THE WORKS OF STANLEY J. WEYMAN

VOL. XX

THE WILD GEESE

Thin Paper Edition of

Stanley J. Weyman's Novels

(Author's Complete Edition)

In 20 VolumesArranged ChronologicallyWith an Introduction in the FirstVolume by Mr. Weyman

In clear type and handy sizeTo range with Henry Seton Merriman's Novels

Fcap. 8vo, Gilt Top, in Cloth and Leather

Vol. 1. The House of the Wolf. " 2. The New Rector. " 3. The Story of Francis Cludde. " 4. A Gentleman of France. " 5. The Man in Black. " 6. Under the Red Robe. " 7. My Lady Rotha. " 8. Memoirs of a Minister of France. " 9. The Red Cockade. " 10. Shrewsbury. Vol. 11. The Castle Inn. " 12. Sophia. " 13. Count Hannibal. " 14. In Kings' Byways. " 15. The Long Night. " 16. The Abbess of Vlaye. " 17. Starvecrow Farm. " 18. Chippinge. " 19. Laid up in Lavender. " 20. The Wild Geese. 

LONDON:SMITH, ELDER & CO. AndLONGMANS GREEN & CO. 

THE WILD GEESE

BY

STANLEY J. WEYMAN

LONDON:SMITH, ELDER & CO. (_For the United Kingdom_)IN CONJUNCTION WITH CASSELL AND CO. , LTD. ; HODDER ANDSTOUGHTON; METHUEN AND CO. , WARD, LOCK AND CO. , ANDLONGMANS GREEN & CO. (_For the British Possessions and Foreign Countries_)1911

1908 July 1st Edition " Aug. 2nd Impression " Oct. 3rd Impression1910 July 4th Impression " Nov. 5th Impression1911 Mar. 6d. Edition " Oct. 6th (Author's Complete Edition)

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

 I. ON BOARD THE "CORMORANT" SLOOP 1

 II. MORRISTOWN 15

 III. A SCION OF KINGS 27

 IV. "STOP THIEF!" 42

 V. THE MESS-ROOM AT TRALEE 57

 VI. THE MAÎTRE D'ARMES 72

 VII. BARGAINING 90

 VIII. AN AFTER-DINNER GAME 103

 IX. EARLY RISERS 119

 X. A COUNCIL OF WAR 136

 XI. A MESSAGE FOR THE YOUNG MASTER 154

 XII. THE SEA MIST 171

 XIII. A SLIP 187

 XIV. THE COLONEL'S TERMS 202

 XV. FEMINA FURENS 218

 XVI. THE MARPLOT 235

 XVII. THE LIMIT 251

XVIII. A COUNTERPLOT 268

 XIX. PEINE FORTE ET DURE 285

 XX. AN UNWELCOME VISITOR 301

 XXI. THE KEY 320

 XXII. THE SCENE IN THE PASSAGE 336

XXIII. BEHIND THE YEWS 350

 XXIV. THE PITCHER AT THE WELL 368

XXV. PEACE 378

CHAPTER I

ON BOARD THE "CORMORANT" SLOOP

Midway in that period of Ireland's history during which, according tohistorians, the distressful country had none--to be more precise, on aspring morning early in the eighteenth century, and the reign of Georgethe First, a sloop of about seventy tons burthen was beating up DingleBay, in the teeth of a stiff easterly breeze. The sun was two hourshigh, and the grey expanse of the bay was flecked with white horseshurrying seaward in haste to leap upon the Blasquets, or to disportthemselves in the field of ocean. From the heaving deck of the vesselthe mountains that shall not be removed were visible--on the northerlytack Brandon, on the southerly Carntual; the former sunlit, withpatches of moss gleaming like emeralds on its breast, the latter darkand melancholy, clothed in the midst of tradition and fancy that inthose days garbed so much of Ireland's bog and hill. 

The sloop had missed the tide, and, close hauled to the wind, rode deepin the ebb, making little way with each tack. The breeze hummed throughthe rigging. The man at the helm humped a shoulder to the sting of thespray, and the rest of the crew, seven or eight in number--tarry, pigtailed, outlandish sailor men--crouched under the windward rail. Theskipper sat with a companion on a coil of rope on the dry side of theskylight, and at the moment at which our story opens was obliviousalike of the weather and his difficulties. He sat with his eyes fixedon his neighbour, and in those eyes a wondering, fatuous admiration. Somight a mortal look if some strange hap brought him face to face with acentaur. 

"Never?" he murmured respectfully. 

"Never, " his companion answered. 

"My faith!" Captain Augustin rejoined. He was a cross between aFrenchman and an Irishman. For twenty years he had carried wine toIreland, and returned laden with wool to Bordeaux or Cadiz. He knewevery inlet between Achill Sound and the Head of Kinsale, and was sofar a Jacobite that he scorned to pay duty to King George. "Never? Myfaith!" he repeated, staring, if possible, harder than ever. 

"No, " said the Colonel. "Under no provocation, thank God!"

"But it's _drôle_, " Captain Augustin rejoined. "It would bother mesorely to know what you do. "

"What we all should do, " his passenger answered gently. "Our duty, Captain Augustin. Our duty! Doing which we are men indeed. Doing which, we have no more to do, no more to fear, no more to question. " AndColonel John Sullivan threw out both his hands, as if to illustrate thefreedom from care which followed. "See! it is done!"

"But west of Shannon, where there is no law?" Augustin answered. "Eh, Colonel? And in Kerry, where we'll be, the saints helping, beforenoon--which is all one with Connaught? No, in Kerry, what withSullivans, and Mahonies, and O'Beirnes, that wear coats only for agentleman to tread upon, and would sooner shoot a friend beforebreakfast than spend the day idle, _par ma foi_, I'm not seeing whatyou'll be doing there, Colonel. "

"A man may protect himself from violence, " the Colonel answeredsoberly, "and yet do his duty. What he may not do--is this. He may notgo out to kill another in cold blood, for a point of honour, or forrevenge, or to sustain what he has already done amiss! No, nor forvanity, or for the hundred trifles for which men risk their lives andseek the lives of others. I hope I make myself clear, CaptainAugustin?" he added courteously. 

He asked because the skipper's face of wonderment was not to bemisread. And the skipper answered, "Quite clear!" meaning the reverse. Clear, indeed? Yonder were the hills and bogs of Kerry--lawless, impenetrable, abominable--a realm of Tories and rapparees. On the sloopitself was scarce a man whose hands were free from blood. He, Augustin, mild-mannered as any smuggler on the coast, had spent his life betweenfleeing and fighting, with his four carronades ever crammed to themuzzle, and his cargo ready to be jettisoned at sight of a cruiser. Andthis man talked as if he were in church! Talked--talked--the skipperfairly gasped. "Oh, quite clear!" he mumbled. "Quite clear!" hereplied. "But it's an odd creed. "

"Not a creed, my friend, " Colonel Sullivan replied precisely. "But theresult of a creed. The result, thank God, of more creeds than one. "

Captain Augustin cast a wild eye at the straining, shrieking rigging;the sloop was lurching heavily. But whether he would or no, his eyefluttered back and rested, fascinated, on the Colonel's face. Indeed, from the hour, ten days earlier, which had seen him mount the side inthe Bordeaux river, Colonel John Sullivan had been a subject of growingastonishment to the skipper. Captain Augustin knew his world tolerably. In his time he had conveyed many a strange passenger from strand tostrand: haggard men who ground their shoulders against the bulkhead, and saw things in corners; dark, down-looking adventurers, whose handsflew to hilts if a gentleman addressed them suddenly; gay young sparksbound on foreign service and with the point of honour on their lips, ortheir like, returning old and broken to beg or cut throats on thehighway--these, and men who carried their lives in their hands, and menwho went, cloaked, on mysterious missions, and men who wept as theIrish coast faded behind them, and men, more numerous, who wept whenthey saw it again--he knew them all! All, he had carried them, talkedwith them, learned their secrets, and more often their hopes. 

But such a man as this he had never carried. A man who indeed woreoutlandish fur-trimmed clothes, and had seen, if his servant's sparsewords went for aught, outlandish service; but who neither swore, nordrank above measure, nor swaggered, nor threatened. Who would not dice, nor game--save for trifles. Who, on the contrary, talked of duty, andhad a peaceful word for all, and openly condemned the duello, and wasmild as milk and as gentle as an owl. Such a one seemed, indeed, thefabled "phaynix, " or a bat with six wings, or any other prodigy whichthe fancy, Irish or foreign, could conceive. 

Then, to double the marvel, the Colonel had a servant, a close-tonguedfellow, William Bale by name, and reputed an Englishman, who, if he wasnot like his master, was as unlike other folk. He was as quiet-spokenas the Colonel, and as precise, and as peaceable. He had even beenheard to talk of his duty. But while the Colonel was tall and spare, with a gentle eye and a long, kindly face, and was altogether of apensive cast, Bale was short and stout, of a black pallor, and veryforbidding. His mouth, when he opened it--which was seldom--droppedhoney. But his brow scowled, his lip sneered, and his silence invitedno confidence. 

Such being the skipper's passenger, and such his man, the wonder wasthat Captain Augustin's astonishment had not long ago melted intocontempt. But it had not. For one thing, a seaman had been hurt, andthe Colonel had exhibited a skill in the treatment of wounds whichwould not have disgraced an experienced chirurgeon. Then in the Bay thesloop had met with half a gale, and the passenger, in circumstanceswhich the skipper knew to be more trying to landsmen than to himself, had maintained a serenity beyond applause. He had even, clinging to thesame ring-bolt with the skipper, while the south-wester tore overheadand the gallant little vessel lay over wellnigh to her beam-ends, praised with a queer condescension the conduct of the crew. 

"This is the finest thing in the world, " he had shouted, amid the roarof things, "to see men doing their duty! I would not have missed thisfor a hundred crowns!"

"I'd give as much to be safe in Cherbourg, " had been the skipper's grimreply as he watched his mast. 

But Augustin had not forgotten the Colonel's coolness. A landsman, forwhom the trough of the wave had no terrors, and the leeward breakers, falling mountain high on Ushant, no message, was not a man to bedespised. 

Indeed, from that time the skipper had begun to find a charm in theColonel's gentleness and courtesy. He had fought against the feeling, but it had grown upon him. Something that was almost affection began tomingle with and augment his wonder. Hence the patience with which, withKerry on the beam, he listened while the Colonel sang his siren song. 

"He will be one of the people called Quakers, " the skipper thought, after a while. "I've heard of them, but never seen one. Yes, he will bea Quaker. "

Unfortunately, as he arrived at this conclusion a cry from thesteersman roused him. He sprang to his feet. Alas! the sloop had runtoo far on the northerly tack, and simultaneously the wind had shifteda point to the southward. In the open water this had advantaged her;but she had been allowed to run into a bight of the north shore and aline of foam cut her off to the eastward, leaving small room to tack. She might still clear the westerly rocks and run out to sea, but theskipper saw--with an oath--that this was doubtful, and with a seaman'squickness he made up his mind. 

"Keep her on!--keep her on!" he roared, "you son of a _maudite mère_!Child of the accursed! We must run into Skull haven! And if the men ofSkull take so much as an iron bolt from us, and I misdoubt them, I'llkeel-haul you, son of the _Diable_! I'll not leave an inch of skin uponyou!"

The man, cowering over the wheel, obeyed, and the little vessel ran upthe narrowing water--in which she had become involved--on an even keel. The crew were already on their feet, they had loosened the sheet, andsquared the boom; they stood by to lower the yard. All--the skipperwith a grim face--stood looking forward, as the inlet narrowed, thegreen banks closed in, the rocks that fringed them approached. Silentlyand gracefully the sloop glided on, more smoothly with every moment, until a turn in the passage opened a small land-locked haven. At thehead of the haven, barely a hundred yards above high-water mark, stooda ruined tower--the Tower of Skull--and below this a long house ofstone with a thatched roof. 

It was clear that the sloop's movements had been watched from theshore, for although the melancholy waste of moor and mountain disclosedno other habitation, a score of half-naked barefoot figures weregathered on the jetty; while others could be seen hurrying down thehillside. These cried to one another in an unknown tongue, and withshrill eldritch voices, which vied with the screams of the gullsswinging overhead. 

"Stand by to let go the kedge, " Augustin cried, eyeing them gloomily. "We are too far in now! Let go!--let go!"

But the order and the ensuing action at once redoubled the clamour onshore. A dozen of the foremost natives flung themselves into crazyboats, that seemed as if they could not float long enough to reach thevessel. But the men handled them with consummate skill and with equaldaring. In a twinkling they were within hail, and a man, wearing a longfrieze coat, a fisherman's red cap, and little besides, stood up in thebow of the nearest. 

"You will be coming to the jetty, Captain?" he cried in imperfectEnglish. 

The skipper scowled at him, but did not answer. 

"You will come to the jetty, Captain, " the man repeated in his high, sing-song voice. "Sure, and you've come convenient, for there's no onehere barring yourselves. "

"And you're wanting brandy!" Augustin muttered bitterly under hisbreath. He glanced at his men, as if he meditated resistance. 

But, "Kerry law! Kerry law!" the man cried. "You know it well, Captain!It's not I'll be answerable if you don't come to the jetty. "

The skipper, who had fallen ill at Skull once before, and got away withsome loss, hoping that he might never see the place again, knew that hewas in the men's power. True, a single discharge of his carronadeswould blow the boats to pieces; but he could not in a moment warp hisship out through the narrow passage. And if he could, he knew that theact would be bloodily avenged if he ever landed again in that part ofIreland. He swore under his breath, and the steersman who had wroughtthe harm by holding on too long wilted under his eye. The crew lookedother ways. 

At length he yielded, and sulkily gave the order, the windlass wasmanned, and the kedge drawn up. Fenders were lowered, and the sloopslid gently to the jetty side. 

In a twinkling a score of natives swarmed aboard. The man in the friezecoat followed more leisurely, and with such dignity as became the ownerof a stone-walled house. He sauntered up to the skipper, a leer in hiseye. "You will have lost something the last time you were here, Captain?" he said. "It is not I that will be responsible this timeunless the stuff is landed. "

Augustin laughed scornfully. "The cargo is for Crosby of Castlemaine, "he said. And he added various things which he hoped would happen tohimself if he landed so much as a single tub. 

"It's little we know of Crosby here, " the other replied; and he spat onthe deck. "And less we'll be caring, my dear. I say it shall be landed. Here, you, Darby Sullivan, off with the hatch!"

Augustin stepped forward impulsively, as if he had a mind to throw thegentleman in the frieze coat into the sea. But he had not armed himselfbefore he came on deck, the men of Skull outnumbered his crew two toone, and, savage and half-naked as they were, were furnished to a manwith long sharp skenes and the skill to use them. If resistance hadbeen possible at any time, he had let the moment pass. The nearestJustice lived twelve Irish miles away, and had he been on the spot hewould, since he was of necessity a Protestant, have been ashelpless--unless he brought the garrison of Tralee at his back--as achurchwarden in a Synod of Cardinals. The skipper hesitated, and whilehe hesitated the hatches were off, and the Sullivans swarmed down likemonkeys. Before the sloop could be made fast, the smaller kegs werebeing tossed up, and passed over the side, a line was formed on land, and the cargo, which had last seen the sun on the banks of the Garonne, was swiftly vanishing in the maw of the stone house on the shore. 

The skipper's rage was great, but he could only swear, and O'SullivanOg, the man in the frieze coat, who bore him an old grudge, grinned inmockery. "For better custody, Captain!" he said. "For better custody!Under my roof, _bien_! And when you will to go again there will be thedues to be paid, the little dues over which we quarrelled last time!And all will be rendered to a stave!"

"You villain!" the Captain muttered under his breath. "I understand!"Turning--for the sight was more than he could bear--he found hispassenger at his elbow. 

The Colonel, if his face went for anything, liked the proceedingsalmost as little as the skipper. His lips were tightly closed, and hefrowned. 

"Ay, " Augustin cried bitterly--for the first instinct of the man who ishurt is to hurt another--"now you see what it is you've come back to!It's rob, or be robbed, this side of Tralee, and as far as the devilcould kick you beyond it! I wish you well out of it! But I suppose itwould take more than this to make you draw that long hanger of yours?"

The Colonel cast a troubled eye on him. "Beyond doubt, " he said, "it isthe duty of a man to assist in defending the house of his host. And ina sense and measure, the goods of his host"--with an uneasy look at thefast-vanishing cargo, which was leaping from hand to hand so swiftlythat the progress of a tub from the hold to the house was as the flightof a swallow--"are the house of his host. I do not deny that, " hecontinued precisely, "but----"

"But in this instance, " the sea-captain struck in with a sneer, contempt for the first time mastering wonder, "in this instance?"

"In this instance, " the Colonel repeated with an unmistakable blush, "Iam not very free to act. The truth is, Captain Augustin, these folk areof my kin. I was born not many miles from here"--his eye measured thelonely landscape as if he compared it with more recent scenes--"and, wrong or right, blood is thicker than wine. So that frankly, I am notclear that for the sake of your Bordeaux, I'm tied to shed blood thatmight be my forbears'!"

"Or your grandmother's, " Augustin cried, with an open sneer. 

"Or my grandmother's. Very true. But if a word to them in season----"

"Oh, d--n your words, " the skipper retorted disdainfully. 

He would have said more, but at that moment it became clear thatsomething was happening on shore. On the green brow beside the tower agirl mounted on horseback had appeared; at a cry from her the men hadstopped work. The next moment her horse came cantering down the slope, and with uplifted whip she rode in among the men. The whip fell twice, and down went all the tubs within reach. Her voice, speaking, now Erse, now Kerry English, could be heard upbraiding the nearest, commanding, threatening, denouncing. Then on the brow behind her appeared in turn aman--a man who looked gigantic against the sky, and who sat a horse tomatch. He descended more slowly, and reached the girl's side asO'Sullivan Og, in his frieze coat, came to the front in support of hismen. 

For a full minute the girl vented her anger on Og, while he stood sulkybut patient, waiting for an opening to defend himself. When he obtainedthis, he seemed to the two on the deck of the sloop to appeal to thebig man, who said a word or two, but was cut short by the girl. Hervoice, passionate and indignant, reached the deck; but not her words. 

"That should be Flavia McMurrough!" the Colonel murmured thoughtfully, "And Uncle Ulick. He's little changed, whoever's changed! She has awill, it seems, and good impulses!"

The big man had begun by frowning on O'Sullivan Og. But presently hesmiled at something the latter said, then he laughed; at last he made ajoke himself. At that the girl turned on him; but he argued with her. Aman held up a tub for inspection, and though she struck it pettishlywith her whip, it was plain that she was shaken. O'Sullivan Og pointedto the sloop, pointed to his house, grinned. The listeners on the deckcaught the word "Dues!" and the peal of laughter that followed. 

Captain Augustin understood naught of what was going forward. But theman beside him, who did, touched his sleeve. "It were well to speak toher, " he said. 

"Who is she?" the skipper asked impatiently. "What has she to do withit?"

"They are her people, " the Colonel answered simply--"or they should be. If she says yea, it is yea; and if she says nay, it is nay. Or, so itshould be--as far as a league beyond Morristown. "

Augustin waited for no more. He was still in a fog, but he saw a ray ofhope; this was the Chatelaine, it seemed. He bundled over the side. 

Alas! he ventured too late. As his feet touched the slippery stones ofthe jetty, the girl wheeled her horse about with an angry exclamation, shook her whip at O'Sullivan Og--who winked the moment her back wasturned--and cantered away up the hill. On the instant the men picked upthe kegs they had dropped, a shrill cry passed down the line, and thework was resumed. 

But the big man remained; and the skipper, with the Colonel at hiselbow, made for him through the half-naked kernes. He saw them coming, however, guessed their errand, and, with the plain intention ofavoiding them, he turned his horse's head. 

But the skipper, springing forward, was in time to seize his stirrup. "Sir, " he cried, "this is robbery! _Nom de Dieu_, it is thievery!"

The big man looked down at him with temper. "Oh, by G--d, you must payyour dues!" he said. "Oh yes, you must pay your dues!"

"But this is robbery. "

"Sure it's not that you must be saying!"

The Colonel put the skipper on one side. "By your leave, " he cried, "one word! You don't know, sir, who I am, but----"

"I know you must pay your dues!" Uncle Ulick answered, parrot-like. "Ohyes, you must pay your dues!" He was clearly ashamed of his _rôle_, however; for as he spoke he shook off the Colonel's hold with a pettishgesture, struck his horse with his stick, and cantered away over thehill. In a twinkling he was lost to sight. 

"_Vaurien!_" cried Captain Augustin, shaking his fist after him. But hemight as well have sworn at the moon. 

CHAPTER II

MORRISTOWN

It was not until the Colonel had passed over the shoulder above thestone-walled house that he escaped from the jabber of the crowd and thejeers of the younger members of this savage tribe, who, notingsomething abnormal in the fashion of the stranger's clothes, followedhim a space. On descending the farther slope, however, he found himselfalone in the silence of the waste. Choosing without hesitation one oftwo tracks, ill-trodden, but such as in that district and at thatperiod passed for roads, he took his way along it at a good pace. 

A wide brown basin, bog for the most part, but rising here and thereinto low mounds of sward or clumps of thorn-trees, stretched away tothe foot of the hills. He gazed upon it with eyes which had beenstrained for years across the vast unbroken plains of Central Europe, the sandy steppes of Poland, the frozen marshes of Lithuania; andbeside the majesty of their boundless distances this view shrank tolittleness. But it spoke to more than his eyes; it spoke to the heart, to feelings and memories which time had not blunted, nor could blunt. The tower on the shoulder behind him had been raised by his wildforefathers in the days when the Spaniard lay at Smerwick; and, meanand crumbling, still gave rise to emotions which the stern battlementsof Stralsund or of Rostock had failed to evoke. Soil and sky, the larkwhich sang overhead, the dark peat-water which rose under foot, thescent of the moist air, the cry of the curlew, all spoke of home--thehome which he had left in the gaiety of youth, to return to it a graveman, older than his years, and with grey hairs flecking the black. Nowonder that he stood more than once, and, absorbed in thought, gazed onthis or that, on crag and moss, on the things which time and experiencehad so strangely diminished. 

The track, after zig-zagging across a segment of the basin that hasbeen described, entered a narrow valley, drained by a tolerable stream. After ascending this for a couple of miles, it disclosed a view of awider vale, enclosed by gentle hills of no great height. In the lap ofthis nestled a lake, on the upper end of which some beauty wasconferred by a few masses of rock partly clothed by birch-trees, through which a stream fell sharply from the upland. Not far from theserocks a long, low house stood on the shore. 

The stranger paused to take in the prospect; nor was it until after thelapse of some minutes, spent in the deepest reverie, that he pursuedhis way along the left-hand bank of the lake. By-and-by he was able todiscern, amid the masses of rock at the head of the lake, a grey tower, the twin of that Tower of Skull which he had left behind him; and ahundred paces farther he came upon a near view of the house. 

"Two-and-twenty years!" he murmured. "There is not even a dog to bid mewelcome!"

The house was of two stories, with a thatched roof. Its back was to theslopes that rose by marshy terraces to the hills. Its face was turnedto the lake, and between it and the water lay a walled forecourt, theangle on each side of the entrance protected by a tower of an olderdate than the house. The entrance was somewhat pretentious, andmight--for each of the pillars supported a heraldic beast--have seemedto an English eye out of character with the thatched roof. But, as ifto correct this, one of the beasts was headless, and one of the gateshad fallen from its hinges. In like manner the dignity of a tolerablyspacious garden, laid out beside the house, was marred by the proximityof the fold-yard, which had also trespassed, in the shape of sundryoffices and hovels, on the forecourt. 

On the lower side of the road opposite the gates half a dozen stonesteps, that like the heraldic pillars might have graced a more statelymansion, led down to the water. They formed a resting-place for as manybeggars, engaged in drawing at empty pipes; while twice as many oldwomen sat against the wall of the forecourt and, with their druggetcloaks about them, kept up a continual whine. Among these, turningherself now to one, now to another, moved the girl whom the Colonel hadseen at the landing-place. She held her riding-skirt uplifted in onehand, her whip in the other, and she was bare-headed. At her elbow, whistling idly, and tapping his boots with a switch, lounged the bigman of the morning. 

As the Colonel approached, taking these things in with his eyes, andmaking, Heaven knows what comparisons in his mind, the man and the maidturned and looked at him. The two exchanged some sentences, and the mancame forward to meet him. 

"Sir, " he said, not without a touch of rough courtesy, "if it is forhospitality you have come, you will be welcome at Morristown. But if itis to start a cry about this morning's business, you've travelled onyour ten toes to no purpose, and so I warn you. "

The Colonel looked at him. "Cousin Ulick, " he said, "I take yourwelcome as it is meant, and I thank you for it. "

The big man's mouth opened wide. "By the Holy Cross!" he said, "if I'mnot thinking it is John Sullivan!"

"It is, " the Colonel answered, smiling. And he held out his hand. 

Uncle Ulick grasped it impulsively. "And it's I'm the one that's gladto see you, " he said. "By Heaven, I am! Though I didn't expect you, nomore than I expected myself! And, faith, " he continued, grinning as ifhe began to see something humorous as well as surprising in thearrival, "I'm not sure that you will be as welcome to all, JohnSullivan, as you are to me. "

"You were always easy, Ulick, " the other answered with a smile, "whenyou were big and I was little. "

"Ay? Well, in size we're much as we were. But--Flavia!"

The girl, scenting something strange, was already at his elbow. "Whatis it?" she asked, her breath coming a little quickly. "Who is it?"fixing her eyes on the new-comer's face. 

Uncle Ulick chuckled. "It's your guardian, my jewel, " he said. "Noless! And what he'll say to what's going on I'll not be foretelling!"

"My guardian?" she repeated, the blood rising abruptly to her cheek. 

"Just that, " Ulick Sullivan answered humorously. "Just that, mydarling. It's John Sullivan come back from Sweden. And, as I've toldhim, I'm not sure that all at Morristown will be as glad to see him asI am. " At which Uncle Ulick went off into a peal of Titanic laughter. 

But that which amused him did not appear to amuse his niece, She stoodstaring at Colonel Sullivan as if she were far more surprised thanpleased. At length, and with a childish dignity, she held out her hand. 

"If you are Colonel John Sullivan, " she said, in a thin voice, "you arewelcome at Morristown. "

He might have laughed at the distance of her tone. But he merely bowed, and with the utmost gravity. "I thank you, " he answered. And then, addressing Ulick Sullivan, "I need not say that I had yourcommunication, " he continued, "with the news of Sir Michael's death andof the dispositions made by his will. I could not come at once, butwhen I could I did, and I am here. Having said so much, " he went on, turning to the girl and looking at her with serious kindness, "may Iadd that I think it will be well if we leave matters of business on oneside until we know one another?"

"Well, faith, I think we'd better, " Ulick Sullivan replied. And hechuckled. "I do think so, bedad!"

The girl said nothing, and when he had chuckled his fill restraint fellupon the three. They turned from one another and looked across thelake, which the wind, brisk at sea, barely ruffled. Colonel Sullivanremarked that they had a little more land under tillage than heremembered, and Ulick Sullivan assented. And then again there wassilence, until the girl struck her habit with her whip and criedflippantly, "Well, to dinner, if we are to have dinner! To dinner!" Sheturned, and led the way to the gate of the forecourt. 

The man who followed was clever enough to read defiance in the pose ofher head and resentment in her shoulders. When a beggar-woman, moreimportunate than the rest, caught hold of her skirt, and Flavia flickedher with the whip as she would have flicked a dog, he understood. Andwhen the dogs in the court fell upon her in a troop and were kicked toright and left, and when a babe, that, clothed in a single shift, wascrawling on hands and knees upon the threshold, was removed in the samemanner--but more gently--still he understood. 

There were other dogs in the stone-paved hall; a hen too, finding itsfood on the floor and strutting here and there as if it had never knownanother home. On the left of the door, an oak table stood laid for themid-day meal; on the right, before a carved stone chimney-piece, underwhich a huge log smouldered on the andirons, two or three men wereseated. These rose on the entrance of the young mistress-they weredependants of the better class, for whom open house was kept atMorristown when business brought them thither. And, so far, all waswell. Yet it may be that on the instant eyes which had been blind todefects were opened by the presence of this stranger from the outerworld. For Flavia's voice was hard as she asked old Darby, the butler, if The McMurrough was in the house. 

"Faith, I believe not, " said he. "His honour, nor the other quality, have not returned from the fishing. "

"Well, let him know when he comes in, " she rejoined, "that Colonel JohnSullivan has arrived from Sweden, and, " she added with a faint sneer, "it were well if you put on your uniform coat, Darby. "

The old butler did not hear the last words. He was looking at thenew-comer. "Glory be to God, Colonel, " he said; "it's in a field ofpeas I'd have known you! True for you, you're as like the father thatbred you as the two covers of a book! It's he was the grand gentleman!I was beyond the Mahoney's great gravestone when he shot Squire Crosbyin the old church-yard of Tralee for an appetite to his breakfast! Moreby token, he went out with the garrison officer after his second bottlethat same day that ever was--and the creature shot him in the knee--badluck to him for a foreigner and a Protestant--and he limped to hisdying day!"

The girl laughed unkindly. "You're opening your mouth and putting yourfoot in it, Darby, " she said. "If the Colonel is not a foreigner----"

"And sure he couldn't be that, and his own father's son!" cried thequick-witted Irishman. "And if, bad luck, he's a Protestant, I'll neverbelieve he's one of them through-and-through d----d black Protestantsthat you and I mean! Glory be to God, it's not in the Sullivans to beone of them!"

The Colonel laughed as he shook the old servant's hand; and Uncle Ulickjoined in the laugh. "You're a clever rogue, Darby, " he said. "Yourneck'll never be in a rope, but your fingers will untie the knot! Andnow, where'll you put him?"

Flavia tapped her foot on the floor; foreseeing, perhaps, what wascoming. 

"Put his honour?" Darby repeated, rubbing his bald head. "Ay, sure, where'll we put him? May it be long before the heavens is his bed!There's the old master's room, a grand chamber fit for a lord, butthere's a small matter of the floor that is sunk and lets in therats--bad cess to the dogs for an idle, useless pack. And there's theCount's room would do finely, but the vagabonds have never mended thethatch that was burned the last drinking, and though 'twas no more thanthe width of a flea's leap, the devil of a big bowl of water has it letin! The young master's friends are in the South, but the small roombeyond that has the camp truckle that Sir Michael brought from the ouldwars: that's dry and snug! And for the one window that's airy, sure, 'tis no drawback at this sayson. "

"It will do very well for me, Darby, " the Colonel said, smiling. 

"Well, " Darby answered, rubbing his head, "the Cross be between us andharm, I'm not so sure where's another. The young masther----"

"That will do, Darby!" the girl cried impatiently. And then, "I amsorry, Colonel Sullivan, " she continued stiffly, "that you should be sopoorly lodged--who are the master of all. But doubtless, " with anirrepressible resentment in her voice, "you will be able presently toput matters on a better footing. "

With a formal curtsey she left them then, and retreated up the stairs, which at the rear of the hall ascended to a gallery that ran right andleft to the rooms on the first floor. 

Colonel Sullivan turned with Uncle Ulick to the nearest window andlooked out on the untidy forecourt. "You know, I suppose, " he said, ina tone which the men beside the fire, who were regarding him curiously, could not hear, "the gist of Sir Michael's letters to me?"

Uncle Ulick drummed with his fingers on the window-sill. "Faith, themost of it, " he said. 

"Was he right in believing that her brother intended to turn Protestantfor the reasons he told me?"

"It's like enough, I'm thinking. "

"Does she know? The girl?"

"Not a breath! And I would not be the one to tell her, " Uncle Ulickadded, with some grimness. 

"Yet it may be necessary?"

Uncle Ulick shook his fist at a particularly importunate beggar who hadventured across the forecourt. "It's a gift the little people nevergave me to tell unpleasant things, " he said. "And if you'll be told byme, Colonel, you'll travel easy. The girl has a spirit, and you'll notpersuade her to stand in her brother's light, at all, at all! She hasit fast that her grandfather wronged him--and old Sir Michael wasqueer-tempered at times, God forbid I should say the other! The gift toher will go for nothing, you'll see!"

"She must be a very noble girl. "

"Devil a better has He made!"

"But if her grandfather was right in thinking so ill of his grandson?"

"I'm not saying he wasn't, " Uncle Ulick muttered. 

"Then we must not let her set the will aside. "

Ulick Sullivan shrugged his shoulders. "Let?" he said. "Faith! it's butlittle it'll be a question of that! James is for taking, and she's forgiving! He's her white swan, and to her mind, sleeping or waking, asDarby says, he'd tread on eggs and sorra a chick the less! Let? Who'sto hinder?"

"You. "

"It's easiness has been my ruin, and faith! it's too late to change. "

"Then I?"

Uncle Ulick smiled. "To be sure, " he said slily, "there's you, Colonel. "

"The whole estate is mine, you see, in law. "

"Ay, but there's no law west of Tralee, " Uncle Ulick retorted. "That'swhere old Sir Michael made his mistake. Anywhere through the length andbreadth of old Ireland, if 'twas in the Four Courts themselves, and allthe garrison round you, you'd be on honour, Colonel, to take noadvantage. But here it would not be the cold shoulder and a littleunpleasantness, and a meeting or two on the ground, that's neither herenor there--that you'd be like to taste. I'd not be knowing what wouldhappen if it went about that you were ousting them that had the right, and you a Protestant. He's not the great favourite, James McMurrough, and whether he or the girl took most 'd be a mighty small matter. Butif you think to twist it, so as to play cuckoo--though with the heightof fair meaning and not spying a silver penny of profit for yourself, Colonel--I take leave to tell you, he's a most unpopular bird. "

"But, Sir Michael, " the Colonel, who had listened with a thoughtfulface, answered, "left all to me to that very end--that it might besecured to the girl. "

"Sorrow one of me says no!" Ulick rejoined. "But----"

"But what?" the Colonel replied politely. "The more plainly you speakthe more you will oblige me. "

But all that Ulick Sullivan could be brought to say at thatmoment--perhaps he knew that curious eyes were on their conference--wasthat Kerry was "a mighty queer country, " and the thief of the worldwouldn't know what would pass there by times. And besides, there werethings afoot--faith, and there were, that he'd talk about at anothertime. 

Then he changed the subject abruptly, asking the Colonel if he had seena big ship in the bay. 

"What colours?" the Colonel asked--the question men ask who have beenat sea. 

"Spanish, maybe, " Uncle Ulick answered. "Did you sight such a one?"

But the Colonel had seen no big ship. 

CHAPTER III

A SCION OF KINGS

The family at Morristown had been half an hour at table, and in theinterval a man of more hasty judgment than Colonel Sullivan might havemade up his mind on many points. Whether the young McMurrough wasoffensive of set purpose, and because an unwelcome guest was present, or whether he merely showed himself as he was--an unlicked cub--such aman might have determined. But the Colonel held his judgment insuspense, though he leaned to the latter view of the case. He knew thateven in England a lad brought up among women was apt to develop aquarrelsome uncouthness, a bearishness, intolerable among men of theworld. How much more likely, he reflected, was this to be the case whenthe youth belonged to a proscribed race, and lived, a little chieftainamong his peasants, in a district wild and remote, where for a leagueeach way his will was law. The Colonel made allowances, and, where needwas, he checked his indignation. If he blamed any one, he let hiscensure rest on the easy temper of Uncle Ulick. The giant could haveshaken the young man, who was not over robust, with a single finger;and at any time in the last ten years might have taught him a lifelonglesson. 

At their first sitting down the young man had shown his churlishness. Beginning by viewing the Colonel in sulky silence, he had answered hiskinsman's overtures only by a rude stare or a boorish word. Hiscompanions, two squireens of his own age, and much of his own kidney, nudged him from time to time, and then the three would laugh in such away as to make it plain that the stranger was the butt of the jest. Presently, overcoming the reluctant impression which Colonel John'smanners made upon him, the young man found his tongue, and, glancing athis companions to bring them into the joke, "Much to have where youcome from, Colonel?" he asked. 

"As in most places, " the Colonel replied mildly, "by working for it, orearning it after one fashion or another. Indeed, my friend, country andcountry are more alike, except on the outside, than is thought by thosewho stay at home. "

"You've seen a wealth of countries, I'm thinking?" the youth asked witha sneer. 

"I have crossed Europe more than once. "

"And stayed in none?"

"If you mean----"

"Faith, I mean you've come back!" the young man exclaimed with a loudlaugh, in which his companions joined. "You'll mind the song"--and witha wink he trolled out, "In such contempt in short I fell, Which was a very hard thing, They devilish badly used me there, For nothing but a farthing. 

"You're better than that, Colonel, for the worst we can say of you is, you's come back a penny!"

"If you mean a bad one, come home, " the Colonel rejoined, taking thelad good-humouredly--he was not blind to the flush of indignation whichdyed Flavia's cheeks--"I'll take the wit for welcome. To be sure, todie in Ireland is an Irishman's hope, all the world over. "

"True for you, Colonel!" Uncle Ulick said. And "For shame, James, " hecontinued, speaking with more sternness than was natural to him. "Faith, and if you talked abroad as you talk at home, you'd be forhaving a pistol-ball in your gizzard in the time it takes you to sayyour prayers--if you ever say them, my lad!"

"What are my prayers to you, I'd like to know?" James retortedoffensively. 

"Easy, lad, easy!"

The young man glared at him. "What is it to you, " he cried still morerudely, "whether I pray or no?"

"James! James!" Flavia pleaded under her breath. 

"Do you be keeping your feet to yourself!" he cried, betraying herkindly manoeuvre. "And let my shins be! I want none of your guiding!More by token, miss, don't you be making a sight of yourself as you didthis morning, or you'll smart for it. What is it to you if O'SullivanOg takes our dues for us--and a trifle over? And, sorra one of youdoubt it, if Mounseer comes jawing here, it's in the peat-hole he'llfind himself! Or the devil the value of a cork he gets out of me;that's flat! Eh, Phelim?"

"True for you, McMurrough!" the youth who sat beside him answered, winking. "We'll soak him for you. "

"So do you be taking a lesson, Miss Flavvy, " the young Hectorcontinued, "and don't you go threatening honest folk with your whip, orit'll be about your own shoulders it'll fall! I know what's going on, and when I want your help, I'll ask it. "

The girl's lip trembled. "But it's robbery, James, " she murmured. 

"To the devil with your robbery!" he retorted, casting a defiant eyeround the table. "They'll pay our dues, and what they get back will betheir own!"

"And it's rich they'll be with it!" Phelim chuckled. 

"Ay, faith, it's the proud men they'll be that day!" laughed Morty, hisbrother. "Sure, when it comes!" with a wink. 

"Fine words, my lad, " Uncle Ulick replied quietly; "but it's my opinionyou'll fall on trouble, and more than'll please you, with Crosby ofCastlemaine. And why, I'd like to know? 'Tis a grand trade, and hasserved us well since I can remember! Why can't you take what's fair outof it, and let the poor devil of a sea-captain that's supplied many anhonest man's table have his own, and go his way? Take my word for it, it's ruing it you'll be, when all's done. "

"It's not from Crosby of Castlemaine I'll rue it!" James McMurroughanswered arrogantly. "I'll shoot him like a bog-snipe if he's sorra aword to say to it! That for him, the black sneak of a Protestant!" Andhe snapped his fingers. "But his day will soon be past, and we'll bedealing with him. The toast is warming for him now!"

Phelim slapped his thigh. "True for you, McMurrough! That's the talk!"

"That's the talk!" chorussed Morty. 

The Colonel opened his mouth to speak, but he caught Flavia's look ofdistress, and he refrained. And "For my part, " Morty continuedjovially, "I'd not wait--for you know what! The gentleman's way's thebetter; early or late, Clare or Kerry, 'tis all one! A drink of thetea, a peppered devil, and a pair of the beauties, is an Irishman'smorning!"

"And many's the poor soul has to mourn it--long and bitterly, " theColonel said. His tender corn being trod upon, he could be silent nolonger. "For shame, sir, for shame!" he added warmly. 

Morty stared. "Begorra, and why?" he cried, in a tone which proved thathe asked the question in perfect innocence. 

"Why?" Colonel John repeated. And for a moment, in face of prejudicesso strong, and of prepossessions so deeply rooted, he paused. Then, "Why?" he repeated. "Can you ask me when you know how many a life asyoung as yours--and I take you to be scarcely, sir, in yourtwenties--has been forfeit for a thoughtless word, an unwitting touch, a look; when you know how many a bride has been widowed as soon aswedded, how many a babe orphaned as soon as born? And for what? Forwhat, sir?"

"For the point of honour!" The McMurrough cried. Morty, for his part, was dumb with astonishment. What talk was this!

"The point of honour?" the Colonel repeated, more slowly, "what is it?In nine cases out of ten the fear of seeming to be afraid. In thetenth--the desire to wipe out a stain that blood leaves as deep asbefore!"

"Faith, and you surprise me!" Phelim cried with a genuine _naïveté_that at another time would have provoked a smile. "You do indeed!"

"And Kerry'll more than surprise you, " quoth The McMurrough rudely, "ifit's that way you'll be acting! Would you let Crosby of Castlemainecall you thief?"

"I would not thieve!" the Colonel replied. 

There was a stricken silence for a moment. Then The McMurrough sprangto his feet, his querulous face flushed with rage, his arm raised. ButUlick's huge hand dragged him down. "Easy, lad, easy, " he cried, restraining the young man. "He's your guest! He's your guest; rememberthat!"

"And he spoke in haste, " the Colonel said. "I withdraw my words, " hecontinued, rising and frankly holding out his hand. "I recognise that Iwas wrong! I see that the act bears in your eyes a different aspect, and I beg your pardon, sir. "

The McMurrough took the hand, though he took it sullenly; and theColonel sat down again. His action, to say nothing of his words, leftPhelim and Morty in a state of amazement so profound that the two satstaring as if carved out of the same block of wood. 

If Colonel John noticed their surprise he seemed in no way put out byit. "Perhaps, " he said gently, "it is wrong to thrust opinions onothers unasked. I think that is so! It should be enough to act uponthem one's self, and refrain from judging others. "

No one answered. But one thing was certain: whether he judged them ornot, they were all judging him, with such of their faculties asremained to them. True, Flavia, save by a single frightened glance whena quarrel seemed imminent, had not betrayed what she thought--nor nowbetrayed what she was thinking. Her eyes were glued to her plate. Butthe impression made on the others, not excepting the dependent buckeenswho sat at the board a little apart and took no part in the talk, wasso apparent that an onlooker must have laughed at their bewilderment. Even Uncle Ulick, whom a steady good humour had steered clear of many abrawl--so that a single meeting on Aghrim racecourse made up the taleof his exploits--stared vacantly at his kinsman. Never before had heheard any one question the right of an Irish gentleman to fight atpleasure; and for the others whose blood was hotter and younger, forthe three Kerry Cocks, the Conclave had not been more surprised if aCardinal had risen and denounced the Papacy, nor an assembly ofhalf-pay captains been more astonished if one of their number haddenounced the pension system. The Colonel was a Sullivan and anIrishman, and it was supposed that he had followed the wars. Whence, then, these strange words, these unheard-of opinions? Morty felt hischeek flush with the shame which Colonel John should have felt; andPhelim grieved for the family. The gentleman might be mad; it wascharitable to think he was. But, mad or sane, he was like, they feared, to be the cause of sad misunderstanding in the country round. 

The McMurrough, of a harder and less generous nature than hiscompanions, felt more contempt than wonder. The man had insulted himgrossly, and had apologised as abjectly; that was his view of theincident. And he was the first to break the silence. "Sure, it's verywell for the gentleman it's in the family, " he said dryly. "Tail up, tail down, 's all one among friends. But if he'll be so quick with histongue in Tralee Market, he'll chance on one here and there that he'llnot blarney so easily! Eh, Morty?"

"I'm fearing so, too, " said Phelim pensively. Morty did not answer. "'Tis a queer world, " Phelim added. 

"And all sorts in it, " The McMurrough cried, his tone more arrogantthan before. 

Flavia glanced at him, frowning. "Let us have peace now, " she said. 

"Peace? Sorrow a bit of war there's like to be in the present company!"the victor cried. And he began to whistle, amid an awkward silence. Theair he chose was one well known at that day, and when he had whistled afew bars, one of the buckeens at the lower end of the table began tosing the words softly. 

 It was a' for our rightful king We left fair Ireland's strand! It was a' for our rightful king We e'er saw foreign land, my dear, We e'er saw foreign land!

"My dear, or no, you'll be doing well to be careful!" The McMurroughsaid, in a jeering tone, with his eye on the Colonel. 

"Pho!" the man replied. "And I that have heard the young mistress singit a score of times!"

"Ay, but not in this company!" The McMurrough rejoined. 

Colonel John looked round the table. "If you mean, " he said quietly, "that I am a loyal subject of King George, I am that. But what is saidat my host's table, no matter who he is, is safe for me. Moreover, I'velived long enough to know, gentlemen, that most said is least meant, and that the theme of a lady's song is more often--sunset thansunrise!" And he bowed in the direction of the girl. 

The McMurrough's lip curled. "Fair words, " he sneered. "And easy tospeak them, when you and your d--d Protestant Whigs are on top!"

"We won't talk of Protestants, d--d or otherwise!" Colonel Johnreplied. And for the first time his glance, keen as the flicker ofsteel, crossed The McMurrough's. The younger man's eyes fell. A flushof something that might have been shame tinged his brow: and though noone at table save Uncle Ulick understood the allusion, his consciencesilenced him. "I hope, " the Colonel continued more soberly, "that agood Protestant may still be a good Irishman. "

"It's not I that have seen one, then!" The McMurrough mutteredchurlishly. 

"Just as a bad Protestant makes a bad Irishman, " the Colonel returned, with another of those glances which seemed to prove that the old manwas not quite put off. 

The McMurrough was silenced. But the cudgels were taken up in anunexpected quarter. "I know nothing of bad or good, " Flavia said, in avoice vibrating with eagerness, "but only, to our sorrow, of those whothrough centuries have robbed us! Who, not content, shame on them! withshutting us up in a corner of the land that was ours from sea to sea, deny us even here the protection of their law! Law? Can you call itlaw----"

"Heaven be between us and it!" old Darby groaned. 

"Can you call it law, " she continued with passion, "which denies us allnatural rights, all honourable employments; which drives us abroad, divides son from father, and brother from brother; which bans ourpriests, and forbids our worship, and, if it had its will, would leaveno Catholic from Cape Clear to Killaloe?"

The Colonel looked sorrowfully at her, but made no answer; for to muchof what she said no answer could be made. On the other hand, a murmurpassed round the board; and more than one looked at the stranger withcompressed lips. "If you had your will, " the girl continued, withgrowing emotion; "if your law were carried out--as, thank God! it isnot, no man's heart being hard enough--to possess a pistol were to bepilloried; to possess a fowling-piece were to be whipped; to own ahorse, above the value of a miserable garron, were to be robbed by thefirst rascal who passed! We must not be soldiers, nor sailors, " shecontinued; "nay"--with bitter irony--"we may not be constables norgamekeepers! The courts, the bar, the bench of our fatherland, are shutto us! We may have neither school nor college; the lands that were ourfathers' must be held for us by Protestants, and it's I must have aProtestant guardian! We are outlaws in the dear land that is ours; wedwell on sufferance where our fathers ruled! And men like you, abandoning their country, abandoning their creed----"

"God forbid!" the Colonel exclaimed, much moved himself. 

"Men like you uphold these things!"

"God forbid!" he repeated. 

"But let Him forbid, or not forbid, " she retorted, rising from her seatwith eyes that flashed anger through tears, "we exist, and shall exist!And the time is coming, and comes soon--ay, comes perhaps to-day!--whenwe who now suffer for the true faith and the rightful King will raiseour heads, and the Faithful Land shall cease to mourn and honest men topine! And, ah"--with upraised face and clasped hands--"I pray for thatday! I pray for that day! I----"

She broke off amid cries of applause, fierce as the barking of wolves. She struggled for a moment with her overmastering emotion, then, unableto continue or to calm herself, she turned from the table and fledweeping up the stairs. 

Colonel John had risen. He watched her go with deep feeling; he turnedto his seat again with a sigh. He was a shade paler than before, andthe eyes which he bent on the board were dark with thought. He wasunconscious of all that passed round him, and, if aware, he washeedless of the strength of the passions which she had unbridled--untila hand fell on his arm. 

He glanced up then and saw that all the men had risen, and were lookingat him--even Ulick Sullivan--with dark faces. A passion of angerclouded their gaze. Without a word spoken, they were of one mind. Thehand that touched him trembled, the voice that broke the silence shookunder the weight of the speaker's feelings. 

"You'll be leaving here this day, " the man muttered. 

"I?" the Colonel said, taken by surprise. "Not at all. "

"We wish you no harm, but to see your back. But you'll be leavinghere. "

The Colonel, his first wonder subdued, looked from one to another. "Iam sure you wish me no harm, " he said. 

"None, but to see your back, " the man repeated, while his companionslooked down at the Colonel with a strange fixedness. The Celtic nature, prone to sudden rage, stirred in them. The stranger who an hour beforehad been indifferent to them now wore the face of an enemy. The lakeand the bog--ay, the secret grave yearned for him: the winding-sheetwas high upon his breast. "Stay, and it's but once in your life you'llbe sorry, " the man growled, "and faith, that'll be always!"

"But I cannot go, " the Colonel answered, as gently as before. 

"And why?" the man returned. The McMurrough was not of the speakers, but stood behind them, glowering at him with a dark face. 

"Because, " the Colonel answered, "I am in my duty here, my friends. Andthe man who is in his duty can suffer nothing. "

"He can die, " the man replied, breathing hard. The men who were on theColonel's side of the table leant more closely about him. 

But he seemed unmoved. "That, " he replied cheerfully, "is nothing. Todie is but an accident. Who dies in his duty suffers no harm. And werethat not enough--and it is all, " he continued slowly, "what harm shouldhappen to me, a Sullivan among Sullivans? Because I have fared far andseen much, am I so changed that, coming back, I shall find no welcomeon the hearth of my race, and no shelter where my fathers lie?"

"And are not our hearths cold over many a league? And the graves----"

"Whisht!" a voice broke in sternly, as Uncle Ulick thrust his waythrough the group. "The man says well!" he continued. "He's aSullivan----"

"He's a Protestant!"

"He is a Sullivan, I say!" Uncle Ulick retorted, "were he the blackestheretic on the sod! And you, would you do the foul deed for a woman'swet eye? Are the hearts of Kerry turned as hard as its rocks? Make anend of this prating and foolishness! And you, James McMurrough, theseare your men and this is your house? Will you be telling them at oncethat you will be standing between him and harm, be he a heretic tentimes over? For shame, man! Is it for raising the corp of old SirMichael from his grave ye are?"

The McMurrough looked sombrely at the big man. "On you be the risk, " hesaid sullenly. "You know what you know. "

"I know that the seal in the cave and the seal on the wave are one!"Ulick answered vehemently. "Whisht, man, whisht, and make an end! Anddo you, John Sullivan, give no thought to these omadhauns, but comewith me and I'll show you to your chamber. A woman's tear is ever nearher smile. With her the good thought treads ever on the heel of the badword!"

"I have little knowledge of them, " Colonel John answered quietly. 

But when he was above with Uncle Ulick, he spoke. "I hope that this isbut wild talk, " he said. "You cannot remember, nor can I, the bad days. But the little that is left, it were madness and worse than madness torisk! If you've thought of a rising, in God's name put it from you. Think of your maids and your children! I have seen the fires rise fromtoo many roofs, I have heard the wail of the homeless too often, I haveseen too many frozen corpses stand for milestones by the road, I havewakened to the creak of too many gibbets--to face these things in myown land!"

Uncle Ulick was looking from the little casement. He turned and showeda face working with agitation. "And you, if you wore no sword, nordared wear one? If you walked in Tralee a clown among gentlefolk, ifyou lived a pariah in a corner of pariahs, if your land were thehandmaid of nations, and the vampire crouched upon her breast, what--what would you do, then?"

"Wait, " Colonel John answered gravely, "until the time came. "

Uncle Ulick gripped his arm. "And if it came not in your time?"

"Still wait, " Colonel John answered with solemnity. "For believe me, Ulick Sullivan, there is no deed that has not its reward! Not does onethatch go up in smoke that is not paid for a hundredfold. "

"Ay, but when? When?"

"When the time is ripe. "

CHAPTER IV

"STOP THIEF!"

A candid Englishman must own, and deplore the fact, that FlaviaMcMurrough's tears were due to the wrongs of her country. Broken bythree great wars waged by three successive generations, defeated in thelast of three desperate struggles for liberty, Ireland at this periodlay like a woman swooning at the feet of her captors. Nor were theseminded that she should rise again quickly, or in her natural force. Themastery which they had won by the sword the English were resolved tokeep by the law. 

They were determined that the Irishman of the old faith should ceaseto exist; or if he endured, should be _nemo_, no one. Confined to hellor Connaught, he must not even in the latter possess the ordinaryrights. He must not will his own lands or buy new lands. If his son, more sensible than he, "_went over_, " the father sank into a merelife-tenant, bound to furnish a handsome allowance, and to leave allto the Protestant heir. He might not marry a Protestant, he might notkeep a school, nor follow the liberal professions. The priest whoconfessed him was banished if known, and hanged if he returned. In acountry of sportsmen he might not own a fowling-piece, nor a horseworth more than five pounds; and in days when every gentleman carrieda sword at his side, he must not wear one. Finally, his country grewbut one article of great value--wool: and that he must not make intocloth, but he must sell it to England at England's price--which wasone-fifth of the continental price. Was it wonderful that, such beingIreland's status, every Roman Catholic of spirit sought fortuneabroad; that the wild geese, as they were called, went and cameunchecked; or that every inlet in Galway, Clare, and Kerry swarmedwith smugglers, who ran in under the green flag with brandy andclaret, and, running out again with wool, laughed to scorn England'sboast that she ruled the waves?

Nor was it surprising that, spent and helpless as the land lay, somesanguine spirits still clung to visions of a change and of revenge. Afew men, living in the vague remotenesses beyond the bridling Shannonand its long string of lakes, or on the western shore where the longrollers broke in spume and the French and Spanish tongues were spokenmore freely than English, still hoped for the impossible. Passing theirlives far from the Castle and the Four Courts, far even from theprovincial capitals, they shut their eyes to facts and dreamed oftriumph. The Sullivans of Morristown and Skull were of these; as weresome of their neighbours. And Flavia was especially of these. As shelooked from her window a day or two after the Colonel's arrival, as shesniffed the peat reek and plumbed the soft distances beyond the lake, she was lost in such a dream; until her eyes fell on a man seatedcross-legged under a tree between herself and the shore. And shefrowned. The man sorted ill with her dream. 

It was Bale, Colonel John's servant. He was mending some article takenfrom his master's wardrobe. His elbow went busily to and fro as heplied the needle, while sprawling on the sod about him half a dozengossoons watched him inquisitively. 

Perhaps it was the suggestive contrast between his diligence and theiridleness which irritated Flavia; but she set down her annoyance toanother cause. The man was an Englishman, and therefore an enemy: andwhat did he there? Had the Colonel left him on guard?

Flavia's heart swelled at the thought. Here, at least, she and herswere masters. Here, three hours west of Tralee--and God help the horseon that road that was not a "lepper"--they brooked no rival. ColonelJohn had awakened mixed feelings in her. At times she admired him. But, admirable or not, he should rue his insolence, if he had it in his mindto push his authority, or interfere with her plans. 

In the meantime she stood watching William Bale, and a desire to knowmore of the man, and through him of the master, rose within her. Thehouse was quiet. The McMurrough and his following had gone to acocking-match and race-meeting at Joyce's Corner. She went down thestairs, took her hood, and crossed the courtyard. Bale did not look upat her approach, but he saw her out of the corner of his eye, and whenshe paused before him he laid down his work and made as if he wouldrise. 

She looked at him with a superciliousness not natural to her. "Are allthe men tailors where you come from?" she asked. "There, you need notrise. "

"Where I came from last, " he replied, "we were all trades, my lady. "

"Where was that?"

"In the camp, " he answered. 

"In Sweden?"

"God knows, " he replied. "They raise no landmarks there, betweencountry and country, or it might be all their work to move them. "

For a moment she was silent. Then, "Have you been a soldier long?" sheasked, feeling herself rebuffed. 

"Twenty-one years, my lady. "

"And now you have done with it. "

"It is as his honour pleases. "

She frowned. He had a way of speaking that sounded uncivil to earsattuned to the soft Irish accent and the wheedling tone. Yet the maninterested her, and after a moment's silence she fixed her eyes moreintently on his work. "Did you lose your fingers in battle?" she asked. His right hand was maimed. 

"No, " he answered--grudgingly, as he seemed to answer all herquestions--"in prison. "

"In prison?" she repeated; "where?"

He cast an upward look at his questioner. "In the Grand Turk's land, "he said. "Nearer than that, I can't say. I'm no scholar, my lady. "

"But why?" she asked, puzzled. "I don't understand. "

"Cut off, " he said, stooping over his work. 

Flavia turned a shade paler. "Why?" she repeated. 

"'One God, and Mahomet His prophet'--couldn't swallow it. One finger!"the man answered jerkily. "Next week--same. Third week----"

"Third week?" she murmured, shuddering. 

"Exchanged. "

She lifted her eyes with an effort from his maimed hand. "How many wereyou?" she inquired. 

