Further Experiences of an Irish R.M.

by E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross

  V

  A CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE

  It has not often been my lot to be associated with a being of soprofound and rooted a pessimism as Michael Leary, Huntsman andKennelman to Mr. Flurry Knox's Fox-hounds. His attitude was that ofthe one and only righteous man in a perfidious and dissolute world.With, perhaps, the exception of Flurry Knox, he believed in no one savehimself. I was thoroughly aware of my inadequacy as Deputy-Master, andcherished only a hope that Michael might look upon me as a kind ofParsifal, a fool perhaps, yet at least a "blameless fool"; but duringmy time of office there were many distressing moments in which I wasmade to feel not only incapable, but culpable.

  Michael was small, sandy, green-eyed, freckled, and, I believe,considerably junior to myself; he neither drank nor smoked, and he hada blistering tongue. I have never tried more sincerely to earn anyone's good opinion.

  It was a pleasant afternoon towards the middle of December, and I waspaying my customary Sunday visit to the kennels to see the hounds fed.What Michael called "the Throch" was nearly empty; the greedier of thehounds were flitting from place to place in the line, in the undyingbelief that others were better off than they. I was studying the rowof parti-coloured backs, and trying for the fiftieth time to fit eachwith its name, when I was aware of a most respectable face, with greywhiskers, regarding me from between the bars of the kennel door.

  With an effort not inferior to that with which I had just discriminatedbetween Guardsman and General, I recognised my visitor as Mr. JeremiahFlynn, a farmer, and a cattle dealer on a large scale, with whom I hadoccasionally done business in a humble way. He was a DistrictCouncillor, and a man of substance; he lived twenty miles away, at aplace on the coast called Knockeenbwee, in a flat-faced, two-storeyedhouse of the usual type of hideousness. Once, when an unkind fate hadsent me to that region, I had heard the incongruous tinkle of a pianoproceeding from Mr. Flynn's mansion, as I drove past fighting anumbrella against the wet wind that swept in from the Atlantic.

  "I beg your pardon, Major Yeates," began Mr. Flynn, with an agreeablesmile, which I saw in sections between the bars; "I had a littlebusiness over this side of the country, and I took the liberty oftaking a stroll around to the kennels to see the hounds."

  I made haste to extend the hospitality of the feeding-yard to myvisitor, who accepted it with equal alacrity, and went on to remarkthat it was wonderful weather for the time of year. Having obeyed thisprimary instinct of mankind, Mr. Flynn embarked upon large yet ablecompliments on the appearance of the hounds. His manners wereexcellent; sufficiently robust to accord with his grey frieze coat andflat-topped felt hat, and with just the extra touch of deference thatexpressed his respect for my high qualities and position.

  "Ye have them in great form, Michael," he remarked, surveying thehounds' bloated sides with a knowledgeable eye; "and upon me word,there's our own poor Playboy! and a fine dog he is too!"

  "YE HAVE THEM IN GREAT FORM, MICHAEL"]

  "He is; and a fine dog to hunt rabbits!" said Michael, without arelaxation of his drab countenance.

  "I daresay, Major, you didn't know that it was in my place that fellowwas rared?" continued Mr. Flynn.

  Owing to his providentially distinctive colouring of lemon and white,Playboy was one of the hounds about whose identity I was never indoubt. I was able to bestow a suitable glance upon him, and to recallthe fact of his having come from a trencher-fed pack, of which Mr.Flynn was the ruling spirit, kept by the farmers in the wildernessesbeyond and around Knockeenbwee.

  "Ah! Mr. Knox was too smart for us over that hound!" pursued Mr. Flynnpleasantly; "there was a small difference between himself and meself ina matter of a few heifers I was buying off him--a thrifle of fifteenshillings it was, I believe----"

  "Five and thirty," said Michael to the lash of his thong, in which hewas making a knot.

  "And I had to give him the pup before we could come to terms," ended myvisitor.

  Whether at fifteen or thirty-five shillings Playboy had been a cheaphound. Brief, and chiefly ornamental, as my term of office had been, Ihad learnt to know his voice in covert, and had learned also to actupon it in moments of solitary and helpless ignorance as to what washappening. This, however, was not the moment to sing his praises; Ipreserved a careful silence.

  "I rared himself and his sister," said Mr. Flynn, patting Playboyheavily, "but the sister died on me. I think 'twas from all shefretted after the brother when he went, and 'twas a pity. Those twohad the old Irish breed in them; sure you'd know it by the colour, andthere's no more of them now in the country only the mother, and she hada right to be shot this long time."

