The O'Donoghue: Tale of Ireland Fifty Years Ago. Lever Charles James
be laughing – ‘you’re an honest fellow; and although I cannot let you have your mare back again, for she was killed last night, you shall have your own price for the four carriage-horses and the two roadsters I ordered.’ With that I began blubbering about the mare, and swore I was as fond of her as if she was my sister. I wish you’d seen his daughter then; upon my conscience it was as good as a play. ‘They have so much feelin’, says she to her father. ‘For fun,’ says I to myself. ‘O murther, murther. Mary, and them’s the people that rules us!’”
“Omadhauns they are, the devil a’ more!” interposed Mary, whose hearty contempt for the Saxon originated in the facility by which he could be imposed upon.
“That’s what I’m always saying,” said Lanty. “I’d rather have the chaytin’ than the bayting of John Bull, any day! You’ll humbug him out of his shirt, and faix it’s the easiest way to get it after all.”
“It’s a mane way, Lanty,” interposed Mary, with a look of pride; “it’s a dirty, mane way, and doesn’t become an Irishman?”
“Wait till the time comes, Mary M’Kelly,” said Lanty, half angrily, “and maybe I’d be as ready as another.”
“I wish it was come,” said Mary, sighing; “I wish to the Virgin it was; I’m tired heerin’ of the preparations. Sorra one of me knows what more they want, if the stout heart was there. There’s eight barrels of gunpowder in that rock there,” said she, in a low whisper, “behind yer back – you needn’t stir, Lanty. Begorra, if a spark was in it, ‘twould blow you and me, and the house that’s over us, as high as Hungry mountain.”
“The angels be near us!” said Lanty, making the sign of the cross.
“Ay,” resumed Mary, “and muskets for a thousand min, and pikes for two more. There’s saddles and bridles, eighteen hogsheads full.”
“True enough,” chimed in Lanty; “and I have an order for five hundred cavalry horses – the money to be paid out of the Bank of France. Musha, I wish it was some place nearer home.”
“Is it doubting them ye are, Lanty Lawler?”
“No, not a bit; but it’s always time enough to get the beasts, when we see the riders. I could mount two thousand men in a fortnight, any day, if there was money to the fore; ay, and mount them well, too: not the kind of devils I give the government, that won’t stand three days of hard work. Musha, Mary, but it’s getting very late; that mutton will be as dry as a stick.”
“The French likes it best that way,” said Mary, with a droll glance, as though to intimate she guessed the speaker’s object. “Take a look down the road, Lanty, and try if you can hear any one coming.”
Lanty arose from his comfortable corner with evident reluctance, and laid down his pipe with a half sigh, as he moved slowly towards the door of the cabin, which having unbarred he issued forth into the darkness.
“It’s likely I’d hear any thing such a night as this,” grumbled he to himself, “with the trees snapping across, and the rocks tumbling down! It’s a great storm entirely.”
“Is there any sign of them, Lanty?” cried Mary, as she held the door ajar, and peeped out into the gloomy night.
“I couldn’t see my hand fornint me.”
“Do you hear nothing?”
“Faix I hear enough over my head; that was thunder! Is there any fear of it getting at the powder, Mary?”
“Divil a fear; don’t be unasy about that,” said the stout-hearted Mary. “Can you see nothing at all?”
“Sorra a thing, barrin’ the lights up at Carrig-na-curra; they’re moving about there, at a wonderful rate. What’s O’Donoghue doing at all?”
“‘Tis the young boy, Herbert, is sick,” said Mary, as she opened the door to admit Lanty once more. “The poor child is in a fever. Kerry O’Leary was down here this evening for lemons for a drink for him. Poor Kerry! he was telling me, himself has a sore time of it, with that ould Scotchman that’s up there; nothing ever was like him for scoulding, and barging, and abusing; and O’Donoghue now minds nothing inside or out, but sits all day long in the big chair, just as if he was asleep. Maybe he does take a nap sometimes, for he talks of bailiffs, and writs, and all them things. Poor ould man! it’s a bad end, when the law comes with the grey hairs!”
“They’ve a big score with yourself, I’ll be bound,” said Lanty inquiringly.
“Troth, I’d like to see myself charge them with any thing,” said she, indignantly. “It’s to them and their’s I owe the roof that’s over me, and my father, and my father’s father before me owes it. Musha, it would become me to take their money, for a trifle of wine and spirits, and tay and tobacco, as if I wasn’t proud to see them send down here – the raal ould stock that’s in it! Lanty, it must be very late by this. I’m afeard something’s wrong up in the bay.”
“‘Tis that same I was thinking myself,” said Lanty, with a sly look towards the roasted joint, whose savoury odour was becoming a temptation overmuch for resistance.
“You’ve a smart baste in the stable,” said Mary; “he has eaten his corn by this time, and must be fresh enough; just put the saddle on him, Lanty dear, and ride down the road a mile or two – do, and good luck attend you.”
There never was a proposition less acceptable to the individual to whom it was made; to leave a warm fire-side was bad enough, but to issue forth on a night it would have been inhumanity to expose a dog to, was far too much for his compliance; yet Lanty did not actually refuse; no, he had his own good reasons for keeping fair with Mary M’Kelly; so he commenced a system of diplomatic delay and discussion, by which time at least might be gained, in which it was possible the long-expected guests would arrive, or the project fall to the ground on its own merits.
“Which way will they come, Mary?” said he, rising from his seat.
“Up the glen, to be sure – what other way could they from the Bay. You’ll hear them plain enough, for they shout and sing every step of the road, as if it was their own; wild devils they are.”
“Sing is it? musha, now, do they sing?”
“Ay, faix, the drollest songs ever ye heerd; French and Roosian songs – sorra the likes of them going at all.”
“Light hearts they have of their own.”
“You may say that, Lanty Lawler; fair weather or foul, them’s the boys never change; but come now be alive, and get out the baste.”
“I’m going, I’m going; it’s myself would like to hear them sing a Roosian song. Whisht! what’s that? did ye hear a shout there?”
“Here they are; that’s them,” said Mary, springing towards the door, and withdrawing the bolt, while a smart knock was heard, and the same instant, a voice called out —
“Holloa! house ahoy!”
The door at the moment flew open, and a short, thick-set looking man, in a large boat cloak, entered, followed by a taller figure, equally muffled. The former dropping his heavy envelope, and throwing off an oil-skin cap from his head, held out his arms wide as, he said —
“Marie, ma mie! embrasse moi;” and then, not waiting for a compliance with the request, sprang forward, and clasped the buxom landlady in his arms, and kissed her on each cheek, with an air compounded of true feeling, and stage effect.
“Here’s my friend and travelling companion, Henry Talbot, come to share your hospitality, Mary,” said he in English, to which the slightest foreign accent lent a tone of recitative. “One of us, Mary – one of us.”
The individual alluded to had by this time dropped his cloak to the ground, and displayed the figure of a slight and very young man, whose features were singularly handsome, save for a look of great effeminacy; his complexion was fair as a girl’s, and, flushed by exercise, the tint upon his cheek was of a pale rose colour; he was dressed in a riding coat, and top boots, which, in