"Thirty-four. " He laughed drily. "We know one another when we meet, " hesaid. He drew his waxed thread between his finger and thumb, held it upto the light, then looked askance at the gossoons about him, to whomwhat he said was gibberish. They knew only Erse. 

The day was still, the mist lay on the lake, and under it the watergleamed, a smooth pale mirror. Flavia had seen it so a hundred times, and thought naught of it. But to-day, moved by what she had heard, theprospect spoke of a remoteness from the moving world which depressedher. Hitherto the quick pulse and the energy of youth had left her notime for melancholy, and not much for thought. If at rare intervals shehad felt herself lonely, if she had been tempted to think that thebrother in whom were centred her hopes, her affections, and her familypride was hard and selfish, rude and overbearing, she had told herselfthat all men were so; that all men rode rough-shod over their women. And that being so, who had a better right to hector it than the last ofthe McMurroughs, heir of the Wicklow kings, who in days far past haddealt on equal terms with Richard Plantagenet, and to whom, by virtueof that never-forgotten kingship, the Sullivans and Mahonies, some ofthe McCarthys, and all the O'Beirnes, paid rude homage? With suchfeelings Sir Michael's strange whim of disinheriting the heir of hisrace had but drawn her closer to her brother. To her loyalty the actwas abhorrent, was unnatural, was one that could only have sprung, shewas certain, from second childhood, the dotage of a man close onninety, whose early years had been steeped in trouble, and who lovedher so much that he was ready to do wrong for her sake. 

Often she differed from her brother. But he was a man, she toldherself; and he must be right--a man's life could not be ruled by thelaws which a woman observed. For the rest, for herself, if her lifeseemed solitary she had the free air and the mountains; she had herdear land; above all, she had her dreams. Perhaps when these wererealised--and the time seemed very near now--and a new Ireland wascreated, to her too a brighter world would open. 

She had forgotten Bale's presence, and was only recalled to every-daylife by the sound of voices. Four men were approaching the house. UncleUlick, Colonel John, and the French skipper were three of these; at thesight of the fourth Flavia's face fell. Luke Asgill of Batterstown wasthe nearest Justice, and of necessity he was a Protestant. But it wasnot this fact, nor the certainty that Augustin was pouring his wrongsinto his ears, that affected Flavia. Asgill was distasteful to her, because her brother affected him. For why should her brother haverelations with a Protestant? Why should he, a man of the oldest blood, stoop to intimacy with the son of a "middleman, " the son of one ofthose who, taking a long lease of a great estate and under-letting atrack rents, made at this period huge fortunes? Finally, if he must haverelations with him, why did he not keep him at a distance from hishome--and his sister?

It was too late, or she would have slipped away. Not that Asgill--hewas a stout, dark, civil-spoken man of thirty-three or four--wore athreatening face. On the contrary, he listened to the Frenchman'scomplaint with a droll air; and if he had not known of the matterbefore, his smile betrayed him. He greeted Flavia with an excess ofpoliteness which she could have spared; and while Uncle Ulick andColonel John looked perturbed and ill at ease, he jested on the matter. 

"The whole cargo?" he said, with one eye on the Frenchman and one onhis companions. "You're not for stating that, sir?"

"All the tubs, " Augustin answered in a passion of earnestness. "Whatyou call, every tub! Every tub!"

"The saints be between us and harm!" Asgill responded. "Are you hearingthis, Miss Flavia? It's no less than felony that you're accused of, andI'm thinking, by rights, I must arrest you and carry you toBatterstown. "

"I do not understand, " she answered stiffly. "And The McMurrough is notat home. "

"Gone out of the way, eh?" Asgill replied with a deprecatory grin. "Andthe whole cargo was it, Captain?"

"All the tubs, perfectly!"

"You'd paid your dues, of course?"

"Dues, _mon Dieu_! But they take the goods!"

"Had you paid your dues?"

"Not already, because----"

"That's unfortunate, " Asgill answered in a tone of mock condolence. "Mighty unfortunate!" He winked at Uncle Ulick. "Port dues, you know, Captain, must be paid before the ship slips her moorings. "

"But----"

"Mighty unfortunate!"

"But what are the dues?" poor Augustin cried, dimly aware that he wasbeing baited. 

"Ah, you're talking now, " the magistrate answered glibly. "Unluckily, that's not in my province. I'm made aware that the goods are held underlien for dues, and I can do nothing. However, upon payment, ofcourse----"

"But how much? Eh, sir? How much? How much?"

Luke Asgill, who had two faces, and for once was minded to let both beseen, enjoyed the Frenchman's perplexity. He wished to stand well withFlavia, and here was a rare opportunity of exhibiting at once hisfriendliness and his powers of drollery. He was surprised, therefore, and taken aback, when a grave voice cut short his enjoyment. 

"Still, if Captain Augustin, " the voice interposed, "is willing to paya reasonable sum on account of dues?"

The magistrate turned about abruptly. "Eh?" he said. "Oh, ColonelSullivan, is it?"

"Then, doubtless, the goods will be released, so that he may performhis duty to his customer. "

Asgill had only known the Colonel a few minutes, and, aware that he wasone of the family, he did not see how to take it. It was as if treasonlifted its head in the camp. He coughed. 

"I'd not be denying it, " he said. "But until The McMurroughreturns----"

"Such a matter is doubtless within Mr. Sullivan's authority, " theColonel said, turning from him to Uncle Ulick. 

Uncle Ulick showed his embarrassment. "Faith, I don't know that it is, "he said. 

"If Captain Augustin paid, say, twenty per cent. On his bills oflading----"

"_Ma foi_, twenty per cent. !" the Captain exclaimed in astonishment. "Twenty--but yes, I will pay it. I will pay even that. Of what use tothrow the handle after the hatchet?"

Luke Asgill thought the Colonel either a fool or very simple. "Well, I've nothing to say to this, at all!" he said, shrugging his shoulders. "It's not within my province. "

Colonel John looked at the girl in a way in which he had not looked ather before; and she found herself speaking before she knew it. "Yes, "she cried impulsively; "let that be done, and the goods be given up!"

"But The McMurrough?" Asgill began. 

"I will answer for him, " she said impulsively. "Uncle Ulick, go, I beg, and see it done. "

"I will go with you, " Colonel Sullivan said. "And doubtless Mr. Asgillwill accompany us, and lend the weight of his authority in the event ofany difficulty arising. "

Asgill's countenance fell, and he looked the uncertainty he felt. Hewas between two stools, for he had no mind to displease Flavia orthwart her brother. At length, "No, " he said, "I'll not be doinganything in The McMurrough's absence--no, I don't see that I can dothat!"

Colonel John looked in the same strange fashion at Flavia. "I havelegal power to act, sir, " he said, "as I can prove to you in private. And that being so, I must certainly ask you to lend me the weight ofyour authority. "

"And I will be d----d if I do!" Asgill cried. There was a change in histone, and the reason was not far to seek. "Here's The McMurrough, " hecontinued, "and he'll say!"

They all turned and looked along the road which ran by the edge of thelake. With James McMurrough, who was still a furlong away, were the twoO'Beirnes. They came slowly, and something in their bearing, even atthat distance, awoke anxiety. 

"They're early from the cocking, " Uncle Ulick muttered doubtfully, "andsober as pigs! What's the meaning of that? There's something amiss, I'mfearing. "

A cry from Flavia proved the keenness of her eyes. "Where is Giralda?"she exclaimed. "Where is the mare?"

"Ay, what have they done with the mare?" Uncle Ulick said in a tone ofconsternation. "Have they lamed her, I'm wondering? The garron Morty'sriding is none of ours. "

"I begged him not to take her!" Flavia cried, anger contending with hergrief. Giralda, her grey mare, ascribed in sanguine moments to thestrain of the Darley Arabian, and as gentle as she was spirited, wasthe girl's dearest possession. "I begged him not to take her!" sherepeated, almost in tears. "I knew there was danger. "

"James was wrong to take her up country, " Uncle Ulick said sternly. 

"They've claimed her!" Flavia wailed. "I know they have! And I shallnever recover her! I shall never see her again! Oh, I'd rather--I'd farrather she were dead!"

Uncle Ulick lifted up his powerful voice. "Where's the mare?" heshouted. 

James McMurrough shrugged his shoulders, and a moment later the riderscame up and the tale was told. The three young men had halted at thehedge tavern at Brocktown, where their road ran out of the road toTralee. There were four men drinking in the house, who seemed to takeno notice of them. But when The McMurrough and his companions went tothe shed beside the house to draw out their horses, the men followed, challenged them for Papists, threw down five pounds in gold, and seizedthe mare. The four were armed, and resistance was useless. 

The story was received with a volley of oaths and curses. "But by theHoly, " Uncle Ulick flamed up, "I'd have hung on their heels and raisedthe country! By G--d, I would!"

"Ay, ay! The thieves of the world!"

"They took the big road by Tralee, " James McMurrough explained sulkily. "What was the use?"

"Were there no men working in the bogs?"

"There were none near by, to be sure, " Morty said. "But I'd a notion ifwe followed them we might light on one friend or another--'twas inKerry, after all!"

"'Twas not more than nine miles English from here!" Uncle Ulick cried. 

"That was just what I thought, " Morty continued with some hesitation. "Just that, but----" And his eye transferred the burden to TheMcMurrough. 

James answered with an oath. "A nice time this to be bringing thesoldiers upon us, " he cried, "when, bedad, if the time ever was, wewant no trouble with the Englishry! What's the use of crying over spiltmilk? I'll give you another mare. "

"But it'll not be Giralda!" Flavia wailed. 

"Sure it's the black shame, it is!" Uncle Ulick cried, his face dark. "It's enough to raise the country! Ay, I say it, though you'relistening, Asgill. It's more than blood can stand!"

"No one is more sorry than myself, " Asgill replied, with a look ofconcern. "I don't make the laws, or they'd be other than they are!"

"True for you, " Uncle Ulick answered. "I'm allowing that. And it istrue, too, that to make a stir too early would ruin all. I'm afraid youmust be making the best of it, Flavvy! I'd go after them myself, butthe time's not convenient, as you know, and by this they're in Tralee, bad cess to it, where there's naught to be done. They'll be for sellingher to one of the garrison officers, I'm thinking; and may the littlegentleman in black velvet break his neck for him! Or they'll take herfarther up country, maybe to Dublin. "

Flavia's last hopes died with this verdict. She could not control hertears, and she turned and went away in grief to the house. 

Meantime the hangers-on and the beggars pressed upon the gentry, anxious to hear. The McMurrough, not sorry to find some one on whom tovent his temper, turned upon them and drove them away with blows of hiswhip. The movement brought him face to face with Captain Augustin. Thefiery little Frenchman disdained to give way, in a trice angry wordspassed, and--partly out of mischief, for the moment was certainly notpropitious--Asgill repeated the proposal which Colonel John had justmade. The Colonel had stood in the background during the debate aboutthe mare, but thus challenged he stood forward. 

"It's a fair compromise, " he argued. "And if Captain Augustin isprepared to pay twenty per cent----. "

"He'll not have his cargo, nor yet a cask!" The McMurrough replied witha curt, angry laugh. "Loss and enough we've had to-day. "

"But----"

"Get me back the mare, " the young man cried, cutting the Colonel shortwith savage ridicule. "Get me back the mare, and I'll talk. That's allI have to say. "

"It seems to me, " Colonel John replied quietly, "that those who loseshould find. Still--still, " checking the young man's anger by the verycalmness of his tone, "for Captain Augustin's sake, who can ill bearthe loss, and for your sister's sake, I will see what I can do. "

The McMurrough stared. "You?" he cried. "You?"

"Yes, I. "

"Heaven help us, and the pigs!" the young man exclaimed. And he laughedaloud in his scorn. 

But Colonel John seemed no way moved. "Yes, " he replied. "Only let usunderstand one another"--with a look at Uncle Ulick which made himparty to the bargain--"if I return to-morrow evening or on thefollowing day--or week--with your sister's mare----"

"Mounseer shall have his stuff again to the last pennyworth, " youngMcMurrough returned with an ironical laugh, "and without payment atall! Or stay! Perhaps you'll buy the mare?"

"No, I shall not buy her, " Colonel John answered, "except at the pricethe man gave you. "

"Then you'll not get her. That's certain! But it's your concern. "

The Colonel nodded, and, turning on his heels, went away towards thehouse, calling William Bale to him as he passed. 

The McMurrough looked at the Frenchman. He had a taste for tormentingsome one. "Well, monsieur, " he jeered, "how do you like your bargain?"

"I do not understand, " the Frenchman answered. "But he is a man of hisword, _ma foi_! And they are not--of the common. "

CHAPTER V

THE MESS-ROOM AT TRALEE

If England had made of Ireland a desert and called it peace, she hadnot marred its beauty. That was the thought in Colonel Sullivan's mindas he rode eastward under Slieve Mish, with the sun rising above thelower spurs of the mountain, and the lark saluting the new-bornradiance with a song attuned to the freshness of the morning. Where hisroad ascended he viewed the sparkling inlet spread far to thesouthward; and where the track dipped, the smooth slopes on either sideran up to grey crags that, high above, took strange shapes, now ofmonstrous heads, now of fantastic towers. As his sure-footed nag fordedthe brown bog-stream, long-shanked birds rose silently from the pools, and he marked with emotion the spots his boyhood had known: the shallowwhere the dog-wolf--so big that it had become a fable--died biting, andthe cliff whence the sea-eagle's nest had long bidden him defiance. 

Bale rode behind him, taciturn, comparing, perhaps, the folds of hisnative Suffolk hills with these greener vales. They reached the hedgetavern, where the mare had been seized, and they stayed to bait theirhorses, but got no news. About eight they rode on; and five long Irishmiles nearer Tralee, though still in a wild and lonely country, theyviewed from the crest of a hill a piece of road stretched ribbon-likebefore them, and on it a man walking from them at a great pace. He hadfor companion a boy, who trotted beside him. 

Neither man nor boy looked back, and it did not seem to be from fear ofthe two riders that they moved so quickly. The man wore a loose druggetcoat and an old jockey-cap, and walked with a stout six-foot staff. Thus armed and dressed he should have stood in small fear of robbers. Yet when Colonel John's horse, the tread of its hoofs deadened by thesod road, showed its head at his shoulder, and he sprang aside, heturned a face of more vivid alarm than seemed necessary. And he crossedhimself. 

Colonel John touched his hat. "I give you good morning, good man, " hesaid. 

The walker raised his hand to his cap as if to return the salute, butlowered it without doing so. He muttered something. 

"You will be in haste?" Colonel John continued. He saw that the sweatstood in beads on the man's brow, and the lad's face was tear-stained. 

"I've far to go, " the man muttered. He spoke with a slight foreignaccent, but in the west of Ireland this was common. "The top of themorning to you. "

Plainly he wished the two riders to pass on, but he did not slacken hisspeed for a moment. So for a space they went abreast, the man, withevery twenty paces, glancing up suspiciously. And now and again, theboy, as he ran or walked, vented a sob. 

The Colonel looked about him. The solitude of the valley was unbroken. No cabin smoked, no man worked within sight, so that the haste of thesetwo, their sweating faces, their straining steps, seemed portentous. "Shall I take up the lad?" Colonel John asked. 

Plainly the man hesitated. Then, "You will be doing a kindness, " hepanted. And, seizing the lad in two powerful arms, he swung him to theColonel's stirrup, who, in taking him, knocked off the other'sjockey-cap. 

The man snatched it up and put it on with a single movement. ButColonel John had seen what he expected. 

"You walk on a matter of life and death?" he said. 

"It is all that, " the man answered; and this time his look was defiant. 

"You are taking the offices, father?"

The man did not reply. 

"To one who is near his end, I suspect?"

The priest--for such he was--glanced at the weapon Colonel John wore. "You can do what you will, " he said sullenly. "I am on my duty. "

"And a fine thing, that!" Colonel John answered heartily. He drew rein, and, before the other knew what he would be at, he was off his horse. "Mount, father, " he said, "and ride, and God be with you!"

For a moment the priest stared dumbfounded. "Sir, " he said, "you wear asword! And no son of the Church goes armed in these parts. "

"If I am not one of your Church I am a Christian, " Colonel Johnanswered. "Mount, father, and ride in God's name, and when you arethere send the lad back with the beast. "

"The Mother of God reward you!" the priest cried fervently, "and turnyour heart in the right way!" He scrambled to the saddle. "The blessingof all----"

The rest was lost in the thud of hoofs as the horse started briskly, leaving Colonel John standing alone upon the road beside Bale'sstirrup. The servant looked after the retreating pair, but saidnothing. 

"It's something if a man serves where he's listed, " Colonel Johnremarked. 

Bale smiled. "And don't betray his own side, " he said. He slipped fromhis saddle. 

"You think it's the devil's work we've done?" Colonel John asked. 

But Bale declined to say more, and the two walked on, one on eitherside of the horse, master or man punching it when it showed a desire tosample the herbage. A stranger, seeing them, might have thought thatthey were wont to walk thus, so unmoved were their faces. 

They had trudged the better part of two miles when they came upon thehorse tethered by the reins to one of two gate-pillars, which stoodgateless beside the road. Colonel John got to his saddle, and theytrotted on. Notwithstanding which it was late in the afternoon whenthey approached the town of Tralee. 

In those days it was a town much ruined. The grim castle of theDesmonds, scene of the midnight murder which had brought so many woeson Ireland, still elbowed the grey Templars Cloister, and looked down, as it frowned across the bay, on the crumbling aisles and squalidgraves of the Abbey. To Bale, as he scanned the dark pile, it was but akeep--a mere nothing beside Marienburg or Stettin--rising above thehovels of an Irish town. But to the Irishman it stood for many a bittermemory and many a crime, besides that murder of a guest which willnever be forgotten. The Colonel sighed as he gazed. 

Presently his eyes dropped to the mean houses which flanked theentrance to the town; and he recognised that if all the saints had notvouchsafed their company, the delay caused by the meeting with thepriest had done somewhat. For at that precise moment a man was ridinginto the town before them, and the horse under the man was FlaviaMcMurrough's lost mare. 

Colonel John's eye lightened as he recognised its points. With a signto Bale he fell in behind the man and followed him through two or threeill-paved and squalid streets. Presently the rider passed through aloop-holed gateway, before which a soldier was doing sentry-go. The twofollowed. Thence the quarry crossed an open space surrounded by drearybuildings which no military eye could take for aught but a barrackyard. The two still followed--the sentry staring after them. On the farside of the yard the mare and its rider vanished through a secondarchway, which appeared to lead to an inner court. The Colonel, nothingintimidated, went after them. Fortune, he thought, had favoured him. 

But as he emerged from the tunnel-like passage he raised his head inastonishment. A din of voices, an outbreak of laughter and revelry, burst in a flood of sound upon his ears. He turned his face in thedirection whence the sounds came, and saw three open windows, and ateach window three or four flushed countenances. His sudden emergencefrom the tunnel, perhaps his look of surprise, wrought an instant'ssilence, which was followed by a ruder outburst. 

"Cock! cock! cock!" shrieked a tipsy voice, and an orange, hurled atrandom, missed the Colonel's astonished face by a yard. The mare whichhad led him so far had disappeared, and instinctively he drew bridle. He stared at the window. 

"Mark one!" cried a second roisterer, and a cork, better aimed than theorange, struck the Colonel sharply on the chin. A shout of laughtergreeted the hit. 

He raised his hat. "Gentlemen, " he remonstrated, "gentlemen----"

He could proceed no further. A flight of corks, a renewed cry of "Cock!cock! cock!" a chorus of "Fetch him, Ponto! Dead, good dog! Find him, Ponto!" drowned his remonstrances. Perhaps in the scowling face at hiselbow--for William Bale had followed him and was looking very fierceindeed--the wits of the --th found more amusement than in the master'smild astonishment. 

"Who the devil is he?" cried one of the seniors, raising his voiceabove the uproar. "English or Irish?"

"Irish for a dozen!" a voice answered. "Here, Paddy, where's yourpapers?"

"Ay, be jabers!" in an exaggerated brogue; "it's the broth of a boy heis, and never a face as long as his in ould Ireland!"

"Gentlemen, " the Colonel said, getting in a word at last. "Gentlemen, Ihave been in many companies before this, and----"

"And by G--d, you shall be in ours!" one of the revellers retorted. And"Have him in! Fetch him in!" roared a dozen voices, amid much laughter. In a twinkling half as many young fellows had leapt from the windows, and surrounded him. "Who-whoop!" cried one, "Who-whoop!"

"Steady, gentlemen, steady!" the Colonel said, a note of sternness inhis voice. "I've no objection to joining you, or to a little timelyfrolic, but----"

"Join us you will, whether or no!" replied one, more drunken or moreturbulent than the rest. He made as if he would lay hands on theColonel, and, to avoid violence, the latter suffered himself to behelped from his saddle. In a twinkling he was urged through thedoorway, leaving his reins in Bale's hand, whose face, for sheer wrathand vindictiveness, was a picture. 

Boisterous cries of "Hallo, sobersides!" and "Cock, cock, cock!"greeted the Colonel, as, partly of his own accord and partly urged byunceremonious hands, he crossed the threshold, and shot forward intothe room. 

The scene presented by the apartment matched the flushed faces and thewandering eyes which the windows had framed. The long table was strewnwith flasks and glasses and half-peeled fruit, the floor with emptybottles. A corner of the table had been cleared for a main at hazard;but to make up for this the sideboard was a wilderness of broken meatsand piled-up dishes, and an overturned card-table beside one of thewindows had strewn the floor with cards. Here, there, everywhere onchairs, on hooks, were cast sword-belts, neckcloths, neglected wigs. 

A peaceful citizen of that day had as soon found himself in a bear-pit;and even the Colonel's face grew a trifle longer as hands, not toogentle, conducted him towards the end of the table. "Gentlemen, gentlemen, " he began, "I have been in many companies, as I said before, and----"

"A speech! Old Gravity's speech!" roared a middle-aged, bold-eyed man, who had suggested the sally from the windows, and from the first hadset the younger spirits an example of recklessness. "Hear to him!" Hefilled a glass of wine and waved it perilously near the Colonel's nose. "Old Gravity's speech! Give it tongue!" he cried. "The flure's yourown, and we're listening. "

Colonel John eyed him with a slight contraction of the features. Butthe announcement, if ill-meant, availed to procure silence. The moresober had resumed their seats. He raised his head and spoke. 

"Gentlemen, " he said--and it was strange to note the effect of his lookas his eyes fell first on one and then on another, fraught with adignity which insensibly wrought on them. "Gentlemen, I have been inmany companies, and I have found it true, all the world over, that whata man brings he finds. I have the honour to speak to you as a soldierto soldiers----"

"English or Irish?" asked a tall sallow man--sharply, but in a newtone. 

"Irish!"

"Oh, be jabers!" from the man with the wineglass. 

But the Colonel's eye and manner had had their effect, and "Let himspeak!" the sallow man said. "And you, Payton, have done with yourfooling, will you?"

"Well, hear to him!"

"I have been in many camps and many companies, gentlemen, " the Colonelresumed, "and those of many nations. But wherever I have been I havefound that if a man brought courtesy with him, he met with courtesy atthe hands of others. And if he brought no offence, he received none. Iam a stranger here, for I have been out of my own country for a scoreof years. On my return you welcome me, " he smiled, "a littleboisterously perhaps, but I am sure, gentlemen, with a good intent. Andas I have fared elsewhere I am sure I shall fare at your hands. "

"Well, sure, " from the background, "and haven't we made you welcome?"

"Almost too freely, " the Colonel replied, smiling good-humouredly. "Apeaceable man who had not lived as long as I have might have foundhimself at a loss in face of so strenuous a welcome. Corks, perhaps, are more in place in bottles----"

"And a dale more in place out of them!" from the background. 

"But if you will permit me to explain my errand, I will say no more ofthat. My name, gentlemen, is Sullivan, Colonel John Sullivan of Skull, formerly of the Swedish service, and much at your service. I shall bestill more obliged if any of you will be kind enough to inform me whois the purchaser----"

Payton interrupted him rudely. "Oh, d--n! We have had enough of this!"he cried. "Sink all purchasers, I say!" And with a drunken crow hethrust his neighbour against the speaker, causing both to reel. How ithappened no one saw--whether Payton himself staggered in the act, orflung the wine wantonly; but somehow the contents of his glass flewover the Colonel's face and neckcloth. 

Half a dozen men rose from their seats. "Shame!" an indignant voicecried. 

Among those who had risen was the sallow man. "Payton, " he saidsharply, "what did you do that for?"

"Because I chose, if you like!" the stout man answered. "What is it toyou? I am ready to give him satisfaction when he likes, and where helikes, and no heel-taps! And what more can he want? Do you hear, sir?"he continued in a bullying tone. "Sword or pistols, before breakfast orafter dinner, drunk or sober, Jack Payton's your man. D--n me, it shallnever be said in my time that the --th suffered a crop-eared Irishmanto preach to them in their own mess-room! You can send your friend tome when you please. He'll find me!"

The Colonel was wiping the wine from his chin and neckcloth. He hadturned strangely pale at the moment of the insult. More than one ofthose who watched him curiously--and of such were all in the room, Payton excepted--and who noted the slow preciseness of his movementsand the care with which he cleansed himself, albeit his hand shook, expected some extraordinary action. 

But no one looked for anything so abnormal or so astonishing as thecourse he took when he spoke. Nothing in his bearing had prepared themfor it; nor anything in his conduct which, so far, had been that of aman of the world not too much at a loss even in the unfavourablecircumstances in which he was placed--circumstances which would haveunnerved many a one. 

"I do not fight, " he said. "Your challenge is cheap, sir, as yourinsult. "

Payton stared. He had never been more astonished in his life. "GoodL--d!" he cried. "You do not fight? Heaven and earth! and you asoldier!"

"I do not fight. "

"After that, man! Not--after----" He did not finish the sentence, butlaughed with uplifted chin, as at some great joke. 

"No, " Colonel John said between his teeth. 

And then no one spoke. A something in Colonel John's tone and manner, asomething in the repression of his voice, sobered the spectators, andturned that which might have seemed an ignominy, a surrender, into atragedy. And a tragedy in which they all had their share. For theinsult had been so wanton, so gross, so brutal, that there was not oneof the witnesses who had not felt shame, not one whose sympathy had notbeen for a moment with the victim, and who did not experience a pang onhis account as he stood, mild and passive, before them. 

Payton alone was moved only by contempt. "Lord above us, man!" hecried, finding his voice again. Are you a Quaker? If so, why the devildo you call yourself a soldier?"

"I am no Quaker, " Colonel John answered, "but I do not fight duels. "

"Why?"

"If I killed you, " the Colonel replied, eyeing him steadily, "would itdry my neckcloth or clean my face?"

"No!" Payton retorted with a sneer, "but it would clean your honour!"He had felt the reprehension in the air, he had been conscious for afew seconds that he had not the room with him; but the perception madehim only the more arrogant now that he felt his feet again. "It wouldprove, man, that, unlike the beasts that perish, you valued somethingmore than your life!"

"I do. "

"What?" Payton asked with careless disdain. 

"Among other things, my duty. " Payton laughed brutally. "Why, by thepowers, you _are_ a preacher!" he retorted. "Hang your duty, sir, andyou for a craven! Give me acts, not words! It's a man's duty to defendhis honour, and you talk of your neckcloth! There's for a newneckcloth!" He pulled out a half-crown and flung it, with an insultinggesture, upon the table. "Show us your back, and for the future givegentlemen of honour--a wide berth! You are no mate for them!"

The act and the words were too strong for the stomachs of the moregenerous among his hearers. A murmur, an undoubted murmur rose--for ifPayton was feared he was not loved; and the sallow-faced man, whosename was Marsh, spoke out. "Easy, Payton, " he said. "The gentleman----"

"The gentleman, eh?"

"Did not come here of his own accord, and you've said enough, and doneenough! For my part----"

"I didn't ask for your interference!" the other cried insolently. 

"Well, anyway----"

"And I don't want it! And I won't have it; do you hear, Marsh?" Paytonrepeated menacingly. "You know me, and I know you. "

"I know that you are a better fencer and a better shot than I am, "Marsh replied, shrugging his shoulders, "and I daresay than any of us. We are apt to believe it, anyway. But----"

"I would advise you to let that be enough, " Payton sneered. 

It was then that the Colonel, who had stood silent during thealtercation of which he was the subject, spoke--and in a tone somewhataltered. "I am much obliged to you, sir, " he said, addressing thesallow-faced man, "but I will cause no further trouble. I crave leaveto say one word only, which may come home to some among you. We areall, at times, at the mercy of mean persons. Yes, sir, of meanpersons, " the Colonel repeated, raising his voice and speaking in atone so determined--he seemed another man--that Payton, in the act ofseizing a decanter to hurl at him, hesitated. "For any but a meanperson, " Colonel John continued, drawing himself up to his full height, "finding that he had insulted one who could not meet him on eventerms--one who could not resent the insult in the mannerintended--would have deemed it all one as if he had insulted aone-armed man, or a blind man, and would have set himself right by anapology. "

At that word Payton found his voice. "Hang your apology!" he criedfuriously. 

"By an apology, " the Colonel repeated, fixing him with eyes ofunmeasured contempt, "which would have lowered him no more than anapology to a woman or a child. Not doing so, his act dishonours himselfonly, and those who sit with him. And one day, unless I mistake not, his own blood, and the blood of others, will rest upon his head. "

With that word the speaker turned slowly, walked with an even pace tothe door, and opened it, none gainsaying him. On the threshold hepaused and looked back. Something, possibly some chord of superstitionin his breast which his adversary's last words had touched, held Paytonsilent: and silent the Colonel's raised finger found him. 

"I believe, " Colonel John said, gazing solemnly at him, "that we shallmeet again. " And he went out. 

Payton turned to the table, and, with an unsteady hand, filled a glass. He read disapprobation in the eyes about him, but he had shaken themomentary chill from his own spirits, and he stared them down. "Sinkthe old Square-Toes!" he cried. "He got what he deserved! Who'll throwa main with me?"

"Thirty guineas against your new mare, if you like?"

"No, confound you, " Payton retorted angrily. "Didn't I say she wasn'tfor sale?"

CHAPTER VI

THE MAÎTRE D'ARMES

Beyond doubt Colonel John had got himself off the scene with a certainamount of dignity. But with all that he had done and suffered in thelands beyond the Baltic and the Vistula, he had not yet become soperfect a philosopher as to be indifferent to the opinion held of himby others. He was, indeed, as he retired, as unhappy as a more ordinaryman might have been in the same case. He knew that he was no craven, that he had given his proofs a score of times. But old deeds and aforeign reputation availed nothing here. And it was with a deep senseof vexation and shame that he rode out of the barrack-yard. Why, ohwhy! had he been so unlucky as to enter it? He was a man, after all, and the laughter of the mess-room, the taunts of the bully, burned hisears. 

Nor were his spirits low on his account only. The cruelty of man toman, the abuse of strength by those who had it, and the pains of thosewho had it not, the crookedness of the world in which the weak go tothe wall--thoughts of these things weighed him down. But more, and moreto the purpose, he saw that after what had happened, his chances ofsuccess in the enterprise which had brought him to town, and which wasitself but a means to an end, were lessened. It might not be possibleto pursue that enterprise any farther. This was a mortifying thought, and accounted for the melancholy face with which he sought the inn, andsupped; now wishing that he had not done this or that, now ponderinghow he might turn the flank of a misfortune which threatened to shatterall his plans. 

For if he was anxious to recover the mare, his anxiety did not restthere. Her recovery was but a step to other things; to that influenceat Morristown which would make him potent for good; to thatconsideration which would enable him to expel foolish councils, andsilence that simmering talk of treason which might at any moment boilup into action and ruin a countryside. But he knew that he could onlyget the mare from those who held her by imposing himself upon them; andto do this after what had happened seemed impossible. The story wouldbe told, must be told: it would be carried far and wide. Such thingswere never hid; and he had come off so ill, as the world viewed things, he had cut so poor a figure, that after this he could hope for nothingfrom his personal influence here or at Morristown. Nothing, unless hecould see himself right at Tralee. 

He brooded long over the matter, and at length--but not until after hismeal--he hit on a plan, promising, though distasteful. He called Bale, and made inquiries through that taciturn man; and next morning he satlate at his breakfast. He had learned that the garrison used the innmuch, many of the officers calling there for their "morning"; and theinformation proved correct. About ten he heard heavy steps in thestone-paved passage, spurs rang out an arrogant challenge, voicescalled for Patsy and Molly, and demanded this or that. By-and-by twoofficers, almost lads, sauntered into the room in which he sat, and, finding him there, moved with a wink and a grin to the window. Theyleant out, and he heard them laugh; he knew that they were discussinghim before they turned to the daily fare--the neat ankles of a passing"colleen, " the glancing eyes of the French milliner over the way, orthe dog-fight at the corner. The two remained thus, half eclipsed asfar as the Colonel was concerned, until presently the sallow-faced mansauntered idly into the room. 

He did not see the Colonel at once, but the latter rose and bowed, andMarsh, a little added colour in his face, returned the salute--with anindifferent grace. It was clear that, though he had behaved better thanhis fellows on the previous day, he had no desire to push theacquaintance farther. 

Colonel John, however, gave him no chance. Still standing, and with agrave, courteous face, "May I, as a stranger, " he said, "trouble youwith a question, sir?"

The two lady-killers at the window heard the words and nudged oneanother, with a stifled chuckle at their comrade's predicament. CaptainMarsh, with one eye on them, assented stiffly. 

"Is there any one, " the Colonel asked, "in Tralee--I fear the chance issmall--who gives fencing lessons?--or who is qualified to do so?"

The Captain's look of surprise yielded to one of pitying comprehension. He smiled--he could not help it; while the young men drew in theirheads to hear the better. 

"Yes, " he answered, "there is. "

"In the regiment, I presume?"

"He is attached to it temporarily. If you will inquire at the Armouryfor Lemoine, the Maître d'Armes, he will oblige you, I have no doubt. But----"

"If you please?" the Colonel said politely, seeing that Marshhesitated. 

"If you are not a skilled swordsman, I fear that it is not one lesson, or two, or a dozen, will enable you to meet Captain Payton, if you havesuch a thing in your mind, sir. He is but little weaker than Lemoine, and Lemoine is a fair match with a small-sword for any man out ofLondon. Brady in Dublin, possibly, and perhaps half a dozen in Englandare his betters, but----" he stopped abruptly, his ear catching asnigger at the window. "I need not trouble you with that, " he concludedlamely. 

"Still, " the Colonel answered simply, "a long reach goes for much, Ihave heard, and I am tall. "

Captain Marsh looked at him in pity, and he might have put hiscompassion into words, but for the young bloods at the window, who, heknew, would repeat the conversation. He contented himself, therefore, with saying rather curtly, "I believe it goes some way. " And he turnedstiffly to go out. 

But the Colonel had a last question to put to him. "At what hour, " heasked, "should I be most likely to find this--Lemoine, at leisure?"

"Lemoine?"

"If you please. "

Marsh opened his mouth to answer, but found himself anticipated by oneof the youngsters. "Three in the afternoon is the best time, " the ladsaid bluntly, speaking over his shoulder. He popped out his head again, that his face, swollen by his perception of the jest, might not betrayit. 

But the Colonel seemed to see nothing. "I thank you, " he said, bowingcourteously. 

And re-seating himself, as Marsh went out, he finished his breakfast. The two at the window, after exploding once or twice in an attempt tostifle their laughter, drew in their heads, and, still red in the face, marched solemnly past the Colonel, and out of the room. His seat, nowthe window was clear, commanded a view of the street, and presently hesaw the two young bloods go by in the company of four or five of theirlike. They were gesticulating, nor was there much doubt, from thelaughter with which their tale was received, that they were retailing ajoke of signal humour. 

That did not surprise the Colonel. But when the door opened a momentlater, and Marsh came hastily into the room, and with averted facebegan to peer about for something, he was surprised. 

"Where the devil's that snuff-box!" the sallow-faced man exclaimed. "Left it somewhere!" Then, looking about him to make sure that the doorwas closed. "See, here sir, " he said awkwardly, "it's no business ofmine, but for a man who has served as you say you have, you're a d----dsimple fellow. Take my advice and don't go to Lemoine's at three, ifyou go at all. "

"No?" the Colonel echoed. 

"Can't you see they'll all be there to guy you?" Marsh retortedimpatiently. He could not help liking the man, and yet the man seemed afool! The next moment, with a hasty nod, he was gone. He had found thebox in his pocket. 

Colonel Sullivan smiled, and, after carefully brushing the crumbs fromhis breeches, rose from the table. "A good man, " he muttered. "Pity hehas not more courage. " The next moment he came to attention, for slowlypast the window moved Captain Payton himself, riding Flavia's mare, andtalking with one of the young bloods who walked at his stirrup. 

The man and the horse! The Colonel began to understand that somethingmore than wantonness had inspired Payton's conduct the previous night. Either he had been privy from the first to the plot to waylay thehorse; or he had bought it cheaply knowing how it had been acquired;or--a third alternative--it had been placed in his hands, to the endthat his reputation as a fire-eater might protect it. In any event, hehad had an interest in nipping inquiry in the bud; and, learning whothe Colonel was, had acted on the instant, and with considerablepresence of mind. 

The Colonel looked thoughtful; and though the day was fine forIreland--that is, no more than a small rain was falling--he remainedwithin doors until five minutes before three o'clock. Bale had employedthe interval in brushing the stains of travel from his master'sclothes, and combing his horseman's wig with particular care; so thatit was a neat and spruce gentleman who at five minutes before threewalked through Tralee, and, attending to the directions he hadreceived, approached a particular door, a little within the barrackgate. 

Had he glanced up at the windows he would have seen faces at them;moreover, a suspicious ear might have caught, as he paused on thethreshold, a scurrying of feet, mingled with stifled laughter. But hedid not look up. He did not seem to expect to see more than he found, when he entered--a great bare room with its floor strewn with sawdustand its walls adorned here and there by a gaunt trophy of arms. In themiddle of the floor, engaged apparently in weighing one foil againstanother, was a stout, dark-complexioned man, whose light and nimblestep, as he advanced to meet his visitor, gave the lie to his weight. 

Certainly there came from a half-opened door at the end of the room astealthy sound as of rats taking cover. But Colonel John did not lookthat way. His whole attention was bent upon the Maître d'Armes, whobowed low to him. Clicking his heels together, and extending his palmsin the French fashion, "Good-morning, sare, " he said, his southernaccent unmistakable. "I make you welcome. "

The Colonel returned his salute less elaborately. "The Maître d'ArmesLemoine?" he said. 

"Yes, sare, that is me. At your service!"

"I am a stranger in Tralee, and I have been recommended to apply toyou. You are, I am told, accustomed to give lessons. "

"With the small-sword?" the Frenchman answered, with the same gestureof the open hands. "It is my profession. "

"I am desirous of brushing up my knowledge--such as it is. "

"A vare good notion, " the fencing-master replied, his black beady eyestwinkling. "Vare good for me. Vare good also for you. Always ready, isthe gentleman's motto; and to make himself ready, his high recreation. But, doubtless, sare, " with a faint smile, "you are proficient, and Iteach you nothing. You come but to sweat a little. " An observant personwould have noticed that as he said this he raised his voice above hisusual tone. 

"At one time, " Colonel John replied with simplicity, "I was fairlyproficient. Then--this happened!" He held out his right hand. "Yousee?"

"Ah!" the Frenchman said in a low tone, and he raised his hands. "Thatis ogly! That is vare ogly! Can you hold with that?" he added, inspecting the hand with interest. He was a different man. 

"So, so, " the Colonel answered cheerfully. 

"Not strongly, eh? It is not possible. "

"Not very strongly, " the Colonel assented. His hand, like Bale's, lacked two fingers. 

Lemoine muttered something under his breath, and looked at the Colonelwith a wrinkled brow. "Tut--tut!" he said, "and how long are you likethat, sare?"

"Seven years. "

"Pity! pity!" Lemoine exclaimed. Again he looked at his visitor withperplexed eyes. After which, "Dam!" he said suddenly. 

The Colonel stared. 

"It is not right!" the Frenchman continued, frowning. "I--no! Pardonme, sare, I do not fence with _les estropiés_. That is downright! Thatis certain, sare. I do not do it. "

If the Colonel had been listening he might have caught the sound of awarning cough, with a stir, and a subdued murmur of voices--allproceeding from the direction of the inner room. But he had his back tothe half-opened door and he seemed to be taken up with thefencing-master's change of tone. "But if, " he objected, "I am willingto pay for an hour's practice?"

"Another day, sare. Another day, if you will. "

"But I shall not be here another day. I have but to-day. By-and-by, " hecontinued with a smile as kindly as it was humorous, "I shall begin tothink that you are afraid to pit yourself against a _manchot_!"

"Oh, la! la!" The Frenchman dismissed the idea with a contemptuousgesture. 

"Do me the favour, then, " Colonel John retorted. "If you please?"

Against one of the walls were three chairs arranged in a row. Beforeeach stood a boot-jack, and beside it a pair of boot-hooks; over it, fixed in the wall, were two or three pegs for the occupant's wig, cravat, and cane. The Colonel, without waiting for a further answer, took his seat on one of the chairs, removed his boots, and then hiscoat, vest, and wig, which he hung on the pegs above him. 

"And now, " he said gaily, as he stood up, "the mask!"

He did not see the change--for he seemed to have no suspicion--but ashe rose, the door of the room behind him became fringed with grinningfaces. Payton, the two youths who had leant from the window of the innand who had carried his words, a couple of older officers, half a dozensubalterns, all were there--and one or two civilians. The more gravecould hardly keep the more hilarious in order. The curtain was ready togo up on what they promised themselves would be the most absurd scene. The stranger who fought no duels, yet thought that a lesson or twowould make him a match for a dead-hand like Payton--was ever such apromising joke conceived? The good feeling, even the respect which theColonel had succeeded in awakening for a short time the evening before, were forgotten in the prospect of such a jest. 

The Frenchman made no further demur. He had said what he could, and itwas not his business to quarrel with his best clients. He took hismask, and proffered a choice of foils to his antagonist, whose figure, freed from the heavy coat and vest of the day, and the overshadowingwig, seemed younger and more supple than the Frenchman had expected. "Apity, a pity!" the latter said to himself. "To have lost, if he everwas professor, the joy of life!"

"Are you ready?" Colonel John asked. 

"At your service, sare, " the Maître d'Armes replied--but not with muchheartiness. The two advanced each a foot, they touched swords, thensaluted with that graceful and courteous engagement which to anignorant observer is one of the charms of the foil. As they did so, andsteel grated on steel, the eavesdroppers in the inner room venturedsoftly from ambush--like rats issuing forth; soon they were allstanding behind the Colonel, the sawdust, and the fencers' stampingfeet as they lunged or gave back, covering the sound of theirmovements. 

They were on the broad grin when they came out. But it took them lessthan a minute to discover that the entertainment was not likely to beso extravagantly funny as they had hoped. The Colonel was not, strictlyspeaking, a tyro; moreover, he had, as he said, a long reach. He was nomatch indeed for Lemoine, who touched him twice in the first bout andmight have touched him thrice had he put forth his strength. But he didnothing absurd. When he dropped his point, therefore, at the end of therally, and, turning to take breath came face to face with the galleryof onlookers, the best-natured of these felt rather foolish. ButColonel John seemed to find nothing surprising in their presence. Hesaluted them courteously with his weapon. "I am afraid I cannot showyou much sport, gentlemen, " he said. 

One or two muttered something--a good day, or the like. The restgrinned unmeaningly. Payton said nothing, but, folding his arms with asuperior air, leant, frowning haughtily, against the wall. 

"_Parbleu_, " said Lemoine, as they rested. "It is a pity. The wrist isexcellent, sare. But the pointing finger is not--is not!"

"I do my best, " the Colonel answered, with cheerful resignation. "Shallwe engage again?"

"At your pleasure. "

The Frenchman's eye no longer twinkled; his gallantry was on itsmettle. He was grave and severe, fixing his gaze on the Colonel'sattack, and remaining blind to the nods and shrugs and smiles ofamusement of his patrons in the background. Again he touched theColonel, and, alas! again; with an ease which, good-natured as he was, he could not mask. 

Colonel John, a little breathed, and perhaps a little chagrined also, dropped his point. Some one coughed, and another tittered. 

"I think he will need another lesson or two, " Payton remarked, speakingostensibly to one of his companions, but loudly enough for all to hear. 

The man whom he addressed made an inaudible answer. The Colonel turnedtowards them. 

"And--a new hand, " Payton added in the same tone. 

Even for his henchman the remark was almost too much. But the Colonel, strange to say--perhaps he really was very simple--seemed to findnothing offensive in it. On the contrary, he replied to it. 

"That was precisely, " he said, "what I thought when this"--he indicatedhis maimed hand--"happened to me. And I did my best to procure one. "

"Did you succeed?" Payton retorted in an insolent tone. 

"To some extent, " the Colonel replied, in the most matter-of-factmanner. And he transferred the foil to his left hand. 

"Give you four to one, " Payton rejoined, "Lemoine hits you twice beforeyou hit him once. "

Colonel John had anticipated some of the things that had happened. Buthe had not foreseen this. He was quick to see the use to which he mightput it, and it was only for an instant that he hesitated. Then "Four toone?" he repeated. 

"Five, if you like!" Payton sneered. 

"If you will wager, " the Colonel said slowly, "if you will wager thegrey mare you were riding this morning, sir----"

Payton uttered an angry oath. "What do you mean?" he said. 

"Against ten guineas, " Colonel John continued carelessly, bending thefoil against the floor and letting it spring to its length again, "Iwill make that wager. "

Payton scowled at him. He was aware of the other's interest in themare, and suspected, at least, that he had come to town to recover her. And caution would have had him refuse the snare. But his toadies wereabout him, he had long ruled the roast, to retreat went against thegrain; while to suppose that the man had the least chance againstLemoine was absurd. Yet he hesitated. "What do you know about themare?" he said coarsely. 

"I have seen her. But of course, if you are afraid to wager her, sir----"

Payton answered to the spur. "Bah! Afraid?" he cried contemptuously. "Done, with you!"

"That is settled, " the Colonel replied. "I am at your service, " hecontinued, turning to the Maître d'Armes. "I trust, " indicating that hewas going to fence with his left hand, "that this will not embarrassyou?"

"No! But it is interesting, by G--d, it is vare interesting, " theFrenchman replied. "I have encountered _les gauchers_ before, and----"

He did not finish the sentence, but saluting, he assumed an attitude alittle more wary than usual. He bent his knees a trifle lower, and heldhis left shoulder somewhat more advanced, as compared with his right. The foils felt one another, and "Oh, va, va!" he muttered. "Iunderstand, the droll!"

For half a minute or so the faces of the onlookers reflected only amild surprise, mingled with curiosity. But the fencers had done littlemore than feel one another's blades, they had certainly not exchangedmore than half a dozen serious passes, before this was changed, beforeone face grew longer and another more intent. A man who was no fencer, and therefore no judge, spoke. A fierce oath silenced him. Anothermurmured an exclamation under his breath. A third stooped low with hishands on his hips that he might not lose a lunge or a parry. ForPayton, his face became slowly a dull red. At length, "Ha!" cried one, drawing in his breath. And he was right. The Maître d'Armes' button, sliding under the Colonel's blade, had touched his opponent. At once, Lemoine sprang back out of danger, the two points dropped, the twofencers stood back to take breath. 

For a few seconds the Colonel's chagrin was plain. He looked, and was, disappointed. Then he conquered the feeling, and he smiled. "I fear youare too strong for me, " he said. 

"Not at all, " the Frenchman made answer. "Not at all! It was fortune, sare. I know not what you were with your right hand, but you are withthe left vare strong, of the first force. It is certain. "

Payton, an expert, had been among the earliest to discern, with as muchastonishment as mortification, the Colonel's skill. With a suddensinking of the heart, he had foreseen the figure he would cut ifLemoine were worsted; he had endured a moment of great fear. But atthis success he choked down his apprehensions, and, a sanguine man, hebreathed again. One more hit, one more success on Lemoine's part, andhe had won the wager! But with all he could do he could no longer bearhimself carelessly. Pallid and troubled, he watched, biting his lip;and though he longed to say something cutting, he could think ofnothing. Nay, if it came to that, he could not trust his voice, andwhile he still faltered, seeking for a gibe and finding none, the twocombatants had crossed their foils again. Their tense features, plainthrough the masks, as well as their wary movements, made it clear thatthey played for a victory of which neither was confident. 

By this time the rank and file of the spectators had been reinforced bythe arrival of Marsh; who, discovering a scene so unexpected, andquickly perceiving that Lemoine was doing his utmost, wondered whatPayton's thoughts were. Apart from the wager, it was clear that ifLemoine had not met his match, the Captain had; and in the future wouldhave to mend his manners in respect to one person present. Doubtlessmany of those in the room, on whose toes Payton had often trodden, hadthe same idea, and felt secret joy, pleased that the bully of theregiment was like to meet with a reverse and a master. 

Whatever their thoughts, a quick rally diverted them, and riveted alleyes on the fencers. For a moment thrust and parry followed one anotherso rapidly that the untrained gaze could not distinguish them or tracethe play. The spectators held their breath, expecting a hit with eachsecond. But the rally died away again, neither of the players had gotthrough the other's guard; and now they fell to it more slowly, theColonel, a little winded, giving ground, and Lemoine pressing him. 

Then, no one saw precisely how it happened, whiff-whaff, Lemoine'sweapon flew from his hand and struck the wall with a whirr and ajangle. The fencing-master wrung his wrist. "_Sacre!_" he cried, between his teeth, unable in the moment of surprise to control hischagrin. 

The Colonel touched him with his button for form's sake, then steppedrapidly to the wall, picked up the foil by the blade, and courteouslyreturned it to him. Two or three cried "Bravo, " but faintly, as barelycomprehending what had happened. The greater part stood silent in sheerastonishment. For Payton, he remained dumb with mortification anddisgust; and if he had the grace to be thankful for anything, he wasthankful that for the moment attention was diverted from him. 

Lemoine, indeed, the person more immediately concerned, had only eyesfor his opponent, whom he regarded with a queer mixture of approval andvexation. "You have been at Angelo's school in Paris, sare?" he said, in the tone of one who stated a fact rather than asked a question. 

"It is true, " the Colonel answered, smiling. "You have guessed it. "

"And learned that trick from him?"

"I did. It is of little use except to a left-handed man. "

"Yet in play with one not of the first force it succeeds twice out ofthree times, " Lemoine answered. "Twice out of three times, with theright hand. _Ma foi!_ I remember it well! I offered the master twentyguineas, Monsieur, if he would teach it me. But because"--he held outhis palms pathetically--"I was right-handed, he would not. "

"I am fortunate, " Colonel John answered, bowing, and regarding hisopponent with kind eyes, "in being able to requite your good nature. Ishall be pleased to teach it you for nothing, but not now. Gentlemen, "he continued, giving up his foil to Lemoine, and removing his mask, "gentlemen, you will bear me witness, I trust, that I have won thewager?"

Some nodded, some murmured an affirmative, others turned towardsPayton, who, too deeply chagrined to speak, nodded sullenly. Howwillingly at that moment would he have laid the Colonel dead at hisfeet, and Lemoine, and the whole crew, friends and enemies! He gulpedsomething down. "Oh, d--n you!" he said, "I give it you! Take the mare, she's in the stable!"

At that a brother officer touched his arm, and, disregarding hisgesture of impatience, drew him aside. The intervener seemed to bereminding him of something; and the Colonel, not inattentive, andindeed suspicious, caught the name "Asgill" twice repeated. But Paytonwas too angry to care for minor consequences, or to regard anything buthow he might most quickly escape from the scene of defeat and the eyesof those who had witnessed his downfall. He shook off his adviser witha rough hand. 

"What do I care?" he answered with an oath. "He must shoe his owncattle!" Then, with a poor show of hiding his spite under a cloak ofinsouciance, he addressed the Colonel. "The mare is yours, " he said. "You've won her. Much good may she do you!"

And he turned on his heel and went out of the armoury. 

CHAPTER VII

BARGAINING

The melancholy which underlies the Celtic temperament finds somethingcongenial in the shadows that at close of day fall about an old ruin. On fine summer evenings, and sometimes when the south-wester washurling sheets of rain from hill to hill, and the birch-trees werebending low before its blast, Flavia would seek the round tower thatstood on the ledge beside the waterfall. It was as much as half a milefrom the house, and the track which scaled the broken ground to itsfoot was rough. But from the narrow terrace before the wall the eye notonly commanded the valley in all its length, but embraced above oneshoulder a distant view of Brandon Mountain, and above the other a peepof the Atlantic. Thither, ever since she could remember, she hadcarried her dreams and her troubles; there, with the lake stretchedbelow her, and the house a mere Noah's ark to the eye, she had cooledher hot brow or dried her tears, dwelt on past glories, or bashfullythought upon the mysterious possibilities of that love, of that jointlife, of that rosy-hued future, to which the most innocent of maidensmust sometimes turn their minds. 

It was perhaps because she often sought the tower at sunset, and he hadnoted the fact, that Luke Asgill's steps bore him thither on an eveningthree days after the Colonel's departure for Tralee. Asgill hadremained at Morristown, though the girl had not hidden her distaste forhis presence. But to all her remonstrances The McMurrough had replied, with his usual churlishness, that the man was there on business--didshe want to recover her mare, or did she not? And she had found nothingmore to say. But the most slavish observance on the guest's part, andsome improvement in her brother's conduct--which she might have rightlyattributed to Asgill's presence--had not melted her. She, who hadscarcely masked her reluctance to receive a Protestant kinsman, was notgoing to smile on a Protestant of Asgill's past and reputation; on aman whose father had stood hat in hand before her grandfather, andwhose wealth had been wrung from the sweat of his fellow peasants. 

Be that as it might, Asgill did not find her at the tower. But he waspatient; he thought that she might still come, and he waited, sittinglow, with his back against the ruined wall, that she might not see himuntil it was too late for her to retreat. By-and-by he heard footstepsmounting the path; his face reddened, and he made as if he would rise. Remembering himself, however, he sat down again, with such a look inhis eyes as comes into a dog's when it expects to be beaten. But theface that rose above the brow was not Flavia's, but her brother's. AndAsgill swore. 

The McMurrough understood, grinned, and threw himself on the groundbeside him. "You'll be wishing me in the devil's bowl, I'm thinking, "he said. "Yet, faith, I'm not so sure--if you're not a fool. For it'scertain I am, you'll never touch so much as the sole of her footwithout me. "

"I'm not denying it, " the other answered sulkily. 

"So it's mighty little use your wishing me away!" The McMurroughcontinued, stretching himself at his ease. "You can't get her withoutme; nor at all, at all, but on my terms! It would be a fine thing foryou, no doubt, if you could sneak round her behind my back! Don't Iknow you'd be all for old Sir Michael's will then, and I might die in agutter, for you! But an egg, and an egg's fair sharing. "

"Have I said it was any other?" Asgill asked gloomily. 

"The old place is mine, and I'm minded to keep it. "

"And if any other marries her, " Asgill said quietly, "he will want herrights. "

"Well, and do you think, " the younger man answered in his ugliestmanner, "that if it weren't for that small fact, Mister Asgill----"

"And the small fact, " Asgill struck in, "that before your grandfatherdied I lent you a clear five hundred, and I'm to take that, that's myown already, in quittance of all!"

"Well, and wasn't it that same I'm saying?" The McMurrough retorted. "If it weren't for that, and the bargain we've struck, d'you think thatI'd be letting my sister and a McMurrough look at the likes of you? No, not in as many Midsummer Days as are between this and world withoutend!"

The look Asgill shot at him would have made a wiser man tremble. ButThe McMurrough knew the strength of his position. 

"And if I were to tell her?" Asgill said slowly. 

"What?"

"That we've made a bargain about her. "

"It's the last strand of hope you'd be breaking, my man, " the youngerman answered briskly. "For you'd lose my help, and she'd not believeyou--though every priest in Douai backed your word!"

Asgill knew that that was true, and though his face grew dark hechanged his tone. "Enough said, " he replied pacifically. "Where'll webe if we quarrel? You want the old place that is yours by right. And Iwant--your sister. " He swallowed something as he named her; even histone was different. "'Tis one and one. That's all. "

"And you're the one who wants the most, " James replied cunningly. "Asgill, my man, you'd give your soul for her, I'm thinking. "

"I would. "

"You would, I believe. By G--d, " he continued, with a leer, "you'rethat fond of her I'll have to look to her! Hang me, my friend, if I lether be alone with you after this. Safe bind, safe find. Women and fruitare easily bruised. "

Asgill rose slowly to his feet. "You scoundrel!" he said in a low tone. And it was only when The McMurrough, surprised by his movement, turnedto him, that the young man saw that his face was black withpassion--saw, indeed, a face so menacing, that he also sprang to hisfeet. "You scoundrel!" Asgill repeated, choking on the words. "If yousay a thing like that again--if you say it again, do you hear?--I'll doyou a mischief. Do you hear? Do you hear?"

"What in the saints' names is the matter with you?" The McMurroughfaltered. 

"You're not fit to breathe the air she breathes!" Asgill continued, with the same ferocity. "Nor am I! But I know it, thank God! And youdon't! Why, man, " he continued, still fighting with the passion thatpossessed him, "I wouldn't dare to touch the hem of her gown withouther leave! I wouldn't dare to look in her face if she bade me not!She's as safe with me as if she were an angel in heaven! And yousay--you; but you don't understand!"

"Faith and I don't, " The McMurrough answered, his tone much lowered. "That's true for you!" When it came to a collision of wills the otherwas his master. 

