WAITING
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
LONDON BOMBAY CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE
WAITING
GERALD O'DONOVAN
AUTHOR OP "FATHER RALPH "
NEW YORK: MITCHELL KENNERLEY : 1915
WAITING
CHAPTER I
" HAVE you done papering the room, Mary ? "
" I have then, and the paint has dried out nicely
on the chairs. There's not the least fear of them
sticking to any one in the morning. The eggs are
gathered and the priest's cake is in the cupboard.
Maurice is bringing home a couple of pound of beef-
steak from the butcher within at Liscannow. I never
rose to the like before at a station breakfast, but a
neighbour told me Father James has a great liking
for it as a relish with his tea."
" The Lord send it might put him in good
humour," Mike Blake said, puffing a short, black,
clay pipe thoughtfully.
" Amen, amen to that," his wife said, lifting the
lid, laden with smouldering sods of turf, off a
bastable on the open hearth. " It's doing grand,"
she added, peeping under the lid, "as brown as a
berry, and no signs of burning on it."
" It's little people'll care for soda cake when
they'll have lashings of white bread and their share
of the priest's currant cake as well."
" Don't you be always looking at the black side
of things, Mike Blake. When I was borrowing the
cups and saucers off Mrs. Maloney beyond at
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Lissfad, she said the young curate had a liking for
soda cake. He was reared in a town, and no doubt
got his fill of white bread in his time, and he was
never seen to touch the priest's cake. His own
servant girl told Mrs. Maloney that, through dint of
fasting for the late masses, his stomach is that weak
that it rises against currant cake in the mornings."
Mike watched the turf blaze on the hearth for a
few minutes.
"That's queer now," he said, his eyes fixed
abstractedly on the pipe which he held out at
arm's length. " I'm always able to eat what God
sends."
Mrs. Blake took the cake out of the oven, laid
it end up against a ledge of the dresser, sniffing the
odour appreciatively.
" I know by the smell of it that it's as light as
a feather," she said, with a sigh of satisfaction.
" Everything is ready now for the morning, thanks
be to God."
" Sit down on the creepy there and take your
ease now, poor woman. It's on your feet you were
all day," Mike said, making elaborate preparations
for re-filling his pipe.
" I can't abide an untidy hearth. Wait till I
put the broom to it," she said, taking a broom
from beside the back door and brushing outlying
embers and ashes on to the fire.
She sat on a three-legged stool opposite her
husband, shaded her eyes from the blaze and
watched him scrape out his pipe with a broken blade
of an old pen-knife. He emptied the scrapings on
to the hob beside him, carefully replacing them in
the pipe when he had re-filled it with fresh tobacco.
Her gaze wandered to his face as he lifted a live sod
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of turf with the tongs, blew it to a flame, and pro-
ceeded to light his pipe. As the flame glowed on
his face a short stubble showed on his clear, ruddy-
skin.
" 'Twould never do not to be shaved in front
of the priests," she said anxiously.
He rubbed his chin with his hand, put down the
tongs and said dolefully
"True for you, Mary. That's the worst of a
station or a fair or the like, a man has to face the
razor twice in the one week. I'll bring myself to it
sometime between this and the bed."
He puffed his pipe slowly, his eyes following
the shifting figures in the fire. Now and again a
troubled look flitted across his hard grey eyes, his
lips tightened on the pipe stem, giving prominence
to his strong chin, and the lines on his forehead
deepened.
His wife followed the changes in his face with
some anxiety. Once she opened her lips as if to
speak, but shut them again. He broke the silence
after a few minutes.
u 1 wish I hadn't to face the big man," he said,
puckering his forehead till his shaggy brows almost
covered his eyes.
" Sure, he can't eat you, Mike," she said
encouragingly. " And if Father James is hard to
deal with itself, we might make it worth his while to
be pleasant and accommodating."
She glanced round the kitchen complacently.
The hammered-earth floor was swept clean. The
light of the fire glinted on old lustre jugs hanging
from the well-stocked dresser. Little curtains of
cheap lace, looped back with pink ribbon, encased
the one small window. The feeble rays of an
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oil lamp on the window sill showed up the well-
scoured deal table in front of the window, and
lost themselves in the dim shapes of a few hams
and flitches of bacon suspended from the newly
whitened ceiling.
"Whist, woman," he said, looking round
cautiously. " In a matter of the kind you mustn't
let one hand know what the other hand is doing.
We're fairly snug, thank God, but for all that we
mustn't be too free with the few pence we have.
There's Tom to think of, and Hanny will have to
be fortuned. Besides, it cost us a power of money
already to make Maurice a schoolmaster."
" It's little good that'll do him or us unless he
can get a school," Mrs. Blake said moodily.
" True enough," Mike said, tapping his pipe on
the heel of his shoe to loosen the tobacco ; " though
Maurice himself told me that up and down the
country everywhere there's plenty of priests giving
schools to masters for a knowledge of book-learning
alone, and without the compliment of a penny."
"What's the use of talking like that, Mike
Blake ? And the whole world knowing it was never
Father James Mahon's way to give anything for
nothing. Maybe it's how you want to break my
heart," she added, raising her voice, " by sending
my son roaming the nation in search of a cheap
school, and you having dry money, enough and
more to get him into Bourneen, lying idle in the
Liscannow bank. And me wearing myself to the
bone, too, for the last week, to ready the house for
as fine a station as will ever be seen in the townland
or for that matter, in the whole parish and all to
pave the way for you to broach the matter decently
to Father James."
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She wiped her eyes with the corner of her apron.
" "Tis you always had the tears handy, Mary.
Accusing me in the wrong, too ! And I only sur-
veying the ground on all sides, so as to argue the
affair proper with Father James," he said with an
aggrieved look.
" I might get the young curate to put in a
good word with Father James," Mrs. Blake said
in a calm, tearless voice, smoothing her apron
carefully. " He's taken with Maurice greatly over
the Irish."
" You might drop a tear or two at him," Mike
said dryly. " If you got round the curate itself,
sorra much good it'd do you with Father James.
As long as I remember, the one thing he can't abide
above everything else is a curate sticking his nose
into the affairs of the parish."
" It's a pity we didn't make a priest of Maurice
when we were about it. We wouldn't have to be
going hat in hand for him now," Mrs. Blake said
with a sigh.
" Hear the woman talk ! " Mike said despairingly
to the fire, spreading out his hands and shaking his
head vigorously up and down. "It's hard set enough
we were to spare the money to make a schoolmaster
of him, let alone making a priest of him."
" There's no use crying over spilt milk anyway.
Here, take the kettle off the crane, and scrape the
beard off yourself while the house is quiet. There's
nothing you'd ever do right only that I'm always at
your elbow."
" You're a caution at the tongue, you are, Mary,"
Mike grunted.
He stood up, stretched himself, yawned, and
set about his preparations for shaving in a leisurely
6 WAITING
fashion. Taking the lamp off the window sill he
put it on the corner of the table, whence it shed
a faint light on a small handglass hanging on the
wall. He laid a tin basin of hot water on the
dresser, and, after much fumbling, found his razor
in one of the lustre jugs.
" If you make a mess of the dresser, you'll get a
taste of Hanny's tongue when she comes back from
the Reardons," Mrs. Blake said, as he began to splash
the water.
She mended a rent in the back of his sleeved
waistcoat while he shaved with much spluttering and
grunting. He had just put some cobweb on a cut
on his chin, and was stropping his razor on the leg
of his corduroy trousers, when the yard gate was shut
with a bang.
"That's Maurice, or them other galivanters,
Tom and Hanny though it's early for them yet,"
Mrs. Blake said, pausing in her sewing and listening
intently. " There's only one footstep it must be
Maurice."
" Not a word to him about our little dealing with
Father James," Mike said hastily. " The less said
about a thing like that the soonest mended."
She nodded. The latch of the front door was
moved and the door pushed in. It was soon fol-
lowed by the half door, and a young man of about
twenty- four came in excitedly.
" It's true about the Bourneen school," he said.
" I got a lift home from Father Ned Malone, and
he told me for certain that the old master resigned
to-day."
His blue eyes gleamed and lit up his whole face,
giving a boyish softness to his strong jaw and firm
lips. He held up a discoloured newspaper parcel,
WAITING 7
smiled with the corners of his lips, and threw the
parcel on the table.
" I don't think I'll ever be able to eat meat again
after bringing that all the way from Liscannow,"
he said, wiping his hands on the roller towel at the
back of the door.
" I was afeard you might forget it, and we must
lose no chance of getting the right side of Father
James now," Mrs. Blake said, her eyes fixed on him
in admiration. " It's no surprise to me," she went
on, again plying her needle rapidly, " that Master
Driscoll is giving up. He gave me a hint of it
early in the summer, and you still up in Dublin at
the Training College. ' I'm growing old, Mrs.
Blake,' he said, c and by Christmas I'll lay the cane
aside. With the help of God, and approaching
Father Mahon in the right way, Maurice'll step
into my shoes,' he said."
Maurice took a seat in the chimney corner and
gazed at the fire.
" When I think of asking the big man I get
nervous," he said. " He's very distant with me
when he passes me on the road ever since I came
home. Though he knows I'm fully trained and all."
" Priests do have a lot on their minds," his
mother said eagerly. " I wouldn't mind his black
looks at all. Sure, you wouldn't, Mike ? "
" Sorra bit," Mike said, emptying the basin of
water with an emphatic dash through the back door.
"It comes natural to a man that has the ruling of
several hundred families in a big parish like this to
carry himself stiff"."
" It's not my idea of a priest," Maurice said, with
a slight frown ; " Father Ned, now, is different "
" Oh, he's only a new beginner. When he fills
8 WAITING
out and gets a parish of his own, you'll see he'll be
important enough," Mrs. Blake said, holding up the
waistcoat to the light.
" He's not that sort," Maurice said, laughing.
" Will ye not leave the priests alone ? They
belong to God and let Him look after them," Mike
said, drawing a wooden chair across the floor to the
front of the fire. "Besides, you'd never know
when you'd want them to do you a good turn."
" He can't do worse than refuse me."
" Refuse a master with all the prize books and
certificates you have ! Did you ever hear the like,
Mike ? " Mrs. Blake said, throwing the waistcoat
into Mike's lap. "There's your waistcoat for you,
and don't be tearing it again in a hurry. Not but
that it might be better, maybe, if Mike had a word
with the priest first," she added, with a shrewd look
at her husband.
Maurice looked dubiously at his father, who
said, as he wriggled into his waistcoat, " It's hardly
worth while putting it on and it so near bed-
time
" Did you hear me, Mike ? " Mrs. Blake said
sharply.
" My face is as prickly as a furze field the way
I grubbed at it with the razor," Mike said irrele-
vantly. When he had buttoned his waistcoat he
glanced hesitatingly at his wife. Her stern look
seemed to give him courage. He struck his knee
sharply with his hand. "I'll do it," he said. "I'll
face him like a man."
" I think I'd rather send in my application and
stand on my own merits. After all, I'm well quali-
fied," Maurice said shyly.
" Listen to the dying-away voice of him when
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he's talking of himself ! " Mrs. Blake said disdain-
fully. " If Father James let a bellow at you he'd
make you tongue-tied entirely. Be said by your
mother, and there's a good boy. Mike can make
the most of your good points. He's not much at
the talk except when he's worked up, but then the
language rises in him like water in a pump."
Maurice smiled, frowned and muttered some-
thing about not liking it. Mike shuffled his feet
uneasily and was about to speak when his wife shut
him up.
"Take a look up the road and see if them
stragglers are coming home," she said. " Hanny
and myself '11 have our work cut out for us in the
morning, and we ought to be in bed by now."
Mike got up with a sigh of relief. " I'll have
a look round too, and see that the cattle are safe for
the night," he said, moving towards the door.
Mother and son sat on by the fire. He played
with the smouldering sods with the tongs. She
watched him hungrily, her hands laid flat on her lap.
" It's a great chance to have you near me for
ever and always," she said, with a break in her
voice.
He looked up with a start, but her face was as
he had always seen it, lined and hard.
" I'll be able to work now. There's so much
for a man to do." The glow in his eyes died away.
" That is if I get Bourneen," he added doubtfully.
" I had it in my mind you to be there, ever since
the day Master Driscoll said he was going to make
a monitor of you," she said gently.
" I've been a great burthen on ye all, spending
and not making anything."
" Mike itself, and he's sometimes close with the
io WAITING
money, never grudged the few pounds we spent on
you."
" I didn't mean it in that way, mother," he said
impulsively, laying his hand on hers.
She looked at his hand curiously for a moment.
" I don't know what's come over me," she said,
rising hastily. " It's the press of work for the
station, I doubt, that has taken the wits out of me."
She moved and replaced several articles on the
dresser. " That's your father's notion of cleaning
up after himself. He and his shaving ! It's like a
litter of pigs about the floor. It's marrying you'll
be thinking of now when you get a school of your
own ? " she added without turning round.
Maurice laughed heartily. " It's a queer mood
you're in, mother. I've something else to do
besides marrying. Moreover, there isn't a girl
between here and Dublin that'd take a second
look at me."
" Isn't there then ? " she said, bridling and
facing him, her arms akimbo. Her eyes rested
on his face, from which his eyes gleamed humor-
ously through half-closed lids ; passed with a grow-
ing look of satisfaction over his well-knit figure,
the lines of which not even his ill-fitting black
coat and baggy tweed trousers could conceal. "And
plenty, maybe, the hussies ! if you gave 'em any
encouragement. Keep ofF them, Maurice, agra,
it's only supping sorrow you'd be with the half ot
'em. Not that people heed that very much when
the fit is on 'em," she added half to herself.
The sound of laughter came through the open
door. Mrs. Blake frowned. She listened a moment
and smiled wearily.
" That's Minnie Reardon's laugh," she said,
WAITING 1 1
pursing her lips. " She sees Tom and Hanny down
the road, and now he'll see her back home. Well,
well, sooner or later it comes to every one, and he
could do worse. Larry Reardon can give her a
good pot of money, and we could fortune Hanny
out of it decently, and have some over. What kept
you so late, Hanny ? " she said to a shawled girl
who stood hesitating in the doorway.
" The Irish class was late to-night," Hanny said
apologetically. " But look at what I've brought,
mother."
" Irish or Rooshan, it's the same the world
over " Mrs. Blake was beginning, when she
caught sight of a teapot in the parcel which Hanny
was undoing. " Not Mrs. Reardon's best Britannia
metal teapot ! " she said in surprise.
"The very one," Hanny said, displaying it
proudly. " Mrs. Reardon forced it on me, for to
be the priest's teapot at the station to-morrow.
It'll look grand at the head of the table."
" Six and twenty years I've seen it in her cup-
board, or on her room table on station days, but she
never proffered it to me before," Mrs. Blake said
musingly, holding the teapot between her and the
light.
" It's a grand teapot," Maurice said quizzingly.
" It is," Mrs. Blake said, snapping her lips.
" It shows how the wind blows up at the Reardons,
anyway. But sure, it's glad and thanking God I
ought to be to have Tom well done for, and not
to be flying in the face of Providence."
" Strawberry and Blacky were lashing at other
in the stall, and I had to spancel " Mike said,
coming in.
His wife interrupted him crossly. " It's all
12 WAITING
hours of the night. Will you begin the Rosary,
Mike Blake, and not be gabbling there ? I'll have
to be up before the dawn to ready things for the
priests."
Mike grumbled that there was " no depending
on a woman's temper between one minute and the
next," but he knelt obediently by the hob, and gave
out the Five Glorious Mysteries, to which his
family responded, kneeling beside a chair or table.
Mrs. Blake looked towards the door as the latch
rattled in the middle of the second mystery, and
watched Tom, a loose-framed, yellow-haired giant,
creep in on tiptoe and kneel by the dresser. " I
might as well steel my heart to be parted from them
all," she muttered, leaning her head on her arms.
In a moment she added a fervent voice to the
response, " Holy Mary, mother of God, pray for
us sinners.
CHAPTER 11
HANNY BLAKE'S face was flushed and shining as
she stood before the looking-glass in the kitchen
and pushed a stray curl into place.
" What o'clock is it now ? " Mrs. Blake called
out anxiously from a room off the kitchen.
" It's seven by the clock, so it's half-past six
at least," Hanny replied, after a few seconds calcu-
lation in front of the old, uncased, grandfather clock
hanging from the wall beside the dresser. " Every-
thing is near done, and there's oceans of time. No
one is likely to be here before half-past seven."
" Did you see that your father had on his clean
shirt ? "
I did."
" I'm just getting out of my old skirt, and I'll be
ready to meet the world in a couple of minutes.
Come in and see is there any button loose behind
on me ? "
Hanny stood for a while at the door, admiring
the room for the hundredth time. It was all newly
done up. Pink tissue paper filled the small grate.
Blue cornflowers predominated in the many-coloured
wall-paper. A brilliant patchwork quilt covered the
four-poster bed in the corner. Bed-posts, wooden
chairs, the mantelpiece, the window sill, the huge
cupboard, and Mrs. Blake's wooden chest, at the
foot of the bed, were all freshly painted in chocolate
i 4 WAITING
red. The crochet antimacassar on the one hair-cloth
armchair, the curtains on bed and window had come
spotless from a recent washing. New fibre matting
covered the earthen floor. Mrs. Blake's cast-off
clothes, strewn around her on the matting, were alone
out of place. Hanny picked them up and thrust
them into the trunk. She then walked all round
her mother and nodded approvingly.
" You look years younger in them clothes," she
said, tightening a hairpin. " Though the apron is
white itself, I'd be inclined to leave it off," she
added, examining it critically.
" I'd be lost without it for want of something
to do with my hands," Mrs. Blake said, looking
round the room carefully. " Everything is right
here as far as I can see. There's the chair with the
cushion on it for Father James to hear on, and all
the things for the room breakfast are on the table
there in the corner. Don't forget to come in about
the last gospel and pull it into the middle of the
room, and lay it out right. Minnie Reardon might
help you."
" She will. I asked her last night ; she said
she'd be glad to do anything."
" She did, did she ? I suppose she thinks any
one marrying Tom'll get the room. But sorra foot
Mike and me'll budge out of it as long as there's
breath in our bodies. If the finest lady in the land
came into the house she must put up with the big
room upstairs, and I'll be loth to disturb Maurice
out of that too, for a stranger. Is there a chair
in your room for Father Ned to hear on ? "
"There is."
" And everything else ? "
Hanny ticked off the items on her fingers.
WAITING 15
" The cows are milked and driven out. The
horses are in the cow stalls, and there's a feed
of oats in the manger in the stable for the priests'
horses."
" You saw to that with your own eyes ? "
" I did."
" I wouldn't trust a man to do anything right on
a morning like this. Any trifle of sense they have
leaves them. I'm sure your father forgot to put a
bundle of rushes in that puddle by the gate ? "
" He did it near an hour ago. Besides, it's
near dried out with the frost."
Mrs. Blake looked disappointed, but said cheer-
fully-
" It promises to be sunny, and it'll get wet again
soon. Them white frosts don't last long."
They went into the kitchen, where Hanny con-
tinued to tick off her list.
" The kitchen breakfast things are on the dresser,
all ready. The big kettle is full to the brim, and
on the top crook, well out of the reach of the fire.
The eggs are in the skillet, ready to be put on. The
beefsteak is in the pan under the hob."
" Everything is going too smooth to last," Mrs.
Blake said dolefully. " You forgot the clean bag
for the priest's feet in front of the altar when he's
saying mass," she added sharply.
" I didn't then. It's there rolled up so as not to
be walked on by the throng of people. I'll spread
it out after Matsey Boylan lays the altar," Hanny
said, in a slightly ruffled tone.
" Don't lose heart, Hanny, agra," Mrs. Blake
said, patting her daughter on the shoulder. " I'm
not fault-finding. Only making sure that we'll get
the full credit out of all our slaving and a credit
1 6 WAITING
to us it is, if we were up before cock-crow to-day
itself."
She looked around the kitchen complacently, at
the cheerful turf fire on the hearth, at the burnished,
brass candlesticks on the ledge over the settle. She
sighed happily as she took a Prayer-book off a shelf,
sat on a creepy and said
" I might be able to say a few prayers, and
prepare for confession before the people come.
You'd best rest your limbs too."
Hanny was too restless to sit down. She took
another look in the glass, and refixed the brooch in
the lace collar which she wore over her blouse. As
she stood at the door the red sun turned to gold as
it rose over a low hill in the distance. The bare
elm tree at the end of the bawn seemed to hold the
sun in the close embrace of one of its huge branches,
curved like an arm. It reminded her somehow of
Jim Reardon. She blushed, and fell to wondering
if he'd admire all she had done to the house for the
last week. Would she ever have a house of her
own to paper, and whitewash and paint ? Jim
Reardon came into her thoughts again, but she
said a " Hail Mary " to put him away he was too
distracting. With a deep sigh she went in to the
kitchen, knelt by the settle and began her preparation
for confession.
Mike Blake and his two sons lounged by the
gate, clad in their best clothes.
" We were turned out of bed hours too early,"
Mike said resentfully.
" It was the most wonderful dawn I ever saw,"
Maurice said dreamily : " the grey pallor of a corpse
flushing into this." He waved his hand towards
the elm tree.
WAITING 17
Mike yawned. " It's the promise or a fine day,
sure enough, but I wish I wasn't shook out of the
blankets so soon, and I wanting all my strength,
too, to face Father James." He dragged at his tight
collar. " If a man could only take a shough of a
pipe itself, but I'm afeard of swallowing the smoke
and breaking my fast, and it'd never do for the
head of the house not to lead the way to com-
munion at a station mass. Look down the road,
Tom, and see if there's any signs of the priests'
coming."
Tom stepped out briskly, fingering his tie,
rubbing back his shock hair at the sides, and
straightening his hat. He looked up the road first
and sighed.
" There's no sign of them," he said dejectedly,
when he returned.
" Nor of the Reardons either, I suppose ? "
Maurice said dryly, with a smile.
" No," Tom said shortly, blushing to the colour
of his reddish-yellow hair.
" You're doing great work about the place,
Tom," Maurice said.
Tom looked pleased, but said gruffly, " It's only
a trifle."
" It's a tower of strength you are to the
place "
" I think I'll wait within," Tom said, interrupting
his father.
" I'd as Kef keep out of the reach of your mother's
tongue when she's in a fuss," Mike said, his eyes
following Tom's retreating figure. " He's a giant
of a man and as biddable as a child a throw back
in size to some old ancestor, I suppose, for he's a
head above his mother or myself. Not but he has
c
1 8 WAITING
the obstinacy of a jackass when he's roused, which
is seldom. It's the way with all them quiet-going
people. He mightn't have the learning of you,
Maurice, but he has a powerful grip of things "
He was settling himself down to a long speech
when a young priest drove up to the gate.
" You're heartily welcome, Father Ned," Mike
said, standing, hat in hand, at the side of the trap,
while Maurice stood at the horse's head.
The priest, a tall, fair man in glasses, a heavy
frieze coat buttoned to his chin, jumped down and
shook Mike's hand warmly.
"Don't let the grass grow under your feet
about Bourneen school," he whispered to Maurice
as he passed. " I tried to pump the P.P. last night,
but he was a dry well."
Mrs. Blake, Hanny and Tom met him at the
door.
" God bless the house," he said heartily.
"And you too, Father," they said in one voice.
Before he had taken off his overcoat half a dozen
people arrived. He chatted pleasantly with them,
holding his hands towards the blaze.
" Won't you sit down, Father, and take a real
heat of the fire ? " Mrs. Blake said, pushing a chair
towards him.
He shook his head, took a purple stole from the
pocket of his soutane and put it round his neck.
" I'm late as it is," he said, with a regretful
glance at the fire. " I must try and hear the bulk
of the people before Father James comes. If you
show me where I'm to sit, I'll start at once."
She led the way to Hanny's small bedroom
off the kitchen, to the back of " the room." He
sat on a chair inside the half-opened door. Mrs.
WAITING 19
Blake knelt on the clay floor and began her
confession.
" The curate itself stands in fear of the big man,"
a woman in the kitchen whispered.
" Faith, and why wouldn't he ? 'Tis Father
James has an awesome eye," her neighbour replied.
A thin stream of people now began to arrive. The
queue, opposite the room in which Father Malone
was hearing confessions, extended in an irregular
curve to the back door, and along the side-wall as
far as the settle. Most of the women wore shawls
over their heads ; a few were in hats and bonnets,
and a few in long, hooded cloaks of dark-blue pilot
cloth. Even Hanny donned a shawl before taking
her place in the queue. When they had confessed,
the women knelt in corners or around the fireplace,
and prayed with an occasional whisper to a neigh-
bour. " 'Tis Father Ned is easy with the penance."
u He's a grand man entirely." " He never puts the
blush on your face with an awkward question."
The men, after kneeling for a few minutes, retired
to the yard in front of the house, where they talked
in small groups in hushed tones. Mrs. Blake flitted
between " the room " and the kitchen fire, making
final preparations. She counted the people in the
kitchen and in the yard and whispered to Hanny
" Do you miss any one ? "
u They're all here except the Dilleens, and you
can count on three of them."
" Stand you by the door and give me word when
Father James appears, so that I can be outside to bid
him welcome."
She placed the Britannia metal teapot, a large tin
one, and two made of brown earthenware on the
seat within the fireplace.
20 WAITING
" Keep an eye on them, Mrs. Donlon," she said
to a woman kneeling near, " and don't let any one
knock over the canister."
" Here's Father James now, mother. He's just
getting down at the gate," Hanny said in a loud,
excited whisper.
There was a general movement throughout the
kitchen. The muttering of prayer in the corners
ceased. All stood up.
" Keep the passage to the room clear, and to the
fire, too. He might like a heat of it before he begins
to hear," Mrs. Blake said, rushing towards the door.
''Let me in before you, Bessy," a girl said
eagerly to another in front of her in Father Malone's
queue. " 1 must get heard before Father Ned stops.
I never could face Father James. Sure you have
nothing to tell."
"Little or more, I'm not going to tell it to
Father James. The place I have I'll keep."
Mrs. Blake and Hanny stood on the doorstep.
The men in the yard held their hats in their hands.
Mike Blake stretched an arm over the wheel of
Father Mahon's trap to save his greatcoat. Tom
patted the horse's head, while Maurice fidgeted
uneasily in the background.
Still sitting in the trap Father Mahon unwound
a long, black, woollen muffler which swathed his
neck and the lower part of his face.
"Hang that near the fire. It might be damp
from the touch of frost on my breath," he said,
handing the muffler to Mike.
" Sure I will, your reverence."
" Rub the mare down well, and cover her.
Don't give her more than a lock of oats, only let it
be good."
WAITING 21
" I'll see to that, sir," Tom said stiffly.
A slight look of suspicion passed over the priest's
steel grey eyes, but he laughed. It was an un-
smiling laugh that came in a harsh cackle from the
back of his throat, and had a varied effect on those
who heard it. Tom twitched at the reins, and, with
a sour look on his usually pleasant face, said, " Dang
you," to the mare. Matsey Boylan, the clerk,
who was fumbling with the station-box at the back
of the trap, grasped the box nervously and slunk away
towards the house. Mike attempted a sickly smile,
but there was no responsive laugh from any one.
Father Mahon frowned on Tom ; who said
cheerfully, " I'm afraid I pulled her mouth, your
reverence."
The frown persisted as he descended from the
trap with dignity. It was more pleasant than his
laugh and seemed to put Mike at his ease.
"You're looking grand, your reverence," he
said admiringly.
"Thank you, thank you," the priest said,
drawing himself up.
He was an imposing man of about six feet
two, and held his square shoulders well back. He
carried himself so well that one hardly noticed
the curvature in the front of his overcoat where
the middle buttons were somewhat strained. In
occasional moments of repose his face looked hand-
some. His chin was strong, his nose well formed ;
the blue black of his skin, where he shaved, went
well with his rather heavy, black eyebrows and thick,
black hair flecked with grey. But he had a habit
of protruding his under-lip and contracting his
forehead and eyebrows that took away somewhat
from his good looks.
22 WAITING
He threw a keen look at Maurice, said " How
are you ? " but did not wait for a reply. He looked
over the wall of the kitchen garden on his left
and said, " Humph ! " as his eyes rested on some
flower beds.
"They're Hanny's," Mike said. "Tom gives
her a hand at them an odd time."
Mrs. Blake was already curtseying at the door ;
but Father James, after waving his hand carelessly
to a few men in the yard who greeted him, stood
inspecting the house, his eyes passing through and
over her without recognition.
"You're getting up in the world every year,
Mike," he said.
" God is fairly good to us," Mike said cautiously.
" I don't hold myself with whitewashing to that
extent. And them window boxes are only throwing
away money. It cost a power, too, to move the
manure heap out of the bawn, and shut up the
doors of the stable and cowhouse on this side,
and make new doors into the new yard at the
back."
" Humph ! " Father James said, walking on.
Mrs. Blake curtseyed again, saying, "You're
welcome, Father."
"Well, Mrs. Blake," he said, shaking hands
with a preoccupied air, " how is all your care ? "
" Finely, your reverence, and thank you kindly,"
she said, following at his heels. "There's a nip of
frost in the air. Won't you take a heat of the
fire ? "
He made no reply to this. He nodded and
waved his right hand in a blessing to those who
bowed and curtseyed in the kitchen, as he walked
into the room.
WAITING 23
" For God sake let some one go in to him ?
He'll be vexed to be kept waiting," Mrs. Blake said
anxiously.
" I suppose I'll have to go in," Mike said with
a sigh, laying his hat on the floor.
" 'Tis Mike has the bold spirit," a woman said
admiringly.
" Sure if the man of the house wouldn't give
the good example, who would ? " another said.
" Himself isn't in the best of tempers to-day,"
Mrs. Blake said to Matsey Boylan, busy over the
station-box, jerking her thumb towards the room
door.
" If it's Mike you mean, I see no loss on him ;
if it's the priest you mean, he's as cross as two sticks,"
Matsey said, lifting the collapsible station-box on to
the kitchen table, and giving his attention to the
arrangement of the temporary altar.
" Put a splinter of wood, one of ye, under that
front leg of the table to steady it," he said. " That'll
do now. Let ye keep back," he added to several
willing helpers, " and don't ye put a finger near any
of the blessed things, the chalice or the altar stone
or the like, or maybe ye'd find yourselves turned
into a beast or something worse."
" Glory be to God," an old woman said, " and
it's gospel truth, for I often heard it said in my
young days."
Mrs. Blake was busy dragging people from the
end of Father Ned Malone's queue and pushing
them forcibly through " the room " door to confess
to Father Mahon. She soon tired of this and spoke
generally
" Ye might as well go first as last. The more
of ye that go to him the better chance there'll be
24 WAITING
for the rest of ye to be heard by the young priest.
For if ye leave long gaps Father James'll think
ye're all done, and give orders to Father Ned to
begin the mass. And where'll ye be then ? Ye'll
have to go to Father Mahon whether ye like it
or no."
"There's something in what you say, Mrs.
Blake, but I don't see how 'twould benefit me,"
a woman said doubtfully, making an effort to resist
Mrs. Blake's pull on her arm. " I don't like to be
disrespectful to the woman of the house, but you
took good care, ma'am, to make your soul yourself
with the young curate."
" Is the altar ready ? " Father Mahon called out
from the room.
" It is, your reverence. I'm just lighting the
candles," Matsey said.
"Then ring the bell and tell Father Malone to
begin mass. I'll hear the few that are over."
" Let me in first, Matsey, and I'll not forget it
to you," whispered the man nearest Father Malone's
door as Matsey approached.
" It'd be as much as my place is worth, if him-
self came to know of it," Matsey said, after a
moment's hesitation ; " and he has eyes in the back
of his head."
There was a general sigh from the penitents
as they crossed over reluctantly to Father Mahon's
door.
While Father Malone was praying in front of
the altar, Matsey rang a small bell at the kitchen
door. The little groups in the yard broke up and
the men entered the house. The large kitchen was
soon packed, an overflow extending into Hanny's
bedroom. Mrs. Blake lowered the kettle nearer
WAITING 25
to the flame, drew the pot of eggs close to the fire
and ladled tea into the teapots.
Before putting on his chasuble Father Malone
sprinkled the little congregation with holy water.
All stood up to receive it. For a moment there
was a re-shifting of places. Hanny knelt near the
room door. Mrs. Blake beckoned to Maurice and
whispered
" I'll keep handy to the fire myself to lift on the
things when the time comes. Keep convenient to
the front door you. Though you shut the half-
door itself, them hens have a way of jumping up on
it when they're least wanted. Hoosh them off the
minute you catch sight of one, or they'll be drowning
the voice of the priest and Matsey."
Maurice knelt in the corner between the dresser
and the door. Not even the warm clasp of old
Master Driscoll's hand, nor his assurance, " he
must give it to you the whole parish would rise
against him if he didn't," had driven away the
feeling of depression evoked in him by Father
Mahon's manner. He had missed going to con-
fession to Father Malone. He watched the people
go in and out of the room in which Father Mahon
was still hearing, and half got up off his knees.
He dropped back again. It would be a mockery
with the feelings he had towards the priest. He
heard the priest's voice raised in anger addressing
some penitent, and felt still more bitter. Stories he
had heard from his youth up of Father Mahon's
tyranny came into his mind ; and stories of other
priests heard from students in the Training College.
How could he take a school from him ? A longing
to get away from Bourneen came over him. A hen
fluttered on to the half-door. He hooshed it away
26 WAITING
with a smile, and smiled again at a ridiculous mis-
pronunciation of a Latin phrase in Matsey's stentorian
voice. He looked towards the altar. Father
Malone's eyes were fixed with an absorbed look on
the missal from which he was reading the Sanctus.
Was it the effect of his glasses, or some trick of the
sunlight streaming through the window and lighting
up the priest's face, that so transformed his common-
place features ? An indescribable quality was in his
voice too, as if he saw and felt and tried to put into
words some vision that made him transcendently
happy.
Matsey tinkled the bell at the end of the Sanctus
and the spell was broken. Father Mahon blew his
nose loudly in the room. Father Malone read the
canon silently. The congregation coughed and
shuffled. A voice said impatiently, "Don't be
scrooging me, will you ? " The bell tinkled again
to announce the consecration. There was a drawing
in of breath and a bending of heads. The priest's
voice, hardly raised above his breath, filled the whole
kitchen. The kettle sang on the hearth, the clock
ticked loudly, a cock crowed in the yard. But
these sounds only made the silence deeper. The
sun danced, as if in joy, on the brass candlesticks
over the settle, on the tin basin that hung by the
back door, and glittered through the white hair
of an old man bending forward over the stick with
which he supported his shaking body. The priest's
voice seemed to have gathered to itself all the pent-
up emotion of the congregation as he spoke the
words of consecration, and, for a moment, Maurice
had the feeling of infinite peace and harmony that
he felt, earlier in the morning, when the first saffron
tints of the sky in the east flushed into pink.
WAITING 27
At the last tinkle of the bell the whole congrega-
tion breathed a deep sigh in unison, and the coughing
and shuffling began anew. As he held back from
communion Maurice felt that he had missed much,
and regretted that he had not gone to confession,
even to Father Mahon of whom he now thought
more gently.
At the last gospel Mrs. Blake elbowed her way
towards Hanny.
" Why aren't you laying the table ? " she said
impatiently.
" He's walking about the room, and Minnie
and myself were afraid to venture it."
" You haven't the spunk of a cat. Go up and
wet the tea you, and I'll do it."
As Father Malone was taking off his vest-
ments, Father Mahon stood in front of the altar,
facing the people, and spoke what he called a few
words in season. He gave a vivid picture of hell,
of its many torments, especially of its heat, which
was so great that if all the oceans, seas, rivers and
lakes of the world were poured into hell they would
dry up in a moment, quicker than a spit in a
limekiln. He was in the middle of an illustration
in which a little boy in torn breeches was sliding
down a red-hot banister, when the frizzling and
odour of beefsteak filled the room.
" Bedad, I can smell the gossoon burning," some
one whispered.
There was a smothered laugh. Father Mahon
frowned and paused.
" If he starts again the tea'll be as black as
senna," came from near the fire.
There was a loud clatter of crockery from the
room.
28 WAITING
" It's impossible for a preacher to collect his
thoughts in such a pandemonium. I'll take the
dues now," Father Mahon said crossly, opening a
black note-book which he had been fingering while
he was preaching.
" Mike Blake," he called out.
Mike laid a half-sovereign and a half-crown on
the table which, by Matsey Boylan's efforts while
Father Mahon was preaching, had ceased to be an
altar.
" For the mass ; for the dues," Mike said, as
he laid down each coin separately.
" It's an improvement ; but not enough, not
enough," the priest said, protruding his under lip.
" A man of your substance too, and your land your
own now."
" And what would you be cessing me at, your
reverence ? " Mike said, scratching his grizzled
head.
" Make it the even pound," the priest said,
wetting the point of his pencil.
" Bedad, that's new doctrine, your reverence,
and I paying high at the Christmas and Easter
collections."
" There's no compulsion," the priest said laugh-
ing, showing his regular, yellow teeth.
" What are you up to, Mike ? bandying words
with the priest, and in your own house too,"
Mrs. Blake said agitatedly, a teapot in her hand.
" He's got into that habit of arguing with me, your
reverence, over every trifle, 'tis no wonder he'd
forget himself when he's talking to his betters.
And the priest of the parish, too ! For shame,
Mike 1 "
Mike drew a dirty linen bag from an inside
WAITING 29
pocket of his waistcoat, and reluctantly undid the
string. He laid another half-sovereign on the
table, and was taking back the half-crown when
Mrs. Blake pulled away his hand.
"Is it take back money you would, once you
laid it on the altar of God ? You're no better than
a heathen savage. He's only an ignorant man at
the best, your reverence."
" God will bless the cheerful giver," Father
James said sententiously. " You all know how it
grieves me to speak about money. All I shall say
is that I hope Mike Blake's generosity will prove a
good example to others."
" I never heard him yet that there wasn't a silver
tail to his sermon," Larry Reardon muttered to his
wife, in the background. " 'Twas a dirty trick
Mike Blake played on the whole of us, giving such
a lead as that so readily."
" I wouldn't be too hard on the poor people.
It's easy seen they're making up to him because
of Maurice," his wife whispered. " We'll have to
rise a little I doubt, but I'd take no pattern from
Mike Blake. On account of the purchase of the
land, and the whole world knows we got it cheap,
I wouldn't grudge him a couple of shillings.
But as for gold ! I'd see him in heaven first, the
Lord forgive me. There's many a place the
station dues is only a shilling, and he's bent on
making 'em equal to Christmas and Easter. You
haven't the character of a mouse, Larry, unless
you put down your foot upon it," she added
vehemently.
" Whist, woman. It's easier said than done ;
not but I'll put up a strong fight," Larry said, with
doubtful firmness.
30 WAITING
While Father James haggled with each con-
tributor, Mike Blake stood by the front door with
hospitable intent. Custom made the house free to
all for mass, but breakfast was a matter of private
hospitality. Custom also dictated that after payment
of the dues all strangers should make an effort to
leave. Mike intercepted them at the door.
" Sorra foot any one'll leave the house without
breakfast. Don't be slipping away there, Mrs.
Hinnissey," he said, embracing a fat woman who
got wedged in the doorway in an attempt to get
out.
"With all the throng you have, I thought I'd
better be making myself scarce."
"There's lashings for all, and besides the wife'd
never forgive you for leaving her in the lurch
like that."
" Faith, I wouldn't be offending her for the
whole world," Mrs. Hinnissey said, going back
cheerfully.
" I am surprised at you trying to leave without
breaking your fast, Teigue Donlon."
" Mightn't I be let have a draw of the pipe in
the yard itself ? "
Mike looked out. " You might then. Tom is
at his post by the gate, so there's no danger of you
slipping away. I'd like a few draws myself, but I
must do my duty here," with a sigh.
Mrs. Blake kept up a constant march between
the room and the kitchen fire. She chafed at the
delay over the collection, complained that the eggs
would be as hard as bullets : a hard case for her,
she explained, as it was her pride on a station day
to have the milk running out of the tops. The
steak, too, was done to thraneens and would be
WAITING 31
as tough as leather, a sore trial for Father Mahon's
teeth to get through. It was all to the good, of
course, to have the room table laid, but how was a
woman to have any peace till the kitchen table was
ready ? and that couldn't be touched till the money
was cleared off it. She put fresh coals under the
teapots, ranged in a semicircle round the hearth, and
ordered Minnie Reardon to keep on cutting bread
and butter, nice and thick, while she had any strength
left in her arm. She gave a sigh of relief when
Father Mahon closed the station book with
" It's not too bad, but it ought to be better,
much better."
" Won't you take the head of the table in the
room now, your reverence ? Sure you must be
starved to death," she said, curtseying.
He assented graciously, almost with a smile.
" There's no use in leaving this money to Mike
he has too much as it is," he said jocosely, gathering
up the coins and stuffing them into his trousers'
pockets.
When the priest left the kitchen Hanny spread
a cloth on the kitchen table, which was soon covered
with dishes of bread and butter, currant cake, eggs,
and a varied assortment of crockery. There was
much disputing as to who should sit at the kitchen
table or in the room with the priests. It needed much
persuasion and some pushing on the part of Mrs.
Blake to induce her guests to take the more honour-
able position. One said that the big man paralysed
his tongue ; another, that he could eat more free if
the eyes of the clergy wasn't on him. Matsey
Boylan said that by rights the clerk of the parish
should sit with the clergy it was the way in old
ancient days ; but in these days the clerk had come
32 WAITING
down in the world, and only for the drop of wine
that was always left when Father M alone said mass,
he'd have no heart in him for his breakfast at all.
" Is it a fine young man like you, and all the
girls running after you, Matsey ? " Mrs. Hinnissey
said.
" They are that. But what's the use, when my
mother won't let me have one of them ?" he said
dismally. " I'll be fifty-three come Martinmas, but
she says she'd take the stick to me if ever I thought
of bringing one of 'em in on the floor to her." Tears
filled his weak, rheumy eyes and his jaw dropped.
" And who is she now ? " Mrs. Hinnissey said
encouragingly.
Matsey's eyes brightened and he pushed a wisp
of grey hair over his bald forehead.
" Well, last week it was Ellen Davey ; but I was
greatly taken by a likely girl of the Dwyers' at the
station we were at yesterday. But, begob, if either
Miss Hanny there or Miss Reardon would only say
the word, I'd risk my mother and the stick," he
said valiantly, though his wizened face blanched a
little.
"It's a pity I'm not a widow woman," Mrs.
Hinnissey said with a sigh. " If I could only get
rid of Jack you might cast an eye on me, Matsey ? "
Matsey looked at her critically.
" There's no denying you're fine and fat and
comfortable looking "
"I'm the best of fat pork," Mrs. Hinnissey
shouted, laughing boisterously.
" Come away into the room out of that, Mrs.
Hinnissey," Mrs. Blake interrupted, " and try and
raise a laugh there. A funeral is nothing to it for
solemn seriousness. And you, too, Mrs. Reardon,
WAITING 33
there's a place next Father James for you. And
who has a better right to sit forenint her own tea-
pot?"
" There's no denying the woman of the house,"
Mrs. Hinnissey said, making a wry face, " even if it
loses me my chances of Matsey itself."
" Make your mind easy, ma'am," Matsey said
graciously, " I think I'll stick to the young ones
they're more suited to my sprightly youth. Maybe
before I'm done eating I might make up my mind
which of them I'll have since I can't have 'em
both," he added with a sigh.
With the coming of Mrs. Reardon and Mrs.
Hinnissey the table in the room was full. Father
Mahon sat at the head with Father Malone on
his right and Mrs. Reardon on his left. The old
schoolmaster sat beside Mrs. Reardon, and Mrs.
Hinnissey next Father Malone. Mike Blake,
Maurice, Larry Reardon, Teigue Donlon and Jack
Hinnissey completed the select party.
" Why don't you take a seat yourself, Mrs.
Blake ? " old Driscoll said. " You must have been
on your feet all the morning."
" And who'd look after every one if I did ?
Besides, sure the excitement is eating and drinking
to me. Is your steak all right, Father James ? "
" Excellent, thanks, excellent. Do sit down,
Mrs. Blake."
" Troth, if I had the time itself, your reverence,
there isn't the place. The kitchen table is crammed
full, but through the dint of turning the settle into
a table, all the men are seated now, thanks be to
God. There's a relay of women to come. But
sure they can hold out longer than the men. They
wouldn't be worth much if they couldn't do that."
D
34 WAITING
t( They won't starve with all the food they're
carrying about between their hands," Mike Blake
said gloomily.
Mrs. Blake frowned. " Would you grudge
them, Mike, the bite or the sup they can have
between times, and all the fetching and carrying
they're doing for ye ? Try and swallow that turkey's
egg, Father Ned. I boiled it special for you, knowing
you were a citizen. It's more delicate within than
a hen's egg, for a townsman like you. Mike there
has a weakness for a duck's egg, but sure he has the
stomach of a horse. Don't be trenching on the priest's
lump sugar," she said in a fierce whisper to Mike.
" Isn't there plenty of soft sugar at your elbow ? "
Father James munched steadily at the beefsteak
without once laying down his knife and fork.
Father Ned fiddled with the turkey egg, and
replaced it by a hen egg when Mrs. Blake's back
was turned.
" I'll eat it and put the shell back on your plate,
and she'll never know the differ," Mrs. Hinnissey
said obligingly.
" Won't you have more tea ? " Father Ned said,
holding up the best teapot.
" Is it out of the priest's teapot ? The Lord
love you, Mrs. Blake'd never forgive me if she
thought I did that. I'll wait till Bessy Reilly gets
round with the tin one."
Even Mrs. Reardon, though she eyed her teapot
enviously, did not dare to help herself from it. She
was somewhat compensated by Mrs. Blake's whisper,
" It's shining like a blaze of glory."
Mrs. Blake's willing helpers were kept busy
filling cups, held out to intercept the passing teapots,
and serving bread and butter, eggs, and cake.
WAITING 35
u I had four, and that's not a bad morning's work
for a man," Jack Hinnissey said, refusing a fifth
egg. " I hear, master, that you're thinking of
giving up Bourneen," he added, addressing Driscoll
from the end of the table.
Father Mahon, who had finished with the steak
and was just starting on an egg, frowned.
Driscoll glanced at him. " I'm thinking of it.
Yes, I'm thinking of it," he answered, with another
look at Father Mahon's lowered eyes.
" Faith, it's sorry I am that you won't be in it to
belt my own children like you ought to have belted
me," Hinnissey said heartily.
" Troth, if he gave you your due, his arm, God
bless it, would be sore from trying to knock the
devil out of you, Jack," Teigue Donlon said with a
grin.
" It's the pity of the world you didn't banish
the old boy out of him when you're hand was in,
master," Mrs. Hinnissey said, beaming.
Driscoll chuckled. " I left that for you, ma'am,"
he said quietly.
" Is there any talk of who is to come after you ? "
Larry Reardon, with a side glance at Father Mahon,
said to Driscoll.
" I dare say there is. It's his reverence that
knows that."
" Now's your time, Mike, to put in a word for
Maurice," Mrs. Blake whispered under cover of a
bowl of eggs.
"Whist, woman, can't you see his eye on
you ? "
Father Mahon took out his handkerchief and
wiped the remains of an egg off his mouth.
" I never discuss secular business at a station
36 WAITING
house. This is a place for religion only," he said,
rising abruptly.
" After all my trouble, too ! " Mrs. Blake
murmured wearily.
She revived somewhat when Father Mahon said,
in bidding her good-bye
" Your son Maurice is growing into a fine man."
" He as much as gave me a hint that it would be
all right," she whispered excitedly to Mike, while
the priest was being helped into his overcoat.
" I heard the remark," Mike said stolidly.
" You'll be reading a tune into an ass's bray next."
" There isn't much cuteness in you after all,
Mike. Take my word that you'll find him ready
for you if you run out with him now and broach the
matter while Tom is tackling the mare."
For five minutes Father Mahon and Mike
paced the road in front of the gate. The priest
said nothing. Mike made two isolated remarks
"The harvest was very fine, thanks be to God,"
and " It's a hot day for this time of year." It was
only when the priest's trap was halfway across the
bawn that Mike said diffidently.
" Bourneen school, your reverence my son,
Maurice."
"A fine young man," Father Mahon said.
" He'd like to get the school, your reverence."
The priest frowned thoughtfully. "That's a
horse of another colour," he said. " I'm not against
him, mind you, Mike not by any means. But it
needs thinking over and talking over. It's a great
responsibility I have in a matter of the kind, to the
children of the parish, and to the government, and,
last but not least, to the Church of God. Come up
to-morrow night after dark and we'll help one
WAITING 37
another to shed a light on it. I make no promise,
but I've an open mind. I can tell you that much."
" Well ? " Mrs. Blake said eagerly when Mike
returned.
" I'm seeing him to-morrow night about it,"
Mike said doubtfully. " Anyway, he was more civil
than ever I seen him before."
" I knew there was great virtue in a beefsteak,"
Mrs. Blake said joyfully.
CHAPTER III
AT half-past three in the afternoon of the day
following the station at Mike Blake's, Father James
Mahon leant over the iron gate of the narrow garden
that separated his house from the main road lead-
ing from the village of Bourneen to the town of
Liscannow. His soft felt hat was pulled well down
over his eyes, to shade them from the almost level
rays of the sun. A single, bare, elm tree on the
other side of the road made a beautiful pattern
against the burnished gold of the sky. The patch
of sea in the distance by Liscannow glittered like
a silver mirror ; while the clefts of the mountain,
at the base of which the town seemed to nestle, were
already a deep purple. Bourneen chapel and village
on his left, usually gaunt and ugly under a pre-
vailing grey sky, now glowed with genial warmth.
But Father James was not interested in light effects.
He had no eye for the brilliant colours, purples
and greens and soft pinks, which the mixed slates
on his church threw back to the sun. He saw
only the stumpy tower of the barn-like building.
It occupied his thoughts, in short, jerky spasms
of annoyance and relief, at intervals when he
was not moodily gazing at the road, thinking of
nothing in particular ; or wondering why Father
Malone was so late ; or counting the chances of
Father Delahunty dropping in to dinner on his
WAITING 39
way home from Liscannow ; or angrily asking him-
self why he had invited Father Delahunty at all
when he met him accidentally in the road in the
morning, especially as he didn't like him, and,
moreover, as he would be in the way when Mike
Blake called. The thought of Mike Blake brought
him back to the church tower, and he resisted an
interesting thought as to how his three bullocks
were doing on Larry Reardon's land. It was a
nuisance that the priest who built the church and
tower didn't build the spire too. Not that the tower
needed a spire, but it would have stopped the mouth
of that new broom of a bishop, Dr. Hannigan. He
scowled as he thought of Dr. Hannigan, an outsider
brought into the diocese when he himself should
have been made bishop. But, after all, he argued
with himself, why shouldn't Hannigan push on the
parish priests to build and improve churches and
make a good show of activity in his returns to
Rome ? It was well known that he didn't intend
to settle for life at Liscannow, but had his eye
on the bishopric of his native diocese of Droomeen
which was richer and more important. No wonder
that he'd work hard to create the impression at
Rome that he was an active man ; and so pave
his way to promotion. Father James tapped the
lower bar of the gate with his boot and admitted,
with a feeling of satisfaction in his own tolerance,
that he would have done likewise in Hannigan's
circumstances. And, there would be another chance
of Liscannow diocese for him, James Mahon, if
Hannigan left. Why not ? The Bishop of Droo-
meen was an old man and could not last long.
He watched with unseeing eyes a dark bank of
cloud creep up and clutch the sun. The elm was
4 o WAITING
again a gnarled tree and no longer a vivid mystery
of colour and line. The warmth had gone from
the wind that blew in from the sea. Father James
buttoned up his coat and walked the short gravel
path, with rectangular plots of rank, untended,
weedy grass on either side, towards his house. He
stood for a moment to admire it. The oak graining
on the hall door, the red brick chevron mouldings
over the door and windows, the stucco trowelled off
into squares, the green paint on the down pipe and
eave shoots, were all happy suggestions of his own
to the complaisant Board of Works architect who
designed the house. Was it Delahunty who said
it was stark and ugly ? The fool ! and he living in
an old, thatched cottage, without the room or the
dignity that a parish priest's house ought to have.
The bishop had a word of praise for this beautiful
house. That was to Hannigan's credit. After all,
why shouldn't he, he thought, do his best to be
friends with Hannigan ? The great mistake of his
life was fighting with the old bishop, Dr. Murray.
It made him popular with some of the parish priests
and got him their votes at the election for bishop on
the old man's death ; but it gave him a bad name
with the bishops of the province, who ignored the
priests' votes, passed him over, and secured
the appointment of Hannigan. He frowned at the
memory of this ; but, in a moment, he laughed his
harsh cackle and said aloud, "Pooh, pooh, a man
must be sensible." He would build the spire, he
decided, as he opened the front door with a latch-
key. Or, at least, he would make a show of setting
about it. Mike Blake should start the subscription
list. He banged the door with a grim smile. If
the spire wasn't built the money could go to
WAITING 41
something else useful. It wouldn't be wasted anyway.
And Hannigan would be pleased. Who knew
what might happen if there was another election for
bishop with Hannigan's good will, and, maybe, the
friendship of bishops he might meet at Hannigan's ?
All the efforts he had made to curb his temper with
the priests, and the dinners he had lavished on them
might not be wasted after all.
He hung his hat on a peg in the hall and was
hardly seated in his study when Father Malone
came in.
" I'm sorry I'm late," he said apologetically.
t( I had two sick calls running."
Father Mahon frowned and touched a bell-push
by the fireplace.
" It's not often you find an electric bell in a
country parish," he said, with returning good
humour. " I like having things up-to-date and
I have what I like."
Father Malone smiled at a bookcase and took
out a book. There was a timid knock at the door,
and a weary-looking, elderly servant entered.
" Dish the dinner, Kate. We won't wait another
minute for Father Delahunty. He can blame him-
self if he finds everything cold."
" Yes, your reverence."
"Now, you talk a lot about art and things,
Father Malone," he said, when the servant had gone.
" These walls are dried out by this, and I'm think-
ing of papering them. What colour would you put
on them ? "
Father Malone glanced at the bright green
Venetian blinds, the red plush window curtains, the
American roll-top desk of light oak, the carpet with
chocolate roses on a greenish-yellow background.
42 WAITING
" I don't know," he said blankly. " Some
neutral shade, perhaps it would take some think-
ing. The plain grey of the plaster isn't at all bad.
Why not let it alone ? "
" And you're a light of the Gaelic League, no
less, and write in the poet's corner of the Liscannow
News ! And you can't make up your mind about
the colour of a wall-paper ! Why, I'd paper every
room in the house in my own mind in a minute,
and a different paper on each of 'em."
" You would," Father Malone said, with an
intonation that disturbed Father Mahon and put
him on the defensive.
" I would, and I'd teach you Irish, too," he said,
bridling.
" I know you could, and I only wish you would,"
Father Malone said, brightening.
Father Mahon was somewhat mollified by the
compliment.
" The turkey is on the table, I'm sure, by this,"
he said, rising. " This Irish is a bad business," he
added, as he opened the study door, " I'll have to
put down my foot "
There was a loud knock at the front door.
Father Mahon opened it.
" Father Delahunty, you're more than welcome,"
he said heartily. " I almost despaired of you, but
you're in the nick of time. Let me help you off
with your coat, and we'll go straight in."
Father Delahunty held his hands over the fire in
the dining-room for a few seconds.
"The food will heat you up better," Father
Mahon said, sharpening a carving knife.
"I'll be as fit as a fiddle after a nip," Father
Delahunty said, taking his seat and helping himself
WAITING 43
to whiskey. " Here's to you both," he added
cheerfully, his merry blue eyes twinkling. He
took a few sips and smacked his lips. " If you were
out after the hares all day like me, you wouldn't be
getting fat, Mahon," he said, laughing. "We had
a great day's coursing entirely, near the foot of the
mountain beyond Liscannow. I won a couple of
pounds, and that puts great heart in a man."
His open face, tanned russet from exposure,
gleamed in the light of the lamp Kate now put on
the table.
(< Don't pull down them blinds, Kate," he said
anxiously. " There's the kind of a sky out to-night
that Father Malone there'd be making a poem on.
I had one in me myself as the horse ambled along
the road, but sorra word of prose, let alone poetry,
could I find that'd say what I felt. If it was to
describe a hound after a hare now, I could do it as
well as any man."
Father Malone blushed, and stole a glance
through the window. The elm tree was now a flat
intricate pattern against the purple of the horizon,
its top branches hidden in a belt of grey, while
higher in the sky were the last silver gleams of
the sun.
" It's a nuisance having windows facing the west,
the sun bothers you so much in the summer even-
ings," Father Mahon said, busy carving and making
comparisons between Father Delahunty's slim, wiry
figure and his own. " I'm not fat. No one could
call me fat with my figure," he added, handing a
plate to Delahunty.
"You were always a bit vain of your figure,
James. And sorra much bulge there's in it yet.
If you'd only take to coursing "
44 WAITING
Father Mahon pursed his lips. " Alas ! the
cares of a big parish
" A score of bullocks out on grass they take
some looking after. True, they ought to give you
exercise enough. Maybe it's age that's coming over
us, James ? We're both on the borders of fifty,"
Father Delahunty said cheerfully.
" Nonsense. I feel as young as ever I did.
Not but I have troubles enough to worry me,"
Father James said with a frown.
" Not the curate ? " Father Delahunty said, with
a wink at Father Malone. " They're always a thorn
in the flesh. I turn the parish over to mine, and
he's as meek as a mouse since I let him be boss."
Father Mahon frowned, glared at Father
Malone, opened his lips and shut them with a
snap.
"The people, I meant," he said, after some
hesitation. "They're getting beyond the beyonds.
Not but that I'm able for them."
"You might be pulling the reins too tight,"
Delahunty said seriously.
" The day the priests of Ireland cease to be
masters, it'll be a bad day for the Church and for
the country," Father Mahon said emphatically.
u Phew," Father Delahunty said, making a long
face.
" I find the people easy to work with," Father
Malone said, with some determination.
" Because you let them master you it's a case
of the dog wagging his tail," Father Mahon said
crossly.
" Sometimes they wag me, sometimes I wag
them ; generally, we trot along comfortably to-
gether," Father Malone said, with good humour.
WAITING 45
" A man after all is very like a greyhound,"
Father Delahunty said musingly.
Father Mahon bit his lip to restrain his anger.
He laughed harshly.
" Wait till you've twenty-five years on the
mission, like me and Delahunty there, and you'll
learn sense."
" I don't know. Babes and sucklings ! you
know, James ? " Delahunty said. " I often learnt a
great deal from a litter of young dogs."
" I'm not going to let any one, curate or people,
turn my parish upside down," Father Mahon said,
frowning into his plate. He gulped his food for a
few minutes in silence.
Father Delahunty shrugged his shoulders and
went on with his dinner.
" A present ? " he said, nodding at the remains
of the turkey, as he laid down his knife and fork.
" Oh, they're free-handed enough if you keep
'em up to it," Father Mahon said gloomily.
Kate appeared at the door and beckoned eagerly
to Father Mahon. When he noticed her he got up
hastily and said
" Draw your chairs round to the fire. The
whiskey is at your elbow, and Kate'll bring in the
hot water at once. The dinner was a bit late, and
I forgot I appointed to see a man. I won't be
long."
"Where is he ? " he said to Kate in the hall.
" In the kitchen, your reverence. It's Mike
Blake, and he said you expected him. Will you see
him here in the hall, or in your study ? "
" What did I tell you before when people come
by appointment ? " he said impatiently.
" You'll find the lamp lit. Sometimes you're
46 WAITING
vexed at one thing, sometimes at another," she
muttered in a flat voice without resentment.
He stood, picking his teeth, with his back to
the fire, and admired his bookcase. The room was
called a study partly because it was so marked on
the architect's plans, and partly because there were
books in it. Father James had been a prizeman in
Maynooth, but he seldom read anything now except
newspapers. Occasionally he read a text-book on
canon law to assure himself of his own rights, and
of the limits of a bishop's authority. He also
refreshed his memory of moral theology for a few
hours before the conferences which were held four
or five times a year. He professed a love of litera-
ture, but never read any. His anger with Father
Malone was often tempered by the contempt he felt
for him because he had once found him absorbed in
some book of poetry. He sometimes bought a
paper-covered sensational novel at the bookshop in
Liscannow, but rarely finished it. He was so
interested in his own schemes that it bored him to
read other people's imaginary adventures. He often
sat for hours in front of the study fire, the poker in
his hand, thinking of his cattle, or his investments,
or the affairs of his parishioners of the latter,
always, however, in relation to himself. As he
heard Mike Blake's heavy step coming along the
linoleum-covered hall his eye rested on a vacant
space in one of the walls. Dr. Hannigan had open
shelves running round his whole library, he remem-
bered. Yes, he would put shelves on that wall, and
pick up books enough to fill them, at auctions, where
they were always to be had for little or nothing.
He was so taken by this idea that he began to
measure the vacant space by stepping the floor, and
WAITING 47
did not notice Mike Blake standing at the open
door. Mike coughed.
" Wait a minute, till I step this," the priest said,
looking up and balancing himself carefully, one foot
touching the other.
" Sit in front of the fire," he said, as he made a
note on a sheet of paper at his desk.
Mike sat on the edge of a chair and laid his
hat beside him on the floor.
Father James drew an armchair close to the fire
and sat so that he could look at the fire or at Mike
without altering his position. He crossed his legs,
rested them on a corner of the fender, and clasped
his hands as if in prayer.
"Well, Mike," he said, looking at the fire, "and
what can I be doing for you ? "
" Touching our little conversation yesterday,
your reverence "
"Yes, yes. I'm glad you called, Mike. You
remember the bishop's sermon at the last con-
firmation ? "
Mike scratched his head. "What with hearing
so many of 'em, one every Sunday, and two, maybe,
if it's a confraternity night, not to speak of holidays,
they oftentimes go in one ear and out the other."
" About the spire."
" I remember it well now that you call it to
mind. Sure we all thought it was a great romancer
he was. And all the calls that was on us lately, too,
drawing stone and gravel for this grand house,
thanks be to God, and for the new porch in the
chapel, and the new schoolhouse "
" It's the new teacher'll get the benefit of that,"
Father James interrupted.
" Sure what I came to talk to you about "
48 WAITING
"The bishop was quite serious," Father James
broke in, looking meditatively at the fire. "That
spire has been on my conscience too, this many a
year. We must build it, Mike. We must build it.
For the credit of the parish, we must build it. I'd
have done it long ago, only I didn't like to be
putting too much of the substance of my poor
people into stone and mortar. If I had the money
by me I'd pay for it out of my own pocket. But
what's the use of talking about that ? and the drag
there's on the few pence a priest has in a parish like
this."
While the priest was speaking, Mike looked
alternately at him and at the fire several times. He
was puzzled, and thought that the fire, from which
Father James seemed to be reading, would enlighten
him. The unusual gentleness of the priest's voice
troubled him ; all he could say, when Father Mahon
stopped, was
" It's a power of money it'll take."
" It will. I can't put a public cess on at present
it'll give me enough to do to level up the dues.
