Interference

George Holroyd had fain to be content with the Ballingoole Harriers, instead of the Ward-Union and Meath hounds; his poverty but not his will consented to this pitiable change. However, even Harriers must be followed on horseback, and up to the present, although the Major had been making constant enquiries among his own immediate connections, and many sporting friends, no suitable steed was secured. A large number of the blind, the maimed, the halt, had been forthcoming, had been submitted for inspection, each and all a dead bargain, each sold as a personal favour to George, and for no fault, so the Major expressively stated upon what he was pleased to call “his sacred word of honour.” George, who rode well, and recognised a decent horse when he saw it, at last grew tired of this farce, and said:

“I always thought that Ireland was the country for good horses. Where are they? I never saw such a set of old screws—that one,” pointing to a discarded charger, “is like an old hair trunk, and has not a tooth in his head. My bump of veneration would forbid my getting on his back.”

“If you will go to a couple of hundred guineas,” said the Major (who loved not his step-son), “I’ll engage to get you a flyer—a chaser.”

“Thanks—but sixty is my limit, and as I am a light-weight I ought to be able to pick up something that will carry me for a couple of months.”

“There was that bay horse of Cooney’s—he is cheap enough! You tried him one day with the Harriers.”

“Yes, but I don’t care about an animal that expects you to carry his head home, after a very mild day’s sport.”

“Well, I believe I know of one, but he is a good way off, that won’t ask you to carry his head, but that takes it and mostly keeps it. Maybe, he will please you,” said the Major huffily; “he belongs to a tenant of me cousin’s, Mick Malone.”

While this independent animal was being looked up, George passed his time in shooting snipe, sunning himself in Miss Redmond’s smiles, and thinning her mother’s rabbits. One day, as he was tramping through the wet woods, accompanied by “lodge” Pat, laden with dead bunnies, he noticed through a glade, what looked like a black figure—the figure of a woman. As any figure was an unusual sight in the upper plantations, he halted, stared, and finally advanced towards her—a girl in an old waterproof and black felt hat, with masses of loose brown hair, kneeling on the damp moss, and occasionally laying her head on the ground! “An escaped lunatic!” Also two very anxious fox terriers sniffing and yelping and running circles round her.

“It’s Miss Betty,” ejaculated Pat, and the sound of his voice made her spring to her feet, and confront them.

It was Miss Betty, the bath-chair girl; and how plain she was! Her hair was tumbling over her shoulders; her face was deadly white; her eyes dim and watery with crying; her nose the colour of a ripe tomato; an unbecoming old hat; a raw November day—of a truth, Betty Redmond had never looked worse!

“Can I be of any assistance? Is anything the matter?” enquired George politely, as he doffed his deerstalker.

“Yes, of course there is!” she gasped out hysterically. “It’s Jones! He has been in a rabbit-hole since yesterday.”

Mr. Holroyd had never been formally introduced to the dogs; they were always out with Betty, and he was more than ever confirmed in his first impression.

“And Aunt Emma does not care, nor feel it one bit,” she continued passionately. “She says he will come out of himself; perhaps she will be sorry when he is dead, and she loses his legacy.”

Strange, he thought, that even Maria Finny had never mentioned that Miss Elizabeth Redmond was out of her mind.

“Do not excite yourself,” he said, soothingly. “It will be all right, I am sure; just leave it in my hands, and I will see after him—if you will only allow me to take you home first.”

Could a professional mad doctor say more? he thought, with warm self-approval.

“Go home,” she echoed, stamping her foot. “And leave him here to die—he that is so fond of me—that is my very shadow—that loves me better than anything in the world. What do you think I am made of?—a block of stone? No, never. I will stay here till he is brought out, either dead or alive—if I stay for a week. Well, what are you waiting for? If you want to be of some use, you might dig.”

“Sure it’s only a dog, sir,” explained Pat, as he looked up into his employer’s sorely perplexed countenance. “It’s only Jones, and ’tis himself is a born devil for hunting rabbits, and going to ground like any ferret.”

