By the Barrow River, and Other Stories

A VISION OR A DREAM

I never had a decided opinion one way or the other on the subject of ghosts—that is to say, I was never able to affirm my belief in them, nor was I willing, on the other hand, to deny that occasionally they visited the glimpses of the moon. Nothing, however, would induce me to spend a night in a churchyard, and indeed, it would cost me a considerable effort to pass by one on a country road after nightfall if I chanced to be alone. The fact is, I suffered for many years, and from my earliest childhood from the effects of a morbid imagination. I had, when little over six years old, received a terrible shock by the suicide of a neighbour. I had often seen him pass by the door of the house in which we lived. He was, as well as I remember, an engineer, and he had a rather peculiar cast of countenance, which had made a deep impression on me. I did not see him lying dead, but I followed a crowd mainly composed of women which attended the coffin, as it was being borne on the shoulders of four men, to the house of the deceased. When the coffin was taken inside the door the crowd remained for a long time outside, and of course the fatal deed formed the sole topic of conversation. I was close to three or four women who were listening to another who was giving a most graphic description of the manner in which the unhappy man had taken his life. The details were probably the offspring of her imagination, but they sank into my mind and the recollection of them cost me hours and nights of the bitterest agony—an agony indeed, impossible to describe. I have not forgotten them yet, though close on half a century has passed away.

I was, as I have mentioned, only about six years old at the time, and I was sent to bed every night about eight o’clock. I slept at the top of the house, and in the same room one of the servants also slept. I have no recollection of having, prior to the time I speak of, felt any fear when left alone in the room in the dark, but the night on which I heard the account of the suicide was to open a new experience for me, and to leave a mark upon my mind and character which has never been wholly effaced.

I remember well, as if it were only last night, hearing the footfalls of the servant as she descended the stairs after having put me to bed. I can remember, too, the noises in the street, the sound of feet and the voices talking, when suddenly in the dark, and close to my face, I saw the face of the dead man! I have purposely omitted the details of the suicide, nor do I wish to describe here the face as I saw it. Let it suffice to say that it was exactly in the condition as described by the woman in the crowd. It was the peculiar face which I had been accustomed to see, only hideously marred by wounds.

I screamed as it came close to me—screamed as if my life was in my throat—screamed and screamed, but no help came. I was at the top of a high house and the door was closed. I covered my head with the clothes until I was almost smothered. I closed my eyes fast to shut out the horrid sight as I hoped, but only to see it more clearly. Sometimes the face, while preserving the likeness to the peculiar face of the engineer, as I was wont to see it when he was alive, seemed to spread itself out and then contract, and every lineament of it seemed to be in convulsive motion. The pressure of the clothes and the suffocating heat forced me at length to lift them up, and again I screamed—screamed like a wild animal in agony. At last I was heard. Someone came quickly up the stairs. The door was flung open, and the candle lighted. It was the servant.

“My God! What’s the matter?” she exclaimed, as she saw me trembling as if I were in a fit and covered with perspiration.

I tried to explain as well as I could, and she endeavoured to soothe me. She remained by my side until I fell into a disturbed sleep. And for months after she, by the doctor’s orders, who was called in next day, sat in the room until I slept. And for many years, until I became almost a man, I never ventured to sleep except in a lighted room.

But whenever I was alone, either at night time, or at day time, I was liable to see the faces such as I have since read in De Quincey’s volume haunt the dreams of opium eaters. I have often started back shuddering from these faces, which have appeared suddenly in front of me when going by myself along a country road, even in the broad noon-day, when the sun was shining. And when people often expressed surprise that I never could be induced to visit a wake-house, they little knew that I could do so only at the price of being haunted for months by what I saw there, whenever I found myself alone.

I have narrated all this chiefly because it may serve in some degree to account for the phenomena which I witnessed under the circumstances I am about to describe.

About twenty years ago I paid a long promised visit to a friend, Gerald F——, who then lived in one of the counties bordering on Dublin, but who has since died.

He was engaged to be married to a very handsome girl, a Miss R——, whom he had met in London, but who was residing with her aunt not many miles from Creeve house, my friend’s residence. The wedding was to take place a few months subsequent to my visit. The marriage promised to be full of happiness. The girl was as gracious as she was beautiful, and my friend Gerald was in every way worthy of her. Both were very well off. The girl, an orphan, had been well provided for by her parents, and had large expectations from her aunt. The young couple were deeply in love with each other, and Gerald was constantly driving over to her aunt’s residence, and often took his fiancée for a drive through the charming country roads.

My visit was made in compliance with a promise which I had made long before the engagement took place, and which Gerald had frequently reminded me of. I came down to him not knowing of the engagement, and so when I heard the news I could not help remarking to him that my visit was rather ill-timed. But Gerald replied that he was delighted to see his old friend and to be able to talk over his own good fortune with him, and talk he did, I must say, to his heart’s content. But one day he said he feared he was boring me when we were together, and that I must, on the other hand, find it rather dull to be left alone, as I often was, when he was away in the company of his fiancée.

I interrupted him by saying that I rejoiced in his happiness and to hear him speak of it, and that as I loved the country and was fond of books I was able to pass my time very pleasantly in the glorious summer weather we were having.

And the time undoubtedly slipped away very agreeably, until one evening, about three weeks after my arrival, I was reclining on the lawn in front of the house under the shadow of a fine ash that flung its branches over the little rippling stream that wound through the lawn, and thinking myself as happy as Horace used to be in a similar situation, when the sound of a very fast galloping horse came suddenly down the avenue.

I had barely time to turn round when the horse pulled up before the hall-door, and I saw it was Gerald’s trap, and that he, white as a sheet, had one arm twined round Miss R——’s waist, with her head resting against his breast. I rushed up, and the look of unutterable agony in Gerald’s eyes satisfied me, without even the sight of the blood upon Miss R——’s face, that a terrible tragedy had occurred.

Of course the first thing to be done was to remove the lady into the house. This was done, and the doctor was at once sent for, although the slightest observation satisfied us all that his services were of no avail. The poor girl was dead!