But I'm going to start a private fund to show the
bishop we're in earnest. I'll head it with a hundred
pounds."
" It's easy for your reverence to lift money from
one pocket into the other," Mike said with an un-
easy laugh.
The priest glared at him angrily, poked the fire
and laughed harshly.
"We'll keep the matter between ourselves for
the present. You're the first man I've mentioned
it to," he said, ignoring Mike's remark.
" I'd as lief I wasn't, but as your reverence spoke
of it, five pounds won't rob me."
WAITING 49
Father Mahon stood up and frowned, his under
lip for a moment almost touching his nose.
" I gave you credit for more sense, Mike Blake,"
he said, turning towards the fire and holding out
his hands to the blaze. " You ! a man with your
farm bought, and a good slice of grass land thrown
in, and your son, the schoolmaster, as good as
settled in the world."
A slow smile crept over Mike's face. He
screwed up his lips and fumbled in the pocket of
his waistcoat for his pipe. He took it out and put
it back hastily. He looked at Father James, who
was gazing thoughtfully at the fire.
" Maybe I made it too little, would twenty-
five-
The priest only protruded his under lip.
" Forty ? " Mike said tremulously.
Father James seemed to consider this, turned
towards Mike, and shook his head doubtfully.
" If I make it the round sum of fifty," Mike
said, standing up in his excitement, " it's the highest
I can go."
" And a generous subscription it is, Mike. And
a credit to yourself and your fine family. And now
about this other business. Can you speak up for
your son Maurice ? "
" I can, then."
" Is he biddable ?"
" His mother and myself always found him that."
"And a good warrant to attend mass and the
sacraments ? "
" There's no fault in him on that head."
" Well, then, tell him I'm glad to give the
school to his father's son. And I promise I'll treat
him well if he'll be said and led by me."
E
50 WAITING
<{ No one could speak fairer, and we're all
beholden to your reverence," Mike said, reaching
for his hat.
" I haven't asked you if you had a mouth on
you, but I've a few priests within, and I'm too long
from them as it is."
" Sure I never expected that, Father. The
blessing of God on you. Mary'll be on the tenter-
hooks till I tell her the news. She'll be a proud
woman to-night."
When Father Mahon got back to his guests he
was still frowning, but he was rubbing his hands
together vigorously.
" You're as pleased as punch," Father Delahunty
said, glancing from his face to his hands.
" I am. Whatever tricks the young people may
be up to, thank God the old are still amenable to
their Church and their priests. I've taken your
advice," he added, laughingly, to Father Malone,
" and given Bourneen school to Maurice Blake."
"Why that's splendid," Father Malone said
excitedly. " I was afraid, from the way you took
what I said of him, that you had some one else in
your mind."
" A wise man doesn't rush an important affair,"
Father Mahon said sententiously.
u So that was it," Father Delahunty said dryly,
holding his glass between him and the light.
CHAPTER IV
FOR some time after his father had set out for the
priest's house Maurice Blake chatted with his mother
in front of the fire in the kitchen. Tom was busy
in the cowhouse and Hanny in the dairy. Mrs.
Blake sat on a creepy, sewing, halfway between the
lamp on the window and the fire, so that the light
from both fell dimly on her work. Maurice stood,
his arm resting on the wooden beam that ran across
the top of the open fireplace.
" He's no farther than the five-acre meadow
yet ? " Mrs. Blake said.
" Hardly."
She plied her needle for a few minutes in a
silence broken only by the asthmatic ticking of the
old clock and the swish of thread through the cloth.
" He ought to be past the cross-roads by this ? "
" About that. He's not a quick walker."
" No. He's getting leisurely on the feet."
" Why in the world does Father James want
to see my father and not me ? "
Mrs. Blake fastened her needle in the cloth and
measured with the back of her hand.
" Sure why would you ask me ? It is not easy
to fathom what's in the back of Father James's mind.
It wouldn't surprise me, though he's dark and
haughty itself, if he wanted to pay a compliment to
Mike. There'd be small wonder in it if he did, and
52 WAITING
the way Mike always stood by the clergy, and his
father before him. A horse and cart always at their
bidding whenever they liked to call for it. And
many a load of hay and straw when the priest was
scarce, or a lock of oats itself, and the freedom of
the gravel pit for any building the clergy had a hand
in since the year of one. And quarried and carried
by Mike himself for nothing at all. And the priest
often getting paid for it, I'm told, by the government
or the like. And carts for bringing home the turf.
Not to speak of him being always among the fore-
most, for his means, at the dues. And the fat goose
that I plucked with my own hands at Michaelmas
and took to the parish priest's back door every year
since I stepped across the threshold of this house,
and maybe a pair of hens at Martinmas, and a turkey
at Christmas, and an odd thing in between."
" I hope Father Mahon will be influenced by
none of these things," Maurice said, flushing a little.
" It's a government appointment, and I ought to get
it on my merits or not at all."
" Sure no one knows better that you deserve it
than Father Mahon himself; but you wouldn't
grudge your father the satisfaction of being the
first to hear the news, and his heart as set on you
being in Bourneen as my own is."
Maurice tapped one of the flagstones with his
boot. " I'd rather "
" He ought to be passing the old mill, by now,"
Mrs. Blake interrupted.
" You won't mind if I go up and read awhile,
mother," Maurice said with a smile.
" Sure I won't," she said with relief. " We're
only making each other uneasy by our thoughts and
the great errand Mike is gone on. Besides, the
WAITING 53
needle is great company. Wait till I fill the quart
bottle with hot water for you to put to your feet.
It's chilly above."
He mounted the flat-runged ladder that served
as a stairs, a lighted candle in an old-fashioned
brass candlestick in one hand, the hot-water bottle
covered with a piece of flannel in the other. The
ladder, starting from the foot of the settle in the
kitchen, led to the " big room," now handed over
to Maurice's use, though usually it served as the
dower house of widowed heads of the Blake family,
or the bridal chamber of the eldest son if he married
in the lifetime of both parents. Opening out of it
was Tom's bedroom.
Maurice sat at a small deal table at the foot of
the bed, a large structure enclosed by a wooden
canopy on all sides except the front, which was cur-
tained, and so placed as to be heated by the kitchen
flue. He opened a book and began to read.
Though he sat with his back to the warm wall and
had the hot-water bottle at his feet he soon felt cold.
He put on an overcoat and wrapped a rug about his
knees. He turned a few pages of the book, an
idealized history of medieval Ireland, but soon gave
way to the dreams which this book always evoked.
His eyes wandered to the guttering candle which
seemed to be blown on by all the winds of heaven.
For moments it burned with a clear flame. A
blast up the open stair head made it flutter towards
the bed, till another blast, creeping round the corner
of the bed from the windows, almost set it straight
again. A whistling wind from over the low par-
tition, dividing the room from Tom's, drove the
flame towards the book. Then all the winds seemed
to rush to the open space above the rafters, rattled
54 WAITING
and fought among the slates, swept down in a united
phalanx, and for some doubtful seconds threatened
to extinguish the candle. Then it burnt clear again.
Somehow, in some vague way, it typified Ireland
for him. Buffeted now by one harsh wind, now by
another, until she lay almost prone in the dust.
Then, at intervals, the clear flame and the infinite
promise !
Always in his imagination Ireland had been a
woman. In the sad songs he remembered from his
childhood she was often old and decrepit, sitting by
a fireless hearth, forsaken and weary under a broken
roof, but always with haunting eyes that looked
straight into his soul. When he saw her young
and radiant in other songs she had the same eyes of
appealing beauty, sad even in their smile.
The wind had gone down and the faint light of
the candle lost itself in the gloom above the rafters.
Curious shadows flitted in dim corners. The fire-
light from the kitchen danced on the wall by the
stairhead. Maurice saw all the squalid details of
the room : the rough uncarpeted floor ; the white-
washed walls, stained green in patches where the
rain had trickled down from the roof; the few
unpainted deal shelves that contained his books ;
the battered tin trunk that held his best suit ; the
rest of his clothes, hanging from pegs on the parti-
tion ; the wooden box, with a towel laid over it,
that served as a wash-stand ; the other box that
made a dressing-table, but this Hanny had decorated
with muslin and ribbons. All his life he seemed to
have been able to see the sordid, to see it keenly, to
feel its pain. But always the lady of his dreams
had been a refuge from the stench of the manure
heap when it stood in the bawn and pervaded the
WAITING 55
whole house, from Father Mahon's scowling face on
station days, from the stones that bruised his feet as
he scampered barefooted to school as a boy.
He saw her now in the gleam of firelight dancing
on the wall, tresses of shining hair at her waist, her
beautiful mysterious face hidden in the shadows of
the rafters, as he had so often seen her in the dawn and
in the twilight, and at the back of the fire on winter
nights when he sat on the hob listening entranced to
his grandfather's tales of heroic deeds done for
Ireland in the past.
Even then he knew that she was only the child
of his imagination, but he loved her none the less
well for that. She made him work and gave
purpose to his life.
His mind went back to that first walk with Master
Driscoll, when the teacher said that he was inclined
to recommend him for a monitorship.
They passed a rath surmounted by a dismantled
castle, and Driscoll told story after story : how, in
that very fort, Guaire the High King had kindled
hope in the heart of Ireland ; how Brian had washed
the tears away from the face of Ireland for many a
long day by a fierce fight that lasted far into the
night. . . .
"There's no doing of great deeds like them in
these days," he had wound up, with a sigh. " Still
every man can do his little. Even a schoolmaster
can do his share. Indeed, he can do great things
for Ireland if he's only the right sort."
From that day Maurice had set his heart on
being a schoolmaster. In the old thatched school-
house beside the chapel, weather-beaten and dilapi-
dated despite all Master Driscoll's efforts to keep
it neat and trim, he dreamt dreams and saw visions.
56 WAITING
All that the teacher knew he soon learned : such
knowledge as counts with Boards of Education, and
knowledge that Boards are suspicious of, great stores
of traditional lore that coloured the whole country
side with romance. He drank in too, incon-
gruously enough, a hatred of the whole system
and methods of the Board of Education, one of
whose teachers it was his ambition to become.
" All the good I ever did as a teacher," Driscoll
used to say, " I did in my own garden in odd half-
hours before school or after and during recreations.
The Board forced me to train a boy to be a bad clerk,
and I did it, God forgive me ; but for my penance,
or maybe because I loved it, in that few roods of
garden that you see there I tried to teach him to be
a man, to know and love the land he was reared on
and the things that grew and lived on it."
These and other memories of his childhood and
youth came back to Maurice as he watched the
firelight flicker ; and the memory of a few unhappy
years in Liscannow as an assistant teacher, and his
two years at the Training College. . . .
Then he tried to see himself as teacher of
Bourneen school. Much as he had dreamed and
thought of it in the past, only vague and blurred
images emerged now of himself weak and helpless,
struggling with some sinister force. . . .
He heard his father's step on the gravel, the
latch lifted, his mother's, " Oh, Mike, I didn't
think you could be back yet," a whispered con-
versation, a long-drawn " Oh," in his mother's
voice, more whispers, then his mother again, " God'll
make up for it. Thanks be to His holy name that
I'll have Maurice near me all my life."
He had got the school. All his old hopes began
WAITING
57
to revive. He jumped up and had already blown
out the candle when his mother shouted, " Maurice,
Maurice." When he was halfway down the ladder
she said excitedly
" Sure I knew you'd get it."
" You did," Mike said grimly, rattling the
tin tobacco-box and the old penknife in his right-
hand trousers pocket.
" Did he make any difficulties ? " Maurice asked,
when he got to the floor.
Mike looked gloomily at the fire, but Mrs.
Blake said effusively
" Sorra one, only a few questions that a child
could answer. Rouse yourself, Mike. He's always
moonstruck after seeing Father Tames he has that
paralysing effect on him. Though the priest was in
the best of humours a fine young man, he said you
were."
Maurice was not quite satisfied, and asked his
father for an exact account of what took place.
" It's up to you now, Mike. Rack your brain
and tell the boy what happened," Mrs. Blake said
anxiously.
Mike filled his pipe with some deliberation.
When he had lit it and taken a few long puffs, he
began a detailed narration of the interview, at which,
it seemed, all the merits of Maurice, from a child
up, if forgotten by his father, were mentioned with
much fervour by the priest.
Maurice tried to stop him several times, but
Mike, having once started, would not be checked.
"There it's all for you now," he wound up.
" I wouldn't swear to every remark being made in
them exact words. But sorra word I've spoken to you
now that one or other of us didn't think anyway."
58 WAITING
With this salve to his conscience Mike fell into
silence. But Maurice had long since ceased to
listen. He was thinking of what he would teach
and what he wouldn't teach.
Hanny came in and asked, " Has he got it ? "
Her mother nodded.
Hanny said, " Thank God," and proceeded to
lay the table for supper.
" Put on the currant cake that's left over from
the station, in honour of the night that's in it,"
Mrs. Blake said.
Mike was gloomy over his supper, Mrs. Blake
and Maurice thoughtful. Hanny cast admiring
glances at Maurice in the intervals of helping every
one.
Towards the end of the meal Tom entered
singing.
" What news ? " he asked eagerly.
" The best," Hanny said cheerfully. " But
don't be sitting down with them hands. The
basin is on the chair by the back door."
He washed his face and hands. " It's a poor
job, Maurice, my boy, teaching a lot of gossoons;
but sure, as you like it, I'm glad you got it," he
said from the middle of the floor, scrubbing his
face and neck vigorously with a towel. " Did the
big man make a struggle to put in a bullock on us
on the head of it ? "
" He didn't," Mike said crossly.
" Moreover," Mrs. Blake intervened, " he said
he always had a liking for Maurice ever since he
used to serve mass at the Bourneen altar."
" It's many a clout he gave him on the side of
the head by the way of showing it," Tom said,
taking his seat at a corner of the table.
WAITING 59
" It's too free ye are in discussing the clergy,"
Mike Blake said. " There's neither luck nor grace
in it."
"That's true enough," Mrs. Blake said.
" Troth, they get a skelp of the tongue now as
well as another," Tom said grimly.
Maurice rose from the table and took his hat off
the back of the door.
" I think I'll take a run down to see Master
Driscoll."
" Do then, agra. He'll be glad to hear of it,"
Mrs. Blake said.
" I'd be glad to go a bit of the way with you,
only I'll be taking the opposite direction," Tom
said, his mouth full.
" Reardons again," Mrs. Blake said, with a sigh.
Maurice lingered on the road. A high moon
seemed to race through the sky as thin filmy clouds
scudded across it, lighting up the old landmarks in
vivid flashes : the robber cavern of his very young
days, now, alas ! to his grown-up eyes, only a rather
shallow ditch covered with blackberry bushes ; the
twisted thorn tree under which the leprechaun sat
and mended brogues or mayhap hammered sove-
reigns on his little anvil ; the gate of the five-acre
meadow, past which one had to hurry at the coming
on of dark, lest the dead coach, drawn by headless
horses, should dash through with its ghostly freight
from the big house that once stood in the middle
of the field a great house with a hundred windows,
lit by countless candles, sometimes seen by the
unwary and always a sure presage of death. To-
night there was no feeling half fear, half hope of
seeing leprechaun or coach. Still his heart beat
wonderfully. The great river, over which he had
60 WAITING
stood patiently for hours as a boy fishing with a
bent pin baited with bread crumb, was only the tiny
stream whose faint murmur he scarcely heard as he
walked, and up which no trout had ever ventured.
Yet, another and a greater dream had not been
shattered. He was to be schoolmaster at Bourneen.
This dazzling dream, with which at first he only
played, as he played at keeping house with Hanny
under the privet bushes in the garden, trudging
along barefooted at Tom's heels by this very road,
two sods of turf under his arm and a strap of books
slung on his back, was at last about to come true.
Nor had the glamour gone when the play became
a set purpose. The game of wielding a ferule at a
rostrum had yielded to a higher ideal. He was to
continue Master Driscoll's work, to help in the
forming of men and women, to ...
He laughed now as he remembered the language
in which he used to clothe his ideal, " to help them
to lift the mantle of sorrow off the shoulders of
Kathleen ni Houlihan."
Father Mahon's dining-room was still alight as
he passed. He caught a glimpse of the priest's side
face through the uncurtained window. It brought
back painful memories which he tried in vain to
shake off: the terror of the children when Father
James stalked into the schoolroom and scowled at
them ; his rudeness to Master Driscoll ; that
terrible Sunday in Bourneen chapel when the priest
had struck him across the face with the wisp of a
cow's tail used for sprinkling holy water, because,
while holding the basin, he had pushed against the
priest's elbow. He felt the weal on his cheek now
and the coil of the tail round the back of his head,
and the holy water oozing down his neck.
WAITING 6 1
All that was in the past, he said to himself,
shrugging his shoulders. And perhaps the priest
had changed ? It was a good omen that he had
been so civil and pleasant to his father in their
interview to-night.
The moon, breaking from under a cloud as he
entered the little village, shone on the thatch of the
half-dozen labourers' cottages that led to Clancy's
big public house and general shop opposite the
chapel gate. A few more cottages, two public houses,
the post office with sweets and thread and a trimmed
hat in its small window, a police barrack, Father
Malone's cottage, a forge, and Maurice was at the
gate of the schoolhouse, with nothing of village
beyond but Master Driscoll's cottage and the
corrugated iron store of the Bourneen Agricultural
Society.
He stood for a few minutes gazing at the school.
He could just read " Bourneen Mixed National
School," in white letters on a black board over the
door. Notwithstanding Master Driscoll's efforts at
flower-beds, and the creepers which already climbed
to the window sills, the new building looked bleak
and cold in the wan light. He checked a sigh for
the old school with its thatched roof and the
rambler roses twining about the wooden porch and
losing themselves in the thatch, by the thought that
in this month the rose trees would have been dead
too. In spring these banked-up flower-beds would
be gay with colour, and the creepers no longer little
strips of rag.
In response to his knock at the door of the
schoolmaster's cottage, Driscoll shouted " Come
in." He pushed open the door and found
the old man seated in a rush armchair in the
62 WAITING
living-room and kitchen, on which the front door
gave.
" Maurice, is it ? " he said, pushing his spectacles
up on his forehead, and shading his eyes from the
lamp-light with his hand. " Shut the door tight
and draw the curtain over it. There's a cruel
draught on the fire these cold nights."
He pushed forward a second rush armchair, took
a box or churchwarden pipes from a shelf, and care-
fully selecting two, put them and a tobacco jar on
the table behind the two chairs.
" I believe I've got the school. Father James
promised my father to-night," Maurice said, taking
a seat.
Driscoll stood up and shook Maurice's hands.
" I'm gladder of that than if you brought a
crock of gold in on the floor to me," he said with
emotion.
He held the hands for a while, gave them another
pressure before letting them go. Turning to the
open turf box beside the fender, he threw several
sods on the blazing fire and watched them catch the
flame.
" You were always more like a son of my own
to me than a stranger," he said musingly.
He sat down, handed a pipe to Maurice, and
filled and lighted the other. He puffed slowly,
his eyes on the glowing turf which lighted up
his strong rugged face. His mobile lips twitched
a little, and his bushy eyebrows made curious
shadows on his broad forehead. His blue eyes
had the fearless simplicity of a child's, and some
of a child's depth of wonder. The front of his
hair, brushed straight up on his forehead, looked
dark in the shadow ; but behind, where it fell in
WAITING 63
locks over his collar, the lamplight showed it to be
a silky white.
" Where are you going to live ? " he asked, with-
out moving his eyes off the fire.
" At home at least until Tom marries. I dare
say I must leave then."
Driscoll moved his chair sideways so as to get
a good view of the room. About three-fourths of
it was covered with rush matting. The white walls
were hung with steel engravings : Robert Emmett's
speech during his trial, a sitting of the Irish House
of Commons during the debate on the Union, Wolfe
Tone, a chalk drawing in profile of the beautiful
head of John O'Leary, and other patriotic subjects.
Well-filled open book-shelves occupied the space on
both sides of the front window, from the floor to
the boarded ceiling. A rough carpenter's bench
stood under the window at the back. On it were a
box of tools, two trays of bulbs, a bundle of what
looked like dried weeds, and a microscope.
" All I ever use of this house is the kitchen here,
and my bedroom there," pointing to a door on the
left of the fireplace. " You never saw the rooms at
the other end ? "
Maurice shook his head. Driscoll went to the
standing desk by the front window, took a key from
a drawer, hesitated a moment, and put it back.
" I'll show 'em to you another time. I'm too
happy to-night to do it," he said, taking his seat
again. " But if you come and live in 'em, you'll
give me most of the happiness I'm likely to have on
this side of the grave."
Maurice was deeply moved. He had heard of
the rooms ever since he was a child. Rumour,
starting from Bessy Reilly, the old woman who
64 WAITING
spent some hours every day in what she called
" doing for Master Driscoll," and what he called
" messing my house upside down," gave a glowing
description of the two rooms and their furniture.
All Bessy had said was that they were " finer
furnished than any room in Father Mahon's house
itself," but this had grown in other mouths to
" finer than any room in the castle of Dublin or in
Durrisk Manor itself." But what moved Maurice
was not the offer of well-furnished rooms, but the
offer of these rooms at all. For it was well known
that they had been unused for over thirty years ;
ever since Ellen McRory died, a week before the
day fixed for her marriage with Dan Driscoll. They
had been fitted up for her, and at regular intervals
since, Driscoll aired and dusted them and lighted
fires in both the sitting and bedroom.
c< Those ! " Maurice said. " I couldn't dream
of it. Besides, you would hate it ? "
Driscoll smiled gently. " One time I might,
but that was many a year ago. If they're empty
now, it's because I'm a lonely man without any one
to fill them. She wouldn't mind it, and why should
I ?" His voice shook a little. He got up, took
out the key again, and taking the lamp in his hand,
unlocked the sitting-room door.
They walked quickly through the small rooms,
one opening out of the other. Maurice had a
vague recollection, when they sat again by the
kitchen fire, of faded pink wall-paper, a faded
Brussels carpet, some mahogany chairs, and a sofa
covered with black hair cloth.
"There's many a man'd tell you," the old man
said, lighting another pipe, " that two of a trade
never agree, and that you'd be more comfortable
WAITING 65
living away from the man into whose shoes you
stepped."
Maurice opened his lips, but Driscoll held up
his pipe.
" Not a word now," he said. " Take time to
think but if you come, you'll make me a happy
man."
CHAPTER V
" How is your new assistant doing with you ? "
Master Driscoll said, looking at the brilliant red ball
low on the horizon.
" It's a sign of frost," he went on without wait-
ing for a reply, " and it'll likely be a hard, dry night.
My rheumatism is gone, I might say, only that my
little finger is crooked for good, I'm afraid. I
might be going with you after all to the Hallow Eve
doings up at Reardons'."
"Of course you will," Maurice said heartily.
" I'm getting too old for that kind of merriment."
" Nonsense, it's young you're growing," Maurice
said, laughing.
The old man busied himself with the lamp.
" There's no strength to read in the light of the sky
on an evening like this," he said, lighting a match.
" It was the luck of heaven that sent you in on the
floor to me. I didn't think I'd be alive nine
months after giving up the school, and I'd have
moped myself to death only for you. Having them
classes down in the garden behind the house here is
a great God-send to me."
He moved about quietly, shut the door, drew the
curtains, put a kettle on the fire, and laid the table
for tea. Maurice cut bread and butter, and brought
a pot of jam from a cupboard in the sitting-room.
" We're going to have a real Samhain feast of
WAITING 67
it," Driscoll said, taking a seat by the fire, a book in
his hand.
Maurice stood with his back to the fire, filling a
pipe.
" I'm not keeping you from your reading ? " the
old man said uneasily.
" Too strict you are with me, if any. You're
worse than when I was a gossoon. But I'll have a free
time to-night, no matter what hints you give me,"
Maurice said with mock severity.
A shadow passed across the old man's face.
" I'm not a burthen to you in any way, Maurice ? I
hadn't the courage to put it to you before," he said
diffidently.
Maurice looked grave. " A burthen ? You're
more of a help to me than you ever were in your
life before, and that's saying a good deal. And
what's more, you're doing a bigger share of the real
work of the school than I am," he said, with obvious
sincerity.
"I've my own opinion about that," Driscoll
said, looking at Maurice affectionately. " But
whether I'm a nuisance or a help, my heart is easy
now, and I'll not open my lips on the subject
again," he went on happily. " We'll have our
supper a little early, about six or so, and then we
can be at the Reardons' in plenty of time."
He listened to the faint simmering of the kettle
for a while. " It's far from the boil yet," he said,
shutting the book which he hadn't looked at, and
putting it on the table. " As you're set on doing
nothing we might as well talk of one thing and
another for a bit."
Maurice lolled in his armchair, his feet on the
hob.
68 WAITING
" I was asking you about your new assistant,
Miss Devoy," Driscoll said.
" Oh, the work-mistress ? Not so bad ; but she
thinks I've nothing else to do but point her pencils
for her."
" She's that kind, is she ? " Driscoll said with a
smile. " The glimpse I had of her she looked as if
she had an eager eye."
" The worst of her is that she doesn't know Irish
or care for it, and I asked Father James to appoint
some one who could take an Irish class."
" It's not that she's thinking of, nor he either,"
Driscoll said chuckling. " 1
Thick steam had been pouring from the spout of
the kettle for some time ; n ow the pressure lifted up
the lid and made it rattle.
The old man stopped speaking and jumped up.
" The tea won't be worth drinking unless I wet it
at once," he said, seizing the tea caddy.
After tea they set out for the party at Reardons'.
Mrs. Reardon had given the invitation in the chapel-
yard on Sunday before mass. " Any time after the
cows are milked. Jim Mescall, the blind fiddler,
is coming, and he might have some tale of Hallow
Eve that you never heard tell of yet, Master
Driscoll."
" It's footing it to the music ye young people'll
be, and not listening to old tales," Driscoll said, as
he and Maurice walked along briskly.
A benevolent moon blinked at them from a clear
sky. Here and there a branch glittered with the
beginnings of frost, and the mud of the rutty road
crackled to their tread. The thin, windless air was
almost warm on their cheeks.
"They've taken to the Irish wonderfully,"
WAITING 69
Maurice said defensively, "and they're making a
great success of the bank and the store."
" Thank God, they're knocking fun out of it,
too. It doesn't make Tom less anxious for the
Irish that he often has the chance of reading out
of the one book with Minnie Reardon."
" I don't know," Maurice said doubtfully.
" Wait till you feel the like."
" My work will always be enough for me."
Driscoll laughed cheerfully. " Young fellows
like you always say that. You'll know the differ
when the fire touches you."
Half-way down the boreen which connected Larry
Reardon's house with the Liscannow road they
heard the strains of Jim Mescall's fiddle in a lively
jig tune. Despite the frost several young men
and women stood around in groups in front of the
house. Lamps on the window sills of the kitchen
and the room cast feeble rays into the moonlight,
but inside the open door a jug, the corner of the
dresser, hands and faces shone like gold bronze in
the ruddy glow of the turf fire.
" God save all here," Driscoll said at the
threshold.
" And you too, master, and the young master,
too. Ye're fine and early, thanks be to God," Larry
Reardon said, shaking hands.
" You're making a great place of it, Larry."
" It might be worse," Larry said, standing back
and giving a pleased glance at a new, two-storied,
slated addition to the old thatched house. " Own-
ing the land gives a man great courage in the way
of building. If the slates look down on the thatch
itself, it's cold comfort there's in them on a winter's
night. Sorra one of me'd sleep under a slate while
70 WAITING
I've the thatch to cover me ; not if you gave me the
wealth of the world. But sure the women the Lord
give 'em sense think they're genteel. But let ye be
coming in. The people aren't near gathered yet,
and there's no right face put upon things, only Jim
Mescall rasping away on the fiddle to pass the time
by the way of no harm."
The furniture in the kitchen had been pushed
back close to the walls. Guests sat on chairs and
tables, on the settle, and on the hob, or lounged
against the dresser and cupboards. The centre of
the flagged floor was bare of everything except a
large wooden tub half-filled with water. Suspended
from a rafter above the tub were an apple and a dip
candle, tied close together in the forked loops of a
stout string about five feet from the floor.
" Come and sit beside me here," Mrs. Blake
said from the hearth. " By dint of watching, the
woman of the house kept these two seats for ye,
though 'tis little either of ye deserves it, the one for
deserting his old mother, and the other for enticing
him off."
" Old, indeed ! " Driscoll said. " 'Tis you had
the light foot for a dance, Mrs. Blake, and there's
no signs of it failing you yet."
" True for you, master," Jack Hinnissey said
from the settle. " You'll see her footing it yet
before the night is out."
" It's a height of preparations they've made here,
anyhow, for a great night of it," she said graciously.
" Who are them within in the room, Maurice ?
You've better eyesight than me."
He looked at the group around the fireplace in
the room, the boarded floor of which had also been
cleared.
WAITING 71
" Minnie and her mother," he said, " and
Hanny and Miss Devoy and Mrs. Crawford and
and a strange girl."
" That must be Mrs. Crawford's niece a girl
by the name of Alice Barton. Minnie was telling
me last night that she was going to ask her. She
wasn't too sure if she'd come, for her father has
some grand situation in Dublin, a couple of hun-
dred pounds a year, I'm told, and you never know
what kind of airs them sort of people'll put on.
But likely she takes after the Crawfords decent
poor people, though they're Protestants itself.
She's of the same brand of religion herself, I hear ;
not that that's agin her, poor thing, and she born to
it. Going round the country, she is, teaching the
people how to keep hens and ducks and the like,
and some Government Board in Dublin paying her
big money for doing it. A slip of a girl like her ! "
she added sceptically.
Maurice heard everything his mother said. But
all the time he was watching Alice Barton's figure,
at the corner of the fender, silhouetted against the
light. The dim light of the candle on the mantel-
piece, passing through her loose hair, transformed it
into gold. The dull lamp in the window left her
face almost in shadow, but the firelight caught her
curved chin and mouth, and the short upper lip with
a touch of wilfulness, and the nose with the slightest
tilt upwards. Her whole body seemed instinct with
gracious curves, from her instep on the fender to
the line which her hair made against her forehead.
u That girl of the Devoys' thinks a lot of her-
self," Mrs. Blake said critically. " It's no wonder,
I suppose, and all Father Mahon is doing for her."
Maurice's eyes wandered to the stocky figure
72 WAITING
beside Alice Barton. The light, which gave a warm
glow to Alice Barton's profile, was reflected in a
harsh glare from the high cheek-bones of Agnes
Devoy.
" She's a relation of his, isn't she a niece or
something ? " he said indifferently.
" Niece, indeed ! " Mrs. Blake said, tossing her
head. " If she was as near as that to him, he'd have
her married long ago to a lawyer or doctor within
in Liscannow. She's only a second cousin once re-
moved, or it's not a schoolmistress he'd make of
her, and poor at that. It's as plain as two eyes in
a cat what he's aiming at in putting her in on you in
Bourneen. He could have done better for her in
the way of schoolmistressing, I'm told, down in the
Strand girls' school, only that he had you in his eye
for her. She's not much to look at, but you might
do worse easily," she added, with a thoughtful
frown. " It'd be a great back to you entirely to
have the priest for a relation."
" Hush, mother ! " he said, with a frown, " the
people'll hear you talking nonsense."
Jim Mescall had put aside his fiddle and was
arguing vigorously with Master Driscoll on Hallow
Eve traditions. The fiddler said that all the life
had gone out of them compared with what they
were in his young days, when he had the sight in
his eyes. It was many a long day since the fairy
music was heard by the blessed well on the road
beyond, as the clock struck twelve on Hallow Eve
night. And the things that happened when you
passed lead through a key, or looked into a tub of
water, not to speak of looking into the blessed well
under the light of the moon, weren't lucky even to
talk about. The "good people" only appeared
WAITING 73
now to a few dark men like himself, who, he added
vehemently, mightn't be so blind after all as them
that had eyesight.
" I often heard my father say God rest his
soul " Jack Hinnissey broke in, " that the good
people were put in a temper because they couldn't
understand the drift of the English that we all took
to speaking."
" Then they'll soon be in humour again with all
the Irish that's springing up everywhere," Driscoll
said genially.
" Yerra, leave the good people be they don't
like being talked about," Mrs. Reardon said,
approaching the fire. " Leave 'em to Jim Mescall,
and he'll put the comether on 'em when he starts
playing rightly. It's the best of friends he's with
'em, and he often playing to 'em in the dead of
night under a thorn bush. Come, Tom Blake, and
make a start at diving for the apples."
" It's a deep meaning there's in that itself, but
it's little any one knows about it now," Jim Mescall
said, hugging his fiddle between his knees, and
turning his sightless eyes towards the blaze.
" There's the height of fun in it, anyway," Mrs.
Reardon said, taking a skib of apples off the dresser
and throwing a few into the tub of water.
" A man might as well begin to make a fool of
himself first as last," Tom said with a grin.
He took off his coat and waistcoat, loosened the
collar of his shirt, and rolled back the sleeves. Amid
shouts of laughter he knelt on the floor and tried to
catch one of the floating apples with his mouth.
His head disappeared under the water, and rose
again, spluttering, without the apple.
" Well tried, bedad ! "
74 WAITING
" Angle it in at the side, Tom."
" Try suction on it ; the teeth is no good."
Advice, serious and derisive, was plentiful from
the excited crowd surrounding the tub. After half
a dozen fruitless efforts Tom stood up, victorious,
an apple between his teeth.
" I'd never forgive you if you didn't get it,"
Minnie Reardon said, handing him a towel
He whispered in her ear. She blushed and
laughed.
" It's the cheek of the world you have over a
trifle like that," she said, pushing him away.
Young and old followed one another at the tub,
with varying success, but always to the intense
enjoyment of the onlookers.
" I love these old customs," an eager voice said
behind Maurice.
" There's more sport in the dancing, though Jim
Reardon wasn't bad at the apple. I suppose you
don't have the like of this in Dublin, Miss Barton ? "
his sister Hanny said.
Before his sister said the name he had known it
must be Miss Barton. The voice seemed to belong
inevitably to the girl he had seen in the room. He
got up and offered her his seat.
" My brother Maurice," Hanny said.
Alice Barton made a little smiling bow, but said
that she saw better standing. The tub was now
removed. She eagerly watched Larry Reardon light
the candle beside the apple on the string. He
twisted the string, let it go suddenly, and the apple
and candle revolved in a wide circle.
The more adventurous of the company tried to
bite the apple as it circled.
Alice Barton caught Maurice's arm, " It's
WAITING 75
dangerous," she said excitedly, her eyes fixed on the
candle.
Her touch thrilled him, but he said lightly,
" The worst that happens is a mouthful of unsavoury
candle grease."
" Oh ! " she said in a relieved tone, releasing her
hold on his arm, and giving her whole attention to
the game.
Her hair was brown he saw now, as he looked
her over approvingly, the brown that becomes gold
at the least excuse : a stray strand on her forehead
sparkled as the firelight fell on it. Her eyes
were brown too, almost black in this light. Sad in
repose, because of the shadows of her long curled
eyelashes, they lit up her whole face when she
smiled.
Jim Mescall began to tune his fiddle impatiently.
" Pull down the apple and candle by accident
like, and then we can have the dance," Minnie
Reardon whispered to Tom.
Before he had made up his mind as to how the
accident was to happen, Mrs. Reardon cut the string
with a scissors, saying
" Hand round the apples and the nuts, Minnie.
And, Jim, you might be loosening your fingers with
a tune while we're eating, so that they'll be supple
for the dance tunes."
" There's no great call on them to be supple
with the people that's in it now," Mescall said
gloomily. " All the old spirit has gone out of their
limbs. Besides, I might be grinding an apple and a
nut myself."
" And there's a drop in the bottom of a bottle
that might put courage into you," Mrs. Reardon
said soothingly.
76 WAITING
" It might then," he said in a more hopeful tone.
The skib of apples and a bowl of hazel nuts were
handed round. Some of the guests roasted their
apples on live embers round the hearth. The
younger people put nuts beside the fire and watched
excitedly till they exploded.
" That's mine," Hanny said.
" It isn't ; it's mine," Minnie Reardon claimed,
as a nut jumped into old Driscoll's lap.
" I'm afeared I'm done for this Saraft if ye can
make up your minds which of ye I'm bound to put
the ring on. There's no going back on a nut," he
said solemnly, his eyes twinkling. " What do you
say, Jim ? "
" There's more in it than meets the eye even of
a dark man," Mescall said with interest. " Could
any one say for certain who the nut belonged to ? "
Hanny and Minnie drew back blushing. " Yerra,
master, 'tis you were always a great warrant to joke,"
Minnie said uneasily.
" I call ye all to witness that neither one nor
the other of them'll have me," Driscoll said dole-
fully.
In the laugh that followed the girls escaped, and
fussily helped Mrs. Reardon at the dresser.
" There, now," she said at last, " you might tell
Jim to strike up, Minnie. Everything is ready.
There's buttermilk and separated milk and, though
the cows are going dry itself, a drop of new milk for
the young people that might be thirsty at the dance.
We never had a night of the kind before without a
half-barrel of porter," she added, addressing some
guests near by, " but the curate is so much agin
porter sprees that we thought it better to give in.
There'll be a cup of tea for old women like myself
WAITING 77
on the table in the corner of the room ; and maybe
Larry'll find something in the cupboard for an odd
old man."
" I wouldn't doubt Larry to get the blind side
of the curate," Jack Hinnissey said, laughing.
" The man that'd miss porter and he getting a nip
of the hard stuff'd be finding queer fault with his
food."
"There's no fault in the curate," Tom Blake
said seriously. " If he's hard on the drink itself, it's
time some one was down on it. It's the parish
priest we ought to stand up against if we had the
courage of a mouse, and he scattering innocent
dances like this with a stick."
" Whist, Tom. Miss Devoy might hear you,"
Mrs. Reardon said anxiously.
" Why did you ask her here then ? "
" Sure she's safer mixed up in an affair of the
kind than maybe hearing tell of it and carrying
tales," Mrs. Reardon said, with a shrewd wink.
" There's only one way to meet a bully, and
that's to stand up to him," Tom said, squaring his
shoulders.
"That's only gossoon's talk, Tom Blake," Mrs.
Reardon said dryly. " You're old enough to know
better. What happened to Dick Fahy the time he
lifted his hand against Father James ? Paralysed
it was that same night. I'll take right good care
there won't be any row with the priest on my floor.
Haven't I Tim Daly, our labouring man, stationed on
the road outside to give warning if he hears the
noise of a car, for fear it might be Father James
going to a sick call or the like, so that we could
stop down the dance and Jim tuck away his fiddle."
Tom muttered something which was lost in the
78 WAITING
strains of " The Wind that shakes the Barley." After
a preliminary flourish, while partners were being
selected, mostly by the young women, Mescall
settled down steadily to a long programme of jigs,
reels, and hornpipes, with an occasional quadrille
(though that wasn't rightly an Irish dance, Mescall
complained). The elders sat around in small groups
and discussed politics and farming and likely
marriages for next Shrovetide ; or, when tapped on
the shoulder by Larry Reardon, accompanied him
with an air of mystery to the room, and returned,
wiping their mouths, prepared to take a more genial
view of life. Jim Mescall, playing with vigour,
carried on a whispered conversation with Master
Driscoll on old Samhain customs, that were old, he
said, before St. Patrick himself saw the light. Mike
Blake consulted Maurice as to some difference of
opinion between the agricultural society and the
agricultural bank ; being a director of both he was
troubled as to how he could " divide up against
himself in case he took sides." Maurice was
interested in the dispute. Both projects were linked
with his school, the language, Home Rule, in his
vision of a new Ireland. He had already made a
plan for the adjustment of this petty quarrel. But
to-night it obstinately evaded him. Only that
morning he had thought it out in all its details.
He was secretary of the little bank and had under-
taken to find a solution. He had found it. But
where was it now ? He had the appearance of an
intent listener a puckered brow and a far-away
expression in his eyes. His father's whispering voice,
almost at his ear, seemed curiously distant. He
caught the words " bank " and " store," and sought
some meaning of them in the smouldering sods on
WAITING 79
the hearth, in a shining old lustre jug on the dresser.
Then his eyes followed the movements of an eight-
handed reel. His brow cleared though his eyes were
not less absorbed. His father's voice became an
indistinct murmur, a sort of placid undertone to Jim
Mescall's music. Bank and store were forgotten in
the great content with which he watched the girl in
black pick her way with graceful and confident ease
through one of the complicated figures of the dance.
She gave a charm even to Mescall's harsh, staccato
rasping on the fiddle. There was something strangely
pleasant in the swish of her skirt, in the curve of
her arm as she held out a hand to a partner, in the
faint flush of her cheeks fading into the deeper
red of her lips. For a moment her eyes met his,
great lustrous pools that seemed to flash vivid colour,
and then he saw only the white nape of her neck and
a loose curl. . . .
" You're not listening to a word I say," Mike
Blake said loudly, as the music stopped.
" Oh yes," Maurice said with a happy smile.
" What you've got to do is this. . . ." It had all
come back to him in a flash the moment the dance
had ended.
"There's some sense in what you say. It shows
you were listening anyway, though I was ready to
swear you weren't. I might do worse than follow
your advice," Mike said ungraciously.
He danced with her once. Her thin shoes
troubled him. Wouldn't her feet get hurt on the
rough stone floor ? She smiled. Dancing made
one forget all that. Jack Hinnissey shouted
" Bedad, 'tis you have the light foot, Miss
Barton. Like a rubber ball you are touching the
floor."
8o WAITING
Maurice was a little annoyed by the grotesque
image ; but she laughed, and he forgot his annoyance
in the music of the laugh.
u That's a great compliment," she said demurely.
"And he's the best step dancer in the room too.
And I never seeing a reel danced till a year ago.
What do you think of that ? "
They were separated for a moment and he could
not say what he thought. He bungled the figure
and brought a frown to Miss Devoy's face, ignoring
her outstretched hand. A year ! why he could
imagine her stepping into the Reardons' kitchen
without ever having seen a reel before, and dancing
it better than any one there. But all he said when
they danced together again was
" Where did you learn ? "
" At a Gaelic League dancing class at Drum-
condra."
He said that he must have been within a few
steps of her at the time at the Training College.
She frowned at this, and admitted, on being
questioned, that she did not think much of Training
Colleges : they made machines of people, and weren't
in touch with the real needs of the country. He
spoke of Master Driscoll : she thawed a little, but
said maliciously
" He hadn't the soul ground out of him in one
of those training barracks."
Meekly Maurice put in a defence for trained
teachers " there were some who tried to keep their
souls."
" Maybe there are," she said doubtfully.
All this was in snatches. Dancing absorbed her,
and speech, for the moment, was only an incident.
Long since the dancing had ceased to matter for
WAITING 8 1
Maurice, except as a broad chasm that divided him
from the next sound of her voice.
He swung her almost into Hanny's arms as
Mescall drew the last creaking chord. Hanny, who
had just come in through the open kitchen door
with Jim Reardon in her wake, said shyly
" There's a beautiful moon outside, and it's not
so stuffy there as in here."
" One minute then, I mustn't miss a dance,"
Alice said, taking the shawl Hanny offered her
and wrapping it round her shoulders. Maurice
followed her out and they stood in front of the
door.
The ground was hard. The white rime on the
grass and on the bare trees sparkled. In the shadow
of the house Minnie Reardon was bent over the tub
of water, which had been removed from the kitchen
to make room for the dancing.
" I can see nothing but my own image," she said
regretfully.
" I bet you can, now," Tom Blake said, bending
over her.
" What's the good of that when it's the image of
your own face I see, and not of a spirit in the like-
ness of you ? "
" As if my own face wasn't better than a spirit's
any day."
" Be off with you, now, out of that," she said,
pushing him away, " or some one'll see you."
" Sorra one of me cares if the whole barony seen
me," he said, kissing her.
Minnie laughed softly. After a minute they
walked hand in hand towards the road.
Jim Mescall began another tune. Maurice
made a movement to go in, but Alice did not stir.
G
82 WAITING
Her eyes were fixed speculatively on Tom and
Minnie as they disappeared round the gate.
" Did she expect to see anything ? " Alice said
in a hushed voice.
He looked at her face. The excitement and
glow of the dance had died away. In this light her
face was as cold as the moon. The white priestesses
of the forest, of whom he had read in some old Celtic
tale, must have looked like her, he thought, a little
bitterly. For years he had seen the love-making of
Tom and Minnie, had laughed at it and thought it
foolish. To-night it had moved him, and he felt a
dull aching pain. . . .
" Don't you believe in the old powers ? " she
asked, as he remained silent, fidgeting with his feet.
" I don't know," he said crossly.
The tone of his own voice made him angry with
himself. Why should he be angry with her ? He
pulled himself together and said banteringly
" I thought Protestants had thrown over all these
old beliefs."
She looked at him curiously. " There are older
things than Protestantism, or Catholicism either, that
still move the world," she said musingly.
" Oh ! the holy well on the road below," he said
lightly. " Minnie Reardon is probably looking for
Tom's image in it this minute."
Alice laughed. " She knows the oldest wisdom
perhaps," she said with a slight shrug, turning
indoors.
CHAPTER VI
MASTER DRISCOLL was unusually silent on the way
home. He mounted the cross-roads hill without
stopping to admire the view, though to-night there
was some excuse for a rest. Hills had begun to
tell on him. As a rule he stood and turned round
in the middle, or, if it was a long hill, two or three
times, and said "how beautiful." And this often
when it was almost too dark to see the road. It was
only when they reached the sharp rise near the top
that he stood and looked towards the sea. Field and
hedgerow shimmered. The thin line of breakers near
Liscannow, and the sullen mountain behind the town
shone with an illusive clearness. The brilliant,
frosty moon threw a mysterious veil of brightness
over everything.
" Jim Mescall thinks the old Ireland'll die with
himself," he said gloomily.
" It won't. He's only an old croaker," Maurice
said, with an abstracted air.
" God send," Driscoll said reverently.
They walked on in silence, one on each side of
the road, deep in meditation. On any other night
for the last ten months this conversational opening
would have urged Maurice to the speech of vision and
prophecy ; but to-night he preferred to walk alone
with his thoughts. For the most part they were
hardly thoughts at all, only mere flashes of memory
84 WAITING
the turn of a cheek, the line of an eyebrow, and,
dimly, how she held and carried herself. Their last
words came back to him.
" Will you be long in these parts, Miss Barton ? "
And the flash of her eyes as she said, her head
turned slightly, " That depends, Mr. Blake. I'm
tossed round like a ball from hand to hand. I'm
lent to the Liscannow County Committee, and any
agricultural society that asks for me can have me, I
believe."
The worst of it was, he thought, that one didn't
rightly know whether she wanted to be asked for or
not. All the girls he had known hitherto would
have said a thing out straight, or would have
pretended in such a way that one could see through
them easily. He was not quite satisfied with this
generalization. Were Minnie Reardon and Miss
Devoy and Hanny quite so simple ? Few women
in the old Irish stories were simple. They often
looked one thing and seemed to think another, and
then did something entirely unexpected. When he
tried to test this by his own experience, he suddenly
realized that, until to-night, he had never really
observed a woman. Hanny, even, he did not know,
much less Minnie Reardon. He could not re-
member the colour of their eyes, nor their dress.
He had never dreamt of analysing what relation an
intonation in the voice, a flash of the eye, bore to
their words or thoughts. Then he jumped to the
other extreme.
" There's a great subtlety in women," he said
aloud.
" They're queer enough," Master Driscoll said
vaguely, as if he was thinking of something else.
After a pause he continued, " I don't think myself
WAITING 85
there's much in what Jim Mescall says. There
ought to be no fear of the new things, banks and
stores and the like, and Home Rule itself, destroy-
ing what's best in the old ways, if we only give 'em
the proper graft."
" Of course not," Maurice said, somewhat
impatiently.
This was his own favourite topic ; but now it
threatened a train of thought that he had found
pleasantly disturbing. He had a sudden illumina-
tion. There was a connection between Master
Driscoll's thoughts and his own at least they
could be made to connect.
" We ought to have an egg and poultry society
in Bourneen," he said emphatically.
Driscoll sighed. " We ought, indeed," he said.
" I often thought of showing the people the way by
putting up a fowl-run at the end of the garden.
But I always shirked it, God forgive me, through
not knowing much of the habits of hens and the
like, except out of books."
He opened the cottage door as he finished
speaking, lit the lamp, raked the ashes off the live
turf in the grate, and put on a few sods.
" I think I'll sit up awhile," he said, taking a
seat. " To-morrow to-day, by the same token,"
glancing at the clock, u is a holiday, and I'll be time
enough in the morning if I catch second mass."
He yawned and looked thoughtfully at the fire.
" The hens are heavy on my mind," he said after a
while. " It's too little is done for the labouring
men, with all that's done for the farmers ; and that
society'd be making some sort of a start for them."
Maurice told him of Miss Barton and the
possibility of getting her as instructor.
86 WAITING
"The very thing. It's God sent her into the
parish," Driscoll said, striking his hand on his leg.
" At the next meeting of the committee I'll move
that we'll put in an application for her. A fine girl
she is, with a laugh that made my own old heart
jump. She's learning the Irish too, and knows more
about the Red Branch than I do myself we had a
great seanachus by the fire, though she never let on
to me what her business was."
" I think she'll do," Maurice said with judicial
coldness, his nerves reacting to the excitement with
which he awaited the old man's decision.
" Do ! " Driscoll said indignantly. " What are
ye young fellows coming to ? God knows I ought
to be tired of schools, but I'd begin all over again,
from the alphabet, if I had the chance of learning
from her. Go off to bed out of that ! It's lumps
of ice ye all have where your hearts ought to be."
He caught up the poker and shook it at
Maurice, who gave a pleased laugh at the turf,
which had now begun to flare.
The humorous gleam in Driscoll's eyes gave
place to a thoughtful stare as he laid down the poker.
" I forgot that she's a Protestant," he said in a
troubled tone.
Maurice at once fired up. " It doesn't make a
pin's difference," he said excitedly. " The people
are above that nonsense now." He stood up and
kicked in a sod that was tumbling over the grate.
" See what happened when an attempt was made to
start the Erinites in the parish. My father himself,
though he doesn't take much interest in politics
since he bought the land, was against it. And you
should hear Tom at the meeting ! 1 was proud of
him being my brother. * The Crawfords and the
WAITING 87
Levises and the Barbers,' he said, 'go to church on
a Sunday, and we go to mass ; but apart from that
there aren't better neighbours in the barony the
first to help at a threshing and a potato digging.
Is it set up a friendly society ye would that'd shut
the door on Emmet and Wolfe Tone and Mitchell
and Parnell, not to mention the living ? Friendly ! '
he said, and I never saw such scorn on the face of a
man before. ' We'll have no society in this parish
that'd exclude our decent Protestant neighbours.
We ' "
"Oh, I know they routed it," Driscoll inter-
rupted. " The people are right enough in this
parish. I wasn't thinking of them. 'Twas Father
James I had in my mind."
" Oh, him ! " Maurice said more quietly, as if
ashamed of his outburst. " Fortunately for her,
she's not under the National Board. What has he to
do with her ? "
" It'd be hard to bring religion into hens and
ducks, that's true, though I wouldn't put it past
him if he took the notion," Driscoll said, smiling
again. " I suppose I'm still in dread of him, though
I'm out of his hands itself. The way he used to tower
over me when I had anything good to propose, shout-
ing ' Remember I'm your manager and the priest of
the parish ! I'll have none of it.' And often opposite
the boys too," he added sadly. " It's a wonder they
ever had any respect for me."
" It's not you they lost respect for," Maurice
said bitterly.
" I had no right at all to be mentioning the like
of that. Tut, tut ! I'm getting like any old maid with
a cutting tongue," the old man said, standing up and
lighting a candle. " There, take that now, and don't
88 WAITING
be keeping it alight all night wearing out your eyes
reading. And forget what I said about Father
James I've long since left him to God."
Maurice was soon in bed. He extinguished the
candle, forgot all about Father Mahon, but he could
not sleep. He shut his eyes, and saw Alice Barton
in her toque, which seemed to bring some new
beauty of her face into relief ; he opened them, but
she was still there, her big pleading eyes bent on
Jack Hinnissey, who had refused even Mrs. Reardon
to wind up the dance with his famous exhibition of
hornpipes on a half-door. He heard again Jack
Hinnissey's "Bedad, I'll do it to please you, miss."
He took part, as vividly as when it happened, in
taking down the half-door " off the dairy, not the
house, for that's only just been new painted," he
again heard Mrs. Reardon say excitedly. And such
hornpipes no one ever saw before in Bourneen !
Alice's eyes glowed with excitement, and even Jim
Mescall said, as he put down the fiddle, " I didn't
think there was a man in these days that had it in
him and age creeping upon Jack Hinnissey too,
and he the father of four." For a long time he
heard only the rattle of the half-door on the stone
floor and the quick stepping of agile feet, and, was
it Jack Hinnissey's voice miles away ? " Resin your
elbow, Jim, and let the bow fly." Then there was
only the old woman, the Ireland of the sad songs,
sitting by a fireless hearth, her head bent on her
knees. Soon a fire glowed, the bent shoulders
straightened, the scant grey locks changed to a
ruddy brown. She turned her face towards him,
and he felt no surprise that the dream woman was
Alice Barton. . . .
He awoke and laughed ; it was absurd that she
WAITING 89
should remind him of the dream woman, he said to
himself. It seemed less absurd as he drew up the
blinds in the kitchen and made the fire, noiselessly,
lest he should awaken Driscoll in the room beyond.
It seemed quite natural as he let himself out quietly
to nine o'clock mass. Hair and eyes were alike in
both ; this resemblance must have made him notice
Alice at first. Afterwards, of course, she appealed
to him because she was interested in Irish things,
in the language, in old Irish dancing and folk songs,
and because she worked for Ireland. . . .
He felt unaccountably jumpy as he walked the
short distance to the chapel. He was greeted by
several people on their way to mass, and always he
responded nervously, expecting somehow that each
voice would be hers. Not, he thought, that any
one could mistake the somewhat harsh Bourneen
brogue for her delightful accent which, while dis-
carding the flatness of Bourneen and the pressure,
as if through an overgrowth of adenoids, that
characterized the speech of Dublin as he remembered
it, retained all the music of both, and had an added
beauty that was peculiarly its own.
Her voice would be a great asset : it would
draw people to her lectures. There was no telling
the influence for good it would have on all the
progressive movements in the parish. He sat at
the end of a bench in the cold chapel and con-
gratulated himself on seeing her usefulness so clearly.
He drew further inspiration from the shuffling and
coughing all around, signs of impatient waiting for
Father James, who was a little late ; from the
frosted breaths of the worshippers, beginning in
fantastic puffs and spirals and coalescing into a
grey haze that enveloped the whole congregation ;
90 WAITING
from the two touzled boys, only half awake, who
lighted the reluctant candles on the altar. When,
after much uncertain jabbing with the long tapers, the
last candle was lighted, he had come to a decision
to see her that very day, to give her timely notice
that the parish would probably demand her services ;
otherwise, and the thought arrested the visible breath
he was exhaling at the moment and seemed to
congeal it, she might make some other engagement
and so be lost to the parish. It was his bounden
duty, he felt, to do everything in his power to prevent
the possibility of that calamity ; he must see her at
once.
He joined in the relieved sigh with which the
congregation greeted the appearance of Father James
at the vestry door, the chalice, of necessity, held well
in front of his commanding figure. He read his
Prayer-book diligently during mass. By turning a
page quickly, or by looking at the altar, he managed
to brush away a disconcerting strand of gold brown
hair or a laughing brown eye that occasionally came
between him and the print. For one brief moment
of distraction he reflected that, when he was not
actually controlling his thoughts, it was not her
usefulness which recalled her to him, but some little
nuance of appearance, of speech, of gesture. He
was elaborating a rational explanation of this when
the server's bell reminded him of the mystery at the
altar. He bowed his head. Gradually all sounds
ceased. He forgot even the aggressive personality
of Father Mahon, at whom he peered unconsciously
through the slits between his fingers, in the deep
hushed silence that filled the church. The feeling
of peace that always came to him at the consecration
of the mass had to-day some new wonder in it.
WAITING 91
Even when the sounds began anew, snuffling and
coughing and shuffling that had often worried him
in the past, he hardly noticed them in the gladness
and joy that filled him. The Pater Noster and the
Communion had a fresh significance. The sun-
light that broke through the tawdry glass in the east
window as Father James was purifying the chalice
seemed to sing to his heart.
As he resumed his seat to await the sermon he
had a consciousness of life such as he felt only on
rare occasions when he heard the first birds twitter
after dawn, or when he stood entranced and alone on
the high pass behind Liscannow on a late summer
afternoon, the mountains beyond clad in different
shades of purple, and, at his feet, the shining track
of the sun on the sea. He was tolerant of every one
and of everything. He even smiled as Father
Mahon jerked his chasuble over his head, flung it on
the altar, turned round, faced the congregation with
a fierce frown, pulled up the sleeves of his alb as if
preparing for a prize fight, and shouted " Dearly
beloved brethren."
His thoughts wandered again to his project of
seeing Miss Barton during the day. He was worry-
ing over the hour of his visit when a snigger from
Jim Reardon, who sat in front of him, made him
listen to the sermon.
" Hallow Eve dances, indeed ! Looking for
sweethearts in wells and tubs of water 1 Night
walking and trapesing the parish under shawls in
the dead of night. I'll put it down. I hope no
Catholic house in this parish was disgraced by such
a gathering last night sowing the seed of the devil
in its track. That's what learning Irish comes to, a
language that's no use to man or mortal an excbse
92 WAITING
for sweethearting and sin. Revive old customs,
indeed ! Every one of 'em sprung from the devil
himself. For what were the heathen pagans that
invented them but children of the devil ! Fathers
and mothers of families, take heed of what I say,
and keep your children from these dance houses
of sin and infamy. They'll be choosing wives
and husbands for themselves next, and you know
what that means ! maybe bringing a penniless girl
in on the floor to you. Love, indeed ! I never
knew any good to come of it but sin and harm
and unsuitable marriages. Young men and young
women, the only lucky marriages are the mar-
riages made for you by your parents and your
friends with the full blessing of the priest of the
parish."
Father James worked himself up to a high pitch
of excitement. He frothed at the mouth, relapsed
into the broadest brogue, and wound up with a vivid
picture of the hell that awaited those who refused to
be said by their priests ; describing in detail the
torments of a sinful soul gripping frantically with
lacerated fingers at the molten metal of a sloping
lead roof in a fruitless effort to save himself from
slipping into a pit of brimstone beneath.
Use had dulled Maurice to the description of
these horrors, the invariable peroration of every
sermon. He had even listened to denunciations of
dances and of love in previous sermons without
having been particularly moved. But to-day he
burned with indignation. It was infamous to speak
like that of the girls who were at the dance last
night. . . . He caught sight of Miss Devoy in the
women's side of the nave. Arranged marriages,
indeed ! he thought angrily. Not that foolish talk
WAITING 93
ought to trouble him. He had no time to think of
o
marriage, and no desire . . .
He tried to escape the group of talkers in front
of the chapel after mass. His mother ran after him
and caught his arm.
" You might drop in after dinner if you can at
all," she said.
" I'm very busy, but I'll try," he said moodily.
" Bedad, master," Jack Hinnissey said from
another group, " he flailed all round him to-day."
" I'm that used to the geography of hell that I
could find my way blindfolded in it after that,"
Larry Reardon said.
" The best chance you have, if you've the mis-
fortune to go there, is to sit still, I'm told," Mike
Blake said, lighting his pipe. " If you try to hop
out of one torment, you're sure to hop into a worse.
Not but there was a good deal of sense in what he
said about marriages."
" There wasn't sense, nor rhyme, nor reason in
it," Tom Blake said bluntly.
Mike was gesticulating violently with his pipe
in preparation for a spirited reply, when a tactful
neighbour interposed.
" How many tons of spuds did you draw off
that lea land you ploughed, Mike ? "
Mike's face assumed a look of worried calculation.
Mrs. Blake sighed. " It'll be all hours of the
day before we get our breakfast if Mike once gets
rightly started on that lea field," she said fretfully.
Drawing Maurice aside she whispered : " You won't
forget to drop in, agra. I have something in my
eye for you."
Father Mahon passed out with long strides, his
soutane swishing against his legs. The women
94 WAITING
curtseyed. The men took off their hats and stood
bareheaded, their pipes held discreetly behind their
backs. The priest gave a few jerky nods.
" He's pleased enough with the lambasting he
gave us," Jack Hinnissey said.
" Exercising himself for his breakfast he was.
He might as well try and stop the tide beating
against the Liscannow cliffs beyond as to try to
hinder what's going on in the country now," Tom
Blake said angrily.
" Whist, Tom," Mike said, leaving a sentence
about potatoes unfinished. " Young fellows have
long tongues and little sense."
" They don't be chewing the truth in their jaws,
anyway, afraid to utter it."
Mike pretended not to hear Tom's retort, and
resumed his dissertation on potatoes.
" Bedad, you had him there, Tom," Jack
Hinnissey said, admiringly. " Besides, sure Father
James isn't the Pope himself, that puts the kybosh
on a thing the moment he speaks the word, I'm
told. For the matter of that, there's things I could
teach him myself. I wouldn't give ten pounds for
the spavined colt he gave thirty for the other day.
And his opinion on a bullock, with all he has of
'em, isn't worth that " spitting on the ground.
" And the whole world knows the curate is agin
him in most of what he said to-day. Barring that
I hadn't the right of the clergy to throw hell in
your faces, 1 often made a more sensible speech
myself in the Land League days."
" Faith, then, you did."
" 'Tis your tongue is well oiled still, Jack."
" The day is long yet. Go on, Jack."
Maurice withdrew from the small crowd of
WAITING
95
admiring listeners that was circling round Hinnissey.
His mother again pressed his arm and said, " Don't
forget." At the gate of the chapel yard he almost
ran into Miss Devoy.
" I'm waiting for your mother," she said
timidly.
He flushed. She went on speaking, but he
didn't hear what she said. He seemed to see
her for the first time. The high colour on her
cheek-bones had become a dark blue purple. A
light blue bow in the front of her ungainly hat
made her cheeks livid. She tapped the ground with
her umbrella, held nervously in hands covered with
white cotton gloves several sizes too large. Streaks
of purple wrist appeared between the gloves and the
short sleeves of her serge coat. Her thick lips and
grey eyes gave a hint of humour when she smiled,
and she was smiling broadly now.
So this was the girl people were saying that he
should marry, he thought. He looked at her eyes
again and liked them. They were kind eyes and it
did not matter that the lashes were few and straight
and short. A feeling of friendliness for her came
over him. She looked so forlorn and cold and ugly
in spite of her good-humoured lips and eyes. He
pitied her and reproached himself for not being
kinder to her in the school. She was just the sort
of girl Miss Barton could help . . .
He noticed that she had stopped speaking.
" I thought you always went to mass at the
Strand chapel," he said, after groping round for
something to say.
" Sure that's what I was telling you. I came
here on account of your mother asking me to spend
the day."
96 WAITING
He laughed boyishly. She laughed too. The
spirit died out of his laugh as he watched and heard
her. Her crinkled eyes, half shrewd, half humorous,
seemed to share some secret with him, and her laugh
had an understanding ring. He had begun to laugh
at a sudden recognition of what struck him as a
grotesque attempt of his mother at match-making.
