The O'Donoghue: Tale of Ireland Fifty Years Ago

He moved towards the door, then turning suddenly, said —

“By-the-bye, have you heard any thing of a movement in the country here about us? The Government have apparently got some information on the subject, but I suspect without any foundation whatever.”

“To what extent does this information go?” said Sir Archy, cautiously.

“That I can’t tell you; all I know is, that my father has just received a letter from the Castle, stating that we are living in the very midst of an organised rebellion, only waiting the signal for open revolt.

“That same rebellion has been going on, to my knowledge, something more than forty years” said the O’Donoghue, laughing; “and I never knew of a Lord Lieutenant or Chief Secretary who didn’t discover the plot, and save the kingdom: always leaving a nest egg of treason for his successor to make a character by.”

“I’m no’ so sure it will not come to a hatching yet,” said Sir Archy, with a dry shake of the head.

“If it is to come, I wish with all my heart it might while I have a chance of being a spectator,” said Travers; then suddenly remembering that the levity of the remark might not please the others, he muttered a few words about a hope of better prospects, and withdrew.

During this brief colloquy, Kate listened with breathless interest to learn some fact, or even some well-grounded suspicion which might serve to put Mark on his guard; but nothing could be more vague and indecisive than Travers’s information, and it was evident that he had not concealed any thing he knew. Was he in a position to learn more, was the next question to herself – might he not be able to ascertain where the suspicion of Government rested, and on whom? Her decisions were seldom but the work of a second, and as soon as this thought struck her, she determined to act upon it. Slipping noiselessly from the room, she hastily threw a shawl around her, and hurried from the house by a small postern door, which, leading down to the high road, was considerably shorter than the causeway by which Travers must pass.

It was no time for the indulgence of bashfulness, and indeed her thoughts were far too highly excited by another’s destiny to leave any room to think of herself; and short as the path was, it sufficed to let her arrange her plan of procedure, even to the very words she should employ.

“I must not tell him it is for Mark,” said she; “he must think it is a general desire to save any rash or misguided enthusiast from ruin. But, here he comes;” and at the same instant the figure of a man was seen approaching, leading his horse by the bridle. The dark shadow of the castle fell across the road at the spot, and served to make the form dim and indistinct. Kate waited not for his coming nearer, but advancing hastily towards him, cried out —

“Captain Travers, I have a favour to ask of you – one, which my coming thus to seek – ”

“Say no more, Kate, lest I hear what was never intended for my ears,” said a low, deep voice.

“Mark – cousin Mark, is this you,” cried she, with mingled pleasure and shame.

“Yes,” replied he, in a tone of still deeper gravity; “I grieve to disappoint you – it is me.”

“Oh, Mark, mistake me not – do not wrong me,” said she, laying her hand affectionately on his arm. “I have longed so much to see you – to speak to you, ere we went away.”

“To see me– to speak to me,” said he, stepping back, and letting the moonlight fall full upon his features, now pale as death; “it was not me you expected to meet here.”

“No, Mark, but it was for you I came; I wished to serve – perhaps to save you. I know your secret, Mark, but it is safe with me.”

“And I know yours, young lady,” retorted he, bitterly. “I cannot say how far my discretion will rival your own.”

As he spoke, a horseman darted rapidly past, and as he emerged from the shadow, turned round in his saddle, stared fixedly at the figures before him, and then taking off his hat, said —

“Good-night, Miss O’Donoghue.”

When Kate-recovered the shock of this surprise, she found herself alone – Mark had disappeared; and she now returned slowly to the castle, her heart torn with opposing emotions, among which wounded pride was not the least poignant.

CHAPTER XXVII. A SUPPER PARTY

As we are about to withdraw our reader for a brief period from the scenes wherein he has so kindly lingered with us hitherto, we may be permitted to throw on them a last look ere we part.

On the evening which followed that recorded in our last chapter, the two old men were seated alone in the tower of Carrig-na-curra, silent and thoughtful, each following out in his mind the fortunes of him for whom his interest was deepest, and each sad with the sorrow that never spares those who are, or who deem themselves, forsaken.

Unaided memory can conjure up no such memorials of past pleasure as come from the objects and scenes associated with days and nights of happiness; they appeal with a force mere speculation never suggests, and bring back all the lesser, but more touching incidents of hourly intercourse, so little at the time – so much when remembered years afterwards.

The brightest moments of life are the most difficult to recall; they are like the brilliant lights upon a landscape, which we may revisit a hundred times, yet never behold under the same favourable circumstances, nor gaze on with the same enthusiasm as at first. It was thus that both the O’Donoghue and Sir Archy now remembered her whose presence lightened so many hours of solitude, and even grafted hope upon the tree scathed and withered by evil fortune. Several efforts to start a topic of conversation were made by each, but all equally fruitless, and both relapsed into a moody silence, from which they were suddenly aroused by a violent ringing at the gate, and the voices of many persons talking together, among which Mark O’Donoghue’s could plainly be heard.