Gerald was at first too distracted to be able to give a coherent account of what had happened; but when he was calm enough to speak the story was soon told.

He and Miss R—— were driving together past Creveen Wood when a shot was fired. The lady was on the side from which it was fired, and she was struck and killed instantly. The horse, frightened by the report, had galloped on frantically making for home. Gerald made no attempt to stay it, as his sole thought was the wounded girl who had fallen beside him. Fortunately the gate leading into the avenue was open, and it was a pretty wide one, and the horse galloped through it without coming in contact with the piers.

The doctor arrived, and he was followed by the police, word having been sent to the neighbouring barrack. The former was, of course, no use, and the latter, after having heard what Gerald had to say went off to the plantation, but were unable to find any trace that would help them in the discovery of the assassin.

I need not dwell upon the details of the funeral, or upon Gerald’s condition of mind, or the terrible sad nights which followed that of the tragedy. I remained up for several nights with Gerald, and indeed, nearly exhausted myself. The doctor, however, at last insisted that I should have some rest, and about a week after the dreadful occurrence I withdrew to my own room for the night.

I tried to sleep the moment I got into bed, but sleep kept away from me. I had put out the light and was tossing from side to side, when right in the dark in front of me was outlined a face! The strain upon my nerves had brought back the old haunting visions! The suddenness with which it appeared and its closeness startled me and brought the old dread back to me, although it was many years since I had suffered and I had become very strong.

There was nothing objectionable in the face. It was that of a young man about eight and twenty, and it bore something more than a faint resemblance to that of my friend Gerald. I tried instinctively the trick of closing my eyes, but only to see it, if possible more clearly, but as I looked at it, it began to recede from me, and to fall back towards the wall. Then I perceived that it was no longer only a face that presented itself; there was the figure of a man. He was dressed in dark grey tweed, rather the worse of wear, and looked like one who had received a military training. I had never seen the face before, but this did not surprise me, as my imagination had been wont to play me curious tricks in this way.

I began to think of other men whom I had known, and to bring their faces before me in the hope of blotting this one out, which, as I have said, caused me to feel as in the old nights of terror I was wont to feel, but just as I appeared to be on the point of succeeding the vision became more vivid, and again advanced up to the bedside, and then I noticed that in its right hand it carried a gun. Soon after it vanished, and I fell into a tolerably sound sleep, and slept late into the next day.

In about a fortnight after, Gerald, whom I had scarcely ever left except at bedtime, was coming to himself, and I found I could go out for an occasional stroll. And one day my steps involuntarily turned in the direction of Creveen Wood. Nothing had in the meantime turned up to elucidate the mystery. A reward had been offered, but no information was forthcoming, and all hope of discovery was abandoned.

I had come close to the plantation without being aware of it, but on recognising it I made an effort to turn back, but I was prevented doing so by an irresistible impulse which drove me forward. I entered the plantation, and after straying through it for some time my foot knocked against something hard, which emitted a peculiar sound. This caused me to look down to see what it was that I had struck against. I found it was a piece of metal. I picked it up and examined it carefully, and it seemed to be the portion of the lock of a gun.

Swift as a lightning flash came the recollection of what at the time had made no perceptible impression on my mind. The lock of the gun in the hand of the figure which I had seen in the vision was imperfect!

A strange excitement took possession of me, and I felt that if I could only find the original, if he existed, of that vision I should find the assassin of Miss R——.

Gerald’s heart was bent on his discovery, and in one of our talks together he made me promise to help him in the search. I gave the promise to soothe him, believing at the time I made it that there was little or no likelihood that I could assist him.

I put the piece of metal in my pocket and returned to Creeve House.

Gerald, who had been able to leave his room, had come down to the study, and as I entered it I found him turning over the pages of an album of portraits.

I went over and sat down beside him, and congratulated him on his improved appearance. He shook his head sadly, and then, hoping to turn his thoughts from their object, which I had no doubt of, I put my finger on the album.

“Who is this?” said I.

It was the figure of an old lady.

“She was an aunt of mine.”

I turned over the leaf, and the next portrait was that of the man I had seen in the vision! For a moment I held my breath; then bending down over the album, that my face might not betray me, I asked:

“Who is this?”

“A half-brother, Frank L——,” he answered. “He was my mother’s son by her first husband. Mother was a widow when she married father.”

I burned to ask another question, but feared I might betray myself.

“She was very fond of him,” he went on, “as fond as she was of me—fonder, I sometimes think, because he did not turn out too well. He was a soldier, and left his regiment under rather cloudy circumstances; but I don’t know the particulars.”

“He looks somewhat like you,” I ventured to observe.

“More like mother, I should say,” he replied.

“And where is he now?”

“I don’t know. He was, when I last heard of him, lodging in Kingstown or Blackrock. I don’t know much about him. We were never friends. He always resented mother’s second marriage, and, I fear, hated me in consequence.”

Then Gerald spoke of some other indifferent subject, and I did not desire to bring him back to the one uppermost in my mind. But as he talked the question shaped itself—“Was Frank L—— the assassin, and if so what could have been his motive?”

A few days after I left Creeve House as Gerald was nearly himself again. I found, however that the strain of attending him, and the anxiety, and the vision, and the haunting question ever putting itself to me, had taxed me more than I had thought, and I determined to spend a few days at the sea-side, and I found a couple of rooms that suited me in one of the houses on the Bray Esplanade not far from the “Head.”

I took the rooms, put in my luggage, and went to Dublin for a few hours to transact some private business. It was near ten at night when I returned. I found my landlady very much perturbed. The gentleman who had occupied the rooms I had taken had, as she thought, gone away finally, but two or three days of his tenancy were unexpired, and he returned unexpectedly that evening. If I did not mind, she said, I could have for the night the room of another gentleman who was and would be absent for three or four days.

Of course I assented, and in a few minutes I was told the room was ready.

Being rather tired I went up to it on receiving this information. I glanced around it, and was satisfied. I sat on a chair facing the chimney-piece, in order to take off my boots; and this done, I gazed about more leisurely, and observed that over the mantle-place, in a rack, was suspended a gun. I went over towards it to examine it, as I am curious in firearms, and discovered with a sharp surprise that the lock of the gun was broken.