But Miss Devoy's laugh made a cold shudder run
down his back. Did she know his mother's plans ?
Surely his mother hadn't spoken to her ? The
whole idea was absurd. He wrinkled his brows in
a search for resonant condemnatory adjectives
ridiculous, preposterous, impossible. He laughed
again a little shrilly.
" Father James got out the wrong side of the
bed to-day," she said pleasantly.
He didn't wish to discuss Father James with
her, and was relieved to see his mother approach
a relief, however, that lasted only till she spoke.
"That's right having a little chat," she said
amicably.
He gave a wry smile, made a muttered excuse of
having to get the master's breakfast, and hurried
away. For a few paces he was angry with his
mother. He should have to put a stop to her
nonsense : he wouldn't go home that afternoon, he
resolved with a frown. The sight of Master Driscoll
standing bareheaded at the open door of the cottage,
the sun glinting from his white locks, made him
smile a smile at his own foolishness.
" Seeing that I've no notion of getting married,
I'm only bothering over nothing," he said to himself,
with a shrug.
" You stole a march on me this morning," the
old man said ; " but I've stolen another on you,"
WAITING 97
pointing to the table which was laid for breakfast.
" I put on the eggs the minute I caught sight of
you. They'll be done before you're rightly sitting
down.
" Was it hell, or the Sea of Galilee, or the
dignity of the priesthood, or Purgatory, or the dues,
he gave you to-day ? He used to have another
sermon on Faith, but I haven't heard it for the last
dozen years I suppose it has slipped his memory,"
Driscoll continued, as he lifted a small pot off the
fire and ladled four eggs into a saucer with an iron
spoon.
"He gave us hell all round," Maurice said
laughing.
" I always slept less under it than under the
others. Itself and the one on the dues are the only
two sermons that rouse him to the pitch of keeping
me awake. He'll be after the mass offerings to-
morrow, so we'll have Purgatory. Not but it's
fitting enough for All Souls' Day if only he didn't
sound the drum so loud for the money," Driscoll
said, taking his seat and breaking the top of an egg
with much care. " He'll soon have it as brimstony
as hell itself if he goes on trimming it up with
any more torments, to soften the heart into an extra
five shillings towards the relief of the poor souls.
May God forgive me for making light of their
sufferings."
At his second cup of tea he said : " I was awake
half the night thinking of that girl up at the
Crawfords. We must get her at any cost."
The hand with which Maurice was holding his
cup to his lips shook and some of the tea was spilled
on his waiscoat.
" Bother it," he said nervously.
H
98 WAITING
" If there's any fault I see in you, Maurice,"
the old man said, leaning back in his chair, " it is
that you don't give credit enough to women for the
power of good they're able to do if their mind is set
on it. You're not half so eager to get that girl to
help us as you ought to be."
Maurice said doubtfully, " Maybe I'm not."
CHAPTER VII
WHEN Driscoll left for second mass, Maurice settled
down with a pipe to the bank accounts. More than
the creamery or the agricultural society, the little
parish bank interested him. More even than the
Bourneen branch of the United Irish League, in
whose proceedings he had a deep concern, partly
since, under the rules of the Education Board,
politics were a forbidden pleasure, partly because he
had notions on politics that he had a hankering to
submit to practical tests. But the bank was his own
pet child. Bourneen was a comparatively rich parish
of tillage land, pasture and grazing. The majority
of the farms ranged from twenty acres to fifty ; a few
were close on a hundred acres ; mixed land for the
most part, good, middling, and poor, but capable of
yielding a comfortable subsistence. Along the bog,
however, on the east of the parish, and stretching up
a spur of Slieve Mor, were many small holdings of
reclaimed bog and mountain on which life was a
constant struggle. And, by the sea, twenty or
thirty families depended, half on miserable strips of
bottom, half on precarious fishing in small boats
on an unsafe shore. The Land Purchase Act had
done something to better the condition of all the
farmers, but it had done least for the poorer, and
nothing at all for a score of landless labourers.
When, through Master Driscoll's efforts, several
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co-operative societies were started Maurice feared for
awhile that the hoary principle, " to those that have
more shall be given," would mark their work. But
gradually their influence extended to the cotter on
the edge of the bog, to the labourer's patch of
garden, to the fisherman's boat.
Driscoll had said at a committee meeting,
" We've a long road to go yet, but we're making
a real beginning at last. What Maurice Blake has
done with that bank, since he became secretary near
a year ago, is beyond telling."
" Isn't he your own rearing, if he did itself ?
Not but the whole world knows he has a head on
him," was Jack Hinnissey's comment.
The items in the books that gave a pleasant
flavour to Maurice's pipe, and caused him to give
low chuckles of satisfaction, might have provoked a
regular banker to a cynical smile. Twenty-five
shillings to Mike Fahey to buy a sow bonham paid
back in full later, on selling a litter of seven pigs ;
six pounds advanced on the date of repayment to buy
a yearling heifer. Two pounds to Jimmy Delaney for
basic slag to be paid when the crop was reaped.
Twelve pounds to four Strand fishermen towards
the purchase of a Greencastle yawl ; four pounds
paid back " after the big haul of herrings on the 4th
August."
The arrival of Bessy Reilly, to clean up, inter-
rupted him. He refilled his pipe and walked
bareheaded in the small garden in front. All signs
of frost had gone, except a few blackened sprigs
of heliotrope and some faded calceolarias. The
chrysanthemum blooms along the wall of the cottage
opened wide to the sun ; the canvas which protected
them from the frost having been rolled up neatly by
WAITING 101
Master Driscoll before going to mass. Maurice
gazed long at the flowers, but thought of a poultry
society. Soon there would be entries in the bank
books of Buff Orpingtons and Indian Runner ducks.
His thoughts wandered to Alice Barton. If she
came to help in the parish, things must be made as
pleasant as possible for her. A young girl like her
needed play as well as work. It wasn't much the
country had to offer, he said to himself with a frown.
But it was waking up. There was dancing at the
Irish class, and the singing of folk songs. They
must have more gatherings in the houses at night.
Jim Mescall must be induced to spend more time in
the parish. . . .
Afterwards he sat in his own room making a fair
copy of some old tales that he hoped one day to see
in print. He had taken them down in small note-
books from the lips of old story tellers at ceilidhs ;
or Driscoll had dictated them as they sat together at
night. He read his own English translation of one
about the holy well near Reardon's, a fantastic story
with laughter and tears as closely blended as warp and
woof in a web of linen. How she would smile over
it and look sad. . . .
" Are you asleep ? " Driscoll said, opening the
door. " Bessy shouted to you before she went, and
I've called out twice myself. The bacon and
cabbage'll be cold."
" I'm afraid I was," Maurice said, looking
wryly at the few lines he had copied in as many
hours.
" If only Father Malone had the ruling of the
parish, I wouldn't exchange out of it for heaven
itself," Driscoll said, as he carved the small joint of
bacon in its bed of white cabbage.
102 WAITING
" He's a fine man every way," Maurice said
enthusiastically. " Did he give a good sermon ? "
" He did then. One that'd put the heart in a
man, no matter how he was broken down by mis-
fortune. And it wasn't by lying under it neither,
his advice was, but by putting on a bold front
to it."
Maurice let the conversation drop and ate his
frugal dinner hurriedly. He pushed back his
chair as he laid down his knife and fork, and
said
" 1 think I'll step up to the Crawfords' and see
that girl as you're so set on it."
He added the last sentence hesitatingly, after a
pause. He had no sooner said it than he corrected
it, blushing as if ashamed of a mis-statement. "I
was thinking of going myself, in any case."
" That's right. But if you're too busy I'd strive
a point and go myself, after I get rid of the men that
are coming about the new shed in the store yard
beyond."
" I'm quite free nothing at all to do," Maurice
said emphatically, taking his hat off a peg.
"It's all one which of us goes," Driscoll said
heartily.
Maurice's reply to this was to make quickly for
the door. It struck him on the doorstep to take the
story about the well and read it to her ; but after a
moment's hesitation he decided not to take it. A
few of the chrysanthemums ? He shook his head.
As he walked rapidly through the village he had
misgivings as to the wisdom of going at all. A
letter would have done as well. It would be better
if Master Driscoll had gone. There was no necessity
for any one to write to her or see her a letter to
WAITING 103
the County Committee would have settled every-
thing. He did not, however, slacken his pace. He
glanced sideways at his shadow, lengthened by the
low westering sun. He looked at his watch. It
was still early. Was it too early to call at the
Crawfords' ? The afternoon of a Sunday or holiday
was all right for a visit to a Catholic house. But
the Crawfords were Protestants. As this was no
holiday with them, they were probably working.
And on working days the fittest time for visiting
was in the evening after supper. As he approached
his father's house he decided to go in there and put
off the visit to Crawfords' till later. He thought of
Miss Devoy. She was with his mother. He began
to hum "The Snowy- breasted Pearl," and walked
steadily past the gate.
At the entrance to the boreen leading to
Crawford's house he came on John Crawford, his
hands in his pockets, gazing over the low hedge
at a field in which a few drills of potatoes were
still undug. His bearded, taciturn face was set
gloomily.
" More frost ? " he said, looking up at the
sky.
" I think not," Maurice said gravely, after in-
specting the signs.
Crawford took a long look at the sun and nodded
twice in agreement.
" Maybe they're safe then. Last night's frost
was only skin deep. Are you going up to the
house ? "
" I am. Is Miss Barton in ? "
" She is."
They walked in silence along the well-kept
boreen. A waste of time and labour and money,
io 4 WAITING
some of Crawford's neighbours called his efforts to
keep the boreen in repair. He usually muttered
into his beard something about " saving in horses'
legs and cart wheels." His clipped hedges were
excused with knowing nods and a reference to " the
Scotch blood that was far back in him "; explanation
enough apparently of all queer fads. He was often
counselled, more in former years than recently, not
" to waste such a terrible wicked lot of money on the
land in bag manure and the like." Master Driscoll
attributed his good crops to good farming ; but it
was generally accepted that " them Protestants have
the devil's luck."
" It's a powerful lot of holidays ye have," he
said, half-way up the boreen.
" Not near so many as there used to be," Maurice
said smiling.
" Ye might clip another couple without any loss,"
Crawford said, deftly kicking a loose stone off the
road with his right foot behind his left.
Yet he paid a subtle deference to Catholic holidays.
He wore his week-day clothes but he always put on a
coat, an unusual feature in his working attire. He
never did any work " in face of the public," and
confined his labours to the garden or the fields behind
the house.
" You'll find her within likely," he said, pushing
open the door.
He sauntered away when he had discharged his
office of hospitality.
Mrs. Crawford, who was pouring water from a
kettle into a teapot at the hearth, suspended the
operation and turned her head.
" If it's not Maurice Blake ! " she said, laying
down the kettle and wiping her hands on her apron.
WAITING 105
" A thousand welcomes to you, Maurice." She
shook hands warmly.
Alice Barton, seated on a three-legged stool by
the fire, nodded to him brightly. She was vigorously
whipping cream in a bowl with a spoon, one of
Mrs. Crawford's largest aprons tied high on her
waist.
" Is it near broke yet ? " Mrs. Crawford asked.
" It is not though my arm is almost," Alice
said jerkily.
" The worst of that creamery is that we're often
without a bit of butter in the house," Mrs. Crawford
said, turning to Maurice. "We were just going to
have a cup of tea and a mouthful of hot cake and
what'd that be without the butter to slip it down ?
when I found all of a sudden there wasn't a taste in
the place. So we're making shift to make a bit in a
bowl. Hold it well over the fire, Alice, so that it'll
get a touch of the heat."
"And the face nearly burned off me already,"
Alice said, turning her back to the fire.
Maurice thought the pink glow in her cheeks
very becoming, and was' tempted to say so. But
he was tongue tied, and Mrs. Crawford anticipated
him.
" A fat lot of harm it has done you," she said,
as she filled the teapot. " Here, give me that bowl
and I'll soon have the butter swimming on the top
of it. And now that the master has come you might
put a cloth on the table in the room and lay the tea-
things there," she added, as Alice, with a sigh of
relief, handed her the bowl.
Alice took off the apron, which had enveloped
her like a sack, glanced doubtfully at the dresser and
at her aunt.
io6 WAITING
" Oh ! the best cups in the room cupboard, of
course," Mrs. Crawford said.
She watched Alice admiringly as she walked across
the kitchen to the room door, and whispered to
Maurice
u She's that smart and handy she might have
been reared in the country."
Though Maurice at the moment was attributing
her grace of movement to some unknown town in-
fluence, he nodded emphatic agreement.
Mrs. Crawford whipped the cream with an easy
certainty. Alice moved about the room, coming a few
times to the dresser in the kitchen for a knife or a
plate. Maurice watched her. She had changed some-
how since last night. He smiled with pleasure. It
was ridiculous of Hanny to say that a girl's new blouse
would be staring him in the face for a year before
he'd notice it, and not even then unless he was told
about it. Why, he had noticed Miss Barton's dress
twice in twenty-four hours : he noticed even the
difference in her shoes, he asserted strongly, in proof
of his acute power of observation. Of course, it was
because she was wearing a blouse and skirt now that
she looked different.
"There, it's broke at last," Mrs. Crawford said
with satisfaction. " I'll have it gathered together in
a minute. The tea is more than drawn enough for
Alice. She has queer city notions about tea, but
sure she can add a drop of water to it if it's too
strong. We won't wait for John," she continued,
as she collected the butter into a small lump, poured
off the buttermilk, washed the butter, walking the
while between the table and the dresser. " If he's
working he likes a cup taken to him in the field. If
he's only pottering about the place, either he comes
WAITING 107
in or he doesn't. If he chances in while the tea is
going he enjoys a cup as well as another. If he
doesn't come in, sorra one of me looks for him, and
he never feels the want of it."
" Where is Allan ? " Maurice asked, to fill up a
pause.
" Allan ! he's worse than a Catholic for all the
good we get out of that son of ours on a holiday.
Galivanting he is into Liscannow to a Gaelic foot-
ball match in his Sunday clothes too. Come along
in now and we'll have a cup of tea," she added, leading
the way to the room, the teapot in one hand and a
plate of butter in the other.
A small fire burned in the grate. "That's for
Alice," Mrs. Crawford said, nodding at the fire with
some pride. " She has a powerful deal of reading
and writing to do in that job of hers. With all the
comings in and going out in the kitchen her head'd
be moidered, so I keep a few sods in here for
her."
This reminded Maurice of the object of his
visit, but it was not till he had almost finished tea
that he mustered courage to say
" Mr. Driscoll wishes to know if you'd like to
come to Bourneen to lecture, Miss Barton ? He
says the society is going to ask for you at once."
He spoke nervously, in a hushed voice, as if
the fate of empires depended on her reply. Her
eyes sparkled mischievously.
" There now ? " she said, tossing her head, to
Mrs. Crawford, whose mouth hung open in as-
tonishment.
" Think of that now," Mrs. Crawford said
weakly.
Alice turned to Maurice with a set face. There
io8 WAITING
was a prim severity about her lips, but her eyes
sparkled a little as she said
" I've to go where I'm sent of course, I've no
objection to come here."
" Listen to her putting on now ! " Mrs. Crawford
said derisively. " And she near on her knees to
John all the morning coaxing him to try and get her
asked."
" Oh ! Aunt Ruth," Alice said appealingly, all
her primness gone.
" Far be it from me to belittle you," her aunt
said, looking at her affectionately. " I wouldn't
give in to any one in the ten parishes on your laying
of a table or settling a posy of flowers. And >you
should see the wonders she worked, Maurice, on my
Sunday dress in the course of a few minutes. I'm
never tired of singing her praises. But," she
screwed her face doubtfully, " it's a different matter
entirely when it comes to the rearing of fowl.
There's myself now, and I all my life at it, and
didn't I lose eleven young turkeys out of a score
this very year. There John sat," she pointed to the
kitchen, " and she begging of him, and his eyes
fixed on the back of next year and as dumb as a
post, and never word of encouragement he'd breathe
on her. He's a silent man and it's hard to know
what he notices. From the way he sat her on his
knee the night she came, I doubt if he sees that she's
out of the long-clothes she used to wear and he
dandling her when he saw her last, near twenty years
ago. Though I believe in my heart he didn't give
any heed to her because of a crazy notion he has
against pushing relations on the county pay-sheet.
But it puts a different face on it if Master Driscoll
thinks well of her knowledge. What he doesn't
WAITING 109
know about one thing and another isn't worth
knowing. Maybe, I wasn't giving her enough of
credit myself," she wound up, her voice trailing off
in a questioning tone.
Maurice listened uneasily. His eyes wandered
from the framed scripture texts on the walls to the
clasped family Bible, on its mat of blue and red
Berlin wool, on a small table in the corner. He
had strong opinions on qualifications and had always
opposed foisting people into jobs. What did he or
Master Driscoll know about her ? His eyes fell on
her photograph on the mantelpiece. The very dress
she wore last night at Reardons' ! With a faith that
transcends all knowledge, he felt convinced that she
was capable. If weaker people needed evidence,
there it was in the picture, in the poise of her head,
in the line of her neck and shoulders. He was even
a little disappointed when he remembered why he
had taken her knowledge for granted the Board
that appointed to her post enforced the strictest tests
of fitness. His eyes caught hers fixed on him
quizzically.
"What do you think of me ? " said they.
He intended his to answer, " I believe you are
well qualified," and was disturbed when she turned
away her eyes hastily, blushed the faintest pink up
to the edge of her hair and frowned.
When he said the same words aloud to Mrs.
Crawford a moment afterwards, Alice smiled normally
and gave him a grateful little nod. Then she shrugged
her shoulders, saying
" A girl's relatives never believe that she can do
anything."
Mrs. Crawford threw up her hands. " Did
any one ever hear the like ? " she said to the ceiling.
i io WAITING
" Why if you only heard all I say to John about you,
and I lying awake at night. ' Whist, woman,' he'd
say, * you're keeping the sleep off me.' But he
might just as well be speaking to the wall. All
along I knew you had it in you "
" Ruth," Crawford interrupted through the
window, having lifted the sash from outside, " would
you hand out an old apron to save Dempsey's Sun-
day trousers, and he milking ? "
" You ruffian of the world," she said, on going
to the window, to the workman who stood beside
her husband. " And you not coming next or nigh the
place since you went off early to second mass."
" And would you blame me, ma'am, and I having
my clean things on me ? " Dempsey said, laughing
sheepishly. " The last time I went to confession to
Father James, he drew the line of work on a Holiday
at milking cows or the like that couldn't go without.
And to be all the more careful, he said, because
I'm a labouring man to Protestants, to keep up
the credit of my religion, and on no account to
change out of my Sunday trousers or my greased
shoes though the last wouldn't matter a ha'penny,
for they're the same Sunday and day, for fear I
might be forgetting the holy day that was in it and
be putting my hand to other servile works that there
was no allowance of."
Mrs. Crawford sniffed. " It's a pity he didn't
put a padlock on your tongue. As for work !
if you confessed all you done of it from one week's
end to the other, and every day was a holiday, he'd
be hard set to make a sin out of it"
She brought an apron from the kitchen and
handed it to Dempsey through the window.
" The teapot isn't cold yet, come in and have
WAITING in
a cup, John, and I have the news of the world for
you, too," she said in a wheedling tone to her hus-
band.
He grunted but walked towards the kitchen door.
" If I had a cup myself it would put the heart in
me for the milking," Dempsey said, as she was about
to let down the sash.
" You idle stravager," she said, pulling it down
and jerking it up again. She filled a cup, buttered
a huge slice of soda cake and handed them out.
" Be off out of my sight with you and I'll be out
in a minute to help you with the milking," she added,
banging the sash to.
Crawford came in and stood behind Alice's chair.
" I'll have no tea now. I must see after the
cows," he said gloomily. " What is it ? "
" There are others that think higher of your own
than you do," Mrs. Crawford said scornfully, her
hands on her hips. " The master there brought the
news. Master Driscoll is head and front of a move
to get Alice to work in the parish."
Crawford was fingering a strand of Alice's hair
between his thumb and first finger.
" You'll be coming back to us for a bit again,
then," he said.
She turned her head, and pressed her cheek
against his hand.
" I must go and look after the milk," he said.
Alice walked with him to the kitchen door.
" It was always a grievance to him that he never
had a daughter of his own," Mrs. Crawford said to
Maurice in a low voice. " Sorra a word he ever
gives Alice more than that. But she won't have a
word said against him. It might be blood speaking
in her and she his own sister's daughter. They can
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sit there of a night, the best of company, without a
word between them, and the next minute she'd be
as lively as a cricket with myself. If she doesn't
know about the fowl itself she has the heart in her
to comfort a lonely man. But there, I'm talking,
and I ought to be helping Dempsey. We're all
beholden to you for taking the trouble to come with
the news."
Alice sat with Maurice by the fire in the kitchen
while Mrs. Crawford was in the cowhouse. She
showed him her certificates, spoke of her early life
at home, of the little poultry run her mother kept
beyond Drumcondra, on the outskirts of Dublin,
" as much to keep her in mind of the country as for
the profit of it," The light went from the day, but
she spoke on, the firelight gilding her hair, her eyes
shining, of her mother's love of the country, a love
compared with which her own was only a shadow ;
of the tales of Ireland her mother told her ; of the
Irish class she attended in a back room in Eccles
Street ; of her excitement on the great day when it
struck her that her knowledge of poultry might be
made a means of living in the real country which she
hardly dared to believe had all the charm her mother
ascribed to it ; of her preparation at the agricultural
college ; of her appointment ; and since but here
words failed her, and he saw her eyes shine brighter
for the tears that dimmed them.
It was late when he went home. He had only
a vague memory of what she said, but as he walked
along the familiar road he saw her clearly as she sat
at the fireside, her head slightly bent forward, her
chin resting on her hand, her hair a golden aura.
He heard again her low impassioned voice with a
new music in it at that pitch. He shivered a little
WAITING 113
she seemed so far away, so detached. He ought
to be glad, he said to himself reproachfully, that she
was so bound up in her ideals. They were his own
too. He even said aloud as he passed the old mill :
" It's a happy country that has the heart of a woman
like her." But he felt restless and unhappy. In
passing through the village he recalled the gesture
of her face seeking John Crawford's hand ; and,
somehow, it brought him peace.
CHAPTER VIII
SPRING had come to Bourneen. Trees in bud shone
pink in the sunlight. Delicate green shoots starred
the hedgerows. The cold grey dawns had become
pearl, and the mill hill again glowed red at sunrise.
The snowdrops in Master Driscoll's garden had lost
their flowers. The first bloom of the purple crocuses
had already gone, and a row of daffodils unfolded
golden crowns to the sun. Farmers went early
afield and grudged a morning for the Easter stations,
which were in full swing. Freshly turned earth
scented the morning air, though the last of the
second ploughing was nearly done. Wheat peeped
above the ground. Oats had been sown. In the
barns women deftly cut potato setts and laid them
in skibs ready for planting. In the paddocks lambs
frisked about their mothers or nibbled shyly at the
young grass.
Maurice Blake lingered on his way to the school-
house. He read a placard, displayed outside the
agricultural store, announcing lectures and demon-
strations in poultry keeping by Miss Alice Barton.
It looked well and read well, he thought.
" I hope she won't disappoint this time," the
serjeant of police said, coming to a stand behind
Maurice, after a leisurely saunter through the village
street.
WAITING 115
" Good morning, serjeant. Oh, she didn't dis-
appoint. 'Twas the County Committee's fault.
They gave in to the Drumquin people, who didn't
want to give her up. She's coming for certain in a
fortnight."
" She's a great hand at it, I believe. The patrol
have posted her up well all over the parish. I
thought they might as well be at that as doing
nothing. Not a boycotted man in the place, or a
grass farm itself to be protecting. And Father
Malone leaves little for the men to do in the way of
minding pubs. Only for an odd pig or a cow stray-
ing round the roads, they'd be hard set to make any
showing for their pay."
Maurice dangled the keys which he held in his
hand.
The serjeant looked at them doubtfully. "There's
many ways of making a living," he said, shaking his
head, " but I wouldn't be shut up in a school on a
spring day like this not if I had the offer of being
made a head constable for it. There if that isn't
that racer of a sow of Clancy's ! My own job isn't
all sugarstick, I can tell you. A man can't take a
stroll after breakfast without all the pigs of the
country forcing themselves under his notice. 1
must go back to the barracks and send out a couple
of men to take her in charge."
At the school gate Maurice stopped to talk to
the two boys who had come early to dust the school-
room which they had swept out the afternoon before.
With touzled hair and flushed faces, fresh from a
game of leap-frog, they greeted him sheepishly.
Tommy Hinnissey, with an ear for the notes of a
bird hopping about in a flower-bed, and an eye for
the green in the hedge, said
ii6 WAITING
" There was a robineen peering about a bush in
the end of our garden this morning the same bush
that there was a robineen's nest in last year. I
doubt but she was the same bird, and maybe she's
thinking of nesting there again. Sorra one of us
touched an egg in it, so she might. In another
couple of weeks there'll be nests high and low all
over the parish."
Pierce Donlon said contemptuously, " There
were four nests in our garden last year."
" Shall we light a fire this morning ? " Maurice
asked doubtfully.
" Is it on a morning like this? " Tommy said,
sniffing the air. " It'd be a great day for belting
across the high bank through the middle of the bog
barefooted," he added, with a sigh.
" It might be only a pet day," Pierce said
gloomily.
"And my father saying this morning the spring
had come in earnest ! Why, it's nearly too fine for
spinning a top, and a man could play marbles any
day," Tommy said, taking the school door-key from
Maurice, with a triumphant look at Donlon.
Maurice felt, as he watched them enter the
school, that he, too, would like to be on the bog
path, and go on and on, up the spur of the mountain,
to the very top of Slieve Mor, which still wore a
ragged cap of snow. He took off his hat, opened
his lips wide, and drank in draughts of the fresh
air that fanned his temples like a caressing hand.
It seemed to quicken his blood. There was some-
thing in what the serjeant said about school especi-
ally on a day like this. He sighed, and sighed again
more deeply as he saw Miss Devoy approach the
gate. He stooped and picked some weeds out of a
WAITING 117
bed, turned his back to the path and fingered the
creeper on the school wall, the scarlet buds full to
bursting.
" I am hot," she said in a panting voice, " and
my winter jacket on me too. I was afraid to leave
it off. As I'm early, you might hear my Irish
lesson before school begins."
" I'll be in after you in a minute when I fix
this creeper."
" Can't I help you ? " she said cheerfully.
Spring was kind to her. All the blue-black and
nearly all the purple had left her cheek-bones, which
were flushed a deep red. Drops of sweat stood out
on her forehead and on her upper lip. He watched
anxiously a little stream trickle down by the corner
of her eye.
" I am hot," she said again, mopping her face
with a blue and white speckled handkerchief.
" I've just finished," he said, picking a promising
bud.
For the hundredth time, as he followed her into
the schoolroom, he regretted Joan Bradley, the
elderly workmistress whose place Miss Devoy had
taken. Old Joan wasn't much help, but she didn't
get on his nerves. She could talk Irish too, but
he frowned, then laughed as he caught sight of
the Young Ladies' Journal sticking out of Miss
Devoy's pocket. And he had been so pleased, he
thought ruefully, when Miss Devoy first asked him
to teach her Irish. He remembered the day well,
the day following the All Saints' Day she spent with
his mother. He had expected an attack for not
having kept his promise ; but all Miss Devoy had
said was, " You missed a great deal by not being
there. Myself and your mother had a great crack."
n8 WAITING
Later she had said, " I'm thinking of learning the
Irish myself if you could spare the time to teach
me." After a week her interest flagged, and she
had not yet got through the first primer of
O'Growney. He had begun to loathe the lesson
and hoped every day that she would forget about it.
But she never forgot. It was only when the books
were opened for the lesson that she said
" I had a headache last night, and couldn't read
a word ; " or " I'm blest if I didn't forget all about
it." And in the next breath asked him if he had
read the Young Ladies' Journal for last month.
"That Lady Ermyntrude de Vere is a clip, she is,"
and she plunged into the heroine's exciting adven-
tures. He reduced the time of the lesson from
twenty minutes to ten. One day, when she said
" The Irish is a great chance for a chat," he almost
lost his temper ; but the sight of her beaming, good-
natured face restrained him.
To-day she had looked over the lesson. But at
the end of five minutes she shut the book.
"That's the last word I did," she said with a
smile. " But I'll know it better to-morrow. I see
by the posters that that niece of the Crawfords' is
coming here."
"She is."
"I never could see much in her. She has no
colour in the face," Miss Devoy said, with a critical
air, spreading her arms on the table in preparation
for a talk.
Maurice flushed and pulled out his watch.
"That clock is slow. We must begin," he said
sharply, gathering up his books. "Will you please
take the catechism class, Miss Devoy ? "
"Always when I'm sitting comfortable, I must
WAITING 119
be up and begin something or other," she said,
yawning.
The benches on both sides of the gangway were
fairly full, boys on one side, girls on the other, and
there was still a steady stream through the door.
Half the boys were barefooted, fewer of the girls.
Satchels and straps of books were put away noisily
in the ledges under the desks. There was a low
hum of conversation.
Notwithstanding his remark about the time,
Maurice stood, watch in hand, in front of his desk
till the clock struck the half-hour. He then re-
versed a card, marked " Secular Instruction," and it
read " Religious Instruction." Haifa dozen children
stood up and left the room Protestant Levises and
Barbers. The seventy Catholics watched them
enviously. " The Prods " were to have half an hour's
play, while the unhappy majority remaining behind to
con the Maynooth Catechism felt all the desolation
of martyrdom. No one stirred till the last little
Barber girl took a flying jump through the porch
door. There was a general sigh. The children in
the benches filed out and formed themselves into
semi-circular classes at the top and side of the school-
room. There was much shuffling of feet in the
effort to toe exactly the white chalk circles on the
floor.
Maurice spoke sharply to a late comer. She
said reproachfully, " I had to drive the cows to
the field by the bog." It was only then he realized
that she was an overworked girl for whom he always
had deep sympathy. He felt unaccountably out of
temper, and was annoyed with himself. Miss
Devoy had said something that vexed him. . . .
Children, however, always put him in good humour.
120 WAITING
Both Miss Devoy and Miss Barton were soon for-
gotten. No one could resist the pleading eyes of a
mite of six who insisted strenuously that Christ was
born on Christmas Day in a stable at Bermingham's
the local blacksmith. And a small boy, after
diligent thought, gave an individual view of Christian
charity. When asked what he would do for the
wounded man by the roadside if he passed by in
place of the good Samaritan : "I'd croost him with
stones," said he. When Maurice tried to temper
this truculence the boy was only doubtfully con-
vinced.
At ten o'clock secular school began. A class went
ofFjoyfully to Master Driscoll's garden. While Miss
Devoy gave a writing lesson in the desks, Maurice
took a geography class in the playground. Instead
of beginning with an outline map of the world his
teaching began at the school door. The pupils knew
nothing of Chimborazo or the probable sources of
the Brahmaputra, but they knew all about Slieve
Mor, and the Liscannow river, and the stream that
once turned the mill at the foot of the hill on the
Liscannow road and would turn it again soon
Maurice hoped.
All the pupils were in the schoolroom at ten
minutes to eleven for roll-call. Master Driscoll's
unconventional method of calling the roll still sur-
vived. Attendance was voluntary by law, but a too
vigorous compulsion was often exercised by elder
brothers.
" Charlie Hinnissey ? " Maurice called.
" Absent," Tommy said, cheerfully. " By
reason of a stone bruise on his big toe he got going
home last night. He'll be here to-morrow if I have
to bring him by the scruff of the neck."
WAITING 121
" No harshness, mind," Maurice said.
" Sorra bit. He'll come free enough with me
behind him," Jimmy said righteously.
As Maurice was closing the report book there
was a loud shout of " Hi, there ! " from the road.
Miss Devoy, who was near a window, looked out.
" It's Father James in his trap coming back from
the station," she said excitedly. "He's getting out
and Matsey is off to the chapel with the station-box.
He wants some one to hold the mare."
Maurice smiled drearily, and said abstractedly to
a boy near the door, " Would you please hold the
priest's horse ? "
The infrequent visits of Father James depressed
Maurice. He was always afraid that the all-power-
ful manager was at last about to prevent the teaching
of some cherished subject. With some trepidation
he walked towards the porch. He looked round to
see if everything was in order. An unwonted hush
had fallen on the room. Miss Devoy, in a corner,
was flattening her already flat hair, in front of a
small mirror attached to the back of a stiff cardboard
copy of the Rules and Regulations of the National
Board of Education.
"Why am I kept waiting like this?" Father
James said at the door.
Maurice tried to keep a note of stiffness out of
his voice as he said
" No one saw you drive up, sir."
" Don't let it happen again. Sit down, sit
down," to the pupils who stood in their places
with eyes bent. " Hi, you ! If a herring and a half
cost three halfpence, how many for elevenpence ?
Right. What's the length of the Mississippi ?
Right." He paused before putting his third
122 WAITING
favourite question, and a little girl began to spell
h-i-p. " Spell hippopotamus. Right. I see your
teachers are attending fairly to their work. Stick
to the three R's and you'll get on in the world.
There's a boy from the Strand school below that got
to be a clerk in a shop in Liscannow, and he has just
opened a shop of his own. That's something to
keep before you to make you work."
He turned to Maurice. " Send up three or
four of 'em to pick the weeds out of my front
walk."
He drummed the rostrum nervously with his
fingers and frowned. " The bishop is coming for
confirmation at the end of the autumn. Let me see
how they know their catechism," he said loudly.
Maurice whispered that it was against the rules,
that religious instruction was over, that there were
Protestants present.
" Turn them out," the priest said impatiently.
" As if a manager can't do what he likes in his own
school."
" The inspector ? "
" I don't give that for an inspector," snapping
his fingers. " Do as I tell you at once."
Maurice reluctantly changed the card to " Re-
ligious Instruction." The Levises and Barbers
marched out, but those left behind dared not sigh.
" Who is the invisible head of the Church ? "
" Jesus Christ," a small boy said glibly.
" And the visible head ? "
"The Pope."
"And who represents Jesus Christ and the Pope
in this parish ? "
There was some hesitation over this. A little
girl said, " Miss Devoy."
WAITING 123
" What am I always telling you week in and
week out off the altar ? " the priest said furiously.
" To pay the dues, your reverence," a small boy
said brightly.
Father James cuffed his ears. Another boy
said
"That you're the same as the Pope himself in
Bourneen."
This seemed satisfactory, for the priest said,
"That's enough for one bout. I'll come in soon
and give you more instruction in your religion."
The " Secular Instruction " side of the card in
front of the teacher's desk was again exposed and
the Protestants were called in. Father James walked
up and down restlessly. He went to the teacher's
desk and opened the report book.
" How many am I to put down present ? " he
said.
"There are seventy-six, and the boy holding
the mare," Maurice said quietly.
Father James looked at him suspiciously and
marked seventy-seven. He put down the pen and
looked round the room, caught Tommy Hinnis-
sey's eye and beckoned to him.
" You're Hinnissey, aren't you ? "
Tommy pulled his forelock and stammered,
" Yes, sir your reverence."
"Tell your father he hasn't given me a day's
ploughing yet, and I'm behind-hand."
He watched Miss Devoy handing out copy-books,
looked thoughtfully from her to Maurice, and said,
" Hum, hum."
" I must be going," he said after a brown study
of a few minutes. " I have my work to do."
Maurice, who was standing by idle, checked a
i2 4 WAITING
long breath of relief. On his way out, Father James
said roughly to Miss Devoy
" How are you ? " with contemptuous emphasis
on the " you."
" Quite well, thank you, Father James," she
said, with a little bob, all the colour gone out of
her cheeks except on the high bones, which were a
streaky blue.
" You are, are you," he said half to himself, as
he turned moodily to the door.
When he had taken his seat in his trap he flicked
the boy who held the horse with his whip, shouting,
" Let go the mare's head, can't you " ; and turning
slightly towards Maurice, who stood by the gate,
he said aggressively, "And you, come up to the
parochial house this evening at five o'clock. I want
a word with you." Without waiting for a reply he
drove off.
" I did my best," the boy whimpered, rubbing
his ear.
But Maurice was watching the bobbing of the
priest's silk hat as the trap rattled up the street at
a brisk pace. As it disappeared out of sight round
the bend, he had a dull feeling of resentment.
" Now that he's gone, send me out another
class. I'm waiting for 'em," Driscoll said, leaning
over the hedge that divided his garden from the
school yard.
Maurice waved assent. He walked slowly up
the path. Inside the school door Miss Devoy met
him and whispered
" I'm feeling myself again, now he's gone.
Though he's my own blood itself, he makes the
marrow run cold down my spine."
He heard her vaguely. All the freshness seemed
WAITING 125
to have gone out of the day. He opened the
windows wider. It came as a shock to him that
the sun was still shining, that it danced, through the
gently waving branches of a tree in the playground,
on the front of his desk. He pulled himself together,
sent a class out to Master Driscoll, and took a class
himself. But, while he made figures on the black-
board and spoke to the children, he was thinking of
Father Mahon. He handed the class over to a
monitor and went out into the playground. He
looked longingly at Slieve Mor, stood awhile watch-
ing the class gathered round Master Driscoll. The
old man laughed, and there was a happy responsive
laugh from the group of children. What's wrong
with me to-day ? Maurice asked himself ; and the only
answer he could give was to shrug his shoulders.
Father Mahon had not treated him worse to-day
than on previous visits. He was always rude. To-
day he was less aggressive than usual. Only once,
when he struck the boy with the whip, had he felt
like hitting him. During other visits Maurice had to
restrain himself half a dozen times in as many
minutes. Master Driscoll had put up with the priest
for years ; but then Master Driscoll had the temper of
a saint. With a sigh, as if this was something quite
beyond him, Maurice went back to his work.
Father Mahon, however, troubled his thoughts
all through the school hours. And at dinner in the
afternoon he said abruptly to Driscoll
" How did you put up with him so long ? "
"Oh, the P.P.," Driscoll said, after a moment's
doubt as to whom Maurice referred. " I suppose I
took him as a penance for my sins. You see, I had
a good start under old Father Boland, a grand man
that knew what real education was, and cared for it.
126 WAITING
Father James neither knows nor cares. His only
idea was to boss me and the children, and to make
us fetch and carry for him."
The old man leaned back in his chair and
regarded the ceiling attentively.
" It's a queer system that makes directors of
education of men that don't care a pin about it, and
only use it for their own ends," Maurice said
moodily.
" It is then. But what can't be cured must be
endured. The priests have the schools. Thank
God there's many a good man among them.
They're a mixed lot, God forgive me, like the con-
tents of Tommy Hinnissey's breeches pockets a
top that spins true, and one with a crooked peg that'd
drive you crazy ; a glass tawe with the colours of
the rainbow in it that's not much good except to
look at ; china tawes that might run straight and
that mightn't, and a lot of common marbles with a
few useful ones among 'em."
" I wouldn't mind if they weren't ruining the
schools," Maurice said with a frown.
" That's where the shoe pinches you," Driscoll
said with a smile. " Bide your time and you don't
know what might happen. I had Father Boland,
you see, and the man that'll follow Father James
might take some interest in the schools. It's a
queer make up of a world, and I'm always hoping
for the best."
"Father Mahon might be here all his life,"
Maurice said hopelessly.
"God send they'll make a bishop of him, or
give him some promotion."
" In the next shuffle we might get worse."
"There's some truth in that," Driscoll said
WAITING 127
thoughtfully. "After all, Father James has his
good points. I soon found out that his only idea
of managing the school was to make a kind of
servant of me, to stand at the chapel door for him
and make collections, to copy letters and run
messages, and let him act the tyrant over me in
front of the school and the whole parish. It
took some trampling of myself to stifle the pride
that was in me. But once I did, what happened ?
He came into the school three or four times a year
and stood on my neck for five minutes. The rest
of the time I had it all to myself. He never knew
what I was teaching. He signed papers without
reading them. As long as the children were able to
roll out the penny catechism like a lot of parrots at
the confirmation examinations, he never gave any
heed to what I was doing in the school. Except
when he wanted me to help him in his own affairs,
or wanted a boy to work in his garden, or to run
into Liscannow on a message, or when he had an
appointment to make, or some money to knock out
of the Board for building and repairs, he never gave
a thought to the school thank God for that same.
For it often came between me and my night's rest
that some day he'd be messing about his real business
as a manager, and then where would the school
be ? "
" Some day I'll throw an inkpot at his head, and
he might then," Maurice said bitterly.
Driscoll held up his hands in horror. " And he
having the power of life and death over you. And
the good you're able to do on the blind side of him
as long as there's peace."
" I haven't your patience, master," Maurice said,
standing up and looking at the clock. " I wonder
128 WAITING
what he wants me for this evening ? It's nearly
five I must be off."
The old man stood up and put his hand on
Maurice's shoulder. " Cool yourself in the walk
up," he said anxiously. " There's no one in the
world without some cross or other. Teigue Donlon
is always worrying over that kicking mare of his that
near knocks the bottom out of the cart every market
day going to Liscannow. If it's not one thing it's
another a shrew of a wife'd be worse than a
domineering manager, for she'd be on the floor with
you always, but you only see him once in a while."
" He won't kill me anyway," Maurice said
laughing, as he went out.
On passing the store, his eye again caught the
notice of Miss Barton's lectures. Father James had
no control over her, he thought, and he smiled
happily. How glad she'd be to be back with the
Crawfords. . . .
He found Father Mahon seated at the desk in
his study, picking his teeth with his little finger, his
elbow resting on an open newspaper.
" Oh, is that you ? " the priest said, staring at
Maurice superciliously, and continuing the operation
on his teeth with his tongue. When he had satis-
factorily finished this, he motioned Maurice to a
chair.
" Sit down. Here, take these books I may
forget 'em again." He took two account books off
the desk. " Just copy all the names from this old
station collection book into this new one. You'll
have it done easily before the next station."
Maurice took the books and was rising to go
when the priest waved his hand.
" Don't be in a hurry. How do you like your
WAITING 129
school ? " Without waiting for a reply, he went
on : " It's a great position for a young man like
you : good pay, and a great deal of the power
of the Church over education delegated to you."
He got up, walked to the fire-place, and stood
with his back to the fire that had recently been
lighted.
" A fine position, and one that a man could well
keep a wife on," he continued, rubbing his hands
together with gusto. " Why, I expected you up
here for a letter of freedom any day these two
last Sarafts."
He laughed loudly at his own words, as if they
held some humour that appealed to him. For a
moment he looked almost jovial, but this expression
soon faded and he looked down on Maurice with
a frown.
" The master of a mixed school ought to be
married," he said, sitting down near Maurice. " I
had a talk with your mother a couple of months ago,
and she thought the same. She mentioned Miss
Devoy."
" I have no intention of marrying," Maurice said
dryly.
" Oh, she said to give you time. You're doing
fairly well in the school, fairly well. I wouldn't
mind building a teacher's residence for you. Ye
wouldn't miss the annuity on it with your two
salaries joined together. As she's a sort of relation
of my own, I'd let her down light in the marriage
money. The Devoys haven't much but they'd be
able to give her a few pounds, and I'd add a few to
it for the sake of the relationship. She's not up to
much in the way of looks, but it would be a good
marriage for you."
K
130 WAITING
Maurice laughed, a shrill treble. It had an
uncanny sound to his own ears and he stopped it
abruptly.
The priest gazed at him in open-mouthed
astonishment. But soon his eyes blazed.
" What do you mean ? " he asked angrily.
" I wish Miss Devoy's name hadn't been brought
into this. I don't intend to marry," Maurice said
in an even tone. His nerves were tingling. He
was not a little awed by the priest's furious face, and
was surprised at the firmness of his own voice.
" Are you mad ? " the priest shouted.
Maurice stood up. Half nervously he asked
" Can I do anything else for you ? "
Father Mahon glared at him in speechless rage,
pointed to the door, and spluttered as Maurice
opened it
" Teachers scum to slight me in my own
parish ! "
CHAPTER IX
FATHER JAMES MAHON was not given to self-
analysis. All through his life he had taken himself
for granted. He was always right. All who
opposed his will were wrong. In any collision with
external circumstance he, therefore, occupied an
impregnable position. As a child he was his
mother's favourite she had early marked him out
for the Church. In all disputes with his brothers
and sisters she always upheld him. His confidence
in himself increased when he was told that he was
to be a priest. His favourite study in Maynooth
was ecclesiastical history. His great hero was Pope
Innocent III. His ideal was a Church ruling with
uncontrolled power over all the nations of the earth.
He knew little of popes or of the nations of the
earth, and the little he learned from books he after-
wards forgot, but he clung fast to his belief in power.
He soon saw the Church in himself. Everything
that added to his authority added to hers. While a
student his field was limited. The only person he
completely dominated was his mother. As a curate
most of his time was wasted in trying to manage an
easy-going parish priest who seemed to believe that it
was the duty of a priest to serve the people, not to
govern them. Weak-minded priests and bishops,
like Father Barry, Father Mahon felt angrily,
reduced the Church to its present foolish policy of
1 32 WAITING
expediency. With priests and bishops like himself
the Church would again rule the world. It was
then he wrote his famous sermons on hell and on the
dignity of the priesthood. He proved by irrefragible
logic that the priest was higher than the Blessed
Virgin, in a sense greater than Christ Himself, since
he created Him anew daily in the mass. He deter-
mined to bide his time until he was himself a parish
priest. Then he should have no Father Barry to
interfere with him. When he got Bourneen parish
he tasted all the sweets of power for some months.
His housekeeper trembled when he spoke to her.
Matsey Boylan's stammer became almost unin-
telligible with fright. Teachers grovelled before
him, except Driscoll, and he was obedient. The
people seemed submissive. Even the few Protes-
tants, whose presence in the parish he resented,
saluted him respectfully as they passed him by.
His horizon widened. He felt that he ought to be
a bishop. Then suddenly his cup had occasionally a
bitter taste. A curate had ,the temerity to disobey
him : with some difficulty he was removed. Things
seemed to happen in the parish without his know-
ledge. He consoled himself with the thought that
the people had been badly trained under the last parish
priest ; some day he would exert all his authority
and bring them well to heel. While he was yet
devising means to this happy end the see of Lis-
cannow fell vacant. Intriguing for the bishopric
took up much of his time. Except for his farming
and his sermons on Sundays, he neglected the parish.
He hadn't time to manage the negotiations which
changed most of the tenants into landowners. Co-
operative societies, which he didn't much like, and
Irish classes, which he disliked, had been set up.
WAITING 133
After his disappointment in the bishopric he began
to take his parish in hand again. The dues were
readjusted to the changed conditions. His farming
and the renewed prospect of the bishopric were both
favourable.
And now, this bolt from the blue !
He sat hunched in front of the fire, biting his
nails, after Maurice's departure. He was not think-
ing much. He was incapable of consecutive thought.
He was bitterly offended, outraged. A wave of self-
pity passed through him. Tears came into his eyes.
But this mood did not last long. He jumped up,
and stood frowning at the elm tree across the road.
A teacher, of all the people in the world, to turn on
him ! he thought bitterly, protruding his jaw. A
fellow he could crush like a clod of earth under his
heel ! He ground his heel on the carpet. This
action calmed him considerably. His mind shifted
to cattle. Should he sell those bullocks now or
wait till October ? The agricultural inspector he
met at the bishop's didn't know everything. There
was more profit in fattening off young stock, no
doubt, if one paid for the feed. But when one
had free grass ? He sat at his desk and accepted
an invitation to dinner at Dr. Hannigan's. He
permitted himself a mild clerical joke. He read it
over aloud and laughed appreciatively. He wrote
" James Mahon, P.P.," at the end with a flourish.
He addressed an envelope to the bishop. The
" D.D." seemed to fascinate him. He began
scribbling on a loose sheet of paper, "James
Mahon " half a dozen times. Then, " James
Mahon, D.D. ; " then, James Mahon, D.D.,"
and, under it, " Bishop of Liscannow." He tried
it in Latin, "Jacobus Mahon, D.D., Episcopus
i 3 4 WAITING
Liscannowensis," and gazed at it with an approving
frown.
The figure of Maurice Blake came between
him and the paper, and the frown lost all its lighter
qualities. His eyebrows descended to the middle
of his nose. That fellow looked so cool, too, not a
bit afraid of him, he thought pettishly. He stood
up and walked between the window and the fire-
place. He rang for tea, and as he gulped it down
he recalled his generosity and unselfishness in
regard to the marriage. His anger grew again.
That girl of the Devoys was very little to him, only
a second cousin once removed. Still he wanted to
do her a good turn, and Blake would have had
the handling of her pay as well as his own. The
protuberance at his waist-line visibly swelled with
indignation. Blake was a fool, incapable of seeing
what was for his good. He didn't expect gratitude
from any one, least of all from teachers. The world
was selfish, but Blake was worse than ungrateful, he
was rebellious. He threw the girl back in the face
of his manager, his parish priest ! What would the
Church come to if it tolerated offences like that ?
This new aspect of the question lent a certain grave
dignity to his figure. His frown became more
thoughtful. There was no sign of rain in the sky,
he said to himself, as he glanced through the window.
He would give instructions that Hinnissey should
plough the turnip field if he came to-morrow. It
was early yet for turnips, but . . .
He went to the fire-place and poked the fire.
He struck a sod vigorously, and a few small pieces
flew out on the hearthrug. He trod on them.
What was this behaviour of Blake's but the
beginning of anti-clericalism ? There was a lot of
WAITING 135
it about, but it should take no root in his parish
while he had the life left in him to prevent it. And
what was anti-clericalism but heresy and a trampling
on all morality and all religion ? How could even
a breath of such an evil arise in a parish of his, with
his sermons and care for the souls and bodies of his
people ?
This thought worried him a little. He gazed
moodily at the fire, now glowing brightly. He
gave a sigh of relief as a new thought came to him.
It was the curate's fault, of course. But this relief
did not last. His thoughts suddenly took on an
angry hue. Curates always worked mischief. And
Malone had no idea of the dignity of the priesthood.
He dragged it in the mud by letting the people
presume on him ; by being hand and glove with every
Tom, Dick, and Harry in the parish often having
Driscoll or Blake in to spend the evening with him ;
even visiting them as if they were his equals. . . .
He took up a newspaper, but it was too dark
to read with comfort. He put out his hand to
ring for the lamp, hesitated and got up. He would
see Father Malone that very night and have a talk
with him, he decided.
Malone had his uses of course, he thought,
during the short walk to the village. He said the
late masses, attended all the night calls, and never
made a fuss over going to the poorer sick-calls that
it wasn't worth a parish priest's while to attend
maybe a half-crown mass offering; maybe nothing
at all. The devil you know is better than the devil
you don't know, and if he got rid of Malone he
might get worse. He'd be wary enough in talking
with him, but he'd take right good care he'd shorten
his rope in the parish. . . .
136 WAITING
He knocked loudly at Father Malone's door,
which was opened, after a few minutes, by the curate
himself.
" Maria out craw-thumping as usual ? " Father
Mahon said, setting his face to the frown he intended
for a smile, as he laid his overcoat and silk hat on a
table in the hall.
" 1 dare say she is in the church."
" I let mine out only to mass on Sundays. If
you don't learn to control your servant, you'll never
be able to manage a parish," Father Mahon said
with a harsh laugh.
Father Malone shrugged his shoulders and
pointed the way to his sitting-room.
" Not a bad little house for a curate," Father
Mahon said, looking round the room complacently.
"It was Board of Works money, of course, but I
practically built it myself."
Father Malone pointed ruefully to the wall by
the window, where the green paper was discoloured
and hung loose about the skirting.
Father Mahon took the lamp in his hand and
examined the paper.
" That'll dry out. It's only a few years built,"
he said, a little crossly.
" Six," Father Malone said laconically.
"That's new," Father Mahon said, lifting the
lamp so that the light shone higher on the wall, and
nodding towards a picture.
" It's rather nice," Father Malone said brighten-
ing. " A pastel. It's only a sketch, but see how
he got the twilight and that effect of the crescent
moon over the shoulder of the figure."
" I thought it was a rake she was carrying,"
Father Mahon said indifferently. " If you want to
WAITING
137
see pictures drop in one evening and I'll show you
some," he added, putting the lamp on the table.
" 1 bought a dozen beauties from a travelling
German man the other day. He wanted five
pounds, but I cut him down to three, and they're
dirt cheap at the money."
His eyes wandered round the room with a look
of contempt to another pastel ; a few pen and ink
sketches ; a few prints ; long, open book shelves
of white enamelled deal, and a worn and faded carpet.
" You pick up enough money in this parish
to do better," he said condescendingly.
" Take this armchair. It's the most comfort-
able," Father Malone said dryly, pushing it close to
the fender.
Father Mahon sat down, spread his hands to the
blaze, at which he gazed thoughtfully with a deeply
lined brow.
Father Malone sat at the other corner of the
fender and lit a pipe.
" There's no use asking you to smoke," he
said.
" It's a dirty habit," Father Mahon said, spitting
at the fire.
" A glass of punch ? "
" No I don't think I will. A teetotaller never
keeps good whiskey," with an ungracious laugh.
" Maria will get some tea when she comes in."
" I had my own, but I'll take a cup. This
parish weighs so heavy on my mind that I slipped
my tea down without feeling the good of it."
" What's wrong now ? " Father Malone said
smiling.
" Oh, one thing and another," Father Mahon
said fretfully.
138 WAITING
" The country is coming to a queer pass," he
said abruptly, after a few minutes' silence, straighten-
ing himself in his chair and frowning at the curate.
Father Malone shook the ashes out of his pipe
into the grate, tapped the empty pipe on his knee,
his blue eyes fixed dreamily on the fire.
" There is movement," he said. " That is a
great thing."
" There is. Down the hill to the devil," Father
Mahon said angrily.
The curate took off his glasses, wiped them, put
them on again, clasped his hands, which still held
his pipe, round his knees, and looked at Father
Mahon, a smile playing on the corners of his lips.
This seemed to irritate Father Mahon. His
lips and eyebrows twitched spasmodically.
" You're little better than a fool," he said, "talking
that nonsense. There isn't as much sense in you
young fellows as there is in the head of a torn-tit. I
tell you the people are growing out of their skins.
Only last Saraft Thady Finucane had the impudence
to rise against the marriage money I put on his
daughter. Do you think any good'll come to the
parish when the likes of that happens ? "
" I suppose the parish'll benefit by the improve-
ment of Thady's farm. He's putting every penny
he can spare into draining that bottom land of his,"
Father Malone said quietly.
" I'm thinking of the people's souls," Father
Mahon said loudly. " You "He bit his lip,
restrained his anger with difficulty and said, with an
attempt at a friendly tone
" It's a nice parish you'd have the ruling of,
when it comes to your turn, if there wasn't the like
of me to advise you. I'm not blaming you much.
WAITING
'39
You're young yet and don't know the difference.
Take my word for it, the only way to rule the
people is to keep a tight hand on them."
Maria came in with a tray which she laid on a
chair. " I heard your voice in the hall so I brought
a second cup," she said to Father Mahon. She
spread a cloth over the half of the table nearest the
priests.
a I'm heard where I'm not seen," he said
pompously.
" Bedad you are," she said dryly. " It's what I
was remarking to Father Malone himself to-day
about Tim Carty's ass, and he braying in the field
the other side of the hedge. I
"That will do, Maria, thank you," Father Malone
said hastily. " I'll finish laying the table. Would
you take those papers in the hall down to Mr.
Driscoll's ? "
" I could easily do both," she said. " The
night is long, and 1 was just saying
Father Malone took the tray out of her hands,
and she left the room grumbling.
" I'd pitch her out neck and crop," Father
Mahon said scowling. " The cheeky old hag ! "
Father Malone smiled at the tray. " Do you
like your tea strong ? " he asked mildly.
Father Mahon was now in a sulky rage. " 1
do," he said shortly.
He ate a thick slice of bread and butter in
silence, drank a cup of tea in a gulp and banged
the cup on the saucer. Maria evidently rankled in
his mind. He pushed away his plate and it rattled
against the tray.
" If I thought she meant that for me I'd give
her a reading to," he said.
140 WAITING
" It's not much good lecturing Maria," Father
Malone said apologetically.
" Your lecturing of her, you mean," Father
Mahon said, standing up. " It's no wonder things'd
be as they are with the kind of weak-minded
curates I get."
The curate shrugged his shoulders, laughed
softly and went on eating.
" It's no laughing matter and the parish going
to the dogs," Father Mahon said, after glaring at
him for a few seconds. He turned to the fire, bit
his nails and kicked restlessly at the fender.
" If you'd only tell me what's wrong ? " Father
Malone said. He stood up and began to fill a pipe.
"What have I done? I'd rather have it straight
x.
out.
" How thin-skinned we are ! Did I say you
did anything wrong ? A parish priest can't open his
mouth but he's flared up at like this," Father
Mahon said, flopping back into his armchair.
Father Malone sighed, lit his pipe, sat down
and smoked quietly.
" You're too thick with those schoolmasters in the
village for one thing. I never cared much for old
Driscoll, but he's a king to that conceited young
pup that 1 was fool enough to give the school to
after him."
" Giving Maurice Blake Bourneen was the best
day's work you ever did for the parish," Father
Malone said emphatically. He put a few sods of
turf on the fire and patted them carefully into place
with the tongs.
" If the school was vacant again, he'd whistle
for it."
This remark of Father Mahon's roused Father
WAITING 141
Malone to fresh vigour with the tongs. He was a
little flushed. A tightening of the lips and a gleam
behind his glasses hardened his mobile face. He
struck a live sod sharply and a cloud of golden
sparks ascended the chimney. His anger seemed to
go with them.
" This is a joke, I suppose ? Maurice Blake
conceited ! " he laughed lightly.
" You might laugh at the wrong side of your
mouth yet unless you're said by me. I know that
fellow and you don't. I can read his face like a
book. He's bad in and out, I tell you."
Father Malone leant back in his chair and gazed
at the parish priest curiously with level eyes.
" What has he done to you ? " he asked
ironically.
This was too much for Father Mahon. He
stood up and towered angrily over the curate whose
unflinching eyes seemed to provoke him to further
anger.
"He " he foamed. "What could a worm
like him do to me ? " he asked, after a moment's
hesitation. " It's his disrespect for the Church I
object to. I never think of myself. But I have a
position to maintain. The way that fellow stands
and looks at me, his parish priest and manager,
when I call at his school ! He's meddling, too, in
the affairs of the parish those societies and that
tupenny ha'penny bank. Neglecting the work he's
paid for ! "
" Barring Driscoll, he's the best teacher you
ever had."
" He's a downright scamp, that's what he is. If
ever a man was put in his place I'll put him there."
Father Malone shrugged his shoulders. " I
I 4 2 WAITING
don't think I care to discuss my friends," he said
quietly.
" If I find you backing people that rebel against
me the bishop will hear of it," Father Mahon said
with a menacing look.
Father Malone made no reply. Father Mahon
walked up and down the room, giving an occasional
furtive glance at the curate, who was gazing wearily
at the fire. A pleased look gradually overspread
Father Mahon's face, and he muttered to himself,
" That knocked the stuffing out of him." He sat
down again and gave an uneasy boisterous laugh.
" I'm too good a friend to you to fight with you,
Malone," he said ingratiatingly.
He waited for a reply, but as Father Malone
said nothing, his eyes gleamed again. With an
effort he mastered his temper and said soberly
" If I spoke to you it was for your good. The
old dog for the long road ! and I can read the signs
of the times better than a young curate like you.
Priests must stand together in defence of the old
Church. She needs the best that's in every one of
us. The devil is busy sowing ideas in people's
heads, and we've got to pluck 'em out by the roots.
Give the people an inch and they'll take an ell. If
once we let go our hold of the reins, they'll take the
bit between their teeth. Believe you me, the fear of
hell in the marrow of their bones, and absolute
obedience to their priests is the only salvation for the
people of this country. You're too mild with them.
Mind, I'm not finding fault with your sermons on
charity, and bearing one another's burthens and the
like they're nice little things in their way ; but if
you'd only take a leaf out of my book, and give 'em
hell and the dignity of the priesthood, the parish'd
WAITING 143
be all the better for it. And I'm all for the people
when it's for their good. Land purchase was all
right. It turned a lot of Protestant land into
Catholic hands, and it gave the people a chance
not that they were too willing to take it to give
more respectable support to their hard-working
clergy. And there's the tidy farm attached to the
parochial house that I bought in cheap myself, that'll
cheer the heart of future generations of parish
priests of Bourneen. Who knows but yourself
might have it one day ! I'm in two minds about
this co-operation. On the one hand, it makes the
people better off. On the other hand, it gives them
airs of being able to do things without the help of their
parish priest. It'd be better for the Church any day
that they'd be living in muck than have that kind of
independence. I was busy over one thing and
another and I had to let you mess about these
societies. The opposition to them is dying down a
bit too. Now that I've more time on my hands I'll
take my proper place at the front of them, and see
if I can't head them in the right direction. I may
or may not be long in the parish that's in God's
hands but while I'm in it I'm going to be master
in my own house. But now that we're having a
friendly chat, I give you friendly warning that I'll
have no truck with the Irish language. You know
my mind on it already. If there was any good to be
got out of it I'd be the first to see it, and I speaking
it from the cradle, in my father's house. It's leading
to all kinds of devilry. Up to this I've only
given an odd side-blast against it in a sermon ; but
1 tell you straight, so that you can draw out of it in
time, that I'll drive it out of the schools and out of
the parish."
i 4 4 WAITING
He wound up the long speech on a hectoring
note, slapping his leg with his open palm. He
noticed that Father Malone was watching the fire
with a troubled face.
" Don't be sitting there like a stuck pig. If
you've got anything to say out with it," he said in
a self-satisfied voice.
Father Malone roused himself. " Is there any
hope of arguing you out of these views ? " he asked
despairingly.
Father Mahon looked at him compassionately.
He took a snufF-box from his waistcoat pocket and
tapped it.
" You might know me better. I could no more
be moved than Slieve Mor, when once I've made
up my mind to a thing. And for why ? Because
I know I'm right," he said complacently. He
opened the box and took a huge pinch in each
nostril. " There's no more to be said. It's for the
parish priest to lay down the law, and for the curate
to obey," he added, rising. " Come and have a
bite of dinner with me to-morrow, and I'll put
more common sense into you."
" I think I ought to say," Father Malone said,
" that I disagree with almost every word you said."
Father Mahon looked him all over with a
supercilious frown, laughed and said
" Curates always come round. When I lead a
horse to the water, I usually make him drink. If
he doesn't, it's so much the worse for the horse.
Why, what's this ? " he added, catching sight of a
poster pinned to the side of a standing desk by the
window.
"Those poultry lectures," Father Malone said
coldly.
WAITING 145
" Who in the world got her here ? " Father
Mahon said, when he had read to the end.
" The Agricultural Society."
" It's time I took it out of your hands. Bring-
ing in women to trapse round my parish ! Some
fool of a girl that doesn't know a cock from a hen.
Barton that's not a Catholic name," he added
frowning.
"She's a Protestant, I believe a niece of John
Crawford's."