“Yes, but I insist upon it,” cried he; “to refuse will offend me.”

Some words were then spoken in a tone of remonstrance, to which he again replied, but with even greater energy —

“What care I for that? This is my father’s house, and who shall say that his eldest son cannot introduce his friends – ”

A violent jerk of the bell drowned the remainder of the speech.

“We are about to hae company, I perceive,” said Sir Archy, looking cautiously about to secure his book and his spectacles before retreating to his bed room.

“Bedad, you just guessed it,” said Kerry, who, having reconnoitred the party through a small window beside the door, had now prudently adjourned to take council whether he should admit them. “There’s eight or nine at laste, and it is’nt fresh and fasting either they are.”

“Why don’t you open the door? – do you want your bones broken for you,” said the O’Donoghue, harshly.

“I’d let them gang the gate they cam,” said Sir Archy, sagely; “if I may hazard a guess from their speech, they are no in a fit state to visit any respectable house. Hear till that?”

A fearful shout now was heard outside.

“What’s the rascal staring at?” cried the O’Donoghue, with clenched teeth. “Open the door this instant.”

But the words were scarcely uttered, when a tremendous crash resounded through the whole building, and then a heavy noise like the fall of some weighty object.

“‘Tis the window he’s bruk in – divil a lie,” cried Kerry, in an accent of unfeigned terror; and, without waiting a second, he rushed from the room to seek some place of concealment from Mark’s anger.

The clash of the massive chain was next heard, as it banged heavily against the oak door; bolt after bolt was quickly shot, and Mark, calling out – “Follow me – this way,” rudely pushed wide the door and entered the tower. A mere passing glance was enough to show that his excitement was not merely the fruit of passion – his eyes wild and bloodshot, his flushed cheek, his swollen and heavy lips, all betrayed that he had drank deeply. His cravat was loose and his vest open, while the fingers of his right hand were one mass of blood, from the violence with which he had forced his entrance.

“Come along, Talbot – Holt, this way – come in boys,” said he, calling to those behind. “I told them we should find you here, though they insisted it was too late.”

“Never too late to welcome a guest, Mark, but always too early to part with one,” cried the O’Donoghue, who, although shocked at the condition he beheld his son in, resolved to betray for the time no apparent consciousness of it.

“This is my friend, Harry Talbot, father – Sir Archy M’Nab, my uncle. Holt, where are you? I’ll be hanged if they’re not slipped away; and with a fearful imprecation on their treachery, he rushed from the room, leaving Talbot to make his own advances. The rapid tramp of feet, and the loud laughter of the fugitives without, did not for a second or two permit of his few words being heard; but his manner and air had so far assured Sir Archy, that he stopped short as he was about to leave the room, and saluted him courteously.

“It would be very ungracious in me,” said Talbot, smiling, “to disparage my friend Mark’s hospitable intentions, but in truth I feel so much ashamed for the manner of our entry here this evening, that I cannot express the pleasure such a visit would have given me under more becoming circumstances.”

Sir Archibald’s surprise at the tone in which these words were delivered, did not prevent him making a suitable reply, while relinquishing his intention of retiring, he extinguished his candle, and took a seat opposite Talbot.

Having in an early chapter of our tale presented this gentleman to our reader’s notice, we have scarcely any thing to add on the present occasion. His dress indeed was somewhat different; then, he wore a riding costume – now he was habited in a frock richly braided, and ornamented with a deep border of black fur; a cap of the same skin, from which hung a band of deep gold lace, he also carried in his hand – a costume which at the time would have been called foreign.

While Sir Archy was interchanging courtesies with the newly-arrived guest, the O’Donoghue, by dint of reiterated pulling at the bell, had succeeded in inducing Kerry O’Leary to quit his sanctuary, and venture to the door of the apartment, which he did with a caution only to be acquired by long practice.

“Is he here, sir?” whispered he, as his eyes took a rapid but searching survey of the apartment. “Blessed virgin, but he’s in a dreadful temper to-night.”

“Bring some supper here directly,” cried O’Donoghue, striking the ground angrily with his heavy cane; “if I have to tell you again, I hope he’ll break every bone in your skin.”

“I request you will not order any refreshment for me, sir,” said Talbot, bowing; “we partook of a very excellent supper at a little cabin in the glen, where, among other advantages, I had the pleasure of making your son’s acquaintance.”

“Ah, indeed, at Mary’s,” said the old man. “There are worse places than that little ‘shebeen;’ but you must permit me to offer you a glass of claret, which never tastes the worse in company with a grouse pie.