A GRAY EYE OR SO

By Frank Frankfort Moore

In Three Volumes—Volume II

Sixth Edition

London, Hutchinson & Co., 34 Paternoster Row

1893

CONTENTS

A GRAY EYE OR SO.

CHAPTER XX.—ON AN OAK SETTEE.

CHAPTER XXI.—ON THE ELEMENTS OF PARTY POLITICS.

CHAPTER XXII.—ON THE WISDOM OP THE MATRONS.

CHAPTER XXIII.—ON THE ATLANTIC.

CHAPTER XXIV.—ON THE CHANCE.

CHAPTER XXV.—ON THE SOCIAL VALUE OF THE REPROBATE.

CHAPTER XXVI.—ON FRANKNESS AND FRIENDSHIP.

CHAPTER XXVII.—ON CIRCUMVENTING A STAG.

CHAPTER XXVIII.—ON ENJOYING A RESPITE.

CHAPTER XXIX.—ON THE ADVANTAGES OF READY MONEY.

CHAPTER XXX.—ON THE LEGITIMATE IN ART.

CHAPTER XXXI.—ON A BLACK SHEEP.

CHAPTER XXXII.—ON SHAKESPEARE AND SUPPER.

CHAPTER XXXIII.—ON BLESSING OR DOOM.

CHAPTER XXXIV.—ON THE MESSAGE OF THE LILY.

CHAPTER XXXV.—ON THE HOME.

CHAPTER XXXVI.—ON THE INFLUENCE OF A MAN OF THE WORLD.

CHAPTER XXXVII.—ON THE DEFECTIVE LINK.

A GRAY EYE OR SO.

CHAPTER XX.—ON AN OAK SETTEE.

HE was still pondering over the many aspects of the question which, to his mind, needed solution, when he returned to the Castle, to find Lord Fotheringay in a chair by the side of a gaunt old man who, at one period of his life, had probably been tall, but who was now stooped in a remarkable way. The stranger seemed very old, so that beside him Lord Fotheringay looked comparatively youthful. Of this fact no one was better aware than Lord Fotheringay.

Edmund Airey had seen portraits of the new guest, and did not require to be told that he was Julius Anthony Avon, the historian of certain periods.

The first thought that occurred to him when he saw the two men side by side, was that Lord Fotheringay would not appear ridiculous merely as the son-in-law of Mr. Avon. To the casual observer at any rate he might have posed as the son of Mr. Avon.

He himself seemed to be under the impression that he might pass as Mr. Avon’s grandson, for he was extremely sportive in his presence, attitudinizing on his settee in a way that Edmund knew must have been agonizing to his rheumatic joints. Edmund smiled. He felt that he was watching the beginning of a comedy.

He learned that Mr. Avon had yielded to the persuasion of Lady Innisfail and had consented to join his daughter at the Castle for a few days. He was not fond of going into society; but it so happened that Castle Innisfail had been the centre of an Irish conspiracy at the early part of the century, and this fact made the acceptance by him of Lady Innisfail’s invitation a matter of business.

Hearing the nature of the work at which he was engaged, Lord Fotheringay had lost no time in expounding to him, in that airy style which he had at his command, the various mistakes that had been made by several generations of statesmen in dealing with the Irish question. The fundamental error which they had all committed was taking the Irish and their rebellions and conspiracies too seriously.

This theory he expounded to the man who was writing a biographical dictionary of Irish informers, and was about to publish his seventh volume, concluding the letter B.

Mr. Avon listened, gaunt and grim, while Lord Fotheringay gracefully waved away statesman after statesman who had failed signally, by reason of taking Ireland and the Irish seriously.

There was something grim also in Edmund Airey’s smile as he glanced at this beginning of the comedy.

That night Miss Stafford added originality to the ordinary terrors of her recital. She explained that hitherto she had merely interpreted the verses of others: now, however, she would draw upon her store of original poems.

