His speed was so great that Bartle could find neither breath nor leisure to make any reply.
“Thank God!” he exclaimed; “oh, thank God it's not the house, and there lives are safe! but blessed Father, there's the man's whole haggard in flames!”
“Oh, the netarnal villains!” was the simple exclamation of Flanagan.
“Bartle,” said his companion, “you heard what I said this minute?”
Their eyes met as he spoke, and for the first time O'Donovan was struck by the pallid malignity of his features. The servant gazed steadily upon him, his lips slightly but firmly drawn back, and his eye, in which was neither sympathy nor alarm, charged with the spirit of a cool and devilish triumph.
Connor's blazed at the bare idea of his villainy, and, in a fit of manly and indignant rage, he seized Flanagan and hurled him headlong to the earth at his feet. “You have hell in your face, you villain!” he exclaimed; “and if I thought that—if I did—I'd drag you down like a dog, an' pitch you head—foremost into the flames!”
Bartle rose, and, in a voice wonderfully calm, simply observed, “God knows, Connor, if I know either your heart or mine, you'll be sorry for this treatment you've given me for no rason. You know yourself that, as soon as I heard anything of the ill-will against the Bodagh, I tould it to you, in ordher—mark that—in ordher that you might let him know it the best way you thought proper; an' for that you've knocked me down!”
“Why, I believe you may be right, Bartle—there's truth in that—but I can't forgive you the look you gave me.”
“That red light was in my face, maybe; I'm sure if that wasn't it, I can't tell—I was myself wonderin' at your own looks, the same way; but then it was that quare light that was in your face.”
“Well, well, maybe I'm wrong—I hope I am. Do you think we could be of any use there?”
“Of use! an' how would we account for being there at all, Connor? how would you do it, at any rate, widout maybe bringin' the girl into blame?”
“You're right agin, Bartle; I'm not half so cool as you are; our best plan is to go home—”
“And go to bed; it is; an' the sooner we're there the better; sowl, Connor, you gev me a murdherin' crash.”
“Think no more of it—think no more of it—I'm not often hasty, so you must overlook it.”
It was, however, with an anxious and distressed heart that Connor O'Donovan reached his father's barn, where, in the same bed with Flanagan, he enjoyed, towards morning, a brief and broken slumber that brought back to his fancy images of blood and fire, all so confusedly mingled with Una, himself, and their parents, that the voice of his father calling upon them to rise, came to him as a welcome and manifest relief.
At the time laid in this story, neither burnings nor murders were so familiar nor patriotic, as the fancied necessity of working out political progress has recently made them. Such atrocities, in these bad and unreformed days, were certainly looked upon as criminal, rather than meritorious, however unpatriotic it may have been to form so erroneous an estimate of human villainy. The consequence of all this was, that the destruction of Bodagh Buie's property created a sensation in the country, of which, familiarized as we are to such crimes, we can entertain but a very faint notion. In three days a reward of five hundred pounds, exclusive of two hundred from government, was offered for such information as might bring the incendiary, or incendiaries, to justice. The Bodagh and his family were stunned as much with amazement at the occurrence of a calamity so incomprehensible to them, as with the loss they had sustained, for that indeed was heavy. The man was extremely popular, and by many acts of kindness had won the attachment and goodwill of all who knew him, either personally or by character. How, then, account for an act so wanton and vindictive? They could not understand it; it was not only a—crime, but a crime connected with some mysterious motive, beyond their power to detect.
But of all who became acquainted with the outrage, not one sympathized more sincerely and deeply with O'Brien's family than did Connor O'Donovan; although, of course, that sympathy was unknown to those for whom it was felt. The fact was, that his own happiness became, in some degree, involved in their calamity; and, as he came in to breakfast on the fourth morning of its occurrence, he could not help observing as much to his mother. His suspicions of Flanagan, as to possessing some clue to the melancholy business, were by no means removed. On the contrary, he felt that he ought to have him brought before the bench of magistrates who were conducting the investigation from day to day, and, with this determination, he himself resolved to state fully and candidly to the bench, all the hints which had transpired from Flanagan respecting the denunciations said to be held out against O'Brien and the causes assigned for them. Breakfast was now ready, and Fardorougha himself entered, uttering petulant charges of neglect and idleness against his servant.
“He desarves no breakfast,” said he; “not a morsel; it's robbin' me by his idleness and schaming he is. What is he doin', Connor? or what has become of him? He's not in the field nor about the place.”
Connor paused.
“Why, now that I think of it, I didn't see him to-day,” he replied; “I thought that he was mendin' the slap at the Three-Acres. I'll thry if he's in the barn.”
And he went accordingly to find him. “I'm afraid, father,” said he, on his return, “that Bartle's a bad boy, an' a dangerous one; he's not in the barn, an' it appears, from the bed, that he didn't sleep there last night. The truth is, he's gone; at laste he has brought all his clothes, his box, an' everything with him; an' what's more, I suspect the reason of it; he thinks he has let out too much to me; an' it 'ill go hard but I'll make him let out more.”
The servant-maid, Biddy, now entered and informed them that four men, evidently strangers, were approaching the house from the rear, and ere she could add anything further on the subject, two of them walked in, and, seizing Connor, informed him that he was their prisoner.
“Your prisoner!” exclaimed his mother, getting pale; “why, what could our poor boy do to make him your prisoner? He never did hurt or harm to the child unborn.”
Fardorougha's keen gray eye rested sharply upon them for a moment; it then turned to Honor, afterwards to Connor, and again gleamed bitterly at the intruders—“What is this?” said he, starting up; “what is this? you don't mane to rob us?”
“I think,” said the son, “you must be undher a mistake; you surely can have no business with me. It's very likely you want some one else.”
“What is your name?” inquired he who appeared to be the principal of them.
“My name is Connor O'Donovan; an' I know no reason why I should deny it.”