  "Come hounds," said Michael, interrupting this rhapsody, "open thedoor, Bat."

  The pack swept out of the feeding-yard and were away on their wontedconstitutional in half a minute.

  "Grand training, grand training!" said Mr. Flynn admiringly, "they're acredit to you, Major! It's impossible to have hounds anywaydisciplined running wild through the country the way our little packis. Indeed it came into my mind on the way here to try could I coaxyou to come over and give us a day's hunting. We're destroyed withfoxes. Such marauding I never saw! As for turkeys and fowl, they'retired of them, and it's my lambs they'll be after next!"

  The moment of large and general acquiescence in Mr. Flynn's proposalnarrowed itself by imperceptible degrees to the moment, not properlyrealised till it arrived, the horrid moment of getting up at a quarterto seven on a December morning, in order to catch the early train forKnockeenbwee.

  In the belief that I was acting in the interest of sport I hadannounced at the last meet that there was to be a by-day atKnockeenbwee. To say that the fact was received without enthusiasm isto put it mildly. I was assured by one authority that I should have tohunt the hounds from a steam launch; another, more sympathetic,promised a drag, but tempered the encouragement by saying that thewalls there were all made of slates, and that by the end of the run theskin would be hanging off the horses' legs like the skins of bananas.Nothing short of a heart-to-heart appeal to my Whip, Dr. Jerome Hickey,induced him to promise his support. Michael, from first to last,remained an impenetrable thunder-cloud. The die, however, was cast,and the hospitality of Mr. Flynn accepted. The eve of the by-dayarrived, and the Thundercloud and the hounds were sent on by road toKnockeenbwee, accompanied by my ancient ally Slipper, who led my mare,and rode Philippa's pony, which had been commandeered for the occasion.

  Next morning at 9.45 A.M. the train stopped by signal at theflag-station of Moyny, a cheerless strip of platform, from which a deadstraight road retreated to infinity across a bog. An out side car wasbeing backed hard into the wall of the road by a long, scared rag of achestnut horse as Dr. Hickey and I emerged from the station, and itsdriver was composing its anxieties as to the nature of trains bybeating it in the face with his whip. This, we were informed, was Mr.Flynn's equipage, and, at a favourable moment in the conflict, Dr.Hickey and I mounted it.

  "It's seldom the thrain stands here," said the driver apologetically,as we started at a strong canter, "and this one's very frightfulalways."

  The bog ditches fleeted by at some twelve miles an hour; they were thesoftest, blackest, and deepest that I have ever seen, and I thankedheaven that I was not in my red coat.

  "I suppose you never met the Miss Flynns?" murmured Dr. Hickey to meacross the well of the car.

  I replied in the negative.

  "Oh, they're very grand," went on my companion, with a wary eye on thehumped back of the driver, "I believe they never put their foot outsidethe door unless they're going to Paris. Their father told me last weekthat lords in the streets of Cork were asking who they were."

  "I suppose that was on their way to Paris," I suggested.

  "It was not," said the driver, with stunning unexpectedness, "'twaswhen they went up on th'excursion last month for to have their teethpulled. G'wout o' that!" This to the horse, who had shied heavily ata goat.

  Dr. Hickey and I sank into a stricken si
lence, five minutes of which,at the pace we were travelling, sufficed to bring us to a littleplantation, shorn and bent by the Atlantic wind, low whitewashed walls,an economical sweep of gravel, and an entrance gate constructed to fitan outside car to an inch. From the moment that these came within therange of vision the driver beat the horse with the handle of his whip,a prelude, as we discovered, to the fact that a minor gate, obviouslyand invitingly leading to the yard, lolled open on one hinge at theoutset of the plantation. There was a brief dissension, followed by ahand gallop to the more fitting entrance; that we should find it toofitting was a foregone conclusion, and Dr. Hickey whirled his legs onto the seat at the moment when impact between his side of the car andthe gate post became inevitable. The bang that followed was a heartyone, and the driver transmitted it to me in great perfection with hiselbow as he lurched on to me; there was a second and hollower bang asthe well of the car, detached by the shock, dropped on the axle andturned over, flinging from it in its somersault a harlequinadeassortment of herrings, loaves of bread, and a band box. It was, Ithink, a loaf of bread that hit the horse on the hocks, but under allthe circumstances even a herring would have been ample excuse for thetwo sledge hammer kicks which he instantly administered to thefoot-board. While the car still hung in the gateway, a donkey, with aboy sitting on the far end of its back, was suddenly mingled with theepisode. The boy was off the donkey's back and the driver was off mineat apparently one and the same moment, and the car was somehow backedoff the pillar; as we scraped through the boy said something to thedriver in a brogue that was a shade more sophisticated than the peasanttune. It seemed to me to convey the facts that Miss Lynie was waitingfor her hat, and that Maggie Kane was dancing mad for the soft sugar.We proceeded to the house, leaving the ground strewn with what appearedto be the elemental stage of a picnic.