Of course, Edmund Airey was outside the drawingroom while this was going on. So were many of his fellow-guests, including Helen Craven. Edmund found her beside him in a secluded part of the hall. He was rather startled by her sudden appearance. He forgot to greet her with one of the clever things that he reserved for her and other appreciative young women—for he still found a few, as any man with a large income may, if he only keeps his eyes open. “What a fool you must think me,” were the words with which Miss Craven greeted him, so soon as he became aware of her presence.

Strange to say, he had a definite idea that she had said something clever—at any rate something that impressed him more strongly than ever with the idea that she was a clever girl.

And yet she had assumed that he must think her a fool.

“A fool?” said he, “To think you so would be to write myself down one, Miss Craven.”

“Mr Airey,” said she, “I am a woman. Long ago I was a girl. You will thus believe me when I tell you that I never was frank in all my life. I want to begin now.”

“Ah, now I know the drift of your remark,” said he. “A fool. Yes, you made a good beginning: but supposing that I were to be frank, where would you be then?”

“I want you to begin also, Mr Airey,” said she.

“To begin? Oh, I made my start years ago—when I entered Parliament,” said he. “I was perfectly frank with the Opposition when I pointed out their mistakes. I have never yet been frank with a friend, however. That is why I still have a few left.”

“You must be frank with me now; if you won’t it doesn’t matter: I’ll be so to you. I admit that I behaved like an idiot; but you were responsible for it—yes, largely.”

“That is a capital beginning. Now tell me what you have done or left undone—above all, tell me where my responsibility comes in.”

“You like Harold Wynne?”

“You suggest that a mere liking involves a certain responsibility?”

“I love him.”

“Great heavens!”

“Why should you be startled at the confession when you have been aware of the fact for some time?”

“I never met a frank woman before. It is very terrible. Perhaps I shall get used to it.”

“Why will you not drop that tone?” she said, almost piteously. “Cannot you see how serious the thing is to me?”

“It is quite as serious to me,” he replied. “Men have confided in me—mostly fools—a woman never. Pray do not continue in that strain.”

“Then find words for me—be frank.”

“I will. You mean to say, Miss Craven, that I think you a fool because, acting on the hint which I somewhat vaguely, but really in good faith, dropped, you tried to impersonate the figure of the legend at that ridiculous cave. Is not that what you would say if you had the courage to be thoroughly frank?”

“Thank you,” said she, in a still weaker voice. “It is not so easy being frank all in a moment.”

“No, not if one has accustomed oneself to—let us say good manners,” he added.

“When I started for the boats after you had all left for that nonsense at the village, I felt certain that you were my friend as well as Harold Wynne’s, and that you had good reason for believing that he would be about the cave shortly after our hour of dining. I’m not very romantic.”

“Pardon me,” said he. “You are not quite frank. If you were you would say that, while secretly romantic, you follow the example of most young women nowadays in ridiculing romance.”

“Quite right,” she said. “I admitted just now that I found it difficult to be frank all in a moment. Anyhow I believed that if I were to play the part of the Wraith of the Cave within sight of Harold Wynne, he might—oh, how could I have been such a fool? But you—you, I say, were largely responsible for it, Mr. Airey.” She was now speaking not merely reproachfully but fiercely. “Why should you drop those hints—they were much more than hints—about his being so deeply impressed with the romance—about his having gone to the cave on the previous evening, if you did not mean me to act upon them?”

“I did mean you to act upon them,” said he. “I meant that you and he should come together last night, and I know that if you had come together, he would have asked you to marry him. I meant all that, because I like him and I like you too—yes, in spite of your frankness.”

“Thank you,” said she, giving him her hand. “You forgive me for being angry just now?”

“The woman who is angry with a man without cause pays him the greatest compliment in her power,” he remarked. “Fate was against us.”

“You think that she is so very—very pretty?” said Miss Craven.

“She?—fate?—I’ll tell you what I think. I think that Harold Wynne has met with the greatest misfortune of his life.”

“If you believe that, I know that I have met with the greatest of my life.”

The corner of the hall was almost wholly in shadow. The settee upon which Mr. Airey and Miss Craven were sitting, was cut off from the rest of the place by the thigh hone of the great skeleton elk. Between the ribs of the creature, however, some rays of light passed from one of the lamps; and, as Mr. Airey looked sympathetically into the face of his companion, he saw the gleam of a tear upon her cheek.

