It was on a severe night, with frequent gusts of stormy wind shaking the doors and window-frames, or carrying along the drifted flakes of snow with which the air was charged, that Lady Eleanor, her daughter, and Forester, were seated round the fire. All the appliances of indoor comfort by which they were surrounded seemed insufficient to dispel a sense of sadness that pervaded the little party. Conversation flowed not as it was wont, in its pleasant current, diverging here and there as fancy or caprice suggested; the sentences were few and brief, the pauses between them long and frequent; a feeling of awkwardness, too, mingled with the gloom, for, at intervals, each would make an endeavor to relieve the weariness of time, and in the effort show a consciousness of constraint.
Lady Eleanor lay back in her deep chair, and, with half-closed lids, seemed lost in thought. Helen was working at her embroidery, and, apparently, diligently too, although a shrewd observer might have remarked on the slow progress the work was making, and how inevitably her balls of colored worsted seemed bent on entanglement; while Forester sat silently gazing on the wood fire, and watching the bright sparks as they flitted and danced above the red flame; his brow was clouded, and his look sorrowful; not without reason, perhaps: it was to be his last evening at the abbey; the last of those hours of happiness which seemed all the fairer when about to part with them forever.
Lady Eleanor seemed grieved at his approaching departure. From the habit of his mind, and the nature of his education, he was more companionable to her than Lionel.
She saw in him many qualities of high and sterling value, and even in his prejudices she could trace back several of those traits which marked her own youth, when, in the pride of her English breeding, she would tolerate no deviation from the habits of her own country. It was true, many of these notions had given way since his residence at the abbey; many of his opinions had undergone modification or change, but still he was distinctively English.
Helen, who possessed no standard by which to measure such prejudices, was far less indulgent towards them; her joyous, happy nature—the heirloom of her father's house—led her rather to jest than argue on these topics, and she contrasted the less apt and ready apprehension of Forester with the native quickness of her brother Lionel, disadvantageous to the former. She was sorry, too, that he was going; more so, because his society was so pleasing to her mother, and that before him, Lady Eleanor exerted herself in a way which eventually reacted favorably on her own health and spirits. Further than this, her interest in him was weak.
Not so Forester: he was hopelessly, inextricably, in love, not the less so that he would not acknowledge it to himself; far more so because he had made no impression on the object of his passion. There is a period in every story of affection when the flame grows the brighter because unreflected, and seems the more concentrated because unreturned. Forester was in this precise stage of the malady; he was as much piqued by the indifference as fascinated by the charms of Helen Darcy. The very exertions he made for victory stimulated his own passion; while, in her efforts to interest or amuse him, he could not help feeling the evidence of her indifference to him.
We have said that the conversation was broken and interrupted; at length it almost ceased altogether, a stray remark of Lady Eleanor's, followed by a short reply from Forester, alone breaking the silence. Nor were these always very pertinent, inasmuch as the young aide-de-camp occasionally answered his own reflections, and not the queries of his hostess.
“An interesting time in Dublin, no doubt,” said Lady Eleanor, half talking to herself; “for though the forces are unequal, and victory and defeat predestined, there will be a struggle still.”
“Yes, madam, a brief one,” answered Forester, dreamily, comprehending only a part of her remark.
“A brief and a vain one,” echoed Lady Eleanor.
“Say, rather, a glorious one,” interposed Helen; “the last cheer of a sinking crew!”
Forester looked up, startled into attention by the energy of these few words.
“I should say so too, Helen,” remarked her mother, “if they were not accessory to their own misfortunes.”
“Nay, nay, Mamma, you must not remember their failings in their hour of distress; there is a noble-hearted minority untainted yet.”
“There will be a majority of eighteen,” said Forester, whose thoughts were wandering away, while he endeavored to address himself to what he believed they were saying; nor was he aware of his error till aroused by the laughter of Lady Eleanor and her daughter.
“Eighteen!” reiterated he, solemnly.
“How few!” remarked Lady Eleanor, almost scornfully.
“You should say, how costly, Mamma!” exclaimed Helen. “These gentlemen are as precious from their price as their rarity!”
