by Sara Seale
“But a day with Conn is worth any punishment to Clancy, isn’t it, darling?”
Mark glanced at her a little thoughtfully, but made no comment.
“Besides,” went on Clodagh, “this wasn’t just an ordinary day. It was one of their wild jaunts. Was it fun, Clancy?”
Clancy’s chin went up.
“Gorgeous fun,” she said. “It was a wonderful day.”
“I’ll not have you being the talk of Duneen, running round with Conn Driscoll and the like,” shouted Kevin, filling his glass again. “You’ll stick to Slievaun or you don’t go there at all. Do you hear me?”
“Yes, Kilmallin. Can I go now, please?”
Clodagh laughed and shook back her sleek red hair. “Aren’t you going to wait and hear what your punishment is?” she asked. “Have you cooked up something perfectly awful for her, Mark? Drinking and getting talked about with poor, harmless Conn?”
Mark put down his empty glass and got to his feet. “That’s entirely between myself and Clancy,” he said pleasantly. “When you’ve tidied yourself up, will you please come to my room before dinner, Clancy?”
“I suppose I must,” she said.
He had been in his room about half an hour when he heard her knock. He kicked the turf into a brighter blaze and told her to come in. She shut the door behind her and came and stood in the middle of the room, fidgeting a little as he regarded her thoughtfully, without speaking. She looked tired and dispirited and rather plain.
“What do you expect me to say to you?” he asked quietly.
She looked defiant.
“I don’t know. Blast me, I suppose.”
His lips twitched.
“I don’t think I’ve ever had occasion to do that.”
“Well, this is different, isn’t it? You heard Kilmallin—going to saloons and drinking.”
His eyes were amused.
“But I don’t think you did, did you? What did you do?”
For a moment she hesitated, then replied candidly: “Knocked around the farm. Conn had accounts to do.”
“So you didn’t have your jaunt, after all?”
“We’re going another day.”
“I see. Come over here and sit down.”
But she remained where she was and looked at him distrustfully.
“You might just as well get it over with,” she said. She was abrupt to the point of rudeness because his unexpected manner made her nervous. “Lecture and lines, I suppose.”
He caught her by the hand and pushed her into the chair opposite him.
“Don’t be so stubborn and schoolgirlish,” he said. “I’m not going to punish you.”
She stared up at him, defiance giving way to surprise. “No punishment?” she said, and he shook his head.
“No. You’re a little old for lines, don’t you think? And a little old for such silly acts of defiance. If you’d asked me yesterday, instead of letting me hear it from Brian, I’d have probably let you go.”
“Would you?” she said slowly. “Would you really, Mark?”
“Probably. Rules aren’t made to be broken, but they can always be relaxed if you don’t take the law into your own hands. You didn’t much enjoy your day, did you?”
“No,” she said honestly and a little sadly.
He smoked in silence for a moment, then he said: “Clancy, sometimes I hardly know how to talk to you. You’re such a mixture of adolescence and maturity. You’re so quick on the mark sometimes, and at others so hopelessly immature. I suppose that is so when girls are growing up.”
“I’m afraid I don’t understand you,” she said politely.
“Well, all this huroosh yesterday, and Conn getting you to sneak off today. Can’t you see that the other two are just using you?”
“Conn wouldn’t do that,” she said quickly.
“He wanted to score off me, you silly child, and Clodagh encourages half these rows because she’s bored.”
“She shouldn’t hurt Conn because she’s bored.” Clancy’s voice was bleak.
Mark regarded her a little helplessly.
“You’re very fond of Conn, aren’t you?” he asked gently.
She nodded.
“Don’t let them hurt you—Conn or Clodagh.”
Her eyes were wide and uncomprehending.
“How would they? We’ve known each other all our lives.”
He gave it up.
“All right, Clancy,” he said. “We’ll say no more about it. You’d better run along now. The bell will go for dinner any minute.”
She got up and looked at him a little shyly.
“Thank you for not punishing,” she said. “I expected it.”