“Then you are the very man we come for,” said the querist, “so you had better prepare to accompany us; in the mean time you must excuse us if we search your room. This is unpleasant, I grant, but we have no discretion, and must perform our duty.”
“What do you want in this room?” said Fardorougha; “it's robbery you're on for—it's robbery you're on for—in open daylight, too; but you're late; I lodged the last penny yesterday; that's one comfort; you're late—you're late.”
“What did my boy do?” exclaimed the affrighted mother; “what did he do that you come to drag him away from us?”
This question she put to the other constable, the first having entered her son's bedroom.
“I am afraid, ma'am, you'll know it too soon,” replied the man; “it's a heavy charge if it proves to be true.”
As he spoke his companion re-entered the apartment, with Connor's Sunday coat in his hand, from the pocket of which he drew a steel and tinder-box.
“I'm sorry for this,” he observed; “it corroborates what has been sworn against you by your accomplice, and here, I fear, comes additional proof.”
At the same moment the other two made their appearance, one of them holding in his hand the shoes which Connor had lent to Flanagan, and which he wore on the night of the conflagration.
On seeing this, and comparing the two circumstances together, a fearful light broke on the unfortunate young man, who had already felt conscious of the snare into which he had fallen. With an air of sorrow and manly resignation he thus addressed his parents:—
“Don't be alarmed; I see that there is an attempt made to swear away my life; but, whatever happens, you both know that I am innocent of doin' an injury to any one. If I die, I would rather die innocent than live as guilty as he will that must have my blood to answer for.”
His mother, on hearing this, ran to him, and with her arms about his neck, exclaimed,
“Die! die! Connor darlin'—my brave boy—my only son—why do you talk about death? What is it for? what is it about? Oh, for the love of God, tell us what did our boy do?”
“He is charged by Bartle Flanagan,” replied one of the constables, “with burning Bodagh Buie O'Brien's haggard, because he refused him his daughter. He must now come with us to jail.”
“I see the whole plot,” said Connor, “and a deep one it is; the villain will do his worst; still I can't but have dependence upon justice and my own innocence. I can't but have dependence upon God, who knows my heart.”
Fardorougha stood amazed and confounded, looking from one to another like a man who felt incapable of comprehending all that had passed before him. His forehead, over which fell a few gray thin locks, assumed a deadly paleness, and his eye lost the piercing expression which usually characterized it. He threw his Cothamore several times over his shoulders, as he had been in the habit of doing when about to proceed after breakfast to his usual avocations, and as often laid it aside, without being at all conscious of what he did. His limbs appeared to get feeble, and his hands trembled as if he labored under palsy. In this mood he passed from one to another, sometimes seizing a constable by the arm with a hard, tremulous grip, and again suddenly letting go his hold of him without speaking. At length a singular transition from this state of mind became apparent; a gleam of wild exultation shot from his eye; his sallow and blasted features brightened; the Cothamore was buttoned under his chin with a rapid energy of manner evidently arising from the removal of some secret apprehension.
“Then,” he exclaimed, “it's no robbery; it's not robbery afther all; but how could it? there's no money here; not a penny; an' I'm belied, at any rate; for there's not a poorer man in the barony—thank God, it's not robbery!”
“Oh, Fardorougha,” said the wife, “don't you see they're goin' to take him away from us?”
“Take who away from us?”
“Connor, your own Connor—our boy—the light of my heart—the light of his poor mother's heart! Oh, Connor, Connor, what is it they're goin' to do to you?”
“No harm, mother, I trust; no harm—don't be frightened.”
The old man put his open hands to his temples, which he pressed bitterly, and with all his force, for nearly half a minute. He had, in truth, been alarmed into the very worst mood of his habitual vice, apprehension concerning his money; and felt that nothing, except a powerful effort, could succeed in drawing his attention to the scene which was passing before him.
“What,” said he; “what is it that's wrong wid Connor?”
“He must come to jail,” said one of the men, looking at him with surprise; “we have already stated the crime for which he stands committed.”
“To jail! Connor O'Donovan to jail!”
“It's too true, father; Bartle Flanagan has sworn that I burned Mr. O'Brien's haggard.”
“Connor, Connor,” said the old man, approaching him as he spoke, and putting his arms composedly about his neck, “Connor, my brave boy, my brave boy, it wasn't you did it; 'twas I did it,” he added, turning to the constables; “lave him, lave him wid her, an' take me in his place! Who would if I would not—who ought, I say—an' I'll do it—take me; I'll go in his place.”
Connor looked down upon the old man, and as he saw his heart rent, and his reason absolutely tottering, a sense of the singular and devoted affection which he had ever borne him, overcame him, and with a full heart he dashed away a tear from his eye, and pressed his father to his breast.
“Mother,” said he; “this will kill the old man; it will kill him!”
“Fardorougha, a hagur,” said Ha wife, feeling it necessary to sustain him as much as possible, “don't take it so much to heart, it won't signify—Connor's innocent, an' no harm will happen to him!”
“But are you lavin' us, Connor? are they—must they bring you to jail?”
“For a while, father; but I won't be long there I hope.”
“It's an unpleasant duty on our part,” said the principal of them; “still it's one we must perform. Your father should lose no time in taking the proper steps for your defence.”
“And what are we to do?” asked the mother; “God knows the boy's as innocent as I am.”
“Yes,” said Fardorougha, still upon dwelling the resolution he had made; “I'll go stand for you, Connor; you won't let them bring me instead of you.”
“That's out of the question,” replied the constable; “the law suffers nothing of the kind to take place; but if you will be advised by me, lose no time in preparing to defend him. It would be unjust to disguise the matter from you, or to keep you ignorant of its being a case of life and death.”
“Life and death! what do you mane?” asked Fardorougha, staring vacantly at the last speaker.
“It's painful to distress you; but if he's found guilty, it's death.”