“That is scarcely fair, Miss Darcy,” said Forester, at once recalled to himself by the tone of mockery she spoke in; “many adopted the views of Government, after duly weighing every consideration of the measure: some, to my own knowledge, resisted offers of great personal advantage, and Lord Castlereagh was not aware of their adhesion—”
“Till he had them en poche, I suppose,” said Helen, sarcastically; “just as you have been pleased to do with my ball of yellow worsted, and for which I shall be thankful if you will restore it to me.”
Forester blushed deeply, as he drew from his coat-pocket the worsted, which in a moment of abstraction he had lifted from the ground, and thrust into his pocket, without knowing.
Had any moderately shrewd observer witnessed his confusion, and her enjoyment of it, he would easily have understood the precise relation of the two parties to each other. Forester's absence of mind betrayed his engaged affection as palpably as Helen's laughter did her own indifference.
Lady Eleanor did not remark either; her thoughts still rested on the topic of which they had spoken, for it was a subject of no inconsiderable difficulty to her. Whatever her sense of indignant contempt for the bribed adherents of the Ministry, her convictions always inclined to these measures, whose origin was from her native country; her predilections were strongly English; not only her happiest days had been passed there, but she was constantly contrasting the position they would have occupied and sustained in that favored land, against the wasteful and purposeless extravagance of their life in Ireland.
Was it too late to amend? was the question ever rising to her mind, now if even yet the Knight should be induced to adopt the more ambitious course? Every accidental circumstance seemed favorable to the notion: the Government craving his support; her own relatives, influential as they were from rank and station, soliciting it; the Prince himself according favors which could no more be rejected than acknowledged ungraciously.
“What a career for Lionel! What a future for Helen!” such were reflections that would press themselves upon her, but to whose disentanglement her mind suggested no remedy.
“'Tis Mr. Daly, my Lady,” said Tate, for something like the fourth time, without being attended to. “'T is Mr. Daly wants leave to visit you.”
“Mr. Bagenal Daly, Mamma, wishes to know if you'll receive him?”
“Mr. Daly is exactly the kind of person to suggest this impracticable line of policy,” said Lady Eleanor, with half-closed eyes; for the name alone had struck her, and she had not heard what was said.
“My dear Mamma,” said Helen, rising, and leaning over her chair, “it is a visit he proposes; nothing so very impracticable in that, I hope!” and then, at a gesture from her mother, continued to Tate, “Lady Eleanor will be very happy to see Mr. Daly.”
Lady Eleanor had scarcely aroused herself from her revery when Bagenal Daly entered. His manner was stately, perhaps somewhat colder than usual, and he took his seat with an air of formal politeness.
“I have come, my Lady,” said he, slowly, “to learn if I can be of any service in the capital; unexpected news has just reached me, requiring my immediate departure for Dublin.”
“Not to-night, sir, I hope; it is very severe, and likely, I fear, to continue so.”
“To-night, madam, within an hour, I expect to be on the road.”
“Could you defer a little longer, and we may be fellow-travellers,” said Forester; “I was to start to-morrow morning, but my packing can soon be made.”
“I should hope,” said Lady Eleanor, smiling, “that you will not leave us unprotected, gentlemen, and that one, at least, will remain here.” This speech, apparently addressed to both, was specially intended for Forester, whose cheek tingled with a flush of pleasure as he heard it.
“I have no doubt, madam, that Captain Forester, whose age and profession are more in accordance with gallantry, will respond to your desire.”
“If I could really fancy that I was not yielding to my own wishes only,” stammered out Forester.
“Nay, I make it a request.”
“There, sir, how happy to be entreated to what one's wishes incline them,” added Daly; “you may go through a deal of life without being twice so fortunate. I should apologize for so brief a notice of my departure, Lady Eleanor, but the intelligence I have received is pressing.” Here he dropped his voice to a whisper. “The Ministers have hurried forward their bill, and I shall scarcely be in time for the second reading.”
“All accounts agree in saying that the Government majority is certain,” observed Lady Eleanor, calmly.
“It is to be feared, madam, that such rumors are well founded, but the party who form the forlorn hope have their devoirs also.”
“I am a very indifferent politician, Mr. Daly, but it strikes me that a body so manifestly corrupt, give the strongest possible reasons for their own destruction.”