  "I suppose you're getting him into form for the hunt, Eugene?" said Dr.Hickey, as the lathered and panting chestnut came to a stand some tenyards beyond the hall door.

  "Well, indeed, we thought it no harm to loosen him under the car beforeMaster Eddy went riding him," replied Eugene, "and begannies I'm notdone with him yet! I have to be before the masther at the next thrain."

  He shed us and our belongings on the steps, and drove away at a gallop.

  The meet had been arranged for half-past eleven. It was half-past tenwhen Dr. Hickey and I were incarcerated in a dungeon-cold drawing-roomby a breathless being in tennis shoes, with her hair down her back,doubtless Maggie Kane, hot from the war-dance brought on by the lack ofsoft sugar. She told us in a gusty whisper that the masther would bein shortly, and the ladies was coming down, and left us to meditateupon our surroundings.

  A cascade of white paper flowed glacially from the chimney to thefender; the gloom was Cimmerian, and unalterable, owing to the factthat the blind was broken; the cold of a never occupied room ate intoour vitals. Footsteps pounded overhead and crept in the hall. Thehouse was obviously full of people, but no one came near us. Had itnot been for my companion's biographical comments on the photographswith which the room was decked, all of them, it appeared, suitors ofthe Misses Flynn, I think I should have walked back to the station. Ateleven o'clock the hurrying feet overhead were stilled, there was arustling in the hall as of a stage storm, and the daughters of thehouse made their entry, wonderfully attired in gowns suggestive of atheatre, or a tropical garden party, and in picture hats. As I viewedthe miracles of hairdressing, black as the raven's wing, the necklaces,the bracelets, and the lavish top-dressing of powder, I wildly wonderedif Dr. Hickey and I should not have been in evening clothes.

  We fell to a laboured conversation, conducted upon the highest socialplane. The young ladies rolled their black eyes under arched eyebrows,and in almost unimpeachable English accents supposed I found Irelandvery dull. They asked me if I often went to the London Opera. Theydeclared that when at home, music was their only resource, and madesuch pointed reference to their Italian duetts that I found myselftrembling on the verge of asking them to sing. Dr. Hickey, under whosewing I had proposed to shelter myself, remained sardonically aloof. Ablessed diversion was created by the entrance, at racing speed, ofMaggie Kane, bearing a trayful of burning sods of turf; the cascade wastorn from the chimney, and the tray was emptied into the grate.Blinding smoke filled the room, and Maggie Kane murmured an imprecationupon "jackdahs," their nests, and all their works.

  A TRAYFUL OF BURNING SODS OF TURF]

  The moment seemed propitious for escape; I looked at my watch, and saidthat if they would kindly tell me the way to the yard I would go roundand see about things.

  The arched eyebrows went up a shade higher; the Misses Flynn said theyfeared they hardly knew the way to the stables.

  Dr. Hickey rose. "Indeed it isn't easy to find them," he said, "but Idaresay the Major and myself will be able to make them out."

  When we got outside he looked down his long nose at me.

  "Stables indeed!" he said, "I hate that dirty little boasting!"

  Mr. Flynn's yard certainly did not at the first glance betray thepresence of stables. It consisted of an indeterminate assembly ofhuts, with a long corrugated iron shed standing gauntly in the midst;swamp of varying depths and shades occupied the intervals. From theshed proceeded the lamentable and indignant clamours of the hounds,against its door leaned Michael in his red coat, enacting, obviously,the role of a righteous man constrained to have his habitation in thetents of Kedar. A reverential knot of boys admired him from the wallof a neighbouring pigsty; countrymen of all ages, each armed with astick and shadowed by a cur, more or less resembling a fox-hound, stoodabout in patient groups; two or three dejected horses were nibbling,unattended, at a hayrick. Of our host there was no sign.

  At the door of the largest hut Slipper was standing.

  "Come in and see the mare, Major," he called to me in his bantam-cockvoice as I approached. "Last night when we got in she was clean deadaltogether, but this morning when I was giving the feed to the pony sheretched out her neck and met her teeth in me poll! Oh, she's in greatheart now!"

  In confirmation of this statement a shrewish squeal from Lady Janeproceeded from the interior.

  "Sure I slep' in the straw last night with herself and the pony. She'dhave him ate this morning only for me."