"No, " Asgill repeated. "But don't you talk like that again, or harmwill come of it. I may be what you say--I may be! But I wouldn't lay afinger on your sister against her will--no, not to be in Paradise!"

"I thought you didn't believe in Paradise, " the younger man mutteredsulkily, striving to cover the check he had received. 

"There's a Paradise I do believe in, " Asgill answered. "But never mindthat. " He sat down again. 

Strange to relate, he meant what he said. Many changes corrupt loyalty, and of evil times evil men are the natural fruit. In nearly allrespects Asgill was as unscrupulous a man as the time in which he livedand the class from which he sprang could show. Following in the stepsof a griping, miserly sire, he had risen to his present station byoppression and chicanery; by crushing the weak and cajoling the strong. And he was prepared to maintain his ground by means as vile and a handas hard. But he loved; and--strange anomaly, bizarre exception, call itwhat you will--somewhere in the depths of his earthly nature a spark ofgood survived, and fired him with so pure an ardour that at the leasthint of disrespect to his mistress, at a thought of injury to her, thewhole man rose in arms. It was a strange, yet a common inconsistency;an inconstancy to evil odd enough to set The McMurrough marvelling, while common enough to commend itself to a thinking mind. 

"Enough of that!" Asgill repeated after a moment's pause. While he didnot fear, it did not suit him to break with his companion. "And, indeed, it was not of your sister I was thinking when I said where'd webe if we quarrelled. For it's not I'll be the cuckoo to push you out, McMurrough, lad. But a man there is will play the old grey bird yet, ifyou let him be. And him with the power and all. "

"D'you mean John Sullivan?"

"I mean that same, my jewel. "

The young man laughed derisively. He had resumed his seat by theother's side. "Pho!" he said, "you'll be jesting. For the power, it'sbut a name. If he were to use, were it but the thin end of it, it wouldrun into his hand! The boys would rise upon him, and Flavvy'd be theworst of them. It's in the deep bog he'd be, before he knew where hewas, and never'd he come out, Luke Asgill! Sure, I'm not afraid ofhim!"

"You've need to be!" Asgill said soberly. 

"Pho! It takes more than him to frighten me! Why, man, he's a softthing, if ever there was one! He'll not say boh! to a goose with apistol in its hand!"

"And that might be, if you weren't such a fool as ye are, McMurrough!"Asgill answered. "No, but hear me out, lad!" he continued earnestly. "Isay he might not harm you, if you had not the folly we both know of inyour mind. But I tell you freely I'll be no bonnet to it while hestands by. 'Tis too dangerous. Not that I believe you are much inearnest, my lad, whatever others may think--what's your rightful kingto you, or you to him, that you should risk aught? But whether you gointo it out of pure devilment, or just to keep right with yoursister----"

"Which is why you stand bonnet for it, " McMurrough struck in, with agrin. 

"That's possible. But I do that, my lad, because I hope naught may comeof it, but just a drinking of healths and the like. So, why should Iplay the informer and get myself misliked? But you--you may findyourself deeper in it than you think, and quicker than you think, whileall the time, if the truth were told"--with a shrewd look at theother--"I believe you've little more heart for it than myself. "

The young man swore a great oath that he was in it body and soul, sworeit by the bones of his ten toes. But he laughed before the words wereout of his mouth. And "I don't believe you, " Asgill said coolly. "Youknow, and I know, what you were ready to do when the old man was alive, and if it had paid you properly. And you'd do the same now, if it paidyou now. So what are the wrongs of the old faith to you that you shouldrisk all for them? Or the rights of the old Irish, for the matter ofthat? But this being so, and you but half-hearted, I tell you, it istoo dangerous a game to play for groats. And while John Sullivan'shere, that makes it more dangerous, I'll not play bonnet!"

"What'll he know of it, at all, at all?" James McMurrough askedcontemptuously. And he took up a stone and flung it over the edge. 

"With a Spanish ship off the coast, " Asgill answered, "and you know wholikely to land, and a preaching, may be, next Sunday, and pike-drill atthe Carraghalin to follow--man, in three days you may have smokingroof-trees, and 'twill be too late to cry 'Hold!' Stop, I say, stopwhile you can, and before you've all Kerry in a flame!"

James McMurrough turned with a start. His face--but the light wasbeginning to fail--seemed a shade paler. "How did you know there waspike-drill?" he cried sharply. "I didn't tell you. "

"Hundreds know it. "

"But you!" McMurrough retorted. It was plain that he was disagreeablysurprised. 

"Did you think I meant nothing when I said I played bonnet to it?"

"You know a heap too much, Luke Asgill!"

"And could make a good market of it?" Asgill answered coolly. "That'swhat you're thinking, is it? And it's Heaven's truth I could--if you'dnot a sister. "

"And a care for your own skin. "

"Faith, " Asgill answered with humorous frankness, "and I'm plain withyou, that stands for something in it. For it's a weary way west ofAthlone we are!"

"And the bogs are deep, " McMurrough said, with a sidelong look. 

"Maybe, " Asgill replied, shrugging his shoulders. "But that I've notthat in my mind--I'm giving you proof, James McMurrough. Isn't it I ampraying you to draw out of it in time, for all our sakes? If you meannothing but to keep sweet with your sister, you're playing with fire, and so am I! And we'd best see it's not carried too far, as it's liketo be before we know it. But if you are fool enough to be in earnest, which I'll never believe, d'you think to overturn the ProtestantSuccession with a few foreigners and a hundred of White-boys thatwouldn't stand before the garrison of Tralee? You've neither money normen nor powder. Half a dozen broken captains who must starve if there'sno fighting afoot, as many more who've put their souls in the priests'hands and see with their eyes--these and a few score boys without acoat to their backs or breeches to their nakedness--d'you think to oustold Malbrouk with these?"

"He's dead!"

"He's not, my jewel; and if he be he's left more of his kidney. No; ifyou must be a fool, be a fool with your eyes open! I tell you oldIreland had her lesson thirty years back, and if you were Sarsfieldhimself, and called on 'em to rise against the Saxon to-day, you'd notfind as many follow you as would take a sessions town!"

"You know a heap of things, Asgill, " James McMurrough answereddisdainfully. But he looked his discomfiture. 

"I do. And more by token, I know this!" Asgill retorted. He had risento depart, and the two stood with their faces close together. "This!"he repeated, clapping one hand on the other. "If you're a fool, I'm abigger! By Heaven, I am! Or what would I be doing? Why, I'd be pressingyou into this, by the Lord, I would, in place of holding you back! Andthen when the trouble came, as come it would, and you'd to quit, mylad, and no choice but to make work for the hangman or beg a crust overseas, and your sister 'd no more left than she stood up in, and smallchoice either, it's then she'd be glad to take Luke Asgill, as she'llbarely look at now! Ay, my lad, I'd win her then, if it were but as theprice of saving your neck! There's naught she'd not do for you, and I'dask but herself. "

James McMurrough stared at him, confounded. For Asgill spoke with abitterness as well as a vehemence that betrayed how little he cared forthe man he addressed--whether he swung or lived, begged or famished. His tone, his manner, his black look, all made it plain that the schemehe outlined was no sudden thought, but a plan long conceived, oftenstudied, and put aside with reluctance. For the listener it was as if, the steam clearing away, he'd a glimpse of the burning pit of avolcano, on the shelving side of which he stood. He shuddered, and hiscountenance changed. A creature of small vanities and small vices, utterly worthless, selfish, and cruel, but as weak as water, he quailedbefore this glimpse of elemental passion, before this view of a souldarker than his own. And it was with a poor affectation of defiancethat he made his answer. 

"And what for, if it's as easy as you say, don't you do it?" hestammered. 

Asgill groaned. "Because--but there, you wouldn't understand--youwouldn't understand! Still, if you must be knowing, there's ways ofwinning would be worse than losing!"

The McMurrough's confidence began to return. "You're grown scrupulous, "he sneered, half in jest, half in earnest. 

Asgill's answer flung him down again. "You may thank your God I am!" hereplied, with a look that scorched the other. 

"Well--well, " McMurrough made an effort to mutter--he was thoroughlydisconcerted--"at any rate, I'm obliged to you for your warning. "

"You will be obliged to me, " Asgill replied, resuming his ordinarymanner, "if you take my warning, as to the big matter; and also as toyour kinsman, John Sullivan. For, I tell you, I'm afraid of him. "

"Of him?" James cried. 

"Ay, of him. Have a care, have a care, man, or he'll out-general you. See if he doesn't poison your sister against you! See if he does notmake this hearth too hot for you! As long as he's in the house there'sdanger. I know the sort, " Asgill continued shrewdly, "and little bylittle, you'll see, he'll get possession of her--and it's weak is yourposition as it is, my lad. "

"Pho!"

"'Tis not 'pho'! And in a week you'll know it, and be as glad to seehis back as I should be to-day!"

"What, a man who has not the spirit to go out with a gentleman!"

"A man you mean, " Asgill retorted, showing his greater shrewdness, "whohas the spirit to say that he won't go out!"

"Sure, and I've not much opinion of a man of that kind, " McMurroughexclaimed. 

"I have. He'll stand, or I'm mistaken, for more than'll spoil yoursport--and mine, " Asgill replied. "I'd not have played the trick aboutyour sister's mare, good trick as it was, if I'd known he'd be here. Itseemed the height of invention when you hit upon it, and no better wayof commending myself. But I misdoubt it now. Suppose this Colonelbrings her back?"

"But Payton's staunch. "

"Ah, I hold Payton, sure enough, " Asgill answered, "in the hollow of myhand, James McMurrough. But there's accident, and there's what not, andif in place of my restoring the mare to your sister, John Sullivanrestored her--faith, my lad, I'd be laughing on the other side of myface. And if he told what I'll be bound he knows of you, it would notsuit you either!"

"It would not, " The McMurrough replied, with an ugly look which thegloaming failed to mask. "It would not. But there's small chance ofthat. "

"Things happen, " Asgill answered in a sombre tone. "Faith, my lad, theman's a danger. D'you consider, " he continued, his voice low, "thathe's owner of all--in law; and if he said the word, devil a pennythere'd be for you! And no marriage for your sister but with his goodwill. And if Morristown stood as far east of Tralee as it standswest--glory be to God for it!--I'm thinking he'd say that word, andthere'd be no penny for you, and no marriage for her, but you'd both behat in hand to him!"

McMurrough's face showed a shade paler through the dusk. 

"What would you have me do?" he muttered. 

"Quit this fooling, this plan of a rising, and give him no handle. That, any way. "

"But that won't rid us of him?" McMurrough said, in a low voice. 

"True for you. And I'll be thinking about that same. If it is to bedone, it's best done soon--I'm with you there. He's no footing yet, andif he vanished 'twould be no more than if he'd never come. See thelight below? There! It's gone. Well, that way he'd go, and little moretalk, if 'twere well plotted. "

"But how?" The McMurrough asked nervously. 

"I will consider, " Asgill answered. 

CHAPTER VIII

AN AFTER-DINNER GAME

Easiness, the failing of the old-world Irishman, had been Uncle Ulick'sbane through life. It was easiness which had induced him to condone abaseness in his nephew which he would have been the first to condemn ina stranger. And again it was easiness which had beguiled him intostanding idle while the brother's influence was creeping likestrangling ivy over the girl's generous nature; while her bestinstincts were being withered by ridicule, her generosity abused bymeanness, and her sense of right blunted by such acts of lawlessness asthe seizure of the smuggling vessel. He feared, if he did not know, that things were going ill. He saw the blighting shadow of Asgill beginto darken the scene. He believed that The McMurrough, unable to raisemoney on the estate--since he had no title--was passing under Asgill'scontrol. And still he had not raised his voice. 

But, above all, it was easiness which had induced Uncle Ulick tocountenance in Flavia those romantic notions, now fast developing intofull-blown plans, which he, who had seen the world in his youth, shouldhave blasted; which he, who could recall the humiliation of Boyne Waterand the horrors of '90, he, who knew somewhat, if only a little, of thestrength of England and the weakness of Ireland, should have been thefirst to nip in the bud. 

He had not nipped them. Instead, he had allowed the reckless patriotismof the young O'Beirnes, the predatory instincts of O'Sullivan Og, thesimulated enthusiasm--for simulated he knew it to be--of the youngMcMurrough to guide the politics of the house and to bring it to theverge of a crisis. The younger generation and their kin, the Sullivans, the Mahoneys, the O'Beirnes, bred in this remote corner, leading a wildand almost barbarous life, deriving such sparks of culture as reachedthem from foreign sources and through channels wilder than their life, were no judges of their own weakness or of the power opposed to them. But he was. He knew, and had known, that it became him, as the Nestorof the party, to point out the folly of their plans. Instead, he hadbowed to the prevailing feeling. For--be it his excuse--he, too, wasIrish! He, too, felt his heart too large for his bosom when he dwelt onhis country's wrongs. On him, too, though he knew that successfulrebellion was out of the question, Flavia's generous indignation, heryouth, her enthusiasm, wrought powerfully. And at times, in moments ofirritation, he, too, saw red, and dreamed of a last struggle forfreedom. 

At this point, at a moment when the crisis, grown visible, could nolonger be masked, had arrived John Sullivan, a man of experience. Hisvery aspect sobered Uncle Ulick's mind. The latter saw that only ablacker and more hopeless night could follow the day of vengeance ofwhich he dreamt; and he sat this evening--while Asgill talked on thehill with The McMurrough--he sat this evening by the light of thepeat-fire, and was sore troubled. Was it, or was it not, too late? Heoccupied the great chair in which Sir Michael had so often conned hisScudery of winter evenings; but though he filled the chair, he knewthat he had neither the will nor the mastery of its old owner. If ithad not passed already, the thing might easily pass beyond his staying. Meanwhile, Flavia sat on a stool on the farther side of theblaze--until supper was on the board they used no other light--broodingbitterly over the loss of her mare; and he knew that that incidentwould not make things more easy. For here was tyranny brought to anevery-day level; oppression that pricked to the quick! The Saxons, whohad risen for a mere poundage against their anointed king, did notscruple to make slaves, ay, real slaves, of a sister and a more ancientpeople! But the cup was full and running over, and they should rue it!A short day and they would find opposed to them the wrath, the fury, the despair of a united people and an ancient faith. Something likethis Flavia had been saying to him. 

Then silence had fallen. And now he made answer. 

"I'm low at heart about it, none the less, " he said. "War, my girl, isa very dreadful thing. " He had in his mind the words Colonel John hadused to him on that subject. 

"And what is slavery?" she replied. There were red spots in her cheeks, and her eyes shone. 

"But if the yoke be made heavier, my jewel, and not lighter?"

"Then let us die!" she answered. "Let there be an end! For it is time. But let us die free! As it is, do we not blush to own that we areIrish? Is not our race the handmaid among nations? Then let us die!What have we to live for? Our souls they will not leave us, our bodiesthey enslave, they take our goods! What is left, Uncle Ulick?" shecontinued passionately. 

"Just to endure, " he said sadly, "till better times. Or what if we makethings worse? Believe me, Flavvy, the last rising----"

"Rising!" she cried. "Rising! Why do you call it that? It was norising! It was the English who rose, and we who remained faithful toour king. It was they who betrayed, and we who paid the penalty fortreason! Rising!"

"Call it what you like, my dear, " he answered patiently, "'tis notforgotten. "

"Nor forgiven!" she cried fiercely. 

"True! But the spirit is broken in us. If it were not, we should haverisen three years back, when the Scotch rose. There was a chance then. But for us by ourselves there is no chance and no hope. And in thislittle corner what do we know or hear? God forgive us, 'tis only whatcomes from France and Spain by the free-traders that we'll be hearing. "

"Uncle Ulick!" she answered, looking fixedly at him, "I know where youget that from! I know who has been talking to you, and who"--her voicetrembled with anger--"has upset the house! It's meet that one who hasleft the faith of his fathers, and turned his back on his country inher trouble--it is well that he should try to make others act as he hasacted, and be false as he has been false! Caring for nothing himself, cold, and heartless----"

He was about to interrupt her, but on the word the door opened and herbrother and Asgill entered, shaking the moisture from their coats. Ithad begun to rain as they returned along the edge of the lake. Shedashed the tears from her eyes and was silent. 

"Sure, and you've got a fine colour, my girl, " The McMurrough said. "Any news of the mare?" he continued, as he took the middle of thehearth and spread his skirts to the blaze, Asgill remaining in thebackground. Then, as she shook her head despondently--the presence ofAsgill had driven her into herself--"Bet you a hundred crowns to one, Asgill, " he said, with a grin, "cousin Sullivan don't recover her!"

"I couldn't afford to take it, " Asgill answered, smiling. "But if MissFlavia had chosen me for her ambassador in place of him that'sgone----"

"She might have had a better, and couldn't have had a worse!" Jamessaid, with a loud laugh. "It's supper-time, " he continued, after he hadturned to the fire, and kicked the turfs together, "and late, too!Where's Darby? There's never anything but waiting in this house. Isuppose you are not waiting for the mare? If you are, it's emptyinsides we'll all be having for a week of weeks. "

"I'm much afraid of that, " Uncle Ulick answered, as the girl rose. Uncle Ulick could never do anything but fall in with the prevailinghumour. 

Flavia paused half-way across the floor and listened. "What's that?"she asked, raising her hand for silence. "Didn't you hear something? Ithought I heard a horse. "

"You didn't hear a mare, " her brother retorted, grinning. "In themeantime, miss, I'd be having you know we're hungry. And----"

He stopped, startled by a knock on the door. The girl hesitated, thenshe stepped to it, and threw it wide. Confronting her across thethreshold, looking ghostly against the dark background of the night, agrey horse threw up its head and, dazzled by the light, started back apace--then blithered gently. In a twinkling, before the men had graspedthe truth, Flavia had sprung across the threshold, her arms were roundher favourite's neck, she was covering its soft muzzle with kisses. 

"The saints defend us!" Uncle Ulick cried. "It is the mare!"

In his surprise The McMurrough forgot himself, his rôle, the company. "D--n!" he said. Fortunately Uncle Ulick was engrossed in the scene atthe door, and the girl was outside. Neither heard. 

Asgill's mortification, as may be believed, was a hundred times deeper. But his quicker brain had taken in the thing and its consequences onthe instant. And he stood silent. 

"She's found her way back!" The McMurrough exclaimed, recoveringhimself. 

"Ay, lad, that must be it, " Uncle Ulick replied. "She's got loose andfound her way back to her stable, heaven be her bed! And them that tookher are worse by the loss of five pounds!"

"Broken necks to them!" The McMurrough cried viciously. 

But at that moment the door, which led to the back of the house and theoffices, opened, and Colonel John stepped in, a smile on his face. Helaid his damp cloak on a bench, hung up his hat and whip, and nodded toUlick. 

"The Lord save us! is it you've brought her back?" the big manexclaimed. 

The Colonel nodded. "I thought"--he looked towards the open door--"itwould please her to find the creature so!"

The McMurrough stood speechless with mortification. It was Asgill whostepped forward and spoke. "I give you joy, Colonel Sullivan, " he said. "It is small chance I thought you had. "

"I can believe you, " the Colonel answered quietly. If he did not knowmuch he suspected a good deal. 

Before more could be said Flavia McMurrough turned herself about andcame in and saw Colonel Sullivan. Her face flamed hotly, as the wordswhich she had just used about him recurred to her; she could almosthave wished the mare away again, if the obligation went with her. Toowe the mare to him! Yes, she would have preferred to lose the mare!

But the thing was done, and she found words at last; but cold words. "Iam very much obliged to you, " she said, "if it was really you whobrought her back. "

"It was I who brought her back, " he answered quietly, hurt by her wordsand manner, but hiding the hurt. "You need not thank me, however; I didit very willingly. "

She felt the meanness of her attitude, and "I do thank you!" she said, straining at warmth, but with poor success. "I am very grateful to you, Colonel Sullivan, for the service you have done me. "

"And wish another had done it!" he answered, with the faintest tinge ofreproach in his voice. It was a slip from his usual platform, but hecould not deny himself. 

"No! But that you would serve another as effectively, " she responded. 

He did not see her drift. And "What other?" he asked. 

"Your country, " she replied. And, turning to the door again, she wentout into the night, to see that the mare was safely disposed. 

The four men looked at one another, and Uncle Ulick shrugged hisshoulders, as much as to say, "We all know what women are!" Thenfeeling a storm in the air, he spoke for the sake of speaking. "Well, James, " he said, "she's got her mare, and you've lost your wager. It'sgood-bye to the brandy, anyway. And, faith, it'll be good news for thelittle French captain. For you, John Sullivan, I give you joy. You'llamend us all at this rate, and make Kerry as peaceable as the FourCourts out of term time! Sure, and I begin to think you're one of theLittle People!" As he spoke he slapped Colonel John on the shoulders. 

"About the brandy, " The McMurrough said curtly. "Things are by way ofbeing changed, I'd have you know. And I'm not going to forgo a goodship----"

"No, no, a bet's a bet, " Uncle Ulick interposed hurriedly. "Mr. Asgillwas here, and----"

"I'm with you, " Asgill said. "Colonel Sullivan's won the right to havehis way, and it's better so too, and safer. Faith and I'm glad, " hecontinued cordially, "for there might have been trouble, and nowthere'll be none!"

"Well, it's not I'll tell O'Sullivan Og, " James McMurrough retorted. "It's little he'll like to give up the stuff, and, in my opinion, " headded sullenly, "there's more than us will have a word to say to itbefore it's given up. But you can judge of that for yourselves. "

"Mr. Crosby, of Castlemaine----"

"Oh, d--n! It's little he'll count in a week from this!"

"Still, I've no doubt Colonel Sullivan will arrange it, " Asgillanswered smoothly. It was evident that he thought The McMurrough wassaying too much. "Sure he's managed a harder thing. "

There was a gleam in his eye and a something sinister in the tone as hesaid it; but the words were hearty, and Colonel John made no demur. AndDarby, entering at that moment with a pair of lights in tallcandlesticks--which were silver, but might have been copper--caused awelcome interruption. A couple of footboys, with slipshod feet and bareankles, bore in the meats after him and slapped them down on the table;at the same moment the O'Beirnes and two or three more of the "family"entered from the back. Their coming lightened the air. They had to hearthe news, and pass their opinion upon it. Questions were asked: Where'dthe Colonel light on the cratur, and how'd he persuaded the Protestantrogues--ah, be jabbers, begging his honour's pardon entirely!--how'd hepersuaded the rogues to give her up? Colonel John refused to say, butlaughingly. The O'Beirnes and the others were in a good humour, pleasedthat the young mistress had recovered her favourite, and inclined tolook more leniently on the Colonel. "Faith, and it's clear that you'rea Sullivan!" quoth one. "There's none like them to put the comether onman and beast!"

This was not much to the taste of The McMurrough or of Asgill, who, inwardly raging, saw the interloper founding a reputation on the rusewhich they had devised for another end. It was abruptly and with an illgrace that the master of the house cut short the scene and bade all sitdown if they wanted their meat. 

"What are we waiting for?" he continued querulously. "Where's the girl?Stop your jabbering, Martin! And Phelim----"

"Sure, I believe the mare's got from her, " Uncle Ulick cried. "I hearda horse, no farther back than this moment. "

"I'm wishing all horses in Purgatory, " The McMurrough replied angrily. "And fools too! Where's the wench gone? Anyway, I'm beginning. You canbide her time if you like!"

And begin he did. The others, after looking expectantly at thedoor--for none dared treat Flavia as her brother treated her--and afterAsgill had said something about waiting for her, fell to also, one byone. Presently the younger of the slipshod footboys let fall adish--fortunately the whole service was of pewter, so no harm wasdone--and was cursed for awkwardness. Where was Darby? He also hadvanished. 

The claret began to go round in the old Spanish silver jug--for nohouse in the west lacked Bordeaux in those days; it was called inLondon coffee-houses Irish wine. Still, neither Flavia nor the butlerreturned, and many were the glances cast at the door. By-and-by theColonel--who felt that a cloud hung over the board, as over his ownspirits--saw, or fancied that he saw, an odd thing. The door--thatwhich led to the back of the house--opened, as if the draught moved it;it remained open a space, then in a silent, ghostly fashion it fell-toagain. The Colonel laid down his knife, and Uncle Ulick, whose eyes hadfollowed his, crossed himself. "That's not lucky, " the big man said, his face troubled. "The saints send it's not the white horse of theO'Donoghues has whisked her off!"

"Don't be for saying such unchancy things, Mr. Sullivan!" Phelimanswered, with a shiver. And he, too, crossed himself. "What was it, atall, at all?"

"The door opened without a hand, " Uncle Ulick explained. "I'm fearingthere's something amiss. "

"Not with this salmon, " James McMurrough struck in contemptuously. "Eatyour supper and leave those tales to the women!"

Uncle Ulick made no reply, and a moment later Darby entered, slid roundthe table to Uncle Ulick's side, and touched his shoulder. Whether hewhispered a word or not Colonel John did not observe, but forthwith thebig man rose and went out. 

This time it was James McMurrough who laid down his knife. "What in thename of the Evil One is it?" he cried, in a temper. "Can't a man eathis meat in peace, but all the world must be tramping the floor?"

"Oh, whisht! whisht!" Darby muttered, in a peculiar tone. 

James leapt up. He was too angry to take a hint. "You old fool!" hecried, heedless of Asgill's hand, which was plucking at his skirts. "What is it? What do you mean with your 'whishts' and your nods?What----"

But the old butler had turned his back on his master, and gone out in apanic. Fortunately at this moment Flavia showed at the door. "Thefault's mine, James, " she said, in a clear, loud tone. And the Colonelsaw that her colour was high and her eyes were dancing. "I couldn'tbear to leave her at once, the darling! That was it; and besides, Itook a fear----"

"The pastern's right enough, " Uncle Ulick struck in, entering behindher and closing the door with the air of a big man who does not mean tobe trifled with. "Sound as your own light foot, my jewel, and sounderthan James's head! Be easy, be easy, lad, " he continued, with a trifleof sternness. "Sure, you're spoiling other men's meat, and forgettingthe Colonel's present, not to speak of Mr. Asgill, that, being aJustice, is not used to our Kerry tantrums!"

Possibly this last was a hint, cunningly veiled. At any rate, TheMcMurrough took his seat again with a better grace than usual, andAsgill made haste to take up the talk. The Colonel reflected; nor didhe find it the least odd thing that Flavia, who had been so full ofdistress at the loss of her mare, said little of the rescuer'sadventures, nor much of the mare herself. Yet the girl's eyes sparkled, and her whole aspect was changed in the last hour. She seemed, as faras he could judge, to be in a state of the utmost excitement; she hadshaken off the timidity which her brother's temper too often imposed onher, and with it her reticence and her shyness before strangers. Allthe Irish humour in her fluttered to the surface, and her tongue ranwith an incredible gaiety. Uncle Ulick, the O'Beirnes, the buckeens, laughed frank admiration--sometimes at remarks which the Colonel couldnot understand, sometimes at more obvious witticisms. Asgill was herslave. Darby, with the familiarity of the old servant, chuckled openlyand rubbed his hands at her sallies; the footboys guffawed in corners, and more than one dish rolled on the floor without drawing down arebuke. Even her brother regarded her with unwilling amusement, and didnot always refrain from applause. 

Could all this, could the change in her spring from the recovery of themare, of which she said scarce a word? Colonel John could hardlybelieve it; and, indeed, if such were the case, she was ungrateful. For, for the recoverer of her favourite she had no words, and scarce alook. Rather, it seemed to him that there must be two Flavias: the oneshy, modest, and, where her country was not assailed, of a reservebeyond reproach; the other Flavia, a shoot of the old tree, a hoyden, acastback to Sir Michael's wild youth and the gay days of theRestoration Court. 

He listened to her drollery, her ringing laugh, her arch sayings withsome blame, but more admiration. After all, what had he a right toexpect in this remote corner of the land, cut off by twenty leagues ofbog and mountain from modern refinement, culture, thought, in this oldtribal house, the last refuge of a proscribed faith and a hated race?Surely, no more than he found--nay, not a tithe of that he found. For, listening with a kindlier heart--even he, hurt by her neglect, hadjudged her for a while too harshly--he discerned that at her wildestand loudest, in the act of bandying cryptic jests with the buckeens, and uttering much that was thoughtless--Flavia did not suffer one lightor unmaidenly word to pass her lips. 

He gave her credit for that; and in the act he learned, with areflection on his stupidity, that there was method in her madness; ay, and meaning--but he had not hitherto held the key to it--in her jests. On a sudden--he saw now that this was the climax to which she had beenleading up--she sprang to her feet, carried away by her excitement. Erect, defiant--nay, triumphant--she flung her handkerchief into themiddle of the table, strewn as it was with a medley of glasses andflasks and disordered dishes. 

"Who loves me, follows me!" she cried, a queer exultation in hertone--"across the water!"

They pounced on the kerchief, like dogs let loose from the leash--everyman but the astonished Colonel. For an instant the place was apandemonium, a Babel. In a twinkling the kerchief was torn, amid criesof the wildest enthusiasm, into as many fragments as there were menround the table. 

"All!--all!" she cried, still standing erect, and hounding them on withthe magic of her voice, while her beautiful face blazed withexcitement. "All--but you?"--with which, for the briefest space, sheturned to Colonel John. Her eyes met his. They asked him a defiantquestion: they challenged the answer. 

"I do not understand, " he replied, taken by surprise. But indeed he didunderstand only too well. "Is it a game?"

The men were pinning the white shreds on their coats above theirhearts--even her brother, obedient for once. But at that word theyturned as one man to him, turned flushed, frowning faces and passionateeyes on him. But Flavia was before them; excitement had carried herfarther than she had meant to go, yet prudence had not quite left her. "Yes, a game!" she cried, laughing, a note too high. "Don't you knowthe Lady's Kerchief?"

"No, " he said soberly; he was even a little out of countenance. 

"Then no more of it, " Uncle Ulick cried, interposing, with a ring ofauthority in his voice. "For my part, I'm for bed. Bed! We're allchildren, bedad, and as fond of a frolic! And I'm thinking I'm theworst. The lights, Darby, the lights, and pleasant dreams to you! Afterall--

 The spoke that is to-day on top, To-morrow's on the ground. 

Sure, and I'll swear that's true!"

"And no treason!" The McMurrough answered him, with a grin. "Eh, Asgill?"

And so between them they removed Colonel John's last doubt--if he hadone. 

CHAPTER IX

EARLY RISERS

Colonel Sullivan had returned from Tralee in high spirits. He hadsucceeded beyond his hopes in the task he had set himself to perform, and he counted with confidence on gaining by that means a sound footingand a firm influence in the house. But as he sat in his room thatevening, staring at the rushlight, with the night silent about him, hefeared, nay, he almost knew, that his success came too late. Somethinghad happened behind his back, some crisis, some event; and that whichhe had done was as if it were undone, and that which he had gainedavailed nothing. 

It was plain--whatever was obscure--that the play of the Lady'sKerchief was a cover for matter more serious. Those who had taken partin it had scarcely deigned to pretend. Colonel John had been dullerthan the dullest if he had not seen in the white shreds for which themen had scrambled, and which they had affixed with passion to theircoats, the white Cockade of the Pretender; or found in Uncle Ulick'scouplet--uttered while in a careless fashion he affected disguise, The spoke that is to-day on top, To-morrow's on the ground, one of those catchwords which suited the taste of the day, and servedat once for a passport and a sentiment. 

But Colonel John knew that many a word was said over the claret whichmeant less than nothing next morning; and that many a fair hand passedthe wine across the water-bowl--the very movement did honour to ashapely arm--without its owner having the least intention ofendangering those she loved for the sake of the King across the Water. He knew that a fallen cause has ever two sets of devotees--those whotalk and those who act: the many, in other words, who sing the songsand drink the toasts, and delight in the badges of treason--in thesucked orange, the sprig of oak, the knot of white ribbon, thefir-planting; and the few who mean more than they say, who mean, andsternly, to be presently the Spoke on Top. 

Consequently he knew that he might be wrong in dotting the i's andcrossing the t's of the scene which he had witnessed. Such a scenemight mean no more than a burst of high spirits: in nine cases out often it would not be followed by action, nor import more than thatsinging of "'Twas a' for our rightful King!" which had startled him onhis arrival. In that house, in the wilds of Kerry, sheer loyalty couldnot be expected. The wrongs of the nation were too recent, the highseas were too near, the wild geese came and went too freely--wild geeseof another feather than his. Such outbursts as he had witnessed were nomore than the safety-valves of outraged pride. The ease with whichEngland had put down the Scotch rising a few years before--to saynothing of the fate of those who had taken part in it--must deter allreasonable men, whatever their race or creed, from entering on anundertaking beyond doubt more hopeless. 

For Ireland was not as Scotland. Scarcely a generation had passed sinceshe had felt the full weight of the conqueror's hand; and if shepossessed, in place of the Highland mountains, vast stretches ofuncharted bog and lake, to say nothing of a thousand obscure inlets, she had neither the unbroken clan-feeling nor the unbroken nationalspirit of the sister country. Scotland was still homogeneous, she stillcounted for a kingdom, her soil was still owned by her own lords andworked by her own peasants. She had suffered no massacre of Drogheda orof Wexford; no Boyne, no Aghrim, no vast and repeated confiscations. Whereas Ireland, a partitioned and subject land, which had sufferedduring the last two centuries horrors unspeakable, still cowered like awhipped dog before its master, and was as little likely to rebel. 

Colonel John leant upon such arguments; and, disappointed and alarmedas he was by Flavia's behaviour, he told himself that nothing wasseriously meant, and that with the morning light things would look morecheerful. 

But when he awoke, after a feverish and disturbed sleep, the faintgrisly dawn that entered the room was not of a character to inspirit. He turned on his side to sleep again if he could; but in the act, hediscovered that the curtain which he had drawn across the window waswithdrawn. He could discern the dark mass of his clothes piled on achair, of his hat clinging like some black bat to the whitewashed wall, of his valise and saddle-bags in the corner--finally of a stout figurebent, listening, at the door. 

An old campaigner, Colonel John was not easily surprised. Repressingthe exclamation on his lips, he rose to his elbow and waited until thefigure at the door straightened itself, and, turning towards him, became recognisable as Uncle Ulick. The big man crossed the floor, sawthat he was awake, and, finger on lip, enjoined silence. Then hepointed to the clothes on the chair, and brought his mouth near theColonel's ear. 

"The back-door!" he whispered. "Under the yews in the garden! Come!"And leaving the Colonel staring and mystified, he crept from the roomwith a stealth and lightness remarkable in one so big. The door closed, the latch fell, and made no sound. 

Colonel John reflected that Uncle Ulick was no romantic young person toplay at mystery for effect. There was a call for secrecy therefore. TheO'Beirnes slept in a room divided from his only by a thin partition;and to gain the stairs he must pass the doors of other chambers, allinhabited. As softly as he could, and as quickly, he dressed himself. He took his boots in his hand; his sword, perhaps from old habit, underhis other arm; in this guise he crept from the room and down the duskystaircase. Old Darby and an underling were snoring in the cub, which inthe daytime passed for a pantry, and both by day and night gave forth asmell of sour corks and mice: but Colonel John slid by the open door asnoiselessly as a shadow, found the back-door--which led to thefold-yard--on the latch, and stepped out into the cool, dark morning, into the sobering freshness and the clean, rain-washed air. 

The grass was still grey-hued, the world still colourless andmysterious, the house a long black bulk against a slowly lighteningsky. Only the earliest sparrows were twittering; in the trees only themost wakeful rooks were uttering tentative caws. The outburst of joyand life and music which would attend the sun's rising was not yet. 

Colonel John paused on the doorstep to draw on his boots, then hepicked his way delicately to the leather-hung wicket that broke thehedge which served for a fence to the garden. On the right of thewicket a row of tall Florence yews, set within the hedge, screened thepleasaunce, such as it was, from the house. Under the lee of these hefound Uncle Ulick striding to and fro and biting his finger-nails inhis impatience. 

He wrung the Colonel's hand and looked into his face. "You'll do me thejustice, John Sullivan, " he said, with a touch of passion, "that neverin my life have I been overhasty? Eh? Will you do me that?"

"Certainly, Ulick, " Colonel John answered, wondering much what wascoming. 

"And that I'm no coward, where it's not a question of trouble?"

"I'll do you that justice, too, " the Colonel answered. He smiled at thereservation. 

The big man did not smile. "Then you'll take my word for it, " hereplied, "that I'm not speaking idly when I say you must go. "

Colonel John lifted his eyebrows. "Go?" he answered. "Do you mean now?"

"Ay, now, or before noon!" Uncle Ulick retorted. "More by token, " hecontinued with bitterness, "it's not that you might go on the instantthat I've brought you out of our own house as if we were a couple ofrapparees or horse-thieves, but that you might hear it from me who wishyou well, and would warn you not to say nay--instead of from those whomay be 'll not put it so kindly, nor be so wishful for you to be takingthe warning they give. "

"Is it Flavia you're meaning?"

"No; and don't you be thinking it, " Uncle Ulick replied with a touch ofheat. "Nor the least bit of it, John Sullivan! The girl, God bless her, is as honest as the day, if----"

"If she's not very wise!" Colonel John said, smiling. 

"You may put it that way if you please. For the matter of that, you'llbe thinking she's not the only fool at Morristown, nor the oldest, northe biggest. And you'll be right, more shame to me that I didn't usethe prudent tongue to them always, and they young! But the blood mustrun slow, and the breast be cold, that sees the way the Saxons aremocking us, and locks the tongue in silence. And sure, there's no moreto be said, but just this--that there's those here you'll be wise notto see! And you'll get a hint to that end before the sun's high. "

"And you'd have me take it?"

"You'd be mad not to take it!" Uncle Ulick replied, frowning. "Isn't itfor that I'm out of my warm bed, and the mist not off the lake?"

"You'd have me give way to them and go?"

"Faith, and I would!"

"Would you do that same yourself, Ulick?"

"For certain. "

"And be sorry for it afterwards!"

"Not the least taste in life!" Uncle Ulick asseverated. 

"And be sorry for it afterwards, " Colonel John repeated quietly. "Kinsman, come here, " he continued with unusual gravity. And takingUncle Ulick by the arm he led him to the end of the garden, where thewalk looked on the lake and bore some likeness to a roughly madeterrace. Pausing where the black masses of the Florence yews, mostfunereal of trees, still sheltered their forms from the house, he stoodsilent. The mist moved slowly on the surface of the water and crawledabout their feet. But the sky to eastward was growing red, the lowerclouds were flushed with rose-colour, the higher hills were warm withthe coming of the sun. Here and there on the slopes which faced them acotter's hovel stood solitary in its potato patch or its plot of oats. In more than one place three or four cottages made up a tiny hamlet, from which the smoke would presently rise. To English eyes, to oureyes, the scene, these oases in the limitless brown of the bog, hadbeen wild and rude; but to Colonel John, long familiar with thetreeless plains of Poland and the frozen flats of Lithuania, it spokeof home, it spoke of peace and safety and comfort, and even of a narrowplenty. The soft Irish air lapped it, the distances were mellow, memories of boyhood rounded off all that was unsightly or cold. 

He pointed here and there with his hand; and with seeming irrelevance. "You'd be sorry afterwards, " he said, "for you'd think of this, Ulick. God forbid that I should say there are no things for which even thisshould be sacrificed. God forbid I should deny that even for this toohigh a price may be paid. But if you play this away in wantonness--ifthat which you are all planning come about, and you fail, as theyfailed in Scotland three years back, and as you will, as you must failhere--it is of this, it is of the women and the children under theseroofs that will go up in smoke, that you'll be thinking, Ulick, at thelast! Believe me or not, this is the last thing you'll see! It's to aburden as well as an honour you're born where men doff caps to you; andit's that burden will lie the black weight on your soul at the last. There's old Darby and O'Sullivan Og's wife--and Pat Mahony and JudyMahony's four sons--and Mick Sullivan and Tim and Luke the Lamiter--andthe three Sullivans at the landing, and Phil the crowder, and the seventenants at Killabogue--it's of them, it's of them"--as he spoke hisfinger moved from hovel to hovel--"and their like I'm thinking. You crythem and they follow, for they're your folks born. But what do theyknow of England or England's strength, or what is against them, or thecertain end? They think, poor souls, because they land their spiritsand pay no dues, and the Justices look the other way, and a bailiffslife here, if he'd a writ, would be no more worth than a woodcock's, and the laws, bad and good, go for naught--they think the blackProtestants are afraid of them! While you and I, you and I know, Ulick, " he continued, dropping his voice, "'tis because we lie so poorand distant and small, they give no heed to us! We know! And that's ourburden. "

The big man's face worked. He threw out his arms. "God help us!" hecried. 

"He will, in His day! I tell you again, as I told you the hour I came, I, who have followed the wars for twenty years, there is no deed thathas not its reward when the time is ripe, nor a cold hearth that is notpaid for a hundredfold!"

Uncle Ulick looked sombrely over the lake. "I shall never see it, " hesaid. "Never, never! And that's hard. Notwithstanding, I'll do what Ican to quiet them--if it be not too late. "

"Too late?"

"Ay, too late, John. But anyway, I'll be minding what you say. On theother hand, you must go, and this very day that ever is. "

"There are some here that I must not be seeing?" Colonel John saidshrewdly. 

"That's it. "

"And if I do not go, Ulick? What then, man?"

"Whisht! Whisht!" the big man cried in unmistakable distress. "Don'tsay the word! Don't say the word, John, dear. "

"But I must say it, " Colonel John answered, smiling. "To be plain, Ulick, here I am and here I stay. They wish me gone because I am in theway of their plans. Well, and can you give me a better reason forstaying?"

What argument Ulick would have used, what he was opening his mouth tosay, remains unknown. Before he could reply the murmur of a voice nearat hand startled them both. Uncle Ulick's face fell, and the two turnedwith a single movement to see who came. 

They discerned, in the shadow of the wall of yew, two men, who had justpassed through the wicket into the garden. 

The strangers saw them at the same moment, and were equally taken bysurprise. The foremost of the two, a sturdy, weather-beaten man, with asquare, stern face and a look of power, laid his hand on hiscutlass--he wore a broad blade in place of the usual rapier. The other, whom every line of his shaven face, as well as his dress, proclaimed apriest--and perhaps more than a priest--crossed himself, and mutteredsomething to his companion. Then he came forward. 

"You take the air early, gentlemen, " he said, the French accent veryplain in his speech, "as we do. If I mistake not, " he continued, looking with an easy smile at Colonel John, "your Protestant kinsman, of whom you told me, Mr. Sullivan? I did not look to meet you, ColonelSullivan; but I do not doubt you are man of the world enough to excuse, if you cannot approve, the presence of the shepherd among his sheep. The law forbids, but----" still smiling, he finished the sentence witha gesture in the air. 

"I approve all men, " Colonel John answered quietly, "who are in theirduty, father. "

"But wool and wine that pay no duty?" the priest replied, turning witha humorous look to his companion, who stood beside him unsmiling. "I'mnot sure that Colonel Sullivan extends the same indulgence tofree-traders, Captain Machin. "

Colonel John looked closely at the man thus brought to his notice. Thenhe raised his hat courteously. "Sir, " he said, "the guests of theSullivans, whoever they be, are sacred to the Sullivans. "

Uncle Ulick's eyes had met the priest's, as eyes meet in a moment ofsuspense. At this he drew a deep breath of relief. "Well said, " hemuttered. "Bedad, it is something to have seen the world!"

"You have served under the King of Sweden, I believe?" the ecclesiasticcontinued, addressing Colonel John with a polite air. He held a book ofoffices in his hand, as if his purpose in the garden had been merely toread the service. 

"Yes. "

"A great school of war, I am told?"

"It may be called so. But I interrupt you, father, and with yourpermission I will bid you good-morning. Doubtless we shall meet again. "

"At breakfast, I trust, " the ecclesiastic answered, with a certain airof intention. Then he bowed and they returned it, and the two pairsgave place to one another with ceremony, Colonel John and Ulick passingout through the garden wicket, while the strangers moved on towards thewalk which looked over the lake. Here they began to pace up and down. 

With his hand on the house door Uncle Ulick made a last attempt. "ForGod's sake, be easy and go, " he muttered, his voice unsteady, his eyesfixed on the other's, as if he would read his mind. "Leave us to ourfate! You cannot save us--you see what you see, you know what it means. And for what I know, you know the man. You'll but make our end theblacker. "

"And the girl?"

Uncle Ulick tossed his hands in the air. "God help her!" he said. 

"Shall not we too help her?"

"We cannot. "

"It may be. Still, let us do our duty, " Colonel John replied. He wasvery grave. Things were worse, the plot was thicker, than he hadfeared. 

Uncle Ulick groaned. "You'll not be bidden?" he said. 

"Not by an angel, " Colonel John answered steadfastly. "And I've seennone this morning, but only a good man whose one fault in life is toanswer to all men 'Sure, and I will!'"

Uncle Ulick started as if the words stung him. "You make a jest of it!"he said. "Heaven send we do not sorrow for your wilfulness. For mypart, I've small hope of that same. " He opened the door, and, turninghis back upon his companion, went heavily, and without any attempt atconcealment, past the pantry and up the stairs to his room. ColonelJohn heard him slip the bolt, and, bearing a heavy heart himself, heknew that the big man was gone to his prayers. 

To answer "Yes" to all comers and all demands is doubtless, in thelanguage of Uncle Ulick, a mighty convenience, and a great softener ofthe angles of life. But a time comes to the most easy when he mustanswer "No, " or go open-eyed to ruin. Then he finds that from longdisuse the word will not shape itself; or if uttered, it is taken fornaught. That time had come for Uncle Ulick. Years ago his age andexperience had sufficed to curb the hot blood about him. But he hadbeen too easy to dictate while he might; he had let the reins fall fromhis hands; and to-day he must go the young folks' way--ay, go, seeingall too plainly the end of it. 

It was not his fate only. Many good men in the '15 and the '45, ay, andin the war of La Vendée, went out against their better judgment, bornealong by the energy of more vehement spirits--went out, aware, as theyrode down the avenue, and looked back at the old house, that they wouldsee it no more; that never again except in dreams would they mount fromthe horse-block which their grandsires' feet had hollowed, walk throughthe coverts which their fathers had planted, or see the faces of theaged serving-men who had taught their childish fingers to hold thereins and level the fowling-piece!

But Colonel John was of another kind and another mind. Often in theSwedish wars had he seen a fair country-side changed in one day into awaste, from the recesses of which naked creatures with wolfish eyesstole out at night, maddened by their wrongs, to wreak a horridvengeance on the passing soldier. He knew that the fairest parts ofIreland had undergone such a fate within living memory; and how oftenbefore, God and her dark annals alone could tell! Therefore he wasfirmly minded, as firmly minded as one man could be, that not againshould the corner of Kerry under his eyes, the corner he loved, thecorner entrusted to him, suffer that fate. 

Yet when he descended to breakfast, his face told no tale of histhoughts, and he greeted with a smile the unusual brightness of themorning. As he stood at the door, that looked on the courtyard, he hada laughing word for the beggars--never were beggars lacking at the doorof Morristown. Nor as he sunned himself and inhaled with enjoyment thefreshness of the air did any sign escape him that he marked a change. 

But he was not blind. Among the cripples and vagrants who lounged aboutthe entrance he detected six or eight ragged fellows whose sunburntfaces were new to him and who certainly were not cripples. In thedoorway of one of the two towers that fronted him across the courtstood O'Sullivan Og, whittling a stick and chatting with a sturdy idlerin seafaring clothes. The Colonel could not give his reason, but he hadnot looked twice at these two before he got a notion that there wasmore in that tower this morning than the old ploughs and the brokenboat which commonly filled the ground floor, or the grain which wasstored above. Powder? Treasure? He could not say which or what; but hefelt that the open door was a mask that deceived no one. 

And there was a stir, there was a bustle in the court; a sparkle in theeyes of some as they glanced slyly and under their lashes at the house, a lilt in the tread of others as they stepped to and fro. He divinedthat hands would fly to caubeens and knees seek the ground if a certainface showed at a window: moreover, that that at which he merely guessedwas no secret to the barefooted colleens who fed the pigs, or thebarelegged urchins who carried the potatoes. Some strange change hadfallen upon Morristown, and imbued it with life and hope and movement. 

He was weighing this when he caught the sound of voices in the house, and he turned about and entered. The priest and Captain Machin haddescended and were standing with Uncle Ulick warming themselves beforethe wood fire. The McMurrough, the O'Beirnes, and two or threestrangers--grim-looking men who had followed, a glance told him, thetrade he had followed--formed a group a little apart, yet near enoughto be addressed. Asgill was not present, nor Flavia. 

"Good-morning, again, " Colonel John said. And he bowed. 

"With all my heart, Colonel Sullivan, " the priest answered cordially. And Colonel John saw that he had guessed aright: the speaker no longertook the trouble to hide his episcopal cross and chain, or the ring onhis finger. There was an increase of dignity, too, in his manner. Hisvery cordiality seemed a condescension. 

Captain Machin bowed silently, while The McMurrough and the O'Beirneslooked darkly at the Colonel. They did not understand: it was plainthat they were not in the secret of the morning encounter. 

"I see O'Sullivan Og is here, " the Colonel said, addressing UncleUlick. "That will be very convenient. "

"Convenient?" Uncle Ulick repeated, looking blank. 

"We can give him the orders as to the Frenchman's cargo, " the Colonelsaid calmly. 

Uncle Ulick winced. "Ay, to be sure! To be sure, lad, " he answered. Buthe rubbed his head, like a man in a difficulty. 

The Bishop seemed to be going to ask a question. Before he could speak, however, Flavia came tripping down the stairs, a gay song on her lips. Half way down, the song, light and sweet as a bird's, came to a suddenend. 

"I am afraid I am late!" she said. And then--as the Colonelsupposed--she saw that more than the family party were assembled: thatthe Bishop and Captain Machin were there also, and the strangers--and, above all, that he was there. She descended the last three stairssilently, but with a heightened colour, moved proudly into the middleof the group, and curtsied before the ecclesiastic till her kneetouched the floor. 

He gave her his hand to kiss, with a smile and a murmured blessing. Sherose with sparkling eyes. 

"It is a good morning!" she said, as one who having done her duty couldbe cheerful. 

"It is a very fine morning, " the Bishop answered in the same spirit. "The sun shines on us, as we would have him shine. And after breakfast, with your leave, my daughter, and your brother's leave, we will hold alittle council. What say you, Colonel Sullivan?" he continued, turningto the Colonel. "A family council? Will you join us?"

The McMurrough uttered an exclamation, so unexpected and strident, thatthe words were not articulate. But the Bishop understood them, for, asall turned to him, "Nay, " he said, "it shall be for the Colonel to say. But it's ill arguing with a fasting man, " he continued genially, "andby your leave we will return to the matter after breakfast!"

"I am not for argument at all, " Captain Machin said. It was the firsttime he had spoken. 

CHAPTER X

A COUNCIL OF WAR

The meal had been eaten, stolidly by some, by others with a poorappetite, by Colonel John with a thoughtful face. Two men of family, but broken fortunes, old Sir Donny McCarthy of Dingle, and TimothyBurke of Maamtrasna, had joined the party--under the rose as it were, and neither giving nor receiving a welcome. Now old Darby kept the doorand the Bishop the hearth; whence, standing with his back to theglowing peat, he could address his audience with eye and voice. Theothers, risen from the table, had placed themselves here and there, Flavia near the Bishop and on his right hand, Captain Machin on hisleft; The McMurrough, the two O'Beirnes, Sir Donny and Timothy Burke, with the other strangers, sat in a knot by the window. Uncle Ulick withColonel Sullivan formed a third group. The courtyard, visible throughthe windows, seethed with an ever-increasing crew of peasantry, frieze-coated or half bare, who whooped and jabbered, now about one oftheir number, now about another. Among them moved some ten or twelvemen of another kidney--seamen with ear-rings and pigtails, bronzedfaces and gaudy kerchiefs, who listened but idly, and with the contemptof the mercenary, but whose eyes seldom left the window behind whichthe conference sat, and whose hands were never far from the hilt of acutlass or the butt of a pistol. The sun shone on the crowd and thecourt, and now and then those within the house caught through thegateway the shimmer of the lake beyond. The Irish air was soft, the humof voices cheerful; nor could anything less like a secret council, lesslike a meeting of men about to commit themselves to a dark anddangerous enterprise, be well imagined. 

But no one was deceived. The courage, the enthusiasm, that danced inFlavia's eyes were reflected more darkly and more furtively in a scoreof faces, within the room and without. To enjoy one hour of triumph, towreak upon the cursed English a tithe of the wrongs, a tithe of theinsults, that their country had suffered, to be the spoke on top, wereit but for a day, to die for Ireland if they could not live for her, toavenge her daughters outraged and her sons beggared--could man ownIrish blood, and an Irish name, and not rise at the call?

If there were such a man, oh! cowardly, mean, and miserable he seemedto Flavia McMurrough. And much she marvelled at the patience, theconsideration, the arguments which the silver-tongued ecclesiasticbrought to bear upon him. She longed, with a face glowing withindignation, to disown him--in word and deed. She longed to denouncehim, to defy him, to bid him begone, and do his worst. 

But she was a young plotter, and he who spoke from the middle of thehearth with so much patience and forbearance, was an old one, proved byyears of peril, and tempered by a score of failures; a man longaccustomed to play with the lives and fortunes of men. He knew betterthan she what was at stake to win or lose; nor was it withoutforethought that he had determined to risk much to gain ColonelSullivan. The same far-sight and decision which had led him to take abold course on meeting the Colonel in the garden, now lent him patienceto win, if win he might, one whose value in the enterprise on whichthey were embarking he set at the highest. To his mind, and to Machin'smind, the other men in the room, ay, and the woman, so fair andenthusiastic, were but tools to be used, puppets to be danced. But thisman--for among soldiers of fortune there is a camaraderie, so that theyare known to one another by repute from the Baltic to Cadiz--was acoadjutor to be gained. He was one whose experience, joined with anIrish name, might well avail them much. 

Colonel John might refuse, he might be obdurate. But in that event theBishop's mind was made up. Flavia supposed that if the Colonel heldout, he would be dismissed; that he would go out from among them acowardly, mean, miserable creature--and so an end. But the speaker madeno mistake. He had chosen to grip the nettle danger, and he knew thatgentle measures were no longer possible. He must enlist ColonelSullivan, or--but it has been said that he was one hardened by longcustom, and no novice in dealing with the lives of men. 

"If it be a question only of the chances, " he said, after some beatingabout the bush, "if I am right in supposing that it is only that whichwithholds Colonel Sullivan from joining us----"

"I do not say it is, " Colonel John replied very gravely. "Far from it, sir. But to deal with it on that basis: while I can admire, reverendsir, the man who is ready to set his life on a desperate hazard to gainsomething which he sets above that life, I take the case to bedifferent where it is a question of the lives of others. Then I say thechances must be weighed--carefully weighed, and tried in the balance. "

"However sacred the cause and high the aim?"

"I think so. "

The Bishop sighed, his chin sinking on his breast. "I am sorry, " hesaid, in a voice that sufficiently declared his depression--"I amsorry. "

"That we cannot see alike in a matter so grave? Yes, sir, so am I. "

"No. That I met you this morning. "

"I am not sorry, " Colonel John replied, stoutly refusing to see theother's meaning. "For--hear me out, I beg. You and I have seen theworld and can weigh the chances. Your friend, too, Captain Machin"--hepronounced the name in an odd tone--"he too knows on what he isembarked and how he will stand if the result be failure. It may be thathe already has his home, his rank, and his fortune in foreign parts, and will be little the worse if the worst befall. "

"I?" Machin cried, stung out of his taciturnity. And he rose with anair of menace from his seat. "Let me tell you, sir, that I fling backthe insinuation!"

But the Colonel refused to listen. He proceeded as if the other werenot speaking. "You, reverend sir, yourself, " he continued, "you tooknow, and well, on what you are embarking, its prospects and the issuefor you, if it fail. But, you--I give you credit for it--are by yourprofession and choice devoted to a life of danger. You are willing, dayby day and hour by hour, to run the risk of death. But these, my cousinthere"--looking with a kind eye at Flavia--"she----"

"Leave me out!" she cried passionately. And she rose to her feet, herface on fire. "I separate myself from you! I, for my part, ask nobetter than to suffer for my country!"

"She thinks she knows, but she does not know, " the Colonel continuedquietly, unmoved by her words. "She cannot guess what it is to be castadrift--alone, a woman, penniless, in a strange land. And yet that atthe best--and the worst may be unspeakably worse--must be her fate ifthis plot miscarry! For others, The McMurrough and his friendsyonder"--he indicated the group by the window--"they also areignorant. "

The McMurrough sprang to his feet, spluttering with rage. "D--n you, sir, speak for yourself!" he cried. 

"They know nothing, " the Colonel continued, quite unmoved, "of thatforce against which they are asked to pit themselves, of that stolidpower over sea, never more powerful than now! And so to pit themselves, that losing they will lose their all!"

"The saints will be between us and harm!" the eldest of the O'Beirnescried, rising in his wrath. "It's speak for yourself I say too!"

"And I!"

"And I!" others of the group roared with gestures of defiance. "We arenot the boys to be whistled aside! To the devil with your ignorance!"

And one, stepping forward, snapped his fingers close to the Colonel'sface. "That for you!--that for you!" he cried. "Now, or whenever youwill, day or night, and sword or pistol! To the devil with yourimpudence, sir; I'd have you know you're not the only man has seen theworld! The shame of the world on you, talking like a schoolmaster whileyour country cries for you, and 'tis not your tongue but your handshe's wanting!"