I hastily put my hand in my pocket, drew out the piece of metal which I had picked up in Creeveen Wood. It fitted the fracture perfectly!

For a moment I felt like one dazed, and then I began to look around the room as if in search of something, I knew not what. My eyes lighted on a portmanteau, bearing the initials “F.L.” “Frank L——, by all that’s wonderful,” said I to myself.

I flung myself undressed upon the bed. I couldn’t sleep. There was gas in the room, and I kept it burning all night.

When I met the landlady next morning I asked her, as if casually, who was the tenant of my room.

“Oh, Mr. L——,” she answered; “he’s been absent for some weeks, and may not return for some time. He often stays away for over a month.”

What was I to do? I had no doubt whatever I had found the assassin!

Was I to tell Gerald F——? Would he believe in my visions? Would he regard the piece of metal as a proof, and if he did believe it would he thank me for convicting his mother’s son of the crime?

No. I wouldn’t tell, at least until I had pursued the matter further. So the next day I determined to cause some privately conducted investigations to be made concerning the recent career of Frank L——, but before I had well set them on foot, and within a few days of my discovery in the seaside lodgings, came the news through the morning papers that the body of a man was found on the line between Salthill and Kingstown, and from papers on him it turned out that he was a Mr. Francis L——!

Gerald F——, I know, attended the funeral. A week subsequent to it came the information from the private inquiry office which I had set in motion that L—— had been paying attentions to Miss R—— in London, and her maid had stated that she believed he had made a proposal and had been rejected.

L—— was dead and gone. There was no use in pushing the matter any further. Nothing could be gained by any disclosure I could make, and the only question that troubled me, and sometimes troubles me now, is, was what I saw in Creeve House a vision or a dream?

FROM THE JAIL TO THE
BATTLEFIELD.

A few days after the trial Mr. Vesey, who held a commission in the army, was ordered off for foreign service. He attained the rank of captain, and his regiment formed part of the English column that had so nearly made the field of Fontenoy “a Waterloo.” And when, before the impetuous onset of the Irish Brigade that almost invincible column broke, scattered, and fled, Captain Vesey lay with “his back to the field and his feet to the foe.” Two balls had pierced him and a clubbed musket, wielded by a fierce Irish exile’s arm, had reduced him to insensibility. But he was not dead. Louis, when he saw that the field was won, gave orders that the English wounded should be cared for as tenderly as his own soldiers, and Captain Vesey was carried from the field to the hospital at Lille by an Irish soldier, of the regiment of Berwick, of the name of Vaughan, who displayed towards him the greatest solicitude. Captain Vesey received the utmost attention from the officers of the Irish Brigade at Lille, who, now that he was wounded and a prisoner in their hands, remembered only that he was their countryman. He soon became convalescent, and able to join the officers at mess. One evening when in the rooms of the Count de St. Woolstan, the conversation having turned on the incidents of the battle, an officer remarked that Captain Vesey in all probability owed his life to the private who had carried him off from the field when to all appearance he was dead. Captain Vesey eagerly asked for the soldier’s name, and said it was strange that he had never looked to him for any recompense. Count de Woolstan undertook to find the soldier, and a few evenings later the latter presented himself at the count’s quarters and was shown into the presence of Captain Vesey. The captain could hardly believe his eyes, but if they did not deceive him, there before him stood William Keogh, whom he had believed to be lying in a felon’s grave in Kilmainham. He was about to call him by his true name, when it occurred to him that the recognition might be injurious to the man to whom he felt he was indebted for his life. He rose and thanked William Vaughan warmly for his kindness, and offered him twenty gold pieces, but the soldier refused to take it. He was greatly agitated as he answered:

“No, Captain Vesey, I will never touch a penny of your money again.”

“It would appear you have met before,” remarked the count.

“We have,” said Keogh, “but Captain Vesey does not know all. I will tell you.”

But the count said he had no wish to become acquainted with the confidence that was not intended for him. That he knew Vaughan only as a good soldier and desired to know no more.

“And I pledge you my honour,” said the captain, grasping Keogh by the hand, “I shall never allude to you except as the man to whom I owe my life.”

Keogh pressed the captain’s hand warmly in his, and then, with the tears starting to his eyes, he saluted the officers and left the room.

A few months afterwards an exchange of prisoners was effected, and when Captain Vesey was taking farewell of the gallant count, the latter informed him that he had promoted Vaughan to the rank of sergeant. Vaughan—or Keogh as we know him—asked for and was given the opportunity of saying good-bye to the captain, and he took a grateful farewell.

Years passed, and Captain Vesey had fought in India and America, when returning to Europe the fortune of war again made him a prisoner in the hands of the French when the Duc de Richelieu captured Minorca. And for the second time, Captain, or as he now was, Colonel Vesey, met with Count de Woolstan. Naturally enough they talked of former days, and the colonel made inquiries concerning Vaughan, and he learned that shortly after he (the colonel) had left Lille. Vaughan’s brother had arrived from Ireland, joined Berwick’s regiment and was killed at the battle of Raucoux. In that battle William was severely wounded and incapacitated for further service, and he had become an inmate of the Hotel des Invalides.

Colonel Vesey, on being allowed to go on parole to Paris, sought out the old sergeant whose escape from the gallows had often been the cause of curious but unsatisfactory conjecture. Keogh was delighted to see him, and, seated in one of the arbours in the garden of the Invalides, he told him the story of his escape.

“They are all dead and gone now,” said he, “who assisted in it, and there is no longer need for secrecy. No one can be hurt by the disclosure.”

His story was briefly this: When he and his brother had taken the money they put it into a canvas bag and hid it in a deep pool in the river Liffey below the Salmon Leap. There was a heavy weight attached to it to keep it down, but it could be easily removed by a drag. When lying in his condemned cell Keogh noticed that the jailer, who paid but little attention to the other prisoners awaiting execution, was particularly attentive to him, and one day the jailer entered the cell, and carefully closing the door sat down on the stool, and asked him if he could do anything for him. Keogh replied that the only thing he could do was to get him off being hanged. After a pause the jailer asked:

“Have you the money?”