“And I,” he returned with a certain brusqueness; “perhaps expected a little common sense, so we’ve both been disappointed. There’s the bell. We’d better go down.”
CHAPTER NINE
FOR the first few days of November Brian was in bed with a cold, and Mark and Clancy worked alone in the schoolroom. Clodagh was still at Kilmallin, and Mark was beginning to wish she would go home. She unsettled the other two, wandering in and out of the schoolroom on the smallest pretext, mooning in front of a fire with a half-read novel, and doing her best to engage the English tutor in a mild flirtation.
Kevin watched her with amusement. He thought that Mark was just the sort of man his sister Kate would approve of for a son-in-law, and he was delighted by Mark’s apparent immunity, for he did not want to lose his tutor.
“Though, of course, they could always live here until Brian is too old for a tutor,” he said to Aunt Bea.
“Who, dear?” she asked with surprise. It was an O’Shane trick to follow your thoughts aloud and expect comprehension.
“Mark and Clodagh, of course. I was thinking if they married there would be no need for things to change here.”
“Mark and Clodagh,” mused Aunt Bea and shook her head. “That wouldn’t do at all. Kate has much grander ideas for Clodagh than a penniless tutor.”
“He has a little money. He told me so himself,” said Kevin irritably. He was not at all serious in his matchmaking, but he disliked being contradicted. “And if that young minx doesn’t hurry up and make her choice, she’ll find herself left on the shelf.”
Clodagh, in another room, was saying much the same thing to Mark.
“In Irish country places, you know, twenty-two is quite a great age for an unmarried girl.”
“Is it?” said Mark, amused. “You don’t seem very old to me, Clodagh.”
“Ah, but then you’re older yourself—ten years older, aren’t you?”
“Yes, I’m thirty-two.”
And never been married, or even engaged?”
“Yes, I was engaged once, some years ago,” he said impassively.
Clodagh put her head on one side.
“And did she throw you over for another, poor Mark?” she asked.
“No,” he replied. “You seem very interested in my affairs.”
She pouted.
“Is that meant to be a snub? Of course I’m interested. I’ve never met a man so—so self-contained, and—well, dumb about women.”
He looked amused.
“Because I don’t make love to you?”
She went a little pink.
“Oh, well—I didn’t put it like that. But you are rather chilly and unresponsive, aren’t you?”
He watched her sitting on the arm of a chair, swinging a restless foot, and smiled.
“My dear girl,” he said, “whatever my feelings, I could scarcely, as an employee of your uncle’s, make love to you under his roof.”
Her eyes opened wide.
“Good gracious, why not?”
“Call it just the way I’m made, if you like.”
She looked at him speculatively.
“You said whatever your feelings,” she said, “then you would have liked to—to kiss me, perhaps?”
His eyes were lazy.
“Well, you’re very pretty,
Clodagh.”
“Then why not? Where’s the harm? You said you wanted to.”
His smile was teasing.
“I didn’t, as it happened. I said you were pretty, and so you are.”
She looked more like a kitten than ever.
“Then haven’t you wanted to?” she asked in amazement.
His smile became a grin.
“Since you ask me,” he said, “I haven’t.”
“Oh!” She jumped up and began walking about the room. “I think you’re perfectly hateful! Just leading me on and then giving me a slap in the face. Now I understand exactly why Clancy didn’t like you. There’s something cold and—and superior about you that would make anyone mad. I hate you!”
“No, you don’t,” he replied calmly. “I’ve only hurt your feelings, and they’ll soon recover. Do you think I haven’t met girls like you before, Clodagh? I think you can be very charming, but at the moment you’re bored and it amuses you to get a rise out of Conn by trying to work up a flirtation with me. It’s the oldest gag in the world, and if he wasn’t as young as he is, he’d see through you.”
She sat down again on the arm of the chair.
“I wish I was dead,” she said dramatically.
He laughed.
“Oh no, you don’t. That’s one of Clancy’s pet sayings.”