Uncle Ulick put his big form between Colonel John and his assailant. "Sure and be easy!" he said. "Sir Donny, you're forgetting yourself!And you, Tim Burke! Be easy, I say. It's only for himself the Colonel'sspeaking!"

"Thank God for that!" Flavia cried in a voice which rang high. 

They were round him now a ring of men with dark, angry faces, andhardly restrained hands. Their voices cried tumultuously on him, indefiance of Ulick's intervention. But the Bishop intervened. 

"One moment, " he said, still speaking smoothly and with a smile. "Perhaps it is for those he thinks he speaks!" And the Bishop pointedto the crowd which filled the forecourt, and of which one member oranother was perpetually pressing his face against the panes to learnwhat his sacredness, God bless him! would be wishing. "Perhaps it isfor those he thinks he speaks!" he repeated in irony--for of thefeeling of the crowd there could be no doubt. 

"You say well, " Colonel John replied, rising to his feet and speakingwith gloomy firmness. "It is on their behalf I appeal to you. For it isthey who foresee the least, and they who will suffer the most. It isthey who will follow like sheep, and they who like sheep will go to thebutcher! Ay, it is they, " he continued with deeper feeling, and heturned to Flavia, "who are yours, and they will pay for you. Therefore, " raising his hand for silence, "before you name the prize, sum up the cost! Your country, your faith, your race--these are greatthings, but they are far off and can do without you. But these--theseare that fragment of your country, that tenet of your faith, thathandful of your race which God has laid in the palm of your hand, tocherish or to crush, and----"

"The devil!" Machin ejaculated with sudden violence. Perhaps he read inthe girl's face some shadow of hesitation, of thought, of perplexity. "Have done with your preaching, sir, I say! Have done, man! Try us nottoo far! If we fail----"

"You must fail!" Colonel John retorted--with that narrowing of thenostrils that in the pinch of fight men long dead had seen for a momentin distant lands, and seen no more. "You will fail! And failing, sir, his reverence will stand no worse than now, for his life is forfeitalready! While you----"

"What of me? Well, what of me?" the stout man cried truculently. Hisbrows descended over his eyes, and his lips twitched. 

"For you, Admiral Cammock----"

The other stepped forward a pace. "You know me?"

"Yes, I know you. "

There was silence for an instant, while those who were in the secreteyed Colonel Sullivan askance, and those who were not gaped at Cammock. 

Soldiers of fortune, of fame and name, were plentiful in those days, but seamen of equal note were few. And with this man's name the worldhad lately rung. An Irishman, he had risen high in Queen Anne'sservice; but at her death, incited by his devotion to the Stuarts, hehad made a move for them at a critical moment. He had been broken, being already a notable man; on which, turning his back on anungrateful country, as he counted it, he had entered the Spanishmarine, which the great minister Alberoni was at that moment reforming. He had been advanced to a position of rank and power--Spain boasted nostouter seaman; and in the attempt on which Alberoni was bent, to upsetthe Protestant succession in England, Admiral Cammock was a factor ofweight. He was a bold, resolute man, restrained by no fine scruples, prepared to take risks himself, and not too prone to think for others. In Ireland his life was forfeit, Great Britain counted him renegade andtraitor. So that to find himself recognised, though grateful to hisvanity, was a shock to his discretion. 

"Well, and knowing me?" he replied at last, with the tail of his eyeson the Bishop, as if he would gladly gain a hint from his subtlety. "What of me?"

"You have your home, your rank, your relations abroad, " ColonelSullivan answered firmly. "And if a descent on the coast be a part ofyour scheme, then you do not share the peril equally with us. You arehere to-day and elsewhere to-morrow. We shall suffer, while you sailaway. "

"I fling that in your teeth!" Cammock cried. "I know you too, sir, and----"

"Know no worse of me than of yourself!" Colonel Sullivan retorted. "Butif you do indeed know me, you know that I am not one to stand by andsee my friends led blindfold to certain ruin. It may suit your plans tomake a diversion here. But that diversion is a part of larger schemes, and the fate of those who make it is little to you. "

Cammock's hand flew to his belt, he took a step forward, his facesuffused with passion. 

"For half as much I have cut a man down!" he cried. 

"May be, but----"

"Peace, peace, my friends, " the Bishop interposed. He laid a warninghand on Cammock's arm. "This gentleman, " he continued smoothly, "thinkshe speaks for our friends outside. "

"Let me speak, not for them, but to them, " Colonel Sullivan repliedimpulsively. "Let me tell them what I think of this scheme, of itschances, of its certain end! I will tell them no more than I have toldyou, and no more than I think justified. "

He moved, whether he thought they would let him or not, towards thewindow. But he had not taken three steps before he found his progressbarred. "What is this?" he exclaimed. 

"Needs must with so impulsive a gentleman, " the Bishop said. He had notmoved, but at a signal from him The McMurrough, the O'Beirnes and twoof the other young men had thrust themselves forward. "You must give upyour sword, Colonel Sullivan, " he continued. 

The Colonel retreated a pace, and evinced more surprise than he felt. "Give up--do you mean that I am a prisoner?" he cried. He had notdrawn, but two or three of the young men had done so, and Flavia, inthe background by the fire, was white as paper--so suddenly had theshadow of violence fallen on the room. Uncle Ulick could be heardprotesting, but no one heeded him. 

"You must surrender!" the Bishop repeated firmly. He too was a triflepale, but he was used to such scenes and he spoke with decision. 

"Resistance is vain. I hope that with this lady in the room----"

"One moment!" the Colonel cried, raising his hand. But as TheMcMurrough and the others hesitated, he whipped out his sword andstepped two paces to one side with an agility no one had foreseen. Henow had the table behind him and Uncle Ulick on his left hand. "Onemoment!" he repeated, raising his hand in deprecation and keeping hispoint lowered. "Do you consider----"

"We consider our own safety, " Cammock answered grimly. And signing toone of the men to join Darby at the door, he drew his cutlass. "Youknow too much to go free, sir, that is certain. "

"Ay, faith, you do, " The McMurrough chimed in with a sort of glee. "Hewas at Tralee yesterday, no less. And for a little we'll have thegarrison here before the time!"

"But by the powers, " Uncle Ulick cried, "ye shall not hurt him! Yourreverence!"--the big man's voice shook--"your reverence, this shall notbe! It's not in this house they shall murder him, and him a Sullivan!Flavia, speak, girl, " he continued, the perspiration standing on hisbrow. "Say ye'll not have it. After all, it's your house! By G--d, itis your house. And, by the Holy Cross, there shall be no Sullivan bloodspilt in it while I am standing by to prevent it!"

"Then let him give up his sword!" Cammock answered doggedly. 

"Yes, let him give up his sword, " Flavia said in a small voice. 

"Colonel Sullivan, " the Bishop interposed, stepping forward, "I hopeyou'll hear reason. Resistance is vain. You know as well as I do thatat a word from us our friends outside would deal with you, and roughly. Give up your sword and----"

"And _presto_!" Cammock cried, "or take the consequences!" He hadedged his way, while the Bishop spoke, round Ulick and round the headof the table. Now, with his foot on the bench, he was ready at a wordto spring on the table, and take the Colonel in the rear. It was clearthat he was a man of action. "Down with your sword, sir, " he criedflatly. 

Colonel John recognised the weakness of his position. Before him theyoung men were five to one, with old Sir Donny and Timothy Burke in therear. On his flank the help which Ulick might give was discounted bythe move Cammock had made. He saw that he could do no more at present, that he must base his hope on the future; this, though he was not blindto the fact that there might be no future. Suddenly as the storm hadblown up, he knew that he was dealing with desperate men, who from thisday onward would act with their necks in a noose, and whom his wordmight send to the scaffold. They had but to denounce him to the rabblewho waited outside, and, besides the Bishop, one only there, as hebelieved, would have the influence to save him. 

Colonel John had confronted danger many times; to confront it had beenhis trade. And it was with coolness and a clear perception of theposition that he turned to Flavia. "I will give up my sword, " he said, "but to my cousin only. This is her house, and I yield myself"--with asmile and a bow--"her prisoner. "

Before they knew what he would be at, he stepped forward and tenderedhis hilt to the girl, who took it with flaccid fingers. "I am in yourhands now, " he said, fixing his eyes on hers and endeavouring to conveyhis meaning to her. For surely, with such a face, she must have, withall her recklessness, some womanliness, some tenderness of feeling inher. 

"D--n your impudence!" The McMurrough cried. 

"A truce, a truce, " the Bishop interposed. "We are all agreed thatColonel Sullivan knows too much to go free. He must be secured, " hecontinued smoothly, "for his own sake. Will two of these gentlemen seehim to his room, and see also that his servant is placed under guard inanother room?"

"But, " the Colonel objected, looking at Flavia, "my cousin will surelyallow me to give----"

"She will be guided by us in this, " the Bishop rejoined with asperity. "Let what I have said be done. "

Flavia, very pale, holding the Colonel's sword as if it might stingher, did not speak. Colonel Sullivan, after a moment's hesitation, followed one of the O'Beirnes from the room, the other bringing up therear. 

When the door had closed upon them, Flavia's was not the only pale facein the room. The scene had brought home to more than one the fact thathere was an end of peace and law, and a beginning of violence andrebellion. The Rubicon was passed. For good or for ill, they werecommitted to an enterprise fraught, it might be, with success andglory, fraught also, it might be, with obloquy and death. Uncle Ulickstared at the floor with a lowering face, and sighed, liking neitherthe past nor the prospect. The McMurrough, the Squireens, Sir Donny, and Burke, secretly uneasy, put on a reckless air to cover theirapprehensions. The Bishop and Cammock, though they saw themselves in afair way to do what they had come to do, looked thoughtful also. Andonly Flavia--only Flavia, shaking off the remembrance of Colonel John'sface, and Colonel John's existence--closed her grip upon his sword, andin the ardour of her patriotism saw with her mind's eye not victory noracclaiming thousands--no, nor the leaping line of pikemen charging for_his_ glory that her brother saw--but the scaffold, and a death for hercountry. Sweet it seemed to her to die for the cause, for the faith, todie for Ireland! To die as young Lord Derwentwater had died a year ortwo before; as Lady Nithsdale had been ready to die; as innumerable menand women had died, lifted above common things by the love of theircountry. 

True, her country, her Ireland, was but this little corner of Kerrybeaten by the Atlantic storms and sad with the wailing cries ofseagulls; the rudest province of a land itself provincial. But if sheknew no more of Ireland than this, she had read her story; and naughtis more true than that the land the most down-trodden is also the bestbeloved. Wrongs beget a passion of affection; and from oppressionsprings sacrifice. This daughter of the windswept shore, of the mistyhills and fairy glens, whose life from infancy had been bare and ruggedand solitary, had become, for that reason, a dreamer of dreams and aworshipper of the ideal Ireland, her country, her faith. The saltbreeze that lashed her cheeks and tore at her hair, the peat reek andthe soft shadows of the bogland--ay, and many an hour of lonelycommuning--had filled her breast with love; such love as impels ratherto suffering and to sacrifice than to enjoyment. Nor had she yetencountered the inevitable disappointments. Her eyes had not yet beenopened to the seamy side of patriotism; to the sordid view of everygreat adventure that soon or late saddens the experienced and dispelsthe glamour of the dreamer. 

For one moment she had recoiled before the shock of impending violence, the clash of steel, the reality of things. But that had passed; now herone thought, as she stood with dilated eyes, unconsciously clutchingthe Colonel's sword, was that the time was come, the thing wasbegun--henceforth she belonged not to herself, but to Ireland and toGod. 

Deep in such thoughts, the girl was not aware that the others had gottogether and were discussing the Colonel's fate until mention was madeof the French sloop and of Captain Augustin. "Faith, and let him go inthat!" she heard Uncle Ulick urging. "D'ye hear me, your reverence?'Twill be a week before they land him, and the fire we'll be lightingwill be no secret at all at all by then. "

"May be, Mr. Sullivan, " the Bishop replied--"may be. But we cannotspare the sloop. "

"No, by the Holy Bones, and we'll not spare her!" The McMurrough chimedin. "She's heels to her, and it's a godsend she'll be to us if thingsgo ill. "

"And an addition to our fleet anyway, " Cammock said. "We'd be mad tolet her go--just to make a man safe, we can make safe a deal cheaper!"

Flavia propped the sword carefully in an angle of the hearth, and movedforward. "But I do not understand, " she said timidly. "We agreed thatthe sloop and the cargo were to go free if Colonel Sullivan--but youknow!" she added, breaking off and addressing her brother. "You werethere. "

"Is it dreaming you are?" he retorted contemptuously. "Is it we'll betaking note of that now?"

"It was a debt of honour, " she said. 

"The girl's right, " Uncle Ulick said, "and we'll be rid of him. "

"We'll be rid of him without that, " The McMurrough muttered. 

"I am fearing, Mr. Sullivan, " the Bishop said, "that it is not quiteunderstood by all that we are embarked upon a matter of the utmostgravity, upon a matter of life and death. We cannot let bagatellesstand in the way. The sloop and her cargo can be made good to herowners--at another time. For your relative and his servant----"

"The shortest way with them!" some one cried. "That's the best and thesurest!"

"For them, " the Bishop continued, silencing the interruption by a look, "we must not forget that some days must pass before we can hope to getour people together, or to be in a position to hold our own. During theinterval we lie at the mercy of an informer. Your own people you know, and can trust to the last gossoon, I'm told. But the same cannot besaid of this gentleman--who has very fixed ideas--and his servant. Ourlives and the lives of others are in their hands, and it is of the lastimportance that they be kept secure and silent. "

"Ay, silent's the word, " Cammock growled. 

"There could be no better place than one of the towers, " The McMurroughsuggested, "for keeping them safe, bedad!"

"And why'll they be safer there than in the house?" Uncle Ulick askedsuspiciously. He looked from one speaker to another with a baffledface, trying to read their minds. He was sure that they meant more thanthey said. 

"Oh, for the good reason!" the young man returned contemptuously. "Isn't all the world passing the door upstairs? And what more easy thanto open it?"

Cammock's eyes met the Bishop's. "The tower'll be best, " he said. "Devil a doubt of it! Draw off the people, and let them be taken there, and a guard set. We've matters of more importance to discuss now. Thisgathering to-morrow, to raise the country--what's the time fixed forit?"

But Flavia, who had listened with a face of perplexity, interposed. "Still, he is my prisoner, is he not?" she said wistfully. "And if Ianswer for him?"

"By your leave, ma'am, " Cammock replied, with decision, "one word. Women to women's work! I'll let no woman weave a halter for me!"

The room echoed low applause. And Flavia was silent. 

CHAPTER XI

A MESSAGE FOR THE YOUNG MASTER

James McMurrough was young, but he was a slave to as few of thegenerous ambitions of youth as any man of his years. At heart he caredlittle for his country, and nothing for his Faith--which indeed he hadbeen ready to barter for an allowance, and a certain succession. Hecared only for himself; and but for the resentment which the provisionsof his grandfather's will had bred in him, he would have seen the Irishrace in Purgatory, and the Roman faith in a worse place, before hewould have risked a finger to right the one or restore the other. Evenunder the influence of that resentment, that bitterness, he had comeinto the conspiracy with but half a heart; without enthusiasm, and withan eye not so much to its ultimate success as to the gain he might makeout of it in the meantime. 

Once embarked, however, on the enterprise, vanity, the failing of lightminds, and particularly of the Celtic mind, swept him onward. The nightwhich followed Colonel Sullivan's arrest was a night long remembered atMorristown--a night to uplift the sanguine and to kindle theshort-sighted; nor was it a wonder that the young chief--as he strodeamong his admiring tenants, his presence greeted, when he entered, withIrish acclamations, and his skirts kissed, when he passed, by devotedkernes--sniffed the pleasing incense, and trod the ground to themeasure of imagined music. He felt himself a greater man this nightthan he had ever been before. The triumph that was never to beintoxicated him. He was Montrose, he was Claverhouse--a Montrose whomno Philiphaugh awaited, a Claverhouse whom no silver bullet would slay. He saw himself riding in processions, acclaimed by thousands, dictatingto senates, the idol of a rejoicing Dublin. 

His people had kindled a huge bonfire in the middle of the forecourt, and beside this he extended a gracious welcome to a crowd of strongtenants, whose picturesque figures, as they feasted, sang, drank, andfought, the fire silhouetted on the house front and the surroundingwalls; now projecting them skywards, gigantic and menacing, nowreducing them to dwarfs. A second fire, for the comfort of the basersort, had been kindled outside the gates, and was the centre ofmerriment less restrained; while a third, which served as a beacon tothe valley, and a proclamation of what was being done, glowed on theplatform before the ruined tower at the head of the lake. From thislast the red flames streamed far across the water; and now revealed abelated boat shooting from the shadow on its way across, now a troop ofcountrymen, who, led by their priest, came limping along the lake-sideroad; ostensibly to join in the religious services of the morrow, butin reality, as they knew, to hear something, and, God willing, to dosomething towards freeing old Ireland and shaking off the grip of thecursed Saxon. 

In the more settled parts of the land, such a summons as had broughtthem from their rude shielings among the hills or beside the bogs, would have passed for a dark jest. But in this remote spot, the notionof overthrowing the hated power by means of a few score pikes, stiffened by half as many sailors from the Spanish ship in the bay, didnot seem preposterous, either to these poor folk or to their betters. Cammock, of course, knew the truth, and the Bishop. Asgill, too, theone man cognisant of the movement who was not here, and of whom somethought with distrust--he, too, could appraise the attempt at its trueworth. But of these men, the two first aimed merely at a diversionwhich would further their plans in Europe; and the last cared only forFlavia. 

But James McMurrough and Flavia herself, and Sir Donny and old TimothyBurke and the O'Beirnes and the two or three small gentry, Sullivans orMcCarthys, who had also come in--and in a degree Uncle Ulick-these sawnothing hopeless in the plan. That plan, as announced, was first tofall upon Tralee in combination with a couple of sloops said to belying in Galway Bay; and afterwards to surprise Kenmare. Masters ofthese places, they would have the Kerry peninsula behind them, and noenemy within it; for the Crosbys and the Pettys, and the handful ofEnglish settlers who lived there, could offer no resistance. So muchdone, they proposed to raise the old standard, to call Connaught totheir aid, to cry a crusade. Spain would reinforce them through a scoreof ports--was not Galway City half Spanish already?--Ireland would riseas one man. And faith, as Sir Donny said, before the Castle tyrantscould open their eyes, or raise their heads from the pillow, they'd beseeing themselves driven into the salt ocean!

So, while the house-walls gave back the ruddy glare of the torches, andthe bare-footed, bare-headed, laughing colleens damped the thatch, andmen confessed in one corner and kissed their girls in another, and thesmiths in a third wrought hard at the pike-heads--so the struggledepicted itself to more than one! Among others to Flavia, as, halftrembling, half triumphant, she looked down from a window on thestrange riot, and told herself that the time was come! To James as hestrode to and fro, fancying himself Montrose, sweeping eastwards like aflame. To the O'Beirnes and the O'Loughlins and their like. Great whenthe fight was done would be the glory of Kerry! The cocks of Clarewould crow no more, and undying would be the fame of the McMurroughline, descended from the old Wicklow kings!

Meanwhile Cammock and the Bishop walked in the dark in the garden, alittle apart from the turmoil, and, wrapped in their cloaks, talked inlow voices; debating much of Sicily and Naples and the Cardinal and theMediterranean fleet, and at times laughing at some court story. Butthey said, strange to tell, no word of Tralee, or of Kenmare, or ofDublin Castle, or even of Connaught. They were no visionaries. They hadto do with greater things than these, and in doing them knew that theymust spend to gain. The lives of a few score peasants, living inwretchedness already, the ruin of half a dozen hamlets, the desolationof such a God-forsaken country-side as this, which was but bog and hillat best, and where it rained two days in three--what were these besidethe diversion of a single squadron from the great pitched fight, already foreseen, where the excess of one battleship might win anempire, and its absence might ruin nations?

So while the fire at the head of the lake blazed high, and band afterband of the "boys" came in, thirsting for fight, and while song andrevelry lorded it in the forecourt and on the strand, and not whiskyonly but cognac, taken from Captain Augustin's sloop, flowed freely, the two men pacing the walk behind the Florence yews gave scarce athought to the present moment. They had planned this move inconjunction with other and more important moves. It was made or in themaking; and forthwith their thoughts and their speech left it, to dealwith the next move and the one beyond, and with the end of all theirmoves--St. Germains or St. James's. And one other man, and one only, because his life had been passed on their wider plane, and he couldjudge of the relative value of Connaught and Kent, divined the trend oftheir thoughts, and understood the deliberation, almost the sense ofduty with which they prepared to sacrifice their pawns. 

Colonel Sullivan sat in the upper room of one of the two towers thatflanked the entrance to the forecourt. Bale was with him, and the two, with the door doubly locked upon them and guarded by a sentry whosecrooning they could hear, shared such comfort as a pitcher of water anda gloomy outlook afforded. The darkness hid the medley of odds andends, of fishing-nets, broken spinning-wheels and worn-out sails, whichlittered their prison; but the inner of the two slit-like windows thatlighted the room admitted a thin shaft of firelight that, dancing amongthe uncovered rafters, told of the orgy below. Bale, staring moroselyat the crowd about the fire, crouched in the splay of the window, whilethe Colonel, in the same posture at the other window, gazed withfeelings not more cheerful on the dark lake. 

He was concerned for himself and his companion; for he knew thatfrightened folk are ever the most cruel. But he was more gravelyconcerned for those whose advocate he had made himself--for theignorant cotters in their lowly hovels, the women, the children, uponwhom the inevitable punishment would fall. He doubted, now that it wastoo late, the wisdom of the course he had taken; and, blaming himselffor precipitation, he fancied that if he had acted with a little moreguile, a little more reticence, a little less haste, his remonstrancemight have had greater weight. 

There are some whom a life spent in camps and amid bloody scenes, hardens; and others, a few, who emerge from the ordeal with soulspassionately inclined to mercy and justice. Colonel John was of thelatter--a black swan. For at this moment, lying, and aware that he lay, in some peril of his life, he was more troubled by the evil plight ofthe helpless, whose cabins had given him a foster-mother, and made himwelcome in his youth, whose blood, too, he shared, than by his ownuncertain prospects. 

William Bale, as was natural, was far from sharing this view. "May thefire burn them!" he muttered, his ire excited by some prank of theparty below. "The Turks were polite beside these barefoot devils!"

"You'd have said the other thing at Bender, " the Colonel answered, turning his head. 

"Ay, your honour, " Bale returned; "a man never knows when he is welloff. "

His master laughed. "I'd have you apply that now, " he said. 

"So I would if it weren't that I've a kind of a scunner of those blackbog-holes, " Bale said. "To be planted head first 's no proper end of aman, to my thinking; and if there's not something of the kind in theseragamuffins' minds I'm precious mistaken. 

"Pooh, man, you're frightening yourself, " the Colonel answered. But theroom was dank and chill, the lake without lay lonely, and the picturewhich Bale's words called up was not pleasant to the bravest. "It's acivilised land, and they'd not think of it!"

"There's one, and that's the young lady's brother, " Bale answereddarkly, "would not pull us out by the feet! I'll swear to that. Yourhonour's too much in his way, if what they say in the house is true. "

"Pooh!" the Colonel answered again. "We're of one blood. "

"Cain and Abel, " Bale said. "There's example for it. " And he chuckled. 

The Colonel scolded him anew. But having done so he could not shake offthe impression which the man's words had made on him. While he lived hewas a constant and an irritating check upon James McMurrough. If theyoung man saw a chance of getting rid of that check, was he one to putit from him? Colonel John's face grew long as he pondered the question;he had seen enough of James to feel considerable doubt about theanswer. The fire on the height above the lake had died down, the one onthe strand was a bed of red ashes. The lake lay buried in darkness, from which at intervals the cry of an owl as it moused along the shorerose mournfully. 

But Colonel John was not one to give way to fears that might bebaseless. "Let us sleep, " he said, shrugging his shoulders. And he laydown where he was, pillowing his head on a fishing-net. Bale saidnothing, but examined the door before he stretched himself across thethreshold. 

Half an hour after dawn they were roused. It was a heavy trampling onthe stairs that awakened them. The door was quickly unlocked, it wasthrown open, and the hairy face of O'Sullivan Og, who held it wide, looked in. Behind him were two of the boys with pikes--frowsy, savage, repellent figures, with drugget coats tied by the sleeves about theirnecks. 

"You'll be coming with us, Colonel, no less, " Og said. 

Colonel John looked at him. "Whither, my man?" he asked coolly. He andBale had got to their feet at the first alarm. 

"Och, sure, where it will be best for you, " Og replied, with a leer. 

"Both of us?" the Colonel asked, in the same hard tone. 

"Faith, and why'd we be separating you, I'd be asking. "

Colonel John liked neither the man's tone nor his looks. But he was farabove starting at shadows, and he guessed that resistance would beuseless. "Very good, " he said. "Lead on. "

"Bedad, and if you'll be doing that same, we will, " O'Sullivan Oganswered with a grin. 

The Colonel and Bale found their hats--they'd been allowed to bringnothing else with them--and they went down the stairs. In the gloombefore the door of the tower waited two sturdy fellows, barefoot andshock-headed, with musquetoons on their shoulders, who seemed to beexpecting them. Round the smouldering embers of the fire a score offigures lay sleeping in the open, wrapped in their frieze coats. Asmany others sat with their backs against the wall, and their chins sunkon their breasts. The sun was not yet up, and all things were wrapt ina mist that chilled to the bone. Even within the narrow bounds of theforecourt, objects at a distance put on queer shapes and showed newfaces. Nothing in all that was visible took from the ominous aspect ofthe two men with the firearms. One for each, Bale thought. And hisface, always pallid, showed livid in the morning light. 

Without a word the four men formed up round their prisoners, and atonce O'Sullivan Og led the way at a brisk pace towards the gate. Colonel John was following, but he had not taken three steps before athought struck him, and he halted. "Are we leaving the house at once?"he asked. 

"We are. And why not, I'm asking. "

"Only that I've a message for the McMurrough it will be well for him tohave. "

"Sure, " O'Sullivan Og answered, his manner half wheedling, halftruculent, "'tis no time for messages and trifles and the like now, Colonel. No time at all, I tell you. Ye can see that for yourself, I'mthinking, such a morning as this. "

"I'm thinking nothing of the kind, " the Colonel answered, and he hungback, looking towards the house. Fortunately Darby chose that minute toappear at the door. The butler's face was pale, and showed fatigue; hishair hung in wisps; his clothes were ill-fastened. He threw a glance ofcontempt, the contempt of the indoor servant, at the sleeping figures, lying here and there in the wet. Thence his eyes travelled on and tookin the group by the gate. He started, and wrung his hands in sudden, irrepressible distress. It was as if a spasm seized the man. 

The Colonel called him. "Darby, " he cried. "Come here, my man. "

O'Sullivan Og opened his mouth; he was on the point of interposing, buthe thought better of it, and shrugged his shoulders, mutteringsomething in the Erse. 

"Darby, " the Colonel said gravely, "I've a message for the youngmaster, and it must be given him in his bed. Will you give it?"

"I will, your honour. "

"You will not fail?"

"I will not, your honour, " the old servant answered earnestly. 

"Tell him, then, that Colonel Sullivan made his will as he passedthrough Paris, and 'tis now in Dublin. You mind me, Darby?"

The old man began to shake--he had an Irish man's superstition. "I do, your honour. But the saints be between us and harm, " he continued, withthe same gesture of distress. "Who's speaking of wills?"

"Only tell him that in his bed, " Colonel John repeated, with an urgentlook. "That is all. "

"And by your leave, it is now we'll be going, " Og interposed sharply. "We are late already for what we've to do. "

"There are some things, " the Colonel replied with a steady look, "whichit is well to be late about. "

Having fired that shot, he turned his eyes once more on the house. Then, without further remonstrance, he and Bale, with their guard, marched out through the gate, and took the road along the lake--thatsame road by which the Colonel had come some days before from theFrench sloop. The men with the firelocks walked beside them, one oneither flank, while the pikemen guarded them behind, and O'Sullivan Ogbrought up the rear. 

They had not taken twenty paces before the fog swallowed up the party;and henceforth they walked in a sea of mist, like men moving in anightmare from which they cannot awake. The clammy vapour chilled themto the bone: while the unceasing wailing of seagulls, borne off thelough, the whistle of an unseen curlew on the hillside, the hurtle ofwings as some ghostly bird swept over them--these were sounds to deepenthe effect, and depress men who had reason to suspect that they werebeing led to a treacherous end. 

The Colonel, though he masked his apprehensions under an impenetrablefirmness, began to fear no less than that--and with cause. He observedthat O'Sullivan Og's followers were of the lowest type of kerne, islanders in all probability, and half starved; men whose hands werenever far from their skenes, and whose one orderly instinct consistedin a blind obedience to their chief. O'Sullivan Og himself he believedto be The McMurrough's agent in his more lawless business; a fierce, unscrupulous man, prospering on his lack of scruple. The Colonel couldaugur nothing but ill from the hands to which he had been entrusted;and worse from the manner in which these savage, half-naked creatures, shambling beside him, stole from time to time a glance at him, as ifthey fancied they saw the winding-sheet high on his breast. 

Some, so placed, and feeling themselves helpless, isolated by the fog, and entirely at these men's mercy, might have lost their firmness. Buthe did not; nor did Bale, though the servant's face betrayed thekeenness of his anxiety. They weighed indeed, certainly the former, thechances of escape: such chances as a headlong rush into the fog mightafford to unarmed men, uncertain where they were. But the Colonelreflected that it was possible that that was the very course upon whichO'Sullivan Og counted for a pretext and an excuse. And, for a secondobjection, the two could not, so closely were they guarded, communicatewith each other in such a way as to secure joint action. 

After all, The McMurrough's plan might amount to no more than theirdetention in some secret place among the hills. Colonel John hoped so. 

Yet he could not persuade himself that this was the worst that wasintended. He could not but think ill of things; of O'Sullivan Og'ssilence, of the men's stealthy glances, of the uncanny hour. And whenthey came presently to a point where a faintly marked track left theroad, and the party, at a word from their leader, turned into it, hethought worse of the matter. Was it his fancy--he was far fromnervous--or were the men beginning to look impatiently at one another?Was it his fancy, or were they beginning to press more closely on theirprisoners, as if they sought a quarrel? He imagined that he read in oneman's eyes the question "When?" and in another's the question "Now?"And a third, he thought, handled his weapon in an ominous fashion. 

Colonel John was a brave man, inured to danger and trained toemergencies, one who had faced death in many forms. But the lack, ofarms shakes the bravest, and it needed even his nerve to confrontwithout a quiver the fate that, if his fears were justified, lay beforethem: the sudden, violent death, and the black bog-water which wouldswallow all traces of the crime. But he did not lose his firmness orlower his crest for a moment. 

By-and-by the track, which for a time had ascended, began to rundownward. The path grew less sound. The mist, which was thicker thanbefore, and shut them in on the spot where they walked, as in a worlddesolate and apart, allowed nothing to be seen in front; but now andagain a ragged thorn-tree or a furze bush, dripping with moisture, showed ghostlike to right or left. There was nothing to indicate thepoint they were approaching, or how far they were likely to travel;until the Colonel, peering keenly before them, caught the gleam ofwater. It was gone as soon as seen, the mist falling again like acurtain; but he had seen it, and he looked back to see what Og wasdoing. He caught him also in the act of looking over his shoulder. Washe making sure that they were beyond the chance of interruption?

It might be so; and Colonel John wheeled about quickly, thinking thatwhile O'Sullivan Og's attention was directed elsewhere, he might takeone of the other men by surprise, seize his weapon and make a fight forhis life and his servant's life. But he met only sinister looks, eyesthat watched his smallest movement with suspicion, a point readylevelled to strike him if he budged. And then, out of the mist beforethem, loomed the gaunt figure of a man, walking apace towards them. 

The meeting appeared to be as little expected by the stranger as byOg's party. For not only did he spring aside and leave the track togive them a wider berth, but he went by warily, with his feet in thebog. Some word was cried to him in the Erse, he answered, for a momenthe appeared to be going to stop. Then he passed on and was lost in themist. 

But he left a change behind him. One of the firelock-men broke intohasty speech, glancing, the Colonel noticed, at him and Bale, as ifthey were the subjects of his words. O'Sullivan Og answered the mancurtly and harshly; but before the reply was off his lips a second manbroke in vehemently in support of the other. They all halted; for a fewseconds all spoke at once. Then, just as Colonel John was beginning tohope that they would quarrel, O'Sullivan Og gave way with sullenreluctance, and a man ran back the way they had come, shouting a name. Before the prisoners could decide whether his absence afforded a chanceof escape, he was back again, and with him the man who had passed inthe bog. 

Colonel John looked at the stranger, and recognised him; and, a man ofquick wit, he knew on the instant that he had to face the worst. Hisface set more hard, more firm--if it turned also a shade paler. Headdressed his companion. "They've called him back to confess us, " hemuttered in Bale's ear. 

"The devils!" Bale exclaimed. He choked on the word and worked his jaw, glaring at them; but he said no more. Only his eyes glanced from one toanother, wild and full of rage. 

Colonel John did not reply, for already O'Sullivan Og was addressinghim. "There's no more to it, " The McMurrough's agent said bluntly; "butyou've come your last journey, Colonel, and we'll go back wanting you. There's no room in Ireland from this day for them that's not Irish atheart! nor safety for honest men while you're walking the sod. But----"

"Will you murder us?" Colonel John said. "Do you know, man, " hecontinued sternly, "what you do? What have we done to you, or yourmaster?"

"Done?" O'Sullivan Og answered with sudden ferocity. "And murder, sayyou? Ay, faith, I would, and ten thousand like you, for the sake of oldIreland! You may make your peace, and have five minutes to that--and nomore, for time presses, and we've work to do. These fools would have apriest for you"--he turned and spat on the ground--"but it is I, andnone better, know you are black Protestants, and 'twould take the HolyFather, God bless him, and no less, to make your souls!"

Colonel John looked at him with a strange light in his eyes. "It islittle to you, " he said, "and much to me. Yet think, think, man, whatyou do. Or if you will not, here is my servant. Let him go at least. Spare his life at least. Put him, if you please, on board the Frenchsloop that's in the bay----"

"Faith, and you're wasting the little breath that is left you, " theruffian answered, irritated rather than moved by the other's calmness. "It's to take or leave. I told the men a heretic had no soul to make, but----"

"God forgive you!" Colonel John said--and was silent; for he saw thatremonstrance would not help him, nor prayer avail. The man's mind wasmade up, his heart steeled. For a brief instant, something, perhapsthat human fear which he had so often defied, clutched Colonel John'sheart. For a brief instant human weakness had its way with him, and heshuddered--in the face of the bog, in the face of such an end as this. Then the mist passed from his eyes, if not from the landscape; thegracious faith that was his returned to him: he was his grave, unyielding self again. He took Bale's hand and begged his forgiveness. "Would I had never brought you!" he said. "Why did I, why did I? Yet, God's will be done!"

Bale did not seem able to speak. His jaw continued to work, while hiseyes looked sideways at Og. Had the Irishman known his man, he wouldhave put himself out of reach, armed as he was. 

"But I will appeal for you to the priest!" Colonel John continued; "hemay yet prevail with them to spare you. "

"He will not!" O'Sullivan Og said naïvely. 

CHAPTER XII

THE SEA MIST

Father O'Hara looked at the two prisoners, and the tears ran down hisface. He was the man whom Colonel Sullivan and Bale had overtaken ontheir way to Tralee. In spite of his life and his wrongs, he was amerciful man, and with all his heart he wished that, if he could do nogood, God had been pleased to send him another way through the mist. Not that life was to him aught but a tragedy at any time, on whicheverroad he took. What but a tragedy could it be to a man bred at Douay andreared on Greek, and now condemned to live in loneliness and squaloramong unlettered, unwashed creatures; to one who, banned by the law, moved by night, and lurked in some hiding-place by day, and, waking orsleeping, was ever in contact with the lawless and the oppressed, thewretched and the starving--whose existence was spent in shriving, christening, burying among the hills and bogs?

Yet, even in such a life this was a tragedy beyond the common. And--"Whatcan I do?" he cried. "_Non mihi, domine, culpa!_ Oh, what can I do?"

"You can do nothing, father, " O'Sullivan Og said grimly. "They'reheretics, no less! And we're wasting your time, blessed man. " Hewhispered a few words in the priest's ear. 

The latter shuddered. "God forgive us all!" he wailed. "And most, thosewho need it most! God keep us from high place!"

"Sure and we're in little peril!" O'Sullivan Og replied. 

Colonel John looked at the priest with solemn eyes. Nor did aught but atiny pulse beating in his cheek betray that every sense was on thestretch; that he was listening, watching, ready to seize the leastchance, that he might save, at any rate, poor Bale. Then, "You are aChristian, father, " he said gravely. "I ask nothing for myself. Butthis is my servant. He has done nothing, he knows nothing. Prevail withthem to spare him!"

Bale uttered a fierce remonstrance. No one understood it, or what hesaid, or meant. His eyes looked askance, like the eyes of a beast in asnare--seeking a weapon, or a throat! To be butchered thus! To bebutchered thus!

Perhaps Colonel John, notwithstanding his calm courage, had the samethought, and found it bitter. Death had been good in the face of silentthousands, with pride and high resolve for cheer. Or in the heat of afight for the right, where it came unheeded and almost unfelt. But hereon the bog, in the mist, unknown, unnoticed, to perish and be forgottenin a week, even by the savage hands that took their breath! Perhaps toface this he too had need of all his Christian stoicism. 

"My God! My God!" the priest said. And he fell on his knees and raisedhis hands. "Have pity on these two, and soften the hearts of theirmurderers!"

"Amen, " said Colonel John quietly. 

"Faith, and 'tis idle, this, " O'Sullivan Og cried irritably. He gave asecret sign to his men to draw to one side and be ready. "We've ourorders, and other work to do. Kneel aside, father, 'tis no harm we meanyou, God forbid! But you're wasting breath on these same. And you, " hecontinued, addressing the two, "say what prayer you will, if you knowone, and then kneel or stand--it's all one to us--and, God willing, you'll be in purgatory and never a knowledge of it!"

"One moment, " Colonel John interposed, his face pale but composed, "Ihave something to say to my friend. "

"And you may, if you'll play no tricks. "

"If you would spare him----"

"'Tis idle, I say! Sorra a bit of good is it! But there, ye shall behaving while the blessed man says three Paternosters, and not the leasttaste of time beyond! Devil a bit!"

Colonel John made a sign to the priest, who, bowing himself on the wetsod, covered his eyes with his hand and began to pray. The men, at asign from O'Sullivan, had drawn to either side, and the firelock-menwere handling their pieces, with one eye on their leader and one on theprisoners. 

Colonel John took Bale's hand. "What matter, soon or late?" he saidgently "Here, or on our beds we die in our duty. Let us say, _Inmanus tuas_----"

"Popish! Popish!" Bale muttered, shaking his head. He spoke hoarsely, his tongue cleaving to his mouth. His eyes were full of rage. 

"Into Thy hands!" Colonel John said. He stooped nearer to his man'sear. "When I shout, jump and run!" he breathed. "I will hold two. "Again he lifted his head and looked calmly at the threatening figuresstanding about them, gaunt and dark, against the curtain of mist. Theywere waiting for the signal. The priest was half way through his secondPaternoster. His trembling tongue was stumbling, lagging more and more. As he ended it--the two men still standing hand in hand--Colonel Johngripped Bale's fingers hard, but held him. 

"What is that?" he cried, in a loud voice--but still he held Bale tightthat he might not move. "What is that?" he repeated. On the ear--on hisear first--had fallen the sound of hurrying feet. 

They strained their eyes through the mist. 

"And what'll this be?" O'Sullivan Og muttered suspiciously, lookingfirst in the direction of the sound, and then, still more suspiciously, at his prisoners. "If you budge a step, " he growled, "I'll drive thispike----"

"A messenger from The McMurrough, " Colonel John said, speaking assternly as if he and not The McMurrough's henchman commanded the party. If he was human, as indeed he was, if his heart, at the hope ofrespite, beat upon his ribs as the heart of a worse man might havebeaten, he did not betray it save by a light in his eyes. "You will seeif I am not right, " he added. 

They had not to wait. As he spoke a tall, lathy form emerged from themist. It advanced with long leaps, the way they had come. A moment, andthe messenger saw them--almost as soon as they had seen him. He pulledup, and walked the intervening distance, his arms drooping, and hisbreath coming in gasps. He had run apace, and he could not speak. Buthe nodded--as he wiped the saliva from his parted lips--to O'SullivanOg to come aside with him; and the two moved off a space. The otherseyed them while the message was given. The suspense was short. QuicklyO'Sullivan Og came back. 

"Ye may be thankful, " he said drily. "Ye've cheated the pikes for thistime, no less. And 'tis safe ye are. "

"You have the greater reason to be thankful, " Colonel John repliedsolemnly. "You have been spared a foul crime. "

"Faith, and I hope I may never do worse, " Og answered hardily, "thanrid the world of two black Protestants, an' them with a priest to maketheir souls! Many's the honest man's closed his eyes without that same. But 'tis no time for prating! I wonder at your honour, and you no morethan out of the black water! Bring them along, boys, " he continued, "we've work to do yet!"

"_Laus Deo!_" the priest cried, lifting up his hands. "Give Him theglory!"

"Amen, " the Colonel said softly. And for a moment he shut his eyes andstood with clasped hands. Perhaps even his courage was hardly proofagainst so sudden, so late a respite. He looked with a hardly repressedshudder on the dreary face of the bog, on the gleaming water, on thedripping furze bushes. "I thank you kindly, father, for your prayers!"he said. "The words of a good man avail much!"

No more was said. For a few yards Bale walked unsteadily, shaken by hisescape from a death the prospect of which had evoked as much rage asfear. But he recovered himself speedily, and, urged by O'Sullivan'scontinual injunctions to hasten, the party were not long in retracingtheir steps. They reached the road, and went along it, but in thedirection of the landing-place. In a few minutes they were threadingtheir way in single file across the saucer-like waste which lay tolandward of the hill overlooking the jetty and the inlet. 

"Are you taking us to the French sloop?" Colonel John asked. 

"You'll be as wise as the lave of us by-and-by!" Og answered sulkily. 

They crossed the shoulder near the tower, which loomed uncertainlythrough the fog, and they strode down the slope to the stone pier. Themist lay low on the water, and only the wet stones of the jetty, and aboat or two floating in the angle between the jetty and the shore, werevisible. The tide was almost at the flood. Og bade the men draw in oneof the boats, ordered Colonel Sullivan and Bale to go into the bow, andthe pikemen to take the oars. He and the two firelock-men--themessenger had vanished--took their seats in the stern. 

"Pull out, you cripples, " he said. "And be pulling stout, and there'llbe flood enough to be bringing us back. "

The men bent to the clumsy oars, and the boat slid down the inlet, andpassed under the beam of the French sloop, which lay moored fartheralong the jetty. Not a sign of life appeared on deck as they passed;the ship seemed to be deserted. Half a dozen strokes carried the boatbeyond view of it, and the little party were alone on the bosom of thewater, that lay rocking smoothly between its unseen banks. Some minuteswere spent in stout rowing, and the oily swell began to grow longer andslower. They were near the mouth of the inlet, and abreast of theeast-and-west-running shore of the bay. Smoothly as the sea lapped thebeach under the mist, the boat began to rise and fall on the Atlanticrollers. 

"Tis more deceitful than a pretty colleen, " O'Sullivan Og said, "is thesea-fog, bad cess to it! My own father was lost in it. Will you beseeing her, boys?"

"Ye'll not see her till ye touch her!" one of the rowers answered. 

"And the tide running?" the other said. "Save us from that same!"

"She's farther out by three gunshots!" struck in a firelock-man. "We'llbe drifting back, ye thieves of the world, if ye sit staring there!Pull, an' we'll be inshore an' ye know it. "

For some minutes the men pulled steadily onwards, while one of thepassengers, apprised that their destination was the Spanish war-vesselwhich had landed Cammock and the Bishop, felt anything but eager toreach it. A Spanish war-ship meant imprisonment and hardship withoutquestion, possibly the Inquisition, persecution, and death. When themen lay at last on their oars, and swore that they must have passed theship, and they would go no farther, he alone listened indifferently, nay, felt a faint hope born in him. 

"'Tis a black Protestant fog!" O'Sullivan cried. "Where'll we be, Iwonder?"

"Sure, ye can make no mistake, " one answered. "The wind's light off theland. "

"We'll be pulling back, lads. "

"That's the word. "

The men put the boat about, a little sulkily, and started on the returnjourney. The sound of barking dogs and crowing cocks came off the landwith that clearness which all sounds assume in a fog. Suddenly ColonelJohn, crouching in the bow, where was scant room for Bale and himself, saw a large shape loom before him. Involuntarily he uttered a warningcry, O'Sullivan echoed it, the men tried to hold the boat. In doingthis, however, one man was quicker than the other, the boat turnedbroadside on to her former course, and before the cry was well offO'Sullivan Og's lips, it swept violently athwart a cable hauled taut bythe weight of a vessel straining to the flow of the tide. In atwinkling the boat careened, throwing its occupants into the water. 

Colonel John and Bale were nearest to the hawser, and managed, suddenlyas the thing happened, to seize it and cling to it. But the first wavewashed over them, blinding them and choking them; and, warned by this, they worked themselves desperately along the rope until their shoulderswere clear of the water and they could twist a leg over their slendersupport. 

That effected, they could spit out the water, breathe again, and lookabout them. They shouted for help once, twice, thrice, thinking thatsome on the great ship looming dim and distant to shoreward of themmust hear. But their shouts were merged in the wail of despair, ofshrieks and cries that floated away into the mist. The boat, travellingwith the last of the tide, had struck the cable with force, and wasalready drifting a gunshot away. Whether any saved themselves on it, the two clinging to the hawser could not see. 

Bale, shivering and scared, would have shouted again, but Colonel Johnstayed him. "God rest their souls!" he said solemnly. "The men aboardcan do nothing. By the time they'll have lowered a boat it will be donewith these. "

"They can take us aboard, " Bale said. 

"Ay, if we want to go to Cadiz gaol, " Colonel John answered slowly. Hewas peering keenly towards the land. 

"But what can we do, your honour?" Bale asked with a shiver. 

"Swim ashore. "

"God forbid!"

"But you can swim?"

"Not that far. Not near that far, God knows!" Bale repeated withemphasis, his teeth chattering. "I'll go down like a stone. "

"Cadiz gaol! Cadiz gaol!" Colonel John muttered. "Isn't it worth a swimto escape that?"

"Ay, ay, but----"

"Do you see that oar drifting? In a twinkling it will be out of reach. Off with your boots, man, off with your clothes, and to it! That oar isfreedom! The tide is with us still, or it would not be moving that way. But let the tide turn and we cannot do it. "

"It's too far!"

"If you could see the shore, " Colonel John argued, "you'd think nothingof it! With your chin on that oar, you can't sink. But it must be donebefore we are chilled. "

He was stripping himself to his underclothes while he talked: and inhaste, fearing that he might feel the hawser slacken and dip--a signthat the tide had turned. Or if the oar floated out of sight--then toothe worst might happen to them. Already Colonel John had plans andhopes, but freedom was needful if they were to come to anything. 

"Come!" he cried impulsively. "Man, you are not a coward, I know itwell! Come!"

He let himself into the water as he spoke, and after a moment ofhesitation, and with a shiver of disgust, Bale followed his example, let the rope go, and with quick, nervous strokes bobbed after him inthe direction of the oar. Colonel John deserved the less credit, as hewas the better swimmer. He swam long and slow, with his head low: andhis eyes watched his follower. A half minute of violent exertion, andBale's outstretched hand clutched the oar. It was a thick, clumsyimplement, and it floated high. In curt, clipped sentences Colonel Johnbade him rest his hands on it, and thrust it before him lengthwise, swimming with his feet. 

For five minutes nothing was said, but they proceeded slowly andpatiently, rising a little above each wave and trusting--for they couldsee nothing, and the light wind was in their faces--that the tide wasstill seconding their efforts. Colonel John knew that if the shore lay, as he judged, about half a mile distant, he must, to reach it, swimslowly and reserve his strength. Though a natural desire to decide thequestion quickly would have impelled him to greater exertion, heresisted it as many a man has resisted it, and thereby has saved hislife. At the worst, he reflected that the oar would support them bothfor a short time. But that meant remaining stationary and becomingchilled. 

They had been swimming for ten minutes, as he calculated, when Bale, who floated higher, cried joyfully that he could see the land. ColonelJohn made no answer, he needed all his breath. But a minute later hetoo saw it loom low through the fog; and then, in some minutesafterwards, they felt bottom and waded on to a ledge of rocks whichprojected a hundred yards from the mainland eastward of the mouth ofthe inlet. The tide had served them well by carrying them a little tothe eastward. They sat a moment on the rocks to recover theirstrength--while the seagulls flew wailing over them--and for the firsttime they took in the full gravity of the catastrophe. Every other manin the boat had perished--so they judged, for there was no stir onshore. On that they uttered some expressions of pity and ofthankfulness; and then, stung to action by the chill wind, which settheir teeth chattering, they got to their feet and scrambled painfullyalong the rocks until they reached the marshy bank of the inlet. Thencea pilgrimage scarcely less painful, through gorse and rushes, broughtthem at the end of ten minutes to the jetty. 

Here, too, all was quiet. If any of O'Sullivan Og's party had savedthemselves they were not to be seen, nor was there any indication thatthe accident was known on shore. It was still early, but little aftersix, the day Sunday; and apart from the cackling of poultry, and thegrunting of hogs, no sound came from O'Sullivan's house or the hovelsabout it. 

While Colonel John had been picking his way over the rocks and betweenthe gorse bushes, his thoughts had not been idle; and now, withouthesitation, he made along the jetty until the masts of the French slooploomed beside it. He boarded the vessel by a plank and looked roundhim. There was no watch on deck, but a murmur of talk came from theforecastle and a melancholy voice piping a French song rose from thedepths of the cabin. Colonel John bade Bale follow him--they wereshivering from head to foot--and descended the companion. 

The singer was Captain Augustin. He lay on his back in his bunk, whilehis mate, between sleep and waking, formed an unwilling audience. 

 Tout mal chaussé, tout mal vêtu, sang the Captain in a doleful voice, Pauvre marin, d'où reviens-tu? Tout doux! Tout doux!

With the last word on his lips, he called on the name of his Maker, forhe saw two half-naked, dripping figures peering at him through the opendoor. For the moment he took them, by the dim light, for the revenantsof drowned men; while his mate, a Breton, rose on his elbow andshrieked aloud. 

It was only when Colonel John called them by name that they werereassured, lost their fears, and recognised in the pallid figuresbefore them their late passenger and his attendant. Then, as the twoFrenchmen sprang to their feet, the cabin rang with oaths andinvocations, with _Mon Dieu!_ and _Ma foi!_ Immediately clothes werefetched, and rough cloths to dry the visitors and restore warmth totheir limbs, and cognac and food--for the two were half starved. Meantime, and while these comforts were being administered, and halfthe crew, crouching about the companion, listened, and volleys ofquestions rained upon him, Colonel John told very shortly the tale oftheir adventures, of the fate that had menaced them, and their narrowescape. In return he learned that the Frenchmen were virtuallyprisoners. 

"They have taken our equipage, cursed dogs!" Augustin explained, refraining with difficulty from a dance of rage. "The rudder, thesails, they are not, see you! They have locked all in the house onshore, that we may not go by night, you understand. And by day the shipof war beyond, Spanish it is possible, pirate for certain, goes aboutto sink us if we move! Ah, _sacré nom_, that I had never seen this landof swine!"

"Have they a guard over the rudder and the sails?" Colonel John asked, pausing to speak with the food half way to his mouth. 

"I know not. What matter?"

"If not, it were not hard to regain them, " Colonel John said, with anodd light in his eyes. 

"And the ship of war beyond? What would she be doing?"

"While the fog lies?" Colonel John replied. "Nothing. "

"The fog?" Augustin exclaimed. He clapped his hand to his head, ran upthe companion and as quickly returned. A skipper is in a low way who, whatever his position, has no eye for the weather; and he felt thetacit reproach. "Name of Names!" he cried. "There is a fog like theinside of Jonah's whale! For the ship beyond I snap the finger at her!She is not! Then forward, _mes braves_! Yet tranquil! They have takenthe arms!"

"Ay?" Colonel John said, still eating. "Is that so? Then it seems to mewe must retake them. That first. "

"What, you?" Augustin exclaimed. 

"Why not?" Colonel John responded, looking round him, a twinkle in hiseye. "The goods of his host are in a manner of speaking the house ofhis host. And it is the duty--as I said once before. "

"But is it not that they are--of your kin?"

"That is the reason, " Colonel John answered cryptically, and to theskipper's surprise. But that surprise lasted a very short time. "Listento me, " the Colonel continued. "This goes farther than you think, andto cure it we must not stop short. Let me speak, and do you, myfriends, listen. Courage, and I will give you not only freedom but agood bargain. "

The skipper stared. "How so?" he asked. 

Then Colonel John unfolded the plan on which he had been meditatingwhile the waves lapped his smarting chin, while the gorse bushespricked his feet, and the stones gibed them. It was a great plan, andbefore all things a bold one; so bold that Augustin gasped as itunfolded itself, and the seamen, who, with the freedom of foreignsailors in a ship of fortune, crowded the foot of the companion, openedtheir eyes. 

Augustin smacked his lips. "It is what you call _magnifique_!" he said. "But, " he shrugged his shoulders, "it is not possible!"

"If the fog holds?"

"But if it--what you call--lifts? What then, eh?"

"Through how many storms have you ridden?" the Colonel answered. "Yetif the mast had gone?"

"We had gone! _Vraiment!_

"That did not keep you ashore. "

Augustin cogitated over this for a while. Then, "But we are eightonly, " he objected. "Myself, nine. "

"And two are eleven, " Colonel John replied. 

"We do not know the ground. "

"I do. "

The skipper shrugged his shoulders. 

"And they have treated you--but you know how they have treated you, "Colonel John went on, appealing to the lower motive. 

The group of seamen who stood about the door growled seamen's oaths. 

"There are things that seem hard, " the Colonel continued, "and beingbegun, pouf! they are done while you think of them!"

Captain Augustin of Bordeaux swelled out his breast. "That is true, " hesaid. "I have done things like that. "

"Then do one more!"

The skipper's eyes surveyed the men's faces. He caught the spark intheir eyes. "I will do it, " he cried. 

"Good!" Colonel John cried. "The arms first!"

CHAPTER XIII

A SLIP

Flavia McMurrough enjoyed one advantage over her partners inconspiracy. She could rise on the morning after the night of thebonfires with a clear head and an appetite undiminished by punch; andprobably she was the only one at Morristown of whom this could be said. The morning light did not break for her on aching eyelids and a brainat once too retentive of the boasts of the small hours and toosensitive to the perils of the day to come. Colonel John had scarcelypassed away under guard, old Darby had scarcely made his firstround--with many an ominous shake of the head--the slatternlyserving-boys had scarcely risen from their beds in the passages, beforeshe was afoot, gay as a lark, and trilling like one; with spiritsprepared for the best or the worst which the day might bringforth--though she foresaw only the best--and undepressed even by theblanket of mist that shrouded lake and hills and all the world fromview. 

If the past night, with its wassail and its mirth, its toasts and itsloud-voiced bragging, might be called "the great night of Morristown, "this, the girl promised herself, should more truly and more fitly bestyled "the great day of Ireland. " On this day would they begin a workthe end of which no man could see, but which, to the close of time, should shed a lustre on the name of McMurrough. No more should theirnative land be swept along, a chained slave, a handmaid, in the trainof a more brutal, a more violent, and a more stupid people! From thisday Ireland's valour, that had never known fit leading, should berecognised for what it was, her wit be turned to good uses, her oldtraditions be revived in the light of new glories. The tears rose tothe girl's eyes, her bosom heaved, her heart seemed too large for her, as she pictured the fruition of the work to be begun this day, and withclasped hands and prayerful eyes sang her morning hymn. 

No more should an Irish gentleman walk swordless and shamed among hisequals. No more should the gallant beast he had bred be seized withcontumely in the market-place. No more should all the nobler servicesof his native land be closed to him, his faith be banned, his priestsproscribed! No more should he be driven to sell his valour to thehighest bidder, and pour forth his blood in foreign causes, under thewalls of old Vienna, and on every stricken field from Almanza to theDon. For on this day Ireland should rouse herself from the longnightmare, the oppression of centuries. She should remember hergreatness of old time and the blessing of Patrick; and those who hadenslaved her, those who had scorned her and flouted her, should learnthe strength of hands nerved by the love of God and the love ofcountry! This day at Morristown the day should break. 

The tears gushed from her eyes as she thought of this, and with anoverflowing heart thanked Heaven for the grace and favour that assignedher a part in the work. And the halo formed of those tears ennobled allshe saw about her. The men, still sprawling up and down the courtyardin the abandonment of drink, her brother calling with a pale face andquerulous oaths for a cooling draught, Sir Donny and old Tim Burke, yawning off, like the old topers they were, the effects of thecarouse--the cause and her hopes ennobled all. It was much--may she beforgiven!--if, in the first enthusiasm of the morning, she gave asingle thought to the misguided kinsman whose opposition had hurriedhim into trouble, and exposed him to dangers at which she vaguelyguessed. 