“Every penny of it is safe,” was the reply. “And there is fifteen hundred pounds for a true friend.”

The bait was tempting, and the jailer confessed he was in need of money. If he could get that amount, he undertook to allow Keogh’s brother, Sylvester, to pass through his rooms, bring with him a rope ladder, the key being left in the cell, and so the prisoner could escape at midnight. But William would not hear of his brother being brought into the plot, and suggested as an alternative that he, William, should get sick of jail fever, then a very common and often fatal disease; that he should appear to die of it, and be sent out in a coffin.

The jailer caught at the suggestion, but said there must be a real corpse, for there would have to be an inquest; and, he added, that in that case there would only be a thousand pounds for himself as the remaining five hundred should be divided amongst necessary accomplices on whom he could rely.

Accordingly Keogh feigned illness, and made himself really sick by the use of drugs with which the jailer supplied him. The prisoners in the cells at either side of him were removed, to be away from the contagion of the jail fever, from which Keogh was supposed to be suffering. At length he was reported dead, and the night of his supposed death the jailer introduced into his cell a corpse which had been dug up out of the hospital fields. This was placed in Keogh’s bed and the latter was let out on the high road. The inquest was held and verdict found, the jury not taking the trouble to view the corpse, deterred from so doing by fear of infection, and the brother Sylvester, the better to keep up the deception, attended the funeral. William Keogh married a laundress in Paris and died about the year 1769, having by his gallant conduct atoned for the crime of his youth, and he had the happiness of knowing that he had not only obtained the forgiveness, but had also earned the gratitude of the man he had wronged.

ALL FOR A WOMAN’S EYES.

By the bedside of the dying man were seated two persons. One was a youth with one foot across the threshold of manhood. He was well-built, active, good-looking, but his weak mouth suggested want of resolution, and the edges of his eyelashes, which concealed his dreamy eyes, were suspiciously bright, as if tears had just visited them. He was the only son—the only child—of the dying man, and was here now, he knew, to receive his father’s last advice—his last blessing. The other was a man of fifty or thereabouts. He had a rugged, serious face, and by his dress and appearance would at once be taken for what he was—a Dissenting minister. He was seated towards the end of the bed. The young man sat beside the pillow.

“I feel my last moments are come, Robby,” he said faintly, “and I would like to give you my blessing before I go.”

Suppressing a sob, for the lad dearly loved his father, and was even more dearly loved by him, because ‘he was the child of his old age,’ Robby knelt down beside the bed, and the dying father extended his thin, wasted hand, that was almost transparent, and laid it fondly on the head of the boy. The clergyman had also knelt down, and with his hands raised in supplication to heaven, he prayed silently in sympathy with the old man who was so soon to pass away from this fleeting world.

It was a scene and a moment to move less responsive hearts than that of young Robbie Grierson. He felt himself like one under some sacred spell, and at the touch of his father’s hand his innermost and deepest feelings were stirred.

“I am going home, Robbie,” he said. “I am going home where I hope to meet the mother that bore ye and that ye never saw, and who gave her life for ye, and before I go I want ye to promise me something, laddie. I want ye to promise me something—will ye do it, Robbie? Will ye promise it?”

Robbie bent his forehead until it touched the coverlet of the bed.

“I will promise, father.”

“Blessed are those who honour their father and their mother, for their days will be long in the land,” murmured the clergyman, as if to himself.

“Well, Robbie, the times are strange, and men are talking of revolution, and overthrowing governments, and of war that will be needed to bring all that about. I am a dying man, Robbie, and what do all their present charges and revolutions seem to me. Ah, nothing more, lad, than the crimples on the lake when the wind blows, or than the billows when the storm rages—a boat or ship may go down with its load of souls, but when the wind is at rest again, all is as before.”

The tone of the speaker was so solemn, and the surroundings so dramatic, that Robbie felt in no mood to question anything that was said, but listened with pious and filial resignation.

“And now, Robbie, lad, I want ye to promise me, afore I go, that you will not any longer meddle or make with politics, and that you will have nothing to do with any of these societies that, I hear, are being formed in this country, bound by oaths, they tell me. Will ye promise, Robbie, will ye promise, lad. I am getting weak, Robbie, I want ye to promise me before I go, for your mother’s sake and mine, laddie, and there’s Mr. M’Clane there who will be your witness, Robbie.”

But Robbie was silent and did not reply. The request had taken him by a surprise so great that he knew not what to answer.

Robert Grierson, with, as he believed, the tacit approval of his father, had joined the Society of United Irishmen, and as he was well-educated, enthusiastic, and in a good position, for his father was known to be very well off, and, besides his extensive farm, had a good round sum in the bank, he easily acquired a rather prominent position, and was at the head of one of the committees of councils into which his county was divided. The society had become oath-bound, and Robbie, in view of his obligation as a member of it, knew not what to reply to his father’s unexpected request.

“Honour your father and mother if your days will be long in the land.”

It was the voice of the minister raised scarcely higher than a whisper.

“Will ye promise me, laddie, I’m flittin’? Will ye promise me, Robbie, before I go?”

Robert felt the hand on his relaxing. He lifted his own to catch it, and found it cold. He looked on his father’s face, and though he had not seen many die he felt the end was at hand.

“Will ye promise, Robbie?” the voice was growing fainter.

“I promise.”

“Kiss me, Robbie.”

The son lifted himself up, bent over and kissed the wan lips of the father.

“I die happy now, Robbie.”

The tears blinded the youth’s eyes. Brushing them away he looked his last look on his dying father, who held one of his hands. The clergyman had crept up and slipped his hand into the other.

A little gasp, a little flicker of the eyes, and all was over. Old William Grierson was no more.

At the funeral, a few days after, the whole countryside was present, for the deceased had been held in high esteem, and there was much talk as to the future of Robbie Grierson, who found himself so early in life master of a fine position, and even during the funeral procession of the father those who were friends of the deceased were speculating as to the marriage prospects of his son, for this is the way of the world.

