“But it is a very strange story, Ellinor, after all, and — and I have only your word for it, and may be you are only taking advantage of my regard for you to make me believe you.”
“What is it, plase your honour?” said she, stepping forward, as if she did not hear or understand me.
“I say, Ellinor, that after all I have no proof of the truth of this story, except your word.”
“And is not that enough? and where’s the use of having more? but if it will make you asy, sure I can give you proof — sure need you go farther than the scar on his head? If he was shaved to-morrow, I’d engage you’d see it fast enough. But sure, can’t you put your hand up to your head this minute, and feel there never was no scar there, nor if all the hair you have, God save the mark, was shaved this minute, never a bit of a scar would be to be seen: but proof is it you want? — why, there’s the surgeon that dressed the cut in the child’s head, before he ever came to me; sure he’s the man that can’t forget it, and that will tell all: so to make your mind asy, see him, dear; but for your life don’t let him see your head to feel it, for he’d miss the scar, and might suspect something by your going to question him.”
“Where does he live?” interrupted I.
“Not above twelve miles off.”
“Is he alive?”
“Ay, if he been’t dead since Candlemas.”
At first I thought of writing to this man; but afterwards, being afraid of committing myself by writing, I went to him: he had long before this time left off business, and had retired to enjoy his fortune in the decline of life. He was a whimsical sort of character; he had some remains of his former taste for anatomy, and was a collector of curiosities. I found him just returned from a lake which he had been dragging for a moose-deer’s horns, to complete the skeleton of a moose-deer, which he had mounted in his hall. I introduced myself, desiring to see his museum, and mentioned to him the thigh-bone of a giant found in ray neighbourhood; then by favour of this bone I introduced the able cure that he had made of a cut in my head, when I was a child.
“A cut in your head, sir? Yes, my lord, I recollect perfectly well, it was a very ugly cut, especially in an infant’s head; but I am glad to find you feel no bad effects from it. Have you any cicatrice on the place? — Eleven feet high, did you say? and is the giant’s skeleton in your neighbourhood?”
I humoured his fancy, and by degrees he gave me all the information I wanted without in the least suspecting my secret motives. He described the length, breadth, and depth, of the wound to me; showed me just where it was on the head, and observed that it must have left an indelible mark, but that my fine hair covered it. When he seemed disposed to search for it, I defended myself with the giant’s thigh-bone, and warded off his attacks most successfully. To satisfy myself upon this point, I affected to think that he had not been paid: he said he had been amply paid, and he showed me his books to prove it. I examined the dates, and found that they agreed with Ellinor’s precisely. On my return home, the first thing I did was to make Christy a present of a new wig, which I was certain would induce him to shave his head; for the lower Irish agree with the beaux and belles of London and Paris, in preferring wigs to their own hair. Ellinor told me, that I might safely let his head be shaved, because to her certain knowledge, he had scars of so many cuts which he had received at fairs upon his skull, that there would appear nothing particular in one more or less. As soon as the head was shaved, and the wig was worn, I took an opportunity one day of stopping at the forge to have one of my horse’s shoes changed; and whilst this was doing, I took notice of his new wig, and how well it fitted him. As I expected, he took it off to show it me better, and to pay his own compliments to it.
“Sure enough, you are a very fine wig,” said he, apostrophising it as he held it up on the end of his hammer; “and God bless him that give it me, and it fits me as if it was nailed to my head.”
“You seem to have had a good many nails in your head already, Christy,” said I, “if one may judge by all these scars.”
“Oh yes, please your honour, my lord,” said he, “there’s no harm in them neither; they are scratches got when I was no wiser than I should be, at fairs, fighting with the boys of Shrawd-na-scoob.”
Whilst he fought his battles o’er again, I had leisure to study his head; and I traced precisely all the boundary lines. The situation, size, and figure of the cicatrice, which the surgeon and Ellinor had described to me, were so visible and exact, that no doubt could remain in my mind of Christy’s being the real son of the late Lord and Lady Glenthorn. This conviction was still more impressed upon my mind a few days afterwards. I recollected having seen a file of family pictures in a lumber-room in the castle; and I rummaged them out to see if I could discover amongst them any likeness to Christy: I found one; the picture of my grandfather, — I should say, of his grandfather, to which Christy bore a striking resemblance, when I saw him with his face washed, and in his Sunday clothes.