Fool that he was, she reflected, to pit himself against such men as theBishop and the Spanish Admiral! From her window she saw the two walkingin the garden with bent heads, aloof from the yawning crowd, and nowappearing beyond the line of Florence yews, now vanishing behind them. On which she came near to worshipping them. Had they not brought toIreland, to Kerry, to Morristown, the craft and skill in counsel, thesagacity and courage, which had won for them the favour of foreignkings, and raised them high in exile? Lacking their guidance, themovement might have come to nothing, the most enthusiastic must havewasted their strength. But they were here to inspire, to lead, tocontrol. Against such men the parlour-captains of Tralee, theencroaching Pettys, and their like, must fail indeed. And before moreworthy opponents arrived to encounter the patriots, who could say whatbattles might not be won, what allies gained?

It was a dream, but a golden dream, and when she descended to theliving-room she still lived in it. The girl's lips quivered as shekissed the Bishop's hand and received with bent knees his episcopalblessing. "And on this house, my daughter, " he added, "and on thisday!"

"Amen!" she murmured in her heart. 

True, breakfast, and the hour after breakfast, gave some pause to herhappiness. The men's nerves were on edge with potheen and excitement, and they had not been at table five minutes before quarrelling brokeout at the lower end of the board. The Spanish officer who was inattendance on Cammock came to words, and almost to blows, with one ofthe O'Beirnes, who resented the notion that the Admiral's safety wasnot sufficiently secured by the Irish about him. The peace was keptwith difficulty, and so much ill-feeling survived the outbreak thatCammock thought it prudent to remit two-thirds of the sailors to theship, and keep the remainder as far as possible in the background. 

This was not a promising beginning, where the numbers were already soscanty that the Bishop wondered in his heart whether his dupes woulddare to pass from words to action. But it was not all. Some one spokeof Asgill, and of another Justice in the neighbourhood, asserting thattheir hearts were with the rising, and that at a later point their aidmight be expected. At once, "The Evil One's spawn!" cried Sir Donny, rising in his place, andspeaking under the influence of great excitement. "If you're fordealing with them, I'm riding! No Protestants! No black brood ofCromwell for me! I'd as soon never wear sword again as wear it in theircompany!"

"You're not meaning it, Sir Donny!" Uncle Ulick said. 

"Faith, but if he's not, I am!" cried old Tim Burke, rising and bangingthe table with his fist. "'Tis what I'm meaning, and devil a bit of amistake! Just that!"

Another backed him, with so much violence that the most moderate andsensible looked serious, and it needed the Bishop's interference tocalm the storm. "We need not decide one way or the other, " he said, "until they come in. " Probably he thought that an unlikely contingency. "There are arguments on both sides, " he continued blandly. "It is truethat half-measures are seldom wise. On the other hand, it was by aProtestant king that France was led back to the true faith. But of thisat another time. I think we must be moving, gentlemen. It grows late. "

While the gentry talked thus at table, the courtyard and the spacebetween the house and the lake began to present, where the mist allowedthem to be seen, the lively and animated appearance which the Irish, ever lovers of a crowd, admire. Food and drink were there served to thebarefoot, shock-headed boys drawn up in bodies under their priests, orunder the great men's agents; and when these matters had been consumedone band after another moved off in the direction of the rendezvous. This was at the Carraghalin, a name long given to the ruins of an abbeysituate in an upland valley above the waterfall, and a long Irish milefrom the house. But as each troop moved off towards the head of thelake its place was filled in a measure by late-comers, as well as bycompanies of women and girls, close-hooded and shawled, who haltedbefore the house to raise shrill cries of welcome, or, as they passed, stirred the air with their wild Erse melodies. The orders for all wereto take their seats in an orderly fashion and in a mighty semicircleabout a well-known rock situate a hundred yards from the abbey. Tradition reported that in old days this rock had been a pulpit, andthat thence the Irish Apostle had preached to the heathen. Morecertainly it had formed a rostrum and the valley a gathering-place introubled and more recent times. The turf about it was dry, sweet, andsheep-bitten; on either side it sloped gently to the rock, while asentry posted on each of the two low hills which flanked the vale was asufficient surety against surprise. 

It was not until the last of the peasants had filed off, and the spacebefore the house had resumed its normal aspect--but for once withoutits beggars--that the gentry began to make their way in the samedirection. The buckeens were the first to go. Uncle Ulick, with theSpanish officer and his men, formed the next party. The O'Beirnes, withSir Donny and Timothy Burke and a priest or two of a superior order, were not long behind them. The last to leave--and they left the housewith no other guardians than a cook-maid or two--were the Admiral andthe Bishop, honourably escorted, as became their rank, by their hostand hostess. 

Freed from the wrangling and confusion which the presence of the othersbred, Flavia regained her serenity as she walked. There was nothing, indeed, in the face of nature, in the mist and the dark day, and themoisture that hung in beads on thorn and furze, to cheer her. But shedrew her spirits from a higher source, and, sanguine and self-reliant, foreseeing naught but success, stepped proudly along beside the Bishop, who found, perhaps, in her presence and her courage a make-weight forthe gloom of the day. 

"You are sure, " he said, smiling, "that we shall not lose our way?"

"Ah! and I am sure, " she answered, "I could take you blindfold. "

"The mist----"

"It stands, my lord, for the mist overhanging this poor land, which oursun shall disperse. "

"God grant it!" he said--"God grant it, indeed, my daughter!" But, dowhat he would, he spoke without fervour. 

They passed along the lake-edge, catching now and then the shimmer ofwater on their right. Thence they ascended the steep path that led upthe glen of the waterfall to the level of the platform on which the oldtower stood. Leaving this on the right--and only to an informed eye wasit visible--they climbed yet a little higher, and entered a deepdriftway that, at the summit of the gorge, clove its way between themound behind the tower and the hill on their left, and so penetratedpresently to the valley of the Carraghalin. The mist was thinner here, the nature of the ground was more perceptible, and they had notproceeded fifty yards along the sunken way before Cammock, who wasleading, in the company of The McMurrough, halted. 

"A fine place for a stand, " he said, looking about him with a soldierlyeye. "And better for an ambush. Especially on such a morning as this, when you cannot see a man five paces away. "

"I trust, " the Bishop answered, smiling, "that we shall have no need tomake the one, or to fear the other. "

"You could hold this, " Flavia asked eagerly, "with such men as wehave?"

"Against an army, " Cammock answered. 

"Against an army!" she murmured, as, her heart beating high with pride, they resumed their way, Flavia and the Bishop in the van. "Against anarmy!" she repeated fondly. 

The words had not fully left her lips when she recoiled. At the samemoment the Bishop uttered an exclamation, Cammock swore and seized hishilt, The McMurrough turned as if to flee. For on the path close tothem, facing them with a pistol in his hand, stood Colonel Sullivan. 

He levelled the pistol at the head of the nearest man, and thoughFlavia, with instant presence of mind, struck it up, the act helpedlittle. Before Cammock could clear his blade, or his companions back uphis resistance, four or five men, of Colonel John's following, flungthemselves on them from behind. They were seized, strong arms pinionedthem, knives were at their throats. In a twinkling, and while theystill expected death, sacks were dragged over their heads and down totheir waists, and they were helpless. 

It was well, it was neatly done; and completely done, with a singledrawback. The men had not seized Flavia, and, white as paper, but withrage not fear, she screamed shrilly for help--screamed twice. 

She would have screamed a third time, but Colonel Sullivan, who knewthat they were scarcely two furlongs from the meeting-place, and fromsome hundreds of merciless foes, did the only thing possible. He flunghis arms round her, pressed her face roughly against his shoulder, smothered her cries remorselessly. Then raising her, aided by the manwith the musket, he bore her, vainly struggling--and, it must be owned, scratching--after the others out of the driftway. 

The thing done, the Colonel's little band of Frenchmen knew that theyhad cast the die, and must now succeed or perish. The girl's screams, quickly suppressed, might not have given the alarm; but they had setnerves on edge. The prick of a knife was used--and often--to apprisethe blinded prisoners that if they did not move they would be piked. They were dragged, a seaman on either side of each captive, over somehundred paces of rough ground, through the stream, and so into a pathlittle better than a sheep-track which ran round the farther side ofthe hill of the tower, and descended that way to the more remote bankof the lake. It was a rugged path, steep and slippery, droppingprecipitously a couple of feet in places, and more than once followingthe bed of the stream. But it was traceable even in the mist, and theparty from the sloop, once put on it, could follow it. 

If no late-comer to the meeting encountered them, Colonel John, to whomevery foot of the ground was familiar, saw no reason, apart from thechances of pursuit, why they should not get the prisoners, whom theyhad so audaciously surprised, as far as the lower end of the lake. There he and his party must fall again into the Skull road and risk themore serious uncertainties of the open way. All, however, depended ontime. If Flavia's screams had not given the alarm, it would soon begiven by the absence of those whom the people had come to meet. Themissing leaders would be sought, pursuit would be organised. Yet, ifbefore that pursuit reached the foot of the lake, the fugitives hadpassed into the road, the raiders would stand a fair chance. Theywould at least have a start, the sloop in front of them, and theirenemies behind them. 

But, with peril on every side of them, Flavia was still the main, thereal difficulty. Colonel Sullivan could not hope to carry her far, evenwith the help of the man who fettered her feet, and bore part of herweight. Twice she freed her mouth and uttered a stifled cry. TheColonel only pressed her face more ruthlessly to him--his men's livesdepended on her silence. But the sweat stood on his brow; and, aftercarrying her no more than three hundred yards, he staggered under theunwilling burden. He was on the path now and descending, and he heldout a little farther. But presently, when he hoped that she hadswooned, she fell to struggling more desperately. He thought, on this, that he might be smothering her; and he relaxed his hold to allow herto breathe. For reward she struck him madly, furiously in the face, andhe had to stifle her again. 

But his heart was sick. It was a horrible, a brutal business, a thinghe had not foreseen on board the _Cormorant_. He had supposed that shewould faint at the first alarm; and his courage, which would have facedalmost any event with coolness, quailed. He could not murder the girl, and she would not be silent. No, she would not be silent! Short ofsetting her down and binding her hand and foot, which would take time, and was horrible to imagine, he could not see what to do. And the manwith him, who saw the rest of the party outstripping them, and as goodas disappearing in the fog, who fancied, with every step, that he heardthe feet of merciless pursuers overtaking them, was frantic withimpatience. 

Then Colonel John, with the sweat standing on his brow, did a thing towhich he afterwards looked back with great astonishment. 

"Give me your knife, " he said, with a groan, "and hold her hands! Wemust silence her, and there is only one way!"

The man, terrified as he was, and selfish as terrified men are, recoiled from the deed. "My God!" he said. "No!"

"Yes!" Colonel John retorted fiercely. "The knife!--the knife, man! Anddo you hold her hands!"

With a jerk he lifted her face from his breast--and this time sheneither struck him nor screamed. The man had half-heartedly drawn hisknife. The Colonel snatched it from him. "Now her hands!" he said. "Hold her, fool! I know where to strike!"

She opened her mouth to shriek, but no sound came. She had heard, sheunderstood; and for a moment she could neither struggle nor cry. Thatterror which rage and an almost indomitable spirit had kept at bayseized her; the sight of the gleaming death poised above her paralysedher throat. Her mouth gaped, her eyes glared at the steel; then, with aqueer sobbing sound, she fainted. 

"Thank God!" the Colonel cried. And there was indeed thankfulness inhis voice. He thrust the knife back into the man's hands, and, raisingthe girl again in his arms, "There is a house a little below, " he said. "We can leave her there! Hurry, man!--hurry!"

He had not traversed that road for twenty years, but his memory had nottricked him. Less than fifty paces below they came on a cabin, close tothe foot of the waterfall. The door was not fastened--for what, in sucha place, was there to steal?--and Colonel John thrust it open with hisfoot. The interior was dark, the place was almost windowless; but hemade out the form of an old crone who, nursing her knees, crouched witha pipe in her mouth beside a handful of peat. Seeing him, the womantottered to her feet with a cry of alarm, and shaded her bleared eyesfrom the inrush of daylight. She gabbled shrilly, but she knew onlyErse, and Colonel John attempted no explanation. 

"The lady of the house, " he said, in that tongue. And he laid Flavia, not ungently, but very quickly, on the floor. He turned about withoutanother word, shut the door on the two, and hurried along the path atthe full stretch of his legs. In half a minute he had overtaken hiscompanion, and the two pressed on together on the heels of the mainparty. 

The old beldame, left alone with the girl, viewed her with anastonishment which would have been greater if she had not reached thatage at which all sensations become dulled. How the Lady of the House, who was to her both Power and Providence, came to be there, and therein that state, passed her conception. But she had the sense to loosenthe girl's frock at the neck, to throw water on her face, and to beather hands. In a very few minutes Flavia, who had never swoonedbefore--fashionable as the exercise was at this period in femininesociety--sighed once or twice, and came to herself. 

"Where am I?" she muttered. Still for some moments she continued tolook about her in a dazed way; at length she recognised the old woman, and the cottage. Then she remembered, with a moan, what hadhappened--the ambuscade, the flight, the knife. 

She could not turn whiter, but she shuddered and closed her eyes. Atlast, with shrinking, she looked at her dress. "Am I--hurt?" shewhispered. 

The old woman did not understand, but she patted Flavia's hand. Meanwhile the girl saw that there was no blood on her dress, and shefound courage to raise her hand to her throat. She found no wound. Atthat she smiled faintly. Then she began to cry--for she was a woman. 

But, broken as she was by that moment of terror, Flavia's indulgence inthe feminine weakness was short, for it was measured by the time shedevoted to thoughts of her own fortunes. Quickly, very quickly, sheovercame her weakness; she stood up, she understood, and she extendedher arms in rage and grief and unavailing passion. That rage whichtreachery arouses in the generous breast, that passion which an outrageupon hospitality kindles in the meanest, that grief which ruined plansand friends betrayed have bred a thousand times in Irish bosoms--shefelt them all, and intensely. She would that the villains had killedher! She would that they had finished her life! Why should she survive, except for vengeance? For not only were her hopes for Ireland fallen;not only were those who had trusted themselves to The McMurroughperishing even now in the hands of ruthless foes; but her brother, herdear, her only brother, whom her prayers, her influence had broughtinto this path, he too was snared, of his fate also there could be nodoubt!

She felt all that was most keen, most poignant, of grief, of anger, ofindignation. But the sharpest pang of all--had she analysed herfeelings--was inflicted by the consciousness of failure, and of failureverging on the ignominious. The mature take good and evil fortune asthey come; but to fail at first setting out in life, to be outwitted inthe opening venture, to have to acknowledge that experience is, afterall, a formidable foe--these are mishaps which sour the magnanimous andpoison young blood. 

She had not known before what it was to hate. Now she only lived tohate: to hate the man who had shown himself so much cleverer than herfriends, who, in a twinkling, and by a single blow, had wrecked herplans, duped her allies, betrayed her brother, made her name alaughing-stock, robbed Ireland of a last chance of freedom! who hadheld her in his arms, terrified her, mastered her! Oh, why had sheswooned? Why had she not rather, disregarding her womanish weakness, her womanish fears, snatched the knife from him and plunged it into histreacherous breast? Why? Why?

CHAPTER XIV

THE COLONEL'S TERMS

Passive courage--courage in circumstances in which a man cannot helphimself, but must abide with bound hands whatever a frowning fortuneand his enemy's spite threaten--is so much higher a virtue than thatwhich carries him through hot emprises, and is so much more commonamong women, that the palm for bravery may fairly be given to theweaker sex. True, it is not in the first face of danger that a womanshines; time must be given her to string her nerves. But grant time andthere is no calamity so dreadful, no fate so abhorrent to tremblinghumanity, that a woman has not met it smiling: in the sack of cities, or in the slow agony of towns perishing of hunger, in the dungeon, orin the grip of disease. 

The bravest men share this gift, and some whom the shock of conflictappals. Cammock and the Bishop belonged to the former class. Seized ina moment of activity, certain only that they were in hostile hands, andhurried, blind and helpless, to an unknown doom, they might have beenpardoned had they succumbed to despair. But they did not succumb. Thehabit of danger, and a hundred adventures and escapes, had hardenedthem; they felt more rage than fear. Stunned for a moment by theaudacity of the attack, and humiliated by its success, they had notbeen dragged a hundred yards before they began to reason and tocalculate the chances. If the purpose of those into whose hands theyhad fallen were to murder them they would have been piked on the spot. On the other hand, if their captors' object was to deliver them toEnglish justice, it was a long way to the Four Courts, and farther toWestminster. Weeks, if not months, must elapse before they stood at thebar on a capital charge; much water must flow under the bridges, andmany a thing might happen, by force or fraud, in the interval. 

So, half-stifled and bitterly chagrined as they were, they did notwaste their strength in a vain resistance. They allowed themselves tobe pushed this way and pulled that, took what care they could of theirlimbs, and for their thoughts gave as many to vengeance as to safety. They had known many reverses in many lands. They did not believe thatthis was the end. And presently it would be their turn. 

With the third of the prisoners it was otherwise. The courage of theIrish is more conspicuous in the advance than in the retreat; and evenof that recklessness in fight, that joy in the conflict, which is theirbirthright and their fame, Flavia had taken more than her woman'sshare. In James McMurrough's mean and narrow nature there was smallroom for the generous passions. Unlike his sister, he would have struckthe face of no man in whose power he lay; nor was he one to keep astout heart when his hands were bound. Conscience does not always makecowards. But he knew into whose hands he had fallen, he knew the fateto which he had himself consigned Colonel John--or would have consignedhim but for self-interest--and his heart was water, his knees wereaspens, his hair rose, as, helpless, he pictured in livid hues the fatethat now awaited himself. 

As he had meant to do to the other, it would be done to him! He feltthe cruel pike rend the gasping throat; he had heard that it was themost painful death that a man could die, and that the shrieks of mendying on the pike-point could be heard a mile! Or would they throw him, bound and blind as he was, into the sullen lake--yes, that was it! Theywere carrying him that way, they were taking him to the lake. 

And once and twice, in the insanity of fear, he fought with his bondsuntil the blood came, even throwing himself down, until the men, out ofpatience, pricked him savagely, and drove him, venting choked cries ofpain, to his feet again. After the second attempt, if attempt thatcould be called which had no reasoning behind it, but only sheer animalfear, he staggered on, beaten, hopeless. He was aware that Colonel Johnwas not with them; and then, again, that he was with them; andthen--they were on the wide track now between the end of the lake andthe sea--that they were proceeding with increased caution. That mighthave given a braver man hope, the hope of rescue. But rescue had itselfterrors for The McMurrough. His captors, if pressed, might hasten theend, or his friends might strike him in the _mêlée_. And so, with everyfurlong of the forced journey, he died a fresh death. 

And the furlongs seemed interminable, quickly and roughly as he washurried along. In his terror the pains of his position, the heat, thefriction of the rough sacking, the want of air, went for little. But atlast he heard the fall of the waves on the shore, gorse pricked hislegs or tripped him up, the men about him spoke louder, he caught adistant hail. Laughter, and exclamations of triumph reached him, andthe voices of men who had won in spite of odds. 

Then a boat grated on the pebbles, he was lifted into it, and thrustdown in the bottom. He felt it float off, and heard the measured soundof the oars in the thole-pins. A few moments elapsed, the sound of theoars ceased, the boat bumped something. He was raised to his feet, hishands were unbound, he was set on a rope-ladder, and bidden to climb. Obeying with shaking knees, he was led across what he guessed to be adeck, and down steep stairs. Then his head was freed from the sack, and, sweating, dishevelled, pale with exhaustion and fear, he lookedabout him. 

The fog was still thick outside, turning day into twilight, and thecabin lamp had been lit and swung above the narrow table, filling thelowbrowed, Dutch-like interior with a strong but shifting light. Behindthe table Colonel John and the skipper leant against a bulkhead; beforethem, on the nearer side of the table, were ranged the three captives. Behind these, again, the dark, grinning faces of the sailors, withtheir tarred pigtails and flashing eyes, filled the doorway; and, beyond doubt, viewed under the uncertain light of the lamp, they showeda wild and savage crew. As James McMurrough looked, his hopes, whichhad risen during the last few minutes, sank. Escape, or chance ofescape, there was none. He was helpless, and what those into whosehands he had fallen determined, he must suffer. For a moment his heartstood still, his mouth gaped, he swayed on his feet. Then he clutchedthe table and steadied himself. 

"I am--giddy, " he muttered. 

"I am sorry that you have been put to so much inconvenience, " ColonelJohn answered civilly. 

The words, the tone, might have reassured him, if he had not suspecteda devilish irony. Even when Colonel John proceeded to direct one of themen to open a porthole and admit more air, he derived no comfort fromthe attention. But steady! Colonel John was speaking again. 

"You, too, gentlemen, " he said, addressing Cammock and the Bishop, "Iam sorry that I have been forced to put you to so much discomfort. ButI saw no other way of effecting my purpose. And, " he went on with asmile, "if you ask my warranty for acting as I have acted----"

"I do!" the Bishop said between his teeth. The Admiral said nothing, but breathed hard. 

"Then I can only vouch, " the Colonel answered, "the authority by virtueof which you seized me yesterday. I give you credit, reverend father, and you, Admiral, for a belief that in acting as you did you were doingyour duty; that in creating a rising here you were serving a causewhich you think worthy of sacrifice--the sacrifice of others as well asof yourselves. But I tell, you, as frankly, I feel it my duty to thwartthat purpose and prevent that rising; and for the moment fortune iswith me. The game, gentlemen, is for the present in my hand; the moveis mine. Now I need hardly say, " Colonel John continued, with anappearance almost of _bonhomie_, "that I do not wish to proceed toextremities, or to go farther than is necessary to secure my purpose. We might set sail for the nearest garrison port, and I might hand youover to the English authorities, assured that they would pay such areward as would compensate the shipmaster. But far be it from me to dothat! I would have no man's blood on my hands. And though I say at onceI would not shrink, were there no other way of saving innocent lives, from sending you to the scaffold----"

"A thousand thanks to you!" the Bishop said. But, brave man as he was, the irony in his voice masked relief; and not then, but a moment later, he passed his handkerchief across his brow. Cammock said nothing, butthe angry, bloodshot eyes which he fixed on the Colonel lost a littleof their ferocity. 

"I say, I would not shrink from doing that, " Colonel John continuedmildly, "were it necessary. Fortunately for us all, it is notnecessary. Still I must provide against your immediate return, againstimmediate action on your part. I must see that the movement which willdie in your absence is not revived by any word from you, or by tidingsof you! To that end, gentlemen, I must put you to the inconvenience ofa prolonged sea-voyage. "

"If I could speak with you in private?" the Bishop said. 

"You will have every opportunity, " Colonel John answered, smiling, "ofspeaking to Captain Augustin in private. "

"Still, sir, if I could see you alone I think I could convince you----"

"You shall have every opportunity of convincing Captain Augustin, "Colonel John returned, smiling more broadly, "and of convincing him bythe same means which I venture to think, reverend sir, you would employwith me. To be plain, he will take you to sea for a certain period, andat the end of that time, if your arguments are sufficiently weighty, hewill land you at a convenient harbour on the French shore. He will beat the loss of his cargo, and that loss I fear you will have to makegood. Something, too, he may charge by way of interest, and for yourpassage. " By this time the sailors were on the broad grin. "A trifle, perhaps, for landing dues. But I have spoken with him to be moderate, and I doubt not that within a few weeks you, Admiral Cammock, will bewith your command, and the reverend father will be pursuing his callingin another place. "

For a moment there was silence, save for a titter from the group ofseamen. Then Cammock laughed--a curt, barking laugh. "A bite!" he said. "A d----d bite! If I can ever repay it, sir, I will! Be sure of that!"

Colonel John bowed courteously. 

The Bishop took it otherwise. The veins on his forehead swelled, and hehad much ado to control himself. The truth was, he feared ridicule morethan he feared danger, perhaps more than he feared death; and such anend to such an enterprise was hard to bear. To have set forth to raisethe south of Ireland, to have undertaken a diversion that would neverbe forgotten, that, on the contrary, would be marked by historians as amain factor in the restoration of the house of Stuart--to have embarkedon such an enterprise and to be deported like any troublesome villagerdelivered to the pressgang for his hamlet's good! To end thus! It wastoo much. 

"Is there no alternative?" he asked, barely able to speak for thechagrin that took him by the throat. 

"One, if you prefer it, " Colonel Sullivan answered suavely. "You cantake your chance with the English authorities. For myself, I lean tothe course I have suggested. "

"If money were paid down--now? Now, sir?"

"It would not avail. "

"Much money?"

"No. "

The Bishop glared at him for a few seconds. Then his face relaxed, hiseyes grew mild, his chin sank on his breast. His fingers drummed on thetable. "His will be done!" he said--"His will be done! I was notworthy. "

His surrender seemed to sting Cammock. Perhaps in the course of theirjoint adventures he had come to know and to respect his companion, andfelt more for him than for himself. 

"If I had you on my quarter-deck for only half an hour, " he growled, "Iwould learn who was the better man! Ah, my man, I would!"

"The doubt flatters me, " Colonel John answered, viewing them both withgreat respect; for he saw that, bad or good, they were men. Then, "Thatbeing settled, " he continued, "I shall ask you, gentlemen, to go ondeck for a few moments, that I may say a word to my kinsman. "

"He is not to go with us?"

"That remains to be seen, " Colonel John replied, a note of sternness inhis voice. Still they hesitated, and he stood; but at last, inobedience to his courteous gesture, they bowed, turned--with a deepsigh on the Bishop's part--and clambered up the companion. The seamenhad already vanished at a word from Augustin, who himself proceeded tofollow his prisoners on deck. 

"Sit down!" Colonel Sullivan said, the same sternness in his voice. Andhe sat down on his side of the table, while James McMurrough, with asullen look but a beating heart, took his seat on the other. The fearof immediate death had left the young man; he tried to put on an air ofbravado, but with so little success that if his sister had seen himthus she had been blind indeed if she had not discerned, between thesetwo men seated opposite to one another, the difference that existsbetween the great and the small, the strong and the infirm of purpose. 

It was significant of that difference that the one was silent at will, while the other spoke because he had not the force to be silent. 

"What are you wanting with me?" the young man asked. 

"Is it not you, " Colonel John answered, with a piercing look, "will bewanting to know where O'Sullivan Og is--O'Sullivan Og, whom you sent todo your bidding this morning?"

The young man turned a shade paler, and his bravado fell from him. Hisbreath seemed to stop. Then, "Where?" he whispered--"where is he?"

"Where, I pray, Heaven, " Colonel John answered, with the samesolemnity, "may have mercy upon him. "

"He is not dead?" The McMurrough cried, his voice rising on the lastword. 

"I have little doubt he is, " the Colonel replied. "Dead, sir! And themen who were with him--dead also, or the most part of them. Dead, JamesMcMurrough, on the errand they went for you. "

The shock of the news struck the young man dumb, and for some momentshe stared at the Colonel, his face colourless. At length, "All dead?"he whispered. "Not all?"

"For what I know, " Colonel John replied. "Heaven forgive them!" And, inhalf a dozen sentences, he told him what had happened. Then, "They arethe first fruits, " he continued sternly, "God grant that they be thelast fruits of this reckless plot! Not that I blame them, who did butas they were bid. Nor do I blame any man, nor any woman who embarked onthis--reckless as it was, foolish as it was--with a single heart, either in ignorance of the things that I know, or knowing them, for thesake of an end which they set above their own lives. But--but"--andColonel John's voice grew more grave--"there was one who had neither ofthese two excuses. There was one who was willing to do murder, not inblind obedience, nor for a great cause, but to serve his own privateinterest and his own advantage!"

"No! no!" the young man cried, cowering before him. "It is not true!"

"One who was ready to do murder, " Colonel John continued pitilessly, "because it suited him to remove a man!"

"No! no!" the wretched youth cried, almost grovelling before him. "Itwas all of them!--it was all!"

"It was not all!" Colonel John retorted; but there was a keenness inhis face which showed that he had still something to learn. 

"It was--those two-on deck!" The McMurrough cried eagerly. "I swear itwas! They said--it was necessary. "

"They were one with you in condemning! Be it so! I believe you! But whospared?"

"I!" The McMurrough cried, breathlessly eager to exculpate himself. "Itwas I alone. I! I swear it. I sent the boy!"

"You spared? Yes, and you alone!" the Colonel made answer. "So Ithought, and out of your own mouth you are condemned. You sparedbecause you learned that I had made a will, and you feared lest thatwhich had passed to me in trust might pass to a stranger for good andall! You spared because it was--because you thought it was to yourinterest, your advantage to spare! I say, out of your own mouth you arecondemned. "

James McMurrough had scarcely force to follow the pitiless reasoning bywhich the elder man convicted him. But his conscience, his knowledge ofhis own motives, filled the hiatus, and what his tongue did not own hiscolourless face, his terrified eyes, confessed. 

"You have fallen into our hands, " Colonel John continued, grave asfate. "Why should we not deal with you as you would have dealt with us?No!"--the young man by a gesture had appealed to those on deck, totheir escape, to their impunity--"no! They may have consented to mydeath; but as the judge condemns, or the soldier kills; you--you, foryour private profit and advantage. Nevertheless, I shall not deal sowith you. You can go as they are going--abroad, to return at aconvenient season, and I hope a wiser man. Or----"

"Or--what?" the young man cried hurriedly. 

"Or you can stay here, " Colonel John continued, "and we will treat thepast as if it had not been. But on a condition. "

James's colour came back. "What'll you be wanting?" he muttered, averting his gaze. 

"You must swear that you will not pursue this foolish plan further. That first. "

"What can I be doing without _them_?" was the sullen answer. 

"Very true, " Colonel John rejoined. "But you must swear also, myfriend, that you will not attempt anything against me, nor be party toanything. "

"What'd I be doing?"

"Don't lie!" the Colonel replied, losing his temper for a singleinstant. "You know what you have done, and therefore what you'd belikely to do. I've no time to bandy words, and you know how you stand. Swear on your hope of salvation to those two things, and you may stay. Refuse, and I make myself safe by your absence. That is all I have tosay. "

The young man had the sense to know that he was escaping lightly. Thetimes were rough, the district was lawless, he had embarked--howfoolishly he saw--on an enterprise too high for him. He was willingenough to swear that he would not pursue that enterprise further. Butthe second undertaking stuck in his gizzard. He hated Colonel John. Forthe past wrong, for the past defeat, above all for the presenthumiliation, ay, and for the very magnanimity which spared him, he, theweak spirit, hated the strong with a furious, if timid malignity. 

"I'm having no choice, " he said, shrugging his shoulders. 

"Very good, " Colonel John answered curtly. And, going to the door, hecalled Bale from his station by the hatchway, and despatched him to theBishop and to Admiral Cammock, requesting them to do him the honour todescend. 

They came readily enough, in the hope of some favourable turn. But theColonel's words quickly set them right. 

"Gentlemen, " he said politely, "I know you to be men of honour inprivate life. For this reason I have asked you to be present aswitnesses to the bargain between my cousin and myself. Blood is thickerthan water: he has no mind to go abroad, and I have no mind to send himagainst his will. But his presence, after what has passed, is astanding peril to myself. To meet this difficulty, and to free me fromthe necessity of banishing him, he is ready to swear by all he holdssacred, and upon his honour, that he will attempt nothing against me, nor be a party to it. Is that so, sir?" the speaker continued. "Do youwillingly, in the presence of these gentlemen, give that undertaking?"

The young man, with averted eyes and a downcast face, nodded. 

"I am afraid I must trouble you to speak, " Colonel John said. 

"I do, " he muttered, looking at no one. 

"Further, that you will not within six months attempt anything againstthe Government?" Colonel John continued. 

"I will not. "

"Very good. I accept that undertaking, and I thank these gentlemen fortheir courtesy in condescending to act as witnesses. Admiral Cammockand you, reverend father, " Colonel John continued, "it remains but tobid you farewell, and to ask you to believe"--the Colonel paused--"thatI have not pushed further than was necessary the advantage I gained. "

"By a neat stroke, Colonel Sullivan, " the Bishop replied, with a rathersour smile, "not to say a bold one. I'm not denying it. But one, I'dhave you notice, that cannot be repeated. "

"Maybe not, " the Colonel answered. "I am content to think that for sometime to come I have transferred your operations, gentlemen, to a spherewhere I am not concerned for the lives of the people. "

"There are things more precious than lives, " the Bishop said. 

"I admit it. More by token I'm blaming you little--only you see, sir, Idiffer. That is all. "

With that Colonel Sullivan bowed and left the cabin, and TheMcMurrough, who had listened to the colloquy with the air of a whippedhound, slunk after him. On deck the Colonel and Augustin talked apartfor a moment, then the former signed to the young man to go down intothe boat, which lay alongside with a couple of men at the oars, andBale seated in the sternsheets. The fog still hung upon the water, andthe land was hidden. The young man could not see where they lay. 

After the lapse of a minute or two Colonel John joined him, and therowers pushed off, while Augustin and the crew leant over the rail tosee them go, and to send after them a torrent of voluble good wishes. Avery few, strokes of the oars brought the passengers within misty viewof the land; in less than two minutes after leaving the _Cormorant_ theboat grated on the rocks, and the Colonel, James McMurrough, and Balelanded. The young man made out that they were some half-mile eastwardof Skull Harbour. 

Bale stayed to exchange a few words with the seamen, while Colonel Johnand The McMurrough set off along the beach. They had not walked fiftyyards before the fog isolated them; they were alone. And astonishmentfilled the young man, and grew as they walked. Did Colonel John, afterall that had happened, mean to return to Morristown? to establishhimself calmly--he, alone--in the midst of the conspirators whoseleaders he had removed?

It seemed incredible! For though he, James McMurrough, thirst forrevenge as he might, was muzzled by his oath, what of the others? Whatof Sir Donny and old Timothy Burke? What of the two O'Beirnes? Nay, what of his sister, whom he could fancy more incensed, more vindictive, more dangerous than them all? What, finally, of the barbarous rout ofpeasants, ready to commit any violence at a word from him?

And still the Colonel walked on by his side. And now they were in sightof Skull--of the old tower and the house by the jetty, looming largethrough the dripping mist. And at last Colonel John spoke. 

"It was fortunate that I made my will as I came through Paris, " hesaid. 

CHAPTER XV

FEMINA FURENS

The Irish of that day, with all their wit and all their courage, hadthe bad habit of looking abroad for leaders. Colonel John had runlittle risk of being wrong in taking for granted that the meeting atthe Carraghalin, mysteriously robbed of the chiefs from over-seas, whose presence had brought the movement to a head, would disperse;either amid the peals of Homeric laughter that in Ireland greet amonster jest, or, in sadder mood, cursing the detested Saxon for onemore added to the many wrongs of a downtrodden land. 

Had Flavia indeed escaped, had the raid which Colonel Sullivan had soaudaciously conceived failed to embrace her, the issue might have beendifferent. Had she appeared upon the scene at the critical moment, hercourage and enthusiasm might have supported the spirits of theassemblage and kept it together. But Uncle Ulick had not the force todo this: much less had old Timothy Burke or Sir Donny. Uncle Ulick, weknow, expected little good from the rising; he was prepared for any, the worst mishap; while the faith of the older men in any change forthe better was not robust enough to stand alone or to resist the firstblast of doubt. 

Their views indeed were more singular than cheerful. 

"Very like, " Sir Donny said, with a fallen under-lip, "the ould earth'sopened her mouth and swallowed them. She's tired, small blame to her, with all the heretics burdening her and tormenting her--the cream ofhell's fire to them!"

"Whisht, man!" the other answered. "Be easy; you're forgetting one's abishop. Small chance of the devil's tackling him, and, like enough theholy water and all ready to his hand!"

"Then I'm not knowing what it is, " the first pronounced hopelessly. 

"There you speak truth, Sir Donny, " Tim Burke answered. "Is it they canbe losing their way in the least taste of fog there is, do you think?"

"And the young lady knowing the path, so that she'd be walking itblindfold in the dark!"

"I'm fearing, then, it will be the garr'son from Tralee, " was UncleUlick's contribution. And he shook his head. "The saints be between usand them, and grant we'll not be seeing more of them than we like, andsooner!"

"Amen to that same!" replied old Timothy Burke, with an uneasy lookbehind him. 

There was nothing comforting in this. And the messengers sent to learnwhat was amiss and why the expected party did not arrive had as littlecheer to give. They could learn nothing. On which Uncle Ulick and hisfellows rubbed their heads: the small men wondered. A fewpanic-stricken, began to slip away, but the mass were faithful. An hourwent by in this trying uncertainty, and a second and part of a third;and messengers departed and came, and there were rumours and alarms, and presently something like the truth got abroad; and there was talkof pursuit, and a band of young stalwarts was detailed and sent off. Still the greater part of the assemblage, with Irish patience, remainedseated in ranks on the slopes of the hills, the women with theirdrugget shawls drawn over their heads, the men with their frieze coatshanging loose about them. The chill mist which clung to the hillsides, and the atmosphere of doubt which overhung all, were a poor exchangefor the roaring bonfires, the good cheer, the enthusiasm, the merrimentof the previous evening. But the Irish peasant, if he be less staunchat the waiting--even as he is more forward in the hand-to-hand than hisScottish cousins--has the peasant's gift of endurance; and in the mosttrying hours--in ignorance, in doubt, in danger--has often held hisground in dependence on his betters, with a result pitiful in thereading. For too often the great have abandoned the little, the horsehas borne off the rider, and the naked footman, surprised, surrounded, out-matched, and put to the sword, has paid for all. 

But on this day a time came, about high noon, when the assemblage--andthe fog--began at last to melt. Sir Donny was gone, and old Tim Burkeof Maamtrasna. They had slipped homewards, by little-known tracksacross the peat hags; and, shamefaced and fearful of the consequences, the spirit all gone out of them, had turned their minds to oaths andalibis. They had been in trouble before, and were taken to know; andtheir departure sapped the O'Beirnes' resolution, whose uneasy faces asthey talked together spread the contagion. Uncle Ulick and several ofthe buckeens were away on the search; the handful of Spanish seamen hadreturned to the house or to the ship: there was no one to check thedefection when it set in. An hour after Sir Donny had slipped away, themovement which might have meant so much to so many was spent. Theslopes about the ruined gables which they called Carraghalin, and whichwere all that remained of the once proud abbey, had returned to theirwonted solitude; where hundreds had sat a short hour before the eaglehovered, the fox turned his head and scented the wind. Even the houseat Morristown had so far become itself again that a scarcity, ratherthan a plenitude of life, betrayed the past night of orgy; and aquietness beyond the ordinary, the things that had been dreamed. Thegarrison of Tralee, the Protestant Settlement at Kenmare, facts whichhad been held distant and negligible in the first flush of hope andaction, now seemed to the fearful fancy many an Irish mile nearer andmany a shade more real. 

Doubtless, in the minds of some, a secret thankfulness that, after all, they were not required to take the leap, relieved the disappointmentand lessened the shame. They were well out of an ugly scrape, theyreflected; well clear of the ugly shadow of the gallows--alwayssupposing that no informer appeared. It might even be the hand ofProvidence, they thought, that had removed their leaders, and so heldthem back. They might think themselves happy to be quit of it for thefright. 

But there was one--one who found no such consolation; one to whom theissue was pure loss, a shameful defeat, the end of hopes, the defeat ofprayers that had never risen to heaven more purely than that morning. 

Flavia sat with her eyes on the dead peat that cumbered the hearth--forin the general excitement the fire had been suffered to go out--and ina stupor of misery refused to be comforted. Of her plans, of herdevotion, of her lofty resolves, this was the result. She had aspired, God knew how honestly and earnestly, for her race downtrodden and herfaith despised, and this was the bitter fruit. Nor was it only thegirl's devotion to her country and to her faith that lay sore wounded:her vanity suffered, and perhaps more keenly. The enterprise that wasto have glorified the name of McMurrough, that was to have raised thatfallen race, that was to have made that distant province blessed amongthe provinces of Ireland, had come to an end, derisive and contemptible, before it was born. Her spirit, unbroken by experience and untrained todefeat, fearing before all things ridicule, dashed itself against thedreadful conviction, the dreadful fact. She could hardly believe thatall was over. She could hardly realise that the cup was no longer ather lip, that the bird had escaped from the hand. But she looked fromthe window; and, lo, the courtyard which had hummed and seethed wasdead and silent. In one corner a knot of men were carrying out the armsand the powder, and were preparing to bury them. In another, awoman--it was Sullivan Og's widow--sat weeping. It was the _Hic jacet_of the great Rising that was to have been, and that was to haveregenerated Ireland!

And "You must kill him!" she cried, with livid cheeks and blazing eyes. "If you do not, I will!"

Uncle Ulick, who had heard the story of the ambush, and beyond doubtwas one of those who felt more relief than disappointment, stretchedhis legs uneasily. He longed to comfort her, but he did not know whatto say. Moreover, he was afraid of her in this mood. 

"You must kill him!" she repeated. 

"We'll talk of that, " he said, "when we see him. "

"You must kill him!" the girl repeated passionately. "Or I will! If youare a man, if you are an Irishman, if you are a Sullivan, kill him, theshame of your race! Or I will!"

"If he had been on our side, " Uncle Ulick answered soberly, "instead ofagainst us, I'm thinking we should have done better. "

The girl drew in her breath sharply, pierced to the quick by thethought. Simultaneously the big man started, but for another reason. His eyes were on the window, and they saw a sight which his minddeclined to believe. Two men had entered the courtyard--had enteredwith astonishing, with petrifying nonchalance, as it seemed to him. Forthe first was Colonel Sullivan. The second--but the second slunk at theheels of the first with a hang-dog air--was James McMurrough. 

Fortunately Flavia, whose eyes were glooming on the cold hearth and theextinct ashes, fit image of her dead hopes, had her back to thecasement. Uncle Ulick rose. His thoughts came with a shock against thepossibility that Colonel John had the garrison of Tralee at his back!But, although The McMurrough had all the appearance of a prisoner, Ulick thrust away the notion as soon as it occurred. To clear his mind, he looked to see how the men engaged in getting out the powder weretaking it. They had ceased to work, and were staring with all theireyes. Something in their bearing and their attitudes told Uncle Ulickthat the notion which had occurred to him had occurred to them, andthat they were prepared to run at the least alarm. 

"His blood be on his own head!" he muttered. But he did not say it inthe tone of a man who meant it. 

"Amen!" she cried, her back still turned to the window, her eyesbrooding on the cold hearth. The words fell in with her thoughts. 

By this time Colonel Sullivan was within four paces of the door. In ahandturn he would be in the room, he would be actually in the girl'spresence--and Uncle Ulick shrank from the scene which must follow. Colonel John was, indeed, and plainly, running on his fate. Already theO'Beirnes, awakening from their trance of astonishment, were closing inbehind him with grim faces; and short of the garrison of Tralee the bigman saw no help for him; well-nigh--so strongly did even he feel on thematter--he desired none. But Flavia must have no part in it. In God'sname, let the girl be clear of it!

The big man took two steps to the door, opened it, slipped through, andclosed it behind him. His breast as good as touched that of ColonelSullivan, who was on the threshold. Behind the Colonel was JamesMcMurrough; behind James were the two O'Beirnes and two others, ofwhose object, as they cut off the Colonel's retreat, no man who sawtheir faces could doubt. 

For once, in view of the worse things that might happen in the house, Ulick was firm. "You can't come in!" he said, his face pale andfrowning. He had no word of greeting for the Colonel. "You can't comein!" he repeated, staring straight at him. 

The Colonel turned and saw the four men with arms in their handsspreading out behind him. He understood. "You had better let me in, " hesaid gently. "James will talk to them. "

"James----"

"You had better speak to them, " Colonel John continued, addressing hiscompanion. "And you, Ulick----"

"You can't come in, " Ulick repeated grimly. 

James McMurrough interposed in his harshest tone. "An end to this!" hecried. "Who the devil are you to bar the door, Ulick! And you, Phelimand Morty, be easy a minute till you hear me speak. "

Ulick still barred the way. "James, " he said, in a voice little above awhisper, "you don't know----"

"I know enough!" The McMurrough answered violently. It went sadlyagainst the grain with him to shield his enemy, but so it must be. "Curse you, let him in!" he continued fiercely; they were making histask more hard for him. "And have a care of him, " he added anxiously. "Do you hear? Have a care of him!"

Uncle Ulick made a last feeble attempt. "But Flavia, " he said. "Flaviais there and----"

"Curse the girl!" James answered. "Get out of the road and let the manin! Is this my house or yours?"

Ulick yielded, as he had yielded so often before. He stood aside. Colonel John opened the door and entered. 

The rest happened so quickly that no movement on his part could havesaved him. Flavia had heard their voices in altercation--it might be ahalf minute, it might be a few seconds before. She had risen to herfeet, she had recognised the voice of one of the speakers--he hadspoken once only, but that was enough--she had snatched up the nakedsword that since the previous morning had leant in the chimney corner. As Colonel John crossed the threshold--oh, dastardly audacity, oh, insolence incredible, that in the hour of his triumph he should soilthat threshold!--she lunged with all the force of her strong young armat his heart. 

With such violence that the hilt struck his breast and hurled himbodily against the doorpost; while the blade broke off, shivered bycontact with the hard wood. 

Uncle Ulick uttered a cry of horror. "My G----d!" he exclaimed, "youhave killed him!"

"His blood----"

She stopped on the word. For instead of falling Colonel John wasregaining his balance. "Flavia!" he cried--the blade had passed throughhis coat, missing his breast by a bare half-inch. "Flavia, hold!Listen! Listen a moment!"

But in a frenzy of rage, as soon as she saw that her blow had failed, she struck at him with the hilt and the ragged blade thatremained--struck at his face, struck at his breast, with cries of furyalmost animal. "Wretch! wretch!" she cried--"die! If they are cowards, I am not! Die!"

The scene was atrocious, and Uncle Ulick, staring open-mouthed, gave nohelp. But Colonel Sullivan mastered her wrists, though not until he hadsustained a long bleeding cut on the jaw. Even then, though fettered, and though he had forced her to drop the weapon, she struggleddesperately with him--as she had struggled when he carried her throughthe mist. "Kill him! kill him!" she shrieked. "Help! help!"

The men would have killed him twice and thrice if The McMurrough, withvoice and blade and frantic imprecations and the interposition of hisown body, had not kept the O'Beirnes and the others at bay--explaining, deprecating, praying, cursing, all in a breath. Twice a blow was struckat the Colonel through the doorway, but one fell short and the otherJames McMurrough parried. For a moment the peril was of the greatest:the girl's cries, the sight of her struggling in Colonel John's grip, wrought the men almost beyond James's holding. Then the strength wentout of her suddenly, she ceased to fight, and but for ColonelSullivan's grasp she would have fallen her length on the floor. He knewthat she was harmless then, and he thrust her into the nearest chair. He kicked the broken sword under the table, staunched the blood thattrickled fast from his cheek; last of all, he looked at the men whowere contending with James in the doorway. 

"Gentlemen, " he said, breathing a little quickly, but in no other waybetraying the strait through which he had passed, "I shall not runaway. I shall be here to answer you to-morrow, as fully as to-day. Inthe meantime I beg to suggest"--again he raised the handkerchief to hischeek and staunched the blood--"that you retire now, and hear what TheMcMurrough has to say to you: the more as the cases and the arms I seein the courtyard lie obnoxious to discovery and expose all to riskwhile they remain so. "

His surprising coolness did more to check them than The McMurrough'sefforts. They gaped at him in wonder. Then one uttered an imprecation. 

"The McMurrough will explain if you will go with him, " Colonel Johnanswered patiently, "I say again, gentlemen, I shall not run away. "

"If you mean her any harm----"

"I mean her no harm. "

"Are you alone?"

"I am alone. "

So far Morty. But Phelim O'Beirne was not quite satisfied. "If a hairof her head be hurt----" he growled, pushing himself forward, "I tellyou, sir----"

"And I tell you!" James McMurrough retorted, repelling him. "What arethe hairs of her head to you, Phelim O'Beirne? Am I not him that's herbrother? A truce to your prating, curse you, and be coming with me. Iunderstand him, and that is enough!"

"But His Reverence----"

"His Reverence is as safe as you or me!" James retorted. "If it werenot so, are you thinking I'd be here? Fie on you!" he went on, pushingPhelim through the door; "you are good at the talking now, when it'slittle good it will be doing! But where were you this morning when agood blow might have saved all?"

"Could I be helping it, when----?"

The voices passed away, still wrangling, across the courtyard. UncleUlick stepped to the door and closed it. Then he turned and spoke hismind. 

"You were wrong to come back, John Sullivan, " he said, the hardness ofhis tone bearing witness to his horror of what had happened. "Shame onyou! It is no thanks to you that your blood is not on the girl's hands, and the floor of your grandfather's house! You're a bold man, I allow. But the fox made too free with the window at last, and, take my wordfor it, there are a score of men, whose hands are surer than thischild's, who will not rest till they have had your life! And after whathas happened, can you wonder? Be bid and go then; be bid, and go whilethe breath is firm in you!"

Colonel John did not speak for a moment, and when he did answer, it waswith a severity that overbore Ulick's anger, and in a tone of contemptthat was something new to the big man. "If the breath be firm in thosewhom you, Ulick Sullivan, " he said--"ay, you, Ulick Sullivan--and yourfellows would have duped, it is enough for me! For myself, whom shouldI fear? The plotters whose childish plans were not proof against thesimplest stratagem? The conspirators"--his tone grew more cutting inits scorn--"who took it in hand to pull down a throne and were routedby a Sergeant's Guard? The poor puppets who played at a game too highfor them, and, dreaming they were Sarsfields or Montroses, danced intruth to others' piping? Shall I fear them, " he continued, the tail ofhis eye on the girl, who, sitting low in her chair, writhedinvoluntarily under his words--"poor tools, poor creatures, only alittle less ignorant, only a little more guilty than the clods theywould have led to the crows or the hangman? Is it these I am to fear;these I am to flee from? God forbid, Ulick Sullivan! I am not the manto flee from shadows!"

His tone, his manner, the truth of his words--which were intended toopen the girl's eyes, but did in fact increase her burningresentment--hurt even Uncle Ulick's pride. "Whisht, man, " he saidbitterly. "It's plain you're thinking you're master here!"

"I am, " Colonel John replied sternly. "I am, and I intend to be. Nor aday too soon! Where all are children, there is need of a master! Don'tlook at me like that, man! And for my cousin, let her hear the truthfor once! Let her know what men who have seen the world think of thevisions, from which she would have awakened in a dungeon, and the poorfools, her fellow-dupes, under the gibbet! A great rising for a greatcause, if it be real, man, if it be earnest, if it be based onforethought and some calculation of the chances, God knows I hold it afine thing, and a high thing! But the rising of a child with a bladderagainst an armed man, a rising that can ruin but cannot help, I knownot whether to call it more silly or more wicked! Man, the devil doeshis choicest work through fools, not rogues! And, for certain, he neverfound a choicer morsel or fitter instruments than at Morristownyesterday. "

Uncle Ulick swore impatiently. "We may be fools, " he growled. "Yetspare the girl! Spare the girl!"

"What? Spare her the truth?"

"All! Everything!" Uncle Ulick cried, with unusual heat. "Cannot yousee that she at least meant well!"

"Such do the most ill, " Colonel John retorted, with sententiousseverity. "God forgive them--and her!" He paused for a moment and then, in a lighter tone, he continued, "As I do. As I do gladly. Only theremust be an end of this foolishness. The two men who knew in what theyworked and had reason in their wrong-doing are beyond seas. We shallsee their faces no more. The McMurrough is not so mad as to wish to actwithout them. He"--with a faint smile--"is not implacable. You, Ulick, are not of the stuff of whom martyrs are made, nor are Mr. Burke andSir Donny. But the two young men outside"--he paused as if hereflected--"they and three or four others are--what my cousin nowlistening to me makes them. They are tow, if the flame be brought nearthem. And therefore--and therefore, " he repeated still more slowly, "Ihave spoken the truth and plainly. To this purpose, that there may bean end. "

Flavia had sat at first with closed eyes, in a state next door tocollapse, her head inclined, her arms drooping, as if at any moment shemight sink to the floor. But in the course of his speaking a change hadcome over her. The last heavings of the storm, physical and mental, through which she had passed, still shook her; now a quiver distortedher features, now a violent shudder agitated her from head to foot. Butthe indomitable youth in her, and the spirit which she had inheritedfrom some dead forefather, were not to be long gainsaid. Slowly, as shelistened--and mainly under the influence of indignation--her colour hadreturned, her face grown more firm, her form more stiff. In truthColonel John had adopted the wrong course with her. He had beenhard--knowing men better than women--when he should have been mild; hehad browbeaten where he should have forgiven. And so at his lastdeclaration, "There must be an end, " she rose to her feet, and spoke. And speaking, she showed that neither the failure of her attempt onhim, nor the bodily struggle with him, horribly as it humiliated her inthe remembrance, had quelled her courage. 

"An end!" she said, in a voice vibrating with emotion. "Yes, but itwill be an end for you! Children, are we? Well, better that, a thousandtimes better that, than be so old before our time, so cold of heart andcunning of head that there is naught real for us but that we touch andsee, nothing high for us but that our words will be measuring, nothingworth risk but that we are safe to gain! Children, are we?" shecontinued, with deep passion. "But at least we believe! At least we ownsomething higher than ourselves--a God, a Cause, a Country! At least wehave not bartered all--all three and honour for a pittance of pay, fighting alike for right or wrong, betraying alike the right and wrong!Children? May be! But, God be thanked, we are warm, the blood runs inus----"

"Flavia!"

"I say the blood runs in us!" she repeated. "And if we are foolish, asyou say, we are wiser yet than one"--she looked at him with a strangeand almost awful steadfastness--"who in his wisdom thinks that atraitor can walk our Irish soil unharmed, or one go back and forth insafety who has ruined and shamed us! You have escaped my hand! But Iknow that all your boasted wisdom will not lengthen your life till themoon wanes!"

He had tried to interrupt her once--eagerly, vividly, as one who woulddefend himself. He answered her now after another fashion: perhaps hehad learnt his lesson. "If God wills, " he said simply, "it will be so;it will be as you say. And the road will lie open to you. Only while Ilive, Flavia, whether I love this Irish soil or not, or my country, ormy honour, the storm shall not break here, nor the house fall fromwhich we spring!"

"While you live!" she repeated, with a dreadful smile. "I tell you, Itell you, " and she extended her hand towards him, "the winding-sheet ishigh upon your breast, and the salt dried that shall lie upon yourheart. "

CHAPTER XVI

THE MARPLOT

If, after that, Colonel Sullivan's life had depended on his courage orthe vigilance of his servant, it is certain that, tried as was the oneand unwinking as was the other, Flavia's prophecy would have beenquickly fulfilled. He would not have seen another moon, perhaps hewould not have seen another dawn. The part which he had played in theevents at the Carraghalin was known to few; but the hundred tongues ofrumour were already abroad, carrying as many versions, and in all hewas the marplot. His traffic with the Old Fox had spirited away theHoly Father in God--whom the saints preserve!--and swept off also, probably on a broom-stick, the doughty champion whose sole desire itwas to lead the hosts of Ireland to victory. In the eyes of some tenscore persons, scattered over half a dozen leagues of country, wild, and beyond the pale of law--persons who valued an informer's life nohigher than a wolf's--he wore the ugly shape of one. And the logicalconsequence was certain. That the man who had done these things shouldcontinue to walk the sod, that the man who had these things on hisblack heretic conscience should continue to haunt the scene of hiscrimes and lord it over those whom his misdeeds had sullied, was to thecommon mind unthinkable--nay, incredible: a blot on God's good day. Toevery potato-setter who, out of the corner of his eye, watched hispassage, to every beggar by the road whose whine masked heart-feltcurses, to the very children who fell back from the cabin door toescape his evil eye, this was plain and known, and the man already asthe dead. For if the cotters by the lakeside were not men enough, thenights being at present moonlit, was there not Roaring Andy's band inthe hills, not seven miles away, who would cut any man's throat for asilver doubloon, and a Protestant's for the "trate it would be, andsorra a bit of pay at all, the good men!"

Beyond doubt the Colonel's boldness, and the nerve which enabled him totake his place as if nothing threatened him, went for something; andfor something the sinister prestige which the disappearance ofO'Sullivan Og and his whole party cast about him. For there was wailingin the house by the jetty: the rising had cost some lives though nippedin the bud. The evening tide had cast the body of one of the men uponthe shore, where it had been found among the sea-wrack; and, though thefate of the others remained a mystery, the messenger who had sped afterOg with the counter-order told the story as he knew it. The means bywhich the two prisoners, in face of odds so great, had destroyed theircaptors, were still a secret; but the worst was feared. The Irish areever open to superstitious beliefs, and the man who singlehanded couldwreak such a vengeance, who poured death as it were from a horn, wenthis way by road and bog, shrouded in a gloomy fame that might provokethe bold, but kept the timid at bay. Before night it was known in adozen lonely cabins that the Colonel might be shot from behind witha silver bullet: or stabbed, if a man were bold enough, with across-handled knife, blest and sprinkled. But woe to him whose aimproved faulty or his hand uncertain! His chance in the grasp of theFather of ill, or of the mis-shapen Trolls, _revenants_ of a heathenrace, who yearly profaned the Carraghalin with their orgies, had notbeen worse!