“Oh, Mr. Holroyd, you offered to help; help me to dig him out,” said the girl, seizing a spade. “I will do anything for you if you will only save him. Pat, I will give you five shillings! he is choking in there,” she went on distractedly. “Listen to his bark, how faint it is, fainter than it was an hour ago. He is dying, I am sure of it.” And she burst into fresh tears.

George Holroyd leant his gun against a tree, and promptly took hold of a spade, and commenced operations with a will. Beauty in distress must ever appeal to the heart of a young man; only this was not Beauty—far from it—but Beauty’s cousin—besides, George loved dogs, and he worked with all his zeal and strength for the sake of the sporting little terrier, whilst Pat laboured and grubbed, and carried out earth with hard horny hands. After twenty minutes’ incessant toil, through moss and roots, and frost-bound earth, there was a scream of delight from Betty, and a very dirty, frightened terrier struggled forth, and was clasped instantly in her arms.

“Oh, you bad, bad dog,” she murmured ecstatically, as she kissed the top of his head: “how dare you give me such a fright? What should we have done if you had been lost, and spoiled the set? You shall be kept in the stable for a week, on bread and water, for this.”

And she set him down to receive the boisterous congratulations of “Brown” and “Robinson.”

“I don’t know how to thank you,” she said, now turning to Mr. Holroyd—“nor Pat.—Pat, come up to the house this evening for your five shillings.”

“And my reward,” enquired George. “I worked twice as hard as Pat!” Thinking that despite her fiery nose and eyes, she had pretty white teeth and a singularly sweet smile. “You know you said I might have anything I asked for.”

“Oh! that was in the agonies of the moment!”

“Then you would repudiate your offer. Miss Betty, I am surprised at you!”

“No, no, I never, as the people here say, ‘go back from my word;’ only I have so little worth offering,” now following happy Pat, who slouched along, laden with the gun and rabbits. “I have no possessions of the smallest value, nothing but an old watch that goes for about three hours, and a battered locket, that Jones has chewed.”

“Well, I will not enforce my claim now. I shall bide my time, and remind you of your promise some day. Perhaps I had better have it down in writing?”

“Perhaps you had,” she answered with a laugh.

“You appear to be very fond of dogs,” he remarked, as he walked beside her.

“I am indeed. I look upon them almost as if they were my relations. I have——” and she paused.

“You were going to say something,” he suggested politely.

“I have so few relations.”

“Mrs. and Miss Redmond.”

“Very distant connections by marriage. I have one uncle in India, whom I have never seen; he is my only near kith or kin.”

“Perhaps what you lack in relatives, you make up in friends; some people think they are the best of the two.”

“Yes, I am very well off for friends—friends among my school-fellows, and friends over here—there are the Moores of Roskeen, and the Mahon girls, and Miss Dopping, and your sister, Cuckoo.”

“Miss Dopping and Cuckoo! What a contrast; rather a scratch pair, as the Major would say.”

“May be so, but they suit me exactly. Miss Dopping is my house friend, and Cuckoo is my companion out of doors.”

“And have you summer and winter friends, and fine weather and wet weather friends?”

“No, I have no fine weather friend; you don’t understand. Miss Dopping is old and does not go out much. She and I like the same people in books, and we read and talk over things, and she tells me about old times, and teaches me various matters, and lectures me now and then.”

“Yes, and Cuckoo? Does she lecture you and talk about old times?”

“No, indeed, I lecture her; we run after the Harriers together, and botanise, and go nutting, and black-berrying.”

George began to think that a walk with this original girl was an agreeable novelty, and was rather sorry to see the garden walls of Noone looming through the trees. In a narrow path leading from the garden gate, they nearly fell over Lodge Juggy, with her apron very full of something, and if she could be said to blush—she blushed, as she stood right in their way, dropping hurried courtesies.

“Oh, Juggy,” exclaimed Betty, “where are you going; what have you got there?”

“Just a lock of old cabbage laves for the pig, miss, that Mike was throwing out.”

“What small cabbages—they are the shape of potatoes,” said Betty, looking steadily at Juggy’s apron.

“Well, there is a couple or so, and I won’t deny it, miss, but sure, times is hard, terribly hard, Miss Betty, and you mind the days when your uncle was alive, when I went to mass on me own ass’s car, and kept a couple of pigs!”