“Death! hanged!” shrieked the old man, awaking as it were for the first time to a full perception of his son's situation; “hanged! my boy hanged! Connor, Connor, don't go from me!”
“I'll die wid him,” said the mother; “I'll die wid you, Connor. We couldn't live widout him,” she added, addressing the strangers; “as God is in heaven we couldn't! Oh Connor, Connor, avourneen, what is it that has come over us, and brought us to this sorrow?”
The mother's grief then flowed on, accompanied by a burst of that unstudied, but pathetic eloquence, which in Ireland is frequently uttered in the tone of wail and lamentation peculiar to those who mourn over the dead.
“No,” she added, with her arms tenderly about him, and her streaming eyes fixed with a wild and mournful look of despair upon his face; “no, he is in his loving mother's arms, the boy that never gave to his father or me a harsh word or a sore heart! Long were we lookin' for him, an' little did we think it was for this heavy fate that the goodness of God sent him to us! Oh, many a look of lovin' affection, many a happy heart did he give us! Many a time Connor, avillish, did I hang over your cradle, and draw out to myself the happiness and the good that I hoped was before you. You wor too good—too good, I doubt—to be long in such a world as this, an' no wondher that the heart of the fair young colleen, the heart of the Colleen dhas dhun should rest upon you and love you; for who ever knew you that didn't? Isn't there enough, King of heaven! enough of the bad an' the wicked in this world for the law to punish, an' not to take the innocent—not to take away from us the only one—the only one—I can't—I can't—but if they do—Connor—if they do, your lovin' mother will die wid you!”
The stern officers of justice wiped their eyes, and were proceeding to afford such consolation as they could, when Fardorougha, who had sat down after having made way for Honor to recline on the bosom of their son, now rose, and seizing the breast of his coat, was about to speak, but ere he could utter a word he tottered, and, would have instantly fallen, had not Connor caught him in his arms. This served for a moment to divert the mother's grief, and to draw her attention from the son to the husband, who was now insensible. He was carried to the door by Connor; but when they attempted to lay him in a recumbent posture, it was found almost impossible to unclasp the deathlike grip which he held of the coat. His haggard face was shrunk and collapsed; the individual features sharp and thin, but earnest and stamped with traces of alarm; his brows, too, which were slightly knit, gave to his whole countenance a character of keen and painful determination. But that which struck those who were present, most, was the unyielding grasp with which he clung even in his insensibility to the person of Connor.
If not an affecting sight, it was one at least strongly indicative of the intractable and indurated attachment which put itself forth with such vague and illusive energy on behalf of his son. At length he recovered, and on opening his eyes he fixed them with a long look of pain and distraction upon the boy's countenance.
“Father,” said Connor, “don't be cast down—you need not—and you ought not to be so much disheartened—do you feel better?”
When the father heard his voice he smiled; yes—his shrunk, pale, withered face was lit up by a wild, indescribable ecstasy, whose startling expression waa borrowed, one would think, as much from the light of insanity as from that of returning consciousness. He sucked in his thin cheeks, smacked his parched, skinny lips, and with difficulty called for drink. Having swallowed a little water, he looked round him with more composure, and inquired—
“What has happened me? am I robbed? are you robbers? But I tell you there's no money in the house. I lodged the last penny yesterday—afore my God I did—but—oh, what am I sayin'? what is this, Connor?”
“Father dear, compose yourself—we'll get over this throuble.”
“We will, darlin',” said Honor, wiping the pale brows of her husband; “an' we won't lose him.”
“No, achora,” said the old man; “no, we won't lose him! Connor?”
“Well, father dear!”
“There's a thing here—here”—and he placed his hand upon his heart—“something it is that makes me afeard—a sinkin'—a weight—and there's a strugglin', too, Connor. I know I can't stand it long—an' it's about you—it's all about you.”
“You distress yourself too much, father; indeed you do. Why, I hoped that you would comfort my poor mother till I come back to her and you, as I will, plase God.”
“Yes,” he replied; “yes, I will, I will.”
“You had better prepare,” said one of the officers; “the sooner this is over the better—he's a feeble man and not very well able to bear it.”
“You are right,” said Connor; “I won't delay many minutes; I have only to change my clothes, an' I am ready.”
In a short time he made his appearance dressed in his best suit; and, indeed, it would be extremely difficult to meet, in any rank of life, a finer specimen of vigor, activity, and manly beauty. His countenance, at all times sedate and open, was on this occasion shaded by an air of profound melancholy that gave a composed grace and dignity to his whole bearing.
“Now, father,” said he, “before I go, I think it right to lave you and my poor mother all the consolation I can. In the presence of God, in yours, in my dear mother's, and in the presence of all who hear me, I am as innocent of the crime that's laid to my charge as the babe unborn. That's a comfort for you to know, and let it prevent you from frettin'; and now, good by; God be with you, and strengthen, and support you both!”
Fardorougha had already seized his hand; but the old man could neither speak nor weep; his whole frame appeared to have been suddenly pervaded by a dry agony that suspended the beatings of his very heart. The mother's grief, on the contrary, was loud, and piercing, and vehement. She threw herself once more upon his neck; she kissed his lips, she pressed him to her heart, and poured out as before the wail of a wild and hopeless misery. At length, by the aid of some slight but necessary force, her arms were untwined from about his neck; and Connor then, stooping, embraced his father, and, gently placing him on a settle—bed, bade him farewell! On reaching the door he paused, and, turning about, surveyed his mother struggling in the hands of one of the officers to get embracing him again, and his gray—haired father sitting in speechless misery on the settle. He stood a moment to look upon them, and a few bitter tears rolled, in the silence of manly sorrow, down his cheeks.
“Oh, Fardorougha!” exclaimed his mother, after they had gone, “sure it isn't merely for partin' wid him that we feel so heart—broken. He may never stand under this roof again, an' he all we have and had to love!”