But this reputation alone, seeing that reckless spirits were notwanting, nor in the recesses of the hills those whose lives wereforfeit, would have availed him little if the protection of TheMcMurrough had not been cast over him. Why it was cast over him, sothat he went to and fro in safety--men scarcely dared to guess; it wasa dark thing into which it were ill to peer too closely. But the factwas certain; so certain that the anxiety of the young man that theColonel might meet with no hurt was plain and notorious, a thingobserved stealthily and with wonder. Did Colonel John saunter acrossthe court to the gateway, to look on the lake, The McMurrough was athis shoulder in a twinkling, and thence, with a haggard eye, searchedthe furze-bush for the glint of a gun-barrel, and the angle of the wallfor a lurking foe. It was the same if the Colonel, who seemed himselfunconscious of danger, fared as far as the ruined tower, or stretchedhis legs on the road by the shore. The McMurrough could not be too nearhim, walked with his hand on his arm, cast from time to time vigilantlooks to the rear. A score of times between rising and sleeping ColonelJohn smiled at the care that forewent his steps and covered hisretreat; nor perhaps had the contempt in which he held James McMurroughever reached a higher pitch than while he thus stood from hour to hourindebted to that young man for his life. 

What Uncle Ulick, if he held the key to the matter, thought of it, orhow he explained it, if he had not, did not appear; nor, certain thatthe big man would favour a course of action that made for peace, wasColonel John overcurious to know. But what Flavia thought of theposition was a point which aroused his most lively curiosity. He gaveher credit for feelings so deep and for a nature so downright, thattime-serving or paltering were the last faults he looked to find inher. He could hardly believe that she would consent to sit at meat withhim after what had happened; and possibly--for men are strange, and themotives of the best are mixed--a desire to see how she would behave andhow she would bear herself in the circumstances had something to dowith the course he was taking. 

That she consented to the plan was soon made clear. She even took partin it. James could not be always at his elbow. The young man mustsometimes retire, it might be to vent his spleen in curses he dared notutter openly, it might be to take other measures for his safety. Whenthis happened, the girl took her brother's place, stooped to dog theColonel's footsteps, and for a day or two, while the danger hung mostimminent, and every ditch to James's fancy held a lurking foe, cast themantle of her presence over the man she hated. 

But stoop as she might, she never for a moment stooped to mask herhate. In her incomings and her outgoings, in her risings-up and attable with him, every movement of her body, the carriage of her head, the glance of her eye, showed that she despised him; that she who nowsuffered him was the same woman who had struck at his life, and, failing, repented only the failure. In all she did, in parleying withhim, in bearing with his presence, in suffering his gaze, she made itplain that she did it against her will; as the captive endures perforcethe company of the brigand in whose power he lies, but whom, whenopportunity offers, he will deliver with avidity to the cord or thegarotte. Because she must, and for her brother's sake, for the sake ofhis name and pride and home, she was willing to do this, though sheabhorred it; and though every time that she broke bread with theintruder, met his eyes, or breathed the air that he breathed, she toldherself that it was intolerable, that it must end. 

Once or twice, feeling the humiliation more than she could bear, shedeclared to her brother that the man must go. "Let him go!" she cried, in uncontrollable excitement. "Let him go!"

"But he will not be going, Flavvy. "

"He must go!" she replied. 

"And Morristown his?" James would answer. "Ye are forgetting! Over andabove that, he's not one to do my bidding, nor yours!"

That was true. He would not go; he persisted in remaining and beingmaster. But it was not there the difficulty lay. If he had not made awill before he came, a will that doubtless set the property of thefamily for ever beyond James's reach, the thing had been simple andColonel John's shrift had been short. But now, to rid the earth of himwas to place the power in the hands of an unknown person, a stranger, an alien, for whom the ties of family and honour would have nostringency. True, the law was weak in Kerry. A writ was one thing, andpossession another. Whatever right a stranger might gain, it could onlybe with difficulty and after the lapse of years that he would make itgood against the old family, or plant those about him who would ensurehis safety. But it did not do to depend on this. Within the lastgeneration, the McCarthys, a clan more powerful than the McMurroughs, had been driven from the greater part of their lands; and on every sideEnglish settlers were impinging on the old Irish families. A bold manmight indeed keep the forces of law at bay for a time; but JamesMcMurrough, notwithstanding the folly into which he had been led, wasno desperado. He had no desire to live with a rope round his neck, toflee to the bog on the least alarm, and, in the issue, to give his nameto an Irish Glencoe. 

A stranger position it had been hard to conceive; or one morehumiliating to a proud and untamed spirit such as Flavia's. Whatarguments, what prayers, what threats The McMurrough used to bring herto it, Colonel Sullivan could not guess. But though she consented, hershame, her resentment, her hostility, were so patent that the effectwas to pair off Colonel John and herself, to pit them one against theother, to match them one to one. The McMurrough, supple and insincere, found little difficulty in subduing his temper to his interests, thoughnow and again his churlishness broke out. For Uncle Ulick, his habitwas to be easy and to bid others be easy; the dawn and dark of a dayreconciled him to most things. The O'Beirnes, sullen and distrustful, were still glad to escape present peril. Looking for a better time tocome, they took their orders, helped to shield the common enemy, supposed it policy, and felt no shame. Flavia alone, in presence of theman who had announced that he meant to be master, writhed in helplessrevolt, swore that he should never be her master, swore that whoeverbowed the head she never would. 

And Colonel Sullivan, seated, apparently at his ease, on the steep lapof danger, found that this hostility and the hostile person held histhoughts. A man may be an enthusiast in the cause of duty, he may haveplucked from the hideous slough of war the rare blue flower ofloving-kindness, he may in the strength of his convictions seemsufficient to himself; he will still feel a craving for sympathy. Colonel Sullivan was no exception. He found his thoughts dwelling onthe one untamable person, on the one enemy who would not stoop, andwhose submission seemed valuable. The others took up, in a greater orless degree, the positions he assigned to them, gave him lip-service, pretended that they were as they had been, and he as he had been. Shedid not; she would not. 

Presently he discovered with surprise that her attitude rendered himunhappy. Secure in his sense of right, certain that he was acting forthe best, looking from a height of experience on that lowland in whichshe toiled forward, following will-of-the-wisps, he should have beenindifferent. But he was not indifferent. 

Meantime, she believed that there was no length to which she would notgo against him; she fancied that there was no weapon which she wouldnot stoop to pick up if it would hurt him. And presently she was tried. A week had passed since the great fiasco. Again it was the eve ofSunday, and in the usual course of things a priest would appear tocelebrate mass on the following day. This risk James was now unwillingto run. His fears painted that as dangerous which had been done safelySunday by Sunday for years; and in a hang-dog, hesitating way, he letFlavia know his doubts. 

"Devil take me if I think he'll suffer it!" he said, kicking up theturf with his toe. They were standing together by the waterside, Flaviarebelling against the consciousness that it was only outside their ownwalls that they could talk freely. "May be, " he continued, "it will bebest to let Father O'Hara know--to let be for a week or two. "

The girl turned upon him, in passionate reprehension. "Why?" she cried, "Why?"

"Why, is it you're asking?" James answered sullenly. "Well, isn't hemaster for the time, bad luck to him! And if he thinks we're beginningto draw the boys together, he'll maybe put his foot down! And I'drather be stopping it myself, I'm telling you, and it's the truth, too, just for a week or two, Flavvy, than be bidden by him. "

"Never!" she cried. 

"But----"

"Never! Never! Never!" she repeated firmly. "Let us turn our back onour king by all means! But on our God, no! Let him do his worst!"

He was ashamed to persist, and he took another line. "I'm thinking ofO'Hara, " he said. "It'll be four walls for him, or worse, if he'staken. "

"There's no one will be taking him, " she answered steadfastly. 

"But if he is?"

"I'm saying there's no one will be taking him. "

James felt himself repulsed. He shrugged his shoulders and was silent. Presently, "Flavvy, " he said in a low tone, "I've a notion, my girl. And it'll serve, I'm thinking. This can't be lasting. "

She looked at him without much hope. 

"Well?" she said coldly. She had begun to find him out. 

He looked at her cunningly. "We might put the boot on the other leg, "he said. "He's for informing. But what if we inform, my girl? It's thefirst in the field that's believed. He's his tale of the Spanish ship, and you know who. But what if we tell it first, and say that he camewith them and stayed behind to get us to move? Who's to say he didn'tland from the Spaniard, if we're all in a tale? And faith, he's nofriend here nor one that will open his mouth for him. A word at Traleewill do it, and Luke Asgill has friends there, that will be glad to setthe ball rolling at his bidding. Once clapped up John Sullivan may_squeal_, he'll not be the one to be believed, but those that put himthere. It'll be no more than to swear an information, and Luke Asgillwill do the rest. "

Flavia shuddered. "They won't take his life?" she asked. 

James frowned. "That would not suit us at all, " he said. "Not at all!We could do that for ourselves. Faith, " with a sudden laugh, "youdidn't lack much of doing it, Flavvy! No; but a stone box and a ringround his leg, and four walls to talk to--until such time as we have ause for him, would be mighty convenient for everybody. He'd haveleisure to think of his dear relations, and of the neat way heoutwitted them, the clever devil! But for taking his life--I'm seeingmy way there too, " with a grin--"it was naming his dear relations mademe think of it. They'd not bear to be informing without surety for hislife, to be sure! No!" with a chuckle. "And very creditable to them!"

Flavia stared across the water. She was very pale. 

"We'll be wanting one or two to swear to it, " he continued, "and therest to be silent. Sorra a bit of difficulty will there be about it!"

"But if, " she said slowly, "he gets the first word? And tells thetruth?"

"The truth?" James McMurrough replied scornfully. "The truth is whatwe'll make it! I'll see to that, my jewel. "

She shivered. "Still, " she said, "it will not be truth. "

"What matter?" James answered. "It will cook his goose. Curse him, " hecontinued with violence, "what right had he to come here and thrusthimself into other folks' affairs?"

"I could have killed him, " she said. "But----"

"But you can't, " he rejoined. "And you know why. "

"But this"--she continued with a shudder, "this is different. "

"What will you be after?" he cried impatiently. "You are not turningsheep-hearted at this time of day?"

"I am not sheep-hearted. "

"What is it then, my girl?"

"I can't do this, " she said. She was still very pale. Something hadcome close to her, had touched her, that had never approached her sonearly before. 

He stared at her. "But he'll have his life, " he said. 

"It's not that, " she answered slowly. "It's the way. I can't!" sherepeated. "I've tried, and I can't! It sickens me. "

"And he's to do what he likes with us?" James cried. 

"No, no!"

"And we're not to touch him without our gloves?"

She did not answer, and twice her brother repeated the taunt--twiceasked her, with a confidence he did not feel, what was the matter withthe plan. At last, "It's too vile!" she cried passionately. "It's toohorrible! It's to sink to what he is, and worse!" Her voice trembledwith the intensity of her feelings--as a man, who has scaled a giddyheight without faltering, sometimes trembles when he reaches the solidground. "Worse!" she repeated. 

To relieve his feelings, perhaps to hide his shame, he cursed his enemyanew. And "I wish I had never told you!" he added bitterly. 

"It's too late now, " she replied. 

"Asgill could have managed it, and no one the wiser!"

"I believe you!" she replied quickly. "But not you! Don't do it, James, " she repeated, laying her hand on his arm and speaking withsudden heat. "Don't you do it! Don't!"

"And we're to let the worst happen, " he retorted, "and O'Hara perhapsbe seized----"

"God forbid!"

"That's rubbish! And this man be seized, and that man, as he pleases!We're to let him rule over us, and we're to be good boys whateverhappens, and serve King George and turn Protestants, every man of us!"

"God forbid!" she repeated strenuously. 

"As well turn, " he retorted, "if we are to live slaves all our days! ByHeaven, Cammock was right when he said that he would let no woman knita halter for his throat!"

She did not ask him who had been the life and soul of the movement, whose enthusiasm had set it going, and whose steadfastness maintainedit. She did not say that whatever the folly of the enterprise, andhowever ludicrous its failure, she had gone into it whole-hearted, andwith one end in view. She did not tell him that the issue was a hundredtimes more grievous and more galling to her than to him. Her eyes werebeginning to be opened to his failings, she was beginning to see thatall men did not override their womenfolk, or treat them roughly. Butthe habit of giving way to him was still strong; and when, with anothervolley of harsh, contemptuous words, he flung away from her, though herlast interjection was a prayer to him to refrain, she blamed herselfrather than him. 

Now that she was alone, too, the priest's safety weighed on her mind. If Colonel John betrayed him, she would never forgive herself. Certainly it was unlikely he would; for in that part priests movedfreely, the authorities winked at their presence, and it was onlywithin sight of the walls of Tralee or of Galway that the law whichproscribed them was enforced. But her experience of ColonelSullivan--of his activity, his determination, his devilishadroitness--made all things seem possible. He had been firm as fate inthe removal of the Bishop and Cammock; he had been turned no jot fromhis purpose by her prayers, her rage, her ineffectual struggles--shesickened at the remembrance of that moment. He was capable ofeverything, this man who had come suddenly into their lives out of thedarkness of far Scandinavia, himself dark and inscrutable. He wascapable of everything, and if he thought fit--but at that point hereyes alighted on a man who was approaching along the lake-road. It wasFather O'Hara himself. The priest was advancing as calmly and openly asif no law made his presence a felony, or as if no Protestant breathedthe soft Irish air for a dozen leagues about. 

Her brother's words had shaken Flavia's nerves. She was courageous, butshe was a woman. She flew to meet the priest, and with every step hisperil loomed larger before her fluttered spirits. The wretch had saidthat he would be master, and a master who was a Protestant, afanatic----

She did not follow the thought to its conclusion. She waved a warningeven before she reached the Father. When she did, "Father!" she criedeagerly, "you must get away, and come back after dark!"

The good man's jaw fell. He had been looking forward to good cheer anda good bed, to a rare oasis of comfort in his squalid life. He cast awary look round him. "What has happened, my daughter?" he stammered. 

"Colonel Sullivan!" Flavia gasped. "He is here, and he will certainlygive you up. "

"Colonel Sullivan?"

"Yes. You were at the Carraghalin? You have heard what happened! Hewill surely give you up!"

"Are the soldiers here?" the priest asked, with a blanched face. 

"No, but he is here! He is in the house, and may come out at anymoment, " Flavia explained. "Don't you understand?"

"Did he tell you----"

"What?"

"That he would inform?"

"No!" Flavia replied, thinking the man very dull. "But you wouldn'ttrust him?"

The priest looked round to assure himself that the landscape held noovert signs of danger. Then he brought back his eyes to the girl'sface, and he stroked his thin, brown cheek reflectively. He recalledthe scene in the bog, Colonel John's courage, and his thought for hisservant. And at last, "I am not thinking, " he said coolly, "that hewill betray me. I am sure--I think I am sure, " he continued, correctinghimself, "that he will not. He is a heretic, but he is a good man. "

Flavia's cheek flamed. She started back. "A good man!" she cried in avoice audible half a hundred yards away. 

Father O'Hara looked a little ashamed of himself; but he stood by hisguns. "A heretic, of course, " he said. "But, I'm thinking, a good man. At any rate, I'm not believing that he will inform against me. "

As quickly as it had come, the colour fled from Flavia's face, and leftit cold and hard. She looked at the priest as she had never looked at apriest of her Church before. "You must take your own course then, " shesaid. And with a gesture which he did not understand she turned fromhim, and leaving him, puzzled and disconcerted, she went away into thehouse. 

A good man! Heaven and earth and the sea besides! A good man! FatherO'Hara was a fool! A fool!

CHAPTER XVII

THE LIMIT

If there was one man more sorry than another that the Morristown risinghad been nipped in the bud it was Luke Asgill. It stood to his creditthat, though he had never dared to cross Flavia's will, he had tried, and honestly tried, to turn James McMurrough from the attempt. But evenwhile doing this, he had known--as he had once told James with bitterfrankness--that his interest lay in the other scale; he had seen thathad he attended to it only, he would not have dissuaded The McMurrough, but, on the contrary, would have egged him on, in the assurance thatthe failure of the plot would provide his one best chance of winningFlavia. A score of times, indeed, he had pictured, and with rapture, the inevitable collapse. In the visions of his head upon his bed he hadseen the girl turn to him in the wreck of things--it might be to saveher brother's life, it might be to save her tender feet from the stonesof foreign streets. And in the same dream he had seen himself standingby her, alone against the world; as, to do him justice, he would havestood, no matter how sharp the stress or great the cost. 

He had no doubt that he would be able to save her--in spite of herselfand whatever her indiscretion. For he belonged to a class that has everowned inordinate power in Ireland: the class of the middlemen withroots in either camp--a grandam, who, perchance, still softens her clayon the old cabin hearth, while a son preens it with his betters inTrinity College. Such men carry into the ruling ranks their knowledgeof the modes of thought, the tricks and subterfuges of those from whomthey spring; and at once astute and overbearing, hard and supple, turnthe needs of rich and poor to their own advantage, and rise on thecommon loss. Asgill, with money to lend in the town, and protections togrant upon the bog, with the secrets of two worlds in his head or inhis deed-box, could afford to await with confidence the day when thestorm would break upon Morristown, and Flavia, in the ruin of all abouther, would turn to him for rescue. 

Keen therefore was his chagrin when, through the underground channelswhich were in his power, he heard two days after the event, and indistant Tralee, what had happened. Some word of a large Spanish shipseen off the point had reached the mess-room; but only he knew hownearly work had been found for the garrison: only he, walking aboutwith a smooth face, listened for the alarm that did not come. For awonder he had been virtuous, he had given James his warning; yet he hadseen cakes and ale in prospect. Now, not only was the treat vanishedbelow the horizon, but stranger news, news still less welcome, waswhispered in his ear. The man whom he had distrusted from the first, the man against whom he had warned The McMurrough, had done this. More, in spite of the line he had taken, the man was still at Morristown, ifnot honoured, protected, and if not openly triumphant, master in fact. 

Luke Asgill swore horribly. But Colonel Sullivan had got the better ofhim once, and he was not to be duped again by this Don Quixote'smildness and love of peace. He knew him to be formidable, and he tooktime to consider before he acted. He waited a week and examined thematter on many sides before he took horse to see things with his owneyes. Nor did he alight at the gate of Morristown until he had mademany a resolution to be wary and on his guard. 

He had reason to call these to mind before his foot was well out of thestirrup, for the first person he saw, after he had bidden his groomtake the horses to the stable, was Colonel Sullivan. Asgill had time toscan his face before they met in the middle of the courtyard, the oneentering, the other leaving; and he judged that Colonel John's triumphdid not go very deep. He was looking graver, sadder, older;finally--this he saw as they saluted one another--sterner. 

Asgill stepped aside courteously, meaning to go by him. But the Colonelstepped aside also, and so barred his way. "Mr. Asgill, " he said--andthere was something of the martinet in his tone--"I will trouble you togive me a word apart. "

"A word apart?" Asgill answered. He was taken aback, and do what hecould the Colonel's grave eyes discomposed him. "With all the pleasurein life, Colonel. But a little later, by your leave. "

"I think now were more convenient, sir, " the Colonel answered, "by yourleave. "

"I will lay my cloak in the house, and then----"

"It will be more convenient to keep your cloak, I'm thinking, " theColonel rejoined with dryness. And either because of the meaning in hisvoice or the command in his eyes, Asgill gave way and turned with him, and the two walked gravely and step for step through the gateway. 

Outside the Colonel beckoned to a ragged urchin who was playing ducksand drakes with his naked toes. "Go after Mr. Asgill's horses, " hesaid, and bid the man bring them back. "

"Colonel Sullivan!"

The Colonel did not heed his remonstrance. "And follow us!" hecontinued. "Are you hearing, boy? Go then. "

"Colonel Sullivan, " Asgill repeated, his face both darker andpaler--for there could be no doubt about the other's meaning--"I'mthinking this is a strange liberty you're taking. And I beg to say Idon't understand the meaning of it. "

"You wish to know the meaning of it?"

"I do. "

"It means, sir, " Colonel John replied, "that the sooner you start onyour return journey the better!"

Asgill stared. "The better you will be pleased, you mean!" he said. Andhe laughed harshly. 

"The better it will be for you, I mean, " Colonel John answered. 

Asgill flushed darkly, but he commanded himself--having thoseinjunctions to prudence fresh in his mind. "This is an odd tone, " hesaid. "And I must ask you to explain yourself further, or I can tellyou that what you have said will go for little. I am here upon theinvitation of my friend, The McMurrough----"

"This is not his house. "

Asgill stared. "Do you mean----"

"I mean what I say, " the Colonel answered. "This is not his house, asyou well know. "

"But----"

"It is mine, and I do not propose to entertain you, Mr. Asgill, "Colonel John continued. "Is that sufficiently plain?"

The glove was down. The two men looked at one another, while the knotof beggars, gathered round the gate and just out of earshot, watchedthem--in the dark as to all else, but aware with Irish shrewdness thatthey were at grips. Asgill was not only taken by surprise, but he layunder the disadvantage of ignorance. He did not know precisely howthings stood, much less could he explain this sudden attack. Yet if thetall, lean man, serious and growing grey, represented one form ofstrength, the shorter, stouter man, with the mobile face and the quickbrain, stood for another. Offhand he could think of no weak spot on hisside; and if he must fight, he would fight. 

He forced a laugh. And, truly to think of this man, who had not seenMorristown for a score of years, using the experience of a fortnight togive him notice to quit, was laughable. The laugh he had forced becamereal. 

"More plain than hospitable, Colonel, " he said. "Perhaps, after all, itwill be best so, and we shall understand one another. "

"I am thinking so, " Colonel Sullivan answered. It was plain that he didnot mean to be drawn from the position he had taken up. 

"Only I think that you have overlooked this, " Asgill continuedsmoothly. "It is one thing to own a house and another to kick the logson the hearth; one thing to have the deeds and another--in the west--topass the punch-bowl! More, by token, 'tis a hospitable country this, Colonel, none more so; and if there is one thing would annoy TheMcMurrough and the young lady, his sister, more than another, it wouldbe to turn a guest from the door--that is thought to be theirs!"

"You mean that you will not take my bidding?" the Colonel said. 

"Not the least taste in life, " Asgill answered gaily, "unless it isbacked by the gentleman or the lady. "

"Yet I believe, sir, that I have a means to persuade you, " Colonel Johnreplied. "It is no more than a week ago, Mr. Asgill, since a number ofpersons in my presence assumed a badge so notoriously treasonable thata child could not doubt its meaning. "

"In the west of Ireland, " Asgill said, with a twinkle in his eye, "thatis a trifle, my dear sir, not worth naming. "

"But if reported in the east?"

Asgill averted his face that its smile might not be seen. "Well, " hesaid, "it might be a serious matter there. "

"I think you take me now, " Colonel John rejoined. "I wish to use nothreats. The least said the soonest mended. "

Asgill looked at him with half-shut eyes and a lurking smile--in truth, with the amusement of a man watching the transparent scheming of achild. "As you say, the least said the soonest mended, " he rejoined. "So--who is to report it in the east?"

"I will, if necessary. "

"If----"

"If you push me to it. "

Asgill raised his eyebrows impertinently. "An informer?" he said. 

Colonel John did not flinch. "If necessary, " he repeated. 

"That would be serious, " Asgill rejoined, "for many people. In thefirst place for the young lady, your ward, Colonel. Then for yourkinsman--and Mr. Ulick Sullivan. After that for quite a number ofhonest gentlemen, tolerably harmless and tolerably well-reputed here, whose only fault is a tendency to heroics after dinner. It would be soserious, and for so many, Colonel, that for my part I should be glad tosuffer in such good company. Particularly, " he continued, with a drolllook, the droller for his appreciation of the Colonel's face ofdiscomfiture, "as being a Protestant and a Justice, I should, ten toone, be the only person against whom the story would not pass. Eh, Colonel, what do you think? So that, ten to one, I should go free, andthe others go to Geordie's prison!"

Colonel John had not, to be honest, a word to say. He was fairlydefeated, his flank turned, his guns captured. He had counted so surelyon a panic, on the man whom he knew to be a knave proving also acoward, that even his anger--and he was very angry--could not hide hisdiscomfiture. He looked, indeed, so rueful, and at the same time sowrathful, that Asgill laughed aloud. 

"Come, Colonel, " he said, "it is no use to scowl at me. We know younever call any one out. Let me just hint that wits in Ireland are notquite so slow as in colder countries, and that, had I been here a weekback, you had not found it so easy to----"

"To what, sir?"

"To send two old women to sea in a cockboat, " Asgill replied. And helaughed anew and loudly. But this time there was no gaiety in hislaugh. If the Colonel had not performed the feat in question, in howdifferent a state things might have been at this moment! Asgill feltmurderous towards him as he thought of that; and the weapon of theflesh being out of the question--for he had no mind to face theColonel's small-sword--he sought about for an arm of another kind, andhad no difficulty in finding one. "More, by token, " he continued, "ifyou are going to turn informer, it was a pity you did not send theyoung woman to sea with the old ones. But I'm thinking you'd not beliking to be without her, Colonel?"

Colonel John turned surprisingly red: perhaps he did not quite knowwhy. "We will leave her out of the question, sir, " he said haughtily. "Or--that reminds me! That reminds me, " he continued, with increasingsternness. "You question my right to bid you begone----"

"By G--d, I do!" Asgill cried, with zest. He was beginning to enjoyhimself. 

"But you forget, I think, another little matter in the past that isknown to me--and that you would not like disclosed, I believe, sir. "

"You seem to have been raking things up, Colonel. "

"One must deal with a rogue according to his roguery, " Colonel Johnretorted. 

Asgill's face grew dark. This was taking the buttons off with avengeance. He made a movement, but restrained himself. "You don't mincematters, " he said. 

"I do not. "

"You may be finding it an unfortunate policy before long, " Asgill saidbetween his teeth. He was moved at last, angered, perhaps apprehensiveof what was coming. 

"Maybe, sir, " Colonel John returned, "maybe. But in the meantime let meremind you that your tricks as a horsedealer would not go far torecommend you as a guest to my kinswoman. "

"Oh?"

"Who shall assuredly hear who seized her mare if you persist in forcingyour company upon her. "

"Upon her?" Asgill repeated, in a peculiar tone. "I see. "

Colonel John reddened. "You know now, " he said. "And if youpersist----"

"You will tell her, " Asgill took him up, "that I--shall I say--abductedher mare?"

"I shall tell her without hesitation. "

"Or scruple?"

Colonel Sullivan glowered at him, but did not answer. 

Asgill laughed a laugh of honest contempt. "And she, " he said, "willnot believe you if you swear it a score of times! Try, sir! Try! Youwill injure yourself, you will not injure me. Why, man, " he continued, in a tone of unmeasured scorn, "you are duller than I thought you were!The ice is still in your wits and the fog in your brain. I thought, when I heard what you had done, that you were the man for Kerry!But----"

"What is it? What's this?"

The speaker was James McMurrough, who had come from the house in searchof the kinsman he dared not suffer out of his sight. He had approachedunnoticed, and his churlish tone showed that what he had overheard wasnot to his liking. But Asgill supposed that James's ill-humour wasdirected against his enemy, and he appealed to him. 

"What is it?" he repeated with energy; "I'll tell you!"

"Then you'll be telling me indoors!" James answered curtly. 

"No!" said Colonel Sullivan. 

But at that the young man exploded. "No?" he cried. "No? And, why no?Confusion, sir, it's too far you are driving us, " he continuedpassionately. "Is it at your bidding I must stand in a mob of beggarsat my own gate--I, The McMurrough? And be telling and taking for allthe gossoons in the country to hear? No? But it's yes, I say! There'sbounds to it all, and if you must be falling to words with my friends, quarrel like gentlemen within doors, and not in a parcel of loons atthe gate. "

He turned without waiting for a reply and strode into the courtyard. Colonel John hesitated a moment, then he stood aside, and, with a sternface, he invited Asgill to precede him. The Justice did so, smiling. Hehad won the first bout; and now, if he was not much mistaken, hisopponent had made a false move. 

That opponent, following with a sombre face, began to be of the sameopinion. In his simplicity he had supposed that it would be easy tobell the cat. He had seen, he fancied, a way to do it in a corner, quietly, with little outcry and no disturbance. But the cat had teethand claws and the cunning of a cat, and was not, it now appeared, ananimal easy to bell. 

They passed into the house, The McMurrough leading. There were two orthree buckeens in the hall, and Darby and one of the down-at-heelserving-boys were laying the evening meal. "You'll be getting out, "James said curtly. 

"We will, " replied one of the men. And they trooped out at the back. 

"Now, what is it?" the McMurrough asked, turning on his followers andspeaking in a tone hardly more civil. 

"It's what you're saying--Get out!" Asgill answered smiling. "Only it'sthe Colonel here's for saying it, and it seems I'm the one to get out. "

"What the saints do you mean?" James growled. "Sorra bit of your fun amI wishing at this present!" He wanted no trouble, and he saw that herewas trouble. 

"I can tell you in a few words, " Colonel Sullivan answered. "You knowon what terms we are here. I wish to do nothing uncivil, and I waslooking for this gentleman to take a hint and go quietly. He will not, it seems, and so I must say plainly what I mean. I object to hispresence here. "

James stared. He did not understand. "Why, man, he's no Jacobite, " hecried, "whoever the other is!" His surprise was genuine. 

"I will say nothing as to that, " Colonel John answered precisely. 

"Then, faith, what are you saying?" James asked. Asgill stood bysmiling, aware that silence would best fight his battle. 

"This, " Colonel John returned. "That I know those things of him thatmake him unfit company here. "

"The devil you do!"

"And----"

But James's patience was at an end. "Unfit company for whom?" he cried. "Eh! Unfit company for whom? Is it Darby he'll be spoiling? Or Thaddythe lad? Or"--resentment gradually overcoming irony--"is it Phelim orMorty he'll be tainting the souls of, and he a Protestant likeyourself? Curse me, Colonel Sullivan, it's clean out of patience youput me! Are we boys at school, to be scolded and flouted and put rightby you? Unfit company? For whom? For whom, sir? I'd like to know. More, by token, I'd like to know also where this is to end--and I will, byyour leave! For whom, sir?"

"For your sister, " Colonel John replied. "Without saying more, Mr. Asgill is not of the class with whom your grandfather----"

"My grandfather--be hanged!" cried the angry young man--angry with somecause, for it must be confessed that Colonel John, with the bestintentions, was a little heavy-handed. "You said you'd be master here, and faith, " he continued with bitterness, "it's master you mean to be. But there's a limit! By Heaven, there's a limit----"

"Yes, James, there is a limit!" a voice struck in--a voice as angry asThe McMurrough's, but vibrating to a purer note of passion; so that theindignation which it expressed seemed to raise the opposition toColonel John's action to a higher plane. "There is a limit, ColonelSullivan!" Flavia repeated, stepping from the foot of the stairs, onthe upper flight of which--drawn from her room by the firstoutburst--she had heard the whole. "And it has been reached! It hasbeen reached when the head of The McMurroughs of Morristown is told onhis own hearth whom he shall receive and whom he shall put to the door!Limit is it? Let me tell you, sir, I would rather be the poorest exilethan live thus. I would rather beg my bread barefoot among strangers, never to see the sod again, never to hear the friendly Irish tongue, never to smell, the peat reek, than live on this tenure, at the mercyof a hand I loathe, on the sufferance of a man I despise, of aninformer, a traitor, ay, an apostate----"

"Flavia! Flavia!" Colonel John's remonstrance was full of pain. 

"Ah, don't call me that!" she rejoined passionately. "Don't make mehate my own name! Better a hundred times an open foe----"

"Have I ever been anything but an open foe?" he returned. "On thispoint at any rate?"

She swept the remonstrance by. "Better, " she cried vehemently, "farbetter a fate we know, a lot we understand; far better freedom andpoverty, than to live thus--yesterday a laughing-stock, to-day slaves;yesterday false to our vows, to-day false to our friends! Oh, theremust be an end! There----"

She choked on the word, and her distress moved Asgill to do a strangething. He had listened to her with an admiration that for the timepurified the man, lifted him above selfishness, put the desire totriumph far from him. Now he stepped forward. "I would rather nevercross this threshold again, " he cried; "never, ay, believe me, I wouldrather never see you again, than give you this pain! I go, dear lady, Igo! And do not let one thought of me trouble or distress you! Let thisgentleman have his way. I do not understand. I do not ask tounderstand, how he holds you, or constrains you. But I shall besilent. "

He seemed to the onlookers as much raised above himself as Colonel Johnseemed depressed below himself. There could be no doubt with whom thevictory lay: with whom the magnanimity. Asgill stood erect, almostbeatified, a Saint George, a knight of chivalry. Colonel Sullivanshowed smaller to the eye, stood bowed and grey-faced, a man beaten andvisibly beaten. 

But as Asgill turned on his heel Flavia found her voice. "Do not go!"she cried impulsively. "There must be an end! There must be an end ofthis!"

But Asgill insisted. He saw that to go, to submit himself to the swayagainst which she revolted was to impress himself upon her mind, was tocommend himself to her a hundred times more seriously than if hestayed. And he persisted. "No, " he said; "permit me to go. " He steppedforward and, with a grace borrowed for the occasion, and with lips thattrembled at his daring, he raised and kissed her hand. "Permit me togo, dear lady. I would rather banish myself a hundred times than bringill into this house or differences into this family. "

"Flavia!" Colonel Sullivan said, finding his voice at last, "hearfirst, I am begging you, what I have to say! Hear it, since against mywill the matter has been brought to your knowledge. "

"That last I can believe!" she cried spitefully. "But for hearing, Ichoose the part this gentleman has chosen--to go from your presence. What?" looking at the Colonel with white cheeks and flamingeyes--Asgill had turned to go from the room--"has it come to this? Thatwe must seek your leave to live, to breathe, to have a guest, to eatand sleep, and perhaps to die? Then I say--then I say, if this be so, we have no choice but to go. This is no place for us!"

"Flavia!"

"Ah, do not call me that!" she retorted. "My hope, joy, honour, are inthis house, and you have disgraced it! My brother is a McMurrough, andwhat have you made of him? He cowers before your eye! He has no willbut yours! He is as good as dumb--before his master! You flog us likechildren, but you forget that we are grown, and that it is more thanthe body that smarts. It is shame we feel--shame so bitter that if alook could lay you dead at my feet, though it cost us all, though itleft us beggared, I would look it joyfully--were I alone! But you, cowardly interloper, a schemer living on our impotence, walk on andtrample upon us----"

"Enough, " Colonel Sullivan cried, intolerable pain in his voice. "Youwin! You have a heart harder than the millstone, more set than ice! Icall you to witness I have struggled hard, I have struggled hard, girl----"

"For the mastery, " she cried venomously. "And for your master, thedevil!"

"No, " he replied, more quietly. "I think for God. If I was wrong, mayHe forgive me!"

"I never will!" she protested. 

"I shall not ask for your forgiveness, " he retorted. He looked at hersilently, and then, in an altered tone, "The more, " he said, "as mymind is changed again. Ay, thank God, changed again. A minute ago I wasweak; now I am strong, and I will do my duty as I have set myself to doit. When I came here I came to be a peacemaker, I came to save thegreat from his folly and the poor from his ignorance, to shield thehouse of my fathers from ruin and my kin from the gaol and the gibbet. And I stand here still, and I shall persist--I shall persist. "

"You will?" she exclaimed. 

"I shall! I shall remain and persist. "

Passion choked her. She could not find words. After all she had said hewould persist. He was not to be moved--he would persist. He would stilltrample upon them, still be master. The house was no longer theirs, norwas anything theirs. They were to have no life, no will, nofreedom--while he lived. Ah, while he lived. She made an odd gesturewith her hands, and turned and went up the stairs, leaving him masterof the field. The worse for him! The worse, the worse, the worse forhim!

CHAPTER XVIII

A COUNTERPLOT

Luke Asgill rode slowly from the gates, not without a backward glancethat raked the house. The McMurrough walked by his stirrup, talkingrapidly--he, too, with furtive backward glances. In five minutes he hadexplained the situation and the Colonel's vantage ground. At the end ofthose minutes, and when they were at some distance from the house, "Isee, " Asgill said thoughtfully. "Easy to put him under the sod! Butyou're thinking him worse dead than alive. "

"Sorra a doubt of it!"

"Yet the bogs are deep, " Asgill returned, his tone smacking faintly ofraillery. "You might deal with him first, and his heir when the timecame. Why not?"

"God knows!" James answered. "And I've no taste to make the trial. " Hedid not name the oath he had taken to attempt nothing against ColonelJohn, nor to be a party to any attempt. He had slurred over thatepisode. He had dwelt in preference on the fact of the will and thedilemma in which it placed him. 

Asgill looked for some moments between his horse's ears, flicking hisfoot the while with his switch. When he spoke he proved in three orfour sentences that if his will was the stronger, his cunning was alsothe more subtle. "A will is revocable, " he said. "Eh?"

"It is. "

"And the man that's made one may make another?"

"Who's doubting it?"

"But you're doubting, " Asgill rejoined--and he laughed as hespoke--"that it would not be in your favour, my lad. "

"Devil a bit do I doubt it!" James said. 

"No, but in a minute you will, " Asgill answered. And stooping from hissaddle--after he had assured himself that his groom was out ofearshot--he talked for some minutes in a low tone. When he raised hishead again he clapped The McMurrough on the shoulder. "There!" he said, "now won't that be doing the trick for you?"

"It's clever, " James answered, with a cruel gleam in his eyes. "It isd--d clever! The old devil himself couldn't be beating it by the lengthof his hoof! But----"

"What's amiss with it?"

"A will's revocable, " James said, with a cunning look. "And what he cando once he can do twice. "

"Sorrow a doubt of that, too, if you're innocent enough to let him makeone! But you're not, my lad. No; the will first, and then----" LukeAsgill did not finish the sentence, but he grinned. "Anything elseamiss with it?" he asked. 

"No. But the devil a bit do I see why you bring Flavvy into it?"

"Don't you?"

"I do not. "

Asgill drew rein, and by a gesture bade his groom ride on. "No?" hesaid. "Well, I'll be telling you. He's an obstinate dog; faith, andI'll be saying it, as obstinate a dog as ever walked on two legs! Andleft to himself, he'd, maybe, take more time and trouble to come towhere we want him than we can spare. But, I'm thinking, JamesMcMurrough, that he's sweet on your sister!"

The McMurrough stared. The notion had never crossed his mind. "It'sjesting you are?" he said. 

"It's the last thing I'd jest about, " Asgill answered sombrely. "It isso; whether she knows it or not, I know it! And so d'you see, my lad, if she's in this, 'twill do more--take my word for it that know--tobreak him down and draw the heart out of him, so that he'll care littleone way or the other, than anything you can do yourself!"

James McMurrough's face, turned upwards to the rider, reflected hisadmiration. "If you're in the right, " he said, "I'll say it for you, Asgill, you're the match of the old one for cleverness. But do youthink she'll come to it, the jewel?"

"She will. "

James shook his head. "I'm not thinking it, " he said. 

"Are you not?" Asgill answered, and his face fell and his voice wasanxious. "And why?"

"Sure and why? I'll tell you. It was but a day or two ago I'd a plan ofmy own. It was just to swear the plot upon him; swear he'd come off theSpanish ship, and the rest, d' you see, and get him clapped in Traleegaol in my place. More by token, I was coming to you to help in it. ButI thought I'd need the girl to swear to it, and when I up and told hershe was like a hen you'd take the chickens from!"

Asgill was silent for a moment. Then, "You asked her to do that?" hesaid, in an odd tone. 

"Just so. "

"And you're wondering she didn't do it?"

"I am. "

"And I'm thanking God she'd not be doing it!" Asgill retorted. 

"Oh!" James exclaimed. "You're mighty particular all in a minute, Mr. Asgill. But if not that, why this. Eh? Why this?"

"For a reason you'd not be understanding, " Asgill answered coolly. "ButI know it myself in my bones. She'll do this if she's handled. Butthere's a man that'll not be doing it at all, at all, and that's UlickSullivan. You'll have to be rid of him for a time, and how I'm notsaying. "

"I'll be planning that. "

"Well, make no mistake about it. He must not get wind of this. "

"Ain't I knowing it?" James returned restively. He had been snubbed, and he was sore. 

"Well, there was a thing you were not knowing, " Asgill retorted, with alook which it was fortunate that the other did not see. "And stillthere's a thing you've not thought of, my lad. It's only to aProtestant he can leave it, and you must have one ready. Now if I----"

"No!" James cried, with sudden energy. And he drew back a step, andlooked the other in the face. "No, Mr. Asgill, " he continued; "if it isto that you've been working, I'd as soon him as you! Ay, by G----d, Iwould! I'd sooner turn myself!"

"I can believe that. "

"A hundred times sooner!" James repeated. "And what for not? What's toprevent me? Eh? What's to prevent me?"

"Your sister, " Asgill answered. 

James's face, which had flamed with passion, lost its colour. 

"Your sister, " Asgill repeated with gusto. "I'd like fine to see youasking her to help you turn Protestant! Faith, and, for a mere word ofthat same, I'll warrant she'd treat you as the old gentleman treatedyou!"

"Anyway, I'll not trust you, " James replied, with venom. "Sooner thanthat I'll have--ay, that will do finely--I'll have Constantine Husseyof Duppa. He's holder for three or four already, and the whole countrycalls him honest! I'll have him and be safe. "

"You'll do as you please about that, " Asgill answered equably. If hefelt any chagrin, he hid it well. "And that being settled, I wish youluck. Only, mind you, I don't use my wits for nothing. If the estate'sto be yours, Flavia's to be mine--if she's willing. "

"Willing or unwilling for what I care!" James answered brutally. 

Asgill did not hide his scorn. "An excellent brother!" he said. "Andso, good-day to you. But have a care of old Ulick. "

"Do you think I'm a fool?" James shouted after him. 

It was well, perhaps, that the wind carried Asgill's answer across thewater and wasted it on the dusk, which presently swallowed hisretreating form. The McMurrough stood awhile where the other had lefthim. He watched the rider go, and twice he shook his fist after him. 

"Marry my sister, you dog, " he muttered. "Ay, if it will give me myplace again! But for helping you to the land first and to herafterwards, as you'd have me, you schemer, you bog-trotter, it wouldmake Tophet's dog sick! You d----d dirty son of an upstart! You'd marrymy sister, would you? It will be odd"--he paused--"if I don't jink youyet, when I've made my use of you! I'm a schemer too, Mister Asgill, only--one at a time, one at a time! The Colonel first, and youafterwards! Ay, you afterwards, brother-in-law!"

With a last gesture of defiance--Asgill had long passed out ofsight--he returned to the house. 

It was two or three days after this interview that Colonel Sullivan, descending at the breakfast hour, found Flavia in the room. He saw herwith surprise; with greater surprise he saw that she remained, forduring those three days the girl had not sat at meals with him. Once ortwice his entrance had surprised her, but it had been the signal forher departure; and he had seen no more of her than the back of her heador the tail of her gown. More often he had found the men alone and hadsat down with them. Far from resenting this avoidance, he had found itnatural and even proper; and suffering it patiently, he had hoped, though almost against hope, that steering a steady course he wouldgradually force her to change her opinion of him. He, on his part, mustnot give way. He had saved the house from a great peril; he had clearedit of--vermin. As he had begun he must continue, and hug, for comfort, the old proverb, _Femme souvent varie_. 

That she was already beginning to change he could scarcely hope; yet, when he saw on this morning that she meant to abide his coming, he waselated--secretly and absurdly elated. 

She was at the window, but she turned on hearing his step. "I amwishing to speak to you, " she said. But her unforgiving eyes looked outof a hard-cut face, and her figure was stiff as a sergeant's cane. 

After that he did not try to compass a commonplace greeting. He bowedgravely. "I am ready to listen, " he answered. 

"I am wanting to give you a warning, " she said. "Your man Bale--I haveno reason to wish him ill. But he does not share the immunity which youhave secured, and if you'll be taking my advice you will send him away. My uncle is riding as far as Mallow; he will be absent ten days. If youthink fit, you will allow your man to go with him. The intervalmay"--she halted as if in search of a word, but her eyes did not leavehis--"I do not say it will, but it may mend matters. "

"I am obliged to you, " he answered. Then he was silent, reflecting. 

"You are not wishing, " she said, with a touch of contempt, "to exposethe man to a risk you do not run yourself?"

"Heaven forbid!" he answered. "But----"

"If you think he is a protection to you, " she continued in the sametone, "do not send him. "

"He is not that, " he replied, unmoved by her taunt. "But I am alone, and he is a comfort to me. "

"As you please, " she answered. 

"Nevertheless he shall go, " he continued. "It may be for the best. " Hewas thinking that if he rejected this overture, she might make noother: and, hard as it would prove to persuade Bale to leave him, hemust undertake it. "In any case, " he added, "I thank you. "

She did not deign to answer, but she turned on her heel and went out. On the threshold she met a serving-boy and she paused an instant, andthe Colonel caught a momentary glimpse of her face. It wore a strangelook, of disgust or of horror--he was not sure which--that appalledhim; so that when the door closed upon her, he remained gazing at it. Had he misread the look? Or--what was its meaning? Could it be that shehated him to that degree! At once the elation which the interview andher thoughtfulness for Bale had roused in him sank; and he was in abrown study when Uncle Ulick, the only person, Bale excepted, to whomhe could look for support or sympathy, came in and confirmed the storyof his journey. 

"You had better come with me, " he said, with a meaning look at Jamesand the O'Beirnes, who talked with averted faces, turned theirshoulders on their elders and flouted the Colonel as far as they dared. "I shall lie at Tralee one night, and at Ross Castle one night, and atMallow the third. "

But Colonel John had set his course, and was resolved to abide by it. After breakfast he saw Bale, and he had the trouble with him which hehad foreseen. But in the end military obedience prevailed and the manconsented to go--with forebodings at which his master affected tosmile. 

"None the less I misdoubt them, " the man said, sticking to his pointwith the east-country doggedness, which is the antipodes of the Irishcharacter. "I misdoubt them, your honour. They were never so carefulfor me, " he added grimly, "when they were for piking me in the bog!"

"The young lady had naught to do with that, " Colonel John replied. 

"D----n me if I know!"

"Nonsense, man!" the Colonel said sharply. "I'll not hear such words. "

"But why separate us, your honour?" Bale pleaded. "Not for good, Iswear. No, not for good!"

"For your greater safety, I hope. "

"Oh, ay, I understand that! But what of your honour's?"

"I have explained to you, " the Colonel said patiently, "why I am safehere. "

"For my part, and that's flat, I hate their soft sawder!" the man burstout. "It's everything to please you while they sharpen the pike tostick in your back. If old Oliver, that was a countryman of my own, andbred not so far off, had dealt with a few more of the rogues----"

"Hush!" Colonel John cried sternly. "And, for my sake, keep your tonguebetween your teeth. Have done with such talk, or you'll not be safe, goor stay; Be more prudent, man!"

"It's my belief I'll never see your honour again!" the man cried, withpassion. "That's my belief! That's my belief and you'll not stir it. "

"We've parted before in worse hap, " Colonel John answered, "and cometogether again. And, please God, we'll do the same this time. "

The man did not answer, but he shook his head obstinately. For the restof the day he clung to his master like a burr, and it was with anunusual sinking of the heart that Colonel John saw him ride away on themorrow. With him went Uncle Ulick, the Colonel's other friend in thehouse; and certainly the departure of these two seemed unlucky, if itwas nothing worse. But the man who was left behind was not one to giveway to vain fears. He thrust down the rising doubt, and chid himselffor a presentiment that belittled Providence. Perhaps in the depths ofhis heart, he welcomed a change, finding cheer in the thought that thesmaller the household at Morristown, the more prominently, andtherefore the more fairly, he must stand in Flavia's view. 

Be that as it might, he saw nothing of her on that day or the followingday. But though she shunned him, others did not. He began to remarkthat he was seldom alone, even in the house. James and the O'Beirneswere always at his elbow--watching, watching, watching, it seemed tohim. They said little, and what they said they whispered to one anotherin corners; but if he came out of his chamber, he found one in thepassage, and if he mounted to it, one forewent him! This dogging, thesewhisperings, this endless watching, would have got on the nerves of amore timid man; it began to disturb him. He began to fancy that evenDarby and the serving-boys looked askance at him and kept him in view. Once he took a notion that the butler, who had been friendly withinlimits--for the sake of that father who had met his man in Traleechurchyard--wished to say something to him. But at the critical momentMorty O'Beirne popped up from somewhere, and Darby sneaked off insilence. 

The Colonel disdained to ask what was afoot, but he thought that hewould give Morty a chance of speaking. "Are you looking for yourbrother?" he asked suavely. 

"I am not, " Morty answered, with a gloomy look. 

"Nor for The McMurrough?"

"I am not. I am thinking, " he added, with a grin, "that he has hishands full with the young lady. "

Colonel John was somewhat startled. "What's the matter?" he asked. 

"Oh, two minds in a house. Sorrow a bit more than that. It's no verynew thing in a family, " Morty added. And he went out whistling "'Twasa' for our rightful King. " But he went, as the Colonel noted, nofarther than the courtyard, whence he could command the room throughthe window. He lounged there, whistling, and now and again peeping. 

Suddenly, on the upper floor, Colonel John heard a door open, and theclamour of a voice raised in anger. It was James's voice. "Tell him?Curse me if you shall!" Colonel John heard him say. The next moment thedoor was sharply closed and he caught no more. 

But he had heard enough to quicken his pulses. What was it she wishedto tell him? _Souvent femme varie?_ Was she already seeking to followup the hint which she had given him on Bale's behalf? And was thespecial surveillance to which he had been subjected for the last twodays aimed at keeping them apart, that she might have no opportunity oftelling him--something?

Colonel John suspected that this might be so. And his heart beat, ashas been hinted, more quickly. At the evening meal he was early in theroom, on the chance that she might appear before the others. But shedid not descend, and the meal proved unpleasant beyond the ordinary, James drinking more than was good for him, and taking a tone, brutaland churlish, if not positively hostile. For some reason, the Colonelreflected, the young man was beginning to lose his fears. Why? What washe planning? How was he, even if he had no respect for his oath, thinking to evade that dilemma which ensured his guest's safety?

"Secure as I seem, I must look to myself, " Colonel John thought. And heslept that night with his door bolted and a loaded pistol under hispillow. Next morning he took care to descend early, on the chance ofseeing Flavia before the others appeared. She was not down: he waited, and she did not come. But neither did his watchers; and when he hadbeen in the room five minutes a serving-girl slipped in at the back, showed him a scared face, held out a scrap of paper and, when he hadtaken it, fled in a panic and without a spoken word. 

He hid the paper about him and read it later. The message was inFlavia's hand; he had seen her write more than once. But if he had not, he knew that neither James nor the O'Beirnes were capable of penning agrammatical sentence. Colonel John's spirits rose as he read the note. 

 "_Be at the old Tower an hour after sunset. You must not be followed. _"

"That is more easily said than done, " he commented. 

Nor, if he were followed through the day as closely as on previousdays, did he see how it was to be done. He stood, cudgelling his brainsto evolve a plan that would enable him to give the slip to the threemen and to the servants who replaced them when they were called away. But he found none that might not, by awakening James's suspicions, makematters worse; indeed, it seemed to him that James was alreadysuspicious. He had at last to let things take their course, in the hopethat when the time came they would shape themselves favourably. 

They did. For before noon he gathered that James wanted to go fishing. The O'Beirnes also wanted to go fishing, and for the generalconvenience it became him to go with them. He said neither No nor Yes;but he dallied with the idea until it was time to start and they hadmade up their minds that he was coming. Then he declined. 

James swore, the O'Beirnes scowled at him and grumbled. Presently thethree went outside and held a conference. His hopes rose as he satsmiling to himself, for their next step was to call Darby. Evidentlythey gave him orders and left him in charge, for a few minutes laterthey went off, spending their anger on one another, and on the barefootgossoons who carried the tackle. 

Late in the afternoon Colonel John took up his position on thehorse-block by the entrance-gates, where the June sun fell on him;there he affected to be busy plaiting horse-hair lines. Every two orthree minutes Darby showed himself at the door: once in a quarter of anhour the old man found occasion to cross the court to count the ducksor rout a trespassing beggar. Towards sunset, however, he came lessoften, having to busy himself with the evening meal. The Colonel smiledand waited, and presently the butler came again, found him still seatedthere, and withdrew--this time with an air of finality. "He'ssatisfied, " the Colonel muttered, and the next moment--for the sun hadalready set a full hour--he was gone also. The light was waning fast, night was falling in the valley. Before he had travelled a hundredyards he was lost to view. 

The fishing-party had started the contrary way, so that he had nothingto fear from them. But that he might omit no precaution, when he hadgone a quarter of a mile he halted and listened, with his ear near theground, for the beat of pursuing footsteps. He heard none, nor anysounds but the low of a cow whose calf was being weaned, the "Whoo!hoo! hoo!" of owls beginning to mouse beside the lake, and the creak ofoars in a boat which darkness already hid. He straightened himself witha sigh of relief, and hastened at speed in the direction of thewaterfall. 

He gave Flavia credit for all the virtues, if for some of the faults ofa proud, untamed nature. Therefore he believed her to be fearless. Nevertheless, before he stood on the platform and made out the shape ofthe Tower looming dark and huge above him, he had come to theconclusion that the need which forced her to such a place at such anhour must be great. The moon would not rise before eleven o'clock, thelast shimmer of the water had faded into unfathomable blackness beneathhim; he had to tread softly and with care to avoid the brink. 

He peered about him, hoping to see her figure emerge beside him. He didnot, and, disappointed, he coughed. Finally, in a subdued voice, hecalled her by name, once and twice. Alas! only the wind, softlystirring the grass and whispering in the ivy, answered him. He wasbeginning to think--with a chill of disappointment, excessive at hisage and in the circumstances--that she had failed to come, when, at nogreat distance before him, he fancied some one moved. He groped his wayforward half a dozen paces, found a light break on his view, and stoodin astonishment. 

The movement had carried him beyond the face of the Tower, and sorevealed the light, which issued from a doorway situate in the flank ofthe building. He paused; but second thoughts, treading on the heels ofsurprise, reassured him. He saw that in that position the light was notvisible from the lake or the house; and he moved quickly to the opendoor, expecting to see Flavia. Three steps led down to the basementroom of the Tower; great was his surprise when he saw below him in thisremote, abandoned building--in this room three feet below the level ofthe soil--a table set handsomely with four lighted candles in tallsticks, and furnished besides with a silver inkhorn, pens, and paper. Beside the table stood a couple of chairs and a stool. Doubtless therewas other furniture in the room, but in his astonishment he saw onlythese. 

He uttered an exclamation, and descended the steps. "Flavia!" he cried. "Flavia!" He did not see her, and he moved a pace towards that part ofthe room which the door hid from him. 

Crash! The door fell to, dragged by an unseen hand. Colonel John sprangtowards it; but too late. He heard the grating of a rusty key turned inthe lock; he heard through one of the loopholes the sound of an inhumanlaugh; and he knew that he was a prisoner. In that moment the cold airof the vault struck a chill to his bones; but it struck not so cold norso death-like as the knowledge struck to his heart that Flavia hadduped him. Yes, on the instant, before the crash of the closing doorhad ceased to echo in the stone vaulting above him, he knew that, hefelt that! She had tricked him. She had deceived him. He let his chinsink on his breast. Oh, the pity of it!

CHAPTER XIX

PEINE FORTE ET DURE

For many minutes, fifteen, twenty perhaps, Colonel John sat motionlessin the chair into which he had sunk, his eyes fixed on the flames ofthe candles that, so still was the night, burned steadily upwards. Hisunwinking gaze created about each tongue of flame strange effects ofvapour, halo-like circles that widened and again contracted, coloursthat came and went. But he saw these things with his eyes withoutseeing them with his mind. It was not of them, it was not of thedeath-cold room about him, in which the table and chairs formed alighted oasis out of character with the earthen floor, the rough walls, and the vaulted roof--it was not of anything within sight he wasthinking; but of Flavia!

Of Flavia, who had deceived him, duped him, cajoled him. Who, for allhe knew--and he thought it likely--had got rid of Uncle Ulick. Who hadcertainly got rid of Bale by playing on his feeling for the man. Who, by affecting a quarrel with her brother, had thrown him off his guard, and won his confidence, only to betray it. Who, having lured himthither, had laughed--had laughed! Deep sighs broke at long intervalsfrom Colonel John's breast as he thought of her treachery. It cut himto the heart. He looked years older as he sat and pondered. 

At length, with a sigh drawn from his very soul, he roused himself, and, taking a candle, he made the round of the chamber. The door bywhich he had entered was the only outlet, and it was of stout oak, clamped with iron, and locked. For windows, a pair of loopholes, slitsso narrow that on the brightest day the room must be twilit, piercedthe wall towards the lake. If the room had not been used of old as aprison, it made an admirable one; for the ancient walls were two feetthick, and the groined roof was out of reach, and of stone, hard as theweathering of centuries had left it. But not so hard, not so cruel asher heart! Flavia! The word almost came from his lips in a cry of pain. 

Yet what was her purpose? He had been lured hither; but why? He triedto shake off the depression which weighed on him, and to think. Hiseyes fell on the table; he reflected that the answer would doubtless befound among the papers that lay on it. He sat down in the chair whichwas set before it, and he took up the first sheet that came to hand, anote of a dozen lines in her handwriting--alas! in her handwriting. 

 "SIR, " so it ran, --

 "You have betrayed us; and, were that all, I'd still be finding it in my heart to forgive you. But you have betrayed also our Country, our King, and our Faith; and for this it's not with me it lies to pardon. Over and above, you have thought to hold us in a web that would make you safe at once in your life and your person; but you are meshed in your turn, and will fare as you can, without water, food, or fire, until you have signed and sealed the grant which lies beside this paper. We're not unmerciful; and one will visit you once in twenty-four hours until he has it under your hand, when he will witness it. That done, you will go where you please; and Heaven forgive you. I, who write this, am, though unjustly, the owner of that you grant, and you do no wrong. 