" What is the world coming to ? And my own
curate having a hand in it too ! I can't turn my
back for a minute but these things are happening.
This is the thin end of the wedge to get education
out of the hands of the Church. It's rank atheism
to bring a Protestant woman to teach anything in a
Catholic parish like this."
He stalked out of the room and banged the
front door behind him.
Meanwhile, on leaving the parochial house,
Maurice Blake had taken the Liscannow road. He
had some work to do at home, but he had gone
nearly two miles out of his way before he noticed
his direction. He moved the account books from
under one arm to the other and laughed. It was
ludicrous, he said aloud, but his laugh had a hollow
ring and his words did not convince him. He had
walked hitherto with a vague feeling of restlessness,
almost without thought, his eyes, however, alert to
the changing colour of the sky, crimson and orange
and translucent green. He stood for a moment
hesitating, and, without coming to any decision,
walked on. It was quite dark under the trees as the
road skirted the Durrisk demesne. The high wall
146 WAITING
echoed his footsteps. He went slowly past the
big iron gates and thought of the ghost that was
said to haunt the avenue. He felt almost as if he
expected to see it, his nerves were so jumpy. He
tightened his fingers on the books and thought again
of Father Mahon. There was nothing to worry
about. It was all a joke of the priest's. Even if
it wasn't, what could he do to injure him ? The
priest's face seemed to stand out luminously in the
dark. He shivered a little. He pulled himself
together and increased his pace. A manager wasn't
an autocrat in these days. A teacher was a servant
of the state, not of the priest. He whistled a lively
jig tune. . . .
The tea-things were still on the table in the
kitchen when he got home.
" What in the world kept you this late ? "
Driscoll said.
" I walked to Liscannow, and sat awhile on the
quay watching the boats."
" What did the big man want of you ? "
Maurice told him.
The old man listened attentively but did not
speak for some time.
" 'Twas honester by the girl to speak straight
out," he said musingly. " Though I'd as lief you
gave him a softer answer. Maybe no harm'll come
of it."
Later, as he seemed to pore over a book,
Maurice heard him say above his breath, " He's a
cruel hard man to be up against. Thank God, he
can't break a man's soul."
CHAPTER X
A DEPUTATION from the Agricultural Society, con-
sisting of Driscoll and Larry Reardon, called on
Father Mahon and asked him for the use of the
schoolroom for Miss Barton's lectures. He
hummed and hawed, bit his nails and peremptorily
refused. He declined to preside at her opening
lecture. There was some murmuring at the subse-
quent meeting of the society. Hinnissey said that
it was a queer thing that the say of one man, no
matter how high and mighty he was, should make
smithereens of the wishes of the people, and the
schoolhouse, in a kind of a way, belonging to them
too. Tom Blake was strongly of opinion that by
rights they could force in the door. But his father's
milder counsel prevailed. A priest was a priest, he
said, and in an affair of the sort it might be better
in the long run to try and spell out a way of cir-
cumventing him than to take a short cut, and maybe
break their heads agin a stone wall at the end of it.
The corrugated-iron manure shed belonging to the
society, empty at this season, was swept and gar-
nished. The mud of years was partially scrubbed
off the boarded floor. Seats were borrowed through-
out the village. Master Driscoll decked the lecturer's
table with his sweetest scented flowers, which, to
some extent, neutralized the pervasive smell of
guano. Here, with Father Malone in the chair,
Alice Barton was to give her first lecture.
i 4 8 WAITING
Maurice Blake sat in an obscure corner, whither
the feeble light of the few hanging lamps, slung
temporarily from the open rafters, scarcely penetrated.
He had spent an anxious fortnight. Every day for
a week he expected Father Mahon to interfere with
his work. But the priest had not come to the school
and on Sunday he preached his mildest sermon
with a preoccupied air. After mass Driscoll had
" sounded " Father Malone, who said, laughing,
that the Bishop of Droomeen was ill again and
that Father Mahon would not bother much about
the parish till the bishop was dead or well. This
news relieved Maurice for a few hours, but he soon
began to worry about the success of Alice Barton's
lecture. It was a busy time with the farmers.
" Do you think they'll turn up ? " he asked
Master Driscoll a dozen times.
"And the meeting fixed for half an hour after
dusk. The whole parish'll be there, you'll see."
This comforting assurance did not, however,
ease his mind. It was some relief to him that Alice
had actually arrived at the Crawfords'. But despite
all his efforts his anxiety persisted. Master Driscoll
asked him to be on the look-out for the girl and
to show her the way in to the store when she
arrived.
He accepted this duty gladly, but a few hours
before the lecture, he resigned it to Driscoll, on the
plea that he had to see that everything was right in-
side. Long before sunset he came to the shed,
arranged and re-arranged seats, and moved the vase
of flowers from one corner of the table to another.
At dusk he lit the lamps. He looked at his watch
every two or three minutes. Matsey Boylan was
the first to arrive. He took a front seat, saying
WAITING 149
" I want to get a good view of her. I hear she's
a fine figure of a girl. And who knows ? "
This so disgusted Maurice that he went out to
the yard and walked up and down restlessly. He
asked himself crossly why he had come so early
other lectures had taken care of themselves once all
the arrangements were made ? And the answer came
readily : the other lecturers were men, but this was
a woman and a stranger. His sense of chivalry
soothed him. It occurred to him that the men were
strangers too, but he put this irrelevant thought
away. Then the audience began to trickle in, and
he took his seat.
When the hall was about a third full he felt that
the meeting should be a success. The audience was
mostly women, but the scent of strong tobacco came
through the open door, and he could hear men
talking and laughing in the yard.
" They're worse gossips than the women, them
men are, with their excuse of a shaugh of a pipe.
It'd be the price of 'em if they hadn't a seat to get
when they came within," Mrs. Hinnissey said aloud,
a few seats in front of Maurice.
" What do the poor things know about hens
anyway ? " Mrs. Reardon said. " The wonder to
me is what men want to hear about 'em for at all."
"If what Jack read out of the weekly paper last
Sunday is true, we'll be soon wearing the breeches.
So the sooner the men learn about the hens the
better," Mrs. Hinnissey said boisterously.
" Do you hear her now, and she wearing 'em
ever since she married Jack Hinnissey," Mrs. Rear-
don said slyly.
" There's no fault to be found with any woman
for doing that same," Mrs. Blake said seriously.
1 5 o WAITING
Men now crowded in at the door, soon filled
all the seats and stood at the back and sides of the
room.
"She's outside with the priest and Master
Driscoll," a man said, jerking his thumb back
towards the door.
After a short interval Master Driscoll appeared,
and good-humouredly pushed the people aside to
make a clear passage to the platform of rough planks
on which stood the table and a few chairs.
"Now, your reverence," he said from the
door.
But it was Alice Barton who came forward, a
smiling self-possessed Alice Barton, Maurice noticed,
his heart thumping against his ribs. He shrank
back into his seat in an effort to get further away
from the light. She took the cheers of the audience
quietly, giving a few little bows as Driscoll led her
to the table with a gracious courtesy that reminded
Maurice of a chivalrous knight in a medieval tale he
had read sometime. He had no eyes for the priest
and the others who followed. They must have
followed, for the priest was now sitting at the table
with Alice beside him, chatting with her as if she
were some ordinary person.
She hadn't changed in the least. The pink in
her cheeks was a shade deeper, and her eyes sparkled
while the priest was introducing her. She even
nodded to a few people whom she recognized in
front. He was a little disappointed that she did
not nod to him. But she couldn't see him even
if she did see him, it was unlikely that she would
remember him, he thought, a momentary feeling of
satisfaction giving place to doubt. Then she began
to speak.
WAITING 151
" She's only a slip of a thing," a man said
near by.
" Hush, hush," Maurice said, frowning.
He expected a different opening some glimpse
of the dreams she unfolded to him in the Crawfords'
kitchen. But it was all plain fact. She even made
small jokes. He noticed her hands for the first
time, and the width between her eyes. These
seemed to explain to him the hold she had on
her audience and her wonderful voice that gave
colour to the driest details. For whole minutes
he lost the thread of what she was saying. It did
not seem to matter. It was enough to see her, the
light on her profile. The oil-lamps smoked and
grew dim. One or two went out. He blamed
himself for having lighted them so early. Then
he thought it was well that the hall was dark, for,
beyond the vague shapes of the audience, she seemed
a radiant vision. . . .
In a business-like tone she was blaming the
lamp-lighter when he next heard her.
" I have to show diagrams and plans at the next
lecture," she said, " and the hall must be better
lighted."
Which was nonsense, he felt, for the light from
the mean paraffin lamp on the table was enough to
gild the wave of hair that just touched the tip of
her ear, itself a rose-pink, close-set shell.
She sketched her future programme. The lectures
were only fireworks, it seemed. The main part of
her work was to be done by house-to-house visits
and practical demonstrations. He was glad that
her stay seemed to stretch ahead for months.
Master Driscoll proposed a vote of thanks.
" In old ancient times," he said, " the glory of a
1 52 WAITING
great people sprang from an egg. Who knows
what the egg might bring to Bourneen and to
Ireland."
In homely phrases that came from his heart, he
thanked the lecturer.
There were loud calls for Master Blake. He
racked his brains for something to say. As he
got to his feet he thought of her as the Angel
Gabriel, as Joan of Arc. His lips were dry, and
his tongue clave to his palate. He clutched the
chair in front of him. In a voice that sounded, in
his own ears, harsh, ponderous, cold and inadequate,
he said
" I second the vote of thanks."
There was a dreadful silence, during which he
seemed to fall down a bottomless pit. Some one
clapped ; every one clapped. Father Malone was
speaking, and Maurice felt himself at rest in his
chair.
A buzz of conversation arose after the final
clapping of hands at the close of the priest's
speech.
"We'll never be done with all the new things
that's thrown at us one day it's a new way of
making butter, and another it's a new way of laying
eggs," Mrs. Blake said.
" When you're stuck in the house all day, it's a
great relief to get out for a start. She wasn't near
as exciting as a mission sermon, but I wouldn't say
that she didn't pass the time well enough," Mrs.
Reardon said, with a satisfied sigh.
" She was grand, that's what she was," Hanny
said hotly.
Maurice felt grateful to her, and thought that
Hanny was almost beautiful in her angry flush.
WAITING 153
" She didn't make as many mistakes as I thought
she might," Mrs. Blake said dryly. " Come along
up home with us, Maurice," she added ; " Mike
wants to have a word with you."
Maurice was the last to leave the shed. He
put out the lamps and stood blinking in the door-
way, a lighted match in his hand. He heard the
priest say
" Good night, and thank you again."
It was a moonless night. The match flickered
and went out. He saw vague shapes in the yard.
" Come over here," he heard in Master Driscoll's
voice.
He fumbled with the lock.
" You had charge of the lamps, I'm told. I'm
sorry I spoke of them ; but they were pretty bad,
you know."
So she had not gone yet. He laughed. The
bewildering feeling that overcame him all the even-
ing vanished with the laugh.
" I'd never trust a man to trim a wick," Mrs.
Crawford said.
" How is the Irish going on ? " Alice said, as
she shook hands.
" Walk up a bit of the road with them. My
eyes are too bad in this light to travel far," Driscoll
said.
"Don't trouble. Uncle John'll keep ofF the
good people at the holy well though I wish I saw
them for once," Alice said, with a low laugh.
" Though I don't believe in them, I never make
light of them, all the same," Crawford said solemnly,
in rebuke.
" I have to go up as far as my father's, in any
case," Maurice said, as he walked on at Alice's side.
154 WAITING
They threaded their way through little groups
of people and followed in the wake of a small pro-
cession up the village street. Mrs. Hinnissey's
loud laugh rose high above disjointed scraps of talk,
but even she was silent in passing Father Mahon's.
" I feel more at home here than at Dublin the
people are all so friendly," Alice said, her voice
ringing out clearly against the silence.
"And why wouldn't they ? " Maurice said.
He wanted to talk, but he could find nothing
more to say. The opaque clouds had blown away,
and clusters of stars danced in a dark blue sky,
which grew almost black as he gazed at it, so bright
were the quivering fires with which it was studded.
Yet her face showed only in a faintly luminous
outline. . . .
" There's your gate," she said.
" I'll go as far as the boreen I want a walk."
She talked of Drumquin and the preparations
that were being made there for the Liscannow
Feis.
" I'm looking forward to it so much. I've been
at the Oirechtas in Dublin, but never at a country
Feis. You're going, of course ?"
" I'm on the committee," he said shyly.
" I might have known," she said, looking at
him.
" We're in rather a fix in Bourneen school over the
singing," he said hastily. " Joan Bradley, the old
workmistress, used to take it, but she's gone to live
in Liscannow. Miss Devoy doesn't sing. I take
the class now, but I'm no good. Father Malone
helps, but he's not much better. The children are
entered at the Feis for singing, but they're sure to
do badly."
WAITING 155
She clapped her hands and danced along the
road. He looked at her in astonishment.
" What's the girl up to ? " John Crawford said
from behind.
<c I'm not mad or glad they're so bad there's a
rhyme for you ! I'll turn into a poet next. I'm
not all eggs and poultry. Let me train them ? I
know all the set pieces by heart already. I was
helping with the singing at Drumquin."
Dark as it was, he could see her eyes glow with
excitement.
" You sing then ? "
She shrugged her shoulders, and became sedate
at once. Of course she sang, he answered himself:
with her voice ! It was ridiculous of him to ask.
He was framing words to thank her, when she
laughed, began to hum between her teeth, and sang
in a deep contralto, " Silent, O Moyle, be the roar
of thy waters." The sad minor notes seemed to
catch his heart.
"Alice, if the people hear you, and they're in
front of you and behind you, they won't believe
you're any good with the hens," Mrs. Crawford
said anxiously.
" I sing often to drown their cackle," she said,
stopping abruptly.
" Thank you," Maurice said huskily.
" It's not much of a voice," she said lightly,
" but it's good enough to teach with."
He said nothing, but he felt the notes still
echoing in the thin vibrant air. . . .
He found himself thanking her for her offer to
teach.
" I enjoy it. One gets tired of poultry some-
times."
156 WAITING
" You'll be a regular Fenian before you're
ended," John Crawford said, catching them up at
turn of the boreen, " with all your Feis and
nonsense."
" On Saturdays, then, and any afternoon just
after school that I'm free half-past three, is it ? "
she called after Maurice as he walked away.
" Half-past three," he echoed.
This was a stroke of luck, he thought. What
a useful person she would be in the parish. He
returned the greetings of a group who threw a
"good night" out into the unknown. When he
spoke, one said warmly, "Why, it's the young
master ! God bless you, and good night again."
The road was springy to-night, he felt, as he swung
along rapidly. There was a fresh feel in the air.
He inhaled long breaths. What was that inde-
finable odour that cleared his brain and made it so
keen to all impressions ? The earth in a ploughed
field on his right had the freshness of renewed youth.
A star blinked at him joyously from a tiny pool
on the roadside. He even listened for some sound
of growth and life in the filmy shoots that nodded
at him from the hedgerows. He recognized Tom's
bulky form leaning over, the Reardons' gate, and a
shawled figure beyond, but he passed by unnoticed.
He began to hum, " Silent, O Moyle."
His father was blowing out the candle in a stable
lantern when he opened the door. Hanny was
wiping cups at the dresser.
"I thought you'd never come," his mother said,
in her usual seat between the lamp and the fire,
patching Mike's coat.
" I was seeing the Crawfords home," he said
brightly.
WAITING
157
" I suppose they're that blind they couldn't see
the way for themselves."
" Whist, woman, don't be contrary, and I not
ready for him myself till this minute," Mike said,
taking his seat on the hob. " By rights Tom should
be seeing after the cattle, but he's not in yet."
" He's not," Mrs. Blake said crossly. " You be
off to bed, Hanny. You must be up early in the
morning. You can say your own rosary by the
side of the bed, or, if it's too cold there, between
the blankets."
She turned round and watched Hanny finish her
work.
"That girl to-night doesn't know the value of
money," Mike said, lighting his pipe. " The notion
of giving up good land to the feeding of hens ! Who
ever heard the like ? And the expense of them
little houseens she spoke of too ! "
"There's money in it," Maurice said with a
smile, drawing a chair towards the fire.
Mike pulled at his pipe for a minute. " If there
is, I don't see it," he said.
" Tom will " Maurice was beginning.
"Tom, Tom I'm sick of Tom this blessed
night," Mrs. Blake interrupted. "There, she's
gone now," as Hanny shut the door of her bed-
room, *' and we can talk." She drew her stool
closer to Maurice, rested her hands on her knees,
and looked gloomily at the fire. " I suppose I'll
have to let that girl of the Reardons' in on the floor
to me at last," she said angrily.
" But you like her ? " Maurice said in sur-
prise.
"Tom was my first," she said, sobbing and
wiping her eyes with her apron.
i 5 8 WAITING
" Don't, mother, don't," Maurice said anxiously,
laying his hand on her knee.
She caught his hand and pressed it to her bosom
and said, still sobbing
" And a good son he was to me, too. Not that
I'd mind him marrying it's her coming in on the
floor to me, and being day and night before my
eyes, that I can't abide."
" Whist, woman whist," Mike said. " There's
more important matters to attend to than that.
There's making the match," he added gravely.
Mrs. Blake's sobs died away. " That's what he
wanted to see you about," she said, releasing
Maurice's hand.
"We all know they've made the match them-
selves, long ago," Maurice said laughing.
" That's only fool talk," Mike said, striking his
pipe emphatically against his palm, " and there not
being a word yet with Larry Reardon about what
fortune she's to get."
Maurice shrugged his shoulders. " Tom'd be
glad to take her without a penny."
" Have a spark of sense in you now, boy,"
Mike said angrily. " You're great on keeping up
the customs of the country," he added sarcastically,
after a pause, "and here's one that was in the
parish since the beginning of the world. I was
thinking," he continued more graciously, " that my-
self and yourself 'd go up some night and strike the
bargain with Larry. He's that naygurly and close-
fisted, with all his soft talk, that we'd have to bid
the highest penny to start with, so as to give us a
liscense for climbing down a bit afterwards."
Maurice wriggled in his chair. He had always
hated this custom, and to-night it seemed more
WAITING 159
appalling than ever. He smiled as he thought he
saw a way out of his difficulty.
" There's Jim Reardon and Hanny they care
for each other. Make a double match of it, and
there needn't be any bargaining," he said trium-
phantly.
"The whole parish knows that the Reardons
won't let Jim take a wife for a couple of years or
more," Mrs. Blake said.
" But if they were engaged "
" As if I'd trust to a thing like that," Mike said
contemptuously. " I've known a match made on
the Friday before Shrove Tuesday, and it was broke
off and the man married to another girl on Shrove
Tuesday evening. Who knows what'd happen in a
couple of years ? A bird in the hand, I always
heard, is worth as many as you like to name in a
bush. Sorra foot Minnie enters that door there
till I have Larry's money tight in my breast pocket."
" There's no hurry, anyway, Lent isn't over yet,"
Maurice said, temporizing.
" We must be ready the first thing after Easter,
so it's time to put a face on it. We struck against
it last Saraft, but there's no standing Tom since
with the black sulks that's on him. Will you come
with me, or will you not ? " Mike said, rising im-
patiently.
" I shouldn't be the least use."
Mike considered this, gazing thoughtfully at
Maurice.
" There's that way of looking at it. Maybe after
all Jack Hinnissey'd be a better back to me. He
knows Larry inside out, too. Whist ! "
The latch rattled and Tom came in. " It's a
fine starry night," he said.
160 WAITING
" It is," Mike said, lighting a candle. " It's
every man for himself, 1 believe, with the rosary to-
night," he added, yawning.
"There was sense in what that girl at the
Crawfords' said at the lecture," Tom said, when
Mike had retired to the room. " I'll be seeing
about that fowl run to-morrow."
"There, take that," his mother handed him a
candle. " It's all hours ! Sleep sound, agra it's
you're the biddable boy."
She threw her arms around his neck, kissed
him on the shoulder, and then pushed him away
from her. He looked at her in astonishment, blushed
furiously, opened his mouth, turned away without
speaking, and flicked the lighted candle with his
ringers as he ascended the ladder.
" And why wouldn't he marry ? " she said half
to herself, watching him till he disappeared over the
stair head.
Maurice had risen to leave. She turned to him.
" I had it agin him some way," she said
brokenly, " to pick out a girl for himself. There's
your father and myself now, never set eyes on other
till we met in front of the priest at the altar rails.
But the will of God be done."
He kissed her, and she clung to him for a
moment.
" Will I soon be hearing of yourself ? " she
said, holding his hand. " Father James was dead
set on it."
He frowned a little, and she said eagerly, "If
you don't care for her now itself, it'd come. And it
would be a fine marriage for you."
" There is no use in speaking of it, mother," he
said gently.
WAITING 161
She looked at him for a long time, tears brimming
her eyes.
" I don't know what's over me to-night. It's
that fool of a Tom, or something. I haven't it
in my heart to push you to what you don't like.
There isn't a stime of common-sense left in me.
Put the hasp on the half-door and you going out."
As he walked home he felt young again. He
lingered by the stream, listening to the gurgling of
the water. It sang some new song to his heart.
M
CHAPTER XI
RAIN beat heavily on the school cottage. It swished
against the windows as if invisible hands caught it
up in immense buckets and dashed it with unerring
aim at intervals of a few seconds. It fell in thuds
on the sodden roof ; sizzled on the smouldering fire,
which belched smoke and peat ash, acrid and pene-
trating. The water-barrels had long since over-
flown, and Master Driscoll, in oil clothes and sou'-
wester, with many sighs, had broken up his garden
path, and raked out a passage for the water to the
front gate, through which it flowed in a steady
stream to join other swirling waters in a fierce rush
for the hollow at the foot of the hill, where, not
satisfied with making the road impassable, it made
small lakes of the adjoining fields.
" It might be February instead of the middle of
summer," Driscoll said cheerfully. A little sadly
he added, " The poor flowers and the poor farmers !
If it doesn't stop soon the country '11 be in a bad
way."
Maurice nodded in sympathy. " And the Feis'll
be spoiled," he said.
" And the Feis, to be sure," Driscoll said, blow-
ing the fire with a bellows. " We've done all we
can now. After the morning's work I've an appetite
for my breakfast."
Maurice ventured out again by the back door.
WAITING 163
A gust of rain rushed round the corner of the house
and struck him in the face. He looked up the wind
and down for signs of change, sighed, and turned
back. There was no gleam in the murky pall.
" It might clear at the turn of the tide. There
won't be much harm done by then," Driscoll said,
spreading the tablecloth.
" It might," Maurice said hopelessly.
Breakfast took a long time to prepare. Toast
was given up as impossible. " It'll take us all our
time to boil the eggs," Driscoll said. They sat
down at last to a gloomy meal. Then suddenly a
lull came.
" Hark," Driscoll said, holding his cup in mid-
air. The rain against the window had become a tiny
patter. The fire ceased to splutter. The room
lightened into a soft grey. " What did I tell you ? "
he said excitedly.
The rain had stopped by the time Maurice
had opened the front door. A thick grey fog, with
a sheen of silver in it, drifted by towards the
east.
"That's not much better," he said.
"The Feis'll be all right. Wait a bit. Come
back and finish your breakfast."
The room grew brighter as they ate. When
they had finished, Driscoll said
" You might be changing your clothes now.
Them things you have on you are drenched."
The sun shone through Maurice's window as he
finished dressing. He hurried to the garden, where
Driscoll stood smiling in his best black coat and grey
trousers, a black bow tie straggling down his white
shirt front from the wings of his Gladstone collar.
" Look at that now," he said proudly, as if he
1 64 WAITING
had wrought the wonderful transformation, waving
his arms around.
The wet, rocky surface of Slieve Mor caught the
sun in broken sheets of silver flame. The sapphire
sky was soft and tender as the smile in a child's
eyes after tears. Away in the east the fog, driven
by a light wind, whose force seemed to have spent
itself in the effort, was fading into the horizon. The
jewelled hedge sparkled. The drooping flowers,
already lifting joyous though battered heads to the
sun, perfumed the air.
"That trifle of rain only put the heart into
them. A prop here and there, and they'll be as fit
as a fiddle," Driscoll said, fingering the buds of a
carnation.
Maurice gave a contented sigh.
" After all our work, it'd have been a pity to
have a bad day for the Liscannow Feis."
" God is good to us. Everything has had a
smile on it for the last couple of months. I never
saw the people in better fettle for the right sort of
things. I'd better make up that path before we
start. We have an hour to the good yet, and time
to walk at our leisure after. Well, Matsey, what do
you want ? "
" Good morning, masters both," Matsey said,
opening the gate. " It's a letter I have from his
reverence for Maurice Blake there."
He shambled up the path.
" It's dressed up ye are. I'm going myself too.
I was telling Father James all about the Feis, and
we driving home last night from Liscannow.
Though," with a leer, " I didn't let on to him I was
going there myself. Catch me at that. He was as
mad as a hatter at times, and he was ladling questions
WAITING 165
out of me like you'd be emptying the big barrel
beyond with a cuppeen."
" 'Tis you have the long tongue on you, Matsey,"
Driscoll said laughing.
" Where is the letter ? " Maurice asked.
" 'Deed, if I didn't forget it in all my talking."
He turned out several pockets, and finally found it in
his greasy hat.
While Maurice was opening the letter, Matsey
said confidentially to Driscoll in a low voice, jerking
his thumb in the direction of Liscannow
" Is she sure to be in it ? "
"Who?"
" Sure you know. She has the heart haunted
in me. Miss Barton, I mean. She's a girl for you,
now, that any man might be took with."
Driscoll laughed heartily, but stopped suddenly
when he saw Maurice's face.
" What is it ? " he asked anxiously.
Maurice laughed harshly. "Read that."
Driscoll took the letter. " Run off with you,
Matsey, or you'll be late for the Feis," he said,
opening his spectacle case.
Matsey slouched away grumbling. Maurice
watched Driscoll fix the spectacles on his nose.
" Read it out," he said impatiently. " I want to
hear how it sounds."
" To the principal teacher, Bourneen National
School," Driscoll read.
" As your manager, I hereby forbid you to attend
the Liscannow Feis in any capacity whatever. If
any children from my school attend, I shall hold you
responsible."
" Well, well, well," Driscoll interjected frowning.
1 66 WAITING
He lowered the hand which held the letter, and was
about to speak.
" Finish it first," Maurice said.
" I am informed from a reliable source that
during my recent unavoidable absences from the
parish, my school at Bourneen has been used for
purposes not sanctioned by the Board's rules, and for
which I gave no permission. Let this never occur
again.
" JAMES MAHON, P.P.,
" Manager."
" My school ! " Maurice said bitterly.
" Don't take it to heart, boy," Driscoll said
gently, folding the letter with deliberation and
replacing it in the envelope. " It's just the same as
if it is his school as far as you're concerned. Let
us see, now. It's a mild letter enough for him.
That last bit is about the singing and dancing prac-
tices for the Feis likely. Miss Devoy wouldn't be
telling "
" She wouldn't," Maurice said emphatically.
" That's true for you. She's a decent poor slob.
It's Matsey's blabbing, I doubt. Not but the
whole parish knew of it all along and why
wouldn't they ? That's not the point now it is
what's to be done ? "
He walked up and down the path, read the
letter again, clasped his hands beneath his coat-tails
and seemed to consider thoughtfully the little drain
through which the water had now ceased to flow.
Maurice gazed at Slieve Mor, puzzling over its
changed appearance. He had just come to the
decision that some of its beauty had gone because
WAITING 167
the rain had dried off the face of the rocks, when
Driscoll spoke.
" Of course he hasn't that power over you in
vacation time too. Still it might be better "
" I'm going to the Feis," Maurice said, closing
his lips firmly.
" Don't put that jaw on you now, there's a
good gossoon," Driscoll said, taking his arm
affectionately. u He's an obstinate man, and a
bitter one, I won't be denying. He made the
mistake early in life of thinking he was God
Almighty Himself only 'twas a queer sort of God
he set before himself as a model, without any heart
or softness in Him."
He paused and looked at Slieve Mor for a few
minutes, while Maurice methodically kicked loose
stones off the path into the drain.
"Don't give him the chance of breaking you,
Maurice, agra. Stay at home here quietly with me,
and we'll have a fine walk up to the top of Slieve
Mor, if my old legs can carry me that far."
Maurice looked tenderly at the old man, whose
eyes expressed the pathetic anxiety of an affectionate
dog. Deeply shaken, he said, " I'd like to please
you."
Driscoll's face lighted up with hope. " God
bless "
" No," Maurice said, stopping again. " 1 can't
in this I'll go."
The old man's face fell.
" What can he do to me after all ? " Maurice
added, laughing with some bravado. " He can't
dismiss me for this."
" If one handle fails, he's sure to turn another
and another," Driscoll said drearily.
1 68 WAITING
" Bullies are always cowards," Maurice said
lightly.
Driscoll shook his head. " He's no coward
whatever else he is. He's too deep a problem for
me, that same man, but I like to give him his due.
No matter how wrong he is he's always able to per-
suade himself that he's in the right, and he'd make
his way to the gates of hell itself to carry out his
will, at the cost of many a fall to himself too."
" What a man to have power ! "
" That's the evil. But then he has it, you see,"
Driscoll said with a sigh. " There now, if I wasn't
forgetting about the drain. Don't speak another
word till we have it done. Then I'll abide by what
you say, and I won't push agin you any more," and
he looked at Maurice appealingly.
They worked silently, Driscoll starting from the
water-barrel. Maurice from the gate. He tried to
o
see the matter with Driscoll's eyes. The fresh
fragrance of the garden distracted him, and the
soothing notes of a solitary blackbird in the hedge.
There was nothing to fear. It was Driscoll's love
for him that made the old master afraid. Besides
some latent savage feeling took hold of him and he
pounded the gravel into place with unnecessary
force. He had always resented the power that
Father James exercised over him. He had sub-
mitted and felt less of a man for it. ...
His spade touched Driscoll's. He looked up
with a start and read a question in the old man's
eyes. He had not even tried to come to a decision,
but he said firmly
" It would be selling my soul if I gave in I'll
go." Then he added with a short laugh, "The
children'll be there in any case. I can't call them
WAITING 169
back now. I might as well be hung for a sheep
as a lamb."
This sounded to him as a mere subterfuge.
He blushed and stammered, " That's only pretence.
I wouldn't call them back if they were standing at
the gate there. And I'd go if they all stopped at
home. You'll forgive me for not giving in to you,
master ? "
Driscoll did not lift his eyes for some seconds.
There was a smile in them when he straightened
himself and said
" Our own little light is the only one we have to
go by in the end. God send you won't sup sorrow
for doing what's right. Let us wash our hands now
and be off."
Maurice weakened in his resolution. He felt
as if he could give all he had in the world to
say " I'll stay." His lips formed the words ten
times as he washed, but he couldn't utter them. He
lagged behind Driscoll as, stout blackthorns in hand,
they walked up the village street. When they had
passed the parochial house he hurried abreast and
said
" On second thoughts "
" Don't heed them, agra. There are times when
they're of some use, and times when they're no good
at all. Did I ever tell you the story of how Shawn
Oge O'Grady, the greatest of the O'Gradys that
ever lived in Durrisk, came by the land ? I didn't.
Well, it's a proof, if there ever was one, that a man is
often the best judge in his own cause though he
doesn't always act on the judgment, more's the pity
and is as likely to see right first as last."
The story was never finished. It had hardly
begun when interruptions began. Teigue Donlon's
i yo WAITING
two little girls, in white dresses and blue sashes,
blue ribbons in their straw hats, emerged from a
lane on their way to the Feis. Driscoll stopped and
spoke to them. Were they going all alone ? No ;
they were getting a seat in the Hinnisseys' cart.
Their father and mother had to go early to Lis-
cannow for the market, but their mother'd strive to
meet them on the bridge outside the town ; and if
she didn't, Jack Hinnissey'd see them safe. " Lord
bless my soul," Driscoll said, mopping his brow as
he walked on after presenting them each with a
penny, " they know their way round now the
minute they leave the cradle." Carts trundled along
noisily and invariably slackened pace as they came
abreast. " Won't ye have a lift, master ? There's
room enough for the two of ye and welcome." And
Driscoll would wave his stick in mock horror. " Is
it putting a slight on my old legs you are, Jamesey,"
(or Pat, or Jack), " thinking they're not able to
carry me over a few miles of road to Liscannow."
Then a hearty laugh as the horse was urged forward,
and the cheery retort, " Faith, it's many a mile they'll
carry you yet, master, before they give in."
The cathedral clock was striking eleven as
they crossed the bridge into the town. The heavy
rain had swept the roads clean and a genial sun had
almost dried them. But the river, browned by bog
water, still gave sullen evidence of the storm.
Cocks of hay, loose planks, a hen-coop floating
rapidly down mid-stream, showed that the low-lying
inches higher up the river were flooded. A boat-
man freeing the narrow arches of the bridge from the
debris with a long gaff, said " it was only a spatter
of rain that had no harm in it except to clear out
Patsey Lucey's bawn. As for the hen-coop, it was
WAITING 171
for certain the one Patsey discarded long ago and
was thinking of making firing of only he doubted if
it was fit for that same."
This remark made Maurice scan the road.
" I wonder if she's come in yet," he said, his eyes
wandering over the stragglers on the bridge.
" She she ! " Driscoll said, walking on. " One'd
think there was only one female in the world. It's
the great pity that the decorations all got spoiled by
the rain," he added, pointing to an announcement
of the Feis that spanned the street. The calico was
twisted and discoloured and the green lettering had
run. The rope had sagged in the middle. A few
green flags hung limp and forlorn from the windows
of a dozen houses.
Maurice hardly noticed the decorations. He
looked at them as if he were taking in every kink
in the crumpled calico, but he saw only a vague
blot against the sky-line. " She mightn't be the
only woman in the world," he thought, " but anyway
there wasn't another like her." He bumped against
a creel of turf slung from the back of an ass wagging
his tail gleefully in the centre of the narrow street as
he munched hay from a cart heeled up by the pave-
ment.
"The streets are thronged enough, though it's
little thought the people are giving to the Feis, I'm
afraid. Mind your steps there with that pig,"
Driscoll said.
Maurice made no effort to pick his way more
carefully. He felt himself on the brink of some
new discovery about Alice Barton, and he wanted to
think out what it was.
An ash plant, waved by an excited seller of calves,
flashed in front of his eyes. A basket, from which
1 72 WAITING
two cocks struggled to escape, caught him in the
ribs. He followed closely in the path which
Driscoll elbowed through the crowd. He was
now keenly awake to external impressions, though
his mind was vainly trying to bring into conscious-
ness something elusive, vaguely pleasant and dis-
turbing. He searched for it everywhere : in the
dark blue hooded cloaks of the women ; in the back
of a frieze coat still steaming under the hot sun with
the vapour of the rain ; in the carts that lined the
kerbstones ; in the loud chaffering over bonhams and
calves and hay ; in the friendly salutations in Irish
and English that greeted him as he met some
Bourneen neighbours.
" Ye're in for some teachers' meeting, I doubt ? "
Mike Blake said.
" No ; the Feis."
" Oh, that ! " Mike said, his tone and his
shoulders uniting in the expression of a fine shade
of contemptuous indifference. " You'll likely find
that fool of a Tom and his wife there. They
skedaddled off an hour ago, and I wanting him here
to help in selling the hay."
And then Maurice knew. He loved Alice as
Tom loved Minnie. The blood raced through
his veins. The sun suddenly seemed to have
become hotter. His forehead burned with a prickly
heat. They had passed through the crowded Bridge
Street and as they walked abreast through an unfre-
quented side street Driscoll talked. Maurice did
not listen. A vaguely heard voice sounded as
a distant harmonic to his own thought. Of course
he had loved her all along. All his life it seemed.
Certainly at Tom's wedding, he said to himself,
with a frown at a lurid pile of shirting and pink
WAITING 173
flannelette on the pavement at the corner of the
Main Street.
Here Driscoll went ahead. There were fewer
carts but the front of the pavement on both sides
was lined with the stock of the shops behind :
drapery, boots, ironmongery. Itinerant booths
extended far out into the road. Family groups,
having sold in Bridge Street, were making leisurely
inspection of wares preparatory to driving a hard
bargain. Children gazed in rapt absorption at a stall
laden with pink sugar-stick and gingerbread.
" One would think you never saw a market in
Liscannow before. You're not heeding a word I
say," Driscoll said impatiently.
Maurice laughed happily. He had just decided
that he loved her that first moment at the Reardons',
when all he had seen of her was a gleam of gold
in her hair in the candle light.
" I see a lot of people wearing Gaelic League
badges," he said, grasping at a topic suggested by a
passing group.
" It's only selling and buying is occupying the
thoughts of most of the people," Driscoll said,
shaking his head sadly.
Maurice vehemently denied this. " They have
the roots of a great ideal in them, and they have
warm hearts." He went on painting a vision of the
golden age that was surely coming. He saw all the
colour and freshness of the morning in the dull
glare of the mid-day sun. The dingy houses, with
their dirty chocolate and yellow-green washed fronts,
were palaces of art clad in the most delicate hues of
the rainbow. . . .
He stopped suddenly as they turned the corner
of the lane leading to the disused military barracks
174 WAITING
in which the Feis was to be held. In front of the
gate Alice Barton was bent slightly forward, knotting
a blue bow in a child's hair. He blushed. The
end of a sentence trailed off in a stammer. He
glanced at Driscoll, but he, too, had seen Alice and
was hurrying forward. At the sound of his foot-
steps she looked up with a smile. She finished the
bow with deft fingers, wiped away the remains of
tears from the child's smiling face and holding her
at an arm's length said solemnly
"Not another tear, Mary. There's Master
Driscoll ! and he's jealous that no Bourneen child
has as beautiful a bow as that. She's from Drum-
quin," she added, turning to Driscoll. " I'm not
at all sure that I don't hope the Drumquin girls will
get the prize for singing."
" You're only a turncoat," Driscoll said, shaking
his finger.
" Will I sing my piece for you, Miss Alice ? "
the child said eagerly.
" Bourneen shows no such devotion you see
how my heart is torn," Alice said with a twinkle.
She patted the child's shoulder and walked with her
into the barrack yard.
To Maurice she seemed some unapproachable
divinity. He had stood by tongue-tied, hardly
daring to look at her, and he felt relieved when she
turned away. Her smiles even had a detached
expression. He was mad to think that he loved her.
He didn't care for her in the least, he almost said
with his lips. Some pulse in his forehead throbbed
and seemed to beat a refrain against the drum of his
ear, " That's a lie, that's a lie."
Father Malone came into the yard wheeling a
bicycle.
WAITING 175
" This is pretty had, Maurice," he said, with a
serious face.
Maurice started, his face as red as a peony.
Had the priest read the loud whisper, " I love her,
I love her," which his heart was pulsing through
his body ? He muttered something incoherently.
" The big man saw yourself and Driscoll pass
by. He's in a dreadful rage. There's no knowing
what he won't do. I tried to calm him, but I only
made him worse."
Maurice laughed. " I thought it was something
serious," he said, and he laughed again boyishly.
Father Malone looked at him in surprise.
" His only doubt when I left him was whether he'd
dismiss you at once or give you three months'
notice," he said hesitatingly.
" Oh, he'll cool down," Maurice said in-
differently.
Father Malone frowned thoughtfully, then
smiled. " Maybe you know best how to take
him ? "
It was only when Father Malone had passed
into the drill hall that Maurice realized what the
priest had said. It worried him for a moment, but
he soon put all thought of Father Mahon aside. A
group of his school children clamoured for attention.
When the Feis began at twelve he was busy as
steward and examiner.
The little hall was crowded. " There must be
five or six hundred here," Maurice said enthusiastic-
ally, meeting Driscoll as they moved about finding
seats for late comers.
" Aye, and as many thousands outside that are
jeering at it but it's great anyway, we're making
headway."
i 7 6 WAITING
Green-ribboned boys and blue-ribboned girls
filled most of the seats. But all ages were repre-
sented. A tottering old man held an infant in his
palsied arms and murmured, " The sound of the Irish
will loosen his tongue." Young men made room
for young women in seats already packed tight.
Some time during each competition, whether it
was dancing, singing, story-telling, fiddling or piping,
Maurice's eyes unconsciously sought Alice ; but she
seemed to think of nothing but the competitor of the
moment. She had no heart, he said, and then he
remembered a dozen instances to the contrary. She
did not care for him anyway. This he could not
rebut, and found a pleasant satisfaction in his
misery.
CHAPTER XII
AT the close of a spirited contest in story telling
between an old woman of seventy and a boy of ten,
the Feis began to drag. In a quiet corner, Mrs.
Tom Blake, carefully secured from crushing by her
husband's immovable bulk, had gone peacefully to
sleep. Children wandered about listlessly with hair
and ribbons awry, or nodded restlessly in the seats.
A few priests in the front bench, visitors to Lis-
cannow for the bathing, consulted their watches
uneasily every few minutes. Father Delahunty,
who had just confided to a neighbour, in a whisper
audible throughout the hall, that the affair was damn
dull, and that he would not have come next or near
it, only he wanted to please his curate, Cassidy,
who had a bee in his bonnet over that same Irish,
openly yawned. The floor was strewn with skins of
oranges, loose papers, and empty paper bags that had
once held sweets or biscuits. The air was heavy and
stuffy. The very flags on the walls had begun to
droop. The Bourneen children, having won the prize
for part-singing, were sent home by Father Malone
under escort of Mrs. Hinnissey. A flat-chested
spinster, who proclaimed that she had the best song in
the whole world inside her, droned an interminable
hackneyed folk song from the back of her throat in
the tone of a wheezy bag-pipes. The judges tried to
stop her, but she waved them aside imperiously. A
1 78 WAITING
contest of fiddlers awoke the audience again. Jim
Mescall furnished a running sarcastic commentary
on the efforts of his rivals. When awarded the
prize, he said a good fiddle was a waste in a company
of the kind he could have beaten the lot of them
on an old Day & Martin blacking box with a couple
of strings of cat-gut on it that he had by him at
home.
" The best of it is over," Maurice said to Alice.
" You must be worn out. Won't you come with the
master and myself and have a cup of tea in a little
shop round the corner ? "
" It was glorious," she said, her eyes glowing.
" Are you sure we shan't miss anything ? " She
looked around hesitatingly.
A priest entered the hall hurriedly and whispered
to Father Delahunty. After a few seconds he
beckoned to Father Malone, who came down from
the platform. They were soon joined by all the
other priests. Standing in a group in front of the
platform, they carried on an animated whispered
conversation. The whole audience watched them
curiously. Father Malone went back to the plat-
form and whispered to Driscoll.
" It's over in any case," Driscoll said aloud.
"The priests are keen on it," Father Malone
said doubtfully.
Driscoll consulted a few members of the com-
mittee. After some shaking of heads the secretary
came to the front of the platform and announced
" Fortunately the Feis is nearly over. But at the
request of the clergy the committee is glad to finish
it at once out of respect to the Bishop of Droomeen,
the news of whose death has just come. I also
propose a vote of condolence with our own beloved
WAITING 179
bishop, of whose close connection with that ancient
diocese we are all aware, in his deep affliction."
" Tra-la," Father Delahunty said, winking at
the ceiling.
" Was the Bishop of Droomeen a great friend of
the movement ? " Alice asked Maurice.
He did his best to kill it."
A slight frown puckered her brow. " And Dr.
Hannigan ? "
Maurice shrugged his shoulders. " He sits
tight. Neither for nor against in public. I'm told
he doesn't like it. That speech is what McBride, the
secretary, calls policy."
" I'd prefer straightness."
" You would," Maurice said, thinking only of
the glow in her eyes that brought out the gold flecks
in the brown of the irises. " McBride would say
that the bishops are very powerful, and that we
ought to do our best to propitiate them," he added,
after a pause, with a short laugh.
" Open enemies are better than doubtful friends,"
she said sententiously. She smiled at Driscoll, who
was coming towards them. " Being a Protestant, I
suppose I oughtn't say anything," she added, half to
herself.
" What nonsense ! You ' Maurice began ;
but Driscoll interrupted
" Now we can have tea, Miss Barton, and we'll
see you home after. How did you like it ? "
" It dragged out a bit at the end, but it was fine."
As the audience filed out of the hall, Maurice
watched her talking enthusiastically with Driscoll.
" What had her Protestantism to do with it ? " he
asked himself, with a questioning frown.
Father Malone drew him aside. " It's an ill
i8o WAITING
wind that blows nobody good," he whispered. " That
old bishop's death saves you from Father Mahon.
He won't want any row on his hands now for a couple
of months with a mitre in the balance. Though
God help you afterwards if things go wrong with his
plans. I can't stay now, as I'm dining with the
priests. Come in to-night and have a chat."
" Come along, Maurice," Driscoll called out.
At tea in the back room of Miss Doolan's cake
shop, an old rhyme, often flung at the Protestants
attending Bourneen school in his childhood, kept
running through his mind
" Proddy, Woddy, green guts,
Never says a prayer.
Catch him by the hind leg
And fling him down the stair."
He remembered Driscoll's anger on hearing it once
one of the few times he had ever seen the old man
angry, he thought, as he looked at his smiling, eager
face. He wondered if these rhymes were ever sung
now. Alice was engaged in a vigorous argument
with Driscoll. She appealed to Maurice laughingly
to decide some point. He smiled back, but his
thoughts played with her religion. She and Driscoll
again talked with animation, while Maurice picked
the raisins out of one of Miss Doolan's Bath
buns a Bath bun only in name. She wasn't in the
least like what he had believed of Protestants when
he was a child, he thought, eating a raisin appreci-
atively. All Protestants were black, scowling people,
with a look in their eyes of the hell to which they
were certainly speeding. While she he chuckled
softly. The conversation between his companions
had become more serious. He listened.
WAITING 181
" No matter what you say, there is a feeling
against us, Mr. Driscoll," Alice, said.
" In the North, maybe, not here. Have we any
feeling against Protestants, Maurice ? "
"No," Maurice said emphatically.
" I didn't think you or Mr. Blake had. I'd love
to believe that no one had but but Father
Mahon looks so queerly at me when he passes me
on the road. He has never spoken to me since I
came into his parish."
" I wouldn't make much of that," Driscoll said
uneasily. " It's often and often he gave me that
same look, and I a Catholic. There's Father
Malone now," he added, brightening, " he wouldn't
say a hard word against any one in the world, Turk,
Jew, or Atheist, let alone Protestants."
" Even Uncle John says that he's a Christian
out of the gospels," she said smiling.
" The people seem to have no ill-feeling," she
continued, pursuing her own train of thought. " All
the same, there is something I can't explain it-
some feeling that I am different and wrong, and
she hesitated. Maurice said
"It's only the memory of old prejudices. I had
them myself when I was a boy," he added, laughing.
" They don't mean anything now."
" I hope not," she said, looking at him thought-
fully. " I've said as much myself to Uncle John,
but he only shakes his head and says that the priests
could arouse bad feeling any day perhaps I ought
not to have said that, but you both know him ?
He'd say the same to you."
" John Crawford always sees the black side of
things," Driscoll said with a shrug. " Will we be
making a start ? "
1 82 WAITING
" Priests haven't as much power nowadays as
Protestants seem to think," Maurice said lightly, as
they rose.
" I don't know how I got on this subject with
Catholics too," Alice said apologetically. " Before
we go home you must show me the town, Mr.
Driscoll. You've often promised, and I've never
really seen it."
The late afternoon sun transfigured the mean
streets. The motley coloured houses were warm in
tone. Windows flamed in gold. A tinman's stall
flashed silver. The long shadows against the
bronzed dust of the road had a violet tinge. A row
of dirty pink houses on the quay glowed a rich
crimson on the glassy surface of the basin. Driscoll
had stories and legends of all the sights the wall
which only the eye of faith could see ; the castle,
beside which once stood the principal gate ; the
ruined Dominican priory ; the Celtic cross in the
market square, its carved figures almost obliterated
by time, an arm shattered, so the story ran, by
one of Cromwell's cannon balls ; and, near by,
the limpid well of St. Brigid in which the varie-
gated rag-offerings on an overhanging tree were
reflected vividly.
"The sun is kind to Liscannow," Alice said, as
they passed through a squalid street of thatched
houses on their way to the bridge, her eyes on the
flaming poppies and golden rag- weed that grew
luxuriantly on the decaying roofs.
" It has its work cut out for it," Driscoll said
with a sigh. " Not but things are looking up.
They've a new cloth factory and the fishing is better
since they built the new quay."
" And these pigsties ? "
WAITING 183
" Well ! you know Rome wasn't built in a day,"
he said whimsically.
She laughed. " Anyhow, to-day began in a
storm and it ends in this," she said, standing on the
bridge and pointing to the sunset. At the bar the
river broke into silver foam. The peak of Slieve
Mor was already clad in purple, but the slate roofs
of Liscannow gleamed a red gold.
" God send it's a good omen," Driscoll said
reverently.
" Amen," Maurice said, watching the sunset in
Alice's glowing face.
" I'll do anything in reason but I won't go
home," a voice said behind them.
They turned. A man, half drunk, seated in an
ass cart was pulling back the reins with all his strength,
while a weary looking woman tried vainly to urge the
ass forward.
Alice gave a troubled look at Driscoll.
" Even that kind of thing is better than it used
to be. That's the first I've seen to-day," he said
sadly.
He spoke gently to the man, who said in a
drunken whisper
" She has a drop taken, the poor thing. It easy
goes to her head. Get out of the ass's way,
woman," he added loudly to his wife, " and don't
be pitting main strength and ignorance agin me, and
I wanting to get home."
She let go the winkers, gave Driscoll a tired,
grateful look, and hung on to the tail of the cart as
her husband whipped the ass across the bridge.
" It's as much want of food as the drink,"
Driscoll said meditatively. " We're backward in
many ways, even as regards our proper eating
1 84 WAITING
likely enough he never ate a bite since he left home
early and got drenched on top of it. All the same,
them Liscannow public houses are a caution."
" There's a lot to be done yet," Alice said.
As they turned the corner at the far end of the
bridge, a trap approached rapidly along the Bourneen
road.
" It's Father Mahon," Driscoll said, as the last
rays of the sun caught the nap on the silk hat of the
driver. " Well, well, well, but this is a misfortune."
" It's a wonderful day," the priest said cheer-
fully, waving his whip as he passed.
Driscoll stood and stared after him with open
mouth. " Well, now, if he's not the greatest
wonder in it himself. In the best of tempers, too,
after all that's passed."
" There's a dead bishop in front of him,"
Maurice said bitterly, with a frown.
" Now, Maurice, the vexation of the morning is
on you still he might be regretting his part in it.
He had all the looks of it anyway," Driscoll said,
walking on.
Alice looked at them curiously but did not
speak. Maurice shrugged his shoulders. His eyes
roamed over the landscape in front, and the ever
changing colour of the sky. The only signs of the
storm that remained were the fresher green on the
rain-swept hedgerows and a quickened scent from a
field of clover in flower.
" You'll be with us a good while yet," Driscoll
said to Alice, breaking the silence as they passed out
of the dusk of Durrisk wood.
" Three months at the longest."
They kept up a brisk duologue till they reached
the stile where the short cut to Crawford's house
WAITING 185
branched off from the main road. Maurice listened
intently. He heard every word Driscoll's expres-
sions of regret, his praise of her work, a review of
all the activities of the parish but always, at the
end of every sentence of hers, like the harsh roar of
the ground swell on the Liscannow beach in a storm,
the phrase " three months at the longest " battered
against his ears. One lobe of his brain registered
their talk of the Gaelic League, of folk-songs and
folk-tunes, of Jim Mescall's music, of agricultural
banks, of improved farming, of some new heaven
that was opening over the country : the other was
recording obscurely some desperate struggle of his
among the breakers, in which he strove vainly to
grasp some vague object that was ever eluding him
with each receding wave.
" Uncle John and Aunt Ruth will miss me I
think," she said, as they stood in front of the stile.
" We'll all miss you won't we, Maurice ? "
Driscoll said.
Her hand was stretched out. Maurice took it
with a grasp that made her wince. This was what
he was groping after all the time, he thought, and he
crushed it relentlessly. He had got her at last and
he would never let her go. Her fingers felt so small
and cool. She gave a little gasp and her eyes had
a shade of apprehension. He blushed and dropped
her hand suddenly.
" You might see her as far as the door," Driscoll
said.
" Not another step," she said, and she laughed
softly to herself as she mounted the stile.
Maurice gazed after her as she tripped along the
path.
" Come along. It's getting late," Driscoll said.
1 86 WAITING
" What's come over your tongue at all, and you
without a word out of you since we left Liscannow ?
That'd be the very girl for you now to marry, only
it's the pity of the world she's a Protestant."
"What would that matter?" Maurice said,
checking a laugh.
Driscoll peered at him in the fading twilight.
Maurice blushed hotly and laughed again nervously.
" Surely to God you're not thinking of it ? "
Driscoll said anxiously.
" I wish I knew if she'd have me."
" Have you lost your senses, man ? " Driscoll
said, catching Maurice's arm and shaking it
violently.
" I might or have found them," Maurice said
doggedly.
They both stopped and stood facing each other
in the middle of the road. A cart passed and
separated them.
" Bedad, Master Driscoll, from the stand of you
I thought you were going to wallop him," the
driver said cheerfully.
Driscoll gave a curt " good night," and rejoined
Maurice as the cart lumbered on.
" How long have you been thinking of this ? "
" It feels like all my life it was back at the stile
there."
" If that's all," with a sigh that mingled relief
with anxiety, " let us be stepping on, and I might
put some sense into you before we get to
Bourneen."
Maurice waited for Driscoll to speak, but the old
man walked on in silence, his stick under his coat
tails, the forefinger of his left hand making circles in
the air, a trick of his when worried.
WAITING 187
" Well ? " Maurice said impatiently.
" Can't you see it yourself ? "
" I see enough, but nothing to stop me if she'll
only face it with me."
" God send her the sense then. Thank God
women are more clear-sighted than men when there's
foolishness of the heart about."
His face brightened and he struck his iron-bound
stick with a sharp thud on the road. " Maybe,
she'd turn a Catholic ? " he said. " That'd settle
everything."
The suggestion gave Maurice a momentary relief
from a vague fear that was oppressing him. He
pondered it awhile, then shook his head.
" She wouldn't nor would I ask her. What'd
you think of her if she asked me to become a
Protestant ? "
Driscoll's face had grown despondent even
before Maurice spoke. The gloom deepened on it as
he said reluctantly
" I knew it before I had the words out of my
mouth. She's not the stamp of woman to play
pitch and toss with her religion and I'd think
little of her if she was. But that only makes
your duty all the clearer," he added, after a pause.
" You must never open your lips to the girl in the
matter."
Why ? "
" Why ? For ten whys and every one of 'em
sinking you deeper into the bog. You jumped into
the frying-pan with the big man this morning you
might get out of that and keep your school. But
do you want to turn a somersault right into the
middle of the fire from where there'd be no saving
you ? "
1 88 WAITING
The old man spoke excitedly. His finger made
rapid revolutions.
" How could you ask her to marry you without
a ha'penny or the way of earning it. What would
ye live on ? "
"The school isn't much, of course, for a girl
like her, and she used to a lot of things I couldn't
give her but it's enough to live on," Maurice said
doubtfully.
" You'd never darken the door of Bourneen
school again if you married a Protestant wife. You'd
get the sack without a day's notice. The whole
world knows Father James hates Protestants like
poison and mixed marriages like hell itself, God
forgive me."
" I could get another school," Maurice said
aggressively.
" From a priest-manager ! And Father James
to give you a character ! You'd travel through the
five provinces and wear the soles ofF your feet and
be as far from getting a school as when you started.
Besides and this is the one gleam of hope I see in
the whole business you can't get married to a
Protestant without a dispensation, and Father
Mahon'll take good care that you'll never get one."
"He got one for Mr. O'Grady of Durrisk."
Driscoll let his arm fall helplessly.
" The state you're in has made you lose your
wits entirely," he said. " As if the likes of Mr.
O'Grady was any pattern for the likes of us in the
eyes of the clergy. You haven't Durrisk Manor
and more thousands a year than there's days in the
week. And Father James's principles couldn't be
shook by anything he'd expect out of you. Besides,
even if you could pay him well itself for his trouble,
WAITING 189
he'd never suffer a schoolmaster to have a Protestant
wife."
" The bishop might give the dispensation over
Father Mahon's head he has the name of being a
just man," Maurice said, with the despair of a
drowning man grasping at a straw.
" Why would he go out of his way to help you
agin Father Mahon ? Don't be expecting too much
out of life, agra, nor out of the clergy either.
They
He walked along in silence. Maurice regarded
the last pearly light of the sun with curious interest.
An opaque cloud was closing in on a silver patch at
the zenith, while further east a few faint grey clouds
edged with purple were fading into the night. It
was like his own life, he felt, on which darkness was
gathering. Then, over his left shoulder, he saw the
crescent moon. " This is luck," he said under his
breath, with a thrill of joy. Unconsciously he
repeated an old rhyme of his childhood
" I see the new moon ;
The new moon sees me ;
God bless the new moon ;
God bless me,"
turning a circle three times. When he noticed what
he had done he laughed at himself. But the feeling
of depression had passed away.
" There may be some truth in an old pistorogue
after all. I'll not believe but there's some way out
of this trouble," he said with a new feeling of hope.
" By putting it out of your head for good and
all," Driscoll said emphatically.
" It's gone deeper than the head. I can't pitch
out of me every drop of blood that's throbbing in
1 90 WAITING
my body. I'm talking to you now," Maurice said,
with a glad laugh, " but I can't put into words what I
feel. 1 see it up there," he added, gazing meditatively
at the stars, now glimmering brighter than the thin
pale curve of moon, "and I feel it in the scent of the
hedges, and I hear it this very minute in the lowing
of Teigue Donlon's cows up the lane there aye in
the tapping of your old stick against the road.
And it's coming up out of the earth to the sound of
my own feet. Put it out of my head, indeed !
Why, for any power I have over it, I feel like I did
the day I was caught out in the bay in a squall, and
I alone in a little punt. But there is no fear on
me, 'only joy. My thoughts are like that little
kippeen of a boat, dashed about by the big waves
within me, and they singing sweeter than any tune
Jim Mescall at his best ever drew out of the fiddle.
I feel "
"Aye, I remember what it feels like when it
takes a man bad," Driscoll said with a sigh. " Here
we are at the gate. Not another word out of you
about it to-night, or I might be forgetting my own
sense and be bolstering you up in your foolishness."
" I think I'll walk east a bit. Somehow, I don't
feel like being cooped up in the house."
" Do then. It might cool you."
The old man walked up the path with head bent.
He half turned the key in the lock, left it there,
and hastening back to the gate called after Maurice.
" I don't draw back a word of what I said," he
said, when Maurice returned. " There was sound
sense and reason in it. Give heed to it, boy, and
don't do anything rash." He paused hesitatingly,
turned on his heel, walked away a few steps, came
back. "If the world was only ruled by the heart,"
WAITING 191
he said, looking beyond Maurice, "and it ought to
be by rights there wouldn't be much trouble in it.
My mind is pulling me one way and my heart
another till I'm torn in two over you. And if all
was known, maybe God has more to do with the
heart than the head. After all," he continued, in a
hesitating whisper, as if he were trying to read his
words in the distant stars, " it's little we know of the
sap that pushes out the leaves in the spring and
gives all their glory to the flowers. The best tulip I
ever grew was from a bulb I cast away as useless on
the midden. With the best of intentions the wisdom
of the oldest of us is only foolishness." His voice
trailed off in a murmur. He caught Maurice's
sleeve. " I'm only wandering. 1 came after you to
say one thing and I'm saying another. All I want
to say to you now, and it wasn't what came into my
head as I turned the key, is that I'd like to give
you the moon beyond if you had your heart set
on it."
Maurice watched him walk up the path again,
open the door, strike a match, and light the lamp
on the sill of the uncurtained window. There was
a strained, sad look in his face as he stood for a
moment in the glow of the lamp fumbling with the
cord of the blind. He pulled it down slowly.
Maurice watched it descend with a growing depres-
sion. After a while the lamp was moved. He saw
Driscoll's shadow on the blind in profile his
shoulders stooped and what seemed an outline ot
pain in the whole figure. A hand stretched out and
made circles with the forefinger.
Maurice clicked the latch of the gate, half
opened it, closed it again and walked down the hill.
He shivered a little, and put out his hand as if to
i 9 2 WAITING
feel the air. The master was worried, he thought.
How was it that he was so chilled when the air
felt warm ? He quickened his pace. He could not
get away from that look on Driscoll's face. What
had caused it ? Where was that background of
feeling that swayed his thoughts with all its colour
and music a few minutes ago ? Gone. His
thoughts were clear enough now. And cold, thin,
miserable thoughts they were, he laughed grimly.
Paining the old man on the head of Alice Barton
on plans for marrying her, and she never having
given him even a look to show that she cared a pin
for him. Driscoll was right. Supposing she cared
for him, and it was a ridiculous supposition, he
could not marry her. He waded through the pool
in the hollow without noticing it ; though, for a few
minutes afterwards, he was fascinated by the
squishing of the water in his boots as he walked.
He couldn't give up Bourneen. His work had
meant more to him for the last few months than
ever before he had done more too. And if he
gave it up, would he be any nearer to her ? There
was nothing for it but to put her out of his head.
And there was Driscoll, worried. A thought
pointed an accusing finger at Alice Barton. He put
this aside as unfair. She wasn't to blame. . . . He
tried to think of the bank, of new plans for the
school for the winter. He remembered Father
Mahon's letter of the morning. He might have to
leave in any case. He almost stepped into another
pool in a hollow. He turned back. His thoughts
wandered, with his eyes, to a pile of broken stones
on the side of the road. A stone-breaker had a fine
free life and could marry whom he willed : maybe
he couldn't : Father Mahon's long arm might
WAITING 193
stretch out, too, between him and his heart's desire.
A row of poplars fronting a farmhouse rustled in
an almost imperceptible wind. Maurice sniffed the
salt odour of the sea in the warm air, and strained
his ears to catch what he thought at first was the
roar of breakers on the distant beach, but which
proved to be the rumble of an approaching cart. He
stepped aside to let it pass. A woman seated on the
backboard, laid across the middle of the cart, a
vague outline of gracious curves against the star-
light, reminded him of Alice Barton. Then he saw
her in everything, in the shimmering glory of the
milky way, between the silver horns of the vanishing
moon, in every bush that lined the white road in
front a long procession of beautiful women, all
alike and all different in the infinite variety of her
changing face. Again his thoughts were mere
driftwood floating aimlessly on the surface of an
unfathomable deep. His fears were there, too, wide
eyed, and his difficulties, but nothing mattered,
only Alice not the school, not the bank, not the
whole world beside.
CHAPTER XIII
THIS time he saw the water in the hollow. He
stood on the brink. He was already wet, so he
might as well walk through it, he thought. He
remembered that he had promised to call on Father
Malone, and crept cautiously along the top of the
ditch, worn into a narrow path by many feet
during previous floods. He jumped on to the dry
road, past the water, and felt the legs of his trousers.