“No,” returned Fardorougha, quietly; “no, it's not, as you say, for merely partin' wid him—hanged! God! God! Mm—here—Honor—here, the thought of it—I'll die—it'll break! Oh, God support me! my heart—here—my heart'll break! My brain, too, and my head—oh! if God 'ud take me before I'd see it! But it can't be—it's not possible that our innocent boy should meet sich a death!”
“No, dear, it is not; sure he's innocent—that's one comfort; but, Fardorougha, as the men said, you must go to a lawyer and see what can be done to defind him.”
The old man rose up and proceeded to his son's bedroom.
“Honor,” said he, “come here;” and while uttering these words he gazed upon her face with a look of unutterable and hopeless distress; “there's his bed, Honor—his bed—he may never sleep on it more—he may be cut down like a flower in his youth—an' then what will become of us?”
“Forever, from this day out,” said the distracted mother, “no hands will ever make it but my own; on no other will I sleep—we will both sleep—where his head lay there will mine be too—avick machree—machree! Och, Fardorougha, we can't stand this; let us not take it to heart, as we do; let us trust in God, an' hope for the best.”
Honor, in fact, found it necessary to assume the office of a comforter; but it was clear that nothing urged or suggested by her could for a moment win back the old man's heart from the contemplation of the loss of his son. He moped about for a considerable time; but, ever and anon, found himself in Connor's bedroom, looking upon his clothes and such other memorials of him as it contained.
During the occurrence of these melancholy incidents at Fardorougha's, others of a scarcely less distressing character were passing under the roof of Bodagh Buie O'Brien.
Our readers need not be informed that the charge brought by Bartle Flanagan against Connor, excited the utmost amazement in all who heard it. So much at variance were his untarnished reputation and amiable manners with a disposition so dark and malignant as that which must have prompted the perpetration of such a crime, that it was treated at first by the public as an idle rumor. The evidence, however, of Phil Curtis, and his deposition to the conversation which occurred between him and Connor, at the time and place already known to the reader, together with the corroborating circumstances arising from the correspondence of the footprints about the haggard with the shoes produced by the constable—all, when combined together, left little doubt of his guilt. No sooner had this impression become general, than the spirit of the father was immediately imputed to the son, and many sagacious observations made, all tending to show, that, as they expressed it, “the bad drop of the old rogue would sooner or later come out in the young one;” “he wouldn't be what he was, or the bitter heart of the miser would appear;” with many other apothegms of similar import. The family of the Bodagh, however, were painfully and peculiarly circumstanced. With the exception of Una herself, none of them entertained a doubt that Connor was the incendiary. Flanagan had maintained a good character, and his direct impeachment of Connor, supported by such exact circumstantial evidence, left nothing to be urged in the young man's defence. Aware as they were of the force of Una's attachment, and apprehensive that the shock, arising from the discovery of his atrocity, might be dangerous if injudiciously disclosed to her, they resolved, in accordance with the suggestion of their son, to break the matter to herself with the utmost delicacy and caution.
“It is better,” said John, “that she should hear of the misfortune from ourselves; for, after breaking it to her as gently as possible, we can at least attempt to strengthen and console her under it.”
“Heaven above sees,” exclaimed his mother, “that it was a black and unlucky business to her and to all of us; but now that she knows what a revingeful villain he is, I'm sure she'll not find it hard to banish him out of her thoughts. Deah Grasthias for the escape she had from him at any rate!”
“John, bring her in,” said the father; “bring the unfortunate young crature in. I can't but pity her, Bridget; I can't but pity ma colleen voghth.”
When Una entered with her brother she perceived by a glance at the solemn bearing of her parents, that some unhappy announcement was about to be made to her. She sat down, therefore, with a beating heart and a cheek already pale with apprehension.
“Una,” said her father, “we sent for you to mention a circumstance that we would rather you should hear from ourselves than from strangers. You were always a good girl, Una—an' obadient girl, and sensible beyant your years; and I trust that your good sinse and the grace of the Almighty will enable you to bear up undher any disappointment that may come upon you.”
“Surely, father, there can be nothing worse than I know already,” she replied.
“Why, what do you know, dear?”
“Only what you told me the day Fardorougha was here, that nothing agreeable to my wishes could take place.”
“I would give a great deal that the business was now as it was even then,” responded her father; “there's far worse to come, Una, an' you must be firm, an' prepare to hear what'll thry you sorely.”
“I can't guess it, father; but for God's sake tell me at once.”
“Who do you think burned our property?”
“And I suppose if she hadn't been undher the one roof wid us that it's ourselves he'd burn,” observed her mother.
“Father, tell me the worst at once—whatever it may be;—how could I guess the villain or villains who destroyed our property?”
“Villain, indeed! you may well say so,” returned the Bodagh. “That villain is no other than Connor O'Donovan!”
Una felt as if a weighty burden had been removed from her heart; she breathed freely; her depression and alarm vanished, and her dark eye kindled into proud confidence in the integrity of her lover.
“And, father,” she asked, in a full and firm voice, “is there nothing worse than that to come?”
“Worse! is the girl's brain turned?”
“Dhar a Lhora Heena, she's as mad I believe as ould Fardorougha himself,” said the mother; “worse! why, she has parted wid all the reasing she ever had.”
“Indeed, mother, I hope I have not, and that my reason's as clear as ever; but, as to Connor O'Donovan, he's innocent of that charge, and of every other that may be brought against him; I don't believe it, and I never will.”
“It's proved against him; it's brought, home to him.”
“Who's his accuser?”
“His father's servant, Bartle Flanagan, has turned king's evidence.”
“The deep-dyed villain!” she exclaimed, with indignation; “father, of that crime, so sure as God's in heaven, so sure is Connor O'Donovan innocent, and so sure is Bartle Flanagan guilty—I know it.”
“You know it—explain yourself.”