He was deeply impressed—so deeply that some moments had passed before he found himself wondering what she would say next. For a moment he forgot to be on his guard, though if anyone had described the details of a similar scene to him, he would probably have smiled while remarking that when the lamplight gleams upon a tear upon the cheek of a young woman of large experience, is just when a man needs most to be on his guard, He felt in another moment, however, that something was coming.

He waited for it in silence.

It seemed to him in that pause that he was seated by the side of someone whom he had never met before. The girl who was beside him seemed to have nothing in common with Helen Craven. So greatly does a young woman change when she becomes frank.

This is why so many husbands declare—when they are also frank—that the young women whom they marry are in every respect different from the young women who promise to be their wives.

“What is going to happen?” Helen asked him in a steady voice.

“God knows,” said he.

“I saw them together just after they left you this morning,” said she. “I was at one of the windows of the Castle, they were far along the terrace; but I’m sure that he said something to her about her eyes.”

“I should not be surprised if he did,” said Edmund. “Her eyes invite comment.”

“I believe that in spite of her eyes she is much the same as any other girl.”

“Is that to the point?” he asked. He was a trifle disappointed in her last sentence. It seemed to show him that, whatever Beatrice might be, Helen was much the same as other girls.

“It is very much to the point,” said she. “If she is like other girls she will hesitate before marrying a penniless man.”

“I agree with you,” said he. “But if she is like other girls she will not hesitate to love a penniless man.”

“Possibly—if, like me, she can afford to do so. But I happen to know that she cannot afford it. This brings me up to what has been on my mind all day. You are, I know, my friend; you are Harold Wynne’s also. Now, if you want to enable him to gratify his reasonable ambition—if you want to make him happy—to make me happy—you will prevent him from ever asking Beatrice Avon to marry him.”

“And I am prepared to do so much for him—for you—for her. But how can I do it?”

“You can take her away from him. You know how such things are done. You know that if a distinguished man such as you are, with a large income such as you possess, gives a girl to understand that he is, let us say, greatly interested in her, she will soon cease to be interested in any undistinguished and penniless son of a reprobate peer who may be before her eyes.”

“I have seen such a social phenomenon,” said he. “Does your proposition suggest that I should marry the young woman with ‘a gray eye or so’?”

“You may marry her if you please—that’s entirely a matter for yourself. I don’t see any need for you to go that length. Have I not kept my promise to be frank?”

“You have,” said he.

She had risen from the settee. She laid her hand on one of his that rested on a projection of the old oak carving, and in another instant she was laughing in front of Norah Innisfail, who was rendered even more proper than usual through having become acquainted with Miss Stafford’s notions of originality in verse-making.

CHAPTER XXI.—ON THE ELEMENTS OF PARTY POLITICS.

MR. AIREY was actually startled by the suggestion which Miss Craven had made with, on the whole, considerable tact as well as inconceivable frankness.

He had been considering all the afternoon the possibility of carrying out the idea which it seemed Helen Craven had on her mind as well; but it had never occurred to him that his purpose might be achieved through the means suggested by the young woman who had just gone from his side.

His first impression was that the proposal made to him was the cruellest that had ever come from one girl in respect of another girl. He had never previously had an idea that a girl could be so heartless as to make such a suggestion as that which had come from Helen Craven; but in the course of a short space of time, he found it expedient to revise his first judgment on this matter. Helen Craven meant to marry Harold—so much could scarcely be doubted—and her marrying him would be the best thing that could happen to him. She was anxious to prevent his marrying Miss Avon; and surely this was a laudable aim, considering that marrying Miss Avon would be the worst thing that could happen to him—and to Miss Avon as well.

It might possibly be regarded as cruel by some third censors for Miss Craven to suggest that he, Edmund, after leading the other girl to believe that he was desirous of marrying her—or at least to believe that she might have a chance of marrying him—might stop short. To be sure, Miss Craven had not, with all her frankness, said that her idea was that he should refrain from asking the other girl to marry him, but only that the question was one that concerned himself alone.