They were fairly dry, and would not drip in the
priest's parlour. As he mounted the hill his relation
to Alice Barton became clearer. It was just as
inevitable that he should marry her, if he could, as
that he had to get past the pool in order to reach
home. He saw all the difficulties now as clearly as
Driscoll saw them. They were as real as the water
in the hollow, and not to be overcome so easily.
Still there might be a way out. He laughed at him-
self for taking it for granted that she loved him and
would marry him. His reason said, " You are a fool,
she doesn't love you, she is as far above you as the
stars." But a hundred pent-up feelings united in
his heart, and surged through him with a sound in
his ears like the waterfall under the spur of Slieve
Mor. There were no articulate words, but some-
thing stronger than words, stilling the voice of doubt
and protest an emotion that lifted him to the stars
and made them stepping-stones for his feet, giving
WAITING 195
his soul the mastery of the world. . . . He leant,
chilled, against the gate of Driscoll's cottage. The
light still shone through the holland blind. The
shadow of the master's head, his spectacles low down
on his nose, made a quaint pattern. The clock
struck the half-hour. Maurice looked at his watch.
What had come over him ? he asked himself uneasily,
as he tried to read the time in the dim light. Half-
past ten. It was not yet too late to call on the
priest, who was a late goer to bed. He felt hungry
and cold. He had eaten nothing since breakfast,
except the light tea at Liscannow. Perhaps that was
why he felt so queer. His damp stockings pricked
his feet. It was madness to think because he loved
Alice that she loved him ! This thought sobered
him. He stamped his feet on the road, half to
warm them, half to emphasize his own foolishness,
as he walked to the priest's house. All the same, he
loved her.
Maria opened the door.
" The priest is expecting you this hour back,"
she said gruffly.
" I went for a long walk, and forgot the time."
She looked at his boots, caked in dry mud, and
at the limp, wrinkled trouser legs. She leant down
and passed her hand over them.
" Catching your death you'll be. On the road to
Liscoff you were, and driving headlong through the
mud and water. You have no more sense than the
priest himself, and that's saying a good deal."
She lit a candle on the hall table, and opened the
door of the priest's bedroom.
"In here you go," she said, leading the way,
" and I'll give you some dry things."
He protested feebly, but followed her.
196 WAITING
" There now," she said, making a move to leave,
" change into them. It's well there's any left but
what's on his back, and only for me there wouldn't.
I'll be gone to my bed before you go, but you'll find
your own things here, with the clauber off them and
dried, by the time ye give up your foolish talking.
It's peaky enough you're looking," she added,
lingering by the door. " And why wouldn't you ?
Two men living beyond there without a woman to
look after ye, only Bessy Reilly, and she not half
doing it, and fooling ye to your teeth. I'll bring
you in a hot drink to put some life in you. If what
Matsey Boylan told me is true, we ought all be in
the best of spirits he heard it, he said, from the
clerk of the parish within at Liscannow. I had it on
the tip of my tongue to ask Father Malone himself
when he came back, but I remembered in time that
he put me under a vow not to mention Father
Mahon to him the poor, innocent young priest
thinks that'll keep me from giving the big man his
due. And it not a real promise either, except in
Father Ned's own mind, and me only nodding my
head to save words. But I'm keeping you. They
say there's a chance of the big man being made a
bishop and a good riddance it'd be," she wound
up, slamming the door.
"I'm glad Maria took you in hand," Father Malone
said, stopping Maurice's apology as he entered the
sitting-room. " She'll put a bib on me and feed me
next. Mum ! " he added, with the look of a naughty
child, as she bounced into the room with a tray on
which were two steaming cups of cocoa, a loaf of
bread, and some butter.
" There, now, take that before ye stifle your-
selves in smoke," she said crossly.
WAITING 197
Maurice ate slice after slice of thick bread and
butter.
" I've nearly finished the loaf," he said ruefully,
as he got up from the table and sat in an armchair in
front of the empty grate.
" It was a great day," Father Malone said, hand-
ing him a tobacco jar.
" It was."
" We owe a great deal to Miss Barton."
" We do."
They filled and lighted their pipes, and discussed
the Feis desultorily.
" Did you pick up any tale for your collection ?
There were a couple that were new to me."
Maurice laughed. " I wasn't heeding much
to-day. But the master said he'd be on the
look-out."
" You're not growing cold on it ? " the priest
asked anxiously.
" I was having a day off," Maurice said lamely.
" Did I tell you that that new publisher in Dublin
has taken the book ? "
"That's the best news I heard to-day," the
priest said heartily. " I suppose this trouble with
Father James put it out of your head ? "
" I suppose so that, and one thing and another,"
Maurice said, picking busily at his pipe, which
seemed to be drawing freely.
" A great thing about these new movements is that
they're drawing Protestants and Catholics together,"
he added irrelevantly.
Father Malone watched a ring of smoke ascending
in a widening circle to the ceiling.
" It wasn't before it was time," he said thought-
fully.
198 WAITING
" There was a fair sprinkling of the clergy at the
Feis to-day. That's a good sign."
" Most of them were only killing a day of their
vacation. They thought it dull enough."
" They can't have much heart in it, then. Though
I was talking to a few young priests, and they were
as keen as could be."
" We start young all right. The difficulty is to
keep it up. Sitting here alone at night I often get
afraid of myself. I feel it worse after getting back
from a big dinner with the priests. They'd throw
a wet blanket on our Lord Himself if He opened
His lips among them. It's few have His courage to
keep on in the face of laughter and sneers. I used
not to mind it at first, but I find it telling on me.
The Lord only knows what I'll come to myself by
the time I get a parish. But I oughtn't to be speaking
like this and to you, too, that has trouble enough
of your own."
"You'll be preaching caution next," Maurice
said indignantly.
The priest laughed. " I might then. Better
men than me come to that. Only to-night the
bishop gave me a lecture on wisdom and prudence,
and Father James standing by and nodding his head
like as if he was a bishop already. Thank God, in
my heart I knew it was a counsel of timidity and
selfishness. But the atmosphere tells any day I
might be pluming my pet failings as virtues."
" I thought the Church was widening out ? "
" It isn't then. It's closing in. It's losing
ground, and it knows it, and it's gripping tight what's
left. There are some priests even that think it's
going about it the wrong way. But they're muzzled
and daren't open their lips. Tell me about the
WAITING 199
societies it might put some heart into me again,"
emptying his pipe into the grate.
" It's a bad sign that I see these things at all,"
he continued, after a short pause. "A few years
ago I didn't see them, and I worked away without
giving any heed to whether there was a stone wall
in front of me or not But what's the use
in talking ? How did them new boats do at the
herring fishing ? "
After awhile the conversation veered round to
the poultry society.
" That girl has a head on her," Father Malone
said, admiringly.
" You don't mind her being a Protestant ? "
Maurice asked blushing.
" Why in the world should I ? "
" I'm thinking of asking her to marry me."
He had not intended to tell the priest, but the
words were spoken before he was fully conscious of
them. He watched with curious interest a startled
look grow on Father Malone's face.
"What?"
The priest forgot his pipe. It fell from his
opened teeth, scattering the burning tobacco on his
soutane and on the rug. He got up hastily, shook
out his soutane and trod on a spark.
" You're not mad, Maurice ? " he said with a
scared face, taking off his glasses and rubbing them
nervously. " It's imposs "
" I've heard all that from Driscoll. Besides, it's
not impossible. Dispensations are given, why can't
I get one ? "
" A schoolmaster ! the bad example ! "
Maurice made an impatient movement.
" I know there's a good deal of nonsense in
200 WAITING
that," the priest said hastily, "but it's the answer
you'd get. If she'd only turn Catholic
" If I hear any more of that I'll I'll break
something," Maurice said, starting up.
" Poor fellow poor fellow," Father M alone said
gently.
This irritated Maurice. He strode up and
down the room angrily. After three or four turns
he said shyly, " Forgive me I "
" Nonsense, man. Sit down and have another
pipe."
They filled their pipes, lit them, and sat staring
at the grate. Maurice drew short jerky puffs.
The priest turned the smoke round and round in
his mouth and exhaled it in a sort of slow whistle.
" I see no way out of it that won't lose you to
the parish and lose you your job as well. Think it
over well like a good fellow there's the girl to
consider."
" She's all I will consider "
The sharp pinge of gravel on the window
interrupted him. They both looked towards it.
The handle of a whip, thrust through the open-
ing at the top, moved aside the blind.
" Let me in. I didn't like to knock for fear of
Maria's tongue, in case I wakened her out of her
beauty sleep," came in Father Delahunty's voice
from outside. " I saw the light as I was passing I
won't stay a minute."
At the sitting-room door he stood for a few
seconds gazing at Maurice.
" Oh, the schoolmaster ! " he said. " Nice work,
the curate and the schoolmaster conspiring, I sup-
pose, against the P.P. How are you, Mr. Blake ?
What's your time, Father Ned ? Ten to twelve
WAITING 201
that gives lashings of time. No cocoa for me,
thank you. That's one pull ye schoolmasters have
over us, Mr. Blake. Ye can break your fast after
twelve with comfort. God help me, I've mass before
me in the morning. That'll do, Father Ned only
a thimbleful, and a drop of soda if you have it
handy. The horse is all right ; I tied him to the
gate."
He sat on the edge of a chair in his heavy over-
coat and sipped his small helping of whiskey.
" Father James is off to Droomeen to bury the
bishop the sorrow oozing out of him for the poor
man that he never laid eyes on, I'm told. He's
attending on the lord. Well, well, it's a queer
world. There, that's done, and three minutes to
spare," putting down his glass on the table. " The
lads have already appointed our man to Droomeen,"
he continued, his eyes gleaming humorously, "and
the old man hardly stiff yet. As for this diocese,
they've elected half a dozen bishops to it since
dinner time. There are several running neck and
neck. It ought to make a pretty course."
" Who is your man ? " Father Malone said,
laughing.
"Do you hear him now, Mr. Blake?" Father
Delahunty said, with a shrewd smile. "Wanting
to spoil many a good dinner on me. Sorra day
between this and the election if it ever comes off
that I need dine at home if I keep my mouth shut.
All parties'll be making up to me. Wild horses
wouldn't drag my man out of me till I plump him
in the ballot-box."
" I hope we'll get a good man anyway," Father
Malone said.
" Amen to that," Delahunty said seriously.
202 WAITING
" Though he has as many wins to make as a hound
in a big sweepstake," he added grimly. " Here I
am, talking away and scandalizing a layman, and I
ought to be at home in my bed. And the horse
licking the paint off your gate too. Good night,
Father Ned. Good night, young man. If ever
Father Mahon is holding the leash too tight on you
and one of my schools is vacant, you'll have the first
refusal of it if Cassidy'll let me, and he's sure to
as you're as mad on the Irish as he is himself, poor
gom."
" That might be a way out ? " Maurice said
hopefully, when Father Delahunty had gone.
" The bishop wouldn't let him. He's a good
fellow, but his hands are tied. I couldn't do it
myself if I had a school to give."
" Poor schoolmasters ! " Maurice said dryly.
The priest bent his head in silence.
Maurice said " Good night " gruffly, but turned
back at the door and added : " I'm only a selfish
beast worrying you like this."
He changed quickly into his dried clothes.
Father Malone saw him out but he could not trust
himself to speak. He pressed the priest's hand and
tried to look less angry than he felt. When he got
home, Driscoll was still up, seated in his armchair,
his hands resting on his knees, a book turned back
upwards on the table beside him. The kettle was
singing on the hob. The table was laid for tea.
" I thought you'd never come," the old man
said listlessly.
" I was with Father Malone ; I've had food."
" Did you tell him ? "
" I did."
" Well ? "
WAITING 203
" A man that'd be beggared can't well ask a girl
to marry him on the strength of it."
Driscoll gave a sigh of relief. " It's cold com-
fort, but it warms my heart to know you'll give up
the idea," he said, but without enthusiasm.
" It's a hellish system that'd crush the life out
of a man," Maurice said bitterly.
" A good curse often relieves a man. I never
tried it myself, but I've seen it work wonders."
Maurice laughed harshly. He looked at the
old man, whose eyes were fixed on the ground.
He seemed to have aged years in a few hours. The
warm colour of his skin had gone, and his face was
pallid and damp. Thick blue veins on the side of
his forehead stood out against the light. His fingers
and the corners of his lips twitched.
" I'm only thinking of myself all the time,"
Maurice said impulsively, laying a hand on one of
Driscoll's.
Like a child playing " hot-hands " Driscoll lifted
his hand and let it drop on Maurice's. A smile,
beginning on his lips, slowly lighted up his face.
" It's a common enough symptom of your
disease," he said.
" No matter what happens, I'll
" You'll go to bed now, in the name of God. I
know it might be hard, but try and keep in the
one mind for a few hours at any rate."
CHAPTER XIV
MAURICE went to bed but not to sleep. He had
a half-waking nightmare in which malign hands
stretched him on a gridiron on the peak of Slieve
Mor. The flames that surrounded him, instead of
being hot, were icy. He started up and found that
he had kicked off the bedclothes. The night was
warm, but a cold sweat made him shiver. He saw
Alice Barton seated on a snow-clad mountain, from
which he was separated by a foaming bridge-
less torrent. This picture began in some sort of
dream, but persisted when he was fully awake.
There was no question now, he thought, of his
love or hers. If all Driscoll and Father Malone
said was true, it was impossible for him to ask
her to marry him. It was ridiculous that bread
and butter and a roof should be factors in love
and marriage, but it seemed they were. The more
he thought of her the more important they loomed
in his imagination. He should be worse off than
the poorest of the shore fishermen. He couldn't
drag her down to this grinding poverty. . . .
He plunged into a discussion on school-work
with Driscoll when they met at breakfast. He
talked against time to keep the old man off the
subject that was hammering insistently for expression
at the back of his own mind. Long before Driscoll
had finished Maurice was out at the garden gate,
WAITING 205
his head bare to a brilliant summer sun. But all
the vivid colouring of the landscape seemed only a
succession of shades of drab. He was just thinking
how dreary and miserable everything looked when
the postman said
" It's a wonderful day that's in it, glory be to
God."
Maurice shrugged his shoulders with a wry smile,
expressive of his thought, " Have it so if you are so
blind," as he was handed two letters, one for Driscoll,
one for himself. Driscoll's was about the registra-
tion of the new poultry society he saw from the
cover. He hurried in with it, as the old man had
been worrying about it.
" It's all right now," Driscoll said, as he read.
" She " he stopped short. " It's all right all
right. What's that you have there ? "
Maurice opened his letter carelessly. He stared
at long printed slips.
" It's the book," he said in an awe-stricken tone.
" The proofs of it at least."
For an hour they passed them from hand to
hand, Driscoll fingering them tenderly, as if they
were almost too precious to touch.
" And to think you did that," he said.
" It is as much yours as mine more," Maurice
said, and he, too, felt strangely moved by the
tawdry, ill-printed sheets.
" It's you put the English on the tales, and it
fits the Irish like a glove. Not but I'm glad I had
a hand in it though I was only an old gramophone
at the best."
Maurice worked at the proofs till Bessy Reilly
called him to dinner. All through the meal Driscoll
spoke of them.
206 WAITING
" It's a great day for Bourneen," he said.
Maurice felt that the proofs were a blessed relief
for the vacation. He had worked without thinking
of Alice, except for a few bitter moments. There
would be more proofs to-morrow, and Driscoll
would talk of them. . . .
" I must go down to the shore about the new
boat for which they want to borrow," he said.
"Do then, and I'll have another look at them,"
Driscoll said, his eyes seeking the bundle on the
desk. " A mistake or other may have missed your
notice."
Somehow the sun had again begun to shine and
have warmth, and there was a freshness in the breeze,
as Maurice took the shore road. He thought of
Alice calmly now. He probably could never marry
her, but he could always love her. He would
always love her. Filmy clouds of wonderful shades
of soft white were close-packed against the blue on
the horizon. There was music in the harsh call of
a solitary curlew circling over a pool in the bottom,
and in the crackling of gorse pods in the hedges.
Probably more likely, certainly, she never gave
him a thought. The suffering would be his only.
And it was not all suffering. He stood and watched
a lark rise as if from the heart of a poppy in
the cornfield beyond the low hedge. It never sang
at this hour in this month ? But it did. And the
gorgeous flame of sound, piercing the sky, touched
his heart to fire. Sacrifice was the highest love, he
thought, with a sigh, and the low murmur of the
waves soothed the ache he felt.
He met the fishermen by the unprotected slip
the only harbour for their boats. His business was
soon done, but he lingered, watching the nets, a
WAITING 207
golden brown against the shingle. The men talked
as they worked, preparing for the night fishing.
" It's that same bank has been the blessing," one
said. " If we only had a decent boat-slip now, the
Strand'd make Liscannow itself sit up."
There was no lack of work to make a man
happy, Maurice thought, as he listened. All that
had been done up to this was nothing to what was
still to do. Work was the great thing. Seated on
the warm coping, he dangled his legs over the side
of the slip, the cool, green water lapping the soles of
his shoes. The gold of the tarred jumper of one of
the fishermen seemed to colour his thick, yellow
beard and the bronze of his cheek.
" Next winter ye might be making a bid for the
slip," another man said, in a detached voice as if
addressing the sea.
" We might," Maurice said.
That would be more work, he thought, and he
watched the sun dance on the bottom of an old up-
turned boat. The tar glistened in the light, and
shone like beautiful, old watered silk with depths
and depths of colour. He said aloud
"This will never do, idling here," and he
jumped up.
" It's not often you have an idle minute.
You're near as busy as ourselves," an old man said,
pausing in his labour of throwing pebbles into the
smooth water, but without lifting his eyes from the
circles they made.
" If it's only as much as you he and his like
did, you wouldn't have a roof over your head,
Shaun Mick," another said.
u Amn't I working hard ? "
"The master does more than throw pebbles."
208 WAITING
" God be with you then, master," the old man
said. " 'Tis you have your work cut out for you.
Though it's all only pebble-flinging in the end."
Work, work, work, sounded in Maurice's ears
as he walked. Work even on the surface of
things was the secret of life. He took the long
way home, round by the Strand chapel.
" You wouldn't recognize a person, I suppose ? "
Miss Devoy said, running out of the chapel gate-
way. " I saw you at the Feis yesterday, but you
hadn't an eye for me."
" I was busy," he said awkwardly.
" A blind man'd see what you were most busy
about."
He looked at her nervously, and she winked
elaborately.
" Come up to the house, and I'll give you a cup
of tea. Feis, indeed ! This two months and
more I saw what was wrong with you. It was a
relief to me, too, though I didn't let on. You see, I
was told different."
He stammered something about having to get
home, afraid of what she might say next.
" I'll walk up a bit of the road with you, then.
There's something I want a word with you about."
She was very hot but self-possessed, and mopped
her streaming forehead with a large handkerchief.
" Your own mother as much as said one thing
or another to me, and Father James gave me a plain
hint of it. I didn't say anything agin it, and maybe
gave it a helping hand, so to speak. You were
always nice and friendly, but I saw no signs.
What's more, I might tell you, if you'll believe me,
I always kept on with Patsey Brophy of Liscannow,
and glad I am now that I did."
WAITING 209
" Brophy, the builder," he said, seeing light.
" I'm very glad."
She hung her head coquettishly. " There's some
that call him a stone-mason," she said gratefully,
" but you have better manners. And he having
three men of his own under him now ! A builder,
even in a small way but he's blossoming out and
expecting the contract of the new labourers'
cottages is near as good as a schoolmaster ? " She
spoke almost shyly, with an eager questioning into-
nation in her voice.
" As good ? Ten times better."
" I'm glad to hear you say it," she said with relief.
" Father James has put the fear of God into me, and
I was afraid he might think I'd be demeaning him.
He has grand notions," she added reflectively.
"You'll be well out of the teaching anyway.
One's soul isn't one's own at it."
" Thinking of the bark of Father James's tongue
you are, I suppose," she said doubtfully. " Sure it
always seemed to hop off you like water off a duck's
back. It's different with a relation. If I go agin
him, he might put bad luck on my marriage you
know the kind of cross a priest can put on a woman.
Jessy Burke, that married against his will, hasn't a
child to her bosom to this day. Besides, I don't
want him to drive me out of the school. I want to
hang on to it for a start, at any rate. It'd be a good
luck penny in the house and Patsey not firm on his
feet yet."
The skin under her eyelids went pale, and her
eyes had a strained look. Maurice did his best to
cheer her. She began to sob.
" It isn't as if I had the whole world running
after me. If I miss the chance of Patsey, I might
p
2io WAITING
he stranded on the Skellig rocks for life and go
single to my grave," she said with a pitiful attempt
at a smile.
" I don't think Father Mahon will interfere,"
Maurice said, trying to put some conviction into his
voice.
" He's always boasting of the good he's doing
for his relations. But sure, I'd rather have another
man doing me an injury than him doing me good,"
she said ruefully. " Patsey is going to hang out a
new sign with < Builder and Contractor ' on it, and
O *
maybe that might work miracles," she added hope-
fully after a few seconds' thought. " Anyway it's
been a great comfort to me to talk to you. If you
won't come into the house I must be going. My
mother '11 be crying out for her tea, and no one
about to get it for her, and she tied to her chair with
the rheumatics." She shook his hand warmly.
When they had both gone a few paces she
turned back, ran after him and thrust a small gilt
medal into his hand.
" No matter what people might say, you've
always been the best of friends to me. There take
that. It's a blessed medal of St. Benedict. You'll
see if it don't give you a helping hand. It was
given to me by my cousin that's a nun inside in
Liscannow convent. Blessed by the hands of the
Pope himself! And she swore 'twas infallible in
matters of the kind. And didn't I prove the truth
of her words by sewing it out of sight in a tie I
once gave Patsey for a Christmas box ? Give her a
little present that she'll be always wearing and sew
the medal up in it before many days she'll be
running to be baptized and coming to mass, and the
way'll be paved straight for the both of ye."
WAITING 2ii
Her words tumbled out in a rush and she had
gone before he realized what she meant. He gazed
foolishly at the medal in his palm. He went hot
and cold. For a moment Miss Devoy's evident faith
influenced him. What if there was something in
it ? He walked on fingering the medal curiously.
Then he laughed bitterly. He lifted his arm to
throw the medal away, but all the instinct of his
faith made him stay his hand. He dropped it care-
fully into his waistcoat pocket. He felt angry, and
sought round in his mind for a cause. Not with the
superstition. That was even interesting. There
might be a good deal of folk-lore behind it he must
ask Driscoll. He knocked the head off a dandelion
with his stick. Was he angry with Miss Devoy for
guessing his secret ? But he was to blame, not she.
He was going round like a fool wearing his heart
on his sleeve. . . .
By the time he arrived at home he had made
several resolutions to avoid meeting Alice Barton,
not to speak of her, not to think of her. " If I
can at all," he added doubtfully after the last.
CHAPTER XV
IN the weeks that followed Maurice struggled to
keep his resolutions. He could not help thinking
of Alice. He put the thought of her away, but it
came back again. She smiled at him from his
proofs, in his dreams, and in those first waking
moments when he seemed to have no will. The
more he avoided her, the more he seemed to think
of her. For whole weeks he did not see her at all.
When they met, of necessity, at some committee
meeting, or accidentally, on the road, he felt on fire,
but congratulated himself on his coolness and the
level tone of his voice. He feared that she would see
that he avoided her. But she seemed not to notice
it. Once or twice he thought he saw a questioning
look in her eyes, but it had gone when he looked
again.
Father Malone spoke of her once, and Maurice
said it was " all off." The priest said " thank God,"
and gazed wonderingly at Maurice, who walked
away abruptly with an angry frown.
" Never mention her name to me again," he
said, when Driscoll spoke of her.
" If you'd only talk of her you wouldn't be
wearing your heart out thinking of her," the old
man said with a sigh ; but Maurice sat doggedly
silent.
He worked as he had never worked before.
WAITING 213
The proofs were finished. Towards the end of the
vacation he helped Tom, who was county secretary,
to re-organize the Gaelic Athletic Association. There
were meetings in the Mechanics' Hall at Liscannow,
and he made his first public speech.
" It's case equal to you with the tongue or the
pen," Tom said, meaning high praise. There was
another extension of the parish work. Now it was
winter-dairying. Father Malone got hold of the
idea, but as he was busy with his clerical work owing
to Father Mahon's frequent absences, Maurice and
Driscoll had to interview the farmers and set the
scheme going. One morning six copies of a little
paper-covered book came by post. He was in-
terested in a head-piece of Celtic design on the first
page, but he could not read a word. He hid away
all the copies except the one Driscoll always carried
about in his coat pocket. The publisher, to whom
he had sold the book outright for ten pounds,
hinted at a second series. He tried to work at it,
but his thoughts wandered, and he stuck fast in the
first tale. Work of his own he found he couldn't
do, though his capacity for other work seemed to
have no end.
School opened again, and he added two extra
subjects to the programme. He audited the
accounts of the Agricultural Society. As he and
Driscoll sat working of nights at the table in the
kitchen, the desultory talk in between was of
" movements," the school, and folk-lore. Alice
gradually faded into the impersonal lady of his
dreams. He was restless and fitful, but he did not
connect this particularly with her. At a committee
meeting he heard almost with indifference that she
was leaving in a month. Her work, all agreed, was
2i 4 WAITING
done and done well, and that seemed to be all that
mattered. He was able to answer Miss Devoy's
covert allusions to her with a smile.
Early in September he got a letter from the
editor of a Dublin newspaper with an offer for a
column article every week a short folk story with
a translation and a glossary, for which he was to get
a pound a week. He laughed heartily when he
read the letter Driscoll said it was the first real
laugh he gave out of him for a couple of months.
Any tales that might hurt the susceptibility of the
dominant political party, or of the Church, were to
be rigidly excluded : he should be particularly careful
to omit all medieval freedom of expression in regard
to religion : his book, on the whole, was excellent,
and had led to this offer, but some of the tales erred
in these respects.
" It's a funny country," Maurice said.
"It is," Driscoll said, "in some ways. I'd take
the job though, if I were you. With your ideas it's
as well for a schoolmaster to have a second string to
his bow."
" I've a lot to do. But I have enough stories
by me to last a couple of years, so maybe I might
as well. It passes the wit of man though to
know how they can afford to pay such a lot of
money for so little work."
" It's wonderful, glory be to God," Driscoll
said. "That puts me in mind I came out here
last night at two o'clock for a drink of water, and
the light was still shining under your sitting-room
door, and you promising me to go to bed at
twelve."
"I was writing that memorial about the boat-
slip."
WAITING 215
" Slip or no slip, you'll have to take care of your
health. The day after to-morrow is the Liscannow
races, and you must go there with me. It's a
holiday in the school, so you've no excuse. It'll
get your mind off things even if you don't care
for horses itself and that's a great lack in you."
Maurice grumbled that there were a hundred
things to be done, but ten o'clock on the morning
of the races found him and Driscoll on foot for
Liscannow. Carts and side-cars, laden with people,
passed from Liscoff and beyond.
" There's a car from Drimna I know the driver
of it thirty miles if it's an inch. The Lord only
knows when they must have started. At cock-
crow belike," Driscoll said.
" The country 'd be made if they took the same
interest in better things."
" It would. Still it's no bad thing to care for
horses and it's that they come for, and not the
betting. It's different in the towns, I'm told."
" Have you the right time on you, master ? "
Teigue Donlon shouted from the top of a straw rick
in his haggard, a short distance from the road.
" A quarter-past ten."
" I told you the old clock was fast if any.
Stick to it, boys and girls. Sorra one need leave
this until ye hear the stroke of eleven, and be in
plenty of time after," he shouted to a score of
workers, above the din of the threshing machine.
" 'Twas a great harvest, thanks be to God," he
continued, addressing Driscoll and Maurice. " We
kept at the threshing till dark last night, but we
couldn't come within stacks of finishing." He
caught an armful of straw from off a pike as he
spoke, fixed it deftly on the rick and trod it down.
216 WAITING
" It was very kindly of the neighbours to come at
all to-day, and the day that's in it. But here they
were at the dawn ; though they're on tenterhooks
now for fear they'd miss the first race. Down with
the sheaves, Larry," to the man on a disappearing
stack of oats. " Feed her as fast as she'll swallow,
Thade," to the man at the thresher ; " cram them
down her throat, and there won't be an ear left,
please God, at the first stroke of the clock."
Tom Blake wiped the sweat off his face with the
sleeve of his flannel bawneen as he stuck his pike
into a bundle of straw, high as himself. The driver
of the two pairs of horses, turning the machine,
cracked his whip and the horses put on pace.
Sheaves flew. There was a procession of straw,
held aloft on pikes and concealing the bearers, from
the machine to the rick. Men ran with heavy sacks
of threshed oats to the sheeogues. Hanny Blake
handed cups of buttermilk to the thirsty, who drank
as they worked.
" God bless the work," Driscoll shouted in Irish.
" Ye'll do it and to spare, if you keep up that
spurt."
As they drew nearer to Liscannow, farmyards
and fields were deserted. Oats called loudly for
reaping, but the reapers, in their Sunday best,
wended their way to the town. Young and old
had an air of being out to enjoy themselves.
There was no sign of the business preoccupation of
a market-day or fair. In the carts to-day were no
pigs or calves or poultry, the selling price of which
was a matter of anxious calculation ; only a human
freight of men who had left black care behind on
their farms, gaily be-ribboned women, with chubby-
faced children hanging over the tail-boards. A
WAITING 217
brilliant September sun gave a warm colour to the
fields of stubble and ripe corn, shone crimson and
gold on the turning leaves in the hedgerows, and
seemed even to gild the thin jests of the holiday
makers.
" Make way there for Paudeen Flaherty's
racer," greeted an old man, in a tall felt hat and
cutaway coat, astride a spavined mule. He bowed
left and right, his long legs flapping against the
sack that served as a saddle.
" Is it the Farmers' Plate or the Hunt Cup
you're aiming at, Paudeen ? "
" It might be both," Paudeen said with a broad
grin.
The streets of Liscannow were thronged. There
was a din of " Correct card," " Correct card and bill
of the races." The shops were still open, and did
a thriving trade. Shopkeepers and their assistants
were in holiday humour and attire. Not even in
the butchers' stalls was an apron worn. The
utmost concession to business on this day of days
was a discarded coat, hung up, however, within easy
reach, inside the counter. As midday passed,
anxious eyes were cast at clocks. When the half
after twelve boomed from the cathedral tower,
customers were unceremoniously bundled out of
the shops, shutters were hastily put up and doors
were locked. At a quarter to one Liscannow was
like a town of the dead. A long mile separated the
town from the race-course. The first race was
timed for one o'clock, so there was need to
hurry. A thick crowd jostled and pressed up the
hill, past the asylum and the jail. Half a dozen
feeble old men, in corduroy trousers and the
[peculiar coat, grey frieze and collarless, that marked
218 WAITING
the pauper, hung about the workhouse gate, with
anxious eyes on the race-course in the hollow.
One tried to straighten his bent back, clutched his
stick firmly, and stepped forward. Another pulled
him back.
" Don't venture it, Dan. We'd be crushed to
death in that crowd. Wait till the stream slackens."
" Man and boy, I never missed the first race for
seventy years, and I ten years in the workhouse
itself," Dan muttered, his palsied head shaking.
" Sure they won't drop the flag till they see you
on the course."
" There's something in that, and I a well-known
ancient monument in it," Dan said, with a note of
pride in his voice.
There was, however, little fear that he should be
late. Long after one o'clock no attempt had been
made at a start. Driscoll was making a leisurely
inspection of the jumps.
" That's where every man came down in '79,"
he said at the sunk fence. " But the ground is in
fine fettle to-day. Neither too hard nor too soft."
"It's half-past one," Maurice said ; "we ought
to hurry to our place."
" It's one of the queer things about human
nature and the Liscannow races," Driscoll said,
"that the people near break their necks to be on
the course at one o'clock, and still every one knows
that sorra race'll be run till two o'clock, or
maybe after. A finer race-course there isn't in the
whole world," he added, looking round admiringly.
"It was cut out by the hand of God Himself for it."
They wandered about among the crowd, greeting
an acquaintance here and there. At two Driscoll
led Maurice to a knoll at the foot of Slieve Mor, from
WAITING 219
which, he held, the best view was to be had. The
narrow valley, with every jump in sight, stretched
at their feet. Over against them, on the side of
the short hill that hid Liscannow, was the unsightly
structure of rough planks known as the grand
stand. Long, low tents, mounted on semicircular
willow wattles, studded the base of the hills and the
centre of the oval track. Tawdry flags fluttered in
a slight breeze. The raucous voices of the few
bookmakers in the enclosure, echoed from the
mountain opposite. Pewter pots clinked on the
tables in front of the tents. A roaring trade was
done in porter, pig's crubeens, ginger-bread, and
apples. Cheap-jacks cried their wares. A forlorn
nigger minstrel on an empty brandy case strummed
a banjo. The crowd was everywhere. People ate
and drank and were merry, or made a luckless venture
on the three-card trick or the thimble. A bell
sounded, and loud voices cried, " Clear the course."
The grand stand grew into a patch of gay colour.
The crowd hastened to any, and every, eminence
that promised a view. Excitement grew as the
horses were led to the post.
" Fourteen starters," Father Delahunty said in
a loud voice from the priests' hill, a small mound,
east of the rock on which Maurice and Driscoll
sat ; " it's a great field entirely. Don't be pressing
up here," he added good-humouredly, as a few boys
climbed within ten or twelve paces of where a score
of priests lounged, " or we'll be lost entirely."
Maurice looked at Driscoll inquiringly. "They've
some law of their own," the old man whispered with
a smile, " against attending races. But some clever
theologian made out that as long as they weren't
joined to the throng they were out of the course."
220 WAITING
" They're off, they're off," rose in a frenzied
shout.
"Well done, yellow cappeen."
" He's down, I tell you."
" If he was he's on his legs again. There he is
before your eyes."
When the yellow cap won in a close finish,
Driscoll, as excited as the crowd, ran towards the
grand stand, shouting to Maurice to follow. He
lost sight of Driscoll in crossing the course, and was
hastening his steps in pursuit, when a voice
called out beside him
" Don't be running away. You're the very man
I wanted."
He turned and saw Tom and Minnie and
Alice.
" The wife there isn't feeling very well, and I
must be taking her home," Tom said in a stage
whisper. " Not herself by any manner of means
these times, though it's natural enough, and the state
she's in. But she'll be fretting if we spoil the day
for Miss Barton. She came along with us, John
Crawford, poor man, not holding with races, though
willing to give freedom to her if she had a mind.
Let you keep an eye on her, Maurice, like a good
man, and see her safe home."
Maurice mumbled a confused acceptance of the
charge. Alice laughed, offered to go home with
Minnie, who would not hear of it. They disputed
a little. A strange fear that Alice would prevail
came over Maurice. He breathed with relief when
she said
" All right then if Mr. Blake won't think me
a nuisance."
This seemed so absurd that he laughed. They
WAITING 221
saw Tom and Minnie to the outskirts of the crowd,
and then wandered back over the course. The sun
shone brighter and the people looked happier since
he met her. They ate apples and gingerbread, and
drank lemonade, standing by a table at a tent door.
She enjoyed everything a chalked-face acrobat
who twirled a barrel on his toes, a ballad singer who
sang cheerfully of an execution. He forgot Driscoll
till the course was being cleared for the second race,
too late to seek him at his usual stand. A short
way up a track that led to the pass over the
mountain they stood to watch the race.
The crowd again converged on the grand stand
as the horses passed the winning-post.
"There must be a fine view higher up," she
said, her eyes on the winding path. " I never
saw it."
" There is."
She looked at him. He nodded. She led the
way up the narrow path. They climbed for nearly
half an hour, easily, and in silence. Only once
she spoke. She picked a gentian. " That's new to
me," she said, pinning it on her coat. A bell
clanged faintly as they reached the stile giving on
the mountain road.
" That's another race," he said doubtfully.
She turned round for the first time and looked
back.
" This is better," she said, drawing a deep
breath.
He followed her eyes, past the curiously small
crowd of midgets that moved hither and thither
in the valley, over the low hill to Liscannow,
to the boats lying idly in the harbour. In the
offing a four-masted schooner hung motionless
222 WAITING
on the glassy sea. A ripple that seemed but a
shadow swept over the water in her wake. Her
sails filled out, and, in a few seconds, she had passed
the line of the cathedral spire. A hoarse murmur
arose from the valley.
" They are off," he said.
"There is Durrisk and the trees in Uncle
John's bawn. Oh, the race ! What matter ? "
" The view is better higher up," he said.
They followed the road for a mile, branched off
by a pathway, and soon stood on the summit of a
spur, some yards higher than the road.
" The gap," he said.
On the right a flat-topped hill was carpeted thick
with heather a purple sea with oases of vivid green
fern. Slieve Mor seemed to have receded across
another valley, brown with peat bogs, through
which a thin white road wound sinuously till it
was lost in the side of the mountain. Funny little
fields of green and gold, like the squares on a chess-
board, only more irregular in shape, surrounded
the scattered cottages that gleamed white in the
sun. Away on the left was the sea again, bordered
with yellow sands, and beyond, a long mountain
range with a ridge like a toothed saw. She turned
round and looked down on Liscannow. The race-
course was hidden. Only faint sounds, like the
rustling of leaves in a light wind, ascended from the
valley. The ship seemed closer to land, and, far
away, the horizon was lost in a silver haze. The
windows of Bourneen chapel reflected the sun like
mirrors. A rich plain rolled between the mountains
and the sea, to Liscoff and beyond. A warm
crimson tinged everything.
" I've felt it for some time even with this sun
WAITING 223
one notices it with a grey sky there is no doubting
it the colour of Ireland is brown not green."
She spoke in a detached voice, hesitatingly, as
if she was disentangling one thought from another.
" You are tired," he said : " won't you sit
down ? "
They sat on the parched grass. She plucked a
spray of heather from a clump beside her and
fingered the purple bells tenderly.
Maurice stared at the shimmering sea. " There
is so much to .say," he said.
Yes ? "
" I avoided you because I love you."
Since he left the race- course his mind had been
calm. He took it for granted that there was some-
thing he had to say to her, but he thought of it
hardly at all. He spoke now without feeling, as if
reading on the sea, something that had been written
there ages ago.
" That was it then," she nipped off one of the
bells and watched it drop slowly to the ground.
" They said friends like Driscoll and Father
Malone that I should lose my job here, that it
would be an end to my work."
Her fingers closed tightly on another bell, but
she didn't pull it off. She listened intently.
" I was tempted to be a coward. Things one is
doing have a way of winding themselves round one.
They become part of one. One feels there is no
living without them. But I didn't give in to that.
I felt, and I'm certain of it sitting here, that there
was something that mattered more, a man's freedom,
and love."
She exhaled the breath, which she had been
holding, in a short sigh of relief. Her bosom rose
224 WAITING
and fell gently. She seemed absorbed in the colour
of the spray, holding it out to catch the light at
different angles.
"Tell me everything from the beginning," she
said evenly, without looking at him.
She did not take her eyes off the spray while he
spoke. She held it motionless.
" That's how it stands," he wound up. " It's
no disgrace to you to hear that a man loves you
and wants more than anything in the world to
marry you "
" No," she said, through half-opened lips.
" But," he said, looking at her for the first
time she seemed to feel his eyes, lifted hers, and
met his squarely, " before I ask you whether you
love me or'll marry me, there's one condition if
you say Yes. Father James may give in then
'twill be all right. If he doesn't, and I have to
make a living elsewhere, you'll be free of any
promise till I earn enough to support you in
comfort."
" Comfort ! They say men in love are very
dull-witted. I don't love conditionally," she said,
with a pathetic little smile.
He looked at her, and what he read in the
depths of her eyes made him kiss her full on the
mouth. For a moment her head slid weakly on to
his shoulder. He felt her heart beat as loudly as
his own. Her hat had fallen back. The westering
sun crowned her head with gold. A loose strand of
hair brushed against his lips. She pushed him
away gently, and a shy smile lit her crimsoned face
as she fixed her hat.
" Difference of religion is a small thing to us,"
he said.
WAITING 225
" God has a way of ignoring these differences,"
she said, looking full in the level rays of the sun.
She chanted half to herself
" Whither thou goest, I will go ; and where
thou lodgest, I will lodge ; thy people shall be my
people, and thy God my God."
" That sounds like the Bible I don't know it
much. Catholics don't read it," he said simply.
" We have the one country and the one God
they must let us serve Him as our hearts bid us,"
she said rising. She laughed happily, a ringing
laugh that sounded in Maurice's ears like music
against the silence. " You are a nice lover you've
put me to the shame of accepting you without being
asked."
" I believe you led me up here to propose to
me ? " he said with a gleam in his eyes.
She looked at him serenely. " Aunt Ruth says
men are only poor whist bodies," she said lightly,
leading the way down the path. " If we dawdle
here any longer we'll miss all the races."
She still had the spray of heather in her hand.
She gazed at it curiously, buried her face in it,
hummed a tune, fixed the heather in her blouse and
buttoned her coat over it. They walked down the
road abreast. Alice was grave and silent. At the
stile leading to the race-course she began to sob
quietly.
" Why ? What in the world ? " he said in
surprise.
" Nothing," she said.
He kissed her. She clung to him and sobbed
aloud
" You'll miss your work here. It's all my fault,
and so much depending on you. You'll make a
226 WAITING
fight to keep it, Maurice ? No priest could be so
cruel "
"Never mind, little girl. If my work here
goes, I must find or make other work. Besides, one
day I'll be making you give up yours, and you're
fond enough of it."
" Oh, mine ! mine is different," she said
thoughtfully.
" I'll fight of course," he said firmly. " There
are bigger interests than ours involved in this."
" Some day I may see that," she said, mounting
the stile, " but to-day ours is big enough for me.
It fills the whole world."
They walked in single file down the steep path,
speaking little. Once she said, " We'll slip away
home quietly. I feel shy of meeting any one." And
again, with a puckered brow, " Without trouble of
one kind or another maybe we'd pass real happiness
by, without knowing it." When they were half-
way down a race started. They stood for a few
minutes to watch it. The crowd cheered the
winner lustily.
" I wonder if the beaten have any pleasure in
the race ? " she asked.
He was thinking of her, and of his coming
interview with Father Mahon.
" We can't be beaten. I can't anyway I have
you now."
She laughed softly.
At the end of the path Driscoll met them. He
looked tired and worried.
" You, here ? " Maurice said with surprise. " We
were up at the gap."
" The whole race-course knows it from Matsey
Boylan," Driscoll said dryly. " I thought you'd
WAITING 227
have sense, Miss Barton, if Maurice had none
itself."
" I have less than none," she said, with her old
air of assurance. Then seeing the pained look on the
old man's face, she caught his hand in both of hers
and said eagerly, " You must be glad you've been
so good to him and to me."
He looked from Alice to Maurice, smiled feebly
and said
" May God help you both."
CHAPTER XVI
MATSEY BOYLAN'S story had fleeter legs than the
horses in the hunt race. By nightfall variants of it
had reached many houses in Bourneen. All Matsey
had seen was Maurice and Alice, several yards apart,
walking up the path to the gap. He had followed
them for a couple of hundred yards, till his weak
feet gave out. He lost sight of them, sat on a
boulder, nursing a feeble, jealous wrath in his half-
witted mind. After waiting for an hour he returned
to the race-course and told his tale, with some added
embroidery, suggested by his imagination, on each
repetition. He told Driscoll that he had seen
Maurice Blake and the girl at the Crawfords'
walking alone up the mountain. Jim Reardon said
" Be off to hell out of this," when Matsey whispered
with nods and winks that Maurice and Alice had
been hugging and kissing. Instead, he sidled up to
Dempsey, Crawford's workman, and announced
mysteriously " queer carryings on entirely up there
on the mountain out of sight of everybody."
So the story spread.
It was at home before Alice. John Crawford
sat silent ; Mrs. Crawford was excited and fussy.
She made much noise in preparing tea on the kitchen
table, but she said nothing.
" Don't you want to hear about the races ? "
Alice said, taking a chair in front of the fire.
WAITING 229
" They're misfortunate things," Crawford said
dourly.
" By all accounts, you didn't see much of them,"
Mrs. Crawford said, busily polishing a cup, her face
to the dresser.
" Oh ! " Alice said, looking from one to the
other. Crawford was staring at the fire, and her
aunt did not turn round.
" Maurice Blake asked me to marry him, and I
said I would I'm very fond of him," she added
shyly, after a pause.
"Didn't I tell you?" Mrs. Crawford said
triumphantly to her husband.
" There was never any lack of trust in her with
me," Crawford said. " It's the idea of a mixed
marriage that I don't like."
His eyes grew more gentle. Suddenly he stared
as if he saw some horrible vision. He stood up,
his hands clenched.
" It's not thinking of being a turn-coat you
are ? " he said harshly.
" No. Maurice is above that sort of mean-
ness and I hope I am," Alice said proudly.
"That's something at least," Crawford said with
a sigh of relief.
" I wish I was at home," Alice said forlornly.
Her lip trembled. She gulped in the effort to
keep back tears.
Mrs. Crawford enfolded her in an ample
bosom, patted her on the shoulder, and said
angrily
" There now, John Crawford, see what you've
done with all your stiff-necked religious talk she
as much as saying that this house is no home to her.
Don't cry, alanna. You that ought to be a father
230 WAITING
and a mother to her," with a threatening look at her
husband.
" It's because I'm fond of her," he said in a
voice that betrayed little tenderness, though his eyes
had softened.
Alice put her hand on his, and he pressed it.
" The Scarlet Woman has all the wiles of Satan,"
he said after a short silence.
" She won't beguile me," Alice said laughing.
"Troth, Alice'll be able for her," Mrs. Crawford
said pleasantly. " It might easily be worse. He's
a fine, up-standing boy with good pay though he's a
Roman itself. Alice can bring up the girls her way
of thinking, and Maurice'll likely want to carry the
boys with him still, a mother can do a great deal."
" You're only talking nonsense, woman,"
Crawford said, waving her opinions aside with an
emphatic sweep of his hand. " That used to be the
old way, but the Pope of Rome long ago changed
it. I had a cousin of my own that once married
a Papist, and I know the law of it." The unusual
length of his speech seemed to worry him. He
stood up, clutched the back of a chair and
continued : " I read the paper that my cousin
Richard was made to sign by the parish priest,
and sorra word of it I liked that he'd be married
in a Catholic chapel, and that every one of the
children, be they boys or girls, 'd be brought up
Papists. And as if that wasn't enough, the woman
he wanted to marry had to take her book oath,
besides, that she'd make every endeavour to turn
Richard into a Catholic."
" That's a fairly finished halter," Mrs. Crawford
said, with a doubtful look at her husband.
" It is and a promise is a promise whether it's
WAITING 231
made to a priest or a minister," Crawford said,
dropping wearily on his chair.
" I don't know that any woman'd think she'd be
bound by a promise, wrung out of her in a minute
of weakness. Come on now and let us have our
supper. We're all starved and that boy not in
yet," Mrs. Crawford said, pouring water into the
tea-pot.
" This is all new to me, Uncle John," Alice said,
when her aunt moved to the table ; " I don't believe
Maurice knows. I'll speak to him. I was only
thinking of him and his troubles I'll tell you about
them again. Only, Uncle John, I love him, you
know."
He looked at her for a moment, kissed her fore-
head lightly and said
"The blessing of God on you both."
An earlier version of Matsey's tale reached the
Blakes. Jim Reardon called late to inquire about
Minnie. He found her seated in a low chair by
the fire, sewing some garment which she hid in her
apron as he approached.
" Hanny is in the dairy," she said, " and the rest
are seeing after one thing or another for the night."
" How is yourself ? "
" What'd be wrong with me ? 'Twas a great day,
I'm told."
Jim laughed and looked round cautiously.
" Maurice is the sly lad. If he wasn't seen kissing
a girl to-day."
" Well I never who was she ? who told
you ? " Mrs. Tom said excitedly.
" Matsey Boylan told me."
Minnie's face fell. " Oh, him ! " she said
232 WAITING
in a disappointed tone. " He sees kissing in his
dreams. Didn't he say once that I kissed him the
hoary old ruffian that ought to be saying his prayers.
But who was she anyway ? "
" I oughtn't to mention it," Jim said doubtfully.
" What's the harm and there nothing in it to
your own sister too, and 'twon't pass my lips."
"Well, if you promise 'twas Miss Barton."
" Her that bangs Banagher. You'd think
butter wouldn't melt in either of their mouths. I
wonder ? I left them together, anyway."
Tom lifted the latch and came in.
" Tom, Tom," she shrieked, " if Maurice wasn't
seen kissing Alice Barton to-day after we left."
" And why wouldn't he, if he wanted to," Tom
said lightly.
" I never kissed a man but the one I married,"
Minnie said primly.
" You're a wonder, you are," Tom said, stroking
her hair and winking at Jim. " And maybe
Maurice is going to marry her."
" And she a Protestant a likely job. Them
quiet fellows are the worst when they go galivanting,"
she said, screwing her lips and eyes to a look of
wisdom.
" I'm blest, but so she is but why not if it goes
to that ? " Tom said, scratching his head. " She's
a very complete girl no matter what her religion is."
Tom passed on the joke about " Maurice the
rogue of the world " to Hanny when she came in ;
but she only looked at Jim Reardon and laughed.
" And who gave out that tale about my son ? "
Mrs. Blake said when she heard it.
" I never believed it, ma'am," Jim said eagerly.
" You, Jim Reardon I'm ashamed of you.
WAITING 233
I've a good mind to send you straight to bed,
Hanny, sniggering there. It's them that are always
hiding in dark corners themselves that'd spread a
report about a boy that never looked the other side
of the road a woman was at in his whole life. Kneel
down every one of ye and say the rosary and ask
God to forgive ye."
Later, when the others had gone, she and Mike
sat before the fire.
" Do you think there's anything in it, Mike ? "
she asked anxiously.
" There might, and then there mightn't," Mike
said, weighing his pipe on his forefinger judicially.
" If one could see light over her being a Protestant,
she wouldn't make a bad match at all. She could
hold on to her job it's great money they'd be
drawing entirely."
" That's a fence that's not easy jumped and God
forbid that it should. I know the like is done, but
none of my blood ever had a Protestant drop in
their veins. 'Twas an unlucky day she came into
the parish. May God and His Blessed Mother be
about my boy's bed to-night."
" It's a dark problem surely," Mike said.
" You and your problems ! " she said angrily,
" and maybe the boy suffering from a heart scald."
" The like of that is easy got over."
" Your pipe is out. Be off to bed with you."
She sat long over the fire telling her beads. As
she raked the ashes over the smouldering sods she
ejaculated
" God send he may not sup sorrow if his heart is
set on her."
Father Mahon had been nursing disappointment
234 WAITING
and a sharp attack of indigestion for two days. He
had had authoritative information, from a friend in
Rome, that Dr. Hannigan was not to be sent to
Droomeen, but was to be held in reserve for a
higher appointment, expected soon to fall vacant.
He took a gloomy view of the world. He was
vexed with Dr. Hannigan who must have known
the intentions of the Roman authorities, and yet had
allowed him, a friend, to go on lavishing expense
and trouble on a fruitless quest. He was angry
with himself for having neglected his parish for so
long. He had some sort of dull grievance against
the priests who had promised to support him, and
against Father Malone who had done his work.
His dignity and inclination had always fought over
the Liscannow races. But now his dignity was
momentarily in eclipse. He would have gone to
the priests' hill, but at the last moment he quailed
before inevitable references to the bishopric. It
would have hurt him to admit that the chance was
off: it would have hurt him, knowing what he knew,
to discuss the bishopric as if it were still open. So
he brooded in misery at home. There was also a
minor annoyance that, at intervals, irritated him ex-
ceedingly. A colt which he had sold for a trifling
price, was expected to win the Farmers' Plate. He
felt that his judgment was at stake, and had no
little anxiety to hear that Clinker had lost. He
stayed up late in the hope that Father Delahunty
or some friend would call on the way home from
the races. Unhappily no one called.
Next morning, in the sacristy, he said gruffly to
Matsey Boylan
" My man is away. Run up to the house and
wash my trap."
WAITING 235
After breakfast he went out to the yard and
looked on at the operation.
" You were at the races, yesterday ? '*
u I was then."
" What won the Farmers' Plate ? "
Matsey scratched his head. " Sorra one of me
passed any notice on it."
" I might have known your blind eyes could
see nothing."
"Troth, they seen more than you think, your
reverence. Queer things, I tell you," Matsey said,
blinking foolishly, the mop, held head upwards,
dripping on his shoes.
" What things ? "
" The schoolmaster below," indicating the direc-
tion of the school with the mop, " and the girl that
teaches the poultry."
" Hum ? " Father James said, with an interroga-
tive lifting of his eyebrows.
" Stole away alone up the mountain glen they did,
and spent the whole day there out of sight of every-
body and the whole race-course remarking on it.
The things that were said'd make a man's hair
stiffen."
He shrank back from the priest's thunderous
look, and began to mop the wheel of the trap
nervously.
" I wasn't meaning any harm," he mumbled,
looking up.
But Father James was stalking back to the house
in all the just anger of righteousness. That a
schoolmaster of his should be the cause of scandal
to a whole countryside ! It was an injury to him-
self that cut him to the quick. What would the
world think of him to tolerate such conduct ? He
236 WAITING
stamped through the hall and walked rapidly up and
down the path in front of the house with bent
brows. Ordinarily he discounted most of what
Matsey said, but he never questioned reflections on
any one's morality. He knew how hard it was to
keep strong passions in control. And as others had
not his strength, given the occasion, he suspected
them of the worst. And had he not ample evidence
against this Blake ? He had stood up against his
priest, was disobedient and rebellious. Goodness
only knew how long this unholy passion existed.
There was that Protestant girl and every one
knew Protestant girls had no morals, for there was
no one to keep a heavy hand over them loose on
the parish for nearly six months. She must have
been at the bottom of Blake's refusal of the decent
marriage which he, in the goodness of his heart,
had offered him. All the circumstances aggravated
Blake's offence. As a teacher he insulted his
manager, as a parishioner his parish priest. His
anger grew. His official position was dragged in
the mire. He was flouted as the guardian of
morals and religion. . . . His anger exhausted itself
in the thought that he had the power to punish.
His self-confidence, which had been dormant for a
few days, revived. He drew himself up in the
middle of the path, stretched out his arms, bent
them as if expanding the muscles. He felt physically
better already. The languor and unrest of dyspepsia
had passed away. He set his jaws and sniffed
the air, scenting battle joyfully. He went into
his study, wrote a short note, rang the bell, sent
for Matsey Boylan, and, handing him the note,
said
" Here, take that down to the schoolmaster
WAITING 237
at the village, and don't let the grass grow under
your feet."
Ever since he parted from Alice, Maurice Blake
felt himself another man. He seemed to have
grown past his own recognition. His limbs swung
freely with a new strength. Mind and body and
will were in harmony. The gorgeous colours in
the evening sky were only a faint reflex of some-
thing mysterious and satisfying within himself.
The road had a resilience it lacked before. There
was music in the loud rattle of harness as jolting,
springless carts went by rapidly from the races, and
in the cracking of whips and in the peals of harsh
laughter. Driscoll alone seemed outside a universal
joy. He was morose and silent. Once he stumbled
over a loose stone. His feet dragged and his face
had a drawn look. Maurice offered him an arm.
He leant heavily on it, but did not speak. He
stopped opposite the parochial house. Nodding
towards the light in Father Mahon's study window
he said
" He'll break you if you go on with this madness."
" He can't touch me."
" He can drive you out of the parish."
" That's nothing."
" Have you no fear at all in you ? "
" I have not only sorrow that you're taking
things so much to heart."
" And no sorrow for putting yourself in danger
of leaving your work that I thought your heart
was in ? "
" And you thought rightly. But a man's work is
only a part of him, and something bigger than my-
self has hold of me to-night. It "
238 WAITING
His voice trailed off as if no further words were
necessary. His eyes sought the sky in the west.
What he felt was all there in that luminous arc of
indescribable colour, the afterglow of the departed
sun, a blend of the brilliant hues of a moment
back the love that shut out fear, that gave his
soul the freedom of the illimitable spaces beyond
the stars and filled it with trust and hope and
faith. . . .
Yet it saddened him a little in his great joy that
Driscoll only gave a weary sigh.
In his dreams that night the lady of his child-
hood came again. She was seated on the spur above
the gap road. The sun caught her hair. Her
lonely, detached look had gone. Her eyes were
the eyes of Alice Barton, and her hair, as he clasped
her to his heart, had the same fragrance that still
remained in his senses from the afternoon.
In the morning he was up with the dawn.
He threw his window open wide to the growing
light and the twittering of birds. A cool breeze
fanned his face. His heart was full of sound and
colour and a deep content. Red gold rays shot up
in the east, paling the softer tints. Sitting by the
open window he wrote his column for The Star of
Liberty. At breakfast he read it to Driscoll, who
seemed brighter, and walked with him to the school
gate, discussing the tale. As usual on the day after
a holiday the children were late. Stragglers were
still coming in when Matsey Boylan appeared at the
door and beckoned mysteriously. In the porch
Maurice read the note, a curt command to come at
once to the parochial house. He told Miss Devoy,
who had just come in smiling, that he had to leave
for a few minutes. He went back to the schoolroom
WAITING 239
and arranged the classes. As he passed out, Matsey
was lingering at the gate.
"Toko you'll be getting up above," he said,
with a jerk of his head towards Father Mahon's
house.
Maurice laughed. " Had you a good day
yesterday, Matsey ? " he said pleasantly.
" Only middling," Matsey said dismally. " But
it might brighten up, it might brighten up Matsey
might have his day yet," he added with a leer.
The serjeant of police lounged at the barrack
gate, capless, his tunic open, his hands thrust into
the waist of his trousers.
"Easy known you hadn't the Liscannow pubs
to mind on a race night. I'm that tired I haven't
the heart to shave myself," he said with a yawn.
Maurice passed on with a wave of his hand.
He was vaguely wondering what Father Mahon
could want him for. Perhaps about the confirmation
on Tuesday week some fault-finding, of course.
Anyway, the children were prepared. He might as
well have it out with the priest now about Alice.
Or should he wait till he had another talk with her ?
He hummed blithely.
"That's not the funeral march of them fool
societies of yours by any chance ? " Clancy, of the
general shop, said with a grin.
"You'll be buying your own manure from us
next," Maurice said cheerfully.
" I wouldn't mind taking your bankrupt stock
it'll likely be in the market soon dirt cheap. But
where are you off to ? and it school time too."
"To see the manager."
" He's the sensible man, now ! with none of ye'r
new-fangled nonsense and amachoor shopkeeping.
2 4 o WAITING
Let me know when ye're in Stubbs's list. Clancy
and long credit'll beat down ready-money with
the lads you've to deal with."
"They've more sense than that," Maurice said
laughing and walking on.
" God help your head," Clancy shouted, good-
humouredly.
Father Mahon was seated at his desk when
Maurice entered the study.
" Sit down there," he said, turning round and
pointing to a chair beside the desk.
Maurice sat with his face towards the priest,
who glared at a paper on the desk.
" This is a copy of our agreement," he said,
flattening out the paper with his open palm.
" Terminable on three months' notice, or," he
raised his voice, " without notice, for cause for
cause, do you hear ? " he added in an emphatic
shout.
" I hear."
" You hear, do you ? Maybe, you'd soon have
to heed it. You're a nice example to the innocent
young children of the parish ! I'll put the fear
of God into you before I'm done trapseing the
mountains with Protestant sluts ! "
It was some seconds before Maurice realized
what the priest had said.
"That look of injured innocence is thrown away
on me," Father Mahon continued angrily. " You
and your Protestant "
" Stop," Maurice interrupted quietly. His eyes
blazed. " You may say something that'll make me
forget you're a priest if you're speaking of the girl
who is to be my wife."
The priest, who was rising angrily from his
WAITING 241
chair, dropped back into it again. His jaw fell.
He stared at Maurice in astonishment.
" I don't remember her name that niece of
Crawford's ? " he said limply.
" Yes," Maurice said coldly, " and I want a
dispensation to marry her."
Father Mahon steadied himself with the arms of
his chair. His face grew livid. He attempted to
speak, but only muttered incoherently. His eyes
fell on the agreement on the desk. He gazed at it
for several minutes in silence. He seized a pen and
wrote rapidly on a sheet of note-paper. He unlocked
a drawer, took out a cheque-book and filled in a
cheque. When he looked again at Maurice his
face had changed to an expression of contempt.
" There, take that," he said.
Maurice took the sheet of paper and the cheque.
When he had read the notice of summary dismissal,
he held up the cheque and asked with a wry smile
What is this for ? "
"Oh, that I don't owe it to you of course-
but to save trouble three months' pay in lieu of
notice."
" So you know you're doing wrong," Maurice
said, placing the cheque on the desk.
" That's your game, is it ? Wrong, am 1 ? 1
don't give that," snapping his fingers, " for all you
can do or your Teachers' Union either or the
National Board. I'm manager and I'll do as I like.
And if you go to law a jury can be trusted to
deal with a dangerous character like you without
morality or religion. Not that you have a leg to
stand on I'm dismissing you for cause."
He stood up and waved his hand towards the
door. " Don't darken the door of my school again."
R
242 WAITING
Maurice made a successful effort to restrain his
temper. It was all some ghastly mistake, he
thought some misapprehension on the priest's part.
He himself had been too hasty.
" What is the cause ? " he asked quietly.
" Grave public scandal."
" What scandal ? "
" I'll give you no explanation far be it from
me. You have an appeal against me to the bishop
if you think it worth while."
" I suppose that's all that's left to me," Maurice
said bitterly. " What about the dispensation ? "
" You can ask the bishop for that too," Father
Mahon said, again pointing to the door. " You'll
never get it with my good will you See if I
don't put a spoke in your wheel."
CHAPTER XVII
A THIN drizzle of rain fell from early morning on
the day of the Confirmation at Bourneen. A white
mist hung over the village, light and silvery,
with a promise of sunshine that did not come.
The trees loomed ghost-like in the still air.
Occasionally a sodden, faded leaf fell slowly to the
ground. A grey rime frosted the heavy nap of
freize coats and woollen shawls, evaporating in the
warm air almost as quickly as it formed. Boys
whistled cheerfully, regardless of the rain, and one
said, " There isn't enough wet in a month of it to
pierce my new coat." But the little girls suffered.
Their long hair was lank and damp ; their thin,
white dresses, coloured sashes, and white stockings
were limp and draggled. Anxious mothers hurried
their children into the church porch and tried to
make good the damage of the weather. Men
lounged outside, smoked, chatted in low tones, or
idly watched the intermittent stream of people, afoot,
in carts, traps and side-cars, arriving at the gate. A
dozen or more priests in heavy overcoats and silk
hats passed by to the sacristy. Father Mahon, in
soutane and surplice, an umbrella held high to
protect his well-laundried surplice from the rain,
walked several times to the gate and eagerly scanned
the road in the direction of Liscannow.
" He's as nervous as a clucking hen," Hinnissey
said.
244 WAITING
"That's strange enough, and he next door to
being a bishop himself, I'm told," Larry Reardon
said.
" The Lord save us, he'll be a holy terror entirely
then."
" How will Maurice Blake come out of it, do
you think?" Teigue Donlon asked. "They say
the bishop himself is going to have a hand in it."