“I mean I feel it—ay, home to the core of my heart—my unhappy heart—I feel the truth of what I say.”
“Una,” observed her brother, “I'm afraid you have been vilely deceived by him—there's not the slightest doubt of his guilt.”
“Don't you be deceived, John; I say he's innocent—as I hope for heaven he's innocent; and, father, I'm not a bit cast down or disheartened by anything I have yet heard against him.”
“You're a very extraordinary girl, Una; but for my part I'm glad you look upon it as you do. If his innocence appears, no man alive will be better plazed at it than myself.”
“His innocence will appear,” exclaimed the faithful girl; “it must appear; and,—father, mark this—I say the time will tell yet who is innocent and who is guilty. God knows,” she added, her energy of manner increasing, while a shower of hot tears fell down her cheeks, “God knows I would marry him to-morrow with the disgrace of that and ten times as much upon him, so certain am I that his heart and hand are free from thought or deed that's either treacherous or dishonorable.”
“Marry him!” said her brother, losing temper; “nobody doubts but you'd marry him on the gallows, wid the rope about his neck.”
“I would do it, and unite myself to a true heart. Don't mistake me, and mother, dear, don't blame me,” she added, her tears flowing still faster; “he's in disgrace—sunk in shame and sorrow—and I won't conceal the force of what I feel for him; I won't desert him now as the world will do; I know his heart, and on the scaffold to-morrow I would become his wife, if it would take away one atom of his misery.”
“If he's innocent,” said her father, “you have more pinetration than any girl in Europe; but if he's guilty of such an act against any one connected with you, Una, the guilt of all the divils in hell is no match for his. Well, you have heard all we wanted to say to you, and you needn't stay.”
“As she herself says,” observed John, “perhaps time will place everything in its true light. At present all those who are not in love with him have little doubt of his guilt. However, even as it is, in principle Una is right; putting love out of the question, we should prejudge no one.”
“Time will,” said his sister, “or rather God will in His own good time. On God I'm sure he depends; on his providence I also rely for seeing his name and character cleared of all that has been brought against him. John, I wish to speak to you in my own room; not that I intend to make any secret of it, but I want to consult with you first.”
“Cheerna dheelish,” exclaimed her mother; “what a wife that child would make to any man that desarved her!”
“It's more than I'm able to do, to be angry with her,” returned the Bodagh. “Did you ever know her to tell a lie, Bridget?”
“A lie! no, nor the shadow of a lie never came out of her lips; the desate's not in her; an' may God look down on her wid compunction this day; for there's a dark road I doubt before her!”
“Amen,” responded her father; “amen, I pray the Saviour. At all evints, O'Donovan's guilt or innocence will soon be known,” he added; “the 'sizes begin this day week, so that the business will soon be settled either one way or other.”
Una, on reaching her own room, thus addressed her affectionate brother:
“Now, John, you know that my grandfather left rue two hundred guineas in his will, and you know, too, the impossibility of getting any money from the clutches of Pardorougha. You must see Connor, and find out how he intends to defend himself. If his father won't allow him sufficient means to employ the best lawyers—as I doubt whether he will or not—just tell him the truth, that whilst I have a penny of these two hundred guineas, he mustn't want money; an' tell him, too, that all the world won't persuade me that he's guilty; say I know him to be innocent, and that his disgrace has made him dearer to me than he ever was before.”
“Surely, you can't suppose for a moment, my dear Una, that I, your brother, who, by the way, have never opened my lips to him, could deliberately convey such a message.”
“It must be conveyed in some manner; I'm resolved on that.”
“The best plan,” said the other, “is to find out whatsoever attorney they employ, and then to discover, if possible, whether his father has furnished sufficient funds for his defence. If he has, your offer is unnecessary; and if not, a private arrangement may be made with the attorney of which nobody else need know anything.”
“God bless you, John! God bless you!” she replied; “that is far better; you have been a good brother to your poor Una—to your poor unhappy Una!”
She leaned her head on a table, and wept for some time at the trying fate, as she termed it, which hung over two beings so young and so guiltless of any crime. The brother soothed her by every argument in his power, and, after gently compelling her to dry her tears, expressed his intention of going early the next day to ascertain whether or not any professional man had been engaged to conduct the defence of her unfortunate lover.
In effecting this object there was little time lost on the part of young O'Brien. Knowing that two respectable attorneys lived in the next market town, he deemed it best to ascertain whether Fardorougha had applied to either of them for the purposes aforementioned, or, if not, to assure himself whether the old man had gone to any of those pettifoggers, who, rather than appear without practice, will undertake a cause almost on any terms, and afterwards institute a lawsuit for the recovery of a much larger bill of costs than a man of character and experience would demand.
In pursuance of the plan concerted between them, the next morning found him rapping, about eleven o'clock, at the door of an attorney named Kennedy, whom he asked to see on professional business. A clerk, on hearing his voice in the hall, came out and requestedm him to step into a back room, adding that his master, who was engaged, would see him the moment he had despatched the person then with him. Thus shown, he was separated from O'Halloran's office only by a pair of folding doors, through which every word uttered in the office could be distinctly heard; a circumstance that enabled O'Brien unintentionally to overhear the following dialogue between the parties:
“Well, my good friend,” said Kennedy to the stranger, who, it appeared, had arrived before O'Brien only a few minutes, “I am now disengaged; pray, let me know your business.”
The stranger paused a moment, as if seeking the most appropriate terms in which to express himself.
“It's a black business,” he replied, “and the worst of it is I'm a poor man.”
“You should not go to law, then,” observed the attorney. “I tell you beforehand you will find it is devilish expensive.”
“I know it,” said the man; “it's open robbery; I know what it cost me to recover the little pences that wor sometimes due to me, when I broke myself lending weeny trifles to strugglin' people that I thought honest, and robbed me aftherwards.”