He thought over this point for some time, and the conclusion he came to was that, after all, whether or not the cynical indifference of the suggestion amounted to absolute cruelty, the question concerned himself alone. Even if he were not to ask her to marry him after leading her to suppose that he intended doing so, he would at any rate have prevented her from the misery of marrying Harold; and that was something for which she might be thankful to him. He would also have saved her from the degradation of receiving a proposal of marriage from Lord Fotheringay; and that was also something for which she might be thankful to him.

Being a strictly party politician, he regarded expediency as the greatest of all considerations. He was not devoid of certain scruples now and again; but he was capable of weighing the probable advantages of yielding to these scruples against the certain advantages of—well, of throwing them to the winds.

For some minutes after Helen Craven had left him he subjected his scruples to the balancing process, and the result was that he found they were as nothing compared with the expediency of proceeding as Helen had told him that it was advisable for him to proceed.

He made up his mind that he would save the girl—that was how he put it to himself—and he would take extremely good care that he saved himself as well. Marriage would not suit him. Of this he was certain. People around him were beginning to be certain of it also. The mothers in Philistia had practically come to regard him as a quantité négligeable. The young women did not trouble themselves about him, after a while. It would not suit him to marry a young woman with lustrous eyes, he said to himself as he left his settee; but it would suit him to defeat the machinations of Lord Fotheringay, and to induce his friend Harold Wynne to pursue a sensible course.

He found himself by the side of Beatrice Avon before five minutes had passed, and he kept her thoroughly amused for close upon an hour—he kept her altogether to himself also, though many chances of leaving his side were afforded the girl by considerate youths, and by one smiling person who had passed the first bloom of youth and had reached that which is applied by the cautious hare’s foot in the hand of a valet.

Before the hour of brandy-and-sodas and resplendent smoking-jackets had come, the fact of his having kept Beatrice Avon so long entertained had attracted some attention.

It had attracted the attention of Miss Craven, who commented upon it with a confidential smile at Harold. It attracted the attention of Harold’s father, who commented upon it with a leer and a sneer. It attracted the attention of Lady Innisfail, who commented upon it with a smile that caused the dainty dimple in her chin to assume the shape of the dot in a well-made note of interrogation.

It also attracted the attention of quite a number of other persons, but they reserved their comments, which was a wise thing for them to do.

As she said good-night to him, she seemed, Edmund Airey thought, to be a trifle fascinated as well as fascinating. He felt that he had had a delightful hour—it was far more delightful than the half hour which he had passed on the settee at the rear of the skeleton elk.

His feeling in this matter simply meant that it was far more agreeable to him to see a young woman admiring his cleverness than it was to admire the cleverness of another young woman.

He enjoyed his smoke by the side of the judge; for when a man is absorbed in the thoughts of his own cleverness he can still get a considerable amount of passive enjoyment out of the story of How the Odds fell from Thirteen to Five to Six to Four against Porcupine for some prehistoric Grand National.

Harold Wynne now and again glanced across the hall at the man who professed to be his best friend. He could perceive without much trouble that Edmund Airey was particularly well pleased with himself.

This meant, he thought, that Edmund had been particularly well pleased with Beatrice Avon.

Lord Fotheringay was too deeply absorbed in giving point to a story, founded upon personal experience, which he was telling to his host, to give a moment’s attention to Edmund Airey, or to make an attempt to interpret his aspect.

It was only when his valet was putting him carefully to bed—he required very careful handling—that he recollected the effective way in which Airey had snubbed him, when he had made an honest attempt to reach Miss Avon conversationally.

He now found time to wonder what Airey meant by preventing the girl from being entertained—Lord Fotheringay assumed, as a matter of course, that the girl had not been entertained—all the evening. He had no head, however, for considering such a question in all its aspects. He only resolved that in future he would take precious good care that when there was any snubbing in the air, he would be the dispenser of it, not the recipient.

Lord Fotheringay was not a man of genius, but upon occasions he could be quite as disagreeable as if he were. He had studied the art of administering snubs, and though he had never quite succeeded in snubbing a member of Parliament of the same standing as Mr. Airey, yet he felt quite equal to the duty, should he find it necessary to make an effort in this direction.