" Sorra word Mike Blake'll say on it, but pull a
long face, though I'm connected with him myself,"
Larry Reardon said. "Not a foot I'd come near
this to-day, and I having a barn full of wheat to put
into sacks, only I'm expecting the bishop to say a
word about it from the altar."
" The same here," Teigue said. " The parish is
full of it. There's as many tales going round as
there's spikes on a hedgehog."
" There's great fairness in the bishop, they say,"
Larry said.
" He's a soft-spoken man," Hinnissey said, with
a keen eye on a slight clearing in the mist.
In the sacristy a group of priests stood round
the fire-place. Through the window Father Mahon's
stalwart form could be seen swinging down the path
to the gate.
" Sacking teachers without notice he is now,"
one said, with a nod at the window.
" What ? Eh ? That's a dangerous game in
these times," another said eagerly, " with or without
notice, begannies."
" He's a great man, James is."
" Some day he'll cut off more than he can chew.
Drink ? "
"No. Women. Wants to marry a Protestant,
or some foolishness like that."
WAITING 245
" Phew ! " with a prolonged sibilant whistle.
" What do you say, Delahunty ? You're sure to
know all about it."
" Tell them, Cassidy," Delahunty said to his
curate.
Cassidy's prominent blue eyes flashed. "There's
only one thing to be said about it," he said
emphatically. " It's a damned shame."
" That's no way to speak in the sacristy," a
severe-looking, elderly priest said, "and of your
betters too."
" I'd say it before the altar, or to the bishop
himself if I got the chance," Cassidy said warmly.
" He has great practice on me," Delahunty said
whimsically, " and he's often right enough too."
" Wait till he's a manager himself, and he'll
change his tune."
<{ When I am, I hope managers'll be docked of
the cruel powers they have now taking the bread
out of the mouths of decent men," Cassidy said
excitedly. " Here's Malone, he can tell you all
about it." He walked frowning to the window,
muttering in a loud voice, " The best teacher in the
diocese too written a book on the Irish faked-up
nonsense of Marion's all because he can't stand
any one crowing near his own dung-hill a nice man
to give votes for a bishopric to."
The priests crowded round Malone as he came in
from the church.
" Tell us the rights of this teacher business ? "
" Is Mahon likely to get a fall over it ? "
" It's all very sad very sad," Father Malone
said nervously. " I hope the bishop will set it right.
He's seeing Maurice Blake this afternoon. I
" His lordship is at the gate," Matsey Boylan
246 WAITING
said in a wheezing, panting voice, running in
excitedly from the yard.
A brougham drove up to the sacristy door at half
trot, Father Mahon alongside, the umbrella aloft in
his left hand, holding a firm grip on the handle of
the carriage door with his right. He held the
umbrella over the bishop as he descended, and made
as if to kneel on the wet ground on kissing the
bishop's ring, but Dr. Hannigan, with a deprecating
smile in his grey-brown eyes, said " Please not,"
and passed rapidly through the open sacristy door.
The priests stood to attention as he entered, in
attitudes of nervousness or conscious assurance. A
faint smile played about the bishop's lips as he gave
a quick, keen look round, taking in the whole room.
" Good morning, gentlemen," he said coldly.
" It's a wet day for your lordship to be out in,"
one said.
" The poor children, the poor children," he said.
One took his hat, another his coat, a third
opened the Gladstone bag, with which Matsey
Boylan followed at his heels. Father Mahon pushed
a priest aside brusquely, and himself unpacked the
bishop's purple soutane and rochet, and helped him
to vest.
After a silent prayer on the altar steps, Dr.
Hannigan began the examination of the children,
who filled the nave of the church. The aisles and
galleries were packed with the older members of the
congregation. Except the clergy and teachers, no
grown people were in the nave. The Bourneen
school children were in charge of Miss Devoy.
Maurice Blake looked on from a corner seat in
one of the side galleries. All the morning he had
intended to stay away, but, at the last moment, he
WAITING 247
decided to come. "The bishop might say some-
thing at the visitation sermon," Driscoll said. As
the appeal was not to be heard till later the bishop,
after some correspondence, had fixed three o'clock at
the parochial house Maurice did not believe that
his case would be referred to. Still, the mere
possibility drew him to the church.
The examination went through quickly. The
bishop was decisive but gracious. He put three
simple catechism questions to each child. If two
were answered correctly he handed a confirmation
card to the child, who went off immediately to con-
fession to one of the priests, who were now, except
a few who were in personal attendance on the
bishop, in the confessionals, or seated, in stole and
surplice, in secluded corners of the church. If two
questions were missed a fourth was given, and on the
result the child was either passed or put back for
further instruction.
" Mahon'd never pick up that manner. He has
the right touch to a die," Father Delahunty
whispered to an old priest, with a nod towards the
bishop.
" I don't know," the older man said, taking a
pinch of snuff. "As he's going to pass them all,
sooner or later, he might as well do it first as last."
" It's easy known, anyway, why you never wore
a mitre," Delahunty said into the snuff-box which
the old man held out.
As each school was finished the bishop said a
few pleasant words of commendation to the teachers.
" This school ? " he said to Miss Devoy.
" Bourneen, my lord," she said nervously.
Father Mahon frowned and shifted his feet un-
easily, but the bishop was all smiles.
248 WAITING
" An excellent school," he said, in a slightly
raised voice, when the last boy was passed, " excellent
indeed most carefully prepared reflects the utmost
credit on the teachers."
Behind, Father Delahunty muttered " Oh ? " in
the tone of a question of some significance, and
answered it himself with "Yes, yes, yes." In the
gallery Hinnissey whispered to Donlon, " That tells
well in Maurice Blake's favour."
The rejected children now came forward. After
a few perfunctory questions all got cards. The
bishop retired to the sacristy with Father Mahon
and talked with him alone at some length.
The congregation broke up into groups. Some
whispered in the seats. The majority, the weather
having cleared, went out to the churchyard. A few
children still clustered round a confession box.
Others scampered to and fro, between the church and
the yard, begged pennies from grown relatives, and
bought cakes and sweets and apples at the standings
in front of the yard gate. Maurice kept his seat.
Several neighbours eyed him as if they wished to
speak, hesitated and turned away. Under a gallery
a group of priests chatted ; half a dozen walked in a
row up and down the path from the porch to the
gate. Driscoll stood absorbed by the corner of the
porch, as if watching intently the sunlight glistening
on the wet, yellowing leaves.
" This is a bad business, Driscoll," Father
Delahunty said, taking his arm.
Driscoll sighed. " I've talked and talked," he
said, " but it's no good. And if Maurice Blake'd
yield itself, which he won't, 1 doubt if Father James
would."
" My best school'll be vacant at the end of the
WAITING 249
quarter Larkin is retiring. I put it to Cassidy,
and he's strong for taking Maurice Protestant wife
and all. But that's all moonshine and Cassidy's
enthusiasm. We'd be beaten dead on it. I'm too
old to begin battering down windmills. Besides,
there's no sense in putting every one's head in a
halter Blake's too. But short of the wife I'll stand
to him, Mahon or no Mahon."
" Sure I know you'd do what you could, Father.
But what you can do is no good, I'm afeared.
Talking of going to Dublin, he is, if the bishop fails
him, and giving up schoolmastering."
" I wish to God there were more Cassidys
we're only a cowardly crew a decent greyhound'd
be ashamed of us," the priest mumbled as he moved
away, whilst Driscoll relapsed into contemplation of
the leaves.
From a group of women came snatches of con-
versation.
" Run away now, children, and don't ye be
listening. Yes, then, there's a penny between the
three of ye. When ye've ate it, be off into the
chapel with ye and be saying a prayer, and the bishop
soon laying a holy hand on ye." In a lower voice.
" If he was seen walking with her itself ! a fine
laughey girl, that took a cup of tea on my own floor,
as civil as may be, when she was round about the
hens. You'd think it was horns and a tail she had."
" 'Twas that bleary-eyed idiot of a clerk started
it all, I'm told."
" The devil skewer him."
" Maybe she'd turn yet. She hasn't a spice of
bigotry in her."
" She wouldn't be the first woman that turned
because of a man."
250 WAITING
" If it goes to that, I'm told the schools don't
belong to the priests at all, but to the government or
some high up people."
" Speak low on that, Mrs. Maloney. Jack
warned me it's a thing not to be talked about freely,
though, in the next breath, he said if the people was
worth their salt they'd have a say in the schools
themselves."
"Religion is a queer thing, glory be to God,
putting between people."
" It's a fearsome world we're living in, the Lord
between us and all harm."
" When a man can't choose out a wife for him-
self, without losing his bread by it."
"God protect "
" And bless and save us this day, amen."
" Did you see Mary Blake about it at all, Mrs.
Maloney ? She could throw many a light on it."
" Amn't I straining my eyes at her all this day ?
Sitting tight the whole family are, in the side seat
next the altar, where no one'd have the courage to
talk to them except the master, and he's a touch-
me-not above in the north gallery."
" Poor people ! there's trouble on them."
" If there is itself they might share it with a
neighbour," Mrs. Maloney said, tossing her head.
In the porch, Matsey Boylan pulled the bell rope.
For a minute he tugged and writhed without a
sound. The first clear stroke lifted him off his feet
and he bobbed round like a monkey. " Take it
easy, Matsey," some one said, as the congregation
again crowded into the church. " Keep clear of me,"
he shouted as he rose, circled, and fell a dozen
times, and then, " Take hold of me, and stick on,
and stop her."
WAITING 251
From the top step of the altar, in cope and mitre,
his crozier in hand, Dr. Hannigan preached a com-
bined visitation and confirmation sermon. Cordial
relations, he was glad to say, existed between the
priests and people of the parish except in one small
matter which it devolved on him to deal with, and
which, he hoped, would be easily adjusted. For the
rest, there was abundant evidence of zeal. He was
glad that a hint he threw out at a previous visitation
was about to bear immediate fruit. The sadly needed
spire was to be put in hand at once. Even before
a public appeal had been made generous subscriptions
had been forthcoming. He would only read out
three as an example. The generous parish priest, a
hundred pounds. Mr. Clancy, whose munificent
charity was already exemplified by the beautiful
stained-glass window at his back, a hundred pounds.
And Mr. Michael Blake he paused significantly
fifty pounds. To the congregation he would say
" go and do likewise," and to the zealous parish priest
" procede et prospere." Before passing on to his
special address to the children he would make one
other remark and the subscription list he had just
read proved its truth. Where religion was concerned,
and the honour of God's house, good Irish Catholics,
priests and laymen, and it was not for him to say
that they were the salt of the earth, sank all differences,
public and private, and were one in heart and mind
and act in promoting the glory of God. . . .
Father Delahunty's face wore a puzzled frown.
In a seat near the sacristy door Father Cassidy
whispered excitedly to Father Malone. Mike
Blake's stolid, tanned face grew a brick red. His
eyes blinked. " That was a queer trick to play,"
Mrs. Blake said under her breath, her eyes on the
252 WAITING
rosary, which she held between her fingers in her
lap. " Don't pretend to notice, for I feel the eyes
of the congregation on us." There was a whispered
hum all over the church. The bishop had twice to
repeat " My most dearly beloved children." Even
then, Hinnissey whispered
" Mike must have done it to buy Maurice out
of his trouble."
" Connected or no, I'll never forgive him for
starting such a high tariff," Larry Reardon said.
" Mike, of his own option, to start a tariff, high
or low ! " Hinnissey said sceptically. " Take it easy
now, Larry, and reason it out. Believe you me,
there's more in this than meets the eye."
But here the bishop paused expectantly. Behind
his back Father Mahon gesticulated wildly, as if
beating down the conversation with the open palms
of his extended hands.
Driscoll's eyes met Maurice's with an inquiring
look. He shook his head. Throughout the sermon
that followed, while the bishop signed the children
with the sign of the cross and confirmed them with
the chrism of salvation, the question kept recurring
to his mind in a hundred different forms Why had
his father, who couldn't well afford it, done this,
and at this time ? But he could find no satisfactory
answer. On his way out of the church he met his
father and mother and Tom's wife. His mother
said, " Well, Maurice, boy ? " Minnie gave him a
sympathetic look, and hung her head shyly. His
father said gruffly
"As you are going to see the bishop, you might
as well walk that bit of the way with us."
One neighbour said, " Good luck to you."
Another, " I hope to God you'll come out on top."
WAITING 253
No one tried to stop them, though all eyes followed
them curiously. When they got beyond the crowd
at the gate, Mike said
" You're wondering, I doubt, about that money ?
Though I think you're a fool itself, the way
you're pushing things now, I'd have you to know
that I didn't give it lately, either to spite you,
or to curry favour for you with Father James
neither, in your foolery. 'Twas a foolish enough
investment I made a time ago. Wasn't it, Mary ? "
" It was then and maybe not so foolish either,"
Mrs. Blake said hopefully.
Maurice said, with relief, " I'm glad you told me
this."
They walked on in silence. At the gate of the
parochial house Mike said impressively
" This is the last word I'll say to you now you're
going in to your doom. Give up that girl and all
your nonsense, and keep the grace of God, and
common-sense and the good-will of the priest about
you. For reasons best known to myself I'm thinking
he'll take back his word about the school if you give
in on the girl. There isn't a woman in the world
worth giving up all you have for, and, mark my
words, there's as good fish in the sea as ever was
caught." With this, Mike stalked off frowning.
" Speak as wisely as you can, Maurice, agra, to
the holy man he has the look of a saint on him,
thanks be to God. And I'll be saying round and
round of the beads for you," his mother said.
Tom's wife lingered.
" How are you, Minnie ? " Maurice asked.
" Grand, thank God," she said blushing. She
put out her hand impulsively and pressed his.
" Tom and Hanny and myself are with you, no
254 WAITING
matter how the wind blows," she said eagerly ;
" and your mother, I think, though she says little
and has to be humouring Mike, who's cut to the
heart about your losing the school you know how
his mind runs on the money. Alice is worth daring
a good deal for," she added.
Maurice walked on a few steps to avoid the
bishop's brougham, which he saw approaching. As
it was after three, in a few minutes he followed the
bishop and Father Mahon into the parochial house,
and was shown into the study. The bishop was
alone, seated in an armchair in front of the fire,
reading his breviary. His purple biretta was well
back off his high forehead. The long tassels of his
sash, hanging negligently over an arm of the chair,
glowed in a bar of light that came through the
corner of the window. His heavy gold chain, the
gold cross on his breast, his amethyst ring, and the
brown hairs on the backs of his fingers, sparkled in
the sun. He looked up for a moment as Maurice
entered, gave him a friendly smile, and pointing to
an armchair at the corner of the fender, said
" One moment, Mr. Blake, while 1 finish
compline."
He read for three or four minutes, stood up,
knelt for a few seconds on his chair, in silent prayer.
When he got off his knees he held out his hand to
Maurice, who had also risen.
" Do sit down again," he said, as Maurice knelt
and kissed his ring. " You don't mind the fire ? I
got chilled this morning this unhappy dispute of
Father Mahon's was on my mind, too."
Maurice opened his lips to speak.
" Not a word for a moment," Dr. Hannigan
waved his hand with a smile.
WAITING 255
He leant well back in his chair and joined his
hands on his breast, his long capable forefingers
pointed upwards.
" I want you to feel I'm sure you feel that in
this matter I'm no mere judge. All my people are
dear to me my teachers are especially dear. I want
you to feel that I am a father and a friend rather than
a judge. Indeed, the law of the land does not
recognize me as a judge in disputes of this kind
the manager is supreme. But a higher law, the
law of charity, constrained my brother bishops and
myself to arrogate some would say," he smiled
deprecatingly " this function to ourselves. In a
well-ordered state education would be entirely in the
hands of of the hierarchy. Unhappily but why
dwell on that ? The law gives the manager large
discretionary power. But the divine economy gives
me the right, no matter what the law says, of
counselling and advising and "- he hesitated and
smiled " of counselling and advising our clerical
managers. But this is a long preamble. Among
friends there is no need to speak of powers and
rights." He bent his great eyes towards Maurice
appealingly. "Two of my children have a mis-
understanding, two of my helpers in the training
of our Catholic youth how zealous they are the
examination in the church to-day proved ; your
school, if I may say so without flattery, in particular.
Naturally they come to me to help them in their
difficulty." He paused and gazed at the fire.
The smooth, level tone of the bishop's voice and
his composed features disturbed Maurice. If there
was one thing he hated above all others, it was the
power of the priests and bishops over education, and
the way in which it was exercised. He had often
256 WAITING
discussed it bitterly with Driscoll and other teachers.
He disliked intensely much of what the bishop said.
But Dr. Hannigan's manner was disarming. The
slight harshness in his voice had a ring of friendli-
ness, and his eyes were soft and kind. Perhaps
he was different from others ! His effusive speech
might be only a mannerism. Maurice looked again
at the ivory forehead, and let his eyes wander over
the face, pallid and regular, the eyes a shade close
together. It was a kind face, he decided doubtfully
on the whole, he qualified his judgment, on
noticing for the first time a slight stricture of the
lips which brought out their thinness, revealed a
few tight lines at the corners and hardened a rather
prominent chin. As he looked the face softened,
and Dr. Hannigan began to speak again.
" I read over your statement carefully and I
have heard Father Mahon. Let me say at once that I
acquit you of the moral charge. The evidence was
negligible. A slight indiscretion on your part ; a
little over-zeal on his the whole thing vanishes in
a puff of smoke. Though for the future I should
advise care. The noble teaching profession has a
great responsibility to ward off from innocence the
very shadow of sin."
Maurice's brow contracted.
" I am finding no fault with you," the bishop
said quickly. "A counsel of perfection, merely.
Though this is the first time I've met you I've
heard of you a good deal. There were a few minor
charges," he added thoughtfully, " disobedience,
faults of manner and of temper." He sighed.
" To these we are all subject. Human nature is
weak. Cumulatively they have some force singly
1 make light of them, except, perhaps, the disobeying
WAITING 257
of written orders once I forget in regard to what
some meeting ? I have the papers here, but it
does not matter."
Maurice envied his fluency of speech. He felt
strangled, as if a soft silken cord was being wound
tightly round him, depriving him of thought and
words.
" He had no power to give that order," he
blurted out roughly. The contrast between his own
voice and the bishop's made him ashamed as soon as
he had spoken.
" Power," the bishop said reproachfully. " I
thought we agreed to eliminate that word ? Powers
and rights surely need not be mentioned between
a good Catholic and his parish priest. Ah, Mr.
Blake, we are living in difficult times, when it
behoves us all to pull together even by yielding a
little. I myself have to submit my will often to my
brother bishops, often to higher powers. It brings
home to me my unworthiness, and gives me a much-
needed lesson in humility. Our Holy Church and
our holy faith ought to be above all ! Such
artificial secular distinctions as manager and teacher
ought to be forgotten in our common obligation of
working together as good soldiers of Christ."
" Father Mahon did not forget them," Maurice
said dryly.
" You are still bruised in spirit a little in
temper perhaps. Poor fellow ! 1 can well under-
stand it. But are you fair to Father Mahon ? He
was, I feel sure, thinking of higher things, things of
God, of the spirit, of the soul of your soul."
The memory of his interview with Father Mahon
came back to Maurice. He looked at the bishop
keenly that calm face could not be the cause of the
s
258 WAITING
anger that filled him to his finger-tips. He gave a
short uncomprehending laugh.
The bishop's eyebrows lifted almost imperceptibly
for a moment.
" The marriage you proposed ? " he said gently.
" He had made up his mind before he heard of
the marriage."
The bishop's lips tightened. But his eyes smiled
as he said
" This is not a civil court, Mr. Blake nor a
court at all indeed, only a friendly conversation. If
Father Mahon were a mere secular manager this
marriage might not be relevant. But what do we
find ? Try and put yourself in his place, Mr. Blake
a zealous priest charged with safeguarding the
religion of his people, of the little children in his
schools, and above all, of his teachers for on them
devolves the instruction of the children."
" He dismissed me from a secular, undenomina-
tional school, not for any lack of fitness or qualifica-
tion, but because I asked for a dispensation to marry
a Protestant," Maurice said coldly.
A slight frown, faint as the shadow of a tiny
passing cloud on a field of corn waving in the sun-
light, moved rapidly over the bishop's face and seemed
to run down his soutane to his feet, as if in physical
protest against the crudity of Maurice's statement.
" Secular ? undenominational ? " he said with a
smile. " Surely these are only legal fictions ? "
" Unfortunately, my lord."
The bishop seemed to bite the inside of his lip.
He gazed thoughtfully at the fire. When he spoke
again he had shifted his ground.
" Do you prefer this this young lady to your
religion ? " he asked abruptly.
WAITING 259
Maurice blushed, hesitated, and then said
shortly.
" I don't see that they conflict."
" It is no fault of yours, of course," the bishop
said sadly, " that you are not well grounded in the
philosophy and theology of our religion. When a
Catholic marries a Protestant there is necessarily, at
the very least, a certain amount of toleration of
heresy. Now we may tolerate heresy from motives
of expediency the difficulty of doing otherwise, the
greater good of the Church, and other reasons
but the toleration that marriage involves, no matter
how strictly the Church hedges it round with precau-
tions " he shook his head several times. "Believe
me, Mr. Blake and this is why our Holy Church
discourages mixed marriages it saps the very bases
of morality and religion. Come, now," with an
appealing look, " love is here to-day and away who
knows ? to-morrow. Like a good Catholic make
a willing sacrifice of the temporal to the eternal 1
hear the priests coming in to dinner, and they have
had a hard day. We must hurry. Make this
sacrifice on the altar of your faith it may be hard,
but your reward will be the greater. A teacher in
a Catholic school ! for it is that, no matter what the
law pretends. You surely see now that it is im-
possible that Father Mahon could allow you to marry
out of the faith. With his passionate attachment to
the Church too ! Have sense, and your good priest
will forgive you. Give up this idea, and I shall
make it all right with Father Mahon go back to
your school. Some day, when this madness has
passed, you will see in him your best friend."
A feeling of intense weariness overcame Maurice
at the beginning of the bishop's long exhortation.
260 WAITING
Words, words, words battered his confused brain.
He watched the brown eyes, soft and gentle. A
few times the grey showed hard and steely. So the
bishop too, with all his soft words, was trying to
separate him from himself for Alice was himself.
His muscles stiffened and he sat alert in his chair.
At the last reference to Father Mahon he laughed
harshly.
Dr. Hannigan frowned. The grey in his eyes
predominated as he looked questioningly at Maurice.
There was a knock at the door. He said " Come
in " sharply.
The servant curtseyed and said timidly, " Your
lordship, his reverence told me to say the priests
were gathered and the dinner ready to be dished,
and would you be long, my lord ? "
" Tell them wait," he said curtly.
" Well ? " he said, when she had shut the door
behind her.
" I'll give up the school rather than give her up."
A slight flush appeared on the bishop's neck
under his ears. His face was calm but it became
sharper in outline.
" And your religion ? "
Maurice laughed and said, " Really ? my lord."
The bishop looked at him sternly. " There
seems to be nothing more," he said dryly.
" The dispensation ? "
" That, you apply for through Father Mahon."
He took his breviary off the arm of the chair and
made a movement as if to stand up. Maurice rose.
" But he referred me to your lordship."
" I'm afraid I can do nothing," he pursed his
lips. " You might apply direct to Rome."
"Am 1 likely to get it there ?"
WAITING 261
The bishop considered this gravely. "Frankly,
no taking into account Father Mahon's attitude,
and the absence, as far as I can see, of the canonical
causes for dispensing."
" Good-bye, my lord, and thank you."
" Good-bye," the bishop said coldly.
" Am I dismissed then ? " Maurice asked, turning
at the door.
" I don't see that I can interfere. Stay just a
minute." His eyes sought inspiration in the carpet.
" Yes I might get Father Mahon to withdraw the
dismissal and accept your resignation if you tender
it suitably. It might help you to another school
in some other diocese."
" Should I get the dispensation there ? "
" I should say not," Dr. Hannigan said irritably.
" I'd rather be dismissed," Maurice said firmly.
" Does that mean that you will take the case into
a civil court ? " Dr. Hannigan said suspiciously as
he rose.
"No."
Maurice was again putting out his hand for the
door handle, when the bishop laid a hand on his
shoulder, and with a return to his gracious manner
said
" I shall pray for you. I am told that there are
good openings for talented young men in America
or the colonies."
" Or in Timbuctoo," Maurice said under his
breath, smiling pleasantly in response to the bishop's
" God bless you."
CHAPTER XVIII
THERE was much excitement in the parish during
the time Maurice remained in Bourneen. Two days
after he saw the bishop Alice went back to Dublin.
He was glad she was out of hearing of all the
gossip. In every house " the row " was discussed,
wildly and imaginatively, for the actual details were
known only to a few. It was generally agreed that
Maurice was a " wronged man," though there was
some doubtful shaking of heads. Father Malone
drove hopefully to Liscannow to interview the
bishop, and came back despondent. Hinnissey
spoke of resolutions of sympathy from the League,
but Father Mahon, who was honorary president,
attended the meeting called for the purpose, and
nothing was done. Mike Blake blustered a good
deal to his wife, lamented his fifty pounds as thrown
into a bog-hole, blamed Maurice, dressed half a
dozen times in his Sunday clothes for a visit to the
parochial house ; but, always, his courage failed, and
he laid them aside without going. " After all, I did
give the money for the spire," he explained to his
wife, " and I'd be only coming back with my tail
between my legs." She paid a daily visit to the
chapel and burnt many candles in front of the statue
of St. Antony, entreating him to find her son a school,
" or to comfort his heart anyway." At a bank
meeting a fisherman from the Strand called loudly
WAITING 263
for a declaration in favour of Maurice ; but the
chairman reluctantly ruled the discussion out of
order, as being " on the mearing of religion," and,
therefore, forbidden by the rules. John Crawford's
only contribution was a remark, thrown out occasion-
ally between two long tracts of silence as he sat
smoking before the fire at night, " There's nothing
I'd put beyond a priest not all of them, but most."
Tom Blake was roused to fury. He had arranged
for the barricading of the school against the new
teacher, when Maurice heard of the scheme, and,
with much difficulty, dissuaded him from it. Many
murmured against clerical control of the schools.
A dozen children were withdrawn by their parents
from Bourneen, sent to the Strand school and to
Drusheen, beyond the bog. Father Mahon, when
he heard this, drove to both schools, to the
Strand in the morning and to Drusheen in the
afternoon of the same day, and herded the children
back to Bourneen at the point of the whip. The
Government Inspector of Schools shook his head
angrily at the tale of Maurice's dismissal, mut-
tered " those managers, those managers," and later,
dined amicably with Father Mahon. Teachers, for
miles around, visited Maurice in the night and
counselled resistance, with apologies for the inaction
of their local organization. " You know how it is,"
seemed to most of them to be both excuse and
explanation. One was more explicit : " If we say a
word in public, out we may go ; but you you can't
be in much worse case than you are. Though we're
weighed down with charges of one kind and another,
as far as a trifle goes towards expenses in private,
you understand ? you could count on us. And
Driscoll within" he was ill in bed with arthritis
264 WAITING
since the day of the confirmation " could help
openly. He's on a pension and clear of a manager.
It'd be a great chance of showing things up."
But Maurice was not in the mood to show things
up. Perhaps he felt queer, he thought, because
Alice had gone, or because Driscoll was ill. He
O '
was seeing things differently too, noticing things
that escaped him before, seeing himself, even, in
a curiously detached, impersonal way mere little
flashes that were contradictory, or vanished when
he tried to analyse them. As when he saw himself
a spar of wreckage cast up on the beach, and, the
next moment, riding the waves triumphantly, with a
firm foothold on the same spar. The teacher's
words recalled this image. It explained so much
that had been puzzling him in the attitude of
people. He was a broken man, useful for leading
some sort of forlorn hope, but broken. It showed
clearly behind all Father Malone's nervous sympathy,
in his mother's despondent prayers, in his father's
grumbling, in the almost despairing look that he some-
times surprised in Driscoll's eyes when he thought
he was unobserved. Surely they were all wrong,
and Alice was right. He saw her again as the train
bore her away from Liscannow Station, her look of
infinite hope and faith, and her last words, " You are
a free man now."
When he reasoned his position out, and thought
of the future, the fears of his friends depressed him.
But not for long. Alice's faith and some feeling
that was deep down in his own heart came to his
rescue. Suddenly the conviction seized him, that it
was he who was free, and they who were in bond.
They bowed down under a fear from which he had
freed himself. One day he met Teigue Donlon, on
WAITING 265
the road near his house. Teigue pressed his hand
warmly and said, " The feeling of the people is with
you." Father Mahon approached in his trap. Teigue
slunk off up the boreen. Maurice met the priest's
scowling face with a smile. He felt stronger as he
walked on. Once he, too, should have been afraid
... as an unbroken man he often had the timidity
of a mouse ... as a broken man he had the courage
of a giant refreshed. ...
Tom was his great comfort in those days. Tom
had no fear of anything but Minnie's coming mother-
hood, and that fear was only momentary, and faded
away in the larger hope of safety, and a son.
" You have two strong arms on you," he said,
" and you're sure to find work. You're out of the
swing now, but you'll get into it again. Alice is a
kind of smothering now I know it all but soon
she'll be like another arm or another lung as
natural as the day, and a help and not a hindrance.
You'll want to be doing things again, and more of
them. Have a drive at politics now there's an
opening. It ought to come easy to a fellow like you
that has things printed in the papers though the
same papers ! "
He shook his head gloomily. " But the country'll
right itself. It's sick, very sick, but it has the
seeds of health in it. The Star of Liberty now, that
your little stories they're not bad in their way-
come out in. Between you and me it's damn rotten.
If you could only get writing something near the
truth in that paper now, you might do a great deal
of good. ..."
" Oh yes, we're doing things all right mucking
about," he said again. "It's all to the good. The
country is getting richer and we're learning the Irish.
266 WAITING
But a man wants to be able to say out what he thinks.
There are a lot of fellows thinking the same as me.
Take your own case now. Sacked from your job
without rhyme or reason, and the whole country
afraid to open their lips about it. And if there was
a word said, your blessed Star of Liberty' & stand by
Father James to-morrow. No wonder the Pro-
testants'd be afraid of Home Rule. Not but they're
wrong entirely, though it's hard to make 'em see it,
and the things they see happening round them. I'm
not agin priests, mind you. They baptized me and
married me and I hope they'll bury me. It does me
a power of good to go to a mass that Father Malone
says. He's one of the kind of priests we want
though I wish in a way he had more pluck priests
that you'll be able to see religion and not the tyrant
in everything they say and do, and not slim ones
either like the bishop that was here the other day.
I stood at the back of the chapel for a minute
listening to him. Did you hear him about my
father's subscription ? It near made me sick. How
they ever worked it out of him passes me. He's
as deaf as a post when I ask him about it."
Then his optimism would take hold of him again.
" If only once we could get Home Rule every thing'd
be right. The schools'd be taken out of the hands
of the Father Mahons. There'd be no more
breeding of bad will between Protestants and
Catholics. No man'd be down on another because
of a difference of religion. If you could do some-
thing to bring this about," he said with shining eyes,
"you'd be doing the best work a man could set his
hand to. I haven't the education," he added sadly,
" only what Driscoll gave me far be it from me to
belittle it, for he put many a good thought into my
WAITING 267
head. But you know a power from all you read, and
the College and the like. You'll be up in Dublin
doing great things, and maybe I'll be plodding away
down here. Who knows," he wound up wistfully,
" what we mightn't do between us, big and
small ? "
Maurice thought it all over at night while
Driscoll slept. What could he do ? Tom thought
him so learned, and he was so ignorant. All those
men who worked on newspapers knew Latin and
Greek and thousands of things, that he had hardly
heard of. The Star of Liberty itself often gave a Latin
quotation not to be found at the end of Nuttall's
English Dictionary the only Latin, except the list
of roots in the spelling-book, that he knew. But he
knew Irish, and he knew something of what people
were doing and thinking in the country. He already
had his column in The Star. A pound a week was
a great thing. But there was Alice ? Calculation
of the cost of living pushed aside his ideals for the
moment. That pound wasn't a certainty either.
Fortunately he had some of his salary of the last two
years. He had put it by to pay Driscoll for a share
in the expenses of the cottage. But Driscoll had
always refused it. He felt so hurt the last time it
was offered, that Maurice promised not to speak of
it again. It was nearly eighty pounds a small
fortune, he thought cheerfully for a moment. He
calculated again, with pencil and paper, and sighed.
He leant his arms on the table and stared at the
glow of the firelight on the lustre jugs on the
dresser. After all, The Star might solve everything.
The editor had written him flattering letters. Perhaps
he would give him more work ?
In this nebulous state of mind as to his future
268 WAITING
Maurice set out for Dublin. One morning early,
while yet the sun struggled with a thin autumn haze
he drove with Driscoll, on one of Clancy's side-cars,
to catch the first train from Liscannow. His tin
trunk and two boxes of books were on ahead, in a
cart driven by Tom.
" Wrap the rug well round you," Driscoll said,
and fell into a doze.
They sat together on one side of the car, the
driver on the other. Driscojl, though very ill, had
insisted on coming. His peaked, livid face, as he
sat huddled up in the back of the seat, was the worst
blow of a hard parting. All the more because, for
the last few days, he had tried to be cheerful. His
hearty laugh became forced, and deepened the lines
about the corners of his lips. " All is for the best,"
became a refrain, that cut Maurice like a whip every
time he heard it. If only the old man had blamed
him it would have been easier to leave. Milk carts
passed, with a rattle of tins, on the way to the
creamery, the drivers calling, " God speed you," or
" Good luck to you." Men, early afield, digging
potatoes, waved a hand or a spade or a hat. A
collie of Teigue Donlon's followed the car, wagging
his tail, for a hundred yards. Slieve Mor pushed its
massive outline through the haze now shot with
colour. The heavy rime on the leafless trees began
to sparkle. The old mill wheel, green with slime, a
gate, a stream, a stunted tree, smoke rising, in a
snaky whorl, from a gable on which he had played
handball as a boy all had some association that
made the drive more bitter for Maurice than the
good-byes of last night.
All Driscoll said on the platform was " You have
a home with me whenever you want it."
WAITING 269
The memory of him, leaning heavily on Tom's
arm, his eyes fixed on the receding train, remained
with Maurice throughout the journey. He longed
to be back again at the school, watching Driscoll
give the open-air lesson in the garden, with the
fishermen on the shore, at the Irish class, listen-
ing to Jim Mescall's fiddle. Yet it was Driscoll
himself who had said : "You don't fit in here any
more you'd best to go," and Alice would be at
Kingsbridge station awaiting him. . . .
She wanted to know all about Driscoll. " Who is
to look after him ? " " Hanny will go down every
day and there's Bessy Reilly."
" That is something ; I must write to her. And
you must write to him often. Your heavy things
must go by the carrier ; we must be economical, so
we can't afford a cab. I've found the very room for
you between Fairview and Drumcondra a bed-
sitting-room and not far from us. Mother wants
you to come straight to us and have some food
you must be famished ; but we'll take in your
place on the way. Eight shillings a week it's the
cheapest I could get of the kind. Coals are extra,
but you'll only pay for what you use. The great
thing is that I know Mrs. Reed she'll look after
you well."
She said this in snatches as he arranged about
his luggage. They took the tram along the quay to
O'Connell Bridge. Though he had to carry a heavy
bag they walked to the Pillar. " Twopence saved
we'll want it more than the tram company."
"You're in a managing mood," he said grimly,
as they stood waiting for the tram.
" I am," she said demurely. " I proposed to
you, you know. 1 " She blushed crimson.
270 WAITING
" I hope you'll like my mother," she said incon -
sequently.
She was silent until they arrived at Mrs. Reed's
door. He hardly noticed that she did not speak.
It was enough that she was near him. He looked
often out of the window at the half-familiar streets,
but it was more to catch the line of her face under
her fur toque.
He liked the house, and Mrs. Reed, and his
room. It was an old ramshackle cottage, with a
wooden porch that might have come from Bourneen.
So might Mrs. Reed, with her ample waist and
florid untownlike face. She came from Drimna, she
told him in a few minutes, " and though it's near
forty years ago I never took to city ways. And
what's more, I can't abide their eggs." The room
was large and clean, with windows back and front
" that keep out the rain," Mrs. Reed said, " but I
wouldn't be telling a lie about it not always the
draught. But sorra bit you'll feel that, if you only
pull the curtains." Strips of carpet were in front of
the bed, the fireplace, and the dressing-table. A
table and chair filled in the space between the head
of the narrow iron bedstead and the wall. " Hearing
you were a writing gentleman I put it there to keep
you out of the wind," Mrs. Reed said. She looked
him over. " You have the air of the country about
you, like myself," she said confidentially. " I can't
stand people with town airs on them, so I think we'll
suit each other well. And if you care for a fresh egg
with your breakfast, I have them of my own laying
you can hear a hen clucking in the yard this
minute."
As they walked across to Drumcondra, Alice
said, " I thought you'd feel more at home there."
WAITING 271
The little one-storied cottage, off the high-road
beyond Drumcondra, to which she took him was not
unlike Mrs. Reed's. But paint and whitewash did
much to conceal dilapidation. The roof of small
slates, from constant patching with mortar, was
almost as white as the walls. Mrs. Barton opened
the door and welcomed Maurice quietly. He
followed her with his eyes as she moved about, with
Alice, preparing high tea. And sometimes, when
he had looked away for a moment and sought her
again, he found her eyes fixed on him inquiringly.
Her black dress, her brown hair with streaks of grey
in it, parted in the middle and worn flat, her calm
forehead, her eyes that seemed of great depth
because of shadows under the lids, were out of
keeping with the tawdry bamboo furniture. He
was puzzled by something familiar in her. He
imagined her in John Crawford's kitchen, a softer
suggestion of John, where she seemed more at home.
It was then he recognized that she was Alice grown
older, and somehow it made him glad.
During tea, if the conversation wandered from
Bourneen, she always brought it back with " the
threshing now ? Do they still make a great night of
it ? " or " Do the hurts grow as well as they used to
bylthe Reardons' big dyke ?" And always a little wist-
fully. After tea, when Alice had gone to the kitchen
to wash up, she put her hand on Maurice's, and said
timidly, " I'm glad." She hesitated, kissed him on
the forehead, and talked of her poultry. After-
wards she went out " to see to the fowl," she said,
and left them alone. The room was dark in the
twilight. Alice poked the fire. The flame lit up her
face and played on the bright polish of the furniture.
" Shall I light " she said, looking at him.
272 WAITING
Their lips met. Her head rested on his shoulder
and her hair nestled against his chin. They sat
in front of the fire, and he told her what he
saw in her eyes and hair, and in the dimples in
her cheeks. She watched the fire with her lips
slightly parted.
" It's very foolish," she said, " but say more
of it."
Mrs. Barton brought in a lamp and sat with
them, talking of Bourneen till there was a loud knock
at the front door.
" Your father," she said guiltily to Alice, " and
his supper not ready."
She disappeared to the kitchen, while Alice
opened the door.
" Of course, of course. I'll take him as mildly
as a kitten," Maurice heard, in a boisterous voice,
and wished that he could withdraw through the
window.
" Where's this villain that wants to rifle the
nest ? not bad, eh ? but the wife keeps poultry, you
see," Mr. Barton shouted as he entered. " Hullo,
my fine fellow ! " He crushed Maurice's hand in a
big palm and clapped him on the shoulder with the
other hand. " Supper not ready ! this is nice
doings."
Alice ran out to help her mother. Mr. Barton
held Maurice away from him at an arm's length.
" Hum, hum," he said, a little disapprovingly. He
pulled down his own unruffled waistcoat, patted the
ends of his frock-coat, and rubbed his fingers
purringly over the silk facings.
Maurice was horribly conscious of the slight
frown on the handsome, regular, florid face. He
could see it even in the well-kept moustache, in the
WAITING 273
wavy hair, brushed carefully from the side to hide its
thinness, and in the creased trousers that carried the
line of the Roman nose down to the highly varnished
boots. He looked ruefully at his own rumpled
waistcoat and baggy trousers. A thought struck
him and he smiled after all, Alice was more like her
mother. He looked up with some confidence, but
Mr. Barton's frown had already gone.
" You writing fellows are a caution I see them
sometimes where I peck in the middle of the day
down-in-the-leathers sort of chaps. But there
are some I see one with as natty a silk hat as
we ever sold at Scrutton's. That's what you have
to aim at. Take my word I know I'm not head
floor-walker for nothing. Don't be led away by the
wife or Alice. They're among the best, but they
never learned the value of good window-dressing."
He drew himself up and fingered his tie.
Settled down ? "
Maurice was feeling crushed, but he nodded
with a smile.
"Well, you'll soon be rolling in the shekels.
Alice showed me one or two things in The Star
rotten rag. They're not my kind. A little more
spice, eh ? Still it's a great thing to have one's
name in print. I wouldn't wonder if Alice had
done well for herself. We'll talk it all out again
sometime. I must be off and change these togs it
would never do to sit down in them. Care to look
at the racing special ? I had a flutter of a shilling
in a sweep on the Park Plate to-day, and I won, sir.
That gives a man an appetite for his food. Not
sorry you dropped the schoolmastering as for this
bother about religion, we make nothing of it at
Scrutton's," he added from the door.
T
274 WAITING
Maurice spent a depressed few minutes while
Alice and her mother laid the table for a second
high tea. Would Mr. Barton be another com-
plication ? If he were only like Mrs. Barton ? When
he found out that he wasn't really a writing fellow ?
He stood leaning on the mantelpiece with a worried
brow.
Alice came in with a dish of bacon and
eggs. " Don't look like the grave," she said,
smiling as she arranged knives and forks. " If
dad bothers you, talk to him about roses but
here he comes."
Maurice drew a breath of relief. The jovial
face was there but all the stiff lines had gone from
the figure. Mr. Barton's manner had changed with
his clothes. The loose grey alpaca jacket, the baggy
trousers, the well-worn slippers, the flannel shirt and
soft collar made him less loud and assured. Or
was it the presence of Mrs. Barton who followed
him in ?
" If you're trying to keep your trousers straight
all day this is a relief," he said, with a glance down
his leg.
At supper he asked what his wife had been
doing. She told him at some length. He listened
appreciatively. Then Alice was put through a
catechism.
" Oh, and then you met the train and after that
a blank," he said, with a return of the boisterous
manner. He told of the doings at Scrutton's. He
was still relating the day's experience to Maurice
when Alice and her mother, after washing up, re-
joined them in the sitting-room. He waited
patiently while they opened work-boxes, then, taking
them into the circle with a wave of his hand,
WAITING 275
he began again. " What did the manager say to
me ? Barton,' he said "
Alice snapped a thread on her finger and said
quietly
"Did Maurice tell you, dad, about Mr.
Driscoll's roses ? "
Mrs. Barton smiled and looked up at her husband
affectionately, resting her hands for a moment on her
knee. His eyes lit up Maurice thought how like
they were to Alice's with that look.
" No. Why didn't you tell me before and I
making conversation. What sorts has he ? "
At ten o'clock Mrs. Barton put away her work.
" Maurice must be tired, and you have to be up
early, Luke," she said gently.
" Come some Sunday, young man, or a Saturday
afternoon, when I'm free of that damn shop, and I'll
show you my patch. We keep the country in the
town here, don't we, Lizzie ? "
His wife smiled.
" Rus in urbe the dictionary says. I wanted to
paint it on the gate, but the wife and Alice wouldn't
let me. You'll do, young fellow. You have my
blessing. I must make a note of that tip about
grafting. Good night to you, and come soon
again."
Alice walked with him to the paling that separated
the narrow strip of garden from the road. She
locked the little wooden gate for the night. He
leant across it looking at the house.
" A house like that would cost a great deal in a
dear town like this," he said musingly.
" It wouldn't then it's old and has no hot
water nor, what do they call them ? modern con-
trivances."
2j6 WAITING
" What would we want with them ? "
" What, indeed."
" Would you like it to be soon ? "
"When you like," she said, hardly above her
breath. And then, as he was going, " Only I'd like
to live under the mountain beyond Dundrum.
There's more air there, and a view of the sea."
CHAPTER XIX
IN a week Alice was to go to Tyrone for a month's
lecturing. After that she should be in Dublin for a
winter course at Glasnevin. They met every day.
In the mornings, muffled in an overcoat and rug,
Maurice worked. There were slight frosts at night,
his room was cold, and coal was expensive. At half-
past one he was always waiting at the end of the
Drumcondra tram, and, soon, there was only glorious
sunshine. Alice said it was a pity it wasn't summer ;
and he, regretting only that the days were not longer,
agreed. They explored Green Lanes, Raheny, Fing-
lass, and the Phoenix Park. From Donnybrook they
walked along the banks of the Dodder. Twice they
took the mountain road from Dundrum, round
by the back of St. Columba's College, and back
by the Moravian Cemetery. Somewhere between
Dundrum and the mountains they were to live, Alice
said. And there, on a patch of heath, high above
the road, with a clump of ragged fir trees, higher up,
between it and the sky, stood the very cottage she
had been dreaming of. If it were only empty
when ....
" When ? " he often asked himself after Alice
had gone ; and his depression answered " never."
He sent many articles to The Star, but they were
returned without a word. He found it hard to write
cheerful replies to Alice's spirited letters. Mr.
278 WAITING
Barton's boisterous high spirits kept him away from
the only people he knew. The city, which he had
thought so beautiful, when walking through it with
Alice, seemed now a huge sore. All the broken
men of the country like himself, he said bitterly
had drifted there. They hung on the bridges, at
public-house doors, round the Pillar, at street corners,
or slouched in and out of the battered doorways of
old Georgian houses. Was this to be his fate ? . . .
One morning, with a rejected manuscript from
the office of The Star of Liberty, came a letter, signed
Louis Breslin, editor, asking him to call that after-
noon at four. Was it more work ? or was his
weekly folk-tale to be stopped ? He tried to write,
but the paper in front of him remained blank. He
thought of the cottage, with its background of firs,
and he glowed with hope. His vision faded away
in a grey mist, from which emerged a slum palace,
in a back street, sordid, grimy faces peering
through the few panes that were not stuffed with
sacking or boarded up. He shivered and lit the tiny
fire Mrs. Reed had laid in the grate. He piled on the
whole scuttle of coals and soon had a roaring fire.
When Mrs. Reed brought in his dinner she said
approvingly
"A man never did any good without he had
some heat in him, and you as thin as a lath too."
The tray was placed on his writing table,
where he ate the small chop to which he had
limited himself. He gazed hungrily at the bare
bone. What matter if he was spending more than
he earned he still had money in the savings bank.
He went out to the kitchen and asked for eggs.
At two o'clock he set out for The Star office in
Harcourt Street. The slob at Fairview seemed to
WAITING 279
have lost the horrid smell that had been getting on
his nerves. Over the railway embankment he caught
a glimpse of laughing waves. A passing train,
between the sea and sky on the high, narrow
causeway, puffed joyfully. He took the tram to the
Pillar and did not see the dingy streets. He got to
Sackville Street at half-past two by the post office
clock. It was only a quarter of an hour's walk to
Harcourt Street, so he had an hour and a quarter to
dawdle away. He was looking at some prints in a
window when Mr. Barton shouted " Hallo ! " from
the door of a restaurant near by. " You're a nice
fellow 'pon my soul, you are. Deserting us ! Ha !
ha ! There'll be a change, Saturday. Let me
whisper Alice coming home. 'Twas to be a secret
from you. We were to march over take you by
surprise. Thought I'd give you a hint only fair,"
with a preternaturally sly look that stretched upwards
to his glossy hat. He glanced doubtfully at
Maurice's boots, at his hat, said " Ta, ta. Scrutton's'll
think I am lost," and marched off with his chest
well extended.
So that was why Alice asked him not to write,
after Friday, till she gave him another address. He
gazed at the retreating Mr. Barton and envied him
his assurance and self-confidence. If only he had
work before she came back. . . .
He walked up and down in front of The Star
office, with nervous glances at the dingy windows.
He felt cold and hot, took out his watch every few
minutes, returned to Stephen's Green, walked round
the railings twice, went into a tea-shop and ordered
tea which he did not take. . . .
At five minutes past four he was shown into the
editor's room. The hall and stairs had reminded
280 WAITING
him of the slums, but this room was different. He
had read of these old houses. He had seen them
in almost every street, but had never been inside
one. Even in the half light the room gave a feeling
of air and space. He was following the line of the
cornice when a voice said quietly
You like it ? "
Maurice looked round. A dapper little man,
holding in his hands the ends of a half-unwound
white silk muffler, was gazing at him with lazy
brown eyes.
" I do I feel I do. But then, 1 know nothing
of architecture," Maurice said hesitatingly.
" Ah ! that is it to feel. It is so easy to know,"
the other said with more interest.
He unwound the muffler and laid it, beside his
hat and overcoat, on a chair. He turned on the
lights, poked the fire, asked Maurice to take a chair,
and sat himself behind a table covered with papers.
He tapped his well-kept nails with a pencil.
" You never read The Star of Liberty" he said
suddenly.
" No that is sometimes that is
" I know your own folk-tale in the Friday
issue."
Maurice blushed. Breslin's eyes were grave,
though an ironic smile curled the corners of his lips.
" You know the Satyricon ? " he said dryly.
Maurice looked blank.
" Not Petronius ? What a pity. It doesn't matter.
Folk is not a bad substitute. Are you going to live
in town ? What did you do in the country, by the
way?"
Maurice told him ; also, in reply to further
questions, why he left.
WAITING 281
Breslin balanced the pencil on his forefinger.
Maurice spoke to the pencil with an occasional look
at Breslin's face, at the pallid whiteness of the skin
above the closely-trimmed black beard, flecked with
grey, at the high forehead, over which a lock of grey
hair fell negligently.
" So you were kicked out I suppose it was
better than resigning. Very interesting and very
foolish." He got up and stood with his back to the
fire, his hands under his coat-tails. The brown eyes
seemed to look through the wall opposite. " I did
something of the kind once myself, but it was long
a very long time ago." His eyes dropped to a
chair. " That's a good piece of Chippendale ? "
Maurice shook his head.
" You write well though. Gad, some of those
tales were good a little Homerish, a hint of
Rabelais. That last one held my breath. In a
saint's mouth too ! The man who tacked a saint's
name on to that tale had the irony of Anatole France
it came straight from Olympus or from a lover
of Maeve. I split my sides laughing at the chance
of putting it on the Reverend breakfast tables under
the patronage of St. Patrick himself. It makes me
laugh again to think of it." His shoulders moved
a little, and the ends of his waistcoat, but there was
no sound, nor did his face seem mirthful.
Maurice shrugged his shoulders. " I only
translated them," he said simply.
" My dear sir, I didn't say you invented them.
If you had but I'm getting too old for prostrations
and it's bad for one's clothes. But you found the
right word that I'll swear, though I don't know
Irish and that's something."
He moved his chair to the table and sat down
282 WAITING
again, pulling his beard softly. " Now about those
other things of yours they won't do at all you'd
know it yourself if you read The Star diligently."
" Not good enough ? " Maurice said resignedly.
" I did my best, though, to make them true to life."
He looked at the marble mantelpiece with a
puzzled frown.
" Adams," Breslin said. He chuckled, this time
andibly. " Truth ! ah, indeed, what is it ? And
you versed in the irony of folk too ! Truth !
pestiferous thing ! a weary search, and the reward
dust and ashes. I told you I tried the game once."
He waved his hand round the room, " I had to
pawn all these 'twas years before I was able to
redeem them. No, my friend, your truth won't do
at all on the subjects of those articles you sent me,"
he added gravely after a pause. " Priests and
politicians and gombeen men ! " gazing pensively at
the decoration on the celling. " All the regular
subscribers to The Star ! The whole truth about
them is found in my leading articles. I hold the
mirror up to nature none of your vulgar mirrors
that reflect a pimple or a squint or a crooked tie,
but a magic mirror." He leant back and stroked
his beard. " Hey, presto ! I hold it up, and you
see men, not perhaps as they are, nor even as they
see themselves, but as they wish the world to see
them. Who knows ? " he added with a shrug.
Maurice laughed. " I'm afraid my things won't
do," he said dryly, standing up.
" Don't go yet. I've a few minutes before the
infernal grind begins. Sit down a moment. I like
your stuff. It's a weakness, of course." He
fingered a Georgian inkstand. " Write me a series I
don't see why you shouldn't keep it on indefinitely
WAITING 283
simple, non-controversial things a threshing,
games in the country, a fair, a market, a ceilidhe
the thousand and one things. I warn you, I'll blue
pencil anything dangerous. Irony if you are able
and if it is sufficiently elusive I'd like 'em to have
a flavour. Thank God for small mercies," he added
whimsically, " the devils aren't too subtle."
" I might try," Maurice said doubtfully.
" Oh, you'll do 'em all right I've no doubt
about that. If you're bursting with what you call
the truth misguided man there are other rags
that would be glad to have it. They won't pay
you poor devils they're always going smash, but
there's always one about. I'm afraid I must begin
to work. Call again I'm free from four to five, or
better still, Saturday nights, any hour, at my digs
at Dundrum. Supper at seven bachelor pot luck."
He stood up. " Those articles about fourteen
hundred words one or, maybe, two a week say a
pound each say thirty shillings. There's the
Dundrum address." He shook hands, walked half-
way across the room with Maurice, said " a moment,"
turned back to the desk, took a plain, brown paper
covered booklet from under a heap of proofs.
" Put it in your pocket privately printed those
bishops ! selections from Petronius I envy you
the mot juste though."
Maurice walked down the stairs half dazed, the
beautiful room and the trim Breslin still in his eyes.
Surely he was impossible, he thought, as he stood in
the grimy hall. Three or four pallid men passed
him by and down a long passage to the back
printers, he supposed. When he got to the street,
he crossed over and gazed at the dingy house.
The light from a street lamp fell on a discoloured
284 WAITING
board, under the first-floor windows, u The Star of
Liberty," printed on it in large letters. Breslin
seemed even more unreal. It was all a joke. And
he was to write nice, harmless things ! He raged,
along the Green, against The Star of Liberty, Breslin,
bishops, and publicans. In the middle of Grafton
Street he was composing a sketch of a country
wedding. He liked it. At the gate of Trinity he
thought of Alice. He stood gaping at the dimly
lighted archway, at other lights beyond, at the
uniform of the porter who lounged into the light.
That cap Why these articles changed his
position completely. The realization was a shock.
He steadied himself by touching the railings. His
fingers tingled. He stuck his hands in his overcoat
pocket and walked on. With his folk column two
pounds ten a week, perhaps four pounds. It was
wealth untold. More than enough for that cottage.
He leant against the parapet of O'Connell bridge
and watched the lights, in long broken flames,
swaying deep down in the water. And there was
still seventy pounds in the savings bank far more
than they'd need for furniture. He walked on.
Tram cars flashed gay lights at him. In the dark
vault above the wires, the stars had a kind look.
He jostled against a soldier and his sweetheart and
lifted his hat. " The bloke is blind," in response
made him smile. He had got to the top of Sackville
Street before he noticed that he had passed the Pillar
and his tram. He railed against himself for think-
ing so much about money. It was an insult to
Alice too. He watched people go in to the Gaelic
League Rooms. He would take that up again
and other things. And those other papers what
matter if they didn't pay. . . .
WAITING 285
He posted the sketch before going to bed. Two
days afterwards he had a proof and a note from
Breslin : " That's the stuff. Do two a week."
He took the afternoon train to Dundrum. A
policeman, busy warming his gloved hands in the
waiting-room, knew all about the cottage.
" A lonesome place and windy they call it
* The Firs ' and to be got for a song, for all the
year round. Sonny Fogarty has the letting of it,"
he said with friendly interest. " I'll show you the
way to him."
Maurice saw the cottage a living room, a
scullery, two bedrooms and a loft under Sonny
Fogarty's guidance.
" There's great accommodation in the loft," Sonny
said impressively. " You could put this and that in
it, or a bed, and be kept warm at night by the heat
of the kitchen fire." He waxed eloquent over the
eave-shoots, and a green and white water-barrel out-
side the scullery door, " and the spring well, by the
clump of furze beyond, couldn't be beat for coldness
even in the middle of summer."
" The sea and the mountains aren't everybody's
bargain," Sonny said doubtfully. But Maurice was
thinking of Bourneen, of which the sea, stretching
away beyond Howth Head, reminded him. His
abstraction saved him something in the rent, for
Sonny hastened to make apologies for mountain and
sea. " Nearly always, they are as quiet as a lamb,
and if they'd get headstrong itself, why, with the
porch in front, and the way the door is set in it, and
the scullery behind, not a breath can come at you."
As Maurice still made no sign, he went on excitedly,
the fat shaking in waves all over his enormous figure,
for he was six feet two, and broad and deep, " It's
286 WAITING
none of them cottages with a clay floor to it, but the
best of a boarded floor in the kitchen sorra quality
house in the country has better. And signs on it
ladies are running over each other, in the summer
months, trying to get it. Real quality, though they
often tramp about the grass without a shoe or
stocking to their foot it's a way the quality have
if they're given to dabbing paint on a piece of paper
and calling it a cow, or the peep of dawn or the like.
Howsomever, I don't deny I'd rather a yearly tenant,
being a load ofF a man's mind. What'd you say
to ten pounds a year now ? "
Maurice said "All right," cheerfully. His ready
acceptance depressed Sonny. " It's giving it away,
I am," he said, throwing out his hands despairingly,
his ridiculous boyish treble taking a sharper note :
" all them cupboards in holes and corners, and that
grand brick pavement round the fire to warm your
toes on of a winter's night, and a gravel path fornint
the front door, and and all the other conveniences."
He gave a sigh that shook his whole frame. As
they walked back to Dundrum he became more
cheerful. " The wife she's a small woman in size
but powerful in the tongue, sorra woman in Dun-
drum has half her virtue in it she often says to me
by the way of no harm, ' Sonny, you're a fool.' And
I wouldn't say but she's right. But then, ten
pounds isn't bad for an airy house the like of that,
that's too dear for them that it'd suit to take it in
the middle of winter, and too small for them that
could pay for it." He was still trying to explain
this cryptic statement as they signed an agreement.
In handing over the key he said timidly, " Meaning
no disrespect, but seeing that I don't know you from
Adam, would you think it'd be presuming on you to
WAITING 287
ask you for a trifle down, to show that you're in
earnest ? "
Maurice walked home. Now and again he put
his hand in his pocket and fingered the key with
a feeling of satisfaction. It was a gloomy walk,
between high demesne walls, dimly lit at long
intervals by gas lamps, but his feet struck the road
cheerfully. He saw the stars and was happy. Alice
was coming on Saturday. Poor old Driscoll they
would have him up to stay with them. He laughed
at the recollection of Father Mahon. The laugh
died away thinly and his steps became slower. It
flashed through his mind that he was not yet done
with Father Mahon. He touched the key again, but
it had lost its power of assurance. He had the
house, but was not yet married. There was still the
dispensation to get. The high walls took on a
sinister aspect. He stood for a moment at the
frowning entrance to a big demesne. He idly won-
dered who lived there. Then he laughed harshly.
It was a convent, of course, or a monastery. All the
big places round Dublin were occupied by priests or
nuns. The long arm of Father Mahon stretched
everywhere. Resignation was preached to those
wretches in the slums from these palaces. But this
mood did not last long. Some inborn instinct, of
his faith or his peasant training, made him take oflF
his hat almost unconsciously and say reverently,
" May God forgive me for criticising them." Dris-
coll often said, too, that " one wasn't to judge the old
faith by its priests, and if it went to that, some of
them were as good as you'd meet in a day's walk."
All the same, he thought one would have more trust
in them if they were a little more like the religion
they professed. There he was at his criticising
288 WAITING
again ! He stepped out quickly to shake off these
thoughts. The next convent wall brought them
back. Lamps became more frequent. A tram was
standing at the end of a track. He entered it.
The lights, and two old women discussing a rise in
the price of sugar, made him calmer. He bought
an evening paper and tried to read it, but the dis-
pensation worried him. He would see some priest
about it. They were not all Father Mahons. That
old friar, to whom he had been to confession in the
church off the quay, seemed kind. The tram began
to move. He held the paper open in front of him,
but, over it, he studied intently an advertisement of
some desiccated soup, which appeared and dis-
appeared as the heads of the old women opposite
bobbed up and down. . . .
He got off the tram at O'Connell Bridge and
was soon in the church. A few lights struggled
against the dust, and a haze that came in from the
river. Several people were praying in the nave.
The seats round the confessionals, in the aisles,
were packed. He wondered why there were so
many people, till he remembered that it was the eve
of the first Friday of the month. He prayed
awhile, and took his place in the queue at Father
Evangelist's box. As penitent after penitent was
heard he moved up slowly on the long seat, nearer
to the confessional. The dark shadows, the muttered
prayers, the jingling of beads, the click of the slides
of the confession boxes, the immense indrawn
sigh that seemed to fill the gaunt, stuffy church,
made him impatient and irritable. . . .
Father Evangelist opened the slide and blessed
him.
" How long since your last confession ? "
WAITING 289
" I don't want confession. It's about a marriage.
How is a Catholic to get a dispensation to marry a
Protestant ? " he said hesitatingly.
The old priest lifted the curtain in front of the
box, so that the dim light shone a little on Maurice's
face. He peered closely.
"Hum, hum. Well, well. What a question
to pop at a man. Maybe, you'd better make your
confession after all I'd be better able to advise
you."
" I only want to know how to get the dis-
pensation."
" Well, I'm hurried anyway to-night," the priest
said with a sigh. " Look for it, you mean for you
might get it or you might not. It's not as easy here
as in some other places. But that's neither here
nor there, for we poor friars have nothing to say to
it. The seculars keep the like of that to themselves.
Go to your parish priest, my son, and he'll tell you
what to do or what not to do in the matter. Doing
nothing is often the wisest in an affair of the kind.
Where do you live now ? "
Maurice told him.
" Oh, that's Father Cafferley a wise man. See
him. God bless you, my son." He waved his
hand as he shut the slide.
It was not much progress, Maurice thought, as
he left the church, but at least he knew whom to
ask. When he reached his lodgings he found a
letter from Alice. She and her father were coming
to tea with him on Saturday. At first she intended
to surprise him, but it would be dreadful if he
should not be at home, or if there was no plum
cake. He forgot the dispensation in a discussion
with Mrs. Reed on the possibilities of the tea.
u
290 WAITING
" Of course, 'tis no trouble at all," she said,
looking round the room critically. " A screen I have
without can be put round the bed, and the wash-
stand hid behind it. And I'll bring in my best
cups and teapot, and make a real country cake
for ye."
" A plum cake ? " he said diffidently.
" I would and welcome," she said doubtfully,
" but it has a habit of never rising for me. You'd
best buy it. It's better to be sure than sorry."
He wrote to Alice to Tyrone, and another note
to Drumcondra, lest she might miss the first. He
sat for a couple of hours over a sketch for Breslin,
but the thought of seeing Father Cafferley, and the
tea, kept the end of his pen against his teeth. He
threw it down on an unfinished page and went
to bed.
Though he dreamed of the tea, Father Cafferley
occupied his mind when he awoke. At breakfast he
inquired of Mrs. Reed where the parish priest lived.