“In what way can my services be of use to you at present? for that I suppose is the object of your calling upon me,” said Kennedy.
“Oh thin, sir, if you have the grace of God, or kindness, or pity in your heart, you can sarve me, you can save my heart from breakin'!”
“How—how, man?—come to the point.”
“My son, sir, Connor, my only son, was taken away from his mother an' me, an' put into jail yesterday mornin', an' he innocent; he was put in, sir, for burnin' Bodagh Buie O'Brien's haggard, an' as God is above me, he as much burnt it as you did.”
“Then you are Fardorougha Donovan,” said the attorney; “I have heard of that outrage; and, to be plain with you, a good deal about yourself. How, in the name of heaven, can you call yourself a poor man?”
“They belie me, sir, they're bitther enemies that say I'm otherwise.”
“Be you rich or be you poor, let me tell you that I would not stand in your son's situation for the wealth of the king's exchequer. Sell your last cow; your last coat; your last acre; sell the bed from under you, without loss of time, if you wish to save his life; and I tell you that for this purpose you must employ the best counsel, and plenty of them. The Assizes commence on this day week, so that you have not a single moment to lose. Think now whether you love your son or your money best.”
“Saver of earth, amn't I an unhappy man! every one sayin' I have money, an' me has not! Where would I get it? Where would a man like me get it? Instead o' that, I'm so poor that I see plainly I'll starve yet; I see it's before me! God pity me this day! But agin, there's my boy, my boy; oh, God, pity him! Say what's the laste, the lowest, the very lowest you could take, for defendin' him; an' for pity's sake, for charity's sake, for God's sake, don't grind a poor, helpless, ould man by extortion. If you knew the boy—if you knew him—oh, afore my God, if you knew him, you wouldn't be apt to charge a penny; you'd be proud to sarve sich a boy.”
“You wish everything possible to be done for him, of course.”
“Of coorse, of coorse; but widout extravagance; as asy an' light on a poor man as you can. You could shorten it, sure, an' lave out a grate dale that 'ud be of no use; nu' half the paper 'ud do; for you might make the clerks write close—why, very little 'ud be wanted if you wor savin'.”
“I can defend him with one counsel if you wish; but, if anxious to save the boy's life, you ought to enable your attorney to secure a strong bar of the most eminent lawyers he can engage.”
“An' what 'ud it cost to hire three or four of them?”
“The whole expenses might amount to between thirty and forty guineas.”
A deep groan of dismay, astonishment, and anguish, was the only reply made to this for some time.
“Oh, heavens above!” he screamed, “what will—what will become of me! I'd rather be dead, as I'll soon be, than hear this, or know it at all. How could I get it? I'm as poor as poverty itself! Oh, couldn't you feel for the boy, an' defend him on trust; couldn't you feel for him?”
“It's your business to do that,” returned the man of law, coolly.
“Feel for him; me! oh, little you know how my heart's in him; but any way, I'm an unhappy man; everything in the world wide goes against me; but—oh, my darlin' boy—Connor, Connor, my son, to be tould that I don't feel for you—well you know, avourneen machree—well you know that I feel for you, and 'ud kiss the track of your feet upon the ground: Oh, it's cruel to tell it to me; to say sich a thing to a man that his heart's braakin' widin him for your sake; but, sir, you sed this minute that you could defend him wid one lawyer?”
“Certainly, and with a cheap one, too, if you wish; but, in that case, I would rather decline the thing altogether.”
“Why? why? sure if you can defind him chapely, isn't it so much saved? isn't it the same as if you definded him at a higher rate? Sure, if one lawyer tells the truth for the poor boy, ten or fifteen can do no more; an' thin maybe they'd crass in an' puzzle one another if you hired too many of them.”
“How would you feel, should your son be found guilty; you know the penalty is his life. He will be executed.”
O'Brien could hear the old man clap his hands in agony, and in truth he walked about wringing them as if his heart would burst.
“What will I do?” he exclaimed; “what will I do? I can't lose him, an' I won't lose him! Lose him! oh God, oh God, it is to lose the best son and only child that ever man had! Wouldn't it be downright murdher in me to let him be lost if I could prevint it? Oh, if I was in his place, what wouldn't he do for me, for the father that he always loved!”
The tears ran copiously down his furrowed cheeks; and his whole appearance evinced such distraction and anguish as could rarely be witnessed.
“I'll tell you what I'll do,” he added; “I'll give you fifty guineas after my death if you'll defind him properly.”
“Much obliged,” replied the other; “but in matters of this kind we make no such bargains.”
“I'll make it sixty, in case you don't axe it now.”
“Can you give me security that I'll survive you? Why, you are tough-looking enough to outlive me.”
“Me tough!—no, God help me, my race is nearly ran; I won't be alive this day twelve months—look at the differ atween us.”
“This is idle talk,” said the attorney; “determine on what you'll do; really my time is valuable, and I am now wasting it to no purpose.”
“Take the offer—depind on't it'll soon come to you.”
“No, no,” said the other, coolly; “not at all; we might shut up shop if we made such post obit bargains as that.”
“I'll tell you,” said Fardorougha; “I'll tell you what;” his eyes gleamed with a reddish, bitter light; and he clasped his withered hands together, until the joints cracked, and the perspiration teemed from his pale, sallow features; “I'll tell you,” he added—“I'll make it seventy!”
“No.”
“Aighty!”
“No.”
“Ninety!”—with a husky shriek
“No, no.”
“A hundhre'—a hundhre'—a hundhre',” he shouted; “a hundhre', when I'm gone—when I'm gone!”
One solemn and determined No, that precluded all hopes of any such arrangement, was the only reply.
The old man leaped up again, and looked impatiently and wildly and fiercely about him.