“Were they all so, madam, I should join in the sentiment as freely as you utter it,” replied Daly, proudly; “but it is a heavy sentence that would condemn the whole crew because there was a mutiny in the steerage; besides, these rights and privileges are held only in trust; no man can in honor or justice vote away that of which he is only the temporary occupant; forgive me, I beg, for daring to discuss the topic, but I thought the Knight had made you a convert to his own opinions.”
“We have never spoken on the subject, Mr. Daly,” replied Lady Eleanor, coldly; “the Knight dislikes the intrusion of a political matter within the circle of his family, and for that reason, perhaps,” added she, with a smile, “my daughter and myself feel for it all the temptation of a forbidden pleasure.”
“Oh, yes!” exclaimed Helen, who heard the last few words of her mother's speech, “I am as violent a partisan as Mr. Daly could ask for; indeed, I am not certain if all my doctrines are not of his own teaching; I fear the Premier, distrust the Cabinet, and put no faith in the Secretary for Ireland; is not that the first article of our creed?—nay, nay, fear was no part of your instruction.”
“And yet I have fears, my dear Helen, and very great fears just now,” said Daly in a low whisper, only audible by herself, and she turned her full and beaming eyes upon him for an explanation. As if anxious to escape the interrogatory, Daly arose hastily. “I must crave your indulgence for an abrupt leave-taking, Lady Eleanor,” said he, approaching, as he kissed the hand held out to him; “I shall be able to tell the Knight that I left you both well, and under safe protection. Captain Forester, adieu; you need no admonition of mine respecting your charge;” and, with a low and courtly salute, he departed.
“Rely upon it, Captain Forester, he's bent on mischief now. I never saw him particularly mild and quiet in his manner that it was not the prelude to some desperate ebullition,” said Lady Eleanor.
“He is the very strangest of all mortals.”
“Say, the most single-minded and straightforward,” interposed Helen, “and I 'll agree with you.”
“When men of strong minds and ambitious views are curbed and held in within the petty sphere of a small social circle, they are, to my thinking, intolerable. It is making a drawing-room pet of a tiger; every step he takes upsets a vase or smashes a jar. You smile at my simile.”
“I 'm sure it's a most happy one,” said Forester, continuing.
“I enter a dissent,” cried Helen, playfully. “He's a tiger, if you will, with his foes, but in all the relations of private life, gentleness itself; for my part, I can imagine no more pleasing contrast to the modern code of manners than Mr. Bagenal Daly.”
“There, Captain Forester, if you would win Miss Darcy's favor, you have now the model for your imitation.”
Forester's face flushed, and he appeared overwhelmed with confusion, while Helen went on with her embroidery, tranquil as before.
“I believe,” resumed Lady Eleanor,—“I believe, after all, I am unjust to him; but much may be forgiven me for being so; he has made my son a wild, thoughtless boy, and my daughter—”
“No indiscretions, Mamma,” cried Helen, holding up her hand.
“Well, he has made my daughter telle que vous la voyez.”
Forester was too well bred to venture on a word of flattery or compliment, but his glowing color and sparkling eyes spoke his admiration.
Lady Eleanor's quick glance remarked this; and, as if the thought had never occurred before, she seemed amazed, either at the fact or at her own previous inattention.
“Let us finish that second volume you were reading, Captain Forester,” said she, glad to cut short the discussion. And, without a word, he took the book and began to read.
It is not our desire to practise any mystery with our reader, nor would the present occasion warrant such. Mr. Daly's hurried departure for Dublin was caused by the receipt of tidings which had that morning reached him, conveying the startling intelligence that his friend the Knight had accepted terms from the Government, and pledged himself to support their favored measure.
It was a time when men were accustomed to witness the most flagrant breaches of honor and good faith. No station was too high to be above the reach of this reproach, no position too humble not to make its possessor a mark for corruption. It was an epidemic of dishonesty, and people ceased to wonder as they heard of each new victim to the malady.
