Part 26 (1/2)
”To whatever woman you make happy Mogue, there will be. Well, but, Mogue, tell me; had you a good day's sport?”
”Sorra worse then; G.o.d pardon me for swearin',” he replied. ”There riz a mist in the mountains that a man could build a house wid, if there was any implements to be found, hard and sharp enough to cut it. All we got was a brace of grouse and a snipe or two.”
”And--hem--well but--hem--why Mogue, you give but a very miserable account of the proceedings of the day. Had you any one with you?--Oh, yes, by the way, did I not see Mr. M'Carthy go out with you this morning?”
”Yes, Miss Julia, you did; he went out wid me, sure enough,” replied Mogue, drily, and with rather a dissatisfied tone.
”He is a--hem, does he shoot well?”
”He shoots well enough, Miss Julia--when he pulls the trigger the gun goes off; but as for killin' birds, that my bed may be in heaven but they fly away laughin' at him.”
”He came with you as far as O'Driscol's,” she said, at once putting a query in the shape of an a.s.sertion, ”and I suppose sent some apology to my father and brothers, for not having been here to dinner.”
”Hem! come as far as Mr. O'Driscol's?” exclaimed Mogue; ”troth he's about the poorest piece o' goods ever carried a gun--G.o.d help the unhappy woman that'll get him; for sorra thing he is but a mere excuse for a man. I left him lyin' like a half-hung dog, up in the mountains above.”
Julia started, and almost screamed with terror at this account of her lover. ”Gracious heavens, Moylan, what do you mean?” she exclaimed--”up in the mountains!--where and how in the mountains? Is he ill, or does he want aid or a.s.sistance?”
”No, Miss Julia; but the truth is, he's a poor cur of a creature that's not able to undertake a man's task at all; he's lyin' knocked up in Frank Finnerty's; moanin' and groanin' an' yowlin', like a sick hound; I had to carry or drag him over half the mountains; for, from the blessed hour of twelve o'clock this day, he wasn't able to put a foot undher him, an' he did nothing but blasphayme' an' curse every one he knew; your fathers and brothers, your sisther, and mother, and yourself; he cursed and blasphaymed you all, helther skelther; I could bear all, Miss. Julia till he came to run you down, an' 'tis well for him that I hadn't the gun in my hand when he did it, that's all; or, that I may never do an ill turn but I'd a' given him a touch o' the Moylan blood for your sake--an' now, Miss Julia,” he proceeded, ”I hope we understand one another. As for him he's a pitiful whelp!”
”Are you in jest or earnest?” she inquired, changing her tone.
”That luck may flow on me, but I'm in airnest, Miss Julia--but no matther for that, don't you let you spirits down, think of our great family; and remimber that them that was wanst great may be great agin.
Plaise G.o.d we'll have back the forwhitled estates, when we get the Millstone broke, an' the Mill that ground us banished from the counthry; however, that will come soon; but in the mane time, Miss Julia, I have a saycret to tell you about him.”
”About Mr. M'Carthy?” she asked, sadly puzzled as to the tendency and object of his conversation, but at the same time somewhat awakened to an indistinct interest, respecting this secret concerning her lover.
”Yes, miss; listen hether, Miss Julia; would you believe it that he, Mr.
M'Carthy, is sworn, or any way as good as sworn, to take your father's life away?”
”No, Mogue,” she replied firmly, but with good humor, ”not a syllable.”
”Well then,” he proceeded, ”if he did not swear to do it in plain words, he did as good. You won't braithe a syllable of this, Miss Julia; but listen still--You know the ruction that's through, the counthry aginst tides?”
”I do, I am sorry to say.”
”An' that the whole counthry is sworn Whiteboys, and that all the Whiteboys in sworn, of coorse, to put an end to them. That's the oath they take now, miss, by all accounts.”
”So they say Mogue.”
”Well, miss, would you believe it, that that fellow, the ungrateful hound that he is, that same Francis M'Carthy, is at the head of them, is one of their great leaders, and is often out at night wid the villains, leadin' them on to disturbances, and directin' them how to act; ay, an'
he doesn't like a bone in Mr. O'Driscol's body, any more than in your father's.”
”Ha!--ha!--ha! very good, Mogue, but make it short--ha!--ha!--ha!--and who's your authority for all this?”
”Himself, miss, for a great part of it; it was this day, he wanted myself to become a White-boy; but I had the grace o' G.o.d about me, I hope, an' resisted the temptation. 'Mogue,' says he, 'you are a good Catholic, an' ought to join us; we're sworn to put down the tides altogether, an' to banish Protestantism out o' the counthry.'”
”But is not M'Carthy himself a Protestant?” said Julia.
”Not he, miss, he only turned to get a lob o' money from the Great College in Dublin above; sure they provide for any one that will turn, but he's a true Catholic at heart; air when the time comes he'll show it.”
”And you say he joins their meetings at night, Mogue?”