She said with a rare flash of shrewdness:
“You’ve really got to know us all awfully well, haven’t you, Mark? Even Clancy. I think you understand Clancy better than any of us.”
“Well, you see, I have a great deal to do with Clancy, and a teacher is no good without understanding.” His voice was suddenly grave. “That’s one thing I don’t like very much, my dear. You and Conn—you’re not very kind to Clancy.”
“You mean the quarrels? Conn and I have always quarrelled. Clancy’s used to it and usually joins in on Conn’s side.”
“No, I don’t mean just the quarrels. I think you know what I mean.”
Her eyes were round saucers of puzzlement.
“I don’t know what you mean at all. Can I help it if Clancy always takes everything so seriously?”
“No,” he said, “but you could remember that she does. You see, she’s a much more sensitive creature than you, Clodagh, and much more capable of genuine feeling. You shouldn’t trade on that, you and Conn.”
Clodagh yawned delicately.
“My cousin Clancy ought to appreciate you better than she does,” she remarked. “You’re quite a champion, aren’t you?”
In the days which followed, Mark observed with some amusement that she abandoned her former tactics and adopted a manner that was as offhand as Clancy’s toward him. But she bore him no real ill-will for his lack of response. It was quite impossible for Clodagh to dislike any man who would pay her the normal civilities.
The weather was bad again, with storms blowing up from the Atlantic, which kept them all indoors, and Clodagh began to fret. A peremptory letter from her mother summoning her home came as a relief to everyone, and Clodagh packed her numerous suitcases with a light heart.
It was the evening before her departure and she had just returned from an afternoon with Conn in Duneen.
“Why wouldn’t Conn come in?” Clancy was asking.
She and Brian were lying on their stomachs on the floor doing a jig-saw puzzle. They had the library to themselves, for Kevin was down at the home farm inquiring for a sick cow, and Aunt Bea was entertaining her rare visitors in the drawing-room.
Clodagh poured herself out a cup of cold tea from the discarded teapot and brought it over to the fire.
“He wanted to get back,” she said carelessly, “—a horse off its feed, or accounts, or letters, or something. You know Conn.”
Clancy sat back on her heels and looked at her cousin. Clodagh’s cheeks were soft and pink in the lamplight and her eyes were very bright.
“How pretty you look,” Clancy exclaimed impulsively. “We shall miss you, Clodagh. You will come back for my birthday, won’t you?”
“Of course,” said Clodagh, putting down her cup of tea half-tasted. “Ugh! It’s cold and beastly. I’ll wait for a glass of sherry. Your birthday, Clancy. Your eighteenth birthday! It’s awfully hard to believe. When I was eighteen, I was using make-up and having lovely clothes, and Mother was already beginning to line up approved suitors. I’ll tell you what. I’ll get Kilmallin to let me have a really lovely frock sent for you from Dublin. We’ll have a party and all dress for dinner, and you’ll be the queen bee.”
“He’ll never agree,” said Clancy, laughing. “What use would a party frock be to me here?”
“You never know. Besides, you’ve got to start some time being Miss O’Shane of Kilmallin. I’ll talk to neglectful Uncle Kevin. I can always manage him.”
Clodagh was enchanted with her own idea. She discussed patterns and colours and materials until Clancy’s head swam, and when Kevin came in a little later she poured it all out again to him, excited, demanding, and coaxing by turn.
Kevin went straight to the cupboard where the whisky was kept.
“What are you blethering about?” he said impatiently. The sick cow had died, and he was wet and cold and in no mood to be charmed.
“Kilmallin, do listen!” pouted Clodagh. “Clancy must have a frock for her eighteenth birthday—a real, proper grownup frock of her own. I’m going to choose it and send the bill to you, and I’m not going to spare any expense, either.”
Kevin drank a glass of whisky off neat, and filled it again. “You’ll not be running up any bills on Clancy’s account,” he said. “I’ve no doubt you cost your own parents a pretty penny, but I’ll not be the same, my dear.”