But when the burial was over and done, Robbie Grierson set himself to work earnestly at the farm, and kept himself aloof from his former associates. He seemed to have become a wholly different being. He had been a bright, light-hearted youth, ready for all innocent fun and frolic. Now he courted solitude and became almost morose. He declined all invitations to the meetings of the United Irish Society, giving now one excuse and now another, until at last it became evident to the members that he did not wish any longer to attend them. He was looked upon as a very serious loss to their ranks, for he possessed considerable influence over a wide extent of country, and had been the means of attracting many recruits to the ranks of the brotherhood. What made his loss still more serious in the eyes of the heads of the society was that it appeared to be a defection, and, if such, it was likely to prove a tempting example to others who had looked up to Robert Grierson as one of the props of the society.

His conduct seemed inexplicable, for though not looked upon by his superiors as very resolute or masterful, he was believed to be sincere. At length the explanation got about, which young Grierson himself, for some reason or another, was reluctant to offer, and when the story of the death came to be told, the utmost sympathy was felt with Grierson, and it was admitted by most that, under the circumstances, he could hardly be blamed for making the solemn promise which detached him from the United Irishmen. But among them there were not wanting some who scoffed at Robert’s respect for the promise which he had given to the dead, but the majority, it must be said, respected him for it, although they considered it was unreasonable to exact it, and not binding on Robert.

Avoiding, as far as possible, doing any violence to his feelings, the chief men of the district endeavoured to withdraw him from his solitary course, but in vain. They represented to him that a promise exacted under such circumstances was not binding, for if it were, then the living generations might always be bound by the dead, and that all progress in human affairs would be arrested.

But Robert Grierson heeded them not, and he became apparently more disconsolate, and what time he could spare from his business he spent wandering by the banks of the stream, broad and brown, and tossing up its tawny locks as it passed fretfully over the stones that here and there interrupted its passage, and which formed the “mearing” between his property and Mr. George Jephson, who was one of the chiefs of the United Irish Society in his district.

A little story got abroad that there was another, or at least an additional, reason for Robert Grierson keeping so much to himself. It was said that he had been the suitor of a young lady in a position a little higher than his own, and that in the eyes of her parents his Republican principles had proved an insuperable barrier to their union, and that with the object of bringing their romantic attachment to an end, the young lady had been sent away to England and was lost on the voyage there, the vessel in which she sailed having been wrecked just outside Holyhead and all on board drowned.

The story was, in the main, true, and it was a cause of the most poignant grief to Robert Grierson that, having allowed his first love to go away from him rather than surrender his political principles, he now felt himself coerced by his promise to his dead father to abandon them, and, at least, to find it necessary for him to sever himself from those who continued to be the exponents of those principles.

But love-stricken as Robert Grierson was, his heart had not been fatally wounded, and although the homely life he was now leading seemed to hand him over a prey to melancholy, and although he persuaded himself that he was utterly love-lorn and that his heart was secure from any new assaults of Cupid, he knew nothing of the power and the wiles of the mischievous son of Aphrodite, and never dreamt that the little archer had the shaft fitted to the bow that would leave the whirring string only to find a sure passage into his, Robert Grierson’s heart.

CHAPTER II.

On an evening in May, 1797, Robert Grierson was strolling down by the banks of the stream that bound his lands. The weather for weeks had been mild, and the country was dressed in the tender green that had not yet drunk too deeply of the sunlight, unlike the leaves of mid-June, that hang so heavily and so listless in the still air. The stream was not yet as clear as it would be some weeks later, but it glared brightly enough as it flashed and swirled when the stones or boulders strove to stop its way, and even when it ran smooth and deep the rays of the sun, descending in an almost cloudless sky, coloured its brown surface to a golden hue.

Like most romantic youths, Robert Grierson loved to converse with rivers. Their bickerings, their whispers, their mysterious murmurings and sobbings, their chafing at obstructions, and the soft fretting on the banks when the way was clear had all become familiar to him, and all these seemed to glide into his darker musings, “and steal away their sharpness ere he was aware.”

Had anyone interrupted him as he strolled along and asked him what he was thinking of, he would have found it difficult, if not impossible to give a satisfactory reply. The thoughts of youth, as the poet tells us, “are long, long thoughts,” which is another way of saying it is given them to indulge in indefinable longings. But whatever were the musings of Robert Grierson on this evening he was suddenly brought back to his surroundings by a scream and a splash.

At the opposite side of the stream and knee-deep up to his fore-legs in it, was a pony, on which sat a lady, looking scared but gloriously beautiful in the light of the setting sun.

“Oh, I’ll be drowned! I’ll be drowned!”

There was no danger whatever. The pony had come down a boreen leading to the river—to a watering place and knew what he was about. Not so the lady, whom Grierson saw was a stranger, and who was evidently afraid the pony would carry her up mid-stream.

Grierson without hesitation plunged in, and waded up to his neck for a short distance until he swam by the pony’s head. Assuring the lady that there was no danger, he waited until the pony had slaked his thirst, and then turning his head round led him back to the boreen.

The lady was profuse in her thanks, which Grierson protested were not at all deserved, but they were, nevertheless, very grateful to him, for they were uttered in a voice the most musical he had ever heard. It was soft, almost caressing, and there was, moreover, a flavour of a foreign accent which seems to claim a special tender consideration for the speaker when she is a lady, young and beautiful, and a stranger.

With a final graceful wave of her hand, and shooting a Parthian glance from her dark eyes that went with unerring aim to Grierson’s heart, she urged her pony forward, and rounding a bend of the boreen was quickly lost to view.

Grierson stood gazing after her, like one whose gaze was fixed on a vision. It may be that the sun had sunk down behind the hills when she vanished, as it were, from his sight, but the very air seemed dark, the river ran in shadows, and his clinging wet clothes helped to free him from the spell of enchantment under which he had been drawn.

He ought to have hastened home to change his clothing, but he went there slowly, rehearsing in his mind the little scene in which he had taken part. Never was face so fair, he whispered to himself; never was voice so sweet, never were eyes so bewitching. As he thought of them his very soul seemed striving to escape from him to follow them.