Bagenal Daly well knew that no man could be more exempt from an imputation of this nature than the Knight of Gwynne: every act of his life, every sentiment he professed, every trait of his character, flatly contradicted the supposition. But he also knew that though Darcy was unassailable by all the temptations of bribery, come in what shape they might, that his frank and generous spirit would expose him to the stratagems and devices of a wily and insidious party, and that if, by any accident, an expression should fall from him in all the freedom of convivial enjoyment that could be tortured into even the resemblance of a pledge, he well knew that his friend would deem any sacrifice of personal feeling light in the balance, rather than not adhere to it.
Resolved not to lose a moment, he despatched Sandy to order horses along the line, and having passed the remainder of the day in the preparations for his departure, he left the abbey before midnight. A less determined traveller might have hesitated on setting out on such a night: the long menacing storm had at length burst forth, and the air resounded with a chaos of noise, amid which the roaring breakers and the crash of falling trees were uppermost; with difficulty the horses were enabled to keep their feet, as the sea washed heavily over the wall and deluged the road, while at intervals the fallen timber obstructed the way and delayed his progress. Difficulty was, however, the most enjoyable stimulant to Daly's nature; he loved an obstacle as other men enjoy a pleasure, and, as he grew older, so far from yielding to the indolence of years, his hardy spirit seemed to revel in the thought that amid dangers and perils his whole life had been passed, yet never had he suffered himself to be a beaten enemy.
The whole of that night, and all the following day, the violence of the storm was unabated; uprooted trees and wrecked villages met his eye as he passed, while, in the larger towns, the houses were strongly barred and shuttered, and scarcely one living thing to be seen through the streets. Nothing short of the united influence of bribery and intimidation could procure horses in such a season, and had any messenger of less sturdy pretensions than honest Sandy been despatched to order them, they would have been flatly refused. Bagenal Daly and his man were, however, too well known in that part of Ireland to make such a course advisable, and though postboys and ostlers condoled together, the signal of Daly's appearance silenced every thought of opposition, and the words, “I 'm ready!” were an order to dash forward none dared to disobey.
So had it continued until he reached Moate, where he found a message from Sandy, informing him that no horses could be procured, and that he must bring on those from Athlone the entire way to Kilbeggan.
“You hear me,” cried Daly to the astonished postboy, who for the last two miles had spared neither whip nor spur, in the glad anticipation of a speedy shelter,—“you hear me. To Kilbeggan.”
“Oh, begorra! that's impossible, yer honor. If it was the month of May, and the road was a bowling-green, the bastes couldn't do it.”
“Go on!” cried Daly, shutting up the glass, and throwing himself back in the chaise.
But the postboy only buttoned up the collar of his coat around his face, thrust his whip into his boot, and, drawing his sleeves over his hands, sat a perfect picture of fatalism.
“I say, go on!” shouted Daly, as he lowered the front window of the chaise.
A low muttering from the driver, still impassive as before, was all the reply, and at the same instant a sharp report was heard, and a pistol bullet whizzed beside his hat.
“Will you go now?” cried Bagenal Daly, as he levelled another weapon on the window; but no second entreaty was necessary, and, with his bead bent down almost to the mane, and with a mingled cry for mercy and imprecation together, he drove the spurs into his jaded beast, and whipped with all his might through the almost deserted town. With the despairing energy of one who felt his life was in peril, the wretched postboy hurried madly forward, urging the tired animals up the hills, and caring neither for rut nor hollow on his onward course, till at length, blown and exhausted, the animals came to a dead stand, and, with heaving flanks and outstretched forelegs, refused to budge a step farther.
“There!” cried the postboy, as, dropping from the saddle, he fell on his knees upon the road, “shoot, and be d———d to you; I can do no more.”
The terrified expression of the fellow's face as the lamp of the chaise threw its light upon him, seemed to change the current of Daly's thoughts, for he laughed loud and heartily as he looked upon him.
“Come, come,” said he, good-humoredly, “is not that Kilbeggan where I see the lights yonder?”
“Sorra bit of it,” sighed the other, “it is only Horseleap.”
“Well, push on to Horseleap; perhaps they 've horses there.”
“Begorra! you might as well look for black tay in a bog-hole; 't is a poor 'shebeen' is the only thing in the village;” and, so saying, he took the bridle on his arm, and walked along before the horses, who, with drooping heads, tottered after at a foot pace.