He was sleeping the sleep of the reprobate, long before his son had succeeded in sleeping the sleep of the virtuous. Harold had more to think about, as well as more capacity of thinking, than his father. He was puzzled at the attitude of his friend and counsellor, Edmund Airey. What on earth could he have meant by appropriating Beatrice Avon, Harold wondered. He assumed that Airey had some object in doing what he had done. He knew that his friend was not the man to do anything without having an object in view. Previously he had been discreet to an extraordinary degree in his attitude toward women. He had never even made love to those matrons to whom it is discreet to make love. If he had ever done so Harold knew that he would have heard of it; for there is no fascination in making love to other men’s wives, unless it is well known in the world that you are doing so. The school-boy does not smoke his cigarette in private. The fascination of the sin lies in his committing it so that it gets talked about.

Yes, Airey had ever been discreet, Harold knew, and he quite failed to account for his lapse—assuming that it was indiscreet to appropriate Beatrice Avon for an hour, and to keep her amused all that time.

Harold himself had his own ideas of what was discreet in regard to young women, and he had acted up to them. He did not consider that, so far as the majority of young women were concerned, he should be accredited with much self-sacrifice for his discretion.

Had a great temperance movement been set on foot in Italy in the days of Cæsar Borgia, the total abstainers would not have earned commendation for their self-sacrifice. Harold Wynne had been discreet in regard to most women simply because he was afraid of them. He was afraid that he might some day be led to ask one of them to marry him—one of them whom he would regard as worse than a Borgia poison ever after.

The caution that he had displayed in respect of Helen Craven showed how discreet he had accustomed himself to be.

He reflected, however, that in respect of Beatrice Avon he had thrown discretion to the winds From the moment that he had drawn her hands to his by the fishing line, he had given himself up to her. He had been without the power to resist.

Might it not, then, be the same with Edmund Airey? Might not Edmund, who had invariably been so guarded as to be wholly free from reproach so far as women were concerned, have found it impossible to maintain that attitude in the presence of Beatrice?

And if this was so, what would be the result?

This was the thought which kept Harold Wynne awake and uncomfortable for several hours during that night.

CHAPTER XXII.—ON THE WISDOM OP THE MATRONS.

LADY INNISFAIL made a confession to one of her guests—a certain Mrs. Burgoyne—who was always delighted to play the rôle of receiver of confessions. The date at which Lady Innisfail’s confession was made was three days after the arrival of Beatrice Avon at the Castle, and its subject was her own over-eagerness to secure a strange face for the entertainment of her guests.

“I thought that the romantic charm which would attach to that girl, who seemed to float up to us out of the mist—leaving her wonderful eyes out of the question altogether—would interest all my guests,” said she.

“And so it did, if I may speak for the guests,” said Mrs. Burgoyne. “Yes, we were all delighted for nearly an entire day.”

“I am glad that my aims were not wholly frustrated,” said Lady Innisfail. “But you see the condition we are all in at present.”

“I cannot deny it,” replied Mrs. Burgoyne, with a sigh. “My dear, a new face is almost as fascinating as a new religion.”

“More so to some people—generally men,” said Lady Innisfail. “But who could have imagined that a young thing like that—she has never been presented, she tells me—should turn us all topsy turvy?”

“She has a good deal in her favour,” remarked Mrs. Burgoyne. “She is fresh, her face is strange, she neither plays, sings, nor recites, and she is a marvellously patient listener.”

“That last comes through being the daughter of a literary man,” said Lady Innisfail. “The wives and daughters of poets and historians and the like are compelled to be patient listeners. They are allowed to do nothing else.”

“I dare say. Anyhow that girl has made the most of her time since she came among us.”

“She has. The worst of it is that no one could call her a flirt.”

“I suppose not. But what do you call a girl who is attractive to all men, and who makes all the men grumpy, except the one she is talking to?”

“I call her a—a clever girl,” replied Lady Innisfail. “Don’t we all aim at that sort of thing?”