Alas, “for the love that lasts alway!”

Had anyone dared on that morning to whisper to Robert Grierson that before the sun went down he would have completely forgotten his first love, and become the bondslave of a woman’s eyes, whose name he did not know, and whom he had never seen, he would have regarded the prophecy as little better than an insult, or, at least, as a foolish, idle utterance. And now, as he was turning into his house, he felt that in meeting so unexpectedly the fair unknown this evening he had met his fate.

He spent many hours that night thinking of her, and wondering who she was. He surmised that she was a guest of his neighbour, Mr. ——, who, as we know, was a prominent member of the United Society, and Grierson wondered he had heard nothing of her before, but then he remembered that he had kept himself so much aloof that very little gossip of any kind reached his ears.

When he thought of the way in which she and he had met he could not help regretting that he had not the opportunity of rendering her a more signal service, and he began spinning out romantic scenes in his mind—a horse tearing madly along straight for a precipice, a shrieking maiden clinging to his mane, and at the last moment he, Robert Grierson, managing to seize the reins, stopping the horse, but falling as he did so, and becoming unconscious, and then when he woke up, feeling sore all over, not knowing where he was, for he found himself in a dimly lighted room, and while he was still wondering a fair face bent softly over him, etc., etc. Other scenes in which the incidents were varied, succeeded, until he fell asleep.

When he woke the following morning, the fair vision of the previous evening came before his eyes, and he decided that he would endeavour to find out who the lady was.

The news came to him unexpectedly. Mr. —— came over to thank him for himself and also on behalf of his guest. Grierson very naturally made light of the business as a thing, so far as he was concerned, not worth talking about; but Mr. —— assured him that the young lady was very grateful, and it would, he said, give him great pleasure if Grierson would come over to his house that evening to supper. Grierson, after a little reluctance, which he felt bound to pretend owing to his having refused so many former invitations from the same quarter, agreed to go, and that evening found him in the society of Rosette Neilan, who had lately come back from France, and who was an ardent admirer of that gallant people, and was full of enthusiasm for the cause of liberty.

CHAPTER III.

LOVE’S TRIUMPH.

The only persons present at the supper were Mr. ——, his wife, Rosette, and Grierson, and it must be confessed that the young lady did all the talking. Most of it was about her school days, and there were bright little sketches of French life and much, but not very much, of the army that was sweeping over Europe, overthrowing old landmarks and breaking up dynasties. It was hardly to be wondered at that the others were listeners. The lovely face of the speaker seemed to beam as she spoke. Her beautiful eyes were at times as still as a waveless sea, and as deep, under the blue sky of a cloudless summer day. At times they flashed and sparkled as she became more interested in the subject of her conversation; her speech seemed to flow, as flows the song of the lark singing and winging his way up until he is lost in the height, and there was that soupçon of a foreign accent to which we have already referred, and to which we are half tempted to give the name of “brogue,” knowing how sweet what we call the “brogue” can be in a winsome Irish girl’s lips. Then there were the wonderful gestures that seemed, as it were, to add colour and motion to her descriptions. It was simply a delight to watch the play of her features, and as for Robert Grierson, he seemed to himself as if he were under a spell, and in truth he was. If Love had wounded him the previous evening, this night it succeeded in binding him hand and foot; and, as he returned home, walking in the moonlight by the stream, he seemed to hear, as it murmured by, the music of her voice.

It is hardly necessary to say that he made frequent opportunities of meeting her. Mr. and Mrs. —— gave him every facility. Mrs. ——, because she was, like most women, a bit of a matchmaker, and could sympathise still with a little love romance. That this was one she did not doubt. Anyone with her opportunity would have found no difficulty in making this discovery, and she regarded the match in every way a suitable one. Rosette was, indeed, almost penniless, while Robert Grierson had enough and to spare for both, with no relatives depending on him, and she thought he ought to be proud to win for his wife so beautiful and charming a girl as Rosette.

As for Mr. ——, he was glad of the intimacy which he saw springing up between the young couple, for other, though hardly as romantic, reasons. As for Rosette herself, she had been so much accustomed to admiration that at first she accepted Robert Grierson’s attentions as a matter of course, but it was not very long until she felt that her interest in him was becoming deeper, and her longing to meet him stronger.

During their earlier meetings their talk was just such as might be expected to take place between a handsome, brilliant, light-hearted, young lady, who assumed the airs of a queen, and a somewhat bashful young gentleman, who had felt his heart was under her feet, and who, dazed by her beauty and her will, could do barely more than listen and admire. But when they had become more intimate her talk was of another character. She began to speak much of France—of the Revolution—of the cause of Liberty.

She seemed to know by heart the wonderful story of the young Republic that had started up half armed and caught hoary dynasties by the throat, and humbled them to the dust.

As she spoke the battlefields seemed to rise before her vision, and she described the conflicts as if she had taken part in them, and on one occasion, after telling how a crowd of beardless boys, without shoes, and almost in tatters, had rushed the heights and sabred the Austrian gunners, she suddenly turned towards Grierson, and, with passionate gesture, exclaimed:

“Ah, if I were a man, I should be a soldier. But if I ever marry, I’ll marry only a soldier of liberty.”

She and Grierson were standing on a knoll that rose over the river that flashed back the hues of the sunset.

They fell also on the face and figure of Rosette, and as Grierson listened to her impassioned tones and watched her lovely face glowing with transcendent beauty he felt she had only to lift her finger to beckon him to destruction, and that he would have leaped in response like a hound loosened from the leash.

“Ah, glorious France!” she exclaimed, “she had only to stamp her foot and out her children came swarming round her, begging her to let them go fight, conquer or die for her.”

“But poor Ireland,” and a wistful look came into her eyes, “I come back to you only to find a race of slaves!”

And her voice, exultant a second before, sank as if burdened with great sorrow.

Then, after a slight pause, she resumed.

“But I fear I should not have spoken this way, Mr. Grierson, and the evening is waning, and I had better return home.”