“And what has happened to you, Juggy?” enquired George, sympathetically.

“Well, sir, ever since I offended the Lord and Mrs. Redmond, I’m in a poor way. Sure, I get nothing out of the gate, but what people give me.”

“And I hope they are liberal,” said George, feeling his pocket.

“There does be no quality passing now; times is changed, but some are not too bad at Christmas. Mrs. Mahon puts a flannel petticoat on me, and Mrs. Maccabe puts a couple of shifts on me, and Miss Dopping puts a pair of boots on me.”

“The Graces attiring Venus,” muttered the young man to Betty; then louder:

“I hope you will allow me to contribute to your toilet,” placing five shillings in her ready hand. “Get yourself one or two larger and stronger aprons; you don’t know how useful you may find them.”

“The Lord love your handsome face!” exclaimed Juggy, upon whom the sarcasm was completely lost. “Faix! it’s a real trate to see a gentleman,” and, as they passed on, she struck an easy and reflective attitude, and remarked, in a tone of audible approval:

“Och! and wouldn’t they make a lovely pair! And wouldn’t I go ten miles on me hands and knees to see their wedding?”

George could not restrain a smile, at the preposterous idea of coupling him with his present companion.

“What does she mean about offending Mrs. Redmond and the Lord?” he enquired precipitately—trusting that Juggy’s compliments had not reached Betty’s ears.

“Oh! it’s a long story. She has lived at the lodge for years, and some of her people are not quite respectable. One of her brothers is a poacher, and another keeps a still. She used to sell his potheen on the sly, and I often wondered why she had so many visitors, especially on Sundays, in Uncle Brian’s time, for he was an indulgent master, and seemed to think what he called ‘Juggy’s receptions’ a great joke, but last year she quarrelled with Foxy Joe—you know Foxy Joe?”

“Yes, I am acquainted with him.”

“Well, I believe they had some dispute about money, or whisky, and he informed on her, and told Aunt Emma that she kept a very thriving unlicensed ‘public’ at the lodge gate, and so, one day, when Juggy declared that she was dying of rheumatism and cold, and had sent up to her house for port wine and a little jam, Aunt Emma marched down to the lodge, about twelve o’clock at night, and made me go with her. We peeped in at one of the front windows, and saw the whole kitchen lit up. One of the best drawing-room lamps was on the dresser, four silver candlesticks had also been borrowed, as well as glasses, and the family punch-bowl, and Mrs. Redmond’s pet claret jug. About fifty people were sitting round, drinking and smoking, and shouting ‘more power.’ There was a fiddler on the table, and Juggy herself and the Mahons’ groom were dancing a frantic jig in the middle of the floor. When Mrs. Redmond flung the door back and stalked in, perhaps you can imagine the scene, for it is beyond my power of description.”

“I think I can picture it,” said George with a hearty laugh. “Tell me, Miss Betty, how is it that I never see you at Noone? And do you know that I am over almost every afternoon?”

“Oh, yes, I am aware of that, but I have had other engagements. Have you been thinking that I am a sort of Cinderella, hidden in the kitchen among the ashes?” she enquired mischievously.

“No,” he stammered; but the idea had occurred to him.

“I don’t drink five o’clock tea, and I generally go over and sit with Miss Dopping, who has been ill; besides, I know that Belle is a host in herself.”

(She said this in the frank innocence of her heart, and without the faintest arrière pensée.)

“The more the merrier,” returned George, “we shall have your society this evening at any rate.”

“No, I think not. I have a message to take for Mrs. Redmond. You see, Jones has wasted nearly all my day,” and she came to a full stop where the pathway led to the avenue.

“Good-bye, then,” he said, “since you must go, and remember your promise.”

“Yes, I’ll remember my promise,” she answered gaily. “I am very, very much obliged to you,” and she held out her hand.

He took it in his. What a cold, slender, little hand! It gave him a grateful, cordial shake, like a hearty schoolboy, and in another second its proprietor had disappeared in the deepening dusk.

And so that was Betty! who came into a room like a blast of wind, according to Major Malone, and whom his mother had called “a beautiful, warm-hearted, young creature.” Well, on the whole, he rather liked her.