For the first time he learned that she was not a
Catholic.
" I am not his kind," she said, " but to be sure
I know his house well a decent looking, distant
man that keeps himself to himself."
At ten o'clock, following Mrs. Reed's elaborate
directions, he set out by the priest's house. As he
rang the door opened, and a smartly dressed, elderly
priest stood on the threshold. He looked at
Maurice keenly, said " Well ? " and began to button
a grey suede glove.
" Father Cafferley ? "
" Your business ? I'm in a hurry- just going
into town."
" May I have a few minutes "
WAITING 291
" You've wasted that already surely one of the
curates will do, they are inside."
" I would rather speak to you."
Father Cafferley made a gesture of impatience,
adjusted his well-ironed hat to a slightly rakish angle,
brushed a speck of dust off a boot with the glove
he had not yet put on, looked at Maurice super-
ciliously, and said sharply
" This is come in here." He banged the door,
and led the way into a small room in which there
was a desk and a bookcase. " Well ? " he said
again, standing with his hat on, and folding his
umbrella with neatness and precision.
Maurice was fascinated by the glossy figure, by
the gloss of the hat, of the freshly shaven face, of
the collar, of the satin stock, of the clothes, of the
heavy gold watchchain, of the pointed boots. Even
the umbrella was covered with some glossy stuff
that reflected the light. It was folded to a thin
stick as Maurice said
" I want a dispensation for a mixed marriage.
Could I trouble '
" Do you belong to this parish ? "
" I lodge in Briar Lane."
" Oh, there ! " with another look at Maurice's
clothes. " With whom ? "
" Mrs. Reed."
Father Cafferley pursed his lips, his snub nose
inclining upwards thoughtfully.
" Don't know her. A Catholic ? "
" I believe not."
"Oh!" lowering his voice an octave. "A
lodger, you say ? Here to-day and away to-morrow,
and bothering me ! It is really too bad, my good
man. But everybody in this world is unreasonable.
292 WAITING
You come from the country I see by " his eyes
said " clothes " " by your accent." He spoke
himself as if he suffered from adenoids. "You
have a parish priest of your own, I presume ? Go
to him."
" He has refused me."
" Oh ! Who is he ? "
" Father Mahon, of Bourneen, near Liscannow."
Father Cafferley pursed his lips again. " I
know him well a most respectable and distinguished
priest, one of the staunchest supporters of our
Catholic Truth Society, spoken of for a bish "
His voice had lost its patronizing tone and he spoke
sharply. " My good man, this puts an entirely
different complexion on the affair. I can do nothing.
Do you intend to stay in this parish ? " he added
doubtfully.
" No."
"Then that settles it," the priest said with
relief. " One's own parishioners are bad enough,"
he continued, with a rising angry inflection, " but
every every man from the whole country comes
up here bothering us Dublin priests. Good morn-
ing, sir, you've already kept me an unconscionable
time." He drew out a heavily cased gold watch.
" I've lost ten minutes of my valuable time with you."
Maurice, whose anger was slowly growing,
managed to restrain himself. He asked quietly,
" Can I get no priest in Dublin to attend to this ? "
He was retreating backward towards the door, under
pressure of the point of the umbrella under Father
Cafferley 's arm.
" Oh, they might listen to you at the Vicariate."
"Listen ? " Maurice said bitterly : "and send the
fool further, I suppose."
WAITING 293
" Ha, ha, ha ! " Father CafFerley laughed, " not
bad that. I must tell it to the vicars, they'll enjoy
it." They were now at the front door. The priest
descended the steps, turned round and said, "The
Vicariate," chuckled, set his face gravely, and strutted
away along the pavement.
From the top step, a fierce anger clouding his
brain, Maurice watched him till he disappeared
round a corner. Was it any use going to the
Vicariate ? he asked himself, without troubling about
the reply. He wandered through the streets, seeing
nothing. Unconsciously he must have had a purpose,
for he found himself inquiring for the Vicariate. A
policeman shook his head. " I never heard tell of
the like." He asked a sacristan who was beating
mats against the railings in front of a church.
" The next house," he said.
" The vicars ? It isn't their day," the man who
opened the door said. Maurice's distrait look must
have appealed to him for he added, " But by
accident there's one of 'em within he might see
you."
A kind old priest listened patiently to his tale,
though, at times, he interjected gently, "This is
highly informal, highly informal." When he had
heard all the circumstances he said, after some
reflection, " You couldn't put a little more pressure
on her ? all for the good of her soul, you know."
Maurice shook his head.
The old man spoke, at length, of domiciles and
quasi-domiciles, letters of freedom, application
direct to Rome, the expense, the necessity of
observing an orderly procedure.
" What am I to do then ? " Maurice asked,
bewildered.
294 WAITING
" It's exceedingly complicated," the priest said,
and he again gave a long rambling explanation of
domicile which Maurice was unable to follow. " So
you see, all things considered, far the best thing for
you is to make friends with your parish priest in the
country. What did you say his name was ? Father
Mahon I think I've heard of him. A good man,
I'm sure, at the bottom, if you'd only take him the
right way."
"So that is all," Maurice said drearily.
" Only that you have my sympathy any poor
fellow in trouble has it," the priest said, rising, " and
pray pray that's the great thing."
Maurice wandered again through the streets.
Somewhere away at the back of his mind there was
something worrying him. He knew it was there
by a dull ache in the pit of his stomach. But he
did not try to bring it into consciousness. Besides,
there was so much to see. The surface of his mind
was keenly alert. He was interested in the traffic,
in a type of van horse that he saw for the first time,
in the faces of the crowd. Priests passed there
seemed hundreds of them. For no particular reason
that he was conscious of, he looked at them more
closely than at the other passers-by. He saw them
as so many foppish and jaunty Father Cafferleys,
or scowling Father Mahons, or earnest Father
Malones. That one had the kind of face of the old
vicar, this was like Father Delahunty he looked for
the dogs at his heels and was disappointed at not
seeing them. He watched a football match through
the college railings, and the gulls wheeling over the
river by O'Connell Bridge. . . .
He got home late and worked feverishly far into
the night. He was awakened out of a dreamless
WAITING 295
sleep by Mrs. Reed's voice shouting through the
half-opened door :
" I didn't like to waken you before, you were
that sound. But it's near dinner-time and the
people coming to tea, and the room to be done up,
and aired. You can make dinner and breakfast of the
one meal, and then, be off with you till I settle things
up. And don't forget the cake when you're out."
The tea was hardly a success. The plum cake
was good. The soda cake was done to a turn.
Alice, who arrived looking her best and in high
spirits, soon had a sad expression in her eyes.
Maurice was moody and depressed to begin with.
Mr. Barton's hilarious anecdotes of his life at
Scrutton's, when, as a young man, he "lived in,"
evoked stony smiles from Maurice and made him
only more and more silent. Anger pent up in him
since he left the Vicariate yesterday, seemed now to
choke him. His lips were dry and his tongue stuck
to his palate. He wanted to use explosive language,
but he had to listen to those stories about Scrutton's.
Alice's smiles became fewer and fewer. He caught
her looking at him and tried to smile. It must have
been a sickly effort, he thought, as he caught her
anxious glance a few seconds later. She lowered
her eyes quickly and he sat staring at her with a
frown. At last Mr. Barton rose.
"A very pleasant visit, Blake. We enjoyed
ourselves eh, Alice ? "
" What is it ? " Alice asked, lingering behind.
"That damned dispensation," Maurice said
angrily.
" Oh, that ! " she said with relief. She gave a
low laugh. " I'll be at the tram at eleven to-
morrow and we can go somewhere."
296 WAITING
She had never seemed more desirable, yet he
was glad he was alone. He was angry with Barton
for coming, though he shrank from the possibility
of any intimate talk with Alice. What was he
going to do about the marriage ? And to-morrow
he should have to make some explanation to Alice.
He seized his hat and went out. He tried to think,
but all sorts of irrelevant details filled his mind
Father Cafferley's gloves and Father Mahon's pro-
truding under-lip and the Adams mantelpiece in
Breslin's room. He boarded a passing tram and
spelled out the advertisements. At the Pillar he
changed into another tram without thinking of
where it was going. Alice took it too lightly, he
thought. The next moment he muttered between
his teeth that she was right. He was not going to
be crushed by Father Mahon. . . .
Three hours later he stood under a lamp-post
in Dundrum deciphering Breslin's address from a
crumpled card which he found, after long searching,
in the pocket of his waistcoat. The name
" Dundrum " on the post office had just reminded
him of Breslin's invitation and luckily this was
Saturday night. His anger had spent itself till only
a dull resentment remained more against himself,
for his boorishness at tea, than against Father Mahon
for placing obstacles in the way of his marriage, or
against Father CafFerley for his cynical indifference.
There must be some way out of the difficulty.
Thousands of mixed marriages took place every
year. No matter how active was Father Mahon's
hostility there must be some way of overcoming it.
A passing errand boy pointed out the way to
Breslin's house. He was still seated at the table
in the dining-room, when Maurice was shown in.
WAITING 297
A book lay back upwards beside him. He held a
coffee cup half-way to his lips. The only light in
the room, except a glowing fire, a low shaded lamp
on the table, was turned towards a picture on the
wall opposite, a bunch of carnations in a cut-glass
tumbler.
" Stand here, just behind me you get it ? "
" It seems all right," Maurice said indifferently.
Breslin shrugged his shoulders, murmured,
a Poor Fantin," stood up, and turned on more
lights. " Some supper ? " he said.
Maurice said he did not want to eat.
" Take that armchair then, and we shall have
some coffee by the fire it's warmer here than in
my study. Do you like this room ?"
" It's different," Maurice hesitated, his eyes on
Breslin's coloured jacket. " The other room is
severe, this is a riot "
" That's better you see." He waved his arm :
" this colour scheme starts from my smoking jacket.
It takes one out of the damned grey of the country
the grey skies, and the hideous grey slates, and
the grey lives of the people. They have grey souls
if we could only see them."
" The people would have some colour in their
lives if they only got the chance," Maurice said,
taking a cigarette from a box which Breslin held out.
Breslin laughed ironically. " The country is
dying," he said lightly. He waved a hand to the
pictures on the walls. "An opiate for me for the
others," he jerked his hand towards the window,
" the green and gold sentimentality of The Star and
the Church."
" Nonsense the country has only begun to
live. Everywhere there are signs "
298 WAITING
" I've seen them so often there's a monthly
rose in bloom in the garden outside now, in
December pretty illusions."
" Illusions that will burst up The Star some
day," Maurice said doggedly.
" Youth ! " Breslin said dryly. " Have more
coffee ? You are looking at that mantelpiece
picked it up in an old house in William Street.
Take my word for it, young man, the golden rule
in life is to back the strongest side one has power
it's a pretty toy and those," he waved his hand
again towards the pictures. " You've knocked your
head against the Church once a second knock
might be fatal."
Maurice frowned, and threw his cigarette into
the fire.
" Say it out," Breslin drawled, his lazy eyes
gleaming a little. " You can damn priests and
bishops as much as you like in this room. Outside
well, I'm the editor of The Star, and " His
eyes wandered to the table. He stretched out a
hand, took up the book, and turned over a few
leaves. " Riders to the Sea," he said, " as strong
as anything in Aeschylus and more simple. But
all his plays are good. The Playboy "
"Why, you damned it ten times in your
paper."
" Did I ? " He shrugged his shoulders. " Well,
I'll give you ten reasons for thinking it one of the
best plays that has yet come out of Ireland."
He spoke for three or four minutes with some
enthusiasm, took up the poker, tapped idly at a big
lump of coal in the grate, stopped in the middle of
a sentence before he had finished with his first
reason, and said abruptly
WAITING 299
" Tell me where you got your faith ? "
Maurice was taken aback. "I just believe the
country will come right," he said emphatically.
" Yes, yes but why ? " Breslin said, leaning
back in his chair and watching the fire.
" For a thousand reasons," Maurice said.
When he tried to put them into words, they
sounded very thin in his own ears. He looked at
Breslin anxiously now and again, but his eyes were
fixed on the fire.
"A handful of jealous small farmers working
together and sinking their differences, an old school-
master with ideals, a priest with a love of his people,
a few women capable of sacrifice, a growing tolerance
of the religious views of others. It may not seem
much to you to build a nation on," Maurice wound
up, "but it makes my faith unshakable."
" A carpenter's son and a camel driver influenced
millions," Breslin said musingly. " It is the faith
itself that is puzzling the weakness or strength of
the evidence doesn't matter a rap. Do these people
share your faith ? "
" They do."
" And that brother of yours who dislikes The
Star ? A Leaguer too, you say ? Is he active in
politics ? "
" Yes."
" Well, The Star can change its policy if he
wins ! It would be interesting to run a paper again
on lines one shouldn't despise. But I hope not
I hope not. One might be tempted to believe,
and faith is too harrowing," with a wry smile. He
poked the fire to a blaze. " After all, Father Mahon
drove you out, though you had all these people at
your back," he said slyly.
300 WAITING
" That can't happen in a few years," Maurice
said hopefully. " The people want a little more
courage. Many of them see clearly enough give
them a little time and they will act."
" Meanwhile I warm myself at the clerical fire,"
Breslin said, spreading out his hands. He changed
the conversation, and talked of poetry.
Maurice listened in wonder. Poems that he
vaguely liked discovered new and undreamt-of
beauties on Breslin's lips. Maurice forgot the
leading articles in The Star, the cynical view of life,
in Breslin's fine rapture over Shelley something
in his eyes too, some tone in his voice was sympa-
thetic and sincere. . . .
A reference to a folk tale led Maurice to speak
of Bourneen, and of his life there. Unconsciously
he drifted into a full account of his leaving, of Alice,
of the difficulties about his marriage.
" t Damn it," Breslin said irritably, when Maurice
spoke of Father Cafferley. He laughed. " Poor
old CafFerley. I wonder where he was off to
at that hour it was too early for a tea party in
some publican's back parlour. That light tenor
voice of his hasn't cracked yet. It keeps him in great
request. If you had your clothes made by Scott
he'd have given you more time, but " he looked
at Maurice's clothes. "Anyhow, he didn't think
you worth his trouble. I don't know that he could
do anything for you in any case. I tell you what
I'd do, if I were so foolish as to be getting married
and wasn't editor of The Star in fact, if I were you :
I'd go quietly to a registry office and let all their
reverences, reverend and most reverend, go to hell."
Maurice stared at him, a troubled look in his
eyes. " That never struck me," he said slowly.
WAITING 301
Breslin was now excited. He stood up and
walked to and fro, rumpling with his fingers the
thick locks of hair on his forehead.
" No, you wouldn't think of it. You fellows
who kick against the tyranny of the clergy make me
sick. You talk and talk, and then lie down meekly
under their most extravagant pretensions you're all
afraid to fight them with their own weapons." He
stood still, looking at the fire. After a few seconds
he gave a low chuckle. " If I hadn't to sit frock-
coated every Sunday under the pulpit in the parish
church I'd make 'em sit up." This seemed to
amuse him so much that he laughed again.
" It's not fear," Maurice said. " Isn't it a
sin ? "
Breslin looked at him pityingly through half-
closed lids.
" Sin," he said musingly : " that opens up a pretty
discussion but it would take half the night," he
looked at an old clock on the mantelpiece, " and
if you want to catch the last train we shouldn't have
well begun before you leave. A sin to break that
trumpery regulation about mixed marriages ! After
all, the idea of sin has a certain dignity. That's
degrading it. This blessed dispensation that they've
been making such a fuss about with you, sending
you from pillar to post like a fool what is it ?
Only the pope dispenses, the theology books say.
Though the fact is that every bishop I'm told our
bishop here doesn't take them, and that's to his credit
gets from Rome a lot of blank forms, like my Sun-
day Zoo tickets, and thenceforward is pope himself
in the matter. The play begins. The victim of the
wiles of a Protestant goes to his parish priest. A
schoolmaster, of course, is done for from the start
302 WAITING
With the Church's peculiar notions of scandal, the
idea of a teacher marrying a Protestant is anathema.
Besides, there's no inducement to fleece a dependent
poor beggar like him he can be got at in other
ways. But suppose the applicant were well-to-do,
and, more or less, independent of the priest ? His
reverence I'm speaking generally, of course, there
are notable exceptions would pull a long face. * It
is a very difficult matter indeed. Rome is difficult
of approach it must be done through the bishop.
But it's possible, of course, and I'll do my best
to help.' You know the kind of thing. * The
children must be brought up Catholics. You must
promise to try to convert the young lady.' You'd
think religion was a brand of tooth-powder or a
style in summer hats. ' And you must have
some reasons,' the good man would go on. * I'll
look them up in the theology book but you can
leave them to me. I'll see that they're all right.'
And then, at the end remember it's the time of a
man's life when he has less sense than an idiot,
* You will pay something substantial his lordship's
trouble the upkeep of an expensive office at the
Curia the pope. But bear clearly in mind, it's
only for secretarial expenses the dispensation itself
is free, gratis and for nothing.' That repetition
does the trick a couple of penny stamps and a few
sheets of note-paper run up phenomenally depends
on the good father's knowledge of the bank balance
of the applicant twenty pounds, fifty, a hundred
I've known more to be paid." He rubbed his
hands gleefully. " The humour of The Star of
Liberty pales before it."
Maurice was too indignant to see humour in
anything. " But when he had got rid of me as
WAITING 303
teacher why didn't Mahon get me the dispensation
then ? I'd have paid."
Breslin shrugged his shoulders and looked at
Maurice quizzically. "You show a nice sense of
character in those sketches of yours, but " he
gazed at the ceiling. " You're the type that sees
nothing where you're involved yourself. I don't
know Mahon, but I see him clearly in what you told
me. No money not anything you could give
certainly would repair his wounded self-love."
" The bishop then ? He's not that kind ? "
" I'll have doubts about your being able to do
those sketches," Breslin said gravely. He smiled
with his white, even teeth. "This blindness might
wear off with the ridiculous fever that's on you for
goodness' sake get married at once. Hannigan ! If
I know any man I know him the diffident, humble
manner covering the pride of Lucifer. Run you'll
only just catch your train. Take my advice about
the marriage. Keep it as quiet as you can you
may get known one day, and then they might make
trouble though it's as valid according to Church
law as it is by the law of the land. As if it made a
pin's difference in any case," he called after Maurice
jeeringly from the door- step.
By sprinting he just caught the train. It jolted
horribly. Acrid smoke drifted in through the open
window. The weight that oppressed his mind for
days had gone. The registry, of course, was absurd,
he said to himself. Breslin would have his joke.
No Catholic could go against the rules or his
Church. . . . He walked up and down the empty
compartment. How should one set about this
registry marriage ? He sat down and drummed
his feet on the bare floor. What if there was
304 WAITING
something in the idea after all ? He laughed at the
memory of Breslin's description. What would they
say in Bourneen ? No, he couldn't do it. Still it
was a valid marriage. He could find out all about
it in the free library. His fingers tingled with cold.
He thrust his hands into his pockets. He pulled
out a big door-key and glanced at it curiously. He
had forgotten all about that. The house was waiting.
Should he write to Father Mahon again ? But that
was hopeless. The absurd man, and he could get
married in spite of him. . . . And Alice ? An intense
longing for her overcame him. . . . All the way
home the objections to Breslin's solution became
feebler and feebler . . . they recurred as he un-
dressed in his cold room, but, always, he had an
answer ready. . . .
At eleven next morning he met Alice j at the
tram.
" What has come over you ? You look so
happy," she said wonderingly.
I am."
He hurried her into the tram. "Where are we
going ? " she asked.
" Oh, somewhere," he said joyfully. He inquired
about her work in Tyrone, but didn't listen to a
word she said. A girl opposite looked gloomy.
He wondered why every one wasn't happy on such a
glorious day.
" Dundrum," she said in a pleased voice, as he
took tickets at Harcourt Street Station. " It's lucky
I brought sandwiches."
On the mountain road, opposite the cottage, she
said, " No one has taken it yet."
He handed her the key. " I have we have
taken it," he said, watching her face.
WAITING 305
She looked from the key to him, her lips slightly
parted. A deep blush slowly suffused her face and
neck, a tear overflowed on her eyelid.
" Maurice ! " her lips scarcely moved and her
eyes dropped.
He kissed her. After a while she looked up.
" But can we ? " she said, her lips trembling.
He told her about the work for Breslin, and all
that had happened since. They walked towards the
cottage as he spoke. He opened the door. In the
kitchen she listened without a word, standing by
the window overlooking the sea, her eyes fixed on
Howth head.
" So there's no reason why we shouldn't get
married any day," he wound up.
She sighed a little regretfully.
" You're not sorry ? " he said anxiously.
<c No I'm so glad it has a sad feeling," she
said, leaning her cheek against his arm. " Not soon
not for ever so long," she said, standing away
from him. Sitting on the window sill, he watched
her move about from room to room.
" I'm glad you won't have to promise to convert
me," she called out. Afterwards she approached
him with a look of grave concern.
" Well ? " he said eagerly.
" I think we'll do this room with rush matting
that greenish stuff."
Breslin was the only guest invited to the wedding.
On the back of an envelope he replied, " Certainly
not. The editor of The Star of Liberty discounte-
nances any such wicked exercise of freedom though
L. B. sends you both his best wishes." A week
later he wrote again : " Those egregious people have
306 WAITING
been tinkering with their marriage laws some new
rot beginning * Ne Temere.' To-morrow I'll have
a leader, applauding it, in The Star. I haven't yet
grasped its full effect. You might read The Star
for once and see what you make of the thing. In
any case it's all the more necessary to keep your
little affair quiet."
" c Little affair,' indeed," Alice said, tossing her
head, when she read the letter, " we must hurry off
to see those pots and things. Shall I throw this in
the fire ? there's nothing in it."
Maurice nodded.
Within a week, at eleven o'clock one morning,
in a shabby registry office, dark with fog that blew
in from the sea, under the spluttering flare of a gas
jet, they were married.
CHAPTER XX
ALICE stood for a moment at the window watching
the last of the day. She lit a lamp on the desk by
her side, but she still lingered, the cord of the blind
in her hand, her eyes on a silver-grey patch of sky,
towards which a mass of sullen, black cloud was
slowly creeping. She sighed and pulled down the
blind.
" Sun gone bye-bye," a child said solemnly from
the centre of the floor.
Alice turned and looked at her.
" Sun wake up again," the child said, nodding
confidentially.
" There now, Alice, Maureen is teaching you
sense," Maurice said cheerfully from the settle, on
which he was stretched, smoking, idly watching rings
float up to the ceiling. " Besides, you know it's
shining brighter every day there isn't a cloud any-
where near it."
Maureen stared at him with wide-open, big blue
eyes, her little red lips pursed up.
" You little treasure," Alice said, sitting on the
floor.
Maureen's eyes brightened. This was some-
thing she understood. " Mammy put dolly bye-bye.
Daddy get dolly's bed," she said imperiously,
pushing back the golden hair that fell thick and
touzled over her forehead.
3 o8 WAITING
Maurice jumped up and fished out a battered
doll's bed from under a table.
" Not daddy, not mammy, only Maureen done
it," the child said, taking possession of the bed and
pushing Maurice aside. She sat down and was
soon spreading sheets and blankets with much care,
then, with one pull, sweeping them, doll and all, on
to the floor. This she repeated half a dozen times,
saying occasionally " Maureen busy," while Alice,
on a low chair by the side of the open fire-place,
watched her lovingly.
" I can't help feeling afraid," she said, " and we
have been so happy nearly three years."
Maurice, half sitting on the table at her back,
put out his hand and fingered her hair.
" Afraid of what ? " he asked.
" Of nothing of everything I suppose it's
foolish but I can't help it."
He moved and stood in front of the fire.
" The convention may not choose me. Tom
may have been mistaken Breslin is certain the
League man will get in. Even if I am chosen I
can retire. I'd far rather be as I am," he spoke
hesitatingly, with a little catch in his voice, staring
at the dresser at the end of the room.
"Dolly wake up," Maureen said, shaking a
grimy faced doll violently.
" That's what you ought to do with me," Alice
said, stroking his hand. She stood up. " Retire,
indeed ! you'll do nothing of the kind," she said,
taking hold of his sleeve, her eyes flashing. " After
all your speaking and writing for the last three
years, too."
" The wind is nothing to you for sudden
changes," he said, with a relieved laugh.
WAITING 309
" Tom would never think of sending a telegram,"
she said, looking at the clock. " It must be all over
by now. The evening papers might have it Breslin
will be certain to know and he's home to-night.
You might run down to Dundrum after supper ? "
" Me with a chance of being a Member of
Parliament," Maurice said laughing boyishly. " It
sounds too ridiculous."
Maureen stood, her little arms akimbo, and gave
peal after peal of laughter.
" Maureen laugh too," she said, and started off
again.
" There's no one more fit to be in Parliament,"
Alice said gravely.
" Your mother is an impartial judge," Maurice
said, swinging Maureen in his arms.
"Mammy partial judge partial judge," Maureen
crowed.
" From the lips of babes and sucklings ? "
Maurice said triumphantly.
" But you will run down, Maurice ? I can't sleep
to-night till I know," Alice said eagerly.
The old clock on the wall by the dresser wheezed
six. Maureen clapped her hands.
" Maureen's bath. Only mammy bath me," she
said sidling up to her mother. " Only daddy," she
shouted, rushing to him.
She superintended the bringing in of the tin bath
from the scullery, fussed round it as it lay on the
matting in front of the fire. " Soap ? " she said,
with a distressed look. When this was found, she
watched Maurice take the big pot of boiling water
off the fire and empty it into the bath. " Hot too
hot," she said judicially, her feet wide apart, her
hands clasped behind her knitted blue jersey.
3 io WAITING
When Maurice brought a bucket of cold water from
the scullery she gave a sigh of satisfaction. " Nice
and cold," she said : " only daddy bath Maureen."
He took her in his arms, but she slipped down
again. " Coat off apron," she said reproachfully.
He took off his coat meekly, and put on a flannel
apron. Maureen said approvingly " Sit in daddy's
lap."
He was taking off her shoes when a knock
sounded on the front door. Alice went out to the
porch. Maureen said " postman," over and over
again. Maurice heard a muttered conversation.
" Hurrah, hurrah ! " Alice said, rushing in
excitedly. "The convention has selected you."
"sHe's not elected yet," Breslin said dryly,
following at her heels.
"Bressy, Bressy," Maureen shouted.
"By nearly two to one your own county too.
That's something for Father Mahon," she added
maliciously.
Breslin gave her a sharp look and muttered into
his beard.
Maureen struggled and shouted " Bressy, tick-
tick."
He took his watch off its chain and handed it to
her. " Maureen is a wise woman," he said. " She
ignores conventions and elections and all that rot."
" Only Bressy bath me," Maureen said empha-
tically.
A faint blush tinged the pallid cheeks above his
beard. " I never even saw a child in a bath," he
said, with a helpless look at his immaculate clothes.
" The water is getting cold. It's either you or
Maurice I'm nowhere when there's a man about,"
Alice said.
WAITING 311
Maureen, who was now cuddling round Breslin's
neck, said with a defiant look in her little rebellious
face, " Only Bressy bath me."
" She is so wise," Alice said demurely.
Breslin, following Maureen's minute instructions
donned the apron, took off his coat, turned up the
cuffs of his shirt and struggled with her buttons and
garments. With a set face he laid her at last in the
bath. Her first kick sent a huge splash over his
shirt front. She crowed with delight. Afterwards,
it was " Only Bressy feed Maureen," and " Only
Bressy put Maureen bye-bye." She knelt in her
cot, her hands over her eyes, " Gentle Jesus meek
and mild," she said brokenly. She peeped through
her fingers. " Bressy not kneel on toe-toes," she
complained anxiously. He knelt down. She began
a prayer again. " Bressy say it," she said insis-
tently. When he came out from the bedroom he
was wiping his brow with his handkerchief.
" If you've half her grit, you'll beat us," he said
to Maurice.
" Beat you ? " Maurice said. " Where does the
contest come in ? You can't go back on the con-
vention. There won't be a Unionist candidate, so
I'll have a walk over."
" Get me a looking-glass like a good fellow,"
Breslin said, a faint smile on his lips.
Maurice lit a candle and led the way into the
second bedroom off the kitchen. He left Breslin
there, and coming back to the kitchen lowered a
small pot of potatoes, already simmering on the
crook, nearer to the fire. In a few minutes Breslin
appeared, stroking his beard, all traces of his en-
counter with Maureen gone. He threw himself
into a rush armchair. With an ironic smile, he
3 i2 WAITING
watched Maurice emptying the bath and tidying up
the room.
" They've been on to me already by telephone,"
he said, " and I've been in town. I motored here."
Who ? "
"The League people the head office."
" It was their own convention, under their own
rules. They were beaten. They may as well
accept defeat gracefully," Maurice said lightly.
" I'm going to throw suspicion on the Liscannow
convention in Monday's Star," Breslin said, lighting
a cigarette. He rolled the smoke luxuriously in his
mouth, emitted a series of perfect rings, and watched
them expand with one eye shut.
" Why, only this morning you patted it on the
back. What's this you called it ? in the choicest
Star language * a parliament of free and indepen-
dent citizens, with the authority of a united people
behind it,' and the usual trimmings l faith father-
land patriotism toleration.' '
" On Monday it will be suspect. About the
middle of the week we shall probably say that it was
rigged by a malignant anti-national faction," Breslin
said, blowing more rings.
" You're colossal," Maurice said in mock
admiration.
" Hush," Breslin said, holding up his hand.
From Maureen's bedroom came the low croon-
ing of Alice's voice, with, now and again, the child's
treble, muffled, as if taking the note half asleep.
" It has a charm," Breslin said gently, after a
few minutes.
Maurice poured some water in to a saucepan of
eggs and placed it by the fire.
"The truth is," Breslin said, "our organizer
WAITING 313
down there has been asleep. We're going to slough
him. He was so confident of a walk-over that
he didn't take the usual means "
" So it really was a free convention," Maurice
said, interested.
" Always, when we lose, the convention was
rigged by the other side," Breslin said, with a shrug.
" You give credit to us I suppose you call us
the other side for your own virtues : that is too
generous," Maurice said ironically.
" I won't bandy terms."
He listened again. The crooning still continued,
but in a lower tone. The child's voice came fainter,
and only at long intervals.
" Shut that door it's a little ajar," he whispered.
" I don't want Mrs. Blake to hear us."
Maurice crossed the room on tiptoe and shut
the door. When he returned to the fire-place, he
looked inquiringly at Breslin.
" This is going to be a fight without gloves,"
Breslin said seriously. " Our people are frightened.
They'll stop at nothing. They've organizations
enough, but the people are slipping away. They're
weak in the towns "
" They've got the publicans and slum-owners,
and the priests, in so far it suits the interest of
the Church," Maurice interrupted dryly.
Breslin waved this aside. " The country people
are not as solid as they used to be. Then there are
all you foolish people who make a hash of thinking
for yourselves," he pursed his lips contemptuously.
" The Star talks enough of liberty and toleration.
I've often told you, Louis, that some day the people
would attach some real meaning to those words.
You talk of liberty and tolerance and hound down
3 1 4 WAITING
every one who refuses to bend under your narrow,
bigoted tyranny."
"That's very crude," Breslin said, lighting
another cigarette. " Not good enough even for
a leading article in The Star. But we're wandering
from the point. I advise you to withdraw your
name," he said earnestly. " Don't stand for the
Liscannow division."
Maurice stared at him, then laughed. " Why,
I'm as good as in," he said confidently.
" The League will declare the convention
invalid, and start a candidate of its own."
"They'll only show their weakness," Maurice
said laughing.
"Our people never liked you. You weren't a
thick-and-thin party man. They hate those articles
of yours in The Dawn. They don't want people
to think only to vote straight. They're furious
with you for beating the official candidate. Yet
they'd probably let you in unopposed only "
he stroked his beard, and hesitated. "The Church
will be against you," he continued with a grimace :
" a dismissed teacher ; out of forty priests at the con-
vention only six supported you. We've all the
details already, you see."
" I won, nevertheless," Maurice said firmly.
" You don't see any other complications ? "
Breslin said gently.
" I suppose there'll be the usual rough and
tumble of an election. I don't mind a straight
fight ';
" But it won't be a straight fight." Breslin
pulled an orange slip out of his pocket. " They
got it at the League office five minutes after the
result of the convention a telegram from Father
WAITING 315
Mahon. * Search registry offices of Dublin for
record of marriage of Maurice Blake and Alice
Barton about three years ago.' '
Maurice walked up and down in front of the
fire-place with a set face and clenched hands.
" Will you use that weapon ? " he said bitterly.
" I oh ! damn it, there's some limit," Breslin
said sharply. "No 7 won't use it. The Star wont
either 1 told them at the League office it wouldn't
be wise to mix our man up with it in the Press," he
added dryly, " in view of the action this fellow
Mahon is likely to take. It told with them
danger of a charge of undue influence, etc. They
scented the truth at once I didn't tell them. They
don't half like the whole thing in a way plays into
the hands of the enemy. But you must be beaten
by fair means or foul. The organization couldn't
stand a defeat. They're chuckling for all they're
worth ; but they'll let Mahon and his friends do
the dirty work. Oh yes, the weapon will be used,
and used with a vengeance. Don't face it, Maurice.
I don't mind for yourself but your wife, and the
child."
Maurice stood opposite the fire, his eyes on the
pot which had now begun to boil. He lifted, with
the poker, the lid, which was being forced up and
down by the steam.
"It had to come some time," he said musingly.
" Do you know, I've hardly thought of that Ne Temere
decree since a few days before I was married you
wrote to me, you remember ? never as affecting
myself. Alice and Maureen did you say ? Maureen
will hardly mind. And Alice I'd like to keep her
out of it. It'll be pretty bad, I suppose ? " he
smiled drearily.
3 r6 WAITING
" Mud, garbage, filth," Breslin said emphatically.
Maurice leant his forehead against the beam
across the fireplace.
" And this is religion," he said in a dull, wonder-
ing tone.
" The holier the name the better for leading the
hosts of hell to battle," Breslin said grimly. He
shrugged his shoulders and laughed. "If one only
sees it the right way it's as humorous as The
Star of Liberty. Though I doubt if the poor devils
we trample on have much sense of humour left in
them," he added, looking at Maurice through half-
closed lids. " Have sense, Maurice," he went on
airily, waving his cigarette. " You make a fetish of
names liberty, toleration, religion, principle what
are they? A mirage. Good names enough on a
banner to rouse the mob, but
He pitched his cigarette into the fire, and flicked
carefully some ash off his trousers.
"I'll go down to Liscannow on Monday,"
Maurice said coldly.
"And Mrs. Blake? You'll subject her to all
this ? "
Maurice smiled slowly. " Oh, she believes in
those old names too," he said, lifting the pot from
the fire. He took it to the scullery, poured out
the water, covered the potatoes with a cloth, and
stood the pot beside the fire.
" They're done to a turn. You'll stay to supper,
Louis ? " he said heartily. " The eggs are new
laid."
"That's more than they'll be at Liscannow,"
Breslin said dryly. " You're mad of course the
gods are sometimes merciful to those they are
about to destroy. If it weren't for your wife, I'd
WAITING 317
rather enjoy it." He stared at the fire, and his eyes
gleamed a little. " It's a chance of finding out the
power of these fellows the sodality, the pulpit,
the confessional, and all that in an election."
" Your friends ! " Maurice said mockingly.
" They're of use for the moment. They play
their own game though. Take that damn Ne
Temere. They drop it on us just at the moment
when we're straining our lungs shouting * tolera-
tion.' They knife us with one hand and double
their subscriptions to our funds with the other.
Even I'm in doubt sometimes whether they're using
us or we're using them."
Maurice drew a table in front of the fire.
" You're a great help to a man, Louis," he said
gravely. "Whenever I'm inclined to waver you
set me right. There must be a lot of good in the
people since you fellows haven't killed it long ago.
'Twill win out, yet. I
Alice opened the bedroom door and shut it
behind her quietly.
" She's sound asleep for the night. You can
talk away there's no fear of disturbing her," she
said, taking a cloth from a drawer of the dresser and
laying it on the table. They both watched her
silently.
" Eggs, potatoes, butter, a cold apple tart," she
said, as they sat down to supper, " and I'll make you
some coffee afterwards."
" Excellent," Breslin said somewhat too fervently,
checking a rueful pursing of his lips. " It's so
peaceful and quiet up here," breaking the top off an
egg " ideal. I dream some day of giving up politics
and finding some such retreat as this. That husband
of yours, Mrs. Blake, doesn't know when he's
318 WAITING
happy." Alice looked round the cosy living-room
wistfully. (i And of all the purposeless worries of
life," he continued, "Parliament is the worst a
man can do nothing there."
" Maurice can," she said eagerly, her eyes
brightening. " He'll have a chance of doing the
things he has been saying for years. Now that he'll
be inside the party but I'll spare his feelings,"
looking at Maurice affectionately. "You can't
suppress his speeches in future in The Star" she
added, turning to Breslin with a smile.
" There's nothing we're not capable of doing in
The Star" he said calmly.
" Some day I know you'll see the truth," she
said simply. " Maureen trusts you. You "
She stopped abruptly and blushed.
" It shows how weak is the evidence of faith,"
he drawled. "Tell her, Maurice," and he busied
himself with his egg.
She listened in silence while Maurice spoke,
for the most part with her eyes bent on her plate.
Once she looked at the door of Maureen's bedroom
for a moment, and once at Maurice's face, as if
interested in his appearance rather than in what he
was saying.
" But we are married," she said in a faltering
voice, when he finished. She looked helplessly at
Maurice.
"For ever," he said quietly.
" Not only in the eyes of the law, but before
God?"
" Father Mahon will say you are not ; people
will believe him and say things it will hurt you to
hear," Breslin said gently.
She did not take her eyes off Maurice's face.
WAITING 319
" Before God ? Maurice," she repeated solemnly,
" you believe it ? "
" As firmly as that I live."
Her eyes flashed. She turned to Breslin. "It
doesn't matter to us what these people say now,"
she said proudly.
CHAPTER XXI
FOR some miles, as the train wound sinuously
through the valley, Maurice had been dreamily re-
cognizing familiar objects Slieve Mor, at different
angles ; Greenawn Abbey, which he had once
visited with Driscoll.
" It seems only yesterday," he said. " But
three years is a long time I wonder what it will all
be like."
" Mountain," Maureen said gleefully, standing
on the seat, her face pressed against the glass of the
window.
" I dare say it will be a hard pull," Maurice
said, with a short laugh.
" Your work in The Dawn will tell," Alice said
cheerfully. " Remember what Tom said in his
letter how enthusiastic those men at the convention
were about it. You've worked hard for a great
ideal and now you'll see the fruit not a Catholic
Ireland nor a Protestant Ireland, but an Ireland to
which all men, no matter what their creed, can give
their best service without fear of being victimized
in the name of religion."
" It sounds like a copybook maxim," Maurice
said with a shrug.
" It appealed to the convention you'll see they'll
act on it too. The country is sick of "
A great cheer interrupted her, and the opening
WAITING 321
bars of " See the Conquering Hero comes," on a
strident brass band.
" What's up ? " Maurice said, peering through
the gathering dusk. " That's the Liscannow goods
store. We'll be in in a minute."
" It's you, of course," Alice said excitedly : then,
more sedately, and a little complacently, " It's very
different from your going away."
As the train moved slowly along the platform
the crowd cheered. Flares were lit and waved
wildly. The band played louder and louder, deter-
mined to be heard above the din.
"There he is." " That's him I tell you, with the
woman and the child." " The new member for
ever," passed from mouth to mouth.
The door was wrenched open. Tom, red in the
face and laughing shrilly, gripped Maurice's hand
and said
" It's not bad for a start. The hint of opposition
in The Star this morning put great heart into the
people. Keep back there, will ye ? " to the crowd.
" Would ye be frightening the child ? "
The band stopped. Maureen clapped on the
window. " More show more show more music,"
she said eagerly, watching the swaying of the flares.
" Bedad, she'll be making a speech next my
own boy, and he older, hasn't the courage of a
rabbit in him," Tom said in astonishment.
The band began to play again, but it was beaten
down with cries of " The addresses." " Speech
speech." Dozens of hands were stretched into the
compartment and seized Maurice's hand or arm or
coat-tail, or Alice's hands indifferently. There were
shouts of welcome, and cheers for The Dawn and
Maurice Blake.
322 WAITING
" Clear the way there for Dr. Fitzpatrick that's
reading the address on the part of the town," some
one called out.
" For town and country you might say," another
said.
" Aye, aye."
A stout, florid-faced, clean-shaven man, with a
severe mouth and twinkling blue eyes, elbowed his
way to the front. He stood on the footboard and
waved a sheet of blue foolscap at the crowd.
"The train can't be kept here all night," he said
good-humouredly, when he had secured something
approaching silence, " and there's a lady and a child
tired out after a long journey. I'll just present this
address I've half a dozen more in my pocket. Mr.
Blake can read them at his leisure, and we'll have
his speech at the Mechanics' Institute. Run off now
and form the procession. Ireland and Liscannow,
and Mr. Blake for ever."
The crowd cheered and made for the gates.
Maureen gazed wistfully after the vanishing torches
and sighed. Dr. Fitzpatrick shook hands heartily
with Alice and Maurice, saying a little conde-
scendingly
" You're a great man now, Mr. Blake. I'm sure
we're all very glad very glad indeed."
A small group of Bourneen people greeted
Maurice timidly when he stepped out of the train.
"Why, mother ! " he said kissing her.
" Oh, Maurice agra, and sure we didn't like to
intrude," she said, half-frightened.
" Your father'd be here as well as the rest only
he's stiff at home with the rheumatics. There isn't
a bit a jealousy of you in the whole townland, nor
in the parish as far as I can hear. It's great entirely,
WAITING 323
glory be to God, and 'tis I'm beholden to all the
people, neighbours and strangers alike, and the
torches and the band, not to mention Dr. Fitzpatrick
himself."
" Come, come, Mr. Blake," Dr. Fitzpatrick in-
terrupted sharply. " The carriage is waiting oh, is
that you, Mrs. Blake ? Your mother, of course.
Oh, yes. How is Mike's rheumatism ? "
" Finely, thank you, doctor thanks be to God
and you," Mrs. Blake said.
But Dr. Fitzpatrick had rushed off, and was
trying to detach Alice and Maureen from Mrs.
Tom, Mrs. Crawford, and Mrs. Jim Reardon.
" There'll be time enough for all this," he said
fussily. "You really must come, Mrs. Blake
the people'll be getting impatient."
" Stop, Maurice, stop, Alice, stop, doctor agra,"
Mrs. Blake shouted after them excitedly, when, at last,
they were on their way to the gate. " If we weren't
forgetting old Master Driscoll, and he within in the
waiting-room, and he that failing that Mrs. Hinnissey
had to stay and mind him."
"Really, Mr. Blake, I must insist," Dr. Fitz-
patrick said. He stamped his foot angrily as
Maurice, with Maureen in his arms, and Alice dis-
appeared into the waiting-room.
Driscoll held out a bandaged hand to Maurice,
and looked pathetically at Alice.
" They've grand rooms taken for ye at Leary's
Hotel, I'm told, and both sides of your own people
have a place ready for ye but but
" Couldn't you put us up, Mr. Driscoll ? " Alice
said with a smile.
" There, now, what did I tell you, master ? "
Mrs. Hinnissey said triumphantly.
3 2 4 WAITING
" Maurice Mr. Blake I ought to say, only I'm
forgetting my good manners and you too, ma'am,
and the child, 'tis ye all are heartily welcome.
Didn't he send in this morning," she whispered with
a nod at Driscoll, " to Mac's shop for a beddeen,
fitted out with the best of everything, for the child
to sleep in. Sure 'tis his heart'd be broken entirely
if ye went anywhere else."
Driscoll laid his hand on Maureen, who was
staring at him solemnly.
" I brought a covered car to keep the wind off
the child," he said brokenly.
"Now, Mrs. Blake really," Dr. Fitzpatrick
said from the door.
" Maurice must go alone I'm going straight
home with Mr. Driscoll," she said decisively.
Fitzpatrick frowned and expostulated, but she was
firm. " Women have no sense of public duty or
of effect," he muttered, leading Maurice to a waiting
carriage. "A child, too, always looks well in a
procession and arouses sympathy. That old man
has a bad heart he ought to be in bed."
" All the more reason why my wife should see
him home besides, the child is tired," Maurice said.
" Capital ! " Fitzpatrick said, rubbing his hands.
" Excellent for the reporters. I'll make a point of
it in explaining Mrs. Blake's absence. A mother's
anxiety excellent."
They had some difficulty in getting into the
dilapidated landau. The band had struck up again
and the horses were restive.
" Hold on to them like blue blazes if they get
their heads they'll make smithereens of Thade Carty
and the big drum," the diminutive coachman, in
a battered silk hat and an old livery coat, several
WAITING
325
sizes too large for him, cried out to the small
mob clinging desperately to the shafts and reins.
" Let ye spring in doctor and be starting the band
and the nags'll follow quiet enough."
An irregular troop of torch-bearers led the pro-
cession. The band followed. Then came the
candidate's carriage, and more torch-bearers behind.
A yelling crowd rilled the roadway on both sides.
Maurice's head was in a whirl. He seemed to
think of a dozen things at once : how ridiculous
it was to be seated in this grand carriage (it
creaked and swayed and lurched like a ship in a
rough sea) ; of Driscoll and Alice and the child ;
of the friendly Fitzpatrick whom he had known
for years, but who, hitherto, had ignored him
outside the brief moments of professional visits.
Here and there in the crowd he recognized a face,
Hinnissey, Jim Reardon, Tom. Their friendly
grins, though distorted by the curious lights and
shadows of the torches, gave him a feeling of relief.
Had he only dreamt of that telegram and of the
cryptic leader in to-day's Star ? He had feared dis-
trust and suspicion, and here, on every side, were
friendly and enthusiastic faces.
" There is no other candidate ? " he said.
"That's what I can't make out," Fitzpatrick
said in a cautious whisper. "There's all sorts of
hugger-muggering going on. As a rule, I'm on the
end of every wire, but I must admit I'm a bit at
sea in this. At twelve o'clock mass yesterday a
general mission through the diocese was announced,
to begin the Sunday following the day we expect
you to be nominated. 'Twas the first any one heard
of it. I'd make nothing of it, only Galey, the post-
master, said to me coming out, with a nod and a
3 26 WAITING
wink, c Look out for squalls, doctor your man
isn't in yet.' I tried to get more out of him
there's nothing he doesn't know with his nose in
every telegram, but he wouldn't blab another
word. He's on the other side, more's the pity, or
he'd be sure to be more friendly. You haven't any
inkling yourself?"
A loud burst of cheering opposite an illuminated
house diverted the doctor's attention.
" There again," he said, " see ! I'm the only
house illuminated in that row. Not a candle in
Duggan's windows, the chairman of the urban
council, you probably know ? He was against you
at the convention, but the big vote on your side
brought him round. He promised me last night
he'd light up, and be on the platform to meet you.
And there's his house as dark as hell, and he hasn't
been at the station." He stared at the back of the
driver with a frown.
Fitzpatrick's spirits revived as the procession
passed through the main street. About one house
in three was illuminated with one or two rows of
guttering candles to each window.
" It's not bad not bad," he said. " You're
only middling strong in the best streets you're not
sound on the drink question, you see. I looked up
your writings in The Dawn to try and find some-
thing that'd appeal to a publican. Between you and
me, it's well for you that they only read The Star, or
they'd be even stronger against you."
A crowd in front of an unlighted house booed
lustily. Discordant brass instruments brayed through
the open windows.
" Timmins for ever. Down with Blake," rose
in a concerted shout above the din.
WAITING 327
" What the devil do they mean by that ? "
Fitzpatrick asked excitedly.
A rotten egg broke on his hat. A paper bag
of flour, catching the driver's hat on the way,
enveloped Maurice in white. The torches in front
wavered. The band stopped playing. Instruments
were gripped like clubs. Fitzpatrick stood up and
shouted in a stentorian voice, " Don't break order,
boys play up the band take no notice of the
loafers quick march." These orders were echoed
by other excited voices. After a few minutes'
indecision, during which volleys of flour and eggs
came from the darkened building, the procession
moved on to the strains of " God save Ireland "
and the jeers and boos of the crowd on the side-walk.
Fitzpatrick wiped his hat gingerly with a hand-
kerchief, saying, "The Erinites that's their hall
aren't going to take their physic lying down
then. Damn that egg 'twas a year old if 'twas
a day and the hand that fired it. So they have
poor old Timmins still in their eye. I don't deny
he's a great orator but he has to be primed up
for it. He's not worth a damn sober, and a week's
speechifying always lands him in the horrors. It's
odd how it takes him an army of flies attacking
his face, and pigs eating him from the boots up
always the same way very interesting to medical
science."
Maurice was depressed and disgusted. How
many of his supporters were like Fitzpatrick ? He
had pictured them so differently. He recognized
a boat-builder whom he used to know. He held
out his hand and Tracy shook it silently. His
cordial grip, and the look of quiet enthusiasm in his
clean-cut face made Maurice feel better. He began
328 WAITING
to scan the crowd closely. His spirits rose. Here
and there was a face with an ideal and capable of
fighting for it.
When the carriage stopped at the Mechanics'
Hall the crowd shouted itself hoarse. Ten or
twelve men accompanied Maurice to the first floor
room from which he was to speak. He knew
Dr. Grace, Tracy, the captain of the county football
team a clean-shaven, tongue-tied blacksmith, with
a strong jaw, whose name he forgot, a young
solicitor named Duffy, and Healy, the big draper.
They had all been active in the Gaelic League or
in the athletic association. He was a little surprised
to see Foster and Taylor, two Protestant shop-
keepers. He knew they were in sympathy with
the language movement, but he had always under-
stood that they were Unionist in politics. Taylor
laughed as they shook hands.
"You're wondering what I'm doing in this
galley," he said : and added gravely, " If your
views in The Dawn are to be Nationalist politics,
I'm a Nationalist and so are most of the Unionists
here."
" Come now, Blake, the people are getting
impatient," Fitzpatrick said fussily.
" Let them have it straight from the shoulder,"
Tom whispered.
" Home Rule and black porter," a bibulous
voice shouted from the crowd as Maurice opened
his lips.
" No," he said, holding up a hand for silence ;
" but Home Rule and hard work. We shout for
freedom, for the right to manage our own affairs,
for a Parliament. What are we prepared to do
with this power when we get it ? "
WAITING 329
" Get back our own," the same voice answered.
" It's a tired man youd be then, trudging round
the pubs after your money," a voice said jeeringly.
" Not so far neither," another said. " Hasn't
he it all banked in his nose ? "
" What'd we do with it but drive the Protestants
after the landlords," another voice said.
" Shut up you naygur of an Erinite."
" Don't be wasting a decent name on the old
Molly."
Maurice tried to get on. He developed the
idea of power begetting responsibility and even
sacrifice.
" No soft jobs for Erinites. They think they've
their hand in the Home Rule till already," some
one interrupted.
He wound up with an appeal for toleration.
Ireland needed every son she had. The very
name Home Rule created an atmosphere of distrust
and suspicion. He was afraid there was some
cause for this. It was for the Catholic majority
to prove by their actions that their hands were
clean. Here in this constituency let them show
that they respected the religious opinions of all
men and persecuted none.
There was loud cheering when he retired from
the window.
" Live and let live is my motto," a fishwife
shouted. "The poor Protestants ! sure they'll
be up agin hell in the next world, why not let them
have a bite and a sup in peace in this vale of woe ? "
In the room Fitzpatrick buttonholed Healy.
u What do you think of him, Frank ? So so,
eh?"
" I'm surprised at you, doctor, going agin the
330 WAITING
clergy. And you after curing poor old Timmins
out of the D. T.'s so often too. Do you mean
to say you're getting in earnest over politics at
the end of your life ? "
u End, indeed I'm good for thirty years yet.
I've paid Timmins back, anyway, for his vote
against my nephew in that asylum appointment.
I'm not a man to be trifled with. Between our-
selves though, I was a bit sold that so many priests
went for Timmins at the convention and not
one of them turning up to-night. What do you
make of it, Frank ? "
" Begad, you might be caught out at last,
doctor. I met Duggan as I was coming in, and
he told me the supporters of Blake'd be in a queer
kettle offish before the week was out."
" And why, Frank, why ? " Fitzpatrick asked
eagerly.
" I asked him that, and he only blinked his old
fish eyes ; so I told him go and smother himself,"
Healy said indifferently.
Fitzpatrick rubbed his chin anxiously, nodded
to Healy and crossed to the fireplace, where
Maurice was speaking to Duffy and Dr. Grace.
" I've only just remembered an urgent case-
very sorry, Blake, that I've to be off. I hoped to
have you up at the house for a bite or a nip of
something may see you later. Count me in with
any arrangements you may make."
" I'll attend the call for you, Fitz ; there's a
committee meeting and you're chairman," Grace
said slyly.
" Im possible, my dear boy, im possible."
With a wave of his hand he hurried out of the
room.
WAITING 331
" Fitz always makes a professional exit," Duffy
said dryly. " What is it to-night ? Cards ? "
Grace shook his head. " There's more than cards
on his mind he has been uneasy all the evening."
" Oh, nothing weighs on Fitzy long," Duffy
said. " How in the world did he drift to our
side ? He usually keeps his eye on the palace,
and that hasn't smiled on us yet."
" The committee meeting, gentlemen," Tracy
said, " we can hold it here."
Some one drew attention to the fact that Maurice
had had no food. An adjournment to Leary's Hotel
was proposed, but was objected to by a sharp-nosed,
spectacled little man with a pointed beard, who said
that he was not on speaking terms with Leary, and
wouldn't be seen inside his door. He would, how-
ever, be proud to run out himself and bring in some
food for a brilliant fellow journalist.
" McCreery of the Liscannow Advertiser" he
added with a quick bob, shaking Maurice's hand
vehemently.
It was finally settled that the meeting should be
held in Dr. Grace's rooms, where Maurice could get
tea and ham. On the way, Maurice walked with
Tom. A few forlorn candles, burnt almost to the
stumps, still flickered in a window here and there.
" How does it feel ? " Tom asked anxiously.
" Rotten."
" You don't tell me now."
" Father James has got hold of the marriage."
Tom's face set firmly, and he walked a few paces
in silence.
" That's hell," he said, walking heavily, his head
well forward. After a few minutes he added, " Best
tell the lads."
332 WAITING
" I'm going to at Dr. Grace's."
In less than half an hour afterwards he told
them. Dr. Grace's little sitting-room over Miss
Farrell's confectionery was overcrowded. Healy
was still at tea at the small round table. Dufiy,
his legs dangling from the sofa-end, fondled a glass
of whiskey and water. Tom's figure in front of the
firelight made a grotesque shadow, huge and terrible,
on the ceiling. The football captain, erect, awkward,
shy, stood like a sentinel beside the closed door.
Maurice stood at the corner of the mantelpiece,
watching gas hissing from the coal.
"In the absence of Dr. Fitz I move that Dr.
Grace takes the chair," Tracy said.
" Hear hear," came from all parts of the room.
" I'm in it," Grace said from his seat on the
edge of a writing-desk. " The minutes of the last
meeting, Mr. Tracy, please."
Tracy fumbled with a penny exercise-book.
" There's something I've got to say first,"
Maurice said quietly. " All this has been so sudden
let me thank you for your confidence in me "
" You're deserving of it." " Hear, hear."
" That there was no opportunity of letting you
know it before this. In fact, it did not occur to me
as likely to have any bearing on the election till 1
got some information on Saturday night."
There was now dead silence. The football
captain relaxed his features, his head bent forward.
Healy held a knife, on which was impaled a pat of
butter, suspended over a slice of bread, his eyes fixed
on Maurice.
" There is to be a contest '
" I guessed as much," Healy said, relieved,
spreading the butter on the bread.
WAITING 333
" A matter in connection with my private life,
known, I thought, only to one or two down here-
to my brother and Mr. Driscoll of Bourneen, in
fact-
" I never told it even to my wife," Tom said
emphatically.
" Tom is as close as the grave in regard to any-
thing private," the football captain said sepulchrally.
Maurice smiled faintly. The audience now
craned attentive necks.
" Has come to the knowledge of our opponents,
and I've reason to believe the priests are forcing a
contest. I dare say it is more or less public at this
moment."
" Fitzy must have got wind of it," Duffy said,
holding up his glass to the light. " Come to the
point, man," he murmured.
" It's in regard to my marriage," Maurice said,
facing his hearers squarely. " I married a Protestant
in a registry office. The law of the land says I'm
married. The Church says I am not."
" That you're living with your wife without
being married to her," Healy said horrified, letting
his knife drop with a clatter on his plate.
The noise broke the tension. Maurice shrugged
his shoulders.
" Let any one say that outside, and we'll slap a
writ at him," Duffy said standing up.
" Much good that'd do you, with maybe a couple
of fellows or more on the jury," Healy said, " that
won't agree to a verdict agin their Church till
the crack of doom. Besides, I wouldn't be liking
myself to put the law of the land above the law of
the Church. Now, Mr. Blake, be sensible in the
matter. I don't mind having a whack at the clergy
334 WAITING
for their interfering ways God knows it's hard
to stand them, and I was glad enough to support
you for the independent, respectful way you always
stood up agin them in The Dawn, but this is
another pair of shoes entirely. The sanctity of
the marriage bond is a ticklish thing sure we all
know there isn't luck nor grace when the priest's
hand isn't held over you. Have you any child
now ? "
" Yes," Maurice said dryly.
" That's surprising enough ! Listen to me now,"
he said expansively. " All these things can be set
right. I'll speak to his lordship myself he's under
one or two little obligations to me. A quiet marriage
now I've known the like of it often done up in
the cathedral, in the dead of night or before the
dawn of day, and nobody the wiser "
" If that insult is put on a decent woman, damme,
if I won't vote for Timmins," the football captain
said explosively.
Maurice looked at him gratefully.
" Now, Mr. Flaherty, now, you and your hot-
heads of football players. Let ye all listen to reason.
I know what I'm saying. And my wife head of the
women's confraternity too she'd scrape the eyes
out of me, she's that holy, if she saw me supporting
a man that wasn't married," Healy said, sweat
oozing out of his forehead.
Maurice clenched his fists in an effort to control
himself.
" He's married as tightly as you are, my good
man," Duffy said dryly.
" The minutes, Mr. Tracy ? This is a private
matter of Mr. Blake's. Too much has already been
said on it," Dr. Grace said loudly.
WAITING 335
" You won't ask him for a guarantee to set
things right ? " Healy said aggressively.
"Certainly not," Grace said. "The minutes,
Mr. Tracy ? "
" Then I rise out of ye, and wash my hands of
it," Healy said, walking out of the room.
" Any others who take that view and might like
to follow ? " Grace said.
Two men, whom Maurice did not know,
whispered together in a corner, took their hats
sheepishly off a bookcase and followed Healy.
One said from the door
" Believe you me, doctor, it can't be done and
myself, and Willy that's gone out there, having little
girls nuns in the convent too. It's past reason."
Duffy put away his untasted glass. He looked
round the room, scanning each face.
" There's only Fitzy left," he said, as if to him-
self. " Why in the world did you make him chair-
man ? " he asked pettishly.
" He just took it. Fitzy has a way with him,"
Grace said ruefully.
" He has a way of turning tail, too, when things
get hot. Please God we'll see no more of him,"
Duffy said hopefully. " I'll act as your agent, if
you'll have me ? " he said, turning to Maurice and
holding out his hand. " I'm sorry for you, Blake,
and for your wife, that this thing has to be fought
out over you. It's an awkward fix, but I'm almost
glad it has arisen. There are these people up in the
North saying that we Catholics'll ride rough-shod
over them in spite of the law. It's for us now to
show them they're wrong. This minute you have
a majority of voters in this division in favour of you.
There's very little security for any man, Protestant
336 WAITING
or Catholic, in this country if the priests and Timmins
can secure your defeat on the head of your marriage."
" Hear, hear," Flaherty said loudly.
" We've got to show," Duffy went on, facing
his audience, " that the law of the land can't be
overridden by a Roman decree about which we were
never consulted. This blessed decree Ne Temere
the infernal cheek of it says that Mrs. Blake is
a I beg your pardon, Blake, I forgot you,"
he said hesitating ; " not that there's much use
in sparing your feelings now, for worse and grosser
things'll be said."
" I'm quite prepared for them so is my wife,"
Maurice said firmly, though his lips twitched a little.
" I take it that what we have heard makes no
change in our relation to Mr. Blake that he is
our candidate," Dr. Grace said.
u Blake for ever," Flaherty said, the others
clapping their hands.
" Then the minutes, Mr. Tracy," Dr. Grace said
with a sigh of relief.
But the minutes were never read.
It was Grace himself who started a desultory
talk with, " I wonder what they'll do ? "
" Use the mission, of course the holy fathers
will preach Ne Temere from the pulpits and tap every
house direct through the confessional," Duffy said
angrily.
They sat late making plans for the campaign.
It was after twelve when Maurice drove out to
Bourneen. Driscoll and the child were asleep.
Alice was sewing by the kitchen fire.
"Well?" she said.
" Our people know what they have to face," he
said cheerfully.
WAITING 337
" And they're going on ? "
"They're fine fellows win or lose it will be
a victory." A shadow crossed her face. " You're
not losing heart ? " he asked.
" No," she said in a low tone, gazing sadly in
the fire ; " only sorry that so much wrong is done
in the name of God. You won't let it harden
your heart, Maurice ? . . . "
CHAPTER XXII
DRISCOLL'S appearance, as he hobbled out to break-
fast next morning, shocked Maurice. Huge knots
disfigured his fingers. His face was livid. His
white locks had become straggling yellow wisps.
Only the old gentle eyes remained. Yet these too
had changed. They had more fire in them, and
determination, when he spoke of anything in which
he was interested.
" I'm going down the hill quick," he said with
a smile, " ever since I left you in the summer, but
I'll not give in till they carry me out feet fore-
most."
In the garden, afterwards, as he was about to
set out for Liscannow, with some sinking of heart
Maurice told Driscoll of Father Mahon's telegram,
expecting the usual counsel of submission. The old
man struck his stick firmly on the path.
" If your heart tells you you're right," he said
feebly, " never mind the risk. These last few
months, and I not able to read or to work, my
thoughts were wandering a lot over my whole life.
What I was most sorry for was the times I was
cautious and prudent ; and the only consolation I
had was that I helped in the rearing of people more
courageous than myself. Never count the cost
when you think you're right. That's the only way
the world'll get out of the bog it's in."
WAITING 339
He stood by the gate watching the children
pass by to school, a few sods of turf under an arm
of each.
" It's well they get some heat for their bodies
itself, for it's little they get for their minds since
you left," he said sadly.
They walked slowly towards the school. The
gate hung on one hinge. Grass and weeds covered
the flower beds. The plaster had fallen from
the walls in great irregular patches. The creeper
lay sodden on the ground. The paint on the front
door had worn away to the priming. Broken panes
were patched with cardboard. One window was
boarded half-way up.
"The sash fell out near a year ago," Driscoll
said angrily.
"Shall we go in ?" Maurice said.
