Part 22 (2/2)
This arrangement was precisely what M'Carthy could have wished.
”Thank you, Mogue, for thinking of this--you are a considerate kind fellow, and I cordially admit that I owe my life to you this day.
Had you not been with me I must have lost my way and perished in the mountains.”
Mogue and Finnerty exchanged glances, which, however, did not escape the observation of the wife, who thoroughly understood those changes of expression, which reflected her husband's darker and sterner purposes.
”Why, then, Misther Frank, that I may be happy but I am glad I was with you, so I am, for indeed only for me I don't think, sure enough, that ever you'd see this house to-night. There's some spirits left here still, and as I'm for another stretch, I don't think a gla.s.s of it will do me, or for that matther, Frank Finnerty here, any harm. You can see me down the hills a piece, Frank; and you, Mr. Francis, might throw yourself on the bed a while, and get an hour's sleep or so.”
This too was agreed to--Mogue and Finnerty took each a gla.s.s of whiskey, as did Mrs. Finnerty, by permission of her husband, and in a few minutes she and M'Carthy were left by themselves.
After the two worthies had been gone a few minutes, she proceeded to the door, and as the night had now become tolerably light, she looked out, but with a great deal of caution. At first she saw no person, but in walking in the shadow of the house, along! the sidewall to the left, she was able to observe five or six persons coming towards her husband and Moylan in a body; she saw that they stopped and were in close conversation, pointing frequently towards the house as they spoke. She returned to M'Carthy with the same caution, and, approaching him, was about to speak, when dread of her husband supervened for the moment, and she paused like a person in doubt. The peculiar glare and the satanic smile which her husband gave to Mogue, who, by the way, seemed perfectly to understand it, oppressed her with an indistinct sense of approaching evil which she could neither shake off, nor separate from the strange gentleman to whom their glances evidently referred. She remembered also to have heard her husband say upon one occasion when he was drunk, that Mogue Moylan was the deepest villain in the barony--ay, or in the kingdom; and that only for his cowardice he would be a man after his own heart. 'Twas true, she knew that he had contradicted all this afterwards when he got sober, and said it was the liquor that caused him to speak as he did, that Mogue was a good kind-hearted crature, who loved truth, and was one of the most religious boys among them.
This, however, did not satisfy her; the impression of some meditated evil against their temporary guest was too strong to be disregarded, and on recollecting that Mogue had been up with her husband only the evening but one before, as if to prepare him for something unusual, the conviction arose to an alarming height.
We have said that this woman was a poor pa.s.sive creature, whose life was a mere round of almost mechanical action. This, to be sure, so far as regarded her own domestic duties, and in general every matter in which her husband's opinions and her own could clash, was perfectly true. She was naturally devoid, however, of neither heart nor intellect, when any of her fellow-creatures happened to come within the range of her husband's enmity or vengeance, as well as upon other occasions too, and it was well known that she had given strong proofs of this. Her life in general appeared to be one long lull, but, notwithstanding its quietude, there was, under circ.u.mstances of crime or danger, the brooding storm ready to start up into action.
”Sir,” said she, on returning into the house, ”I'm a plain and ignorant woman, so that you needn't feel surprised or alarmed at anything I am goin' to say. I hope you will pardon me, sir, when I ax if you seen my husband before, or if you know him either more or less?”
M'Carthy did feel surprised, and replied in the negative to both points of her question--”I do not know your husband,” he said, ”nor have I to my knowledge ever seen him until to-night; may I beg to inquire why you ask?”
”It's not worth your while,” she replied, ”it was a mere thought that came into my head: but you and Mogue Moylan never had a dispute, sir?”
”Why, what can put such a notion into your head, my good woman?
Certainly not. Mogue and I have been always on the best of terms.”
She paused again for some minutes, after which, she said, in a voice not audible.
”There's something in the wind for all that.
”Sir.” she proceeded, ”you'll think me odd, but will you let me ax if you wor ever threatened or put on your guard, of if you know of any enemy you have that would wish to injure you?”
M'Carthy now started, and, looking at her with a gaze of equal curiosity and astonishment, replied, ”Your language, my good woman, is beyond doubt very strange--why do you ask me these questions?”
”Answer me first, if you plaise,” she replied.
”I have certainly been put on my guard,” he returned, ”and informed that I ought to be cautious, for that I had an enemy and that danger was before me.”
”When, and in what way did this happen?”
”I shall make no further communication on the subject,” he replied, ”until you speak more plainly.”
”Then,” she proceeded, ”I'm afeard there's danger over you this night, if G.o.d hasn't said it.”
”Not, I trust, while I am under the protection of your husband and Mogue Moylan.”
She shook her head. ”If you haven't something better to depend upon, I wouldn't think myself overly safe; but you didn't answer the last question I axed you. How wor you warned, and who warned you?”
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