“Perhaps we did—once,” said Mrs. Burgoyne, who was a year or two younger than her hostess. “I should hope that our aims are different now. We are too old, are we not?—you and I—for any man to insult us by making love to us.”

“A woman is never too old to be insulted, thank God,” said Lady Innisfail; and Mrs. Burgoyne’s laugh was not the laugh of a matron who is shocked.

“All the same,” added Lady Innisfail, “our pleasant party threatens to become a fiasco, simply because I was over-anxious to annex a new face. I had set my heart upon bringing Harold Wynne and Helen Craven together; but now they have become hopelessly good friends.”

“She is very kind to him.”

“Yes, that’s the worst of it; she is kind and he is indifferent—he treats her as if she were his favourite sister.”

“Are matters so bad as that?”

“Quite. But when the other girl is listening to what another man is saying to her, Harold Wynne’s face is a study. He is as clearly in love with the other girl as anything can be. That, old reprobate—his father—has his aims too—horrid old creature! Mr. Durdan has ceased to study the Irish question with a deep-sea cast of hooks in his hand: he spends some hours every morning devising plans for spending as many minutes by the side of Beatrice. I do believe that my dear husband would have fallen a victim too, if I did not keep dinning into his ears that Beatrice is the loveliest creature of our acquaintance. I lured him on to deny it, and now we quarrel about it every night.”

“I believe Lord Innisfail rather dislikes her,” said Mrs. Burgoyne.

“I’m convinced of it,” said Lady Innisfail. “But what annoys me most is the attitude of Mr. Airey. He professed to be Harold’s friend as well as Helen’s, and yet he insists on being so much with Beatrice that Harold will certainly be led on to the love-making point—”

“If he has not passed it already,” suggested Mrs. Burgoyne.

“If he has not passed it already; for I need scarcely tell you, my dear Phil, that a man does not make love to a girl for herself alone, but simply because other men make love to her.”

“Of course.”

“So that it is only natural that Harold should want to make love to Beatrice when he is led to believe that Edmund Airey wants to marry her.”

“The young fool! Why could he not restrain his desire until Mr. Airey has married her? But do you really think that Mr. Airey does want to marry her?”

“I believe that Harold Wynne believes so—that is enough for the present. Oh, no. You’ll not find me quite so anxious to annex a strange face another time.”

From the report of this confidential duologue it may possibly be perceived, first, that Lady Innisfail was a much better judge of the motives and impulses of men than Miss Craven was; and, secondly, that the presence of Beatrice at the Castle had produced a marked impression upon the company beneath its roof.

It was on the evening of the day after the confidential duologue just reported that there was an entertainment in the hall of the Castle. It took the form of tableaux arranged after well-known pictures, and there was certainly no lack of actors and actresses for the figures.

Mary Queen of Scots was, of course, led to execution, and Marie Antoinette, equally as a matter of course, appeared in her prison. Then Miss Stafford did her best to realize the rapt young woman in Mr. Sant’s “The Soul’s Awaking”—Miss Stafford was very wide awake indeed, some scoffer suggested; and Miss Innisfail looked extremely pretty—a hostess’s daughter invariably looks pretty—as “The Peacemaker” in Mr. Marcus Stone’s picture.

Beatrice Avon took no part in the tableaux—the other girls had not absolutely insisted on her appearing beside them on the stage that had been fitted up; they had an+ informal council together, Miss Craven being stage-manager, and they had come to the conclusion that they could get along very nicely without her assistance.

Some of them said that Beatrice preferred flirting with the men. However this may have been, the fact remained that Harold, when he had washed the paint off his face—he had been the ill-tempered lover, Miss Craven being the young woman with whom he was supposed to have quarrelled, requiring the interposition of a sweet Peacemaker in the person of Miss Innisfail—went round by a corridor to the back of the hall, and stood for a few minutes behind a ‘portiere that took the place of a door at one of the entrances. The hall was, of course, dimly lighted to make the contrast with the stage the greater, so that he could not see the features of the man who was sitting on the chair at the end of the row nearest the portiere; but the applause that greeted a reproduction of the picture of a monk shaving himself, having previously used no other soap than was supplied by a particular maker, had scarcely died away before Harold heard the voice of Edmund Airey say, in a low and earnest tone, to someone who was seated beside him, “I do hope that before you go away, you will let me know where you will next pitch your tent. I don’t want to lose sight of you.”