  The record of his devotion was here interrupted by a tremendousrattling in the farm lane; it heralded the entrance of Mr. Flynn on hisoutside car, drawn at full gallop by the young chestnut horse.

  "Oh, look at me, Major, how late I am!" shouted Mr. Flynn jovially, ashe scrambled off the car. "I declare you could light a candle at meeye with the shame that's in it, as they say! I was back inCurranhilty last night buying stock, and this was the first train Icould get. Well, well, the day's long and drink's plenty!"

  He bundled into a darksome hole, and emerged with a pair of dirty spursand a Malacca crop as heavy as a spade handle.

  "Michael! Did they tell you we have a fox for you in the hill north?"

  "I wasn't speaking to any of them," replied Michael coldly.

  "Well, your hounds will be speaking to him soon! Here, hurry boys,pull out the horses!"

  His eye fell on the chestnut, upon whose reeking back Eugene wascramming a saddle, while the boy who had met us at the entrance gatewas proffering to it a tin basin full of oats.

  "What are you doing with the young horse?" he roared.

  "I thought Master Eddy would ride him, sir," replied Eugene.

  "Well, he will not," said Mr. Flynn, conclusively; "the horse hasenough work done, and let you walk him about easy till he's cool. Youcan folly the hunt then."

  Two more crestfallen countenances than those of the young gentlemen headdressed it has seldom been my lot to see. The saddle was slowlyremoved. Master Eddy, red up to the roots of his black hair, retiredsilently with his basin of oats into the stable behind Slipper. Evenhad I not seen his cuff go to his eyes I should have realised that lifewould probably never hold for him a bitterer moment
.

  The hounds were already surging out of the yard with a following wave,composed of every living thing in sight. As I took Lady Jane from thehand of Slipper, Philippa's pony gave a snort. Some touch ofPhilippa's criminal weakness for boys assailed me.

  "That boy can ride the pony if he likes," I said to Slipper.

  I followed the hounds and their cortege down a deep and filthy lane.Mr. Flynn was just in front of me, on a broad-beamed white horse, withstring-halt; three or four of the trencher-fed aliens slunk at hisheels, the mouth of a dingy horn protruded from his coat pocket. Itrembled in spirit as I thought of Michael.

  We were out at length into large and furzy spaces that slanted steeplyto the cliffs; like smuts streaming out of a chimney the followers ofthe hunt belched from the lane and spread themselves over the palegreen slopes. From this point the proceedings became merged in totalincoherence. Accompanied, as it seemed, by the whole population of thedistrict, we moved _en masse_ along the top of the cliffs, whilehounds, curs, and boys strove and scrambled below us, over rocks andalong ledges, which, one might have thought, would have tried the headof a seagull. Two successive bursts of yelling notified the captureand slaughter of two rabbits; in the first hour and a half I can recallno other achievement.

  It was, however, evident that hunting, in its stricter sense, waslooked on as a mere species of side show by the great majority of thefield; the cream of the entertainment was found in the negotiation ofsuch jumps as fell to the lot of the riders. These were neithernumerous nor formidable, but the storm of cheers that accompanied eachperformance would have dignified the win of a Grand National favourite.

  To Master Eddy, on Philippa's pony, it was apparent that the birthdayof his life had come. Attended by Slipper and a howling company ofboon companions, he and the pony played a glorified game of pitch andtoss, in which, as it seemed to me, heads never turned up. Itcertainly was an adverse circumstance that the pony's mane had, the daybefore, been hogged to the bore, so that at critical moments the riderslid, unchecked, from saddle to ears, but the boon companions, whothemselves jumped like antelopes, stride for stride with the pony,replaced him unfailingly with timely snatches at whatever portion ofhis frame first offered itself.

  Music, even, was not wanting to our progress. A lame fiddler, on adonkey, followed in our wake, filling Michael's cup of humiliation tothe brim, by playing jigs during our frequent moments of inaction. Thesun pushed its way out of the grey sky, the sea was grey, with a broadand flashing highway to the horizon, a frayed edge of foam tracked thebroken coast-line, seagulls screamed and swooped, and the grass on thecliff summits was wondrous green. Old Flynn, on his white horse,moving along the verge, and bleating shrilly upon his horn to thehounds below, became idyllic.

  I believe that I ought to have been in a towering passion, and shouldhave swept the hounds home in a flood of blasphemy; as a matter of factI enjoyed myself. Even Dr. Hickey admitted that it was as pleasant aday for smoking cigarettes as he had ever been out.

  It must have been nearly three o'clock when one of Mr. Flynn's hounds,a venerable lady of lemon and white complexion, poked her lean headthrough furze-bushes at the top of the cliff, and came up on to thelevel ground.

