Part 46 (1/2)
”How he dare!--how he dare--!” a slipper crashed into the fireplace.
”Anything for novelty. I suppose he thinks he will amuse himself with me next! He talks as if he imagines I am merely playing--as if a little coaxing and cajolery--he's--he's--bother these tangles!” and the beautiful hair began to suffer badly from its owner's perturbed frame of mind. ”But he'll soon find he's mistaken,”--the hairbrush missed the window by half-an-inch, and fell into the water-jug: ”Oh! if only I were a man and could fight him!--But I'm a Dublin Fusilier General's daughter--and I ought to know something about fighting!” Over went a chair backward, bringing down a small table laden with photo frames.
”I'll be even with him yet--the sweep!” with which she dived under the bedclothes, as if she were a whole regiment of Fusiliers storming a position.
CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR.
ROBERT MORONY ON CHURCH RESTORATION.
It was not until the second week in August that Paddy was able to start on her summer holiday, and then she journeyed to Omeath to pay her long-counted-on visit to the Parsonage.
Eileen and her mother and the two aunties were all at the little station awaiting her, when the train drew up soon after seven in the morning, and, like some small terrier beside itself with excitement, Paddy almost fell headlong, upon the top of them all. From the very instant she caught sight of her old friend the giant on Carlingford Mountain she threw off all cares, all recollections of London, all responsibilities, and stepped into the Omeath train almost the identical, headstrong, happy-go-lucky Paddy of eighteen months ago. Such a hand-shaking there had been at Greenore, for she knew all the railway porters and the station officials and everyone connected with the hotel, and, judging from the greetings, they were as pleased to see her as she them. At Omeath the others began to wonder what time they would manage to get her as far as the Parsonage, for every man, woman, and child had to be talked to and shaken hands with.
There was a great spread for breakfast--everything that they knew she liked best and poor Paddy had to taste something of each dish to please them, until she was obliged to impress them politely that she had reached the utmost limit of her capacity. After breakfast she and Eileen went off on an exploring expedition through the village. At the church gate they met the s.e.xton, old Robert Morony, a sort of monument of longevity to the village.
”I've been to see the restorations, Robert,” cried Paddy joyously.
”Doesn't the church look lovely!”
”It do, indaid, Miss Paddy,” answered the old man, shaking hands with unmistakable pleasure. ”Faith! did ye iver see sich a luvely place o'
wars.h.i.+p afore? An' everythin' so compact lik'! What I mean, nothin'
stunted.”
”I should think not, Robert. Trust Aunt Jane and Aunt Mary to do a thing thoroughly if they undertake it. When I heard the church was to be restored by them, I said, 'Begorra! that'll be an edifice to be proud of now!'”
Robert chuckled with delight.
”But shure, an' you don't see the half,” he explained eagerly. ”It's all them nice things you don't see as so pleases me. Now would you belaive--there's actually twelve new dusters! positively bran' new, all folded as neat an' trim-lik' an' put away where no one can see 'em. Now that's what I call restoring a church properly--indaid, I just luve the sight of 'em.”
”I quite agree with you, Robert,” and Paddy's eyes twinkled rarely.
”It's the things I can't see, that I love to look at.”
”Egzactly,” with growing excitement. ”_I_ ought to 'a' showed you roun', Miss Paddy, 'cos I knows where everythin' bides. Why, there's six new lamp gla.s.ses, all a-lying there case o' accidents, wrapped up in beautiful tissue paper. I'd a-lik' you to see they lamp gla.s.ses. Oh!
an' the new iron safe,” getting almost beside himself. ”Did ye see 'im a-sittin there in the vestry, on all they hymn books, all neatly stacked underneath, looking as important like as if 'e knew 'e was livin' in one o' the foinest churches in ould Oireland?”
”When an iron safe sits on hymn books, what do you suppose hatches out?”
murmured Paddy wickedly to Eileen.
”Did ye see the new bell rope?” ran on Robert, waving his stick about in a somewhat dangerous fas.h.i.+on to eyes and noses. ”A brave wee bit o'
rope that--strong 'nough to hang a man, as I says to Andrew Murphy. The blue ceiling with the yellow stars is all very well, and the new altar, and the winder with the angels playin' on real Oirish harps--but 'tis all a bit popish to my thinkin'--and I lik' that brave wee rope, and they lamp gla.s.ses in tissue paper, and they twelve bran' new dusters the best. Faith! 'tis meeself should have shown ye roun'. I'm shure ye didn't see the half. Did ye notice the new tumbler o' wather for 'is rivirence to drink from when 'is sermons is too long-winded for 'im?
Faith! we did make a job of it. Ivery 'ole and corner turned out and clained. Shure, it's meeself did the back seat by the font, and to my sartin knowledge it 'adn't been cleaned out this ten or twelve year.
Niver more'n about once since I've had the cue o' the edifice this forty year.”
This finished Paddy, and with a hasty farewell she sped off to the beach for her first sail; later on in the day writing Jack a long epistle upon Robert Morony and the church restoration, which Jack read lying at full-length on his back on the gra.s.s a month later; and his shouts of laughter brought his colleagues round to beg a share of the fun.
Two days later Eileen and her mother left for Dublin, and Paddy became the spoiled darling of the Parsonage.
She went everywhere just as of old, and though for a little while she avoided Mourne Lodge, not wis.h.i.+ng to meet Lawrence, she soon found her strategic position untenable, and was obliged to yield to the insistent persuasions of Kathleen and Doreen, who began to look genuinely puzzled and distressed over her extraordinary reluctance to visit them.