About half an hour of such travelling brought Daly in front of a miserable cabin, over the door of which a creaking sign proclaimed accommodation for man and beast. To the partial truth of this statement the bright glare of a fire that shone between the chinks of the shutters bore witness, and, disengaging himself from the chaise, Daly knocked loudly for admission. There are few less conciliating sounds to the ears of a hot-tempered man than those hesitating whispers which, while exposed to a storm himself, he hears deliberating on the question of his admission. Such were the mutterings Daly now listened to, and to which he was about to reply by forcing his entrance, when the door was opened by a man in the dress of a peasant, who somewhat sulkily demanded what he wanted.
“Horses, if you have them, to reach Kilbeggan,” said Daly, “and if you have not, a good fire and shelter until they can be procured;” and as he spoke, he pushed past the man, and entered the room from which the blazing light proceeded.
With his back to the fire, and hands thrust carelessly into the pockets of his coat, stood a man of eight-and-thirty or forty years of age; in dress, air, and appearance he might have been taken for a country horse-dealer; and so, indeed, his well-worn top-boots and green coat, cut in jockey fashion, seemed to bespeak him. He was rather under the middle size, but powerfully built, his wide chest, long arms, and bowed legs all indicating the possession of that strength which is never the accompaniment of more perfect symmetry.
Although Daly's appearance unquestionably proclaimed his class in life, the other exhibited no mark of deference or respect to him as he entered, but maintained his position with the same easy indifference as at first.
“You make yourself at home here, good friend, if one might judge from the way you knocked at the door,” said he, addressing Daly with a look whose easy familiarity was itself an impertinence.
“I have yet to learn,” said Daly, sternly, “that a gentleman must practise any peculiar ceremony when seeking the shelter of a 'shebeen,' not to speak of the right by which such as you address me as your good friend.”
An insolent laugh, that Daly fancied was re-echoed by some one without, was the first reply to this speech; when, after a few minutes, the man added, “I see you 're a stranger in these parts.”
“If I had not been so, the chance is I should have taught you somewhat better manners before this time. Move aside, sir, and let me see the fire.”
But the other never budged in the slightest, standing in the same easy posture as before.
Daly's dark face grew darker, and his heavy brows met in a deep frown, while, with a spring that showed no touch of time in his strong frame, he bounded forward and seized the man by the collar. Few men were Daly's equals in point of strength; but although he with whom he now grappled made no resistance whatever, Daly never stirred him from the spot, to which he seemed fast and firmly rooted.
“Well, that's enough of it!” said the fellow, as with a rough jerk he freed himself from the grasp, and sent Daly several paces back into the room.
“Not so!” cried Daly, whose passion now boiled over, and, drawing a pistol from his bosom, he levelled it at him. Quick as the motion was, the other was equally ready, for his hand now presented a similar weapon at Daly's head.
“Move aside, or—”
A coarse, insulting laugh drowned Daly's words, and he pulled the trigger; but the pistol snapped without exploding.
“There it is, now,” cried the fellow, rudely; “luck's against you, old boy, so you 'd better keep yourself cool and easy;” and with these words he uncocked the weapon and replaced it in his bosom. Daly watched the moment, and with a bound placed himself beside him, when, bringing his leg in front, he caught the man round the middle, and hurled him headlong on the ground.
He fell as if he had been shot; but, rolling over, he leaned upon his elbow and looked up, without the slightest sign of passion or even excitement on his features.
“I 'd know that trip in a thousand; begad, you 're Bagenal Daly, and nobody else!”
Although not a little surprised at the recognition, Daly suffered no sign of astonishment to escape him, but drew his chair to the fire, and stretched out his legs before the blaze. Meanwhile, the other, having arisen, leaned over the back of a chair, and stared at him steadfastly.
“I am as glad as a hundred-pound note, now, you did n't provoke me to lay a hand on you, Mr. Daly,” said he, slowly, and in a voice not devoid of a touch of feeling; “'t is n't often I bear malice, but I 'd never forgive myself the longest day I 'd live.”
Daly turned his eyes towards him, and, for some minutes, they continued to look at each other without speaking.