  "That's old Terrible, Playboy's mother," remarked Dr. Hickey, "and agreat stamp of an old hound too, but she can't run up now. Flynn tellsme when she's beat out she'll sit down and yowl on the line, she's thatfond of it."

  Meantime Terrible was becoming busier and looking younger every moment,as she zigzagged up and across the trampled field towards the hillside.Dr. Hickey paused in the lighting of what must have been his tenthcigarette.

  "If we were in a Christian country," he said, "you'd say she had aline----"

  Old Flynn came pounding up on his white horse, and rode slowly up thehill behind Terrible, who silently pursued her investigations. Fiftyor sixty yards higher up, my eye lighted on something that might havebeen a rusty can, or a wisp of bracken, lying on the sunny side of abank. As I looked, it moved, and slid away over the top of the bank.A yell, followed by a frenzied tootling on Mr. Flynn's ancient horn,told that he had seen it too, and, in a bedlam of shrieks, chaos wasupon us. Through an inextricable huddle of foot people the hounds camebursting up from the cliffs, fighting every foot of ground with thecountry-boys, yelping with the contagion of excitement, they brokethrough, and went screaming up the hill to old Terrible, who wasannouncing her find in deep and continuous notes.

  How Lady Jane got over the first bank without trampling Slipper and twomen under foot is known only to herself; as I landed, Master Eddy andthe pony banged heavily into me from the rear, the pony having once andfor all resolved not to be sundered by more than a yard from his stablecompanion of the night before. I can safely say that I have never seenhounds run faster than did Mr. Knox's and the trencher-feds, in thatbrief scurry from the cliffs at Knockeenbwee. By the time we hadcrossed the second fence the foot people were gone, like things in adream. In front of me was Michael, and, in spite of Michael's spurs,in front of Michael was old Flynn, holding the advantage of his startwith a most admirable jealousy. The white horse got over the ground inbucks like a rabbit, the string-halt lending an additional fire to hisgait; on every bank his great white hind-quarters stood up against thesky, like the gable end of a chapel. Had I had time to think ofanything, I should have repented acutely of having lent Master Eddy thepony, who was practically running away. Twice I replaced his rider inthe saddle with one hand, as he landed off a fence under my stirrup.Master Eddy had lost his cap and whip, his hair was full of mud, pureecstasy stretched his grin from ear to ear, and broke from him ingiggles of delight.

  PURE ECSTASY STRETCHED HIS GRIN FROM EAR TO EAR]

  Providentially, it was, as I have said, only a scurry. It seemed thatwe had run across the neck of a promontory, and in ten minutes we wereat the cliffs again, the company reduced to old Flynn, his son, and theHunt establishment. Below us Moyny Bay was spread forth, enclosing inits span a big green island; between us and the island was a goodhundred yards of mud, plump-looking mud, with channels in it. Deep inthis the hounds were wading; some of them were already ashore on theisland, struggling over black rocks thatched with yellow seaweed, theirvoices coming faintly back to us against the wind. The white horse'stail was working like a fan, and we were all, horses and men, blowinghard enough to turn a windmill.

  "That's better fun than to be eating your dinner!" puffed Mr. Flynn,purple with pride and heat, as he lowered himself from the saddle."There isn't a hound in Ireland would take that stale line up from thecliff only old Terrible!"

  "What will we do now, sir?" said Michael to me, presenting theconundrum with colourless calm, and ignoring the coat-tail trailed forhis benefit, "we'll hardly get them out of that island to-night."

  "I suppose you know you're bare-footed, Major?" put in Hickey, my otherJob's comforter, from behind. "Your two fore-shoes are gone."

  A December day is not good for much after half-past three. For half anhour the horns of Michael and old Flynn blew their summons antiphonallyinto the immensities of sea and sky, and summoned only the sunset, andafter it the twilight; the hounds remained unresponsive, invisible.

  "There's rabbits enough in that island to keep ten packs of hounds busyfor a month," said Mr. Flynn; "the last time I was there I thought'twas the face of the field was running from me. And what was it afterall but the rabbits!"

  "_My_ hounds wouldn't hunt rabbits if they were throwing after them,"said Michael ferociously.

  "Oh, I suppose it's admiring the view they are!" riposted Mr. Flynn; "Itell ye now, Major, there's a man on the strand below has aflat-bottomed boat, and here's Eugene just come up, I'll send him overwith the horn as soon as there's water enough, and he'll flog them outof it."