“If you wish I shall let you know when I learn it from my father,” was the reply that Harold heard, clearly spoken in the voice of Beatrice Avon.

Harold went back into the billowy folds of the tapestry curtain, and then into the corridor. The words that he had overheard had startled him. Not merely were the words spoken by Edmund Airey the same as he himself had employed a few days before to Beatrice, but her reply was practically the same as the reply which she had made to him.

When the last of the figurantes had disappeared from the stage, and when the buzz of congratulations was sounding through the hall, now fully lighted, Harold was nowhere to be seen.

Only a few of the most earnest of the smokers were still in the hall when, long past midnight, he appeared at the door leading to the outer hall or porch. His shoes were muddy and his shirt front was pulpy, for the night was a wet one.

He explained to his astonished friends that it was invariably the case that putting paint and other auxiliaries to “making up” on his face, brought on a headache, which he had learned by experience could only be banished by a long walk in the open air.

Well, he had just had such a walk.

He did not expect that his explanation would carry any weight with it; and the way he was looked at by his friends made him aware of the fact that, in giving them credit for more sense than to believe him, he was doing them no more than the merest justice.

No one who was present on his return placed the smallest amount of credence in his story. What many of them did believe was of no consequence.

CHAPTER XXIII.—ON THE ATLANTIC.

THE boats were scattered like milestones—as was stated by Brian—through the sinuous length of Lough Suangorm. The cutter yacht Acushla was leading the fleet out to the Atlantic, with two reefs in her mainsail, and although she towed a large punt, and was by no means a fast boat, she had no difficulty in maintaining her place, the fact being that the half-dozen boats that lumbered after her were mainly fishing craft hailing from the village of Cairndhu, and, as all the world knows, these are not built for speed but endurance. They are half-decked and each carries a lug sail. One of the legends of the coast is that when a lug sail is new its colour is brown, and as a new sail is never seen at Cairndhu there are no means of finding out if the story is true or false. The sails, as they exist, are kaleidoscopic in their patchwork. It is understood that anything will serve as a patch for a lug sail. Sometimes the centre-piece of an old coat has been used for this purpose; but if so, it is only fair to state that it is on record that the centre-piece of an old sail has been shaped into a jacket for the ordinary wearing of a lad.

The lug sail may yet find its way into a drawing room in Belgravia and repose side by side with the workhouse sheeting which occupies an honoured place in that apartment.

On through the even waves that roll from between the headlands at the entrance, to the little strand of pebbles at the end of the lough, the boats lumbered. The sea and sky were equally gray, but now and again a sudden gleam of sunshine would come from some unsuspected rift in the motionless clouds, and fly along the crests of the waves, revealing a green transparency for an instant, and then, flashing upon the sails, make apparent every patch in their expanse, just as a flash of lightning on a dark night reveals for a second every feature of a broad landscape.

As the first vessel of the little fleet, pursuing an almost direct course in spite of the curving of the shores of the Irish fjord, approached one coast and then the other, the great rocks that appeared snow-white, with only a dab of black here and there, became suddenly all dark, and the air was filled with what seemed like snow flakes. The cries of the innumerable sea birds, that whirled about the disturbing boat before they settled and the rocks became gradually white once more, had a remarkable effect when heard against that monotonous background, so to speak, of rolling waves.

The narrow lough was a gigantic organ pipe through which the mighty bass of the Atlantic roared everlastingly.

But when the headlands at the entrance were reached, the company who sat on the weather side of the cutter Acushla became aware of a commingling of sounds. The organ voice of the lough only filled up the intervals between the tremendous roar of the lion-throated waves that sprang with an appalling force half way up the black faces of the sheer cliffs, and broke in mid-air. All day long and all night long those inexhaustible billows come rushing upon that coast; and watching them and listening to them one feels how mean are contemporary politics as well as other things.

“That’s the Irish question,” remarked Lord Innisfail, who was steering his own cutter.