" 'Twould break your heart and the poor man
within'd be frightened to death too. Long ago he
got orders from Father James to keep me out.
Poor fellow, he's one of them that some people say
is his own worst enemy. But the parish is suffer-
ing. The Board in Dublin made many an attempt
to get rid of him, but Father James wouldn't
budge. The people are grumbling what can
they do?"
"We shall make an effort to change all this."
"Do then. It's time something was done. I'll
walk with you as far as the chapel you can leave
me there."
During his walk to Liscannow, Maurice couldn't
get rid of the memory of the dilapidated school-
house almost in the shadow, too, of the glaring
limestone spire that now crowned the chapel tower.
Neighbours spoke to him, and congratulated him,
340
WAITING
but he hurried on. The Father Mahons had seized
on the education of the country and were throttling
it they gave the people limestone spires instead.
He laughed bitterly. What were they aiming at ?
Durrisk gateway reminded him of the convents and
monasteries round Dublin. Soon, perhaps, Durrisk
would be a monastery. The whole country would
be one I5ig convent of priests and nuns. This, of
course, was ridiculous still. They were amass-
ing immense wealth. They held the people in
spiritual fear. . . .
He asked himself gravely if he had any religion
left if he ever had any. His thoughts went back
to his childhood. There were moments . . . and
priests had helped him too, old Father Boland, and
later, Father Malone. Yes, in spite of Father
Mahon he held to his earlier vision. Men had
suffered for their faith and for their priests. . . .
For the Father Mahons ? The country couldn't
be so foolish. . . . What did an awakening so
often lead to ? Breslin's scepticism. And the
scepticism of the ignorant would be worse still.
He stood on the bridge and watched the river
swirl rapidly under the arches. The Mahons were
damming it with their little spades. There were
so many of them ! Would they succeed ?
Liscannow had resumed its listless mood. Less
than a dozen people passed him between the bridge
and the main street. In front of Leary's hotel a
pack of hounds yapped loudly, impatient of re-
straining whips. He bought a Star which had just
arrived, but there was no reference to the election.
Liscannow seemed to ignore it too. He called at
Duffy's office.
"There's nothing to do till the other side
WAITING 341
moves. They're active Timmins was with the
bishop this morning for over an hour but they've
said nothing yet, we'll just sit tight," was the
agent's advice.
Days passed. Maurice heard minute details of
Bourneen news : Father Malone had been sent to
a mountainy parish ; the new curate was always
galivanting into Liscannow, and had a piano, yellow
kid gloves and a gold-handled umbrella; the cess
for the new spire was something cruel.
There were visits to the Crawfords, the Blakes,
the Reardons, the Hinnisseys ; and return visits.
Miss Clancy, who was just home from a Dublin
convent school, called very formally on Alice,
dropping a card on the kitchen dresser. She com-
plained of the lack of society in Bourneen, and left,
hurriedly and blushingly, when Mrs. Hinnissey
came in and addressed her as Janie. Deputations
came to impress on Maurice the crying need of a
grant of Government money to be had for the
asking once he was in Parliament for draining
the bog, making a railway through the mountains,
lengthening the Strand boat-slip.
Every day he paid a visit to Liscannow, but
nothing happened. The Star was silent. Breslin
wrote that Timmins was to be supported by the
League, and Maurice repudiated. The delay was
due to the difficulty of finding some decent reason
for upsetting the decision of the convention. But
this, he thought, in experienced hands, would not
be of long duration. The Star would make no
reference to the marriage throughout the campaign :
the local League rag he believed it was called The
Liscannow News would do all that was necessary,
but guardedly. "I'll see that The Stat lets you
342 WAITING
down lightly," he wound up. " Factionist, enemy
of the people, betrayer of your country, Socialist,
anti-clerical is the worst I'll let any one write in
the way of names.' And a P.S. : "I hope that it
won't be too beastly but it will. L.B."
Every day Maurice expected the blow, but it
didn't come. The Sheriff fixed the day of nomi-
nation, a Saturday. Maurice was still the only
candidate in the field. Next day the dead walls of
Liscannow, and the gates of all the Catholic churches
in the constituency, were placarded with notices of
a general mission in every parish of the diocese, to
begin at six o'clock in the evening of the Sunday
following the nomination. Maurice and his helpers
became more active. No public meetings were
held, but there was much interviewing of leading
supporters in all parts of the division. He went
about with a smiling face, but his nerves were on
the rack. He always returned to Bourneen with
a fear that something vague but terrifying had
happened to Alice during his absence. But always
he found her happy with some new wonder of
Maureen's doings and sayings on her lips.
Sometimes she said, " You're not minding,
Maurice ? "
And he said, " Nor you ? "
Then they sat silent for awhile before the fire,
and both seemed to sigh at the same moment.
On the Thursday before the nomination The
Star of Liberty announced in leaded type that the
Liscannow convention was found to be informal.
The political organization committee in Dublin, in
view of the fact that there was now no time to hold
a properly constituted convention, had nominated
Mr. Edward Timmins for the vacant seat. This
WAITING 343
was the natural choice, as Mr. Timmins seemed to
have secured the majority of the legally accredited
votes at the informal convention. A moderate lead-
ing article supported the decision of the committee.
Mr. Timmins was an old and tried worker for the
cause, whose opinions on all national questions were
sound. The same could not be said of Mr. Blake.
He had a tendency to air views on policy dangerous
to national unity. What was needed at this
critical moment in the country's history was abso-
lute obedience to the dictates of their gifted leaders.
Mr. Blake was a literary man of eminence, as his
many contributions to the columns of The Star
proved, but the political ideas of literary men were
usually beneath contempt. Mr. Blake was a striking
example of this. Extracts from his political articles
in The Dawn followed. A concluding paragraph
applied to Maurice all the epithets promised by
Breslin, but without rancour.
While Maurice was reading this news in The
Star, in the private sitting-room reserved for him
at Leary's Hotel, Father Malone was announced.
The priest was pale and excited. His lips
moved to speak, but no sound came. He shook
Maurice's hand, and dropped it hurriedly. He
took off his glasses and wiped them nervously with
his handkerchief.
Maurice said, "This is a happy chance I was
looking forward to seeing you. I intended to call
to-morrow when I'm due in your parish. Take
that chair and make yourself comfortable."
" Yes, yes," Father Malone said abstractedly,
his eyes fixed on Maurice with a sort of unseeing
stare. He rubbed away at his glasses, but made no
movement towards the chair. Suddenly he started,
344 WAITING
as if waking from a dream, said " Yes, yes," and sat
down.
Maurice sat near, in another armchair, and
waited somewhat apprehensively.
The priest put on his glasses. He took several
minutes to fix the clips satisfactorily behind his ears.
He stared at the fire.
" How have you been all those years ? " Maurice
said, feeling stupid and almost tongue-tied.
The priest looked at him reproachfully. " I
never expected it of you, Maurice," he said in a
flat tone.
" What didn't you expect ? "
"Oh, the sin of it," Malone said bitterly,
wringing his hands, and speaking as if to the fire.
" Of what ? "
"This marriage this unhappy, unhappy marriage
that's no marriage in the sight of God. Oh,
Maurice, that you, of all men, should do it."
The feeling of anger that momentarily arose in
Maurice gave way to one of pity. Unconsciously
he put out his hand and laid it on the priest's
sleeve.
" Don't feel it so much, Father," he said
anxiously, thinking only of the need of sympathy
expressed in the priest's face.
" You feel it then yourself," Malone said, look-
ing up hopefully. " You're sorry for it you'll do
your best to set it right."
" Sorry for what ? Set what right ? "
" The sin the marriage," Father Malone said,
a little impatiently.
Maurice stared at him. Again his anger gave
way, and he said gently
" I'm sorry if anything I have done gives you
WAITING 345
pain. For the rest, I'm conscious of neither sin
nor sorrow," he added, shutting his lips tightly.
Father Malone extended his hands in a quick,
despairing movement towards the fire.
" It's always the way with the love of a woman,"
he said sadly ; " it hardens a man's heart to the
grace of God. Why, if I reckoned them up
according to the rules of moral theology, the sins
you've committed in this miserable affair are as
numerous, maybe, as the hairs on your head. But,
take heart. Our Lord was never the One to crush
the bruised reed or quench the smoking flax," he
added with a wan smile.
" I'm neither a bruised reed nor smoking flax,"
Maurice said with an answering smile.
" God help us, we all are. But that's neither
here nor there. You're going to rise out of it now,
there's a good fellow."
Maurice stood up and gazed down at the priest's
expectant face.
" You've already said enough to make me
angry with almost any one else in the world," he
said quietly. " 1 don't want to quarrel with you
for holding your view but 1 don't want to hear it
again. Try to conceive that another view mine,
for instance may be right. I'm married, and I'll
expect you to remember it. Don't quarrel with me
don't," he added appealingly.
" But you're not married you're living in
sin the Ne Temere" the priest said in amaze-
ment.
Maurice shrugged his shoulders, and walked
up and down the room.
" What would you have me do ? " he said dryly,
standing by the corner of the fireplace.
346 WAITING
The priest gave a sigh of relief. " That's
talking reason," he said brightening. He held his
clasped hands to his lips and thought for a few
moments. " I saw his lordship before coming to see
you in fact, 'twas he that sent for me," Malone
said timidly.
" Oh, indeed ! " Maurice said dryly.
" He may be a hard man in many things I
won't be denying that it's not always easy to see
what he's driving at. But I'm sure he's all right in
this he couldn't be otherwise, and the law of God
at stake."
" Some Roman lawyer made it the law of God
here a couple of years ago. Up to then my marriage
would have been valid. One would think God
knew His own mind better," Maurice said harshly.
"Perhaps He does, in spite of Ne Temere? But
go on."
The priest shook his head sadly. " After all,
you're a layman and can't grasp these things," he
said slowly. " I don't much like the Church myself
to be making new sins to tell you the truth, I don't
like it at all. But once she says the word why,
it is God speaking, and there's nothing for it but
to obey," he said simply. " But you've put me off
the track. Where was I ? Oh yes. The bishop
was very kind. He isn't always that to me, I may
tell you, so it shows you how much he has taken
your affair to heart. He admitted even that he was
a bit rushed into the steps he has already taken (the
mission and the like), by Father James Mahon
he's a bad egg, may God forgive him and that
he'd far rather for the good of religion and the
glory of God that the matter was settled quietly."
" Well ? " Maurice said interested.
WAITING 347
" Well, the long and the short of it is this. If
the woman "
Who ? "
" The woman oh well, Mrs. Blake can be got
to consent to a marriage by a priest in a Catholic
church, he'd be willing to forget everything, and
make it easy for you about the dispensation and all
that but you'd have to repair the scandal, of
course "
" Scandal ? " Maurice interrupted.
"The injury you've done to God, to our Holy
Church, to the bishop, to the pious faithful."
" My God ! Isn't it I who am injured and
my wife and child ? " Maurice said angrily.
"The sinner does suffer a little, of course ; but
think of God, Maurice. It's He
" Oh," Maurice said wearily. " But go on.
How am I to repair this scandal ? "
" By retiring from the contest I'd wish myself
there was some other way. Timmins is a disgrace
to a Christian community, and no more a real
Nationalist than my old boot. But the bishop was
firm. He said the honour of God, which was
insulted by your action, demanded at least that
much reparation from you."
Maurice laughed. " And if the woman doesn't
consent ? " he asked dryly, pressing the forefinger of
each hand tightly against the thumb.
" You'd have to separate from her at once.
Every minute you're living with her you're living
in sin. You'd keep the child, of course ; any
convent'd take her off your hands."
Maurice gazed at the fire. He turned and looked
Father M alone all over.
" And you are a man ? " he said, as if to himself.
348 WAITING
" And the wonder of it is," he added, letting his
eyes wander to the fire, " that he is, and a good
man too in a hundred ways."
" You're a bit shaken by that," the priest said
sympathetically. " But the grace of God'll come
to your help and you'll soon get over it."
Maurice said nothing. After a pause Father
Malone continued.
"The worst of it is that after doing all that
Timmins'll get in in any event ; for you see you'd
still have the scandal to repair, and nothing less
than your retirement would satisfy his lordship on
that head."
Maurice smiled wearily. " Hadn't I better stick
to my wife and to the contest ? " he asked. " I
might keep out Timmins."
Father Malone blushed. " I was thinking more
of your soul all along," he said reproachfully.
" I'm sure you were," Maurice said impulsively.
"You think I've lost my soul. I think I'm nearer
to finding it. Can you be friends with a lost
soul ? "
The priest took his hand and shook it warmly.
Then he seemed uneasy. After a few moments his
face lit up.
" I'm right in keeping friends," he said gravely.
" You see if I give you up you might go from
bad to worse. And if I keep in with you I might
get you to come round yet."
He spoke of his mountain parish. " There were
few anxious to take it," he said, "but I'm as
happy there as a king. I'm far from the bishop,
and that's sometimes a God-send, and I've no priest
over me or under me, and that helps to keep a
man out of harm's way. I " All the time
WAITING 349
he was evidently thinking of Maurice, for he
broke off suddenly, " To go back to your soul
again
But Maurice interrupted him.
" You won't get there now," he said emphatically.
" I'm due at Duffy's for the last ten minutes."
" They'll beat you. There are so many things
I have to say to you. Couldn't you give
Maurice wouldn't re-open the discussion. On
their way downstairs the priest said
" You're wrong, but I don't like the method by
which you're to be attacked a good many don't.
Only let me talk to you
In the hall Dr. Fitzpatrick almost ran into
them. " Oh ! " he said, " Father Malone, and
yes, it is Mr. Blake. Give him good advice,
Father."
" Hush ! " the priest said looking round anxiously.
" Mum is the word I know everything but
I'm as safe as a
"Leaking kettle," the priest said roughly.
" Father Malone will have his joke," Fitz-
patrick said complacently to Maurice. " Giving
in ? " he whispered. " I'd strongly advise you "
he turned towards Father Malone " for the sake
of religion and all that." Again to Maurice, " A
family man myself! so I didn't turn up after
Duggan told me how matters stood that first night :
he had it direct from his lordship. But I'm not
strait-laced, not by any manner of means. No
prejudice against you whatever."
Maurice must have looked very angry for Father
Malone took his arm and dragged him away ; while
Fitzpatrick muttered in amazement, " And I only
trying to be friendly."
350 WAITING
On Friday night Maurice addressed an enthu-
siastic meeting in the market square. On Saturday
morning the Liscannow News gave brief biographies
of the two candidates, stating, without comment,
that Maurice was married to a Protestant lady, Miss
Alice Barton, in a Dublin Registry Office.
Later in the day the nominations took place
quietly.
CHAPTER XXIII
FATHER MAHON rang for the lamp, pulled down the
blinds to shut out the sodden, dark grey sky, and
took his seat in the little circle round his study fire.
" The sun hasn't gone down yet. I hope to God
the darkness isn't for rain. It'd spoil the mission
to-night," he said, spreading his hands to the cheer-
ful blaze. " God forbid," a rubicund priest, in the
black habit of the Seraphites, said unctuously. He
twirled his thumbs, which just met across his paunch,
his hands resting on it as if on a cushion. Little
grey eyes gleamed under his bushy eyebrows.
Layers of cheek, overhanging his jaws, hid his
collar. A few yellow stumps of teeth protruded
from a wide mouth. He smacked his lips. The
few, wiry hairs, surrounding his tonsure, seemed to
stand erect. " But God is very good to us in the
way of weather, especially on the opening night
isn't He, Father Mansuetudo ? "
" He is that, Father Prior, and He's sure not to
fail us on a great occasion like this," Father Man-
O *
suetudo said emphatically. He shut his thin lips
austerely, till the skin was drawn tight over his high
cheek-bones and narrow forehead. His eyes, set
close together, almost nestling against a long thin
nose, gleamed as he added, " Do you remember that
time, Father Benignus Father Prior, I should say
when we had to denounce that scandal up in the
North ? It was raining cats and dogs all day, and it
352 WAITING
cleared up within an hour of the mission service
a special Providence, I call it," he looked around
questioningly. "You were in great fettle that
night, Father Prior."
" Oh, God fits the back to the burthen," the
prior said carelessly. " It's getting late, Father
Mahon, and I think we ought to be having the
dinner. I like to have it well settled down always
before I begin to preach."
" It's only ten to four, and four is the hour,"
Father Mahon said firmly. " Besides, Father Dela-
hunty is coming. It's like him, I must say, to be
wandering about the country, dining out, and he
having a mission of his own to-night, too."
" I wish 7 could be away," a slim priest sighed.
He stroked tenderly the auburn curl on his fore-
head, and pulled his white cuffs well down over his
knuckles. "There's a good deal of rot about all
this fuss, you know -and I'm missing a musical
party in Liscannow. She's a likely piece of goods
enough too. I don't know but I'm half sorry for
her. There's no telling what I mightn't be doing
myself if the like of her put the comether on me,
and I wasn't tied down as I am."
Father Mahon and Father Mansuetudo frowned.
Father Benignus chuckled. "You're a gay
lad a regular Lothario. It must be a trial now,
Father Mahon, to have a curate like him all the
girls running after him ; I remember my own young
days. Keep a chain on him, Mahon."
Father Mansuetudo gave a hollow laugh. " One
of Father Prior's little jokes in the privacy of the
family, you know," he said in anxious explanation.
Father Benignus chuckled at some memory.
" Gay dog," he murmured.
WAITING 353
" This is too serious a matter for joking,"
Father Mahon said frowning. He glared angrily
at his curate. " I don't mind your being a fool so
long as you do your work, Father Brogan," he
spluttered, " but I won't have my curate lifting his
voice against me in my own parish. I'll I'll "
He glanced at the two Seraphites, who were watching
him, Father Mansuetudo anxiously, Father Benig-
nus with an amused grin, and tried to check his
temper. " This is a momentous occasion, Father
Benignus," he said ponderously. " This fellow,
Blake, has pitted himself against me there is also
the great virtue of purity ! and we have to maintain
the authority of the Church and her laws. I hope
I'm safe in trusting it entirely to your hands ? no
levity ?"
" Oh, I'll diddle him all right," Father Benignus
said, striking the arm of his chair with his open
palm as if crushing a fly.
"He's as solemn as a judge in the pulpit,"
Father Mansuetudo said assuringly. " You never
heard him ? The eloquence pours out of him like
water out of a barrel and his big voice ! the
hammer of the Lord, we call him in the order," he
added admiringly.
Father Benignus smacked his lips complacently.
"The sooner I'll have that dinner, the better I'll
have my wind back," he said, his hands straying
feelingly over his paunch.
There was a knock at the front door. In a few
minutes Father Delahunty came in. As he shook
hands with Father Mahon, the servant announced
dinner.
" Oh, Seraphites ! " Delahunty said. " Father
Benignus, and Father Mansuetudo too ! 'Dad,
2 A
354 WAITING
Mahon, you're going to give it to poor Blake hot.
* Mary had a little lamb, and she was meek and
mild,' " he hummed.
" You should have had me for your mission,
Delahunty, my boy," Father Benignus said boister-
ously, when they had taken their seats in the dining-
room.
" No fireworks for me this time. Cassidy
wouldn't have it he's never far wrong. Nothing'd
do him but a pair of Jesuits he picked them him-
self, too warranted mild."
" They're too mealy-mouthed for a job like this,"
Benignus said, fixing his napkin under his many
chins.
" That's just it butter wouldn't melt in the
mouths of the pair we have. Besides, Cassidy has
reduced them to pulp by this. They're opening
on temperance to-night "
Father Mahon paused in his carving. " What ? "
he shouted.
" Temperance," Delahunty repeated, pouring a
little whiskey into his tumbler. " Shall I help you,
Father Benignus ? "
" Do. But you needn't be too careful about the
measuring."
" Yes, temperance. And why wouldn't they ?
Neither of the poor men drink. They're bubbling
over with cold water Cassidy is in that line himself
too."
" But the bishop's instructions the Ne Temere
the whole opening sermon and to be touched on
every night up to the election," Father Mahon said,
in a series of crescendo shouts.
" Father Benignus is watching that slab of
mutton on your fork like a hawk. Don't let
WAITING 355
it be getting cold on him," Father Delahunty said
dryly.
Father Mahon dashed the mutton on a plate
recklessly. " Send it down to Father Brogan for
ham if you want it," he said angrily, almost
throwing the plate at Father Benignus. "This is
a nice business," he went on " downright insub-
ordination. I venture to say you'll be the only
parish in the diocese not doing your duty to-night."
" It's queer how men put things differently,"
Delahunty said, sipping his whiskey and water.
" That fool of a Cassidy of mine has some notion
that he's keeping the parish decent ' It'll be an
oasis in a desert of shame for the next week at least,'
he says. And that's why he's sprinkling it with
cold water. ' It's cooler,' he says, c in election time
than the kind of blue vitriol Benignus here'll be
spouting.' '
" He's a damn funny codger," Father Benignus
said, with his mouth full.
Father Mansuetudo frowned. " Would you put
it that way, Father Prior ? " he said, with a trace of
asperity. His eyes almost met, so close were they
together. " I should rather say self-willed dan-
gerous temerarious almost in fact, quasi-heretical
for flouting the authority of his bishop, apart
altogether from the disrespectful way he spoke of
you, Father Prior an insult to our Superior and to
our holy order."
" Of course, of course," Father Benignus said,
his little eyes blinking rapidly. " I've often told
you, Father," he said gravely, " that though I see
the humorous side of a situation, I'm none the less
blind to its deplorable circumstances a rash young
man ! likely to come to a bad end."
356 WAITING
Father Mansuetudo gave a sigh of relief. " 1
ought to have known you better, Father Prior," he
said apologetically.
Father Mahon brooded over his untasted dinner.
He dabbed a knife viciously in his mutton.
" The bishop will hear of this, Father Dela-
hunty," he said aggressively. " A parish priest is
a parish priest, and you won't escape responsibility
by bringing in Cassidy."
" What wonderful insight you have, James,"
Delahunty said ironically. "But I didn't tell you
all that Cassidy said," he went on with a chuckle.
" f Delahunty, my boy,' he said to me he looks on
me as a gossoon in petticoats, l that was a great
trick of sending round them marked copies of the
Liscannow News with the account of Blake's registry
marriage,' he said, * laying a train of powder in every
voter's house for the missioners to put a spark to
to-night and blow up the poor devil with. But
damn the fizzle even there'll be out of that same
powder in this parish the way I'll have it deluged
in cold water,' he said."
" But Cassidy and you, too is supposed to be
a priest of God," Father Mahon thundered.
" It's queer now," Delahunty said calmly, " that
them are the very words that Cassidy himself used.
* And I'm damned,' he said besides, ' if I'll have God
turned into an electioneering agent.' '
"This is as good as a play I don't think I'm
missing much in not being in Liscannow," Father
Brogan whispered to Father Mansuetudo.
" It's a scandal a scandal," Father Mansuetudo
muttered angrily. He looked across at his prior ;
but Father Benignus was intent on his plate. There
was no movement in his face, but his breath came
WAITING 357
in short, quick gasps through his nose, and the
napkin, on his breast, was shaking violently.
" The flame Father Prior'll kindle to-night
will spread through the length and breadth of the
diocese," Father Mansuetudo said ecstatically, the
light of vision in his eyes. " And there are thirty
of our Fathers in other parishes no temporizing
Jesuits, but true Seraphites to fan the torch with
their holy zeal." His lips moved as if in prayer.
" No doubt it'll be a great bonfire entirely,"
Father Delahunty said thoughtfully. "Though
the Lord only knows who'll be burnt up in it in
the end the people that lit it as likely as not.
But as Cassidy'd say, may the devil mend them.
Do you know what, James," turning towards
Mahon : " I'm taking a disgust to coursing for
the last couple of days. I'm beginning to think
there's something to be said for the hare."
Father Mahon was speechless with anger. He
gulped down mutton and cabbage and ham and
potatoes as fast as his fork could convey them to
his mouth. He threw down his knife and fork
at last, saying
" The Church must be purged of its traitors."
"Amen, amen," Father Mansuetudo said
fervently.
" That reminds me of a good story," Father
Benignus said, wiping his greasy mouth with a
corner of his napkin. " No more, thank you,
Father James. I'm as taut as a drum no room
for anything but the punch. A red-haired woman
once came "
" Oh, that one ! " Father Mansuetudo said
uneasily. " Isn't it a little too too
" He's as scared as a young woman the night
358 WAITING
of her wedding," Father Benignus said indulgently.
" Don't you know, Father, that 1 never cross the
border ? "
" You lean damn far over the mearing fence,
then," Father Delahunty said dryly.
Father Benignus chuckled. " Besides, Father
Mansuetudo," he said gravely, " I always told
you there was a good moral in it."
" I'm sorry I interrupted you," his subordinate
said meekly, his faith in Father Prior enabling
him, though hesitatingly, to move mountains.
It was a long story, and was interrupted twice
by the servant who came in to remove the plates,
and again with hot water. Father Mahon was
attentive only for short intervals, when his harsh
laugh grated through his teeth. For the most part
he was following thoughts of his own, his lips and
face twitching spasmodically. He made a glass
of punch and passed round the decanter. He
did not notice the close of the tale. Father
Benignus himself gave a loud guffaw and swallowed
the remainder of his punch. Father Mansuetudo
smiled feebly. Father Delahunty looked through
the amber liquid in his glass and said, " Poor
Blake." Father Brogan leant back in his chair
and shook with laughter.
" The best I ever heard," he said, short of
breath. " That's where you missioners have the
pull over us poor seculars," he added, regretfully.
" Knocking round the country so much, you get
the pick of the basket of all the prime stories
going."
Father Benignus looked at him with a more
kindly eye.
" Oh, I've better than that," he said, chuckling.
WAITING 359
" It's nearly six o'clock we ought to be going
to the church," Father Mansuetudo said hastily.
Father Benignus sighed. "Well, well the
week is long. Just remind me, Father Brogan,
another night, of Paudeen Rafferty. That '
Father Mansuetudo moved back his chair.
" Oh, it's time, is it," Father Mahon said.
" Run down, Father Brogan, and see that every-
thing is ready that the collectors are at the doors,
and at the box."
Father Brogan went reluctantly, Father Man-
suetudo at his heels.
" I'll not stir out of this till I have another
glass to oil my throat," Father Benignus said,
grasping the decanter. " It's as dry as a parched
pea this minute, and I'll be putting a great strain
on it down below."
" You won't fail ? " Father Mahon said
doubtfully.
" I'll fry the lad till he wriggles like a live eel
in hot grease," Father Benignus said good-
humouredly. " That's very good whiskey, Mahon."
Father Delahunty stood with his back to the
fire. Father Mahon came towards the fireplace
and said, with an effort to control his temper
" You know you pushed me too far, Delahunty
I nearly forgot the laws of hospitality."
Father Delahunty smiled. " You have that
virtue, James I wish he broke off. " Is
there no moving you ? The man's own parish
too."
Father Mahon straightened himself and his chin
protruded. " I, at least, know my duty to the
Church."
" L'Eglise c'est moi."
360 WAITING
" What's that ? " Father Mahon said suspiciously.
" It's Dutch for my grandmother," Father
Delahunty said moodily.
Father Mahon looked at his watch, then,
impatiently at Father Benignus, who was just
finishing his punch.
" You won't even tell that swipe to deal decently
with the subject ? " Delahunty said in a low tone,
appealingly.
" The guilty have only themselves to blame.
Come on, Father Benignus."
" You're coming down to hear me ? " the prior
said boisterously, laying an affectionate arm on
Delahunty's shoulder. " I feel sure I'll surpass
myself to-night I'm that worked up."
Father Delahunty did not seem to listen. " I
must get back to Cassidy and decency," he murmured
to himself.
He lingered by the front gate, waiting for his
trap. Father Mahon and the missioner passed out,
Father Benignus clasping a crucifix, about two feet
long, to his breast. The silver figure, stretched on
the cross, shone impassive in the light of a newly
risen moon.
Father Delahunty looked from the crucifix to
the missioner's face and muttered, " I'm damned if it
isn't nearly enough to make one have some respect
for the Protestants."
" So long, then, if you won't come to hear a
treat," Father Benignus said cheerily, trotting with
short steps beside Father Mahon's long stride.
" Where does that Blake and his whore live ? "
he asked.
" In the village," Father Mahon said gruffly.
" See, if they're not belled out before me and
WAITING 361
Mansuetudo are done with them great crowds
entirely," he added, as they passed several groups of
people.
"They're a stiff-necked lot," Father Mahon
growled.
" Wait till I pour the grace of God over them
I've a wonderful gift in that way glory be to His
Holy Name," Father Benignus said.
The path from the church gate to the tower
door was lined with canvas tents, open in front.
Smoky oil lamps cast a feeble light on the many
objects of religion exposed for sale on rough wooden
shelves highly coloured pictures, cheap plaster
statues, rosaries, little leaden saints, holy water
stoups, a varied assortment of paper-covered books,
ranging from " Hell opened to Christians " to " The
Imitation of Christ," with realistic illustrations.
One stall, more ambitious than the others, was
made brilliant by a naphtha flare. The owner, a
ferret- face little man with bleary eyes, ran after
Father Benignus and pulled his cloak.
" Hullo, Jimmy. Always on my track."
"And why wouldn't I, Father Prior, and you
such a seller."
" What's your best line this time ? "
" Red and blue plaster saints dirt cheap, and a
new brand of crucifix."
"All right I'll lay stress on them."
" I won't be forgetting your reverence God
Almighty pour blessings down on your head this
night."
Father Benignus bowed left and right, waved his
crucifix, in benediction, in response to the doffing of
hats, curtseys, and salutations of " God bless you,
Father." The thin line of people along the stalls
362 WAITING
merged into a surging crowd at the front door. The
rattle of money in the wooden collecting boxes and
the strident voices of the collectors rose above the din.
" Keep back there crushing won't get you in
without your tuppences."
" 'Twas never more than a penny before."
" Any one that hasn't tuppence in the heel of
his fist'll go out by the scruff of the neck."
Father Mahon had passed on. Father Benignus
listened a while.
" Maurice Blake." " His wife isn't his wife at
all, they tell me." " The holy missioners'll throw a
light on it." " If he was a Turk itself with ten
wives I'd give him my vote." " Whist, there's the
missioner behind you."
"Wait till I talk to 'em," Father Benignus
chuckled to himself, and walked on towards the
sacristy. "A full house," he said cheerfully to
Father Brogan, who was standing beside a wooden
sentry box with " Gallery, sixpence " in large letters
over the ticket window. " It ought to nett out
well. I thought Mahon'd forget this side of the
business, he's so bent on hounding out the member
fellow."
"Catch him forgetting this, even if they made a
pope of him," Brogan said with a leer.
Inside the church Father Mahon was busy,
driving and packing people into seats. " Scrooge
up there's room for another there." There was
some sullen murmuring, but no active resistance.
" I'm in no one's way here. Can't you let me be,
Father." " Move on, I tell you," with a free use
of the wrist and knee that would have done credit
to a Rugby forward There was a hum of conversa-
tion in which "Blake, Maurice, wife," rose to the
WAITING 363
surface. " Silence ! " Father Mahon shouted. " Re-
member you are in the house of God."
The stream through the doors ceased. Every
seat was occupied. The passages were filled with
swaying worshippers. Miss Clancy and her father
and mother were seated within the sanctuary close
to the soutaned and surpliced Father Mahon
and Father Brogan. The gaunt figure of Father
Mansuetudo appeared at the sacristy door. He
advanced to the altar, knelt in prayer for a minute,
elbowed his way to the pulpit, and gave out
the rosary to which the congregation made re-
sponse. As he drew near the end, Father Benignus
knelt at the altar steps and prayed silently. Father
Mansuetudo left the pulpit. The kneeling wor-
shippers rose to their feet. Before they had settled
in their seats, or had found a comfortable standing
position, Father Benignus was in the pulpit, the
silver crucifix, gleaming against the black wood,
held aloft in his right hand, while with his left he
wiped the sweat off his forehead with a red and white
check handkerchief.
He began quietly, his resonant voice filling the
church. Unfortunately the mission coincided with
a contested election. But their first duty was to
their souls. Outside the church the turmoil of an
election might claim them for a brief moment, for
he knew they were good Irishmen. But whether
in the quiet of the church, in peace with God, or
outside, amid all the winds of controversy, during
the time of this holy mission they were to keep God
in the forefront of their words, their thoughts, and
their actions. They were Irishmen, and were no
doubt rightly proud of it. But first and before all
they were Catholics, soldiers of God and of His Holy
364 WAITING
Church. They were slaves, rightly struggling to be
free. He'd say nothing of politics beyond this, that
the great freedom, the only freedom that lasted into
the next world, that landed a man in heaven, or kept
him out of hell, was to be found, and found only, in
absolute obedience to the Catholic Church, the one
true religion of Jesus Christ, Who was speaking to
them to-night through his humble lips. But to-night
he intended to talk of religion only of the great
sacrament of marriage.
Every Catholic that was properly married was a
temple of the Holy Ghost, and had for a symbol the
mystic union of Christ and the Church. Every
Catholic who wasn't rightly married was a spawning
ground of hell.
And what was being rightly married ?
He boggled somewhat over the explanation.
Father Mahon frowned. " He knows less theology
than you do, and that's saying a good deal," he mut-
tered angrily to Father Brogan.
But Father Benignus had again got into his stride.
" You see how this beautiful Ne Temere decree sim-
plifies matters. A marriage of a Catholic, say, with a
Protestant in a registry office, that used to be a valid
marriage, though it was always damnable, is no
longer valid."
Loud talk broke out here and there in the
church.
" Silence," he thundered, " while the voice of
God is speaking." He waved the crucifix violently.
When silence was restored he continued, " This is
what every good Catholic here has to remember to-
night : since the passing of that noble decree every
Catholic man married to a Protestant woman "
he paused, evidently in doubt as to whether he
WAITING 365
would reverse the sexes under each religious head-
ing. But he only repeated, " Every Catholic man
married to a Protestant woman in a registry office is
no more married in the sight of God than the cats
prowling round the streets at night."
" Oh, my God, my God ! " Mary Blake moaned
aloud from a side pew.
" In a registry office mind that it's important.
His wife is no better than a woman off the streets,
and his children are " he paused dramatically.
" But I won't sully my lips with vile names though,
after all, what are they but the protest of the holy
virtue of purity against abominable vice. If, in your
natural indignation, you are tempted to use them, I,
for one, would find it hard to blame you," his voice
trailed off on a sorrowful note.
" Come out of this, woman," Tom Blake said,
taking his wife roughly by the arm. She followed
him with a scared face as he elbowed his way through
the thronged passage. Jim Reardon, his wife, and
half a dozen young men rose to follow. In a moment
all the congregation seemed to be engaged in loud
argument. Father Mahon stood at the altar rails,
gesticulating furiously.
" Stop," Father Benignus shouted, in a voice
that dominated the church. He stood on tiptoe,
and held the crucifix high above his head with a
rigid arm. " Stand still, and be silent in the name
of God."
There was a sudden hush. Even Tom stood.
u In scenes like this before now and the virtue
isn't gone out of the priest of God even to-day
the voices that interrupted were struck dumb, and
people that attempted to leave their seats were
gripped to them tight."
366 WAITING
" Though he's a queer man itself, maybe we
ought to go back," Minnie said in a frightened voice.
" We're not afraid of bird-lime," Tom said de-
fiantly. He had an easier passage now to the door.
The people held back, half scared. Several
whispered, " I wouldn't make so much of him."
" Let him spit it all out." " Who heeds him ? "
Tom and Minnie alone left the church. Jim
Reardon and the others sank back in their seats or
remained in the passage-way.
" Kneel down," Father Benignus shouted,
" and make reparation to an offended God for
such an outrage." Kneeling in the pulpit he
said a short prayer. " No more married than
prowling cats," he thundered at the top of his
voice when the people had resumed their seats,
and his crucifix was again in position. His squat
figure seemed to distend. His eyes gleamed fire.
He had the full attention of his audience now.
The majority were awed, many were sullen and
resentful, but all listened with necks craned forward.
The shuffling of feet, in the passages and aisles, ceased.
There wasn't a sound in the church except the boom-
ing voice of the preacher. He changed the crucifix
to his left hand and thumped the ledge of the pulpit
with his right. " What is that man ? A traitor to his
religion and to his Church. Every day that he
persists in his sin, in his crime, he plants a crown of
thorns on the head of his God. Look at our Divine
Lord writhing there on the cross." He held out the
crucifix. " That sinful traitor pierces His side with
a lance, spits in His face." He paused, and a long-
drawn sigh seemed to rend the church.
" Such things are not likely to be done in a
parish like this, but if they were, what is your
WAITING 367
duty to yourselves and to your wives and children,
to your fellow-men, to your priests, to your religion,
to your reviled and outraged God ? This is a public
sin and demands public punishment If you have a
bad tooth you pull it out, a rotten member, you cut
it off."
He paused again, and then, in language of the
fiercest denunciation, in metaphors that mixed and
tumbled over one another, he left no place on earth
or in heaven, on which a Catholic man who married
a Protestant woman in a registry office should be
allowed to rest the sole of an untroubled foot.
He walked like a drunken man to the sanctuary,
wiping his streaming head with his handkerchief.
Conversation broke out loud all over the church.
" Couldn't be better," Father Mahon said, grasp-
ing the preacher's hand.
" The hammer of the Lord," Father Mansue-
tudo murmured with glistening eyes.
"There are a queer lot of humbugs in the
world," Father Brogan said, admiring his sleeve
links.
" I feel in the marrow of my bones that I did it,"
Father Benignus said huskily, " but Lord, I've the
drought of a limekiln on me."
CHAPTER XXIV
IN an hour the whole division had awakened from
apathy. In every chapel yard in twenty-nine parishes
Maurice Blake's marriage was discussed in varying
degrees of excitement ; even in Father Delahunty's
parish, notwithstanding the well- modulated douche
of cold water, there were surmises as to the mean-
ing of the marked passage in the Liscannow News.
The Timminsites openly rejoiced. Blake's sup-
porters, for the most part, spoke under their breaths,
with much shaking of heads, cautiously, or slunk
home quietly to discuss the situation with more
freedom in the seclusion of their firesides. Some
young men shouted defiance.
Maurice had dined in Liscannow with Dr.
Grace, and went with him and Duffy to hear the
mission sermon at the cathedral. In a back seat in
one of the aisles, under the shadow of the organ
gallery, he listened in vague wonder to an attack on
some unnamed fiend in human form, without faith
or morals or conscience, unworthy of trust, a traitor,
a renegade, false to his country and to his religion.
Under the fascination of the preacher's voice he
hardly thought of the sermon as having any relation
to himself. He could hardly take his eyes off the
refined face of the speaker, his thin lips pouring
out corrosive acid in silky tones, without anger or
resentment, but with an occasional gleam of white
WAITING 369
teeth, and a half-contemptuous play of the lips and
nose. Once or twice Maurice glanced from the
preacher to the bishop, seated on the episcopal
throne, calm and impassive, wearing an air of
sadness.
" Let us get out before the crowd," Duffy said,
when the sermon was finished. Small groups of
excited talkers were, however, already in the
grounds. Men nudged one another as Maurice
passed. A few jeered. Three or four of his sup-
porters raised a feeble cheer. A group booed, half
in amusement, and broke off in a laugh.
"Put that in your pipe and smoke it, Blake,"
one said.
" They'll have more heart in them when Timmins
opens the pubs to-morrow, he has them all," Duffy
said dryly. " Come along to my house. Out of
respect to the holy mission we have no meeting
to-night," he added bitterly.
" You didn't mind that fool in the pulpit ? "
Dr. Grace said as they passed through a slum
street.
" Oh no," Maurice said dully.
" The smell here'd knock down a horse. Why
don't you do something, Grace ? " Duffy said,
putting his handkerchief to his nose.
" 1 report these houses once a month waste-
paper basket," Grace said, shrugging his shoulders.
"Who owns them ?"
" Timmins the worst of them."
This somehow roused Maurice. He looked at
the wretched houses, with their broken doors, roofs,
and windows.
" Can nothing be done ? " he said.
"We're making the best effort we can in this
2 B
370 WAITING
election," Grace said gravely. After a few seconds
he laughed. " Often 1 think we are taking ourselves
too seriously. Fitz may be right after all in taking
life as a joke. I almost regret 1 wasn't built like
him."
"You don't," Maurice said gently.
" Well, maybe I don't. But there you are,"
waving his hand towards the houses. " Timmins
is killing off these poor devils like flies. The
death-rate in this street would make your hair
stand on end. The few that are left'll be shouting
1 up Timmins ' during the week in sheer gratitude
for being alive. But maybe, they're cynical, and
think that this excitement will make him drink him-
self to death."
" Poor fellow," Maurice said.
This made Grace angry. " Nonsense," he said
roughly.
Maurice looked at him in astonishment. The
usually mild face was distorted.
" You're strong enough in action, Blake, but
you have too many soft spots in you. Poor
Timmins ! indeed. Poor Timmins ! If you were
a doctor in this damned town sentimental clap-
trap," he muttered as Duffy opened a door with a
latch-key.
When Duffy had turned on the gas in his study,
Grace began again. " I don't know what's come
over me," he said apologetically. " It's the hypo-
crisy of that sermon, I suppose. You've tried to
act decently all your life and now you're going to
be broken "
" But I won't be broken," Maurice said quietly.
" For Timmins, the tried and proved lover of his
country," Grace went on heatedly, without noticing
WAITING 371
the interruption. " My God ! it's enough to make
a man sick. Timmins puts up stained glass windows
in the cathedral and does jobs for the bishop on the
local boards in the intervals of D.T.'s "
" You're down on Timmins because the fever
always starts in Friar's Row. But it's the priests
we're up against now," Duffy interrupted. " He's
mad on sanitation," he added wryly to Maurice.
" Look here, Blake, I've made a few notes of that
sermon. They'll come in useful in a petition if they
beat us."
He held out an envelope on which he had
scribbled in pencil. Maurice read the notes and
dropped the envelope into the fire.
" I'll get in by votes or not at all," he said.
" Quixotish," Duffy said with a shrug. " Come
let us draw up the programme for the week. ..."
Maurice had only a confused impression of the
week preceding the poll. He saw the best and the
worst of men. Friends that he had known and
loved from childhood looked at him askance, or
passed him by without recognition. Mere ac-
quaintances and strangers became his warm friends.
Irritation, anger, joy, resentment, and a fierce
pleasure moved him in turns. There was no rest
for his feet, for his mind, for his emotions. Every
day supporters deserted him. Every day he dis-
covered finer qualities in the friends that remained.
He was hooted and jeered at, pelted with rotten
eggs, called ribald names. Alice was rescued from
a mob of roughs, who rushed her through the
main street of Liscannow, by Dr. Fitzpatrick, who
had now openly taken Timmins's side. Father
Mahon, who saw the attack, called it " a splendid
372 WAITING
display of religious enthusiasm." The windows ot
Driscoll's cottage were broken : Teigue Donlon and
Dempsey were caught hanging dead cats to the gate
posts. Mary Blake begged Maurice, on her knees,
to go back to Dublin and give up the contest.
Then she kissed him and said she'd scrape the eyes
out of the mean hounds that called little Maureen a
bastard. He had to give up his rooms in Leary's
Hotel. Mrs. Leary said she couldn't sleep at night
with the fear of hell that was on her, on the head of
him, since she was with the missioner at confession.
From all districts he heard that the attacks from the
pulpit had become more pointed ; that persuasion
and threats of punishment, temporal and eternal,
were being used freely in the confessional. His
marriage was not referred to by Timmins or his
helpers, in their public speeches, but Maurice's
speeches were interrupted by constant allusions to it
in the vilest language.
Two nights before the poll, at a committee meeting
in Grace's rooms, Tom said, " We're losing ground
every day. Monday last, in . spite of the big splash
on Sunday night and all, we might have won."
" Timmins isn't making much of a fight Fitzy
tells me he's nearly done up. And our fellows
here are magnificent," Dr. Grace said hopefully.
" It's different in the country places. The
preaching every night, and the back-door business in
the confessional, is telling on 'em more there. I'm
not sure of my own father-in-law. I'm near certain
he's agin us. And my father even is keeping as
quiet as a mouse. Only that he has a spite agin
Father Mahon for fifty pounds he says he did him
out of once, it's as likely as not that he'd be voting
agin Maurice."
WAITING 373
" It's extraordinary," Grace said musingly.
" I've given up being angry about it it's beyond
me. This morning I was called in to a case in
Friars Row typhus, I fear, aggravated by drink.
1 1 beg your pardon, doctor,' the fellow said as I
was going, * for throwing that brick-bat at you at the
meeting last night ' fortunately it only knocked
my hat off c but I had a drop of drink in me.'
4 You might have thrown it at Timmins, who gave
you this fever,' I said. * Sure,' he said, c the fever is
only the will of God, but you're on the side of the
devil himself, may God pardon you. Do you think
you'll have me out on the poll-day, doctor ? ' ' He
laughed heartily. "We're all on the side of
Timmins. Even I try to cure his victims. You
haven't the ghost of a chance, Blake. If you were
only a slum owner now, dispensing the will of
God in the shape of typhus, and giving a good
Catholic people the chance of practising the virtue
of resignation, you might "
" For God's sake, keep Grace off his hobby,"
Duffy said anxiously.
Shouts arose from the street. A drum was
beaten loudly beneath the window. There was a
crash of glass, and a potato bounded off the wall
on to the table round which the committee sat.
" They're out from the mission and in a holy
mood, God bless them," Duffy said calmly. " Come
along we have a meeting in the market square.
One two three four panes gone already, and
there's no use in getting new glass before Saturday
night. The whole of the windows'll probably be
gone by then. We have a glazier on our side,
haven't we, Tracy ? "
374 WAITING
On the morning of the poll Bourneen was white
with snow freshly fallen in the night. The sky
was clear but sullen, almost black against the dead
white of the ground. The slanted roof of the police
barrack sparkled more brightly than the bleak sun
itself. Maureen stood at the door of the cottage in
silent wonder.
" Maureen's powder," she said at last.
" Snow," Alice said.
" Maureen touch," the child said, suiting the
action to the word. " Cold," she said, with the awe
of one making a scientific discovery.
Alice took her up in her arms, clasped her to
her breast and kissed her warmly.
" Daddy coming ? "
" Not yet, dear," Alice said, drawing the child
closer.
Maureen fingered a pin in the collar of her
mother's blouse, murmuring, " Pretty, pretty."
Men passed the gate on their way to the polling
booth, in the school-house near by, but Alice was
looking beyond them, to the sharp, white peak of
Slieve Mor piercing the leaden sky. It was all so
still and peaceful. Even sounds had a depth and
clearness which only intensified the silence that
seemed to brood over the landscape. The latch
of the gate clicked and Bessy Reilly came up the
path. Alice put down the child and smiled a
welcome.
" How is the man of the house ? " Bessy said,
jerking her head towards Driscoll's bedroom.
" Not well."
"Why, you've everything done," Bessy grumbled,
looking round the kitchen.
" Maureen got toast milk," the child said.
WAITING 375
" I was up all night and I had to do something,"
Alice said.
Bessy pottered about. " It's women that do the
suffering. The poor old master not but he'd
rather go down the hill without being a trouble to
any one. Still there you are and you having
enough on your mind as it is, and your own man
going to be beat, they say."
Alice's tired eyes brightened and a faint flush
tinged her cheeks. She touched Maureen's hair
with her fingers.
" Oh no ; he'll win," she said confidently.
"Well, 'tis you're the queer woman, to go on
saying the like of that, and Tom Blake himself
telling me a minute ago up at the school gate, that
there was as much chance of it as of me being a
queen."
" Who knows, but you are," Alice said
gently.
" It's the want of sleep that's rising in your
head. If you'd only go and lie down for a bit, I'd
look after the child as if 'twas my own," Bessy said
anxiously.
" Would you warm the chicken jelly ? I might
get the master to take a little," Alice said, going
towards the bedroom.
Driscoll smiled as she entered. He tried to sit
up but he fell back exhausted. He panted for a
few seconds.
" I'm better feeling grand entirely," he mur-
mured in a weak voice. " I'm well able to get up
I must go out and give my vote."
" He won't need it. And the doctor said you
weren't to get up. He's going to win by ever so
much," she said.
376 WAITING
"Tom told me the truth yesterday," he said
reproachfully.
"Then he'll need the vote less," she said.
" I'd feel the better for it and to give a vote
for him in his own schoolhouse too."
He lay quite still with his eyes closed. Bessy
brought in the chicken jelly. He took some, and
asked again to be allowed to get up. Alice shook her
head. He lay back and shut his eyes.
Bessy beckoned Alice out of the room. " I
doubt but we ought to be getting the priest for
him," she said in a whisper.
Alice shuddered. " Is it necessary ? But, of
course, it is," she added hastily.
" We might get the young curate coming on the
night. I wouldn't like to bring in the big man and
he in that temper."
After dinner Driscoll slept quietly. Alice went
for a rest in her own room. It was almost dark
when she awoke with a start. On her way through
the kitchen, Maureen called out from Bessy's
lap
" Grandpa Driscoll, bye-bye. Mammy, bye-
bye. Only Maureen wake-up."
Driscoll was sitting limply on the side of his
bed partially dressed.
" It's no use, Alice," he said, with a flicker of
his old smile. " If you don't help me, I'll go like
this, and maybe fall in the snow."
She argued, but he was firm. She went in
despair to Bessy, who said
" Best let him have his way. A day more or
less in this world isn't of much account to a man
that's sure to have heaven for his bed. And the
doctor told me he was done for this time. Maybe,
WAITING 377
he'd die happier if his mind is set on it. I'll run
out and get a few of the neighbours decent ones
to carry him. They're round the school gate in
droves."
Hinnissey and Jim Reardon helped Driscoll to
the schoolhouse.
" How are they voting ? " he asked.
" Most of your training, master, as far as one can
know without seeing into the box, are going right,
thank God. But there's bad news from other parts.
And some here itself, my bad scran to 'em, are led
away by the missioners," Hinnissey said, his voice
rising angrily.
A knot of men by the gate, hearing Hinnissey's
last sentence, booed vigorously, and shouted, " Up
Timmins down with adultery."
" It isn't Teigue -Donlon 1 see among them ?
And the man with the stick raised is like your
father, Jim," Driscoll said uneasily.
Hinnissey hurried him forward. " Sure, master,
'tis your eyes are good yet, seeing that likeness !
Two mountainy fellows they are, and the living
image of the men you mentioned. Any one'd be
deceived in the darkness of the night that's near
upon us. Wouldn't he, Jim ? "
" He would then," Jim Reardon said hesi-
tatingly.
While his name was being looked up in the
register, the old man gazed round the school sadly,
at the torn maps and stained walls. He was handed
a voting paper.
" It's going to rack and ruin," he said feebly.
He had to be reminded twice to fill the paper.
"That's a good day's work," he said with a smile as
it disappeared into the ballot-box.
378 WAITING
At his own gate his head fell on Hinnissey's
shoulder. They laid him on his bed unconscious.
" The priest, the priest, for the love of God,"
Bessy Reilly said excitedly. Driscoll opened his
eyes. " But maybe, he wouldn't want him yet
awhile, as the life is in him again," she said.
" I think it's time I had him I haven't far to
run now," he said in short breaths.
" Which of them would you rather to see you
on the road ? " Bessy said, as she took off his boots :
" the young man or the big man ? "
" It's all one to me either one or the other can
lift the hand of God over me."
" Run across for the young curate then, Jim,"
Bessy said with relief.
Alice helped to put Driscoll to bed. He fell
back contentedly on the pillow.
" I'm ready now, when 'twill please the Lord to
take me," he said with a sigh. Maureen began to
cry in the kitchen. " I'd like to see her, and then
I wouldn't," he said half to himself. "Take her
away to bed, Bessy, out of the sight of death."
" Would you hand me my beads, Alice ? They're
hanging to the bedpost," he said after a few minutes.
" And, now, we must prepare for the priest. That
table there that's it. I had it ready this many a
year against my death. You'll find everything
in the drawers the white cloth, the candles, the
crucifix. The holy water is here on the wall. Now,
is there anything else ? Some plain water and a
towel to wash his hands, and a piece of breadcrumb
to wipe the holy oil off his fingers."
He spoke with difficulty, with intervals for
breath between the sentences, sometimes between the
words, but with a calm seriousness, as if death were
WAITING 379
a visitor to be received with some ceremony, yet
not too ceremoniously. Fingering his beads he
watched Alice moving about and placing things in
order. When all was ready he said
" I doubt if God reads the label on a person to
see whether it's Protestant or Catholic. He's more
knowledgable than all that. Soon, maybe, I'll know
the rights of things. Anyway, a saint out of heaven
couldn't tend a man better to his death and you a
Protestant, too."
" I must send for Maurice," Alice said brokenly.
" Don't, then," he said firmly, rousing himself a
little. " It's enough he has on his mind this night,
and not to have the burthen of me on him. There's
only one thing I want to say to him, and I can say it
to you equally well. I near did him and you a
great wrong once. I tried to come between ye ;
but, sure, God knew best. The things that were
near at hand blinded me Maurice's work in the
school, and in the parish. They were great things,
too, in their way. But it's only lately it dawned on
me that there are greater. The love of you opened
Maurice's eyes to them. Maybe it opened mine,
too. All the good that a man has is his life and
his power to love. If these are chained up he's only
pottering about, fettered and useless. A free country
is free men, and no man is free as long as the soul
is crushed in him."
He fell back exhausted.
Bessie beckoned excitedly from the door. She
drew Alice out into the kitchen and whispered
" The curate couldn't be found anywhere. Jim
ransacked the whole place. He isn't at home, nor
in Father James's, nor in the chapel, nor with Miss
Clancy playing the piano. And there isn't tale or
380 WAITING
tidings of him. So I had to pack the boy off again
for the big man."
" Everything is ready," Alice said.
" There's a nice fire in the sitting-room, and the
child's asleep. Maybe you'd be sitting there ? "
Bessy said anxiously.
" I can't leave him," Alice said, turning back
towards the bedroom.
Bessie fingered her apron uneasily, threw out
her hands, pursed her lips and muttered, " Well
I have done my part. If she isn't afeared, maybe
anyway, the big man can't swallow her."
Driscoll was dozing. Alice sat on the chair
by the bed. Soon she was nodding, half asleep.
She was awakened by Driscoll's voice.
"That's Father Mahon in the kitchen."
She started, stood up and listened, her hand
on the back of the chair.
" A nice time to send for me and ye well know-
ing the mission sermon is to begin in a minute.
Well, where is he ? " came in a loud hectoring voice.
Bessy opened the door. Father Mahon bustled
into the bedroom. He stopped short and glared
at Alice. He muttered something, half turned, faced
her again, hesitated as if he were about to speak.
His lips moved inaudibly. He took hold of the
chair on which her hand rested, jerking it off
roughly, and sat down. She stood silent and con-
fused.
" What are you waiting for ? A man's con-
fession is supposed to be private," he said with
heavy sarcasm.
" There's nothing else I can do, Mr. Driscoll ? "
she said quietly to the old man, whose eyes were
again closed.
WAITING 381
" No, child you've done everything. You're
welcome, Father," he said, noticing Father Mahon
for the first time.
The priest waited till Alice had shut the door
behind her. He put on a purple stole, with a
frown.
" Are you bad enough to be anointed ? " he
said roughly.
" I feel as if I was only holding on by a thread,
and the doctor gave me up long ago."
" Well, begin your confession. Benedictio Dei
. . ." He waved his hand in blessing. He bit his
upper lip, frowned, and bit his nails impatiently
while Driscoll was speaking.
" That's all I can remember, Father," he wound
up with a faint smile, " and I beg God's pardon and
yours."
" And what about the public scandal you've been
giving in my parish for the last month ? " Father
Mahon asked violently.
" Scandal scandal," Driscoll murmured feebly.
" Maybe I was forgetting something. I spoke
cross once to Bessy Reilly in front of people, but
sure, I forgot it the minute after, and she took no
heed of it at all."
" None of this quibbling on your death-bed,"
Father Mahon said angrily, pulling violently at the
gold wire threads at the end of his stole.
Driscoll's jaw dropped. He gazed at the priest
in feeble astonishment. He tried to move his lips,
but he could not make them meet.
" Harbouring an unmarried couple in your
house ! Flying in my face, and in the face of
God, and of His Holy Church ! Do you think
that's nothing to confess ? "
382 WAITING
The priest's increasing anger seemed to make
Driscoll calm.
" I've no fear of God on the head of that. I
feel in my heart there's no sin on them, nor on me
either. Give me absolution, Father, and let me be
going my way."
The priest took off his stole. With set teeth
he began to wind it round the ritual he had let fall
D
in his lap.
" You're a public sinner equally with them," he
said, his voice shaking with passion. " You'll get
no sacrament, no absolution, no communion, no
anointing from me, a priest of God, till you repent
of your sin, and make reparation to me and God
by turning out these people from under your roof."
Driscoll stared at him with a half-dazed expres-
sion, as if he did not fully understand.
" Reparation turn out a woman and a child
in the snow that's in it," he murmured disjointedly.
" Snow or no snow, you must abide by the law
of God or suffer for it here and hereafter," Father
Mahon said ruthlessly.
He stood by the side of the bed looking down
menacingly at Driscoll, whose eyes had closed
again.
" Well ? " he said brusquely.
A smile grew slowly on the old man's face.
His eyes opened, and he looked at the priest
fearlessly.
" I'll leave myself to God. The kind heart of
Him might overlook my coming before Him with-
out the holy oil on me," he said simply.
The priest put his stole in the pocket of his
soutane, walked half-way to the door, stood, biting
his nails as if perplexed, and came back to the bedside.
WAITING 383
" I want to give you every chance the Church
is a kind mother. Will you turn them out ? " he
said in a softer tone.
" God won't ask me to do what 1 haven't the
heart to do myself His own Mother, they say,
was once turned out in the snow, and He within
her. No, He won't ask me," Driscoll said wearily.
Father Mahon muttered, " Your sins be on your
own head then," and left the room.
He snatched his overcoat off the kitchen table,
and stalked out of the house, without a glance at
Alice and Bessy Reilly who were standing by the
fireplace.
Driscoll was praying in an intense voice when
Alice entered the bedroom. She could make out
the Irish words of Our Father. She smoothed his
pillow. He prayed on, unheeding. She sat by the
head of the bed and unconsciously repeated the
words as they fell from his lips. Soon the beads
slipped from his fingers, and he seemed to sleep.
After a while he opened his eyes and spoke rapidly.
"Now I'm ready going before God with all
the rites of the Church it's grand to feel my God
within me. And the young priest, Father Malone,
that gave me the Holy Communion, had the look
of a saint on him."
He looked at Alice with glassy eyes that opened
wide questioningly. Then, with a smile of re-
cognition, he said
" The rooms are all ready. There's nothing
now in our way," and he talked on to the girl he
had been about to marry years ago.
Half frightened, Alice called in Bessy Reilly,
who felt his pulse and watched the workings of his
livid face.
384 WAITING
" Maurice, send me out a class," he said in a
feeble voice. " It's a lesson in grafting this
morning."
" The end is in his eyes," Bessy said, " and the
wit is gone out of his words. It's lucky we had the
priest in time."
" Could you send for my husband ? " Alice said.
" He's probably at Liscannow."
Bessy came back in about ten minutes, and said
that Jim Reardon had gone off on a horse of Clancy's,
and wouldn't be a minute. She knelt by the bed-
side and read the prayers for the dying. Now and
again Driscoll gave the responses, but mostly he
talked of Ireland and the great country she was
going to be. . . .
Two hours later, when Maurice came in hurriedly,
he found Driscoll propped up with pillows, breath-
ing with a stertorous rattle, his fingers twitching
the sheet.
" I'm afraid he won't know you," Alice said
tearfully.
Driscoll turned his head slightly on the pillow
and smiled.
" God kept the life in me till you came," he
whispered. His voice had a new strength, and the
unseeing stare had gone from his eyes. " How
many votes did you get ? "
" About one in three, we expect ; but don't
think of that now," Maurice said brokenly, kneeling
by the bed.
" I'm glad my vote was one of them. You'll
bear no malice, Maurice agra ? The heart of the
people is all right, only some of them are led
astray. Men make differences, but some day God'll
scatter them like the sun sucks up the mist on
WAITING 385
a May morning. Only you won't run away,
Maurice ? It's in Ireland where you're most
wanted that you must work better still," he said
pleadingly, " in Bourneen." His voice faltered.
" And now if you'd say the Litany of the Blessed
Virgin for me ? I'd like to hear it."
A troubled look passed over his face while
Maurice was seeking the page of the Litany in
the Prayer-book.
"There's something else on my mind, and then
I'm ready. Oh ! Duffy, the lawyer'll tell you
all about it. That's how you can stay here if you
like. I don't put it on you to stay. And I can't
ease the hardest things you'll have to bear. But
I've left you the cottage and the garden and the
little I have put by. No one can take the bread
out of your mouths till " he paused and smiled
hopefully, " till, please God, nobody'll want to try ;
and now, begin f We fly to thy patronage, O holy
mother of God.' "
He gave the responses firmly for a few seconds.
Then his head fell back. Maurice read on. Bessy
Reilly came to the bed with an anxious face. She put
her hand over Driscoll's heart, took the watch, which
was hanging on the bed-post, and held the glass to
his lips. She scanned the glass closely in the light.
" He's gone home," she said quietly.
Alice sobbed aloud. Maurice looked at the bed
in silence for a few moments, then he read the
prayer to the end.
" Maurice," Alice called through the open back
door.
He wiped the earth off his spade and stuck it
in the ground.
2 C
386 WAITING
" Breakfast ? " he said, smiling as he approached.
" And the post."
" A letter from Breslin," he said, opening it.
"Well?"
" He wants us back, says I'm even a worse fool
than he always thought me. And he has bought
a Chippendale bookcase his Chinese period. Louis
doesn't much like it not pure enough in design,
he says."
" Poor Louis ! " she said compassionately. She
laid her hand on Maurice's shoulder. " Though
Uncle John, too, says we're beating chaff," she
added thoughtfully, " and your father hasn't been
near us since the funeral. People shun me in the
street and the way they look at me. ..." Her
voice broke off in a whisper.
" I've brought all this on you it is too much
for you, we
" I'm a coward but I'm strong too," she
interrupted. She trembled and leant against him
for support. Her lips twitched. She bent her
head so that he could not see her face, and bit
her lips in an effort to control them. She
straightened herself and faced him with shining eyes.
" We'll wait," she said firmly. " You believe
it's worth while ? "
" It's more than the dawn already," he said with
enthusiasm. " Priests even have come round.
Father Malone says the mission was all wrong.
Father Cassidy and Father Delahunty are friendly.
Others "
" Then we'll wait for the sun to rise," she said,
watching the dark clouds on the horizon. " Truth
and freedom must come of faith and love we'll
stay here working, enduring, waiting."
WAITING 387
Maureen stood between them, facing the open
door. She listened with a puzzled puckering of
her forehead. Her face brightened when Alice
stopped speaking.
" What is Maureen do-ning, mammy ? " she
asked.
" I don't know, dear."
"Waiting just waiting. Mammy waiting.
Daddy waiting. Maureen waiting."
The clouds parted and a gleam of sun lit
her hair.
THE END
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