  The tide crept slowly in over the mud, and a young moon was sending aslender streak of light along it through the dusk before Eugene hadaccomplished his mission.

  The boat returned at last across the channel with a pr
ecarious cargo ofthree hounds, while the rest splashed and swam after her.

  "I have them all, only one," shouted Eugene as he jumped ashore, andcame scrambling up the steep slants and shaley ledges of the cliff.

  "I hope it isn't Terrible ye left after ye?" roared Mr. Flynn.

  "Faith, I don't know which is it it is. I seen him down from mefloating in the tide. It must be he was clifted. I think 'tis one ofMajor Yeates's. We have our own whatever."

  A cold feeling ran down my back. Michael and Hickey silently connedover the pack in the growing darkness, striking matches and shieldingthem in their hands as they told off one hound after another, hemmed inby an eager circle of countrymen.

  "It's Playboy's gone," said Michael, with awful brevity. "I suppose wemay go home now, sir?"

  "Ah! hold on, hold on," put in Mr. Flynn, "are ye sure now, Eugene, itwasn't a sheep ye saw? I wouldn't wish it for five pounds that theMajor lost a hound by us."

  "Did ye ever see a sheep with yalla spots on her?" retorted Eugene.

  A shout of laughter instantly broke from the circle of sympathisers. Imounted Lady Jane in gloomy silence; there was nothing for it but toface the long homeward road, minus Flurry Knox's best hound, and withthe knowledge that while I lived this day's work would not be forgottento me by him, by Dr. Hickey, and by Michael.

  It was Hickey who reminded me that I was also minus two fore-shoes, andthat it was an eighteen mile ride. On my responding irritably that Iwas aware of both facts, and would get the mare shod at the forge bythe station, Mr. Flynn, whose voluble and unceasing condolences had notbeen the least of my crosses, informed me that the smith had gone awayto his father-in-law's wake, and that there wasn't another forgebetween that and Skebawn.

  The steps by which the final disposition of events was arrived at neednot here be recounted. It need only be said that every star went outof its course to fight against me; even the special luminary thatpresided over the Curranhilty and Skebawn branch railway was hostile; Iwas told that the last train did not run except on Saturdays.Therefore it was that, in a blend of matchlight and moonlight, atelegram was written to Philippa, and, at the hour at which Dr. Hickey,the hounds, and Michael were nearing their journey's end, I was seatedat the Knockeenbwee dinner-table, tired, thoroughly annoyed, devouredwith sleep, and laboriously discoursing of London and Paris with theyounger Miss Flynn.

  A meal that had opened at six with strong tea, cold mutton, and bottledporter, was still, at eight o'clock, in slow but unceasing progress,suggesting successive inspirations on the part of the cook. At aboutseven we had had mutton chops and potatoes, and now, after an abysmalinterval of conversation, we were faced by a roast goose and a ricepudding with currants in it. Through all these things had gone theheavy sounds and crashes that betokened the conversion of thedrawing-room into a sleeping-place for me. There was, it appeared, nospare room in the house; I felt positively abject at the thought of thetrouble I was inflicting. My soul abhorred the roast goose, and wasyet conscious that the only possible acknowledgment of the hospitalitythat was showered upon me, was to eat my way unflinchingly through allthat was put upon my plate.

  It must have been nine o'clock before we turned our backs upon thepleasures of the table, and settled down to hot whisky-punch over afierce turf fire. Then ensued upon my part one of the most prolongeddeath-grapples with sleep that it has been my lot to endure. Theconversation of Mr. Flynn and his daughters passed into my brain like anarcotic; after circling heavily round various fashionable topics, itsettled at length upon croquet, and it was about here that I began toslip from my moorings and drift softly towards unconsciousness. Ipulled myself up on the delicious verge of a dream to agree with thestatement that "croquet was a fright! You'd boil a leg of mutton whileyou'd be waiting for your turn!"

  Following on this came a period of oblivion, and then an agonisedrecovery. Where were we? Thank heaven, we were still at the croquetparty, and Miss Lynie's narrative was continuing.

  "That was the last place I saw Mary. Oh, she was mad! She was madwith me! 'I was born a lady,' says she, 'and I'll die a lady!' Inever saw her after that day."

  Miss Lynie, with an elegantly curved little finger, finished herwine-glass of toddy and awaited my comment.

  I was, for the instant, capable only of blinking like an owl, but wassaved from disaster by Mr. Flynn.

  "Indeed ye had no loss," he remarked. "She's like a cow that gives agood pail o' milk and spoils all by putting her leg in it!"

  I said, "Quite so--exactly," while the fire, old Flynn, and the pictureof a Pope over the chimney-piece, swam back into their places with ajerk.