 "FLAVIA MCMURROUGH. "

He read the letter with a mixture of emotions. Beside it lay a deed, engrossed on parchment, which purported to grant all that he held underthe will of the late Sir Michael McMurrough to and for the sole use ofConstantine Hussey, Esquire, of Duppa. But annexed to the deed was aseparate scroll, illegal but not unusual in Ireland at that day, stating that the true meaning was that the lands should be held byConstantine Hussey for the use of The McMurrough, who, as a RomanCatholic, was not capable of taking in his own name. 

Fully, only too fully, enlightened by Flavia's letter, Colonel Johnbarely glanced at the parchments; for, largely as these, with theirwaxen discs, prepared to receive the impress of the signet on hisfinger, bulked on the table, the gist of all lay in the letter. He hadfallen into a trap--a trap as cold, cruel, heartless as the bosom ofher who had decoyed him hither. Without food or water! And already thechill of the earthen floor was eating into his bones, already the dampof a hundred years was creeping over him. 

For the moment he lacked the spirit to rise and contend by movementagainst the one or the other. He sat gazing at the paper with dulleyes. For, after all, whose interests had he upheld? Whose cause had hesupported against James McMurrough and his friends? For whose sake hadhe declared himself master at Morristown, with no intention, nothought, as Heaven was his witness, of deriving one jot or one tittleof advantage for himself? Flavia's! Always Flavia's! And she had pennedthis! she had planned this! She had consigned him to this, playing toits crafty end the farce that had blinded him!

His mind, as he sat brooding, travelled back to the beginning of itall; to the day on which Sir Michael's letter, with a copy of his will, had reached his hands, at Stralsund on the Baltic, in his quartersbeside the East Gate, in one of those Hanse houses with the tall narrowfronts which look like nothing so much as the gable-ends of churches. The cast of his thoughts at the reading rose up before him; the vividrecollections of his home, his boyhood, his father, which the old man'swriting had evoked, and the firmness with which, touched by the deadman's confidence, a confidence based wholly on report, he had resolvedto protect the girl's interests. Sir Michael had spoken so plainly ofJames as to leave the reader under no delusion about him. Nevertheless, Colonel John had conceived some pity for him; in a vague way he hadhoped that he might soften things for him when the time came. But thatthe old man's confidence should be justified, the young girl'sinheritance secured to her--this had been the purpose in his mind fromfirst to last. 

And this was his reward!

True, that purpose would not have embroiled him with her, strong as washer love for her brother, if it had not become entwined under thestress of events with another--with the resolve to pluck her and hersfrom the abyss into which they were bent on flinging themselves. It wasthat resolution which had done the mischief, and made her his enemy tothis point. But he could not regret that. He could not repent ofthat--he who had seen war in all its cruel phases, and fiercerebellions, and more cruel repressions. Perish--though he perishedhimself in this cold prison--perish the thought! For even now somewarmth awoke at his heart, some heat was kindled in him by thereflection that, whatever befell him, he had saved scores and hundredsfrom misery, a countryside from devastation, women and children fromthe worst of fates. Many and many a one who cursed his name to-day hadcause, did he know it, to remember him in his prayers. And though henever saw the sun again, though the grim walls about him proved indeedhis grave, though he never lived to return to the cold lands where hehad made a name and a place for himself, he would at least pass beyondwith full hands, and with the knowledge that for every life he, thesoldier of fortune, had taken, he had saved ten. 

He sat an hour, two hours, thinking of this, and of her; and towardsthe end less bitterly. For he was just, and could picture the wild, untutored heart of the girl, bred in solitude, dwelling on the presentwrongs and the past greatness of her race, taking dreams for realities, and that which lay in cloudland for the possible. Her rough awakeningfrom those dreams, her disappointment, the fall from the heaven offancy to the world as it was, might--he owned it--have driven even agenerous spirit to cruel and heartless lengths. And still he sighed--hesighed. 

At the end of two hours he roused himself perforce. For he was verycold, and that could only be mended by such exercise as the size of hisprison permitted. He set himself to walk briskly up and down. When hehad taken a few turns, however, he paused with his eyes on the table. The candles? They would serve him the longer if he burned but one at atime. He extinguished three. The deed? He might burn it, and so put thetemptation, which he was too wise to despise, out of reach. But he hadnoticed in one corner a few half-charred fragments of wood, dampindeed, but such as might be kindled by coaxing. He would preserve thedeed for the purpose of kindling the wood; and the fire, as his onlyluxury, he would postpone until he needed it more sorely. In the endthe table and the chairs--or all but one--should eke out his fuel, andhe would sleep. But not yet. 

For he had no desire to die; and with warmth he knew that he could putup for a long time with the lack of food. Every hour during which hehad the strength and courage to bear up against privation increased hischances; it was impossible to say what might not happen with time. Uncle Ulick was due to return in a week--and Bale. Or his gaolers mightrelent. Nay, they must relent for their own sakes, if he bore a stoutheart and held out; for until the deed was signed they dared not lethim perish. 

That was a good thought. He wondered if it had occurred to them. If ithad, it was plain that they relied on his faint-heartedness, and hisinability to bear the pangs of hunger, even within limits. For theycould put him on the rack, but they dared not push the torment so faras to endanger his life. With that knowledge, surely with that in hismind, he could outstay their patience. He must tighten his belt, hemust eke out his fuel, he must bear equably the pangs of appetite;after all, in comparison with the perils and privations through whichhe had passed on the cruel plains of Eastern Europe, and among abarbarous people, this was a small thing. 

Or it would have been a small thing if that profound depression, thatsadness at the heart which had held him motionless so long had notstill sapped his will, undermined his courage, and bowed his head uponhis breast. A small thing! a few hours, a few days even of hunger andcold and physical privation--no more! But when it was overpast, and hehad suffered and was free, to what could he look forward? What prospectstretched beyond, save one grey, dull, and sunless, a homeless middleage, an old age without solace? He was wounded in the house of hisfriend, and felt not the pain only, but the sorrow. In a little whilehe would remember that, if he had not to take, he had still to give: ifhe had not to enjoy, he had still to do. The wounds would heal. Alreadyshadowy plans rose before him. 

Yet for the time--for he was human--he drew small comfort from suchplans. He would walk up and down for a few minutes, then he would sinkinto his chair with a stern face, and he would brood. Again, when thecold struck to his bones, he would sigh, and rise of necessity and paceagain from wall to wall. 

His had been a mad fancy, a foolish fancy, a fancy of which--for howmany years rolled between him and the girl, and how many things done, suffered, seen--he should have known the outcome. But, taking its risein the instinct to protect, which their relations justified, it hadmastered him slowly, not so much against his will as without hisknowledge; until he had awakened one day to find himself possessed by afancy--a madness, if the term were fitter--the more powerful because hewas no longer young, and in his youth had known passion but once, andthen to his sorrow. By-and-by, for a certainty, the man's sense ofduty, the principles that had ruled him so long--and ruled more menthen than now, for faith was stronger--would assert themselves. And hewould go back to the Baltic lands, the barren, snow-bitten lands of hisprime, a greyer, older, more sombre man--but not an unhappy man. 

Something of this he told himself as he paced up and down the gloomychamber, while the flame of the candle crept steadily downward, and hisshadow in the vault above grew taller and more grotesque. It must bemidnight; it must be two; it must be three in the morning. Theloopholes, when he stood between them and the candle, were growinggrey; the birds were beginning to chirp. Presently the sun would rise, and through the narrow windows he would see its beams flashing on thedistant water. But the windows looked north-west, and many hours mustpass before a ray would strike into his dungeon. The candle wasbeginning to burn low, and it seemed a pity to light another, with thedaylight peering in. But if he did not, he would lack the means tolight his fire. And he was eager to do without the fire as long aspossible, though already he shivered in the keen morning air. He wascold now, but he would be colder, he knew, much colder by-and-by, andhis need of the fire would be greater. 

From that the time wore wearily on--he was feeling the reaction--to thebreakfast hour. The sun was high now; the birds were singing sweetly inthe rough brakes and brambles about the Tower; far away on the shininglake, of which only the farther end lay within his sight, three menwere fishing from a boat. He watched them; now and again he caught thetiny splash as they flung the bait far out. And, so watching, with nothought or expectation of it, he fell asleep, and slept, for five orsix hours, the sleep of which excitement had cheated him through thenight. In warmth, morning and evening, night and day differed little inthat sunken room. Still the air in it profited a little by the highsun; and he awoke, not only less weary, but warmer. But, alas! he awokealso hungry. 

He stood up and stretched himself: and, seeing that two-thirds of thesecond candle had burned away while he slept, he was thankful that hehad lit it. He tried to put away the visions of hot bacon, cold round, and sweet brown bread that rose before him; he smiled, indeed, considering how much more hungry he would be by-and-by, thisevening--and to-morrow. He wondered ruefully how far they would carryit: and, on that, mind got the better of body, and he forgot hisappetite in a thought more engrossing. 

Would she come? Every twenty-four hours, her letter said, a personwould visit him, to learn if his will had yielded to theirs. Would shebe the person? Would she who had so wronged him have the courage toconfront him? And, if she did, how would she carry it off? It waswonderful with what interest, nay, with what agitation, he dwelt onthis. How would she look? how would she bear herself? how would shemeet his eye? Would the shame she ought to feel make itself seen in hercarriage, or would her looks and her mien match the arrogance of herletter? Would she shun his gaze, or would she face it withoutflinching, with a steady colour and a smiling lip? And, if the latterwere the case, would it be the same when hours and days of fasting hadhollowed his cheeks, and given to his eyes the glare which he had seenin many a wretched peasant's eyes in those distant lands? Would shestill be able to face that sight without flinching, to view hissufferings without a qualm, and turn, firm in her cruel purpose, fromthe dumb pleading of his hunger?

"God forbid!" he cried. "Ah! God forbid!"

And he prayed that, rather than that, rather than have that last proofof the hardness of the heart that dwelt in that fair shape, he mightnot see her at all. He prayed that, rather than that, she might notcome; though--so weak are men--that she might come, and he might seehow she bore herself, and how she carried off his knowledge of hertreason--was now the one interest he had, the one thought, prospect, hope that had power to lighten the time, and keep at bay--though noonwas long past, and he had fasted twenty-four hours--the attacks ofhunger!

The thought possessed him to an extraordinary extent. Would she come?And would he see her? Or, having lured him by that Judas letter intohis enemies' power, would she leave him to be treated as they chose, while she lay warm and safe in the house which his interference hadsaved for her?

Oh! cruel!

Then--for no man was more just than this man, though many surpassed himin tact--the very barbarity of an action so false and so unwomanlysuggested that, viewed from her side, it must wear another shape. Foreven Delilah was a Philistine, and by her perfidy served her country. What was this girl gaining? Revenge, yes; yet, if they kept faith withhim, and, the deed signed, let him go free, she had not even revenge. For the rest, she lost by the deed. All that her grandfather had meantfor her passed by it to her brother. To lend herself to strippingherself was not the part of a selfish woman. Even in her falsenessthere was something magnanimous. 

He sat drumming on the table with his fingers, and thinking of it. Shehad been false to him, treacherous, cruel! But not for her own sake, not for her private advantage; rather to her hurt. Viewed on that side, there was something to be said for her. 

He was still staring dreamily at the table when a shadow falling on thetable roused him. He lifted his eyes to the nearest loophole, throughwhich the setting sun had been darting its rays a moment before. MortyO'Beirne bending almost double--for outside, the arrow-slit was notmore than two feet from the ground--was peering in. 

"Ye'll not have changed your quarters, Colonel, " he said, in a tone ofraillery which was assumed perhaps to hide a real feeling of shame. "Sure, you're there, Colonel, safe enough?"

"Yes, I am here, " Colonel John answered austerely. He did not leave hisseat at the table. 

"And as much at home as a mole in a hill, " Morty continued. "And, likethat same blessed little fellow in black velvet that I take my hat offto, with lashings of time for thinking. "

"So much, " Colonel John answered, with the same severe look, "that I amloth to think ill of any. Are you alone, Mr. O'Beirne?"

"Faith, and who'd there be with me?" Morty answered in true Irishfashion. 

"I cannot say. I ask only, Are you alone?"

"Then I am, and that's God's truth, " Morty replied, peeringinquisitively into the corners of the gloomy chamber. "More by token Iwish you no worse than just to be doing as you're bid--and faith, it'sbut what's right!--and go your way. 'Tis a cold, damp, unchancy placeyou've chosen, Colonel, " he continued, with a grin; "like nothing inall the wide world so much as that same molehill. Well, glory be toGod, it can't be said I'm one for talking; but, if you're asking myadvice, you'll be wiser acting first than last, and full than empty!"

"I'm not of that opinion, sir, " Colonel John replied, looking at himwith the same stern eyes. 

"Then I'm thinking you're not as hungry as I'd be! And not the leasttaste in life to stay my stomach for twenty-four hours!"

"It has happened to me before, " Colonel John answered. 

"You're not for signing, then?"

"I am not. "

"Don't be saying that, Colonel!" Morty rejoined. "It's not yet awhile, you're meaning?"

"Neither now nor ever, God willing, " Colonel John answered. "I quotefrom yourself, sir. As well say it first as last, and full as empty!"

"Sure, and ye'll be thinking better of it by-and-by, Colonel. "

"No. "

"Ah, you will, " Morty retorted, in that tone which to a mind made up isworse than a blister. "Sure, ye'll not be so hard-hearted, Colonel, asto refuse a lady! It's not Kerry-born you are, and say the word 'No'that easy!"

"Do not deceive yourself, sir, " Colonel John answered severely, andwith a darker look. "I shall not give way either to-day or to-morrow. "

"Nor the next day?"

"Nor the next day, God willing. "

"Not if the lady asks you herself? Come, Colonel. "

Colonel John rose sharply from his seat; such patience, as a famishedman has, come to an end. 

"Sir, " he said, "if this is all you have to say to me, I have yourmessage, and I prefer to be alone. "

Morty grinned at him a moment, then, with an Irish shrug, he gave way. "As you will, " he said. 

He withdrew himself suddenly, and the sunset light darted into the roomthrough the narrow window, dimming the candle's rays. The Colonel heardhim laugh as he strode away across the platform, and down the hill. Amoment and the sounds ceased. He was gone. The Colonel was alone. 

Until this time to-morrow! Twenty-four hours. Yes, he must tighten hisbelt. 

 * * * * *

Morty, poking his head this way and that, peering into the chamber ashe had peered yesterday, wished he could see Colonel John's face. ButColonel John, bending resolutely over the handful of embers that glowedin an inner angle of the room, showed only his back. Even that Mortycould not see plainly; for the last of the candles had burned out, andin the chamber, dark in comparison with the open air, the crouchingfigure was no more than a shapeless mass obscuring the glow of thefuel. 

Morty shaded his eyes and peered more closely. He was not a sensitiveperson, and he was obeying orders. But he was not quite comfortable. 

"And that's your last word?" he said slowly. "Come, Colonel dear, ye'llsay something more to that. "

"That's my last word to-day, " Colonel John answered as slowly, andwithout turning his head. 

"Honour bright? Won't ye think better of it before I go?"

"I will not. "

Morty paused, to tell the truth, in extreme exasperation. He had nogreat liking for the part he was playing; but why couldn't the man bereasonable? "You're sure of it, Colonel, " he said. 

Colonel John did not answer. 

"And I'm to tell her so?" Morty concluded. 

Colonel John rose sharply, as if at last the other tried him too far. "Yes, " he said, "tell her that! Or, " lowering his voice and his hand, "do not tell her, as you please. That is my last word, sir! Let me be. "

But it was not his last word. For as Morty turned to go, and sufferedthe light to fall again through the aperture, the Colonel heard himspeak--in a lower and a different tone. At the same moment, or his eyesdeceived him, a shadow that was not Morty O'Beirne's fell for onesecond on the splayed wall inside the window. It was gone as soon asseen; but Colonel John had seen it, and he sprang to the window. 

"Flavia!" he cried. "Flavia!"

He paused to listen, his hand on the wall on either side of theopening. His face, which had been pinched and haggard a moment before, was now flushed by the sunset. Then "Flavia!" he repeated, keen appealin his voice. "Flavia!"

She did not answer. She was gone. And perhaps it was as well. Helistened for a long time, but in vain; and he told himself again thatit was as well. Why, after all, appeal to her? How, could it avail him?What good could it do? Slowly he went back to his chair and sat down inthe old attitude over the embers. But his lip quivered. 

CHAPTER XX

AN UNWELCOME VISITOR

A little before sunset on that same day--almost precisely indeed at themoment at which Flavia's shadow darkened the splayed flank of thewindow in the Tower--two men stood beside the entrance at Morristown, whence the one's whip had just chased the beggars. They were staring ata third, who, seated nonchalantly upon the horse-block, slapped hisboot with his riding switch, and made as poor a show of hiding hisamusement as they of masking their disgust. The man who slapped his legand shaped his lips to a silent whistle, was Major Payton of the --th. The men who looked at him, and cursed the unlucky star which hadbrought him thither, were Luke Asgill and The McMurrough. 

"Faith, and I should have thought, " Asgill said, with a clouded face, "that my presence here, Major, and I, a Justice----"

"True for you!" Payton said, with a grin. 

"Should have been enough by itself, and the least taste more thanenough, to prove the absurdity of the Castle's story. "

"True for you again, " Payton replied. "And ain't I saying that but foryour presence here, and a friend at court that I'll not name, it's notyour humble servant this gentleman would be entertaining"--he turned toThe McMurrough--"but half a company and a sergeant's guard!"

"I'm allowing it. "

"You've no cause to do other. "

"Devil a bit I'm denying it, " Asgill replied more amicably; and, as faras he could, he cleared his face. "It's not that you're not welcome. Not at all, Major! Sure, and I'll answer for it, my friend, TheMcMurrough is glad to welcome any English gentleman, much more one ofyour reputation. "

"Truth, and I am, " The McMurrough assented. But he had not Asgill'sself-control, and his sulky tone belied his words. 

"Still--I come at an awkward time, perhaps?" Payton answered, lookingwith a grin from one to the other. 

For the first time it struck him that the suspicions at headquartersmight be well-founded; in that case he had been rash to put his head inthe lion's mouth. For it had been wholly his own notion. Partly totease Asgill, whom he did not love the more because he owed him money, and partly to see the rustic beauty whom, rumour had it, Asgill wascourting in the wilds--a little, too, because life at Tralee was dull, he had volunteered to do with three or four troopers what otherwise ahalf-company would have been sent to do. That he could at the same timeput his creditor under an obligation, and annoy him, had not been theleast part of the temptation; while no one at Tralee believed the storysent down from Dublin. 

He did not credit it even now for more than two seconds. Then commonsense, and his knowledge of Luke Asgill reassured him. "Eh! An awkwardtime, perhaps?" he repeated, looking at The McMurrough. "Sorry, I'msure, but----"

"I'd have entertained you better, I'm thinking, " James McMurrough said, "if I'd known you were coming before you came. "

"Devil a doubt of it!" said Asgill, whose subtle brain had been atwork. "Not that it matters, bedad, for an Irish gentleman will do hisbest. And to-morrow Colonel Sullivan, that's more knowledge of the modeand foreign ways, will be back, and he'll be helping his cousin. Moreby token, " he added, in a different tone, "you know him of old?"

Payton, who had frowned at the name, reddened at the question. "Isthat, " he asked, "the Colonel Sullivan who----"

"Who tried the foils with Lemoine at Tralee?" Asgill cried heartily. "The same and no other! He is away to-day, but he'll be returningtomorrow, and he'll be delighted to see you! And by good luck, thereare foils in the house, and he'll pass the time pleasantly with you!It's he's the hospitable creature!"

Payton was far from pleased. He was anything but anxious to see the manwhose skill had turned the joke against him; and his face betokened hisfeelings. Had he foreseen the meeting he would certainly have remainedin Tralee, and left the job to a subaltern. "Hang it!" he exclaimed, vexed by the recollection, "a fine mess you led me into there, Asgill!"

"I did not know him then, " Asgill replied lightly. "And, pho! Take myword for it, he's no man to bear malice!"

"Malice, begad!" Payton answered, ill-humouredly; "I think it's I----"

"Ah, you are right again, to be sure!" Asgill agreed, laughingsilently. For already he had formed a hope that the guest might bemanoeuvred out of the house on the morrow. Not that he thought Paytonwas likely either to discover the Colonel's plight, or to interfere ifhe did. But Asgill had another, and a stronger motive for wishing theintruder away. He knew Payton. He knew the man's arrogance andinsolence, the contempt in which he held the Irish, his view of them asan inferior race. And he was sure that, if he saw Flavia and fanciedher--and who that saw her would not fancy her?--he was capable of anyrudeness, any outrage; or, if he learned her position in regard to theestate, he might prove a formidable, if an honourable, competitor. Ineither case, to hasten the man's departure, and to induce Flavia toremain in the background in the meantime, became Asgill's chief aim. 

James McMurrough, on the other hand, saw in the unwelcome intruder anEnglish officer; and, troubled by his guilty conscience, he dreadedabove all things what he might discover. True, the past was past, theplot spent, the Spanish ship gone. But the Colonel remained, and indurance. And if by any chance the Englishman stumbled on him, releasedhim and heard his story, and lived to carry it back to Tralee--theconsequences might be such that a cold sweat broke out on the youngman's brow at the thought of them. To add to his alarm, Payton, whosemind was secretly occupied with the Colonel, sought to evince hisindifference by changing the subject, and in doing so, hit on onesingularly unfortunate. 

"A pretty fair piece of water, " he said, rising with an affected yawn, and pointing over the lake with his riding-switch. "The tower at thehead of it--it's grown too dark to see it--is it inhabited?"

The McMurrough started guiltily. "The tower?" he stammered. Could it bethat the man knew all, and was here to expose him? His heart stoodstill, then raced. 

"The Major'll be meaning the tower on the rock, " Asgill said smoothly, but with a warning look. "Ah, sure, it'll be used at times, Major, fora prison, you understand. "

"Oh!"

"But we'll be better to be moving inside, I'm thinking, " he continued. 

Payton assented. He was still brooding on his enemy, the Colonel, andhis probable arrival on the morrow. Curse the man, he was thinking. Whycouldn't he keep out of his way?

"Take the Major in, McMurrough, " Asgill said, who on his side was ontenter-hooks lest Flavia and Morty O'Beirne should arrive from theTower. "You'll like to get rid of your boots before supper, Major?" hewent on. "Bid Darby send the Major's man to him, McMurrough; or, better, I'll be going to the stables myself and I'll be telling him!"

As the others went in, Asgill strolled on this pretext towards thestables. But when they had passed out of sight he turned and walkedalong the lake to meet the girl and her companion. As he walked he hadtime to think, and to decide how he might best deal with Flavia, andhow much and what he should tell her. When he met them, therefore--bythis time the night was falling--his first question related to theirerrand, and to that which an hour before had been the onepre-occupation of all their minds. 

"Well, " he said, "he'll not have yielded yet, I am thinking?"

Dark as it was, the girl averted her face to hide the trouble in hereyes. She shook her head. "No, " she said, "he has not. "

"I did not count on it, " Asgill replied cheerfully. "But time--time andhunger and patience--devil a doubt he'll give in presently. "

She did not answer, but he fancied--she kept her face averted--that sheshivered. 

"While you have been away, something has happened, " he continued. Afterall, it was perhaps as well, he reflected, that Payton had come. Hiscoming, even if Flavia did not encounter him, would divert herthoughts, would suggest an external peril, would prevent her dwellingtoo long or too fancifully on that room in the Tower, and on the manwho famished there. She hated the Colonel, Asgill believed. She hadhated him, he was sure. But how long would she continue to hate him inthese circumstances? How long if she learned what were the Colonel'sfeelings towards her? "An unwelcome guest has come, " he continuedglibly, "and one that'll be giving trouble, I'm fearing. "

"A guest?" Flavia repeated in astonishment. She halted. What time forguests was this? "And unwelcome?" she added. "Who is it?"

"An English officer, " Asgill explained, "from Tralee. He is saying thatthe Castle has heard something, and has sent him here to look abouthim. "

Naturally the danger seemed greater to the two than to Asgill, who knewhis man. Words of dismay broke from Flavia and O'Beirne. "From Tralee?"she cried. "And an English officer? Good heavens! Do you know him?"

"I do, " Asgill answered confidently. "And, believe me or no, I canmanage him. " He began to appreciate this opportunity of showing himselfthe master of the position. "I hold him, like that, not the least doubtof it; but the less we'll be doing for him the sooner he'll be going, and the safer we'll be! I would not be so bold as to advise, " hecontinued diffidently, "but I'm thinking it would be no worse if youleft him to be entertained by the men. "

"I will!" she cried, embracing the idea. "Why should I be wanting tosee him?"

"Then I think he'll be ordering his horse to-morrow!"

"I wish he were gone now!" she cried. 

"Ah, so do I!" he replied, from his heart. 

"I will go in through the garden, " she said. 

He assented; it was to that point he had been moving. She turned aside, and for a moment he bent to the temptation to go with her. Since theday on which he had voluntarily left the house at the Colonel'sdictation he had made progress in her favour. He was sure that he hadcome closer to her--that she had begun not only to suffer his company, but to suffer it willingly. And here, as she passed through thedarkling garden under the solid blackness of the yews, was anopportunity of making a further advance. She would have to grope herway, a reason for taking her hand might offer, and--his head grew hotat the thought. 

But he thrust the temptation from him. He knew that it was not only thestranger's presence that weighed her down, but her recollection of theman in the Tower and his miserable plight. This was not the time, norwas she in the mood for such advances; and, putting pressure onhimself, Asgill turned from her, satisfied with what he had done. 

As he went on with Morty, he gave him a hint to say as little inPayton's presence as possible, and to leave the management to him. "Iknow the man, " he explained, "and where he's weak. I'm for seeing theback of him as soon as we can, but without noise. "

"There's always the bog, " grumbled Morty. He did not love Asgillovermuch, and the interview with the Colonel had left him in a restivemood. 

"And the garrison at Tralee, " Asgill rejoined drily, "to ask where heis! And his troopers to answer the question. "

Morty fell back on sullenness, and bade him manage it his own way. "Only I'll trouble you not to blame me, " he added, "if the Englishsoger finds the Colonel, and ruins us entirely!"

"I'll not, " Asgill answered pithily, "if so be you'll hold yourtongue. "

So at supper that night Payton looked in vain for the Kerry beautywhose charms the warmer wits of the mess had more than once painted inhues rather florid than fit. Lacking her, he found that theconversation lay wholly between Asgill and himself. Nor did thissurprise him, when he had surmounted his annoyance at the young lady'sabsence; for the contempt in which he held the natives disposed him toexpect nothing from them. On the contrary, he found it natural thatthese savages should sit silent before a man of the world, and, likethe clowns they were, find nothing to say fit for a gentleman to hear. Under such circumstances he was not unwilling to pose before them in anindolent, insolent fashion, to show them what a great person he was, and to speak of things beyond their ken. Playing this part, he wouldhave enjoyed himself tolerably--nor the less because now and again helet his contempt for the company peep from under his complaisance--butfor the obtuseness, or the malice of his friend; who, as if he had onlyone man and one idea in his head, let fall with every moment somemention of Colonel John. Now, it was the happy certainty of theColonel's return next day that inspired his eloquence; now, thepleasure with which the Colonel would meet Payton again; now, the luckychance that found a pair of new foils on the window ledge among thefishing-tackle, the old fowling-pieces, and the ragged copies of_Armida_ and _The Don_. 

"For he's ruined entirely and no one to play with him!" Asgillcontinued, a twinkle, which he made no attempt to hide, in his eye. "Noone, I'm meaning, Major, of his sort of force at all! Begad, boys, you'll see some fine fencing for once! Ye'll think ye've never seen anybefore I'm doubting!"

"I'm not sure that I can remain to-morrow, " Payton said in a surlytone. For he began to suspect that Asgill was quizzing him. He noticedthat every time the Justice named Colonel Sullivan, whether he referredto his return, or exalted his prowess, a sensation, a something thatwas almost a physical stir passed round the table. Men looked furtivelyat one another, or looked straight before them, as if they were in adesign. If that were so, the design could only be to pit ColonelSullivan against him, or in some way to provoke a quarrel between them. He felt a qualm of distrust and apprehension, for he remembered thewords the Colonel had used in reference to their next meeting; and hewas confirmed in the plan he had already formed--to be gone next day. But in the meantime his temper moved him to carry the war into theenemy's country. 

"I didn't know, " he snarled, taking Asgill up in the middle of a eulogyof Colonel John's skill, "that he was so great a favourite of yours. "

"He was not, " Asgill replied drily. 

"He is now, it seems!" in the same sneering tone. 

"We know him better. Don't we, boys?"

They murmured assent. 

"And the lady whose horse I sheltered for you, " the Major continued, spitefully watching for an opening--"confound you, little you thankedme for it!--she must be still more in his interest than you. And howdoes that suit your book?"

Asgill had great self-control, and the Major was not, except where hismalice was roused, a close observer. But the thrust was so unexpectedthat on the instant Payton read the other's secret in his eyes--knewthat he loved, and knew that he was jealous. Jealous of Sullivan!Jealous of the man whom he was for some reason praising. Then why notjealous of a younger, a more proper, a more fashionable rival? Asgill'scunningly reared plans began to sink, and even while he answered heknew it. 

"She likes him, " he said, "as we all do. "

"Some more, some less, " Payton answered with a grin. 

"Just so, " the Irishman returned, controlling himself. "Some more, someless. And why not, I'm asking. "

"I think I must stay over to-morrow, " Payton remarked, smiling at theceiling. "There must be a good deal to be seen here. "

"Ah, there is, " Asgill answered in apparent good humour. 

"Worth seeing, too, I'll be sworn!" the Englishman replied, smilingmore broadly. 

"And that's true, too!" the other rejoined. 

He had himself in hand; and it was not from him that the proposal tobreak up the party came. The Major it was who at last pleaded fatigue. Englishmen's heads, he said, were stronger than their stomachs; theywere a match for port but not for claret. "Too much Bordeaux, " hecontinued, with careless contempt, "gives me the vapours next day. It'sa d--d sour drink, I call it! Here's a health to Methuen and soundOporto!"

"You should correct it, Major, with a little cognac, " The McMurroughsuggested politely. 

"Not to-night; and, by your leave, I'll have my man called and go tobed. "

"It's early, " James McMurrough said, playing the host. 

"It is, but I'll have my man and go to bed, " Payton answered, with trueBritish obstinacy. "No offence to any gentleman. "

"There's none will take it here, " Asgill answered. "An Irishman's houseis his guest's castle. " But, knowing that Payton liked his glass, hewondered; until it occurred to him that the other wished to have hishand steady for the sword-play next day. He meant to stay, then! "Hanghim! Hang him!" he repeated in his mind. 

The McMurrough, who had risen, took a light and attended his guest tohis room. Asgill and the O'Beirnes--the smaller folk had withdrawnearlier--remained seated at the table, the young men scoffing at theEnglishman's weak head, and his stiffness and conceit of himself, Asgill silent and downcast. His scheme for ridding himself of Paytonhad failed; it remained to face the situation. He did not distrustFlavia; no Englishman, he was sure, would find favour with her. But hedistrusted Payton, his insolence, his violence, and the privilegedposition which his duellist's skill gave him. And then there wasColonel John. If Payton learned what was afoot at the Tower, and sawhis way to make use of it, the worst might happen to all concerned. 

He looked up at a touch from Morty, and to his astonishment he sawFlavia standing at the end of the table. There was a hasty scramblingto the feet, for the men had not drunk deep, and by all in the house, except her brother, the girl was treated with respect. After a fashion, they were to a man in love with her. 

"I was thinking, " Asgill said, foreseeing trouble, "that you were inbed and asleep. " Her hair was tied back negligently and her dresshalf-fastened at the throat. 

"I cannot sleep, " she answered. And then she stood a moment drummingwith her slender fingers on the table, and the men noticed that she wasunusually pale. "I cannot sleep, " she repeated, a tremor in her voice. "I keep thinking of him. I want some one--to go to him. "

"Now?"

"Now!"

"But, " Asgill said slowly, "I'm thinking that to do that were to givehim hopes. It were to spoil all. Once in twenty-four hours--that wasagreed, and he was told. And it is not four hours since you were there. If there is one thing needful, not the least doubt of it!--it is toleave him thinking that we're meaning it. "

He spoke gently and reasonably. But the girl laboured, it was plain, under a weight of agitation that did not suffer her to reason, muchless to answer him reasonably. She was as one who wakes in the darknight, with the terror of an evil dream upon him, and cannot for a timeshake it off. "But if he dies?" she cried in a woeful tone. "If he diesof hunger? Oh, my God, of hunger! What have we done then? I tell you, "she continued, struggling with overwhelming emotion, "I cannot bear it!I cannot bear it!" She looked from one to the other as appealing toeach in turn to share her horror, and to act. "It is wicked, it iswicked!" she continued, in a shriller tone and with a note of defiancein her voice, "and who will answer for it? Who will answer for it, ifhe dies? I, not you! I, who tricked him, who lied to him, who lured himthere!"

For a moment there was a stricken silence in the room. Then, "And whathad he done to you?" Asgill retorted with spirit--for he saw that if hedid not meet her on her own plane she was capable of any act, howeverruinous. "Or, if not to you, to Ireland, to your King, to your Country, to your hopes?" He flung into his voice all the indignation of which hewas master. "A trick, you say? Was it not by a trick he ruined all? Thefairest prospect, the brightest day that ever dawned for Ireland! Theday of freedom, of liberty, of----"

She twisted her fingers feverishly together. "Yes, " she said, "yes!Yes, but--I can't bear it! I can't! I can't! It is no use talking, " shecontinued with a violent shudder. "You are here--look!" she pointed tothe table strewn with the remains of the meal, with flasks and glassesand tall silver-edged horns. "But he is--starving! Starving!" sherepeated, as if the physical pain touched herself. 

"You shall go to him to-morrow! Go, yourself!" he replied in a soothingtone. 

"I!" she cried. "Never!"

"Oh, but----" Asgill began, perplexed but not surprised by herattitude--"But here's your brother, " he continued, relieved. "He willtell you--he'll tell you, I'm sure, that nothing can be so harmful asto change now. Your sister, " he went on, addressing The McMurrough, whohad just descended the stairs, "she's wishing some one will go to theColonel, and see if he's down a peg. But I'm telling her----"

"It's folly entirely, you should be telling her!" James McMurroughreplied, curtly and roughly. Intercourse with Payton had not left himin the best of tempers. "To-morrow at sunset, and not an hour earlier, he'll be visited. And then it'll be you, Flavvy, that'll speak to him!What more is it you're wanting?"

"I speak to him?" she cried. "I couldn't!"

"But it'll be you'll have to!" he replied roughly. "Wasn't it soarranged?"

"I couldn't, " she replied, in the same tone of trouble. "Some oneelse--if you like!"

"But it's not some one else will do, " James retorted. 

"But why should I be the one--to go?" she wailed. She had ColonelJohn's face before her, haggard, sunken, famished, as, peering into thegloomy, firelit room, she had seen it that afternoon, ay, and as shehad seen it later against the darkness of her bedroom. "Why should I, "she repeated, "be the one to go?"

"For a very good reason, " her brother retorted with a sneer. And helooked at Asgill and laughed. 

That look, which she saw, and the laugh which went with it, startledher as a flash of light startles a traveller groping through darkness. "Why?" she repeated in a different tone. "Why?"

But neither her tone nor Asgill's warning glance put James McMurroughon his guard; he was in one of his brutal humours. "Why?" he replied. "Because he's a silly fool, as I'm thinking some others are, and has afancy for you, Flavvy! Faith, you're not blind!"--he continued, forgetting that he had only learned the fact from Asgill a few daysbefore, and that it was news to the younger men--"and know it, I'll besworn, as well as I do! Any way, I've a notion that if you let him seethat there is no one in the house wishes him worse than you, or wouldsee him starve, the stupid fool, with a lighter heart--I'm thinking itwill be for bringing him down, if anything will!"

She did not answer. And outwardly she was not much moved. But inwardly, the horror of herself and her part in the matter, which she had felt asshe lay upstairs in the darkness, thinking of the starving man, whelmedup and choked her. They were using her for this! They were using herbecause the man--loved her! Because hard words, cruel treatment, brutality from her would be ten times more hard, more cruel, morebrutal than from others! Because such treatment at her hands would bemore likely to break his spirit and crush his heart! To what viler use, to what lower end could a woman be used, or human feeling beprostituted?

Nor was this all. On the tide of this loathing of herself rose another, a newer and a stranger feeling. The man loved her. She did not doubtthe statement. Its truth came home to her at once, although, occupiedwith other views of him, she had never suspected the fact. And becauseit placed him in a different light, because it placed him in a light inwhich she had never viewed him before, because it recalled a hundredthings, acts, words on his part which she had barely noted at the time, but which now took on another aspect, it showed him, too, as one whomshe had never seen. Had he been free at this moment, prosperous, triumphant, the knowledge that he loved her, that he, her enemy, lovedher, might have revolted her--she might have hated him the more for it. But now that he lay a prisoner, famished, starving, the fact that heloved her touched her heart, transfixed her with an almost poignantfeeling, choked her with a rising flood of pity and self-reproach. 

"So there you have it, Flavvy!" James cried complacently. "And sure, you'll not be making a fool of yourself at this time of day!"

She stood as one stunned; looking at him with strange eyes, thinking, not answering. Asgill, and Asgill only, saw a burning blush dye for aninstant the whiteness of her face. He, and he only, discovered, withthe subtle insight of one who loved, a part of what she was thinking. He wished James McMurrough in the depth of hell. But it was too late, or he feared so. 

Great was his relief, therefore, when she spoke. "Then you'll not--begoing now?" she said. 

"Now?" James retorted contemptuously. "Haven't I told you, you'll goto-morrow?"

"If I must, " she said slowly, "I will--if I must. "

"Then what's the good of talking, I'm thinking?" The McMurroughanswered. And he was going on--being in a bullying mood--to say more inthe same strain, when the opportunity was taken from him. One of theO'Beirnes, who happened to avert his eyes from the girl, discoveredPayton standing at the foot of the stairs. Phelim's exclamationapprised the others that something was amiss, and they turned. 

"I left my snuff-box on the table, " Payton said, with a sly grin. Howmuch he had heard they could not tell. "Ha! there it is! Thank you. Sorry! Sorry, I am sure! Hope I don't trespass. Will you present me toyour sister, Mr. McMurrough?"

James McMurrough had no option but to do so--looking foolish; whileLuke Asgill stood by with rage in his heart, cursing the evil chancewhich had brought Flavia downstairs. 

"I assure you, " Payton said, bowing low before her, but not so low thatthe insolence of his smile was hidden from all, "I think myself happy. My friend Asgill's picture of you, warmly as he painted it, fellinfinitely--infinitely below the reality!"

CHAPTER XXI

THE KEY

Colonel John rose and walked unsteadily to the window. He rested a handon either jamb and looked through it, peering to right and left withwistful eyes. He detected no one, nothing, no change, no movement, and, with a groan, he straightened himself. But he still continued to lookout, gazing at the bare sward below the window, at the sparkling sheetof water beyond and beneath it, at the pitiless blue sky above, inwhich the sun was still high, though it had begun to decline. 

Presently he grew weary, and went back to his chair. He sat down withhis elbows on his knees and his head between his hands. Again his earshad deceived him! Again hope had told her flattering tale! How manymore times would he start to his feet, fancying he heard the footstepthat did not fall, calling aloud to those who were not there, anticipating those who, more hard of heart than the stone walls abouthim, more heedless than the pitiless face of nature without, would notcome before the appointed time! And that was hours away, hours ofthirst and hunger, almost intolerable; of patience and waiting, wearywaiting, broken only by such a fancy, born of his weakened senses, ashad just drawn him to the window. 

The suffering which is inevitable is more easy to bear than that whichis caused by man. In the latter case the sense that the misery felt maybe ended by so small a thing as another's will; that another may, bylifting a finger, cut it short, and will not; that to persuade him isall that is needful--this becomes at the last maddening, intolerable, athing to upset the reason, if that other will not be persuaded. 

Colonel John was a man sane and well-balanced, and assuredly not one todespair lightly. But even he had succumbed more than once during thelast twelve hours to gusts of rage, provoked as much by the futility ofhis suffering as by the cruelty of his persecutors. After each of thesestorms he had laughed, in wonder at himself, had scolded himself andgrown calm. But they had made their mark upon him, they had left hiseyes wilder, his cheeks more hollow; his hand less firm. 

He had burned, in fighting the cold of the past night, all that wouldburn, except the chair on which he sat; and with the dawn the lastspark of his fire had died out. Notwithstanding those fits of rage hewas not light-headed. He could command his faculties at will, he couldstill reflect and plan, marshal the arguments and perfect the reasonsthat must convince his foes, that, if they inflicted a lingering deathon him, they did but work their own undoing. But at times he foundhimself confounding the present with the past, fancying, for a while, that he was in a Turkish prison, and turning, under that impression, toaddress Bale; or starting from a waking dream of some cold camp inRussian snows--alas! starting from it only to shiver with thatpenetrating, heart-piercing, frightful cold, which was worse to bearthan the gnawing of hunger or the longing of thirst. 

He had not eaten for more than seventy hours. But the long privationwhich had weakened his limbs and blanched his cheeks, which had evengone some way towards disordering his senses, had not availed to shakehis will. The possibility of surrender did not occur to him, partlybecause he felt sure that James McMurrough would not be so foolish asto let him die; but partly, also, by reason of a noble stubbornness inthe man, a fixedness that for no pain of death would leave a woman or achild to perish. More than once Colonel Sullivan had had to make thatchoice, amid the horrors of a retreat across famished lands, withwolves and Cossacks on his skirts; and perhaps the choice then made hadbecome a habit of the mind. At any rate, whether that were the cause orno, in this new phase he gave no thought to yielding. 

He had sat for some minutes in the attitude of depression, or bodilyweakness, which has, been described, when once more a sound startledhim. He raised his head and turned his eyes, sharpened by hunger, onthe window. But this time, distrusting his senses, he did not riseuntil the sound was repeated. Then he faltered to his feet, and onceagain went unsteadily to the window, and, leaning a hand on each jamb, looked out. 

At the same moment Flavia looked in. Their eyes met. Their faces wereless than a yard apart. 

The girl started back with a low cry, caused either by alarm on findinghim so near her or by horror at the change in his aspect. If thelatter, there was abundant cause. For she had left him hungry, shefound him starving; she had left him haggard, she found him with eyesunnaturally large, his temples hollow, his lips dry, his chin unshaven. It was indeed a mask rather than a face, a staring mask of famine, thatlooked out of the dusky room at her, and looked not the less pitifully, not the less wofully, because, as soon as its owner took in heridentity, the mask tried to smile. 

"Mother of God!" she whispered. Her face had grown nearly as white ashis. "O Mother of God!" She had imagined nothing like this. 

And Colonel John, believing--his throat was so dry that he could notspeak at once--that he read pity as well as horror in her face, felt asob rise in his breast. He tried to smile the more bravely for that, and presently he found his voice, a queer, husky voice. 

"You must not leave me--too long, " he said. His smile was becomingghastly. 

She drew in her breath, and averted her face, to hide, he hoped, theeffect of the sight upon her. Or perhaps--for he saw her shudder--shewas mutely calling the sunlit lake on which her eyes rested, the bluesky, the smiling summer scene, to witness against this foul cruelty, this dark wickedness. 

But it seemed that he deceived himself. For when she turned her face tohim again, though it was still colourless, it was hard and set. 

"You must sign, " she said. "You must sign the paper. "

His parched lips opened, but he did not answer. He was as one struckdumb. 

"You must sign!" she repeated insistently. "Do you hear? You mustsign!"

Still he did not answer; he only looked at her with eyes of infinitereproach. The pity of it! The pity of it! She, a woman, a girl, whomcompassion should have constrained, whose tender heart should have bledfor him, could see him tortured, could aid in the work, and cry "Sign!"

She could indeed, for she repeated the word--fiercely, feverishly. "Sign!" she cried. And then, "If you will, " she said, "I will giveyou--see! See! You shall have this. You shall eat and drink; only sign!For God's sake, sign what they want, and eat and drink!"

And, with fingers that trembled with haste, she drew from ahiding-place in her cloak, bread and milk and wine. "See what I havebrought, " she continued, holding them before his starting eyes, hiscracking lips, "if you will sign. "

He gazed at them, at her, with anguish of the mind as well as of thebody. How he had mistaken her! How he had misread her! Then, with agroan, "God forgive you!" he cried, "I cannot! I cannot!"

"You will not sign?" she retorted. 

"Cannot, and will not!" he said. 

"And why? Why will you not?"

On that his patience, sorely tried, gave way; and, swept along by oneof those gusts of rage, he spoke. "Why?" he cried in hoarse accents. "You ask me why? Because, ungrateful, unwomanly, miserable as youare--I will not rob you or the dead! Because I will not be false to anold man's trust! I will not give to the forsworn what was meant for theinnocent--nor sell my honour for a drink of water! Because, "--helaughed a half-delirious laugh--"there is nothing to sign, nothing! Ihave burned your parchments these two days, and if you tempt me twomore days, if you make me suffer twice as much as I have suffered, youcan do nothing! If your heart be as hard as--it is, you can donothing!" He held out hands which trembled with passion. "You can donothing!" he repeated. "Neither you, who--God forgive you, are nowoman, have no woman's heart, no woman's pity!--nor he who would havekilled me in the bog to gain that which he now starves me to get! But Ifoiled him then, as I will foil him to-day, ingrate, perjured, accursed, as he is, accursed----"

He faltered and was silent, steadying himself by resting one handagainst the wall. For a moment he covered his eyes with the other hand. Then "God forgive me!" he resumed in a lower tone, "I know not what Isay! God forgive me! And you--Go! for you too--God forgive you--knownot what you do. You do not know what it is to hunger and thirst, oryou would not try me thus! Nor do you know what you were to me, or youwould not try me thus! Yet I ought to remember that--that it is not foryourself you do it!"

He turned his back on her then, and on the window. He had taken threesteps towards the middle of the room, when she cried, "Wait!"

"Go!" he repeated with a backward gesture of the hand. "Go! and Godforgive you, as I do!"

"Wait!" she cried. "And take them! Oh, take them! Quick!" He turnedabout slowly, almost with suspicion. She was holding the food and thedrink through the window, holding them out for him to take. But itmight be another deception. He was not sure, and for a moment a cunninglook gleamed in his eyes, and he took a step in a stealthy fashiontowards the window, as if, were she off her guard, he would snatch themfrom her. But she cried again, "Take them! Take them!" with tears inher voice. "I brought them for you. May God indeed forgive me!"

The craving was so strong upon him that he took them then without aword, without answering her or thanking her. He turned his back on her, as soon as he had possessed himself of them, as if he dared not let hersee the desire in his face; and standing thus, he drew the stopper fromthe bottle of milk, and drank. He would fain have held the bottle tohis lips until he had drained the last drop: but he controlled himself, and when he had swallowed a few mouthfuls, he removed it. Then, withthe solemnity of a sacrament, perhaps with the feeling that shouldattend one, he broke off three or four small fragments of the bread, and ate them one by one and slowly--the first with difficulty, thesecond more easily, the third with an avidity which he checked only bya firm effort of the will. "Presently!" he told himself. "Presently!There is plenty, there is plenty. " Yet he allowed himself two moremouthfuls of bread and another sip of milk--milk that was nectar, rather than any earthly drink his lips had ever encountered. 

At length, with new life running in his veins, and not new life only, but a pure thankfulness that she had proved herself very woman at thelast, he laid his treasures on the chair, and turned to her. She wasgone. 

His face fell. For while he had eaten and drunk he had felt herpresence at his back, and once he was sure that he had heard her sob. But she was gone. A chill fell upon his spirits. Yet she might not begone far. He staggered--for he was not yet steady on his feet--to thewindow, and looked to right and left. 

She had not gone far. She was lying prone on the sward, her face hiddenon her arms; and it was true that he had heard her sob, for she wasweeping without restraint. The change in him, the evidence of sufferingwhich she had read in his face, to say nothing of his reproaches, haddone something more than shock her. They had opened her eyes to thetrue nature--already dimly seen--of the plan to which she had lentherself. They had torn the last veil from the selfishness of those withwhom she had acted, their cupidity and their ruthlessness. And they hadshown the man himself in a light so new and startling, that even thelast twenty-four hours had not prepared her for it. The scales ofprejudice which had dimmed her sight fell at length, and wholly, fromher eyes; and, for the first time, she saw him as he was. For the firsttime she perceived that, in pursuing the path he had followed, he mighthave thought himself right; he might have been moved by a higher motivethan self-interest, he might have been standing for others rather thanfor himself. Parts of the passionate rebuke which suffering andindignation had forced from him remained branded upon her memory; andshe wept in shame, feeling her helplessness, her ignorance, herinexperience, feeling that she had no longer any sure support or prop. For how could she trust those who had drawn her into this hideous, thiscruel business? Who, taking advantage at once of her wounded vanity, and her affection for her brother, had led her to this act, from whichshe now shrank in abhorrence?

There was only, of all about her, Uncle Ulick to whom she could turn, or on whom she could depend. And he, though he would not have stoopedto this, was little better, she knew, than a broken reed. The sense ofher loneliness, the knowledge that those about her used her for theirown ends--and those the most unworthy--overwhelmed her; and inproportion as she had been proud and self-reliant, was her presentabasement. 

When the first passion of self-reproach had spent itself, she heard himcalling her by name, and in a voice that stirred her heart-strings. Sherose, first to her knees and then to her feet, and, averting her face, "I will open the door, " she said, humbly and in a broken voice. "I havebrought the key. "

He did not answer, and she did not unlock. For as, still keeping herface averted that he might not see her tears, she turned the corner ofthe Tower to gain the door, her brother's head and shoulders rose abovethe level of the platform. As The McMurrough stepped on to the latterfrom the path, he was in time to see her skirt vanishing. He saw nomore. But his suspicions were aroused. He strode across the face of theTower, turned the corner, and came on her in the act of putting the keyin the lock. 

"What are you doing?" he cried, in a terrible voice. "Are you mad?"

She did not answer, but neither did he pause for her answer. Theimminence of the peril, the thought that the man whom he had so deeplywronged, and who knew him for the perjured thing he was, might inanother minute be free--free to take what steps he pleased, free toavenge himself and punish his foes, rose up before him, and he thrusther roughly from the door. The key, not yet turned, came away in herhand, and he tried to snatch it from her. 

"Give it me!" he cried. "Do you hear? Give it me!"

"I will not!" she cried. "No!"

"Give it up, I say!" he retorted. And this time he made good his holdon her wrist. He tried to force the key from her. "Let it go!" hepanted, "or I shall hurt you!"

But he made a great mistake if he thought that he could coerce Flaviain that way. Her fingers only closed more tightly on the key. "Never!"she cried, struggling with him. "Never! I am going to let him out!"

"You coward!" a voice cried through the door. "Coward! Coward!" Therewas a sound of drumming on the door. 

But Colonel John's voice and his blows were powerless to help, asJames, in a frenzy of rage and alarm, gripped the girl's wrist, andtwisted it. "Let it go! Let it go, you fool!" he cried brutally, "or Iwill break your arm!"

Her face turned white with pain, but for a moment she endured insilence. Then a shriek escaped her. 

It was answered instantly. Neither he nor she had had eyes for aughtbut one another; and the hand that fell, and fell heavily, on James'sshoulder was as unexpected as a thunderbolt. 

"By Heaven, man, " a voice cried in his ear. "Are you mad? Or is thisthe way you treat women in Kerry? Let the lady go! Let her go, I say!"

The command was needless, for at the first sound of the voice James hadfallen back with a curse, and Flavia, grasping her bruised wrist withher other hand, reeled for support against the Tower wall. For a momentno one spoke. Then James, with scarcely a look at Payton--for he itwas--bade her come away with him. "If you are not mad, " he growled, "you'll have a care! You'll have a care, and come away, girl!"

"When I have let him out, I will, " she answered, her eyes glowingsombrely as she nursed her wrist. In her, too, the old Adam had beenraised. 

"Give me the key!" he said for the last time. 

"I will not, " she said. "And if I did--" she continued, with a glanceat Payton that reminded the unhappy McMurrough that, with the secretknown, the key was no longer of use--"if I did, how would it serveyou?"

The McMurrough turned his rage upon the intruder. "Devil take you, whatbusiness will it be of yours?" he cried. "Who are you to come betweenus, eh?"

Payton bowed. "If I offend, " he said airily, "I am entirely at yourservice. " He tapped the hilt of his sword. "You do not wear one, but Ihave no doubt you can use one. I shall be happy to give yousatisfaction where and when you please. A time and place----"

But James did not stop to hear him out. He turned with an oath and asnarl, and went off--went off in such a manner that Flavia could notbut see that the challenge was not to his taste. At another time shewould have blushed for him. But his brutal violence had done moreduring the last ten minutes to depose his image from her heart thanyears of neglect and rudeness. 

Payton saw him go, and, blessing the good fortune which had put him ina position to command the beauty's thanks, he turned to receive them. But Flavia was not looking at him, was not thinking of him. She had putthe key in the lock and was trying to turn it. Her left wrist, however, was too weak, and the right was so strained as to be useless. Shesigned to him to turn the key, and he did so, and threw open the door, wondering much who was there and what it was all about. 

He did not at once recognise the man who, pale and haggard, a mereghost of himself, dragged himself up the three steps, and, exhausted bythe effort, leant against the doorpost. But when Colonel John spoke andtried to thank the girl, he knew him. 

He whistled. "You are Colonel Sullivan!" he said. 

"The same, sir!" Colonel John murmured mechanically. 

"Are you ill?"

"I am not well, " the other replied with a sickly smile. The indignationwhich he had felt during the contest between the girl and her brotherhad been too much for his strength. "I shall be better presently, " headded. He closed his eyes. 

"We should be getting him below, " Flavia said in an undertone. 

Payton looked from one to the other. He was in a fog. "Has he been herelong?" he asked. 

"Nearly four days, " she replied, with a shiver. 

"And nothing to eat?"

"Nothing. "

"The devil! And why?"

She did not stay to think how much it was wise to tell him. In herrepentant mood she was anxious to pour herself out in self-reproach. "We wanted him to convey some property, " she said, "as we wished. "

"To your brother?"

"Ah, to him!" Then, seeing his astonishment, "It was mine, " she added. 

Payton knew that estates were much held in trust in that part, and hebegan to understand. He looked at her; but no, he did not understandnow. For if the idea had been to constrain Colonel Sullivan to transferher property to her brother, how did her interest match with that? Hecould only suppose that her brother had coerced her, and that she hadgiven him the slip and tried to release the man--with the result he hadwitnessed. 

One thing was clear. The property, large or small, was still hers. TheMajor looked with a thoughtful face at the smiling valley, with itscabins scattered over the slopes, at the lake and the fishing-boats, and the rambling slate-roofed house with its sheds and peat-stacks. Hewondered. 

No more was said at that moment, however, for Flavia saw that ColonelSullivan's strength was not to be revived in an hour. He must beassisted to the house and cared for there. But in the meantime, and tolend some strength, she was anxious to give him such wine and food ashe could safely take. To procure these she entered the room in which hehad been confined. 

As she cast her eyes round its dismal interior, marked the poor handfulof embers that told of his long struggle with the cold, marked the onechair which he had saved--for to lie on the floor had beendeath--marked the beaten path that led from the chair to the window, and spoke of many an hour of painful waiting and of hope deferred, shesaw the man in another, a more gentle, a more domestic aspect. She hadseen the heroism, she now saw the pathos of his conduct, and tears cameafresh to her eyes. "For me!" she murmured. "For me! And how had Itreated him!"

Her old grievance against him was forgotten, wiped out of remembranceby his sufferings. She dwelt only on the treatment she had meted out tohim. 

When they had given him to eat and drink he assured them, smiling, thathe could walk. But when he attempted to do so he staggered. "He willneed a stronger arm than yours, " Payton said, with a grin. "May I offermine?"

For the first time she looked at him gratefully "Thank you, " she said. 

"I can walk, " the Colonel repeated obstinately. "A little giddy, thatis all. " But in the end he needed all the help that both could givehim. And so it happened that a few minutes later Luke Asgill, standingat the entrance to the courtyard, a little anxious indeed, but aware ofno immediate danger, looked along the road, and saw the threeapproaching, linked in apparent amity. 

The shock was great, for James McMurrough had fled, cursing, intosolitude and the hills, taking no steps to warn his ally. The sight, thus unforeseen, struck Asgill with the force of a bullet. Colonel Johnreleased, and in the company of Flavia and Payton! All his craft, allhis coolness forsook him. He slunk out of sight by a back way, but notbefore Payton had marked his retreat. 

CHAPTER XXII

THE SCENE IN THE PASSAGE

Asgill saw himself in the position of a commander whose force has beenoutflanked, and who has to decide on the instant how he may bestre-form it on a new front. Flavia and Colonel Sullivan, Flavia andPayton, Payton and Colonel Sullivan--each of these conjunctions had forhim a separate menace; each threatened either his suit for Flavia, orhis standing in the house through which, and through which alone, hecould hope to win her. In addition, the absence of James McMurrough atthis critical moment left Asgill in the most painful perplexity. IfJames knew what had happened, why was he wanting at this moment, whenit behoved them to decide, and to decide quickly, what line they wouldtake?