“I see you don't remember me, sir,” said the stranger, at length; “but I 've a better memory, and a better reason to have it besides: you saved my life once.”
“Saved your life!” repeated Daly, thoughtfully; “I 've not the slightest recollection of ever having seen you before.”
“It's all true I 'm telling, for all that,” replied the other; “and although it happened above five-and-twenty years since, I'm not much changed, they tell me, in look or appearance.” He paused at these words, as if to give Daly time to recognize him; but the effort seemed in vain, as, after along and patient scrutiny, Daly said, “No, I cannot remember you.”
“Let me see, then,” said the man, “if I can't refresh your memory. Were you in Dublin in the winter of '75?”
“Yes; I had a house in Stephen's Green—”
“And used to drive four black thoroughbreds without winkers?”
“It's clear that you know me, at least,” said Daly; “go on.”
“Well, sir, do you remember, it was about a week before Christmas, that Captain Burke Fitzsimon was robbed of a pair of pistols in the guard-room of the Upper Castle Yard, in noonday, ay, and tied with his own sash to the guard-bed?”
“By Jove! I do. He was regularly laughed out of the regiment.”
“Faix, and many that laughed at him mightn't have behaved a deal better than he did,” replied the other, with a dogged sternness in his manner. He became silent after these words, and appeared deeply sunk in meditation, when suddenly he drew two splendidly chased pistols from his bosom, and held them out to Daly as he said, “There they are, and as good as they are handsome, true at thirty paces, and never fail.”
Daly gazed alternately from the pistols to their owner, but never uttered a word.
“That same day,” resumed the man, “you were walking down the quay near the end of Watling Street, when there was a cry of 'Stop thief!—stop him!—a hundred guineas to the man that takes him!' and shortly after a man crossed the quay, pursued closely by several people, one of them, and the foremost, being Tom Lambert, the constable, the strongest man, they said, of his day, in Ireland. The fellow that ran could beat them all, and was doing it too, when, just as he had gained Bloody Bridge, he saw a child on the pathway all covered with blood, and a bulldog standing over him, worrying him—”
“I have it all,” said Daly, interrupting him; “'tis as fresh before me as if it happened yesterday. The robber stopped to save the child, and, seizing the bulldog by the throat, hurled him over the wall into the Liffey. Lambert, as you call him, had by this time come close up, and was within two yards of the man, when I, feeling compassion for a fellow that could be generous at such a moment, laid my hand on the constable's arm to stop him; he struck me; but if he did, he had his reward, for I threw him over the hip on the crown of his head, and he had a brain fever after it that almost brought him to death's door. And where were you all this time, and what were you doing?”
“I was down Barrack Street, across the park, and near Knockmaroon Gate, before they could find a door to stretch Tom Lambert on.”
“You!” said Daly, staring at him; “why, it was Freney, they told me, performed that exploit for a wager.”
“So it was, sir,” said the man, standing up and crossing his arms, not without something of pride in his look,—“I'm Freney.”
Daly arose and gazed at the man with all that curious scrutiny one bestows upon some remarkable object, measuring his strong, athletic frame with the eye of a connoisseur, and, as it were, calculating the physical resources of so powerful a figure.
“You see, sir,” said the robber, at last, “I was right when I told you that you saved my life: there were thirteen indictments hanging over my head that day, and if I 'd been taken they 'd have hanged me as round as a turnip.”
“You owe it to yourself,” said Daly; “had you not stopped for the child, it was just as likely that I 'd have tripped you up myself.”
“'Tis a feeling I never could get over,” said the robber; “'twas a little boy, about the same age as that, that saved the Kells coach the night I stopped it near Dangan. And now, sir, let me ask you what in the world brought you into the village of Horseleap? For I am sure,” added he with a laugh, “it was never to look after me.”
“You are right there, friend; I'm on my way up to town to be present at the debate in Parliament on the Union,—a question that has its interest for yourself too.”
“How so, sir?” said the other, curiously.
“Plainly enough, man; if they carry the Union, they'll not leave a man worth robbing in the island. You 'll have to take to an honest calling, Freney,—turn cattle-drover. By the way, they tell me you 're a good judge of a horse.”