“What are you?” he shouted; “what are you? You're a divil—a born divil. Will nothing but my death satisfy you? Do you want to rob me—to starve me—to murdher me? Don't you see the state I'm in by you? Look at me—look at these thremblin' limbs—look at the sweat powerin' down from my poor ould face! What is it you want? There—there's my gray hairs to you. You have brought me to that—to more than that—I'm dyin' this minute—I'm dyin'—oh, my boy—my boy, if I had you here—ay, I'm—I'm—”
He staggered over on his seat, his eyes gleaming in a fixed and intense glare at the attorney; his hands were clenched, his lips parched, and his mummy-like cheeks sucked, as before, into his toothless jaws. In addition to all this, there was a bitter white smile of despair upon his features, and his thin gray locks, that were discomposed in the paroxysm by his own hands, stood out in disorder upon his head. We question, indeed, whether mere imagination could, without having actually witnessed it in real life, conceive any object so frightfully illustrative of the terrible dominion which the passion of avarice is capable of exercising over the human heart.
“I protest to Heaven,” exclaimed the attorney, alarmed, “I believe the man is dying—if not dead, he is motionless.”
“O'Donovan, what's the matter with you?”
The old man's lips gave a dry, hard smack, then became desperately compressed together, and his cheeks were drawn still further into his jaws. At length he sighed deeply, and changed his fixed and motionless attitude.
“He is alive, at all events,” said one of his young men.
Fardorougha turned his eyes upon the speaker, then upon his master, and successively upon two other assistants who were in the office.
“What is this?” said he, “what is this?—I'm very weak—will you get me a dhrink o' wather? God help me—God direct me! I'm an unhappy man; get me a dhrink, for Heaven's sake! I can hardly spake, my mouth and lips are so dry.”
The water having been procured, he drank it eagerly, and felt evidently relieved.
“This business,” he continued, “about the money—I mane about my poor boy. Connor, how will it be managed, sir?”
“I have already told you that there is but one way of managing it, and that is, as the young man's life is at stake, to spare no cost.”
“And I must do that?”
“You ought, at least, remember that he's an only son, and that if you lose him—”
“Lose him!—I can't—I couldn't—I'd die—die—dead—”
“And by so shameful a death,” proceeded Cassidy, “you will not only be childless, but you will have the bitter fact to reflect on that he died in disgrace. You will blush to name him! What father would not make any sacrifice to prevent his child from meeting such a fate? It's a trying thing and a pitiable calamity to see a father ashamed to name the child that he loves.”
The old man arose, and, approaching Cassidy, said, eagerly, “How much will do? Ashamed to name you, alanna, Ghierna—Ghierna—ashamed to name you, Connor! Oh! if the world knew you, as thore, as well as I an' your poor mother knows you, they'd say that we ought to be proud to hear your name soundin' in our ears. How much will do? for, may God stringthen me, I'll do it.”
“I think about forty guineas; it may be more, and it may be less, but we will say forty.”
“Then I'll give you an ordher for it on a man that's a good mark. Give me pin an' paper, fast.”
“The paper was placed before him, and he held the pen in his hand for some time, and, ere he wrote, turned a look of deep distress on Cassidy.
“God Almighty pity me!” said he; “you see—you see that I'm a poor heart—broken creature—a ruined man I'll be—a ruined man!”
“Think of your son, and of his situation.”
“It's before me—I know it is—to die like a dog behind a ditch wid hunger!”
“Think of your son, I say, and, if possible, save him from a shameful death.”
“What! Ay—yis—yis—surely—surely—oh, my poor boy—my innocent boy—I will—I will do it.”
He then sat down, and, with a tremulous hand, and lips tightly drawn together, wrote an order on P——, the county treasurer, for the money.
Cassidy, on seeing it, looked alternately at the paper and the man for a considerable time.
“Is P——your banker?” he asked.
“Every penny that I'm worth he has.”
“Then you're a ruined man,” he replied, with cool emphasis. “P—— absconded the day before yesterday, and robbed half the county. Have you no loose cash at home?”
“Robbed! who robbed?”
“Why, P——has robbed every man who was fool enough to trust him; he's off to the Isle of Man, with the county funds in addition to the other prog.”
“You don't mane to say,” replied Fardorougha, with a hideous calmness of voice and manner; “you don't, you can't mane to say he has run off wid my money?”
“I do; you'll never see a shilling of it, if you live to the age of a Hebrew patriarch. See what it is to fix the heart upon money. You are now, what you wish the world to believe you to be, a poor man.”
“Ho! ho!” howled the miser, “he darn't, he darn't—wouldn't God consume him if he robbed the poor—wouldn't God stiffen him, and pin him to the airth, if he attempted to run off wid the hard earnings of strugglin' honest men? Where 'ud God be, an' him to dar to do it! But it's a falsity, an' you're thryin' me to see how I'd bear it—it is, it is, an' may Heaven forgive you!”
“It's as true as the Gospel,” replied the other; “why, I'm surprised you didn't hear it before now—every one knows it—it's over the whole country.”
“It's a lie—it's a lie!” he howled again; “no one dar to do such an act. You have some schame in this—you're not a safe man; you're a villain, an' nothin' else; but I'll soon know; which of these is my hat?”
“You are mad, I think,” said Cassidy.
“Get me my hat, I say; I'll soon know it; but sure the world's all in a schame against me—all, all, young an' ould—where's my hat, I say?”
“You have put it upon your head this moment,” said the other.
“An' my stick?”
“It's in your hand.”
“The curse o' Heaven upon you,” he shrieked, “whether it's thrue or false!” and, with a look that might scorch him to whom it was directed, he shuffled in a wild and frantic mood out of the house.
“The man is mad,” observed Cassidy; “or, if not, he will soon be so; I never witnessed such a desperate case of avarice. If ever the demon of money lurked in any man's soul, it's in his. God bless me! God bless me! it's dreadful! Richard, tell the gentleman in the dining-room I'm at leisure to see him.”
