material of her skirt, Sergeant Colgan spoke majestically.
“Get away out of that,” he said. “Get along home out of that, the whole
of yez.”
The children did not, of course, obey him literally; but they always
drew back from Mary Ellen when he spoke, and it was generally at least a
minute before the boldest of them ventured to touch her again.