“Except yourself, there's not a better in the island; and if you 've no objection, I 'll mount and keep you company as far as Maynooth, where you 'll easily get horses—and it will be broad daylight by that time—to bring you into Dublin.”
“I accept the offer willingly. I'll venture to say we shall not be robbed on the journey.”
“Well, sir, the horses won't be here for an hour yet, and if you 'll join me in a bit of supper I was going to have when you came in, it will help to pass the time till we are ready to start.”
Daly assented, not the less readily that he had not eaten anything since morning, and Freney left the room to hasten the preparations for the meal.
“Come, Freney,” said Daly, as the other entered the room a few moments after, “was it the strength of conscious rectitude that made you stand my fire as you did a while ago, or did you think me so bad a marksman at four paces?”
“Neither, sir,” replied the robber, laughing; “I saw the pan of the lock half open as you drew it from your pocket, and I knew the priming must have fallen out; but for that—”
“You had probably fired, yourself?”
“Just so,” rejoined he, with a short nod. “I could have shot you before you levelled at me. Now, sir, here's something far better than burning powder. I am sure you are too old a traveller not to be able to eat a rasher of bacon.”
“And this I take to be as free of any allegiance to the king as yourself,” said Daly, as he poured out a wineglass-ful of “poteen” from a short black bottle.
“You 're right, sir,” said Freney, with a laugh. “We 're both duty free. Let me help you to an egg.”
“I never ate better bacon in my life,” said Daly, who seemed to relish his supper with considerable gusto.
“I'm glad you like it, sir. It is a notion of mine that Costy Moore of Kilcock cures a pig better than any man in this part of Ireland; and though his shop is next the police-barracks, I went in there myself to buy this.”
Daly stared, with something of admiration in his look, at the man whose epicurism was indulged at the hazard of his neck; and he pledged the robber with a motion of the head that betokened a high sense of his daring. “I've heard you have had some close escapes, Freney.”
“I was never taken but once, sir. A woman hid my shoes when I was asleep. I was at the foot of the Galtee mountains: the ground is hard and full of sharp shingle, and I could n't run. They brought me into Clonmel, and I was in the heaviest irons in the jail before two hours were over. That's the strong jail, Mr. Daly; they 've the best walls and the thickest doors there I have ever seen in any jail in Ireland. For,” added he, with a sly laugh, “I went over them all, in a friendly sort of a way.”
“A kind of professional tour, Freney?”
“Just so, sir; taking a bird's-eye view of the country from the drop, because, maybe, I would n't have time for it at another opportunity.”
“You 're a hardened villain!” said Daly, looking at him with an expression the robber felt to be a finished compliment.
“That's no lie, Mr. Daly; and if I wasn't, could I go on for twenty years, hunted down like a wild beast, with fellows tracking me all day, and lying in watch for me all night? Where we are sitting now is the only spot in the whole island where I can say I 'm safe. This is my brother's cabin.”
“Your brother is the same man that opened the door for me?”
Freney nodded, and went on: “He's a poor laboring man, with four acres of wet bog for a farm, and a young woman, in the ague, for a wife, and if it was n't for myself he 'd be starving; and would you believe it, now, he 'd not take to the road for one night—just one single night—to be as rich as the Duke of Leinster; and here am I”—and, as he spoke, his chest expanded, and his dark eyes flashed wildly—“here am I, that would rather be on my black mare's back, with my holsters at the saddle, watching the sounds of wheels on a lonely road, than I 'd be any gentleman in the land, barring your own self.”
“And why me?” said Daly, in a voice whose melancholy cadence made it solemn as a death-bell.
“Just because you 're the only man I ever heard tell of that was fond of danger for the fun of it. Did n't I see the leap you took at the Black Lough, just to show the English Lord-Lieutenant how an Irish gentleman rides, with the rein in your mouth, and your hands behind your back? Isn't that true?”
Daly nodded, and muttered, “I have the old horse still.”
“By the good day! I 'd spend a week in Newgate to see you on his back.”
“Well, Freney,” said Daly, who seemed not disposed to encourage a conversation so personal in its allusions, “where have you been lately?—in the South?”
“No, sir; I spent the last fortnight watching an old fox that doubled on me at last,—old Hickman, of Loughrea, that used to be.”