  The tale, or whatever it was, wound on. Nodding heavily, I heard how"Mary," at some period of her remarkable career, had been found"bawling in the kitchen" because Miss Flynn had refused to kiss her onboth cheeks when she was going to bed, and of how, on that repulse,Mary had said that Miss Flynn was "squat." I am thankful to say that Iretained sufficient control of my faculties to laugh ironically.

  I think the story must then have merged into a description of some sortof entertainment, as I distinctly remember Miss Lynie saying that they"played 'Lodging-houses'--it was young Scully from Ennis made us doit--a very vulgar game _I_ call it."

  "I don't like that pullin' an' draggin'," said Mr. Flynn.

  I did not feel called upon to intrude my opinion upon the remarkablepastime in question, and the veils of sleep once more swathed meirresistibly in their folds. It seemed very long afterwards that theclang of a fire-iron pulled me up with what I fear must have been anaudible snort. Old Flynn was standing up in front of the fire; he hadobviously reached the climax of a narrative, he awaited my comment.

  "That--that must have been very nice," I said desperately.

  "Nice!" echoed Mr. Flynn, and his astounded face shocked me intoconsciousness; "sure she might have burned the house down!"

  What the catastrophe may have been I shall never know, nor do Iremember how I shuffled out of the difficulty; I only know that at thispoint I abandoned the unequal struggle, and asked if I might go to bed.

  The obligations of a troublesome and self-inflicted guest seal my lipsas to the expedients by which the drawing-room had been converted intoa sleeping-place for me. But though gratitude may enforce silence, itcould not enforce sleep. The paralysing drowsiness of the parlourdeserted me at the hour of need. The noises in the kitchen ceased, oldFlynn pounded up to bed, the voices of the young ladies overhead diedaway, and the house sank into stillness, but I grew more wakeful everymoment. I heard the creeping and scurrying of rats in the walls, Icounted every tick, and cursed every quarter told off by a pragmaticalcuckoo clock in the hall. By the time it had struck twelve I was onthe verge of attacking it with the poker.

  I suppose I may have dozed a little, but I was certainly aware that along track of time had elapsed since it had struck two, when a faintbut regular creaking of the staircase impressed itself upon my ear. Itwas followed by a stealing foot in the hall; a hand felt over the door,and knocked very softly. I sat up in my diminutive stretcher-bed andasked who was there. The handle was turned, and a voice at the crackof the door said "It's me!"

  Even in the two monosyllables I recognised the accents of the son ofthe house.

  "I want to tell you something," pursued the voice.

  I instantly surmised all possibilities of disaster; Slipper drunk andoverlaid by Lady Jane, Philippa's pony dead from over-exertion, or evena further instalment of the evening meal, only now arrived atcompletion.

  "What's the matter? Is anything wrong?" I demanded, raising myself inthe trough of the bed.

  "There is not; but I want to speak to you."

  I had by this time found the matches, and my candle revealed EddyFlynn, fully dressed save for his boots, standing in the doorway. Hecrept up to my bedside with elaborate stealth.

  "Well, what is it?" I asked, attuning my voice to a conspirator'swhisper.

  "Playboy's above stairs!"

&nb
sp; "Playboy!" I repeated incredulously, "what do you mean?"

  "Eugene cot him. He's above in Eugene's room now," said the boy, hisface becoming suddenly scarlet.

  "Do you mean that he wasn't killed?" I demanded, instantly allocatingin my own mind half a sovereign to Eugene.

  "He wasn't in the island at all," faltered Master Eddy, "Eugene cot himbelow on the cliffs when the hounds went down in it at the first gooff, and he hid him back in the house here."

  The allotment of the half-sovereign was abruptly cancelled.

  I swallowed my emotions with some difficulty.

  "Well," I said, after an awkward pause, "I'm very much obliged to youfor telling me. I'll see your father about it in the morning."

  Master Eddy did not accept this as a dismissal. He remainedmotionless, except for his eyes that sought refuge anywhere but on myface.

  There was a silence for some moments; he was almost inaudible as hesaid:

  "It would be better for ye to take him now, and to give him to Slipper.I'd be killed if they knew I let on he was here." Then, as anafterthought, "Eugene's gone to the wake."

  The inner aspect of the affair began to reveal itself, accompanied by asingularly unbecoming side light on old Flynn. I perceived also theuseful part that had been played by Philippa's pony, but it did notalter the fact that Master Eddy was showing his gratitude like a hero.The situation was, however, too delicate to admit of comment.

  "Very well," I said, without any change of expression, "will you bringthe dog down to me?"