My mind being now perfectly satisfied of the truth of Ellinor’s story, I was next to consider how I ought to act. To be or not to be Lord Glenthorn, or, in other words, to be or not to be a villain, was now the question. I could not dissemble to my conscience this plain state of the case, that I had no right to keep possession of that which I knew to be another’s lawful property; yet, educated as I had been, and accustomed to the long enjoyment of those luxuries, which become necessaries to the wealthy; habituated to attendance as I had been; and, even amongst the dissipated and idle, notorious for extravagance the most unbounded and indolence the most inveterate; how was I at once to change my habits, to abdicate my rank and power, to encounter the evils of poverty? I was not compelled to make such sacrifices; for though Ellinor’s transient passion had prompted her to threaten me with a public discovery, yet I knew that she would as soon cut off her own right hand as execute her threats. Her affection for me, and her pride in my consequence, were so strong, that I knew I might securely rely upon her secrecy. The horrid idea of being the cause of the death of one of her own children had for a moment sufficient power to balance her love for me; yet there was but little probability that any similar trial should occur, nor had I reason to apprehend that the reproaches of her conscience should induce her to make a voluntary discovery; for all her ideas of virtue depended on the principle of fidelity to the objects of her affection, and no scrupulous notions of justice disturbed her understanding or alarmed her self-complacency. Conscious that she would willingly sacrifice all she had in the world for any body she loved, and scarcely comprehending that any one could be selfish, she, in a confused way, applied the maxim of “Do as you would be done by,” and was as generous of the property of others as of her own. At the worst, if a law-suit commenced against me, I knew that possession was nine points of the law. I also knew that Ellinor’s health was declining, and that the secret would die with her. Unlawful possession of the wealth I enjoyed could not, however, satisfy my own mind; and, after a severe conflict between my love of ease and my sense of right — between my tastes and my principles — I determined to act honestly and honourably, and to relinquish what I could no longer maintain without committing injustice, and feeling remorse. I was, perhaps, the more ready to do rightly because I felt that I was not compelled to it. The moment when I made this virtuous decision was the happiest I had at that time ever felt: my mind seemed suddenly relieved from an oppressive weight; my whole frame glowed with new life; and the consciousness of courageous integrity elevated me so much in my own opinion, that titles, and rank, and fortune, appeared as nothing in my estimation. I rang my bell eagerly, and ordered that Christy O’Donoghoe should be immediately sent for. The servant went instantly; but it seemed to me an immoderately long time before Christy arrived. I walked up and down the room impatiently, and at last threw myself at full length upon the sofa: the servant returned.
“The smith is below in the hall, my lord.”
“Show him up.” — He was shown up into the ante-chamber.
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“The smith is at the door, my lord.”
“Show him in, cannot you? What detains him?”
“My brogues, my lord! I’d be afraid to come in with ’em on the carpet.” Saying this, Christy came in, stepping fearfully, astonished to find himself in a splendid drawing-room.
“Were you never in this room before, Christy?” said I.
“Never, my lord, plase your honour, barring the day I mended the bolt.”
“It is a fine room, is not it, Christy?”
“Troth, it is the finest ever I see, sure enough.”
“How should you like to have such a room of your own, Christy?”
“Is it I, plase your honour?” replied he, laughing; “what should I do with the like?”
“How should you feel if you were master of this great castle?”
“It’s a poor figure I should make, to be sure,” said he, turning his head over his shoulder towards the door, and resting upon the lock: “I’d rather be at the forge by a great dale.”
“Are you sure of that, Christy? Should not you like to be able to live without working any more, and to have horses and servants of your own?”
“What would I do with them, plase your honour, I that have never been used to them? sure they’d all laugh at me, and I’d not be the better o’ that, no more than of having nothing to do; I that have been always used to the work, what should I do all the day without it? But sure, my lord,” continued he, changing his voice to a more serious tone, “the horse that I shod yesterday for your honour did not go lame, did he?”
“The horse is very well shod, I believe; I have not ridden him since: I know nothing of the matter.”
“Because I was thinking, may be, it was that made your honour send for me up in the hurry — I was afeard I’d find your honour mad with me; and I’d be very sorry to disoblige you, my lord; and I’m glad to see your honour looking so well after all the trouble you’ve been put to by them rubbles, the villains, to be consarting against you under-ground. But, thanks be to God, you have ’em all in gaol now. I thought my mother would have died of the fright she took, when the report came that Ody was one of them. I told her there could not be no truth in it at all, but she would not mind me: it would be a strange unnatural thing, indeed, of any belonging to her to be plotting against your honour. I knew Ody could not be in it, and be a brother of mine; and that’s what I kept saying all the time but she never heeded me: for, your honour knows, when the women are frighted, and have taken a thing into their heads, you can’t asy get it out again.”
“Very true: but to return to what I was saying, should not you like to change places with me, if you could?”