“Old Hickman!—what of him?” cried Daly, whose interest became at once excited by the mention of the name.
“I found out, sir, that he was to be down here at Kildare to receive his rents,—for he owns a fine estate here,—and that, besides, Tom Gleeson, the great agent from Dublin, was to meet him, as some said, to pay him a large sum of money for the Knight of Gwynne,—some heavy debt, I believe, owing for many a year.”
“Yes, go on. What then?”
“Well. I knew the reason Hickman wanted the money here: Lord Tyrawley was going to sell him a part of Gore's Wood, for hard cash—d 'ye mind, sir, hard cash—down on the nail, for my Lord likes high play at Daly's—”
“D——n Lord Tyrawley!” said Daly, impatiently. “What of Hickman?”
“Well, d——n him too! He's a shabby negur. I stopped 'him at Ball's Bridge once, and got but three guineas and some shillings for my pains. But to come back to old Hickman: I found he had arrived at the 'Black Dog,' and that Gleeson had come the same evening, and so I disguised myself like an old farmer the next morning, and pretended I wanted his advice about an asthma that I had, just to see the lie of the old premises, and whether he was alone, or had the two bailiffs with him, as usual. There they were, sir, sure enough, and well armed too, and fresh hasps on the door, to lock it inside, all secure as a bank. I saw these things while the old doctor was writing the prescription, for he tore a leaf out of his pocket-book to order me some stuff for the cough,—faith, 't is pills of another kind they 'd have given me if they found me out. That was all I got for my guinea in goold, not to speak of the danger;” and, so saying, he pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket, and held it out towards Daly. “That's not it, sir; 't is the other side the writing is on.”
But Daly's eyes were fixed upon the paper, which he held firmly between both hands.
“Ay, I see what you are looking at,” said Freney; “that was a kind of memorandum the old fellow made of the money Gleeson paid him the day before.”
Daly paid no attention to the remark, but muttered half aloud the contents of the document before him: “Check on Ball for eighteen thousand, payable at sight,—thirty-six thousand eight hundred and ten pounds in notes of the Bank of England,—gold, seventeen hundred guineas.”
“There was a lob,” cried Freney, as he rubbed his hands together. “I was set up for life if I got half of it! And now, Mr. Daly, just tell me one thing: isn't Mr. Darcy there as bad as myself, to take all this money for his vote?”
“How do you mean?” said Daly, sternly.
“I mean that a gentleman born and bred as he is, oughtn't to sell his country for goold; that if a blackguard like myself takes to the road, it's all natural and reasonable, and the world's little worse off when they hang half a dozen of my kind; but for a real born gentleman of the old stock of the land to go and take money for his vote in Parliament!”
“And who dares to say he did so?” cried Daly, indignantly.
“Faix, that's the story up in Dublin; they say he 'd no other way of clearing off the debts on his property. Bad cess to me if I 'd do it! Here I am, a robber and a highwayman, I don't deny it, but may I wear hemp for a handkerchief if I 'd sell my country. Bad luck to the Union, and all that votes for it,” said he, as, filling a bumper of whiskey, he tossed it off to this laudable sentiment.
“If you had n't wronged my friend the Knight of Gwynne, I'm not certain that I wouldn't have pledged your toast myself.”
“If he 's a friend of yours I say nothing against him; but sure when he—”
“Once for all,” said Daly, sternly, “this story is false;” while he added, in a low muttering to himself, “corruption must needs have spread widely when such a calumny was even ventured on.—And so, Freney, Hickman escaped you?”
“He did, sir,” said Freney, sighing; “he made a lodgment in Kildare next day, and more of the money he carried up to town, guarded all the way by the two fellows I told you. Ah! Mr. Daly, if all the world was as cunning as old Peter, I might give up the road as a bad job. There! do you hear that? Listen, sir.”
“What is it?” said Daly, after a moment's silence.
“They're my nags, sir, coming up the road. I'd know their trot if I heard it among a troop of dragoons. 'T is clippers they are.”
As he spoke he arose from the table, and, lighting a small lantern he always carried with him, hastened to the door, where already the two horses were standing, a bare-legged “gossoon” holding the bridles.