  "I tried to bring him down with me, but he wouldn't let me put a handon him."

  I hastily got into the few garments of which I had not divested myselfbefore getting into the misnamed stretcher-bed, aware that the horridtask was before me of burglariously probing the depths of Eugene'sbedroom, and acutely uncertain as to Playboy's reception of me.

  "There's a light above in the room," said Master Eddy, with a dubiousglance at the candle in my hand.

  I put it down, and followed him into the dark hall.

  I have seldom done a more preposterous thing than creep up old Flynn'sstairs in the small hours of the morning, in illicit search for my ownproperty; but, given the dual determination to recover Playboy, and toshield my confederate, I still fail to see that I could have actedotherwise.

  We reached the first landing; it vibrated reassuringly with theenormous snores of Mr. Flynn. Master Eddy's cold paw closed on myhand, and led me to another and steeper flight of stairs. At the topof these was a second landing, or rather passage, at the end of which acrack of light showed under a door. A dim skylight told that the roofwas very near my head; I extended a groping hand for the wall, andwithout any warning found my fingers closing improbably, awfully, upona warm human face. I defy the most hardened conspirator to haverefrained from some expression of opinion.

  "Good Lord!" I gasped, starting back, and knocking my head hard againsta rafter. "What's that?"

  "It's Maggie Kane, sir!" hissed a female voice. "I'm after bringing upa bone for the dog to quieten him!"

  That Maggie Kane should also be in the plot was a complication beyondmy stunned intelligence; I grasped only the single fact that she was anally, endued with supernatural and sympathetic forethought. She placedin my hand a tepid and bulky fragment, which, even in the dark, Irecognised as the mighty drumstick of last night's goose; at the samemoment Master Eddy opened the door, and revealed Playboy, tied to theleg of a low wooden bedstead.

  He was standing up, his eyes gleamed green as emeralds, he looked asbig as a calf. He obviously regarded himself as the guardian ofEugene's bower, and I failed to see any recognition of me in hisaspect, in point of fact he appeared to be on the verge of an outburstof suspicion that would waken the house once and for all. We held acouncil of war in whispers that perceptibly increased his distrust; Ithink it was Maggie Kane who suggested that Master Eddy should profferhim the bone while I unfastened the rope. The strategy succeeded,almost too well in fact. Following the alluring drumstick Playboyburst into the passage, towing me after him on the rope. Stillpreceded by the light-footed Master Eddy, he took me down the atticstairs at a speed which was the next thing to a headlong fall, whileMaggie Kane held the candle at the top. As we stormed past old Flynn'sdoor I was aware that the snoring had ceased, but "the pace was toogood to enquire." We scrimmaged down the second flight into thedarkness of the hall, fetching up somewhere near the clock, which, asif to give the alarm, uttered three loud and poignant cuckoos. I thinkPlayboy must have sprung at it, in the belief that it was the voice ofthe drumstick; I only know that my arm was nearly wrenched from itssocket, and that the clock fell with a crash from the table to thefloor, where, by some malevolence of its machinery, it continued tocuckoo with jocund and implacable persistence. Something that was notPlayboy bumped against me. The cuckoo's note became mysteriouslymuffled, and a door, revealing a fire-lit kitchen, was shoved open. Westruggled through it, bound into a sheaf by Playboy's rope, and in ourmidst the cuckoo clock, stifled but indomitable, continued its protestfrom under Maggie Kane's shawl.

  In the kitchen we drew breath for the first time, and Maggie Kane putthe cuckoo clock into a flour bin; the house remained still as thegrave. Master Eddy opened the back door; behind his head the Ploughglittered wakefully in a clear and frosty sky. It was uncommonly cold.

  Slipper had not gone to the wake, and was quite sober. I shall neverforget it to him. I told him that Playboy had come back, and was to betaken home at once. He asked no inconvenient questions, but did notdeny himself a most dissolute wink. We helped him to saddle the pony,while Playboy crunched his hard-earned drumstick in the straw. In lessthan ten minutes he rode quietly away in the starlight, with Playboytrotting at his stirrup, and Playboy's rope tied to his arm.

  HE DID NOT DENY HIMSELF A MOST DISSOLUTE WINK]

  I did not meet Mr. Flynn at breakfast; he had started early for adistant fair. I have, however, met him frequently since then, and weare on the best of terms. We have not shirked allusions to the day'shunting at Knockeenbwee, but Playboy has not on these occasions beenmentioned by either of us.

  I understand that Slipper has put forth a version of the story, inwhich the whole matter is resolved into a trial of wits between himselfand Eugene. With this I have not interfered.