“Not have spoken this way!” Grierson exclaimed, “as if I have any desire to find fault with your words or your thoughts; as if every word of yours does not find a home in my heart!”

And he caught her little hand and lifted it to his lips.

She permitted the caress, then gently withdrawing her hand she repeated: “I had better return home.”

“But why should you not speak to me and tell me everything?” he cried passionately.

“Because—because,” she stammered, “you know you were once one—one of us, but you are so no longer.”

“One of us!” and he emphasised the last word.

“Oh, I mean,” she replied with a slight toss of her head, rather suggestive of disdain, “you were once a soldier of liberty—but you are so no longer.”

For a second he was puzzled, then his heart caught her meaning.

“You said you would marry only a soldier of liberty.”

“It is true,” she replied.

“And if I were one?”

“But you are not! Look, the sun is sinking behind the hills already—the shadows are in the valley. I must return.”

“But if I were a soldier of liberty once more. If I take the oath of the United Men?”

“You took it, Robert Grierson.”

“But you do not understand. You have not heard all.”

“I understand. I have heard everything. You took the oath, and while men are arming everywhere, and the revolution that will make Ireland a Republic like France and like America is setting into motion you are playing the part of a truant and a dreamer.”

“But my promise was given to the dying—I might almost say, dead.”

“Then go amongst the graves and keep it.”

“But this is too cruel, Rosette—Rosey—little Rose. Tell me, if I were to—to join the United ranks again, would you count me a soldier of liberty?”

“Of course,” she replied. “Every Irish soldier of liberty is one now.”

“And if I did would there be hope for me? You know what I mean, Rosette.”

“Green is the colour of the United Men,” she answered, “and you have heard, I’m sure, how, when Camille Desmoulines, in the gardens of the Palais Royal in the beginning of the Revolution, plucked a leaf from one of the trees, he decked himself with it, crying out: ‘Green is the colour of hope.’”

Her eyelids drooped a little as he looked at her with an ardent gaze.

“And may I hope?” he asked.

“If you wear the green.” And she held towards him a leaf which she had plucked.

He took it and kissed it, and then? Well, it is enough to say that Robert Grierson once more wore the green, as the affianced lover of Rosette.

CHAPTER IV.

La Donna e Mobile.

The announcement of her engagement to Robert Grierson was received with great pleasure both by Mr. and Mrs. ——, the latter from reasons already mentioned, and by the former because it was accompanied with the assurance that the young man had been once more brought within the ranks of the United Society. But although this was so, and that he attended their meetings, he hardly displayed his former zeal, and there were some who thought that his broken promise to his dead father weighed on his mind. Perhaps it did. But it is not unlikely that love was also responsible. And it happened that Rosette, who had been so fervent in the cause of liberty, and so eager to talk of it, since she had acknowledged her love for Robert and promised to be his bride, began to find other and more tender subjects for conversation, and as these two young lovers, all in all to each other, strolled down the green laneways or by the banks of the winding stream under the blue skies of April, he as well as she were fain to forget that already the conflict had begun which was to decide whether the United Irish Society or the English Government were to be masters in Ireland. But at last the time arrived which brought them face to face with the fact that a rising was soon to take place in Ulster, and that Robert Grierson would have to take his part in it.

And now the lovers were in the sweet month of May, when, under other circumstances, their hearts would rejoice with the joyous month of flowers. When they had plighted their troth only such a short time before they knew that the effort to throw off the British yoke was soon to be made, and they had seriously desired that the marriage was not to take place until it was over. The issue then did not seem doubtful, for were not the French coming to render assistance? and in a few weeks Ireland would be free from the centre to the sea.

But now not a day passed without rumours of arrests of popular leaders, and the daily court-martials in Belfast and elsewhere. These, it must be confessed, had little or no effect on Grierson, but they had a most unexpected effect on Rosette. A gloom seemed to settle on her spirits, for at night she had fearful visions of gallowses, and of strangled men, and in nearly every case the face of the victim bore a grotesque resemblance to that of her lover.

She endeavoured to conceal the apprehensions that preyed on her. But Robert coaxed her to tell him the cause of her unhappiness. It chanced that they were standing together on the spot where they had plighted their mutual vows, and which naturally had become dear to both of them. Again the sun was setting gloriously, and the stream shone and flashed, and from the green hedgerows there were some sweet, small voices singing a farewell to the setting sun. But there was no longer the radiant face of Rosette. The sunset light only served to expose its unutterable sadness.

Grierson had his arm round her waist.

“Tell me, darling, tell me, my own little Rosy, what is the trouble on you?”

“Oh, Robbie, Robbie!” the tears came to her eyes, “what brought me here? What brought me and you together?”

“Why, darling, what do you mean? What brought you here except to make me the happiest man in Ulster, or out of it.”

“No, no, Robbie, love, you were happy till I came. You might be happy now and always, but I—I have changed the current of your life. It might have run on calmly as the stream below, flowing in an accustomed course, but now——”

“But no, darling, whatever be its course, it will run brighter than the stream runs on there so long as I have you with me, my own dear, darling little Rosette.”

And he drew her towards him and kissed her.

“But Robbie, don’t you understand, dear. I have had such dreams, and of you—oh, they have frightened my very soul!”

“You silly darling. Do you not know that dreams go by contraries!”

“Oh, but they come again and again.”

“Then what were they, dearest? They will lose all their terror if you tell me,” and thus he coaxed her story from her, and he kissed her and laughed away her fears for the time, but it was only for the time. The dreams recurred—not always the same, however, for sometimes instead of the scaffold she appeared to see a battlefield heaped with dead, the faces of most of the corpses gashed, and amongst them, always recognisable by her, and she felt it was gashed almost out of recognition—was that of Robert Grierson.

The result of these dismal dreams was that Rosette became thoroughly convinced that her lover was destined to a fatal end unless, for she could see no other alternative, he were to quit the country, and day after day her spirits sank, and, do what he could, Robbie was unable to cheer her.

And now the news arrived that the rising was determined on, and a few days later it was followed by the news that Leinster was up.