He nodded in the direction of the waves that were clambering up the headlands. What he meant exactly he might have had difficulty in explaining.

“Very true, very true,” said Mr. Durdan, sagaciously, hoping to provoke Mr. Airey to reply, and thinking it likely that he would learn from Mr. Airey’s reply what was Lord Innisfail’s meaning.

But Mr. Airey, who had long ago become acquainted with Mr. Durdan’s political methods, did not feel it incumbent on him to make the attempt to grapple with the question—if it was a question—suggested by Lord Innisfail.

The metaphor of a host should not, he knew, be considered too curiously. Like the wit of a police-court magistrate, it should be accepted with effusion.

“Stand by that foresheet,” said Lord Innisfail to one of the yacht’s hands. “We’ll heave to until the other craft come up.”

In a few moments the cutter had all way off her, and was simply tumbling about among the waves in a way that made some of the ship’s company hold their breath and think longingly of pale brandy.

The cruise of the Acushla and the appearance of the fleet of boats upon the lough were due to the untiring energy of Lady Innisfail and to the fact that at last Brian, the boatman, had, by the help of Father Conn, come to grasp something of the force of the phrase “local colour”.

Lady Innisfail was anxious that her guests should carry away certain definite impressions of their sojourn at the Connaught castle beyond those that may be acquired at any country-house, which everyone knows may be comprised in a very few words. A big shoot, and an incipient scandal usually constitute the record of a country-house entertainment. Now, it was not that Lady Innisfail objected to a big shoot or an incipient scandal—she admitted that both were excellent in their own way—but she hoped to do a great deal better for her guests. She hoped to impart to their visit some local colour.

She had hung on to the wake and the eviction, as has already been told, with pertinacity. The fête which she believed was known to the Irish peasantry as the Cruiskeen, had certainly some distinctive features; though just as she fancied that the Banshee was within her grasp, it had vanished into something substantial—this was the way she described the scene on the cliffs. Although her guests said they were very well satisfied with what they had seen and heard, adding that they had come to the conclusion that if the Irish had only a touch of humour they would be true to the pictures that had been drawn of them, still Lady Innisfail was not satisfied.

Of course if Mr. Airey were to ask Miss Avon to marry him, her house-party would be talked about during the winter. But she knew that it is the marriages which do not come off that are talked about most; and, after all, there is no local colour in marrying or giving in marriage, and she yearned for local colour. Brian, after a time, came to understand something of her ladyship’s yearnings. Like the priest and the other inhabitants, he did not at first know what she wanted.

It is difficult to impress upon Fuzzy-wuzzy that he would be regarded as a person of distinction in the Strand and as an idol in Belgravia. At his home in the Soudan he is a very commonplace sort of person. So in the region of Lough Suangorm, but a casual interest attaches to the caubeen, which in Piccadilly would be followed by admiring crowds, and would possibly be dealt with in Evening Editions.

But, as has just been said, Brian and his friends in due time came to perceive the spectacular value to her ladyship’s guests of the most commonplace things of the country; and it was this fact that induced Brian to tell three stories of a very high colour to Mr. Airey and Mr. Wynne.

It was also his appreciation of her ladyship’s wants that caused him to suggest to her the possibility of a seal-hunt constituting an element of attraction—these were not the exact words employed by the boatman—to some of her ladyship’s guests.

It is scarcely necessary to say that Lady Innisfail was delighted with the suggestion. Some of her guests pretended that they also were delighted with it, though all that the majority wanted was to be let alone. Still, upon the afternoon appointed for the seal-hunt a considerable number of the Castle party went aboard the yacht. Beatrice was one of the few girls who were of the party. Helen would have dearly liked to go also; she would certainly have gone if she had not upon one—only one—previous occasion allowed herself to be persuaded to sail out to the headlands. She was wise enough not to imperil her prospects for the sake of being drenched with sea water.

She wondered—she did not exactly hope it—if it was possible for Beatrice Avon to become seasick.

This was how upon that gray afternoon, the fleet of boats sailed out to where the yacht was thumping about among the tremendous waves beyond the headlands that guard the entrance to Lough Suangorm.