The scene we have attempted to describe spared O'Brien the trouble of much unpleasant inquiry, and enabled him to enter at once into the proposed arrangements on behalf of Connor. Of course he did not permit his sister's name to transpire, nor any trace whatsoever to appear, by which her delicacy might be compromised, or her character involved. His interference in the matter he judiciously put upon the footing of personal regard for the young man, and his reluctance to be even the indirect means of bringing him to a violent and shameful death. Having thus fulfilled Una's instructions, he returned home, and relieved her of a heavy burthen by a full communication of all that had been done.
The struggle hitherto endured by Fardoroug—he was in its own nature sufficiently severe to render his sufferings sharp and pungent; still they resembled the influence of local disease more than that of a malady which prostrates the strength and grapples with the powers of the whole constitution. The sensation he immediately felt, on hearing that his banker had absconded with the gains of his penurious life, was rather a stunning shock that occasioned for the moment a feeling of dull, and heavy, and overwhelming dismay. It filled, nay, it actually distended his narrow soul with an oppressive sense of exclusive misery that banished all consideration for every person and thing extraneous to his individual selfishness. In truth, the tumult of his mind was peculiarly wild and anomalous. The situation of his son, and the dreadful fate that hung over him, were as completely forgotten as if they did not exist. Yet there lay, underneath his own gloomy agony, a remote consciousness of collateral affliction, such as is frequently experienced by those who may be drawn, by some temporary and present pleasure, from the contemplation of their misery. We feel, in such cases, that the darkness is upon us, even while the image of the calamity is not before the mind; nay, it sometimes requires an effort to bring it back, when anxious to account for our depression; but when it comes, the heart sinks with a shudder, and we feel, that, although it ceased to engage our thoughts, we had been sitting all the time beneath its shadow. For this reason, although Fardorougha's own loss absorbed, in one sense, all his powers of suffering, still he knew that something else pressed with additional weight upon his heart. Of its distinct character, however, he was ignorant, and only felt that a dead and heavy load of multiplied affliction bent him in burning anguish to the earth.
There is something more or less eccentric in the gait and dress of every miser. Fardorougha's pace was naturally slow, and the habit for which, in the latter point, he had all his life been remarkable, was that of wearing a great-coat thrown loosely about his shoulders. In summer it saved an inside one, and, as he said, kept him cool and comfortable. That he seldom or never put his arms into it arose from the fact that he knew it would last a much longer period of time than if he wore it in the usual manner.
On leaving the attorney's office, he might be seen creeping along towards the County Treasurer's, at a pace quite unusual to him; his hollow, gleaming eyes were bent on the earth; his Gothamore about his shoulders; his staff held with a tight desperate grip, and his whole appearance that of a man frightfully distracted by the intelligence of some sudden calamity.
He had not proceeded far on this hopeless errand, when many bitter confirmations of the melancholy truth, by persons whom he met on their return from P——'s residence, were afforded him. Even these, however, were insufficient to satisfy him; he heard them with a vehement impatience, that could not brook the bare possibility of the report being true. His soul clung with the tenacity of a death—grip to the hope, that however others might have suffered, some chance might, notwithstanding, still remain in Ms particular favor. In the meantime, he poured out curses of unexampled malignity against the guilty defaulter, on whose head he invoked the Almighty's vengeance with a venomous fervor which appalled all who heard him. Having reached the treasurer's house, a scene presented itself that was by no means calculated to afford him consolation. Persons of every condition, from the squireen and gentleman farmer, to the humble widow and inexperienced orphan, stood in melancholy groups about the deserted mansion, interchanging details of their losses, their blasted prospects, and their immediate ruin. The cries of the widow, who mourned for the desolation brought upon her and her now destitute orphans, rose in a piteous wail to heaven, and the industrious fathers of many struggling families, with pale faces and breaking hearts, looked in silent misery upon the closed shutters and smokeless chimneys of their oppressor's house, bitterly conscious that the laws of the boasted constitution under which they lived, permitted the destroyer of hundreds to enjoy, in luxury and security, the many thousands of which, at one fell and rapacious swoop, he had deprived them.
With white, quivering lips and panting breath, Fardorougha approached and joined them.
“What, what,” said he, in a broken sentence, “is this true—can it, can it be true? Is the thievin' villain of hell gone? Has he robbed us, ruined us, destroyed us?”
“Ah, too thrue it is,” replied a farmer; “the dam' rip is off to that nest of robbers, the Isle of Man; ay, he's gone! an' may all our bad luck past, present, and to come, go with him, an' all he tuck!”
Fardorougha looked at his informant as if he had been P——himself; he then glared from one to another, whilst the white foam wrought up to his lips by the prodigious force of his excitement. He clasped his hands, then attempted to speak, but language had abandoned him.
“If one is to judge from your appearance, you have suffered heavily,” observed the farmer.
The other stared at him with a kind of angry amazement for doubting it, or it might be, for speaking so coolly of his loss. “Suffered!” said he, “ay, ay, but did yeea thry the house? we'll see—suffered!—suffered!—we'll see.”
He immediately shuffled over to the hall door, which he assaulted with the eagerness of a despairing soul at the gate of heaven, throwing into each knock such a character of impatience and apprehension, as one might suppose the aforesaid soul to feel from a certain knowledge that the devil's clutches were spread immediately behind, to seize and carry him to perdition. His impetuosity, however, was all in vain; not even an echo reverberated through the cold and empty walls, but, on the contrary, every peal was followed by a most unromantic and ominous silence.
“That man appears beside himself,” observed another of the sufferers; “surely, it he wasn't half-mad, he'd not expect to find any one in an empty house!”
“Devil a much it signifies whether he's mad or otherwise,” responded a neighbor. “I know him well; his name's Fardorougha Donovan, the miser of Lisnamona, the biggest shkew that ever skinned a flint. If P——did nothin' worse than fleece him, it would never stand between him an' the blessin' o' Heaven.”