Under the shadow of the great peat-stack at the back of the house, whither he had retired that he might make up his mind before he facedthe three, Asgill bit his nails and cursed The McMurrough with all hisheart, calling him a score of names, each worse than the other. It was, it must be, through his folly and mismanagement that the thing hadbefallen, that the prisoner had been released, that Payton had been letinto the secret. The volley of oaths that flew from Asgill expressed nomore than a tithe of his rage and his bewilderment. 

How was he to get rid of Payton? How prevent Colonel John from resumingthat sway in the house which he had exercised before? How nip in thebud that nascent sympathy, that feeling for him which Flavia's outbreakthe night before had suggested? Or how, short of all this, was he toface either Payton or the Colonel?

Again a volley of oaths flew from him. 

In council with James McMurrough he might have arranged a plan ofaction; at least, he would have learned from him what Payton knew. ButJames's absence ruined all. In the end, after waiting some time in thevain hope that he would appear, Asgill went in to supper. 

Colonel Sullivan was not there; he was in no condition to descend. Norwas Flavia; whereon Asgill reflected, with chagrin, that probably shewas attending upon the invalid. Payton was at table, with the twoO'Beirnes, and three other buckeens. The Englishman, amused anduplifted by the discovery he had made, was openly disdainful of hiscompanions; while the Irishmen, sullen and suspicious, were not awarehow much he knew, nor all of them how much there was to know. If TheMcMurrough chose to imprison his strange and unpopular kinsman, it wasnothing to them; nor a matter into which gentlemen eating at his tableand drinking his potheen and claret were called upon to peer tooclosely. 

The position was singular; for the English officer, partly by virtue ofhis mission and partly by reason of the knowledge he had gained, carried himself as if he held that ascendency in the house whichColonel Sullivan had enjoyed--an ascendency, like his, grudged andprecarious, as the men's savage and furtive glances proved. But for hisrepute as a duellist they would have picked a quarrel with the visitorthere and then. And but for the presence of his four troopers in thebackground they might have fallen upon him in some less regularfashion. As it was, they sat, eating slowly and eyeing him askance;and, without shame, were relieved when Asgill entered. They looked tohim to clear up the situation and put the interloper in his rightplace. At any rate, the burden was now lifted from their shoulders. 

"I'm fearing I'm late, " Asgill said, as he took his seat. "Where'll TheMcMurrough be, I wonder?"

"Gone to meet your friend, I should think, " Payton replied with asneer. 

Asgill maintained a steady face. "My friend?" he repeated. "Oh, ColonelSullivan?"

"Yes, your friend who was to return to-day, " the other retorted. "Haveyou seen anything of him?" he continued, with a grin. 

Asgill fixed his eyes steadily on Payton's face. "I'm fancying you havethe advantage of me, " he said. "More by token, I'm thinking, Major, youhave seen that same friend already. "

"Maybe I have. "

"And had a bout with him?"

"Eh?"

"And, faith, had the best of the bout, too!" Asgill continued coolly, and with his eyes fixed on the other's features, as if his one aim wasto see if he had hit the mark. "So much the best that I'll be chancinga guess he's upstairs at this moment, and wounded! Leastwise, I hearyou and the young lady brought him to the house between you, and himscarcely able to use his ten toes. "

Payton, with his mouth open, glared at the speaker in a manner that atanother time must have provoked him to laughter. 

"Isn't that the fact?" Asgill asked coldly. 

"The fact!" the other burst forth. "No, I'm cursed if it is! And youknow it is not! You know as well as I do----" And with that he pouredforth a version of the events of the afternoon, and of those leading upto them, which included not only the Colonel's release, but thetreatment to which he had been subjected and the motive for it. 

When he had done, "That's a strange story, " Asgill said quietly, "ifit's true. "

"True?" Payton rejoined, laying his hand on a glass and speaking in atowering rage. "Damn you, you know it's true!"

"I know nothing about it, " Asgill replied, with the utmost coolness. 

"Nothing?"

"And for a good reason. Sure, and I'm the last person they would belikely to tell it to!"

"And you were not a party to it?" Payton cried. 

"Why should I be?" Asgill rejoined, calmly cutting a slice of bread. "What have I to gain by robbing the young lady of her inheritance? I'dbe more likely to lose by it than gain. "

"Lose by it? Why?"

"That is my affair, " Asgill answered. And he hummed:

 They tried put the comether on Judy McBain: One, two, three, one, two, three! Cotter and crowder and Paddy O'Hea; For who but she's owner of Ballymacshane?

He made his meaning so clear, and pointed it so audaciously before themall, that Payton, after scowling at him for some seconds with his handon a glass as if he meant to throw it, dropped his eyes and his handand fell into a gloomy study. He could not but own the weight of theother's argument. If Asgill was a pretender to the heiress's hand--andPayton did not doubt this--the last thought in his mind would be todivest her of her property. 

Asgill read his thoughts, and presently, "I hope the wound is notserious?" he said. 

"He is not wounded, " the Major answered curtly. A few minutes before hewould have flown out at the other; now he took the thrust quietly. Hewas thinking. Meanwhile the O'Beirnes and their fellows grinned theiropen-mouthed admiration of the bear-tamer; and by-and-by, concludingthe fun was at an end, they went out one by one, until the two men wereleft together. 

They sat some way apart, Payton brooding savagely, with his eyes on thetable, Asgill toying with the things before him and from time to timeglancing at the other. Each saw the prize clear before him; each sawthe other in the way and wondered how he could best brush him from it. Payton cared for the girl herself, only as a toy that had caught hisfancy; but he was sunk in debt, and his mouth watered for herpossessions. Asgill cared, as has been said, little or nothing for theinheritance, but he swore that the other man should never live topossess the woman. "It is a pity, " Payton meditated, "for, with hisaid, I could take the girl, willing or unwilling. She'd not be thefirst Irish girl who has gone to her marriage across the pommel!" WhileAsgill reflected that if he could find Payton alone on a dark night itwould not be his small-sword would help him or his four troopers wouldfind him! But it must not be at Morristown. 

Each owned, with reluctance, that the other had advantages. Asgill wasIrish, and known to Flavia, and had come to be favoured by her. ButPayton, though English, was the younger, the handsomer, the betterborn, and, in his braggart fashion, the better bred. Both wereProtestants; but if Asgill was the cleverer, Payton was an officer anda gentleman. The latter flattered himself that, given a little time, hewould win, if not by favour, still by force or fraud. But, could hehave looked into Asgill's heart, he would have trembled, perhaps hewould have drawn back. For he would have known that, while Irish bogswere deep and Irish pikes were sharp, his life would not be worth oneweek's purchase if he wronged this girl. Bad man as Asgill was, hislove was of no common kind, even as the man was no common man. 

And he suspected the other; and he shook--ay, so that the table againstwhich he leant trembled--with rage at the thought that Payton mightoffer the girl some rudeness. The suspicion weighed so heavily on himthat he was fixed to see the other to his room that night. When Paytonrose to go, he rose also; and when, by chance, Payton sat down again, he sat down also, with a look that betrayed his thoughts. At once theEnglishman understood; and thenceforth they sat with frowning faces, each thinking more intently than before how he might thrust the otherfrom his path; each more certain, with every moment, that, the otherremoved, his path to the goal was clear and open. Neither gave athought to Colonel Sullivan, sleeping the sleep of exhaustion upstairs:Payton, because the Colonel seemed to him a middle-aged man, plain andgrey; and Asgill, because a more immediate and pressing jealousy hadthrust his mistrust of the Colonel from his mind. 

There was claret on the table, and the Major, dull and bored, andresenting the other's vigilance, did not spare it. When he rose to hisfeet to retire he was heated and flushed, but not drunk. "Where's thatyoung cub?" he asked, breaking the silence. 

Asgill shrugged his shoulders. "I can't hope to fill his place, " hesaid with a smooth smile. "But I will be doing the honours as well as Ican. '

"You are d----d officious, it seems to me, " Payton growled. And then, more loudly, "I am going to bed, " he said. 

"In his absence, " Asgill answered, with mock politeness, "I will havethe honour of lighting you. "

"You needn't trouble. "

"Faith, and it's no trouble at all, " Asgill replied in the same tone. And, taking two of the candles from the table, he preceded theEnglishman up the stairs. 

The gradual ascent of the lights and the men's mounting footstepsshould have given Flavia warning of their coming. But either shedisdained concealment or she was thinking of other things, for whenthey entered the passage beyond the landing they espied the girlstanding, in what had been darkness, outside the Colonel's door. A pangshot through Asgill's heart, and he drew in his breath. 

She raised her hand. "Ah, " she said, "he has been crying out! But Ithink it was in his sleep. Will you be making as little noise as youcan?"

Asgill did not answer, but Payton did. "Happy man!" he said. And, beingin his cups, he said it in such a tone and with such a look that a deepblush crimsoned the girl's face. 

Her eyes snapped. "Good-night, " she said coldly. 

Asgill continued to keep silence. Unfortunately Payton did not. "WishI'd such a guardian!" he said with a chuckle. "I'd be a happy manthen!" And, without thinking what he did, having Asgill's air in hishead, he hummed, with his head on one side and a grin on his face:

 "They tried put the comether on Judy McBain: One, two, three, one, two, three! Cotter and crowder and Paddy O'Hea; For who but she's owner of Ballymacshane?"

Asgill's face was dark with passion, but "Goodnight" Flavia repeatedcoldly. And this time the displeasure in her tone silenced the Major. The two men went on to their rooms, though Asgill's hands itched to beat the other's throat. A moment later two doors closed sharply. 

Flavia remained in the darkness of the passage, but she no longerlistened--she thought. Presently she went back to her room. 

There, when the door had closed upon her, she continued to stand and tothink. And the blush which the Major's insinuation had brought to hercheek still burned there. It was natural that Payton's words shoulddirect her thoughts more closely and more intimately to the man outsidewhose door he had found her; nor less natural that she should institutea comparison between the two, should picture the manner of the one andthe manner of the other, should consider how the one had treated her inan abnormal crisis, when he had held her struggling in his arms, whenin her despair she had beaten his face with her hands, when, after herattempt on his life, he had subdued her by sheer force; and how theother had treated her in the few hours he had known her! And socomparing, she could not but find in the one a nobility, in the othera--a dreadfulness. For, looking back, and having Payton's words andmanner fresh in her mind, she had to own that, in all his treatment ofher, Colonel Sullivan, while opposing and thwarting her, had still, andalways, respected her. 

Strange to say, she could not now understand, much less could shesustain, that rage against him which had before carried her to suchlengths. What had he done? How had he wronged her? She could find nosufficing answer. A curtain had fallen between the past and thepresent. Long years, it seemed to her, had elapsed, so that she couldnow see things in their due proportions and with a clear sight. Therising? It stood on a sudden very distant, very dim, a thing of thepast, an enterprise lofty and romantic, but hopeless. She supposed thathe had seen it in that light all through, and that for acting on whathe saw she had hated him. The contemptuous words in which he haddenounced it rang again in her ears, but they no longer kindled herresentment; they convinced. As one recovering from sickness looks backon the delusions of fever, Flavia reviewed the hopes and aspirations ofthe past month. She saw now that it was not in that remote corner, itwas not with such forces as they could command, it was not with ahandful of cotters and peasants, that Ireland could be saved, or thetrue faith restored!

She was still standing a pace within her door, and thinking suchthoughts when a foot stumbled heavily on the stairs. She recognised itfor James's footstep--she had heard him stumble on those stairsbefore--and she laid her hand on the latch. She had never had a realquarrel with him until now, and, bitterly as he had disappointed her, ruthlessly as he had destroyed her illusions about him, outrageously ashe had treated her, she could not bear to sleep without making anattempt to heal the breach. She opened the door, and stepped out. 

James's light was travelling up the stairs, but he had not himselfreached the landing. She had just noted this when a door between herand the stairs opened, and Payton looked out. He saw her, and, stillflushed with claret, he misunderstood her presence and her purpose. Hestepped towards her. 

"Thought so!" he chuckled. "Still listening, eh? Why not listen at mydoor? Then it would be a pretty man and a pretty maid. But I've caughtyou. " He shot out his arm and tried to draw her towards him. "There'sno one to see, and the least you can do is to give me a kiss for aforfeit!"

The girl recoiled, outraged and angry. But, knowing her brother was athand, and seeing in a flash what might happen in the event of acollision, she did so in silence, hoping to escape before he came uponthem. Unfortunately Payton misread her silence and took her movementfor a show of feigned modesty. With a movement as quick as hers, hegrasped her roughly, dragged her towards him and kissed her. 

She screamed then in sheer rage--screamed with such passion and suchunmistakable earnestness that Payton let her go and stepped back withan oath. As he did so he turned, and the turn brought him face to facewith James McMurrough. 

The young man, tipsy and smarting with his wrongs, saw what was beforehis eyes--his sister in Payton's arms--but he saw something more. Hesaw the man who had thwarted him that day, and whom he had not at thetime dared to beard. What he might have done had he been sober, mattersnot. Drink and vindictiveness gave him more than the courage he needed, and, with a roar of anger, he dashed the glass he was carrying--and itscontents--into Payton's face. 

The Englishman dropped where he was, and James stood over him, swearing, while the grease guttered from the tilted candle in his righthand. Flavia gasped, and, horror-struck, clutched James's arm as helifted the candlestick, and made as if he would beat in the man'sbrains. 

Fortunately a stronger hand than hers interfered. Asgill dragged theyoung man back. "Haven't you done enough?" he cried. "Would you murderthe man, and his troopers in the house?"

"Ah, didn't you see, curse you, he----"

"I know, I know!" Asgill answered hoarsely. "But not now! Not now! Lethim rise if he can! Let him rise, I say! Payton! Major!"

The moment James stood back the fallen man staggered to his feet, andthough the blood was running down his face from a cut on thecheek-bone, he showed that he was less hurt than startled. "You'll giveme satisfaction for this!" he muttered. "You'll give me satisfactionfor this, " he repeated, between his teeth. 

"Ah, by G--d, I will!" James McMurrough answered furiously. "And killyou, too!"

"At eight to-morrow! Do you hear? At eight to-morrow! Not an hourlater!"

"I'll not keep you waiting, " James retorted. 

Flavia leant almost fainting against her door. She tried to speak, tried to say something. But her voice failed her. 

And Payton's livid, scowling, bleeding face was hate itself. "Behindthe yews in the garden?" he said, disregarding her presence. 

"Ah, I'll meet you there!" The McMurrough answered, pot-valiant. "And, more by token, order your coffin, for you'll need it!" Drink and rageleft no place in his brain for fear. 

"That will be seen--to-morrow, " the Englishman answered, in a tone thatchilled the girl's marrow. Then, with his kerchief pressed to his cheekto staunch the blood, he retreated into his room, and slammed the door. They heard him turn the key in it. 

Flavia found her voice. She looked at her brother. "Ah, God!" shecried. "Why did I open my door?"

James, still pot-valiant, returned her look. "Because you were a fool, you slut!" he said. "But I'll spit him, never fear! Faith, and I'llspit him like a fowl!" In his turn he went on unsteadily to his room, disappeared within it, and closed the door. He took the candle withhim, but from Asgill's open door, and from Flavia's, which stood ajar, enough light issued to illumine the passage faintly. 

Flavia and Asgill remained together. Her eyes met his. "Ah, why did Iopen my door?" she cried. "Why did I open my door? Why did I?"

He had no comfort for her. He shook his head, but did not speak. 

"He will kill him!" she said. 

Asgill reflected in a heavy silence. "I will think what can be done, "he muttered at last. "I will think! Do you go to bed!"

"To bed?" she cried. 

"There is naught to be done to-night, " he answered, in a low tone. "Ifthe troopers were not with him--then indeed; but that is useless. And--his door is locked. Do you go to bed, and I will think what we cando!"

"To save James?" She laid her hand on Asgill's arm, and he quivered. "Ah, you will save him!" She had forgotten her brother's treatment ofher earlier in the day. 

"If I can, " he said slowly. His face was damp and very pale. "If Ican, " he repeated. "But it will not be easy to save him honourably. "

"What do you mean?" she whispered. 

"He'll save himself, I fancy. But his honour----"

"Ah!" The word came from her in a cry of pain. 

CHAPTER XXIII

BEHIND THE YEWS

Under the sky the pale softness of dawn had yielded place to the sunin his strength--in more poetical words, Aurora had given way toPhoebus--but within, the passages were still grey and chill, andsilent as though night's ghostly sentinels still walked them, when oneof the bedchamber doors opened and a face peeped out. The face wasFlavia's. The girl was too young, too full of life and vigour, to bealtered by a single sleepless night, but the cold reflection of thewhitewashed walls did that which watching had failed to do. It robbedher eyes of their brightness, her face of its colour, her hair of itslustre. She stood an instant, and gazed, frowning, at the doors that, in a row and all alike, hid nevertheless one a hope, and another afear, and a third perhaps a tragedy. But drab, silent, closed, eachwithin a shadow of its own, they told nothing. Presently the girlstepped forward--paused, scared by a board that creaked under her nakedfoot--then went on again. She stood now at one of the doors, andscratched on it with her nail. 

No one answered the summons, and she pushed the door open and went in. And, as she had feared, enlightened by Asgill's hint and by what shehad seen of her brother's conduct earlier in the day, she found. Jameswas awake--wide awake--and sitting up in his bed, his arms claspedabout his knees. His eyes met hers as she entered, and in his eyes, andin his form, huddled together as in sheer physical pain, she readbeyond all doubt, beyond all mistake--fear. Why she had felt certain, courageous herself, that this was what she would find, she did notknow. But there it was, as Asgill had foretold it, and as she hadforeseen it, through the long, restless, torturing hours; as she hadseen it, and now denied it, now, with a sick heart, owned its reality. 

James tried to utter the oath that, deceiving her, might rid him of herpresence. But his nerves, shaken by his overnight drink, could notcommand his voice even for that. His eyes dropped in shame, themuttered "What the plague will you be wanting at this hour?" was nomore than a querulous whisper. 

"I couldn't sleep, " she said, avoiding his eyes. 

"I, no more, " he muttered. "Curse him! Curse him! Curse you, too! Whywere you getting in his way? You've as good as murdered me with yourtricks and your poses!"

"God forbid!" she exclaimed. 

"Ah, you have!" he answered, rocking himself to and fro in hisexcitement. "If it were any one else, I'm as ready to fight as another!And why not? But he's killed four men, and he'll kill me! Oh, thediffer, if I'd not come up at that minute! If I'd not come up at thatminute!"

The picture of what he would have escaped had he mounted the stairs aminute later, of what he had brought on himself by mounting a momentearlier, was too much for him. Not a thought did he give to what mighthave happened to her had he come on the scene later; but, with all hiscowardly soul laid bare, he rocked himself to and fro in a paroxysm ofself-pity. 

Yet he did not suffer more sorely, he did not wince more tenderly underthe lash of his own terrors, than Flavia suffered; than she winced, seeing him thus, seeing at last her idol as he was--the braggadociostripped from him, and the poor, cringing creature displayed. If herpride of race--and the fabled Wicklow kings, of whom she came, wereoften in her mind--if that pride needed correction, she had it here. Ifshe had thought too much of her descent--and the more in proportion asfortune had straitened the line, and only in this corner of adowntrodden land was its greatness even a memory--she was chastened forit now! She suffered for it now! She could have wept tears of shame. And yet, so plain was the collapse of the man before her, and so futilewords, that she did not think of reproach; even had she found heart tochide him, knowing that her words might send him to his death. 

All her thought was, could she hide the blot? Could she mask the shame?Could she, at any rate, so veil it that this insolent Englishman, thisbully of the conquering race, might not perceive it? That were worth somuch that her own life, on this summer morning, seemed a small price topay for it. 

But, alas! she could not purchase it with her life. Only in fairy talescan the woman pass for the man, and Doris receive in her tender bosomthe thrust intended for the sterner breast. Then how? How could theyshun at least open disgrace, open dishonour? For it needed but a glanceat her brother's pallid face and wandering eye to assure her that, brought to the test, he would flinch; that, brought to the field, hewould prove unequal even to the task of cloaking his fears. 

She sickened at the thought, and her eyes grew hard. Was this the manin whom she had believed? And when, presently, he turned on his sideand hid his face in the pillow and groaned, she had small pity to sparefor him. "Are you not well?" she asked. 

"Can't you be seeing?" he answered fractiously; but for very shame hecould not face her eyes. "Cannot you be seeing I am not fit to get up, let alone be meeting that devil? See how my hand shakes!"

"What is to be done, then?"

He cursed Payton thrice in a frenzy of rage. He beat the pillow withhis fist. 

"That does no good, " she said. 

"I believe you want to kill me!" he retorted, with childish passion. "Ibelieve you want to see me dead! Why can't you be managing your ownaffairs, without--without----Oh, my God!" And then, in a dreadfulvoice, "My God, I shall be dead to-night! I shall be dead to-night! Andyou care nothing!"

He hid unmanly tears on his pillow, while she looked at the wall, paleto the lips and cut to the heart. Her worst misgivings, even thosenightmare fears which haunt the dawn, had not pictured a thing so meanas this, a heart so low, a spirit so poor. And this was her brother, her idol, the last of the McMurroughs of Morristown, he to whom she hadfondly looked to revive the glories of the race! Truly she had notunderstood him, or others. She had been blind indeed, blind, blind!

She had spoken to Luke Asgill the night before. He guessed, if he didnot know the worst, and he would help her, she believed. But for thatshe would have turned, as her thoughts did turn, to Colonel John. Buthe lay prostrate, and, if she could have brought herself to go to him, he was in no state to give aid. The O'Beirnes were out of the question;she could not tell them. Youth has no pity, makes no allowance, expectsthe utmost, and a hundred times they had heard James brag and brawl. They would not understand, they would not believe. And Uncle Ulick wasaway. 

There remained only Luke Asgill, who had offered his help. 

"If you are not well, " she said, in the same hard voice, "shall I betelling Mr. Asgill? He may contrive something. "

The man cringing in the bed leapt at the hope, as he would have leaptat any hope. Nor was he so bemused by fear as not to reflect that, whatever Flavia asked, Asgill would do. "Ah, tell him, " he cried, raising himself on his elbow. "Do you be telling him! He can makehim--wait, may be. "

At that moment she came near to hating her brother. "I will send him toyou, " she said. 

"No!" he cried anxiously. "No! Do you be telling him! You tell him! Doyou hear? I'm not so well to see him. "

She shivered, seeing plainly the cowardice, the unmixed selfishness ofthe course he urged. But she had not the heart to answer him. She wentfrom the room without another word, and, going back to her own chamber, she dressed. By this time it wanted not much of seven. The house wasastir, the June sunshine was pouring with the songs of birds throughthe windows, she heard one of the O'Beirnes stumble downstairs. NextAsgill opened his door and passed down. In a twinkling she slipped outand followed him. At the bottom of the staircase he turned, hearing herfootstep behind him, but she made a sign to him to go on, and led himinto the open air. Nor when they were outside did she speak until shehad put the courtyard between herself and the house. 

For she would have hidden their shame from all if she could! Even tosay what she had to say to one, and though he already guessed thetruth, cost her in pain and humiliation more than her brother had paidfor aught in his selfish life. But it had to be said, and, after apause, and with eyes averted, "My brother is ill, " she faltered. "Hecannot meet--that man, this morning. It is--as you feared. And--whatcan we do?"

In another case Luke Asgill would have blessed the chance that linkedhim with her, that wrought a tie between them, and cast her on hishelp. But he had guessed, before she opened her mouth, what she had tosay--nay, for hours he had lain sleepless on his bed, with eyes staringinto the darkness, anticipating it. He had been certain of theissue--he knew James McMurrough; and, being a man who loved Flaviaindeed, but loved life also, he had foreseen, with the cold sweat onhis brow, what he would be driven to do. 

He made no haste to answer, therefore, and his tone, when he didanswer, was dull and lifeless. "Is it ill he is?" he said. "It's a badmorning to be ill, and a meeting on hand. "

She did not answer. 

"Is he too bad to stand?" he continued. He made no attempt to hide hiscomprehension or his scorn. 

"I don't say that, " she faltered. 

"Perhaps he told you, " Asgill said--and there was nothing of the loverin his tone--"to speak to me?"

She nodded. 

"It is I am to--put it off, I suppose?"

"If it be possible, " she cried. "Oh, if it be possible! Is it?"

He stood, thinking, with a gloomy face. From the first he had seen thatthere were two ways only of extricating The McMurrough. The one by amild explanation, which would leave his honour in the mud. The other byan explanation after a different fashion, _vi et armis, vehementer_, with the word "liar" ready to answer to the word "coward. " But he whogave this last explanation must be willing and able to back the wordwith the deed, and stop cavilling with the sword-point. 

Now, Asgill knew the Major's skill with the sword; none better. Andunder other circumstances the Justice--cold, selfish, scheming--wouldhave gone many a mile about before he entered upon a quarrel with him. None the less, love and much night-thinking had drawn him tocontemplate this very thing. For surely, if he did this and lived, Flavia would smile on him. Surely, if he saved her brother's honour, orcame as near to saving it as driving the foul word down his opponent'sthroat could bring him, she would be won. It was a forlorn, it was adesperate expedient. For no worldly fortune, for no other advantage, would Luke Asgill have faced the Major's sword-point. But, whatever hewas, he loved. He loved! And for the face and the form beside him, andfor the quality of soul within them that shone from the girl's eyes, and made her what she was, and to him different from all other women, he had made up his mind to run the risk. 

It went for something in his decision that he believed that Flavia, ifhe failed her, would go to the one person in the house who had no causeto fear Payton--to Colonel Sullivan. If she did that, Asgill was surethat his own chance was at an end. This was his chance. It lay with himnow, to-day, at this moment--to dare or to retire, to win her favour atthe risk of his life, or to yield her to another. In the chill morninghour he had discovered that the choice lay before him, that he mustrisk all or lose all: and he had decided. That decision he nowannounced. 

"I will make it possible, " he said slowly, questioning in his mindwhether he could make terms with her--whether he dared make terms withher. "I will make it possible, " he repeated, still more slowly, andwith his eyes fixed on her face. 

"If you could!" she cried, clasping her hands. 

"I will!" he said, a sullen undertone in his voice. His eyes stilldwelt darkly on her. "If he raises an objection, I will fighthim--myself!"

She shrank from him. "Ah, but I can't ask that!" she cried, trembling. 

"It is that or nothing. "

"That or----"

"There is no other way, " he said. He spoke with the sameungraciousness; for, try as he would, and though the habit and theeducation of a life cried to him to treat with her and make conditions, he could not; and he was enraged that he could not. 

The more as her quivering lips, her wet eyes, her quick mountingcolour, told of her gratitude. In another moment she might, almostcertainly she would, have said a word fit to unlock his lips. And hewould have spoken; and she would have pledged herself. But fate, in theperson of old Darby, intervened. Timely or untimely, the butlerappeared in the distant doorway, cried "Hist!" and, by a backwardgesture, warned them of some approaching peril. 

"I fear----" she began. 

"Yes, go!" Asgill replied, almost roughly. "He is coming, and he mustnot find us together. "

She fled swiftly, but the garden gate had barely closed on her skirtsbefore Payton issued from the courtyard. The Englishman paused aninstant in the gateway, his sword under his arm and a handkerchief inhis hand. Thence he looked up and down the road with an air of scornfulconfidence that provoked Asgill beyond measure. The sun did not seembright enough for him, nor the air scented to his liking. Finally heapproached the Irishman, who, affecting to be engaged with his ownthoughts, had kept his distance. 

"Is he ready?" he asked, with a sneer. 

With an effort Asgill controlled himself. "He is not, " he said. 

"At his prayers, is he? Well, he'll need them. "

"He is not, to my knowledge, " Asgill replied. "But he is ill. "

Payton's face lightened with a joy not pleasant to see. "A coward!" hesaid coolly. "I am not surprised! Ill is he? Ay, I know that illness. It's not the first time I've met it. "

Asgill had no wish to precipitate a quarrel. On the contrary, he hadmade up his mind to gain time if he could; at any rate, to put off the_ultima ratio_ until evening, or until the next morning. Only inthe last resort had he determined to fling off the mask. But at thatword "coward, " though he knew it to be well deserved, his temper, sapped by the knowledge that love was forcing him into a position whichreason repudiated, gave way, and he spoke his true thoughts. 

"What a d--d bully you are, Payton!" he said, in his slowest tone. "Sure, and you insult the man's sister in your drink----"

"What's that to you?"

"You insult the man's sister, " Asgill persisted coolly, "and because hetreats you like the tipsy creature you are, you'd kill him like a dog. "

Payton turned white. "And you, too, " he said, "if you say another word!What in Heaven's name is amiss with you, man, this morning? Are youmad?"

"I'll not hear the word 'coward' used of the family--I'll soon be oneof!" Asgill returned, speaking on the spur of the moment, and wonderingat himself the moment he had made the statement. "That's what I'mmeaning! Do you see? And if you are for repeating the word, more bytoken, it'll be all the breakfast you'll have, for I'll cram it downyour ugly throat!"

Payton stared dumbfounded, divided between rage and astonishment. Butthe former was not slow to get the upper hand, and "Enough said, " hereplied, in a voice that trembled, but not with fear. "If you arewilling to make it good, you'll be coming this way. "

"Willingly!" Asgill answered. 

"I'll have one of my men for witness. Ay, that I will! I don't trustyou, Mr. Asgill, and that's flat. Get you whom you please! In fiveminutes, in the garden, then?"

Asgill nodded. The Englishman looked once more at him to make sure thathe was sober; then he turned on his heel and went back through thecourtyard. Asgill remained alone. 

He had taken the step there was no retracing. He had cast the dice, andthe next few minutes would decide whether it was for life or death. Hehad done it deliberately; yet at the last he had been so carried awayby impulse that, as he stood there, looking after the man he hadinsulted, looking on the placid water glittering in the early sunshine, looking along the lake-side road, by which he had come, he could hardlycredit what had happened, or that in a moment he had thrown for a stakeso stupendous, that in a moment he had changed all. The sunshine lostits warmth and grew pale, the hills lost their colour and their beauty, as he reflected that he might never see the one or the other again, might never return by that lake-side road by which he had come; as heremembered that all his plans for his aggrandisement, and they weremany and clever, might end this day, this morning, this hour! Life! Itwas that, it was all, it was the future, with its pleasures, hopes, ambitions, that he had staked. And the stake was down. He could not nowtake it up. It might well be, for the odds were great against him, thatit was to this day that all his life had led up; that life by which menwould by-and-by judge him, recalling this and that, this chicane andthat extortion, thanking God that he was dead, or perhaps one here andthere shrugging his shoulders in good-natured regret. 

From the hedge-school in which he had first grasped the clue-line ofhis life, to the day when his father had encouraged him to "turnProtestant, " that he might the better exploit his Papist neighbours, ay, and forward to this day on which, at the bidding of a woman, he hadgiven the lie to his instincts, his training, and his education--fromthe one to the other he saw his life stretched out before him! And hecould have cried upon his folly. Yet for that woman----"

"Faith, Mr. Asgill, " cried a voice in his ear, "it's if you're ill, theMajor's asking. And, by the power, it's not very well you're lookingthis day!"

Asgill eyed the interrupter--it was Morty O'Beirne--with a sternnesswhich his pallor made more striking. "I am coming, " he said, "I amgoing to fight him. "

"The devil you are!" the young man answered. "Now, are you meaning?This morning that ever is?"

"Ay, now. Where is----"

He stopped on the word, and was silent. Instead, he looked across thecourtyard in the direction of the house. If he might see her again. Ifhe might speak to her. But, no. Yet--was it certain that she knew? Thatshe understood? And if she understood, would she know that he had goneto the meeting well-nigh without hope, aware against what skill hepitted himself, and how large, how very large were the odds againsthim?

"But, faith, and it's no jest fighting him, if the least bit in life ofwhat I've heard be true!" Morty said, a cloud on his face. He lookeduncertainly from Asgill to the house and back. "Is it to be doinganything you want me?"

"I want you to come with me and see it out, " Asgill said. He wheeledbrusquely to the garden gate, but when he was within a pace of it hepaused and turned his head. "Mr. O'Beirne, " he said, "I'm going in bythis gate, and it's not much to be expected I'll come out any way butfeet first. Will you be telling her, if you please, that I knew thatsame?"

"I will, " Morty answered, genuinely distressed. "But I'm asking, isthere no other way?"

"There is none, " Asgill said. And he opened the gate. 

Payton was waiting for him on the path under the yew-trees, with two ofhis troopers on guard in the background. He had removed his coat andvest, and stood, a not ungraceful figure, in the sunshine, bending hisrapier and feeling its point with his thumb. He was doing this when hiseyes surprised his opponent's entrance, and, without desisting from hisemployment, he smiled. 

If the other's courage had begun to wane--but, with all his faults, Asgill was brave--that smile would have restored it. For it roused inhim a stronger passion than fear--the passion of hatred. He saw in theman before him, the man with the cruel smile, who handled his weaponwith a scornful ease, a demon--a demon who, in pure malice, withoutreason and without cause, would take his life, would rob him of joy andlove and sunshine, and hurl him into the blackness of the gulf. And hewas seized with a rage at once fierce and deliberate. This man, whowould kill him, and whom he saw smiling before him, he would kill! Hethirsted to set his foot upon his throat and squeeze, and squeeze thelife out of him! These were the thoughts that passed through his mindas he paused an instant at the gate to throw off the encumbering coat. Then he advanced, drawing his weapon as he moved, and fixing his eyeson Payton; who, for his part, reading the other's thoughts in hisface--for more than once he had seen that look--put himself on hisguard without a word. 

Asgill had no more than the rudimentary knowledge of the sword whichwas possessed in that day by all who wore it. He knew that, given timeand the decent observances of the fencing-school, he would be a merechild in Payton's hands; that it would matter nothing whether the sunwere on this side or that, or his sword the longer or the shorter by aninch. The moment he was within reach therefore, and his blade touchedthe other's he rushed in, lunging fiercely at his opponent's breast andtrusting to the vigour of his attack and the circular sweep of hispoint to protect himself. Not seldom has a man skilled in thesubtleties of the art found himself confused and overcome by this modeof attack. But Payton had met his man too often on the green to betaken by surprise. He parried the first thrust, the second he evaded bystepping adroitly aside. By the same movement he put the sun inAsgill's eyes. 

Again the latter rushed in, striving to get within his opponent'sguard; and again Payton stepped aside, and allowed the random thrust topass wasted under his arm. Once more the same thing happened--Asgillrushed in, Payton parried or evaded with the ease and coolness oflong-tried skill. By this time Asgill, forced to keep his blade inmotion, was beginning to breathe quickly. The sweat stood on his brow, he struck more and more wildly, and with less and less strength or aim. He was aware--it could be read in the glare of his eyes--that he wasbeing reduced to the defensive; and he knew that to be fatal. An oathbroke from his panting lips and he rushed in again, even morerecklessly, more at random than before, his sole object now to kill theother, to stab him at close quarters, no matter what happened tohimself. 

Again Payton avoided the full force of the rush, but this time after adifferent fashion. He retreated a step. Then, with a flicker and agirding of steel on steel, Asgill's sword flew from his hand, and atthe same instant--or so nearly at the same instant that the disarmingand the thrust might have seemed to an untrained eye one motion--Paytonturned his wrist and his sword buried itself in Asgill's body. Theunfortunate man recoiled with a gasping cry, staggered and sanksideways to the ground. 

"By the powers, " O'Beirne exclaimed, springing forward, "a foul stroke!By G--d, a foul stroke! He was disarmed. I----"

"Have a care what you say!" Payton answered slowly, and in a terribletone. "You'd do better to look to your friend--for he'll need it. "

"It's you that struck him after he was disarmed!" Morty cried, almostweeping with rage. "Devil a bit of a chance did you give him! You----"

"Silence, I say!" Payton answered, in a fierce tone of authority. "Iknow my duty; and if you know yours you'll look to him. "

He turned aside with that, and thrust the point of his sword twice andthrice into the sod before he sheathed the weapon. Meanwhile Morty hadcast himself down beside the fallen man, who, speechless, and with hishead hanging, continued to support himself on his hand. A patch ofblood, bright-coloured, was growing slowly on his vest: and there wasblood on his lips. 

"Oh, whirra, whirra, what'll I do?" the Irishman exclaimed, helplesslywringing his hands. "What'll I do for him? He's murdered entirely!"

Payton, aided by one of the troopers, was putting on his coat and vest. He paused to bid the other help the gentleman. Then, with a cold lookat the fallen man, for whom, though they had been friends, as friendsgo in the world, he seemed to have no feeling except one of contempt, he walked away in the direction of the rear of the house. 

By the time he reached the back door the alarm was abroad, the maidswere running to and fro and screaming, and on the threshold heencountered Flavia. Pale as the stricken man, she looked on Payton withan eye of horror, and, as he stood aside to let her pass, shedrew--unconscious what she did--her skirts away, that they might nottouch him. 

He went on, with rage in his heart. "Very good, my lady, " he muttered, "very good! But I've not done with you yet. I know a way to pull yourpride down. And I'll go about it!"

He might have moved less at ease, he might have spoken lessconfidently, had he, before he retired from the scene of the fight, cast one upward glance in the direction of the house, had he marked anopening high up in the wall of yew, and noticed through that opening awindow, so placed that it alone of all the windows in the housecommanded the scene of action. For then he would have discovered atthat casement a face he knew, and a pair of stern eyes that hadfollowed the course of the struggle throughout, noted each separateattack, and judged the issue--and the man. 

And he might have taken warning. 

CHAPTER XXIV

THE PITCHER AT THE WELL

The surgeon of that day was better skilled in letting blood than instaunching it, in cupping than in curing. It was well for Luke Asgill, therefore, that none lived nearer than distant Tralee. It was stillmore fortunate for him that there was one in the house to whom thetreatment of such a wound as his was an everyday matter, and who wasguided in his practice less by the rules of the faculty than by thoseof experience and common sense. 

Even under his care Asgill's life hung for many hours in the balance. There was a time, when he was at his weakest, when his breath, in theold phrase, would not raise a feather, and those about his beddespaired of detaining the spirit fluttering to be free. The servantswere ready to raise the "keen, " the cook sought the salt for thedeath-plate. But Colonel John, mindful of many a man found living onthe field hours after he should, by all the rules, have died, did notdespair; and little by little, though the patient knew nothing of thebattle which was maintained for his life, the Colonel's skill andpatience prevailed. The breathing grew stronger and more regular; and, though it seemed likely that fever would follow and the end must remainuncertain, death, for the moment, was repelled. 

Now, he who possesses the habit of command in emergencies, who, whenothers are distraught and wring their hands, knows both what to do andhow to do it, cannot fail to impress the imagination. Unsupported byFlavia, unaided by her deft fingers, Colonel John might have done less:yet she who seconded him the most ably, who fetched and carried forhim, and shrank from no sight of blood or wound, was also the one whoyielded him the fullest meed, and succumbed the most completely to hisascendancy. Flavia's feelings towards her cousin had been altering hourby hour; and this experience of him hastened her tacit surrender. Shehad seen him in many parts. It had been hers to witness, by turns, hisdefeat and his triumph. She had felt aversion, born of his unwelcomeappearance in the character of her guardian, yield to a buddinginterest, which his opposition to her plans, and his success in foilingthem, had converted anew into disdain and hatred. 

But in all strong passions lurk the seeds of the opposite. The objectof hatred is the object of interest. So it had been in her case. Thevery lengths to which she had allowed herself to be carried against himhad revolted her, and pity had taken the place of hatred. Nor pityalone. For, having seen how high he could rise in adversity, whatcourage, what patience, what firmness he could exert--for her sake whopersecuted him--she now saw also how naturally he took the lead ofothers, how completely he dominated the crowd. And while she no longermarvelled at the skill with which he had baffled the Admiral andCammock, and thwarted plans which she began to appraise at their value, she found herself relying upon him, as she watched him moving to andfro, to an extent which startled and frightened her. 

Was it only that morning that she had trembled for her brother's life?Was it only that morning that she had opened her eyes and known himcraven, unworthy of his name and race? Was it only that morning thatshe had sent into peril the man who lay wan and moribund before her;only that morning that she had felt her unhappiness greater than shecould bear, her difficulties insuperable, her loneliness a misery? Forif that were so why did she now feel so different? Why did she now feelinexplicably relieved, inconceivably at ease, almost happy? Why, withthe man whom she had thrust into peril lying _in extremis_ before her, and claiming all her gratitude, did she find her mind straying toanother? Finally, why, with her troubles the same, with her brother noless dishonoured, were her thoughts neither with him nor with herself, but with the man whose movements she watched, whose hands touched hersin the work of tendance, whose voice once chid her sharply--and gaveher an odd pang of pleasure--who, low-toned, ordered her hither andthither, and was obeyed?

She asked herself the question as she sat in the darkened room, watching. And in the twilight she blushed. Once, at a crisis, ColonelJohn had taken her roughly by the wrist and forced her to hold thebandage so, while he twisted it. She looked at the wrist now, and, fancying she could see the imprint of his fingers on it, she blushedmore deeply. 

Presently there came, as they sat listening to the fluttering breath, alow scratching at the door. At a sign from Colonel Sullivan, who sat onthe inner side of the bed, she stole to it and found Morty O'Beirne onthe threshold. He beckoned to her, and, closing the door, she followedhim downstairs, to where, in the living-room, she found the otherO'Beirne standing sheepishly beside the table. 

"It's not knowing what to do, we are, " Morty said. 

He did not look at her, nor did his brother. Her heart sank. "What isit?" she asked. 

"The fiend's in the man, " Morty replied, tapping with his fingers onthe table. "But--it's you will be telling her, Phelim. "

"It's he that's not content, " Phelim muttered. "The thief of theworld!"

"Curse him!" cried his brother. 

"Not content?" she echoed. "Not content? After what he's done?" For aninstant her eyes flashed hot indignation, her very hair seemed to riseabout her head. Then the downcast demeanour of the two, theirembarrassment, their silence, told the story; and she gasped. "He'sfor--fighting my brother?" she whispered. 

"He'll be content with no less, " Morty answered, with a groan. "Badcess to him! And The McMurrough--sure it's certain death, and who'sblaming him, but he's no stomach for it. And whirra, whirra, on thatthe man says he'll be telling it in Tralee that he'd not meet him, andas far as Galway City he'll cut his comb for him! Ay, bedad, he saysthat, and that none of his name shall show their face there, night orday, fair or foul, race or cockfight--the bloody-minded villain!"

She listened, despairing. The house was quiet, as houses in the countryare of an afternoon, and the quieter for the battle with death whichwas joined in the darkened room upstairs. Her thoughts were no longerwith the injured man, however, but in that other room, where herbrother lurked in squalid fear--fear that in a nameless man might havebeen pardoned, but in him, in a McMurrough, head of his race, last ofhis race, never! She came of heroes, to her the strain had descendedpure and untainted, and she would rather have seen him dead. The twomen before her--who knew, alas! who knew!--she was sure that they wouldhave taken up the glove, unwillingly and perforce, perhaps, but theywould have fought! While her brother, The McMurrough---- But even whileshe thought of it, she saw through the open door the figure of a mansaunter slowly past the courtyard gates, his sword under his arm. Itwas the Englishman. She felt the added sting. Her cheek, that had beenpale, burned darkly, her eyes shone. 

"St. Patrick fly away with the toad and the ugly smile of him!" Mortysaid. "I'm thinking it's between the two of us, Phelim, my jewel! Andhe that's killed will help the other. "

"God forbid!" Flavia cried, pale with horror at the thought. "Notanother!"

"But sure, and I'm not seeing how else we'll be rid of him handsomely, "Phelim replied. 

"No!" she repeated firmly. "No! I forbid it!"

Again the man sauntered by the entrance, and again he cast the sameinsolent, smiling look at the house. They watched him pass, an ominousshadow in the sunshine, and Flavia shuddered. 

"But what will you be doing, then?" Morty asked, rubbing, his chin inperplexity. "He's saying that if The McMurrough'll not meet him by fouro'clock, and it isn't much short of it, he'll be riding this day! Andhim once gone he's a bitter tongue, and 'twill be foul shame on thehouse!"

Flavia stood silent in thought, but at length she drew in her breathsharply--she had made up her mind. "I know what I will do, " she said. "I will tell him all. " And she turned to go. 

"It's not worth the shoe-leather!" Morty cried after her, letting hisscorn of James be seen. 

But she was out of hearing, and when she returned a minute later shewas followed, not by James McMurrough, but by Colonel Sullivan. TheColonel's face, seen in the full light, had lost the brown of health;it was thin and peaky, and still bore signs of privation. But he trodfirmly, and his eyes were clear and kind. If he was aware of theO'Beirnes' embarrassment, his greeting did not betray it. 

"I am willing to help if I can, " he said. "What is your trouble?"

"Tell him, " Flavia said, averting her face. 

They told him lamely--they were scarcely less jealous of the honour ofthe house than she was--in almost the same words in which they hadbroken the news to her. "And the curse of Cromwell on me, but he'sparading up and down now, " Morty continued, "and cocking his eye at thesun-dial whenever he passes, as much as to say, 'Is it coming, youare?' till the heart's fairly melted in me with the rage!"

"And it's shame on us we let him be!" cried Phelim. 

Colonel John did not answer. He was silent even when, under the eyes ofall, the ominous shadow passed again before the entrance gates--cameand went. He was so long silent that Flavia turned to him at last, andheld out her hands. "What shall we do?" she cried--and in that cry shebetrayed her new dependence on him. "Tell us!"

"It is hard to say, " Colonel John answered gravely. His face was verygloomy, and to hide it or his thoughts he turned from them and went toone of the windows--that very window through which Uncle Ulick and hehad looked at his first coming. He gazed out, not that he might see, but that he might think unwatched. 

They waited, the men expecting little, but glad to be rid of some partof the burden, Flavia with a growing sense of disappointment. She didnot know for what she had hoped, or what she had thought that he woulddo. But she had been confident that he could help; and it seemed thathe could do no more than others. Neither to her, nor to the men, did itseem as strange as it was that they should turn to him, against whoseguidance they had lately revolted so fiercely. 

He came back to them presently, his face sad and depressed. "I willdeal with it, " he said--and he sighed. "You can leave it to me. Doyou, " he continued, addressing Morty, "come with me, Mr. O'Beirne. "

He was for leaving them with that, but Flavia put herself between himand the door. She fixed her eyes on his face. "What are you going todo?" she asked in a low voice. 

"I will tell you all--later, " he replied gently. 

"No, now!" she retorted, controlling herself with difficulty. "Now! Youare not going--to fight him?"

"I am not going to fight, " he answered slowly. 

But her heart was not so easily deceived as her ear. "There issomething under your words, " she said jealously. "What is it?"

"I am not going to fight, " he replied gravely, "but to punish. There isa limit. " Even while he spoke she remembered in what circumstancesthose words had been used. "There is a limit, " he repeated solemnly. "He has the blood of four on his head, and another lies at death'sdoor. And he is not satisfied. He is not satisfied! Once I warned him. To-day the time for warning is past, the hour for judgment is come. Godforgive me if I err, for vengeance is His and it is terrible to be Hishand. " He turned to Phelim, and, in the same stern tone, "my sword isbroken, " he said. "Fetch me the man's sword who lies upstairs. "

Phelim went, awe-stricken, and marvelling. Morty remained, marvellingalso. And Flavia--but, as she tried to speak, Payton's shadow once morecame into sight at the entrance-gates and went slowly by, and sheclapped her hand to her mouth that she might not scream. ColonelSullivan saw the action, understood, and touched her softly on theshoulder. "Pray, " he said, "pray!"

"For you!" she cried in a voice that, to those who had ears, betrayedher heart. "Ah, I will pray!"

"No, for him, " he replied. "For him now. For me when I return. "

She dropped on her knees before a chair, and, shuddering, hid her facein her hands. And almost at once she knew that they were gone, and thatshe was alone in the room. 

Then, whether she prayed most or listened most, or the very intensityof her listening was itself prayer--prayer in its highest form--shenever knew; but only that, whenever in the agony of her suspense sheraised her head from the chair to hear if there was news, the commonsounds of afternoon life in the house and without lashed her with adreadful irony. The low whirr of a spinning-wheel, a girl's distantchatter, the cluck of a hen in the courtyard, the satisfied grunt of aroving pig, all bore home to her heart the bitter message that, whatever happened, and though nightfall found her lonely in adishonoured home, life would proceed as usual, the men and the womenabout her would eat and drink, and the smallest things would standwhere they stood now--unchanged, unmoved. 

What was that? Only the fall of a spit in the kitchen, or the clatterof a pot-lid. Would they never come? Would she never know? At thismoment--what was that? That surely was something. They were returning!In a moment she would know. She rose to her feet and stared with stonyeyes at the door. But when she had listened long--it was nothing. Nothing! And then--ah, that surely was something--was news--was theend! They were coming now. In a moment she would know. Yes, they werecoming. In a moment she would know. She pressed her hands to herbreast. 

She might have known already, for, had she gone to the door, she wouldhave seen who came. But she could not go. She could not move. 

And he, when he came in, did not look at her. He walked from thethreshold to the hearth, and--strange coincidence--he set theunsheathed blade he carried in the self-same angle, beside thefire-back, from which she had once taken a sword to attempt his life. And still he did not look at her, but stood with bowed head. 

At last he turned. "God forgive us all, " he said. 

She broke into wild weeping. And what her lips, babbling incoherentthanksgiving, did not tell him, the clinging of her arms, as she hungon him, conveyed. 

CHAPTER XXV

PEACE

Uncle Ulick, with the mud of the road still undried on his boots, andthe curls still stiff in the wig which the town barber at Mallow haddressed for him, rubbed his chin with his hand and, covertly lookinground the room, owned himself puzzled. He had returned a week later tothe day than he had arranged to return. But had his absence run intomonths instead of weeks the lapse of time had not sufficed to explainthe change which he felt, but could not define, in his surroundings. 

Certainly old Darby looked a thought more trim, and the room a triflebetter ordered than he had left them. But he was sensible, thoughvaguely, that the change did not stop there--perhaps did not beginthere. Full of news of the outer world as he was, he caught himselfpausing in mid-career to question himself. And more than once hisfurtive eyes scanned his companions' faces for the answer his mindrefused to give. 

An insolent Englishman had come, and given reins to the _'ubris_ thatwas in him, and, after running Luke Asgill through the body, had paidthe penalty--in fight so fair that the very troopers who had witnessedit could make no complaint nor raise trouble. So much Uncle Ulick hadlearned. But he had not known Payton, and, exciting as the episodesounded, it did not explain the difference in the atmosphere of thehouse. Where he had left enmity and suspicion, lowering brows and asilent table, he found smiles, and easiness, and a cheerful sense ofwell-being. 

Again he looked about him. "And where will James be?" he asked, for thefirst time missing his nephew. 

"He has left us, " Flavia said slowly, with her eyes on ColonelSullivan. 

"It's away to Galway City he is, " Morty O'Beirne explained with achuckle. 

"The saints be between us and harm!" Uncle Ulick exclaimed inastonishment. "And why's he there?"

"The story is long, " said Colonel Sullivan. 

"But I can tell it in a few words, " Flavia continued with dignity. "Andthe sooner it is told the better. He has not behaved well, Uncle Ulick. And at his request and with--the legal owner's consent--it's I haveagreed to pay him one-half of the value of the property. "

"The devil you have!" Uncle Ulick exclaimed, in greater astonishment. And, pushing back his seat and rubbing his huge thigh with his hand, helooked from one to another. "By the powers! if I may take the libertyof saying so, young lady, you've done a vast deal in a very littletime-faith, in no time at all, at all!" he added. 

"It was done at his request, " Flavia answered gravely. 

Uncle Ulick continued to rub his thigh and to stare. These things werevery surprising. "And they're telling me, " he said, "that Luke Asgill'sin bed upstairs?"

"He is. "

"And recovering?"

"He is, glory be to God!"

"Nor that same's not the best news of him, " Morty said with a grin. "Nor the last. "

"True for you!" Phelim cried. "If it was the last word you spoke!"

"What are you meaning?" Uncle Ulick asked. 

"He's turned, " said Morty. "No less! Turned! He's what his father wasbefore him, Mr. Sullivan--come back to Holy Church, and not a morningbut Father O'Hara's with him making his soul and what not!"

"Turned!" Uncle Ulick cried. "Luke Asgill, the Justice? Boys, you'remaking fun of me!" And, unable to believe what the O'Beirnes told him, he looked to Flavia for confirmation. 

"It is true, " she said. 

"Bedad, it is?" Uncle Ulick replied. "Then I'll not be surprised in allmy life again! More by token, there's only one thing left to hope for, my jewel, and that's certain. Cannot you do the same to the man that'sbeside you?"

Flavia glanced quickly at Colonel John, then, with a heightened colour, she looked again at Uncle Ulick. "That's what I cannot do, " she said. 

But the blush, and the smile that accompanied it, and something perhapsin the way she hung towards her neighbour as she turned to him, toldUncle Ulick all. The big man smacked the table with his hand till theplatters leapt from the board. "Holy poker!" he cried, "is it thatyou're meaning? And I felt it, and I didn't feel it, and you sittingthere forenent me, and prating as if butter wouldn't melt in yourmouth! It is so, is it? But there, the red of your cheek is answerenough!"

For Flavia was blushing more brightly than before, and Colonel John wassmiling, and the two young men were laughing openly. 

"You must get Flavia alone, " Colonel John said, "and perhaps she'lltell you. "

"Bedad, it's true, and I felt it in the air, " Ulick Sullivan answered, smiling all over his face. "Ho, ho! Ho, ho! Indeed you've not been idlewhile I've been away. But what does Father O'Hara say, eh?"

"The Father----" Flavia began in a small voice. 

"Ay, what does the Father say?"

"He says, " Flavia continued, looking down demurely, "that it's a rarestick that's no bend in it, and--and 'tis very little use looking forit on a dark night. Besides, he----" she glanced at her neighbour, "hesaid he'd be master, you know, and what could I do?"

"Then it's the very wrong way he's gone about it!" Uncle Ulick cried, with a chuckle. "For there's no married man that I know that's master!It's you, my jewel, have put the comether on him, and I'll trust you tokeep it there!"

But into that we need not go. Our task is done. Whether Flavia's highspirit and her husband's gravity, her youth and his experiencetravelled the road together in unbroken amity, or with no more than thejars which the accidents of life occasion, however close the link, itdoes not fall within this story to tell. Nor need we say whether FatherO'Hara proved as discreet in the long run as he had been liberal in thebeginning. Probably the two had their bickerings which did not severlove. But one thing may be taken for granted; in that part of Kerry theKing over the Water, if his health was sometimes drunk of an evening, stirred up no second trouble. Nor, when the '45 convulsed Scotland, andshook England to its centre, did one man at Morristown raise his handor lose his life. For so much at least that windswept corner of Kerry, beaten year in and year out by the Atlantic rollers, had to thankColonel Sullivan. 

Nor for that only. In many unnamed ways his knowledge of the worldblessed those about him. The small improvements, the little advances incivilisation which the English intruders were introducing into thoseparts, he adopted: a more orderly house, an increased neatness, a fewmore acres brought under the plough or the spade, whole roofs and fewbeggars--these things were to be seen at Morristown, and in few otherplaces thereabouts. And, above all, his neighbours owned the influenceof one who, with a reputation gained at the sword's point, stoodresolutely, unflinchingly, abroad as at home, at fairs and cockfightsas on his own hearth, for peace. More than a century was to elapsebefore private war ceased to be the amusement of the Irish gentry. Butin that part of Kerry, and during a score of years, the name and weightof Colonel Sullivan of Morristown availed to quiet many a brawl andavert many a meeting. 

To follow the mean and the poor of spirit beyond the point where theirfortunes cease to be entwined with those of better men is a profitlesstask. James McMurrough, tried and found wanting, where all favouredhim, was not likely to rise above his nature where the odds were equal, and all men his rivals. What he did in Galway City, that bizarre, half-foreign town of the west, how long he tarried there, and whitherhe went afterwards, in the vain search for a place where a man couldswagger without courage and ruffle it without consequences, it mattersnot to inquire. A time came when his kin knew not whether he lived orwas dead. 

Luke Asgill, who could rise as much above The McMurrough as he had itin him to fall below him, who was as wicked as James was weak, wasredeemed, one may believe, by the good that lurked in him. He lay manyweeks on a sick-bed, and returned to everyday life another man. For, whereas he had succumbed, a passionate lover of Flavia, he rose whollycured of that passion. It had ebbed from him with his blood, or wanedwith his fever. And whereas he had before sought both gain and power, restrained by as few scruples as the worst men of a bad age, he rose apursuer of both, but within bounds; so that, though he was still hardand grasping and oppressive, it was possible to say of him that he wasno worse than his class. Close-fisted, at Father O'Hara's instance hecould open his hand. Hard, at the Father's prayer he would at timesremit a rent or extend a bond. Ambitious, he gave up, for his soul'ssake and the sake of the Faith that had been his fathers', the officewhich endowed him with power to oppress. 

There were some who scoffed behind his back, and said that Luke Asgillhad had enough of carrying a sword and now wished no better than to berid of it. But, in truth, as far as the man's reformation went, it wasreal. The devil was well, but he was not the devil he had been. Thehours he had passed in the presence of death, the thoughts he had hadwhile life was low in him, were not forgotten in his health. The strongnature, slow to take an impression, was stiff to retain it. A moody, silent man, going about his business with a face to match the sullenbogs of his native land, he lived to a great age, and paid one tributeonly to the woman he had loved and forgotten--he died a bachelor. 

THE END

_Printed by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld. , London and Aylesbury. _