“Your honour, my lord, is a very happy jantleman, and a very good jantleman, there’s no doubt, and there’s few but would be proud to be like you in any thing at all.”
“Thank you for that compliment. But now, in plain English, as to yourself, would you like to be in my place — to change places with me?”
“In your honour’s place — I! I would not, my lord; and that’s the truth, now,” said he, decidedly. “I would not: no offence — your honour bid me to speak the truth; for I’ve all I want in the world, a good mother, and a good wife, and good childer, and a reasonable good little cabin, and my little pratees, and the grazing of the cow, and work enough always, and not called on to slave, and I get my health, thank God for all; and what more could I have if I should be made a lord to-morrow? Sure, my good woman would never make a lady; and what should I do with her? I’d be grieved to see her the laughing-stock of high and low, besides being the same myself, and my boy after me. That would never answer for me; so I am not like them that would overturn all to get uppermost; I never had any hand, art, or part, in a thing of the kind; I always thought and knew I was best as I am; not but what, if I was to change with any, it is with you, my lord, I would be proud to change; because if I was to be a jantleman at all, I’d wish to be of a ra-al good ould family born.”
“You are then what you wish to be?” said I.
“Och!” said he, laughing and scratching his head, “your honour’s jesting me about them kings of Ireland, that they say the O’Donoghoes was once: but that’s what I never think on, that’s all idle talk for the like of me, for sure that’s a long time ago, and what use going back to it? One might as well be going back to Adam, that was the father of all, but which makes no differ now.”
“But you do not understand me,” interrupted I; “I am not going back to the kings of Ireland: I mean to tell you, that you were born a gentleman — nay, I am perfectly serious; listen to me.”
“I do, plase your honour, though it is mocking me, I know you are; I would be sorry not to take a joke as well as another.”
“This is no joke; I repeat that I am serious. You are not only a gentleman, but a nobleman: to you this castle and this great estate belongs, and to you they shall be surrendered.”
He stood astonished; and, his eyes opening wide, showed a great circle of white in his black face.
“Eh!” cried he, drawing that long breath, which astonishment had suppressed. “But how can this be?”
“Your mother can explain better than I can: your mother, did I say? she is not your mother; Lady Glenthorn was your mother.”
“I can’t understand it at all — I can’t understand it at all. I’ll lave it all to your honour,” said he, making a motion with his hands, as if to throw from him the trouble of comprehending it.
“Did you never hear of such a thing as a child’s being changed at nurse?”
“I did, plase your honour; but my mother would never do the like, I’ll answer for her, any way; and them that said any thing of the kind, belied her; and don’t be believing them, my lord.”
“But Ellinor was the person who told me this secret.”
“Was she so? Oh, she must have been draaming; she was always too good a mother to me to have sarved me so. But,” added he, struggling to clear his intellects, “you say it’s not my mother she is; but whose mother is she then? Can it be that she is yours? ’tis not possible to think such a great lord was the son of such as her, to look at you both: and was you the son of my father Johnny O’Donoghoe? How is that again?”
He rubbed his forehead; and I could scarcely forbear laughing at his odd perplexity, though the subject was of such serious importance. When he clearly understood the case, and thoroughly believed the truth, he did not seem elated by this sudden change of fortune; he really thought more of me than of himself.
“Well, I’ll tell you what you will do then,” continued he, after a pause of deep reflection; “say nothing to nobody, but just keep asy on, even as we are. Don’t let there be any surrendering at all, and I’ll speak to my mother, that is, Ellinor O’Donoghoe, and settle it so; and let it be so settled, in the name of God, and no more about it: and none need never be the wiser; ’tis so best for all. A good day to your honour, and I’ll go shoe the mare.”
“Stay,” said I; “you may hereafter repent of this sudden determination. I insist upon your taking four-and-twenty hours — no, that would be too little — take a month to consider of it coolly, and then let me know your final determination.”
“Oh! plase your honour, I will say the same then as now. It would be a poor thing indeed of me, after all you done for me and mine, to be putting you to more trouble. It would be a poor thing of me to forget how you liked to have lost your life all along with me at the time of the ‘ruction. No, I’ll not take the fortin from you, any how.”
“Put gratitude to me out of the question,” said I. “Far be it from me to take advantage of your affectionate temper. I do not consider you as under any obligations to me; nor will I be paid for doing justice.”
“Sure enough, your honour desarved to be born a gentleman,” said Christy.
“At least I have been bred a gentleman,” said I. “Let me see you again this day month, and not till then.”
Complete Novels of Maria Edgeworth Page 477