Grierson had to confess to himself that Rosette’s forebodings had deeply affected him, and, moreover, as the moment for action approached, the scene at the deathbed of his father intruded itself frequently. His conscience seemed to goad him for having broken the promise so solemnly given, and at the next moment he felt that it never should have been exacted, and at all costs he knew he would have given it up a dozen times for Rosette’s sake.

But here was Rosette now sorry that she had made him break it. But without doing so could he have won her? And then his memory summoned her up as she stood next him on that fateful evening.

At last Grierson received orders to join the forces under Munroe, and he and Rosette were once more going down by the stream. “Would it be the last time?” his heart kept asking him, yet he strove to be cheerful, and he talked of returning in a few months at the outside, and making his Rosette his own bonny bride.

Rosette had, on her side, endeavoured to bear up bravely, but at last she completely broke down.

“Oh, darling, darling, I’ve led you to your ruin—to your death. Yes—yes, it is I who will have killed you. I would give my eyes out for you, dearest!”

“Keep them for me, darling! that will be better,” Robbie answered, with affected gaiety, and he kissed the tears away.

“But Robbie, if you love me, if you love me, dearest, there is yet time to save yourself. I was wrong, Robbie, it was sinful of me to get you to violate your solemn pledge to your dying father. I saw him in my dreams last night, and his face was full of anger. Oh, Robbie, I’ve done wrong, and you—you are the victim.”

He pressed her towards him, patted her cheek, remaining silent, thinking it better to let her speak without interruption.

At last, withdrawing herself from his arms, she returned a step or two and then fell on her knees. She stretched out her hands. “Oh, Robbie, if you love me fly—fly to-night while there is yet time, when you are safe beckon me to come to you, and I’ll follow you if need be around the world.”

Robbie bent down and tenderly lifted her up.

“Dearest, you will crush my heart if you talk in that way. But what you ask is impossible. Be my own brave girl and banish these silly fears. You would not have them brand me a coward or a traitor. I should be one, if not both, if I faltered or fled now when the summons has come. If I could do so, dear, I know that when you and I would meet again I should be ashamed to look into your eyes, counting myself, as I would be, a renegade. No, dearest, I’ll never bring that disgrace upon myself or on the woman who has given me her love.”

And so till the night came he strove to soothe her and to cheer her heart—his own sad enough—but after the final adieu he set out for home for the last time he was ever to visit it, with face set and conscious that he was taking the only course that was open to him, but his heart was dark with forebodings.

The next day he joined Munroe. Poor Rosette remained at home praying and weeping, anticipating always the worst, and unable to shake off the conviction that the day of her happiness had come to a close.

At last the terrible news arrived of the defeat of Munroe at Ballinahinch and the dispersal of his forces. There was at first no word of Robert Grierson, and, of course, Rosette concluded that he was left amongst the slain.

The following day, towards nightfall, a labourer who had been in Robert’s employment, brought her the news that Robert was concealed in his cabin a few miles away. Thither she sped that night to find Robert lying on a heap of clean straw rather badly wounded, but in fairly cheerful spirits.

There he remained for several days, and was rapidly gaining health, and Rosette’s hopes were reviving, and she again indulged the dream that she and Robert would be happy, for she had secured a promise from him which he was now free to give—that, as soon as he was well enough, he would endeavour to escape to France, whither she would follow him.

But alas, it was only a dream. The bloodhounds were on his track. One morning, just in the grey of dawn, Rosette was making her way close to the cabin in which Robbie lay, when suddenly she was confronted by a small party of yeos. She turned and fled, pursued by a volley of oaths and villainous jests. Worse still, she was followed by one or two of the party, and although she flew like a deer she was quickly overtaken, for her foot having caught in a briar she stumbled and fell.

The yeo picked her up, and then swore out: “By ——, it’s the Frenchwoman, and her lover cannot be far off.”

In the meantime the approach of the yeos to the house had been discovered, and the owner had taken out Grierson to the haggard, and concealed him effectually in a heap of turf which stood by the house. Within a few minutes the yeos came, bringing Rosette along, her face aflame with indignation.

“Search the house,” cried the leader of the band. They did so. There was no one in it. “Come, my man tell us at your peril where the traitor Grierson is?”

“That’s more than I know” replied the owner of the house, to whom the question had been addressed.

“Well this wench can tell us, and shall tell us,” cried one of the most ruffianly of the gang, and he seized Rosette in such a manner as to cause her to scream out.

Suddenly the clump of turf came tumbling about the yard, and with flashing eyes and white face Robert Grierson staggered out and made for the ruffian.

“Unhand her, you coward,” and he struck at his face. Weak as he was the blow was not without effect, and Rosette was free from the polluted grasp.

There was something in the passion of Grierson that seemed to win the sympathy of the yeoman captain, who had been acquainted with Grierson.

“Come,” he said, “submit quietly to be bound and I pledge myself the girl shall go away unmolested.”

“Oh, Robbie, Robbie!” was all poor Rosette could say, her whole frame shaking with sobs.

When the yeos were ready to march with Grierson they first had a look round for the man of the house. But he fled when Robbie discovered himself, and had run where he could not be found. The yeos, by way of revenge, set fire to the thatch. Rosette begged to be allowed to accompany the prisoner. Ordering the yeos to fall back from the latter, the captain brought Rosette up to him.

“I would grant your request,” he said kindly, “but if you take my advice you will go to your home. I might be able to protect you from insult, but we shall transfer our prisoner to other hands.”

Robbie urged her to act on this suggestion—and she, promising that she would visit him in prison, bringing Mr. —— with her, on the following day, took a heartbroken farewell, striving to appear strong so as not to give sport to the yeos.

She went to a little hill that commanded the road for nearly a mile, down which the yeos and their prisoner went. As she watched him further and further away, the life-blood seemed to ebb from her heart, and when at last they rounded a curve that shut them out from view, poor Rosette utterly broke down and fell fainting to the ground.

A week later the scaffold found a fresh victim in Robert Grierson. Poor Rosette’s love story was over. Her darkest dream had proved true.