Clodagh came and stood beside her uncle, and slipped a warm hand through his arm.
“You are a nasty, bad-tempered old spoil-sport,” she said. “Just for that, you’ll certainly buy Clancy that frock. You can give it to her for a birthday present if you like.” At nearly all times, she could get round, him, but Clancy could have told her this was not one of them. That was the worst of Clodagh, she thought, trying to catch her cousin’s eye, she could never sense another’s mood.
Kevin shook her hand off and reached for his glass. It was by no means his first drink of the evening, but the whisky he had taken with Doyle at the farm had only served to irritate him.
“Will you stop nagging at me?” he cried. “You’re all alike, you women, whatever your ages. Clothes, fal-lals, trumpery nonsense, that’s all you think about!”
Clodagh began to argue, and Kevin to shout, then quite suddenly he seemed to double up, and the half-empty glass slipped out of his hand and splintered on the hearth.
Clodagh gave a little scream and shrank back, but Clancy sprang to her feet to support her father.
“What is it, Kilmallin?” she said urgently.
He could not speak for a few moments, and if it had not been for Clancy’s strong hold, would have collapsed to his knees.
“Whisky...” he managed to say at last, and Clancy hesitated. She did not know if she ought to give it to him or not, but he stretched out a shaking hand, and she filled another glass and held it to his lips.
“Get Mark,” she flung at Clodagh over her shoulder. “He’s in the schoolroom. Quick!”
Mark came at once, and after one look at Kevin, he took the glass gently from Clancy’s fingers.
“No more just now,” he said. “We’ll wait till the doctor’s been. Are you easier, Kilmallin. Stay quiet till your breathing’s normal, then we’ll get you up to bed. It’s just a slight heart attack. You’ll be all right presently.”
Clancy, standing behind Kevin’s chair, felt as frightened as Clodagh looked, but Mark’s tall figure bending over her father was reassuring. The very impassiveness and deliberation which had before so irked her gave her comfort now.
He looked up and smiled, answering the mute question in her eyes.
“It’s all right,” he said. “It’ll pass. Go and find Michael John an
d tell him to go for Doctor Boyle.”
She was gone and back again with a swiftness spurred by fear, and stood, taut and straight beside her father’s chair asking no questions.
Clodagh and Brian were huddled together, crying, and Clodagh said:
“What’s the matter with him, Mark? Mark, what’s the matter with him? Is he going to die?”
Mark caught the fear in Clancy’s eyes and said sharply: “Of course he’s not going to die. He’s just had a little seizure, that’s all. If you can’t control yourself better than this, Clodagh, take Brian upstairs to Agnes, and then stay there with him yourself. You’re only in the way here.”
The room seemed very quiet after they had gone. There was only the sound of Kevin’s laboured breathing, and the rain beating on the windows.
The colour began to come back to the older man’s face, and his breathing was less painful. Presently he asked for a drink and Mark filled a glass with water and gave it to him.
“That’s a terrible drink to offer a sick man!” Kevin said weakly.
Mark shook his head at him.
“You know very well that whisky’s probably helped to bring this on,” he said. “It’s not the first attack, is it?”
Kevin grimaced.
“Once or twice before, but not as sharp as this,” he admitted.
“I thought as much,” said Mark. “You really will have to lay off a bit, Kilmallin—that and these shouting matches you enjoy with everyone so much.”
“Now I’m to be one of your pupils, am I?” Kevin grumbled, but he allowed Mark to get him upstairs and to bed without any further fuss.
Clancy sat at the top of the stairs, and listened to the sounds from her father’s room. The hall stove was smoking again, and a bitter draught blew along the dim passages. It seemed to her she sat there for a long time, and Mark nearly fell over her as he came downstairs.
“Why, Clancy, you should have stayed in the warm,” he exclaimed. “Your father’s all right now. Agnes is staying with him till the doctor comes. We thought it best not to disturb Miss Bea until her guests had gone.” He took her cold hands in his. “You’re frozen, you poor